So Alabama won last night and the nation lost

So Alabama won the BCS National Championship game last night in a game so bad, many tuned out to watch "Everybody loves Raymond and not college football." The Notre Dame Irish prepared for the game by apparently drinking all week before their game and showing up s-canned at the game. That's the only thing that could explain the 28-0 margin that the Tide rolled up before halftime.

(To buy a Crimson Tide T-shirt, click here)

In other words, the Irish haven't had this bad of night since the potato famine. But don't worry folks! There were still some entertaining things you can pull from this dumpster fire of a game and postseason system. Look at this...

1. Drunk Irish fans think the refs screwed them - Of course it was the refs. Despite getting waterboarded 42-14, some Notre Dame faithful thought Alabama slipped the referee a $20 or something. In other words, Irish fans have become Seahawks fans.

2. Kate Upton makes an Irish-JETS joke - I mean its so easy right now. Did you see the Irish play? They looked like a team with a leprechaun at QB. At least they'll get Tim Tebow next season...

3. Funny Alabama fans - HONEY! WE'RE GOING TO WALMART TO GET A PHOTO WITH THE NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP TROPHY! YEHAWWW BECAUSE THIS IS ALABAMA WHERE WE SPEND MORE MONEY ON FOOTBALL THEN BASIC INFRASTRUCTURE.

4. Brent Musburger wants Alabama QB's girlfriend - Oh come on, who didn't give Brent his meds before the game. Good gawd. Anyone want to make a guess on Miss Alabama's reading level.

5. And the SEC will get bragging rights again for college football - But then you realize, SEC fans are these people...

Lets state the obvious... the powers at be in college football are stupid

Why hasn't there been a FBS playoff in college football yet? Even though the lower levels of college football have it? Even though the pros have it? Even though high school and pee wee football has it? Because the bureaucratic dynamics of universities around the country are so pathetic, even when they actually change the postseason format to a playoff, they can't call it a playoff.

No wonder it takes universities four months to approve a new lamp post in the quad.

...the “plus-one” plan that Southeastern Conference commissioner Mike Slive and Atlantic Coast Conference commissioner John Swofford first proposed four years ago — four teams play two semifinals plus the title game — is hilariously being officially referred to by the BCS as a “four-team event.”

“I’ve never called it a playoff,” Slive reiterated Wednesday after the second official day of BCS meetings here this week involving conference commissioners, television executives and handpicked bowl and university officials.

Yet, no matter how much Slive and the BCS believe they have to spin the “plus-one” to not frighten politically correct university presidents, it is a playoff.

As much as I love college football, this is ridiculous. The reason they don't want to call it a playoff is because they don't want to make it seem like they're going away from the bowl system. Because the bowls make money, and a cheap-ass bowl victory means donors will pony up more cash and heaven forbid universities and college football are actually honest with us.

I mean it's not a playoff? Teams play and advance to a championship game. ITS A PLAYOFF. And they're not called student athletes, they're called players you take advantage of while making millions of dollars and turning the other way at low graduation rates.

It's bowl season! Who gives a crap?

I do like how the BCS makes the regular season very, very important but a side affect is a bowl season that's pointless. Other than the National Championship game, nothing matters. Nadda. Zero. Zilch.

Colleges can brag about their bowl record or perhaps how well their conference does in the bowl season but in the end, it's not like the team that wins gets to move on or anything. It's just really an anti-climatic end to the season.

The bowl games are starting to creep up on ESPN and I just flip to a different channel. I really don't care how Utah does against Boise State. (And that's with a full stadium of fans, have you seen some of these other bowl games where it looks like there's four people there?)

With Ohio State recently suspending several players for selling signed merchandise and championship rings... next season for five games... but keeping them for the Sugar Bowl... really just highlights how dumb this system is. Universities would rather tank an entire season so they can provide the best players in a bowl game that is slated to make money and getting ratings. That's it. Money.

This isn't anything really new, but this year espically with the FCS Playoffs, I can't think of a better way to end the season. Now I agree a playoff would cause the regular season to lose some significance, but here is what you do...

1. All these other 30 bowl games, you keep and have "Conference Crossovers" that way teams that don't make the playoff system can defend their conference's rights. You could go so far as to have these bowl crossovers to determine how many playoff sports are given to each conference.

(Note: you keep the bowl games and actually make them more interesting!)

2. Keep the number of teams in the playoffs artificially low, I'd say between 12-20 teams.

But it wont happen, as these universities are just making soooo much money anyways. However, you wont get me to watch that postseason crap.

Oregon's BCS National Championship uniforms

Nike has released the uniforms that the University of Oregon Ducks will be wearing in the BCS National Championship game.

This season Oregon has worn 12 different uniform combinations in 12 games. Remember, you can always check out the Oregon Duck Tracker for what uniform was worn in each game.

So it was no surprise when Nike announced that Oregon would wear a totally new uniform in the Championship game.

Here are some key points about the uniforms

• The helmets are the "Carbon" design the team wore against Portland State, but the "yellow on the O decal is much brighter.
  
• The uniform will feature the "white on white" pants and jersey combo.
• The jersey now has an "Oregon Shield" at the base of the neckline.
  
• However, like the new neon yellow on the helmet O, the outline color around the silver numbers on the jersey are also the new yellow.
• New neon yellow socks and shoes.
  
• When the palms of the gloves are held to together, they reveal an Oregon "O".

Now that you've seen the BCS National Championship uniforms for Oregon, what are your thoughts? Like 'em, hate 'em, don't care. We want to know!

I've made this argument about the BCS and bowl system for a long time. People pine for a playoff system but look how meaningless the college basketball season gets thanks to conference post-season tournaments. I have no urge whatsoever to watch college basketball unless its my Eags or the Zags are losing (which they did against WSU last night). Check this out.


Under the current system, 70 schools and hordes of fans arrive days before the big game and immediately become the toast of the town. Fans and families plan vacations around bowl week. Student-athletes are celebrated as the players get to see places and do things they otherwise never could do. No wonder a poll of student-athletes taken by ESPN the Magazine earlier this year showed that 77% of players would prefer a career with three bowl games to a career with one playoff game.


A playoff, on the other hand, would be limited to a small number of schools, and it would turn their celebratory week into a series of one-day business trips because the teams would arrive the day before the game and leave right afterward. If they won, they'd need to get ready for next week's game. That's not a bowl party — that's another game on the schedule. For the schools that don't make a playoff, their bowl games would fade away. Sadly, so too would a great American tradition.


If ever a season showed that the BCS is fair and that it works, it's this season. And it happened while maintaining the thrilling regular season in which every game counts.

He does make a good point about how the playoff system would exclude a larger number of schools from postseason play, which in turn, generates more money. The FCS, commonly pointed too as the reason why a playoff system could work, still has the smallest percentage of teams competing in the postseason. The selection process isn't exactly perfect either.

Congress hates the BCS

Congress wants a playoff system for college football! Nevermind everyone would like them to work on things like unemployment, this is important stuff!

WASHINGTON -- A House subcommittee approved legislation Wednesday aimed at forcing college football to switch to a playoff system to determine its national champion, over the objections of some lawmakers who said Congress has meatier targets to tackle.


The bill, which faces steep odds, would ban the promotion of a postseason NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision game as a national championship unless it results from a playoff. The measure passed by voice vote in a House Energy and Commerce Committee subcommittee, with one audible "no," from Rep. John Barrow, D-Ga.


"With all due respect, I really think we have more important things to spend our time on," Barrow said before the vote, although he stressed he didn't like the current Bowl Championship Series, either.

I just don't get why not being about to promote the BCS champion as a national champion is going to cause college football to change everything. How about they make the Bowl names sponsors actually be public service announcements.

"Oregon! Ohio State! Square off against one another in the 'Read something to your kid before he's born' Bowl!"

"Michigan State! North Carolina! Big game in the 'Check yourself for herpes on a regular basis" Bowl!"

Just saying, might get somebody's attention.

The BCS Rankings are out!

We're throwing out the AP Poll now and replacing it with the BCS poll because it's obviously the one that matters. The first poll shows Boise St. sitting at No. 4, meaning that they're in the discussion for the national championship game. Wow

BCS Poll
1. Florida (6-0)
2. Alabama (7-0)
3. Texas (6-0)
4. Boise State (6-0)
5. Cincinnati (6-0)
6. Iowa (7-0)
7. USC (5-1)
8. Texas Christian (6-0)
9. LSU (5-1)
10. Miami (Fla,) (5-1)
11. Oregon (5-1)
12. Georgia Tech (6-1)
13. Penn State (6-1)
14. Virginia Tech (5-2)
15. Oklahoma State (5-1)
16. Brigham Young (6-1)
17. Houston (5-1)
18. Utah (5-1)
19. Ohio State (5-2)
20. Pittsburgh (6-1)
21. Wisconsin (5-2)
22. Arizona (4-2)
23. West Virginia (5-1)
24. South Carolina (5-2)
25. Kansas (5-1)

Don't forget that USC is still up there very high and could swoop in with just one loss. Oregon is within striking range as well. Keep in mind that both Texas and Florida/Alabama could fall out of those top positions very easily. They all play in tough conferences, and the Gators and Crimson Tide would meet one another if they both win out. Meaning somebody loses. 

How they should decide the college football national champion

1. A hearty, well-fought game of Pictionary.

2. Anything other than having coaches vote for their own teams. I'm waiting to see Duke get a first place vote in the final standings.

3. Lets just skip the actual games themselves and do virtual simulations in a 16-game playoff and name the winner the national champion. And lets not use EA Sports latest offering... lets just assign schools to teams in Tecmo Super Bowl.

4. Cheerleading mud wrestling.

5. Give Casey and I final to crown a national champion. It should be a good run for Eastern Washington University...

BCS Championship? More like just BS Championship

All I can say about the game tonight is, "who cares?"

Not I.

The BCS is a joke and this game proves it.

Lee Russakoff said it great in the article A Vote for USC Is a Vote for Change.

View it HERE.

It's lamest time of the year... for the NFL

College football has shut down before it begins it's "Bowl Season" where almost half the mediocre teams in the nation can end their season on a positive note, leaving me without any real meaningful football to be played until the BCS National Championship Game and the NFL Playoffs.

This is still with a couple of games left in the regular season of the pros, but honestly I don't care what 8-8 or 9-7 sneaks into the playoffs, they'll more than likely get their butts handed to them.

Meanwhile the teams that are actually good have already clinched a playoff spot and are fighting for (yawn) home-field advantage. While this is important, probably more important than any other sport, we can expect to see quite a few letdowns by the better teams to either borderline playoff teams actually fighting for something, or really bad teams (other than the Raiders and Lions) looking for a chance to get some pride back. It's basically garbage time football for a few weeks since even if these better teams lose, it really doesn't matter because they'll be playing with a completely different mindset and a completely different intensity once the playoffs start.

And the NFL wants to ADD games? Really? Lets extend this pro football purgatory so I can watch the 5-9 San Francisco 49ers put the smackdown on a playoff team in a game that really doesn't meet anything. Swell! That would be entertaining.

Say what you will about the BCS, but every week in college football is compelling and pretty interesting because one loss can spell the difference between a national championship and playing in the Quizno's Sub Bowl.

Meanwhile in the NFL, I get to watch Seneca Wallace (who looks stoned, all the time) and the 2-11 Seahawks match up against the 2-11 St. Louis Rams with Stephen Jackson (who could probably eat an elephant if he wanted to) in front of roughly 20,000 fans. Whoop-de-do.

At least the Hawks won on a last second field goal, kind of made me forget about my beloved Titans pulling a patented playoff team letdown against the Houston Texans, who are a marginally good squad at 7-7.

Sure, I could have watched that thrilling Steelers-Ravens Game which ended in a 13-9 victory for Pittsburgh. But if I wanted to watch baseball I could watch the Dominican League, not two teams that are going to get knocked out by whatever AFC East and AFC South team they match up against in the playoffs.

(Also don't forget the "who's going to beat the Denver Broncos in the first round of the playoffs" sweepstakes, which should go to Indianapolis at this point.)

When does baseball season start up again?

This Saturday in College Football

It's looking like it's going to be Florida and Oklahoma in the national championship game if all predictions and BCS scenarios play out, which is sure to cause an uproar from every single team with one loss in the country.

Well boo hoo.

Right now, at this moment, the no. 1 and no. 2 teams in the country are Florida and Oklahoma. There's really no doubt about that, except for Texas fans, who will say that they defeated the Oklahoma Sooners earlier this year. Well good job, get a good drink of water and enjoy the Sun Bowl because nowadays it's all about what you're doing right now.

Texas beat the Sooners, were in the driver's seat to the national championship and then lost to Texas Tech, who were then in that same seat, until they got absolutely annihilated by Oklahoma. They get the tiebreaker to the Big 12 Championship game because of their BCS standings and they annihilated Missouri, which was the 19th-ranked team in the country.

Sorry Longhorn fans, your team had it's shot and screwed it up, Oklahoma meanwhile has been simply unstoppable these past few weeks and oh...

THEY WON THEIR CONFERENCE

It would be ridiculous for the Longhorns to be in the National Championship game when they haven't even won their division within their conference.

Does Texas deserve a shot? Sure. However our current system only sets up the no. 1 and no. 2 teams in the country, which is Oklahoma and Florida by most accounts. You can't blame the BCS for the fact that their are competitive no. 3, no. 4 and no. 5 teams as well - however you don't see these coaches talking to their university presidents or conferences about this. You don't.

The BCS gives us the two top teams, as advertised. Every team knows this going into the season.

And please Boise State and Utah... stop complaining about getting snuffed because some FCS programs have a tougher schedule than you do.

Without further delay here's this week's scores:

No. 12 Ball State 24, Buffalo 42 - I'm not shocked that Ball State finally lost a game, I am shocked though that Buffalo is 8-5.

No. 23 Pittsburgh 34, UCONN 10 - Congrats Pittsburgh, enjoy the Sun Bowl.

No. 18 Boston College 12, Virginia Tech 30 - That was the ACC Championship game... yep, that conference is having a down year.

No. 1 Alabama 20, No. 2 Florida 31 - Look! A real conference championship game!

No. 5 USC 28, UCLA 7 - What's funny is that the Trojans seem to play in the Rose Bowl more often than the Bruins... ooo burn.

No. 19 Missouri 21, No. 4 Oklahoma 62 - Yeah Oklahoma doesn't deserve to be in the National Championship Game... no way.

No. 13 Cincinnati 29, Hawaii 24 - And will this loss, the Warriors will be playing in their home state, in their home stadium, for a bowl game. Look for them to get blownout in that game against the 7th best Pac Ten team.

Things I hate about Saturdays...

- When you turn on the TV in the morning, realize that ESPN is showing three college football games, and they're all Directional School that nobody cares about vs. mid-major conference power that likes the run the option a lot and nobody cares about.

- Trying to decide between a college basketball game or college football game.

- Hearing people complain about the BCS simply because other people are complaining about the BCS. I'm sorry but Utah, Boise St. and Ball State do not deserve a shot at the national title.

- Seeing Charlie Weis on the television.

- Saturday NFL games, oh they're coming... and it's going to be equally hard to justify to everyone that it's alright for you to go to the bar on Saturday morning.

- Charlie Weis.

- Oh almost forgot... Nick Saban.