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Happy New Year, SDS faithful! It’s been a month-long hiatus of Christmas spending, eggnog drinking and bowl watching leaving me broke, bloated and brain dead. A lot happened and I’m going to do my best to wrap it up in one tiny little package here with my final Shocks, Shanks, Chafes and Predictions of the 2014 season.
Biggest Shocks: There’s nothing like bowl season to shock you into a state of denial and shatter your dreams of the past four months. While the vast majority of the college football world marveled at the sheer brilliance of the SEC West throughout ‘14, it will likely be highly forgotten. The bowls were busts for the division, and as a result the conference won’t vie for the national title for the first time in a decade.
I’m not really shocked with the Mississippi schools losing to Georgia Tech and TCU as they’re two rather good teams, but I will touch on those in a minute. I am very shocked by Shelley’s husband getting the Saban monkey off his back, extra shocked at Wisconsin shredding Auburn after putting up no points against team Shelley and Notre Dame dumping LSU after ending the season on a four game slide.
Most shocking is the atrocious defenses this bowl season. In the five SEC West losses the opposing teams averaged 500 yards a game. Even Florida gave up over 500 in their win. The defenses have been going the way of the dodo bird in this conference the past few seasons, and I don’t know if the answer lies in defensive coordinators trading places inside the conference like we’re seeing this offseason.
On the bright side the conference still finished with a record two games above .500 joining only the PAC-12 with a winning record in the Power 5. Let’s also not forget the shock of the boys from the erroneous East nailing perfection with a 4-0 record giving a thumb to the nose of those naysayers. Granted, ECU, Iowa, The U and Louisville weren’t world-beaters, but a win is a win.
But the most shocking thing for me as we wrap up SEC bowl season is gut check time on who left a lasting impression heading into ’15: Arkansas and Tennessee. And it’s not even close. Both teams got significantly better throughout ’14 and ended the season on high notes with nifty performances. Let’s see how they shape up next season, but for now it wouldn’t shock me in the least bit if Woo Pig and Rocky Top meet in Atlanta in 11 months. Okay, I lied. It totally would.
Finally, I can’t leave the 2014 without one parting shot at Jeff Driskel and the full release granted to him by Florida. I’m thrilled the days of watching 6 make me sick are over, although I had to endure his slapstick brand of quarterbacking one more miserable time on Saturday afternoon. While some players will their teams to win, he wills them to woe.
You would think this kid would be motivated to use every opportunity to shine, and maybe make people think it was Muschamp’s fault. Shockingly he didn’t. I don’t think he has the ability to shine unless it’s a pair of shoes.
Some people still believe there’s a good quarterback in that body. They must assume he’s inventing time travel and hitting 1905 before the forward pass was legal. I’m not shocked he still sucks – just shocked that anyone with a brain, set of eyes and beating heart would give him a chance to lead their program.
Biggest Shanks: It seems like months ago that the Mississippi teams graced the cover of Sports Illustrated and were on cloud nine. Okay, it was in fact months ago but it might as well have been years given their performances in the Peach and Orange Bowls.
Ole Miss gave up the most points in a bowl after finishing with the #1 ranked scoring defense in 10 years. Bo Wallace looked like Bo Derek with his inability to play the quarterback position with a 4.7 QBR rating. And the Rebel running game, which was lousy all year, was dreadful against TCU managing just nine yards – it’s fewest since 2005.
As for MSU, the good thing is it wasn’t as bad as its rival’s day. Dak Prescott had a career best 453 yards passing but was more than neutralized by Georgia Tech’s rushing attack that smashed the Bulldog D for an Orange Bowl record 452 yards. After the miraculous Hail Mary to end the half, MSU came out flat in the 3rd being blanked 21-0. Combine that with a 0-14 deficit in the 1st and it spelled doom for Clanga.
I don’t want to take anything away from these programs for a very memorable ‘14, but the efforts in these games was smellier than a game day port-a-potty at midnight. This was the first time these schools lost bowl games in the same year, and while I read somewhere (here) that some people (Rebel/Dog fans) pulled the “they were tired from a long SEC season” card I don’t want to hear it. They had a month off to rest, came in flat and got beaten down – so suck it up, buttercup.
In mid-October The Magnolia State seemed like the king state of college football. But in January we get a dose of reality where mediocrity reigns supreme with hopes of better luck next year (again) in the em-eye-crooked letter.
Biggest Chafe: Bowl season used to be like a magical bird singing an elegant song of splendor, but now with 38 of them it’s like listening to 68 year-old Cher sing to see if I believe in life after love. And while I’m thrilled there’s a playoff, its presence diminishes the value of all other bowls played.
The problem isn’t just the absurd number of bowls or playoffs, though. There’s the mediocrity of the teams playing in them and their motivation for playing at this point in the season. Let’s not forget the fans. How eager are they to travel for some Podunk bowl during the holidays when prices are high and you already have to take that trip to Aunt Magda’s and pretend to like your family?
A bowl birth used to be important, and now it’s the equivalent of your kid getting an award for perfect attendance. You’re failing math, Jimmy, but here’s a certificate for showing up every day. I know the importance isn’t in the bowl bids but in the money made by television contracts and important sponsors such as Royal Purple, Bit Pay and Foster Farms. Contracting the bowls isn’t an option, but can we repurpose them?
College football has been all about change for some time now and I think it’s time to put the bowl system as we know it out of its misery. With the introduction of the playoff system there’s been more pressure to add more meaningful games to the regular season. We’ve already seen that the last several years with the rise of Labor Day weekend games in Atlanta, Jerry World and coming to Orlando next season. Let’s add more and offer them all up for sponsorship to the Go Daddies, Duck Commanders and National Universities that so desperately need their name attached to a football contest.
These games would be meaningful as they would be part of the regular season schedule. No more exhibitions of pointless putridity and lacks of showing up by these teams. Many people already travel that weekend since it’s a holiday, and most die-hard college fans live to go to the season opener. Most importantly this would allow the end of the season to truly showcase teams that are deserving of a showcase – and open the door to expand the playoff, which is inevitable anyway.
In this system I’d have an eight-team playoff, keeping the New Year’s Six for the first six playoff games followed by the championship. But I’d have to buck tradition for two bowls as you’d run the first four New Year’s Eve and Day, the semifinals a week later in the other two bowls, then crown the national champion the following Saturday on God’s given day for college football in the first place. Even the NFL knows Monday night is a stupid night to have a championship game.
I know this is all just wishful thinking unlikely to happen. Maybe my New Year’s resolution is to daydream and not day chafe. But just like other resolutions, this has a week or more to really kick in so for now I’ll just opine on how shoddy the current bowl system is and how the grass could be greener.
One final chafe of this bowl season, and that’s Fall Out Boy and their terrible, terrible CFB Playoff song. Jesus, ESPN. You’ve already been striking out for years with the mid-2000’s sensation Big & Rich, so why not go back in time to bring out another horrible 2-k-aughter band? I’m pretty sure their music guy quotes Wedding Crashers non-stop, still rocks a MySpace account and tells people “you’re fired” in his best Donald Trump voice when denying them the chance to vote in relevant, popular music.
My Lousy Picks: The other downfall of the bowls being out of control is the predictability of them from a gambling perspective. You never know what kind of passion the teams have in their slotted games and if they’re going to be an accurate representation of the team they were throughout the year. Prophesying these games is worse than going to see The Wedding Ringer on opening night. Kevin Smith and that guy that voiced Olaf? When will the knee slapping ever cease?
I predicted these SEC and playoff games a month ago in a confidence format with a maximum of 91 points. Here’s how I fared going 7-6 overall:
Wins – 49 points: Ducks (12 Points), UGA (11 points), Razorbacks (10 points),
Vols (6 points), Swagcopter (5 points), UF (4 points), TCU (1 point)
Losses – 42: RTR (13 points), LSU (9 points), MSU (8 points), WDE (7 points), Miami (3 points), Gophers (2 points)
The positive: I came out ahead. The negative: It’s nothing to boast about. And as my prediction of rowdaggumtahd vs. Puddles fell short, I’m sticking with my mother-ducking love of Oregon. I really have no idea what to make of this Cardale Jones-lead Buckeye squad other than he looks like a bigger Cam Newton. I think Oregon has them by a tad and has just been too good for too long this season. Ducks 41, Shelley’s husband’s team 30.
Follow me on Twitter @thenassar and let me know what you make of the CFB Championship, and I’ll holler at you knuckleheads later. Thank God the next time I write one of these brilliant pieces, I should have something to look forward to in Gainesville for the first time in forever.
An idiot college football fan spewing his views on SDS. A graduate of The University of Florida, his greatest gridiron accomplishment was several missed tackles on Tommie Frazier in high school. Much like the entire Gators defense in the '96 Fiesta Bowl.
