I call them awards, but let’s be honest. They’re superlatives.

At the midway point of the regular season (gulp), I thought it would be an ideal time to hand out some imaginary hardware. Of course, not all of these awards/superlatives are positive. There are a few dubious honors that we’ll get to.

If your favorite team or player isn’t mentioned, yes, it’s because I hate them and didn’t feel like they were worthy of these highly coveted honors.

(No, but I suppose there’ll still be people who skip the intro and fire off that take in the comments.)

These are my made-up SEC Midseason Awards:

The team I don’t want to miss a second of — LSU

You know that Aerosmith song “Don’t wanna miss a thing,” from Armageddon? That’s how I feel about watching LSU. If I close my eyes, there’s a good chance that I’m gonna miss a highlight-reel play. Jayden Daniels is playing at a Heisman Trophy-worthy level now that he trusts the offense. Malik Nabers and Brian Thomas Jr. have been as good of a receiving duo as there is in the sport.

And defensively, it’s been a mirror image. LSU is getting gashed constantly. Think about this. LSU ranks No. 1 in America in offensive 20-yard plays from scrimmage, and defensively, USC is the only Power 5 team that allowed more 20-yard plays than LSU. For those of us who want constant entertainment instead of 3 yards and a cloud of dust, well, let’s just say the Bayou Bengals are a neutral fan’s dream.

“I could stay awake, just to hear you breathing … ”

The player I don’t want to miss a second of — Luther Burden III

If a Mizzou fan would’ve told me in August that Burden would be the nation’s leader in receptions and receiving yards at the midway point of the season, I would’ve laughed and said “dream on.”

OK, no more Aerosmith references. I promise.

My laughter wasn’t related to Burden’s ability. It would’ve been related to the usage with new play-caller Kirby Moore, as well as the notion that Brady Cook could support an All-American start for one of his targets. But with Burden sliding into that slot receiver role after Dominic Lovett transferred to Georgia, Mizzou’s offense took off. He’s been a matchup nightmare off the line of scrimmage, and tackling him in space has been a losing endeavor. I’ve been saying since Week 3 that Burden has already established himself as the most electric player in the SEC. You could make an argument that he’s the most electric player in college football heading into Week 7.

The player I cringe while watching — KJ Jefferson

Ugh. It pains me so much. I’m as big of a Jefferson fan as there is on this planet, outside of maybe my guy John Nabors with The Buzz in Little Rock.

But man, watching him behind this shockingly dreadful Arkansas offensive line has been awful. The timing of Arkansas having such uncertainty at tackle combined with the scheme change to a more pass-heavy approach has been disastrous. Jefferson, who used to never throw interceptions, is now behind only Vanderbilt’s AJ Swann in that department. And once upon a time, it was a treat to watch defenders bounce off Jefferson. Now, it’s an inevitable sack. Alabama (with 26) is the only Power 5 team that allowed more sacks than the Hogs (23). Like, the Sam Pittman-coached Hogs. At this point, I find myself waiting on that one hit that’s gonna knock out Jefferson for good.

The only blessing that could come from this frustrating season is that we get another year of Jefferson in college ball. Then again, if he doesn’t get some major reinforcements to protect him, I’m not sure I’d wish that on anyone, much less someone who’s been must-see TV throughout his career.

Dumbest coaching decision — Having Harold Perkins play off-ball linebacker

I’ll say this. Perkins looks like a guy who is making strides in coverage, and not just because he ended Brady Cook’s SEC record streak of most passes without an interception. But that came with LSU already looking at a “2” in the loss column. Trying to turn Perkins into Micah Parsons led to LSU turning its best defensive asset into a project instead of a game-wrecker. If the preseason All-American was facing nothing but Group of 5 teams to start the season, that would’ve been fine. Instead, LSU elected to let Perkins figure out the off-ball linebacker position — he played 28 snaps in coverage compared to 7 rushing the passer vs. FSU — with a schedule that started with 4 returning Power 5 quarterbacks in September.

Yes, we play the results in this business. No, it still doesn’t make sense that DC Matt House and Brian Kelly were on board with taking Perkins’ best attribute and having him play on his heels for the majority of his snaps. As a result, LSU’s defense is a dumpster fire with just 11 sacks in 6 games.

Most head-scratching result — Alabama 17, South Florida 3

It was much closer than the final score indicated, too. Alabama scored its second touchdown with 33 seconds left. I don’t think the decision to bench Jalen Milroe was as baffling as some thought. I actually agreed with Nick Saban’s desire to see what he had in Tyler Buchner and Ty Simpson in an actual game setting, and not just use non-live practice reps to make that evaluation.

But the result is still as head-scratching as it gets. Against a USF team riding a streak of 19 consecutive losses, Alabama held a 310-264 yardage advantage, and USF had 177 yards on the ground. No, that wasn’t just the rainy conditions. That was Alabama getting punched in the mouth up front.

USF did end that FBS losing streak the following week, but it ranks No. 113 in scoring defense, a shade behind LSU’s disastrous unit. For a team with 1 loss to an unranked team in the past 15 seasons, Alabama’s post-Texas response was as baffling as it gets.

Biggest preseason prediction hit — Saying LSU would lose to FSU and Ole Miss

I took plenty of heat in my crystal ball predictions for saying that, but it was based on my belief that mobile quarterbacks who could extend plays would give LSU problems. I didn’t think the secondary improved, and with that aforementioned Perkins experiment, I feared that LSU would get gashed when it couldn’t get home. That played out in an even more extreme way than I imagined. My crystal ball didn’t have LSU allowing 707 yards of offense to Ole Miss, nor did it have Florida State steamrolling the Tigers in the second half of that opener.

A lot of preseason projections seemed to casually leave out how flawed LSU’s defense looked in the regular-season finale against a 4-7 A&M squad, and then a week later when it couldn’t stop a nosebleed in the SEC Championship against Georgia. Mind you, that was in the stretch when LSU was being praised for turning things around. Calling for the Tigers to win the SEC ignored that clear weakness being exposed in the early part of that schedule.

Biggest preseason prediction whiff — Saying South Carolina would be No. 2 in the East

Whoops. I didn’t realize that South Carolina’s offensive line would regress, nor did I bank on an early-season Juice Wells injury. The crazy thing is that Spencer Rattler appears to have made some nice strides under Dowell Loggains, and Xavier Legette has been one of the breakout stars in the sport. The problem is that there’s so much pressure on Rattler to move the chains and while that defense has had its moments, it’s still barely a top-100 scoring unit (and it’s No. 109 in yards/play allowed).

My logic for being high on South Carolina was that I thought every non-Georgia East team had significant flaws. I’d argue that’s proven to be the case. I defaulted to the Gamecocks finishing No. 2 in the East — with a 4-4 conference record — because “Beamer Ball” has proven to find ways to overcome those flaws. In 2 seasons, Beamer won as an underdog 7 times, and 4 of those wins were as a double-digit underdog.

In my defense, those 4 games all came in November or later. Maybe the best is yet to come?

The best player that nobody is talking about — Edgerrin Cooper

Who has the most tackles for loss in the SEC? It’s not Perkins, Dallas Turner or Mykel Williams. Nope. It’s Cooper by a landslide. He has 12, which is tied for No. 1 among Power 5 players. The A&M linebacker spent the majority of the season playing with his hair on fire:

Cooper has been one of the steadying forces of that up-and-down A&M defense. That defensive line has been excellent, and Cooper reaped the benefits. He ranks No. 2 in the SEC — behind the aforementioned Turner — with 6 sacks, which is pretty impressive for a guy with just 46 pass-rush snaps this season. The Aggies have had some frustrating issues this year, but Cooper’s play at middle linebacker hasn’t been one of them.

The least human player — Brock Bowers

Duh. Hey, we’re not here to break any news. I’ve been questioning Bowers’ human status since mid-October of his true freshman season. Fresh off 3 consecutive 100-yard games, the guy looks less human than ever.

(I know that he had that drop in the end zone against Kentucky, which prompted Greg McElroy to say that Bowers was human. I’ll agree to disagree.)

Bowers has 545 receiving yards this season, which is 202 more receiving yards than any other Power 5 tight end. The guy is on a 13-game pace to become the second Georgia player to ever hit 1,000 receiving yards in a season. In the 21st century, Texas Tech’s Jace Amaro is the only Power 5 tight end to hit 1,000 receiving yards, and he did so in an offense that averaged 55 pass attempts per game.

And it’s not just the pass-catching exploits. Bowers is grading out exceptionally well as a blocker, too. Among the 27 FBS tight ends who played at least 300 snaps this season, Bowers is the only one with a PFF run-blocking grade of 75.0. He’s a pure tight end. For my money, he’s the best we’ve ever seen at the college level.

But I guess if we’re only including human beings for that title, Bowers doesn’t qualify.

The least fun thing to watch — Auburn attempt a forward pass

In the year of our lord 2023, Auburn is riding a streak of 6 consecutive games vs. Power 5 competition without 100 passing yards. In defense of the 2023 squad, 3 of those games occurred at the end of 2022 when Auburn’s best offense was becoming a service academy.

Speaking of service academies, do you know who is averaging more passing yards per game than Auburn? Army. Like, the service academy in its first year of the “gun option” offense. Army is averaging 0.4 more passing yards than Auburn with 8 fewer passing attempts per game.

It’s bad. It’s so bad that if you just look at Auburn’s passing numbers against Power 5 competition, you’ll see that among teams with multiple games, it ranks dead last in FBS with 79 yards on 4.0 yards per attempt. Even Iowa is averaging 112.5 against Power 5 competition.

Yuck.

A bonus bold prediction for the road … Mizzou wins 9 regular-season games

Hey, it’s not that crazy to predict this team could finish 4-2 in the latter half of the schedule. Why? I already mentioned the Burden breakout alongside the emerging Theo Wease and Mookie Cooper catching passes from the suddenly thriving Brady Cook. Before the LSU game, Blake Baker’s run defense was No. 1 in the SEC. Outside of Georgia, every other game on that schedule is winnable based on what we’ve seen so far in the first half of the season:

  • at Kentucky
  • vs. South Carolina
  • Bye
  • at Georgia
  • vs. Tennessee
  • vs. Florida
  • at Arkansas

Mizzou could lose at Kentucky, get smoked at Georgia and that prediction would still have a decent shot at hitting. There’s a world in which we’re looking up at season’s end and Mizzou is en route to a Florida bowl game with a chance at win No. 10.

If that happens, there’ll be some made-up postseason hardware calling Eli Drinkwitz’s name.