Your guide to Johnny Manziel

Unless you're a hardcore college football fan that watches every single game on Saturday, you probably are a bit unfamiliar with redshirt freshman Johnny Manziel, the freshman quarterback phenom for Texas A&M who won the Heisman Trophy. While the award practically earmarks that he'll be a first-round bust in the NFL, I still kind of want to know just who "Johnny Football" is. So after the wonders of Google and other sport sites, here's the idiots guide to Johnny Manziel.

1. His stat line is absolutely ridiculous - Sometimes, I feel the Heisman Trophy winner is a bit more about hype by a certain school than actual results out on the field. Not with Manziel. This guy is an absolute stud. Let's look at what he's done in his first year of college football: 3,419 yards passing, 24 touchdown passes, eight interceptions, 1,181 rushing yards, 19 rushing touchdowns. Let that roll around your brain a little bit, then add the fact that he's doing it against tough, practically NFL defenses in the SEC.

Tebow won the Heisman as sophomore when he notched 3,970 total offensive yards. Tebow is considered by some to be the greatest college football player ever (understandable, he did a lot for the Gators). Manziel has collected a whopping 4,600 yards by himself this season. Wowza.

2. He's apparently a folk hero in Texas - While playing for Tivy High School, he was compared by local sports writers to Brett Favre, Michael Vick and Drew Brees. He's also won basically every high school award in the book. This is important because he was still in high school just two years ago. His senior year of high school he threw for 3,609 yards with 45 TD and 5 INT. Rushing, he had 170 carries for 1,674 yards and 30 TD. On the 4A level. Good god.

3. He helped Texas A&M defeat No. 1 Alabama - Threw for 253 yards and two touchdowns while rushing for 92 yards to help the Aggies upend the Crimson Tide 29-24 earlier this season.

4. He's undersized for an NFL-type QB - At just 6'1" and 205 pounds, he's not that physically imposing, but if you watch him on the field, he'll run at defensive players to freeze them and then get by them. He's been compared to a video game player. In other words, when you sit down to watch a Texas A&M game, you will be entertained.

5. He could potentially win three more Heismans - Seriously, even though its a  tough SEC, he's got the talent and the team around him to do it. His hype might reach Tebow levels.

(Get a Johnny Manziel Jersey here.)

Oh Alabama, you keep giving me reasons to hate you

So Alabama won the "national championship" in college football this year and what do you think they did to celebrate with fans? Giving them the oppourtunity to pose in front of the crystal ball national championship trophy and a small mountain of Dr. Pepper boxes. Wooo! Roll Tide.

Oh and SEC homers... the people above are the PEOPLE THAT GO TO SEC GAMES. I'm just saying. It's like Walmart with Helmets.

(Found this on Deadspin)

Reasons why you're still single... SEC fan

Alabama wins the national championship and do you think they'd do a "ALABAMA!" Cheer? Nope.

"SEC!SEC!SEC!" could be heard coming from Alabama fans behind the ESPN College GameDay set.

What kind of arse-backward fan-base would celebrate their conference's supposed superiority over the winning of a national championship by their own team. What the hell?

Typical small-man syndrome or as I like to call it "region of the country that has yet to master indoor plumbing syndrome."

Why I hate SEC fans

Growing up in the great Northwest, I've grown to like the Pac-10. While it's not as "passionate" (read jobless losers watching a football game) as the SEC, it's still great football. However, every SEC fan in the country would disagree. That's why I hate them. And I hate them for this as well...

• They won't see this, because they can't read.
• Apparently they play the greatest brand of football on the face of the planet. Nevermind the other big conferences that consistently beat them in bowl games... oh and the NFL. 
• Ole Miss reminds me of some jerseys they found in the back of some Christmas theater production closet directed by a drunk man.
• Many of states in the south don't have very high populations, yet hundreds of thousands of people tailgate outside of their favorite team's stadium - making them the largest city in the state that day or something. Question - since everyone is getting drunk, who's manning the hospitals and police stations?
• CBS owns your TV contract therefore all we hear during your games are "CSI: Canada" promos.
• Any part of the country that keeps talking about "the rise of the Confederacy" is instantly written off in my book.

So there you have it. I'd better not have a catfish thrown through my window.

East Coast Bias: They take their sports more seriously

We've long heard that when it comes to really any of the major sports - the East Coast views their sports whole lot more seriously than those of us on the West Coast. Which for the most part is true, because I really can't come up with an example of a Pac-10 rivalry being more heated than a SEC rivalry - nor can I point to a fan base that follows and criticizes their teams more religiously than East Coast fans.

And please, don't tell me any other ways, because Seahawks fans didn't get crazy till their team started making the playoffs in the early 2000s, Dodger fans don't show up to games until the playoffs and USC fans are about as friendly and passive as you can get. Many ESPN radio personalities have said on the air "things are a little more relaxed out West"

And that's not a knock. It's not that we care less, it's that we run a little more even keeled ship as fan.

Cities are spread out more on the west coast, and it's almost as if people take to their regional identity than the specific identity of their city. You won't see a person from Seattle refuse to date someone from Portland or Spokane, nor will you talk trash about those cities (well, maaaybe Spokane, just a little :D). Things happen at a slight slower pace on the West Coast - heck, we even talk slow - and therefore I don't think we see sports as so life and death.

When you're mired in the urban jungles of the East Coast such as Pittsburgh above, since theirs so many metro areas and populace centers, you really grab onto what identifies you. Therefore you're sports teams become a huge part of your life. You certainly don't want to lose to your cross-state rivals in Philadelphia, because that's part of YOU losing.

And also consider that in these urban environments with less and less space to escape from society from time to time (example, take a relaxing vacation, hike, bike ride ect. ect.), you're exposed to the myopic mini-society that your city has established.

In Spokane, there's a limited amount of media sources talking up the teams, in Seattle there's more media sources but they're also covering regions outside of the city limits and therefore their tunnel vision on sports is lost somewhat.

On the East, in a city like Pittsburgh, it's STEELERS! It's PIRATES (and their 100 losses!)! It's PENGUINS! And you'd be hard pressed to escape that media hype around sports because your in a city with thousands of people around you talking about topics that matter to your city and even if you get out of town - you're basically just in another city with thousands of people around you talking about topics that matter to their city. You can't escape it.

In the Northwest, well, you can just go fishing...

Reasons why you're still single...

You grew up in the Northwest, you work for the Northwest sports media, you went to a community college in the Northwest, yet all you talk about is how amazin', awesome, super-duper, cool SEC football is.

Linemen are stupid, actually

Tim Tebow scores... he scores alot. I mean just look at this photo above. Okay, that was a lie, Tebow could be going into the priesthood for all I know and that could be his sister in that photo. However, Lineman are always jelous of people that can score a lot. Hence this comment from an Tigers defensive tackle Ricky Jean-Francois about the upcoming Flordia-LSU matchup this weekend in college football:

"If we get a good shot on [Tebow], we're going to try our best to take him out of the game," Jean-Francois said Monday, according to the Orlando Sentinel's Web site. "With his size and his heart, it's hard to get a clean shot.

"I think every lineman wants to get a good hit on a Heisman Trophy winner."

To which a response was released from Florida:

Jean-Francois' remark "fires Tim up. Seems a little unsportsmanlike to me," Florida offensive coordinator Dan Mullen said Tuesday. "Intentionally injuring other players is not part of the game that we teach here."

Awww. Crap. A fired up Tim Tebow? Remember how he promised the media that they would not find a harder working player in college football making sure his team wins their games. And then you throw this into the mix. Tebow is going to rush for 500 yards and pass for a 1,000.

The obvious bulliten board and media controversy that would follow caused Jean-Francois (and probably LSU's PR department) to make this move.

Later in the day, Jean-Francois issued a statement through LSU that said, "We never go into any football game trying to hurt a player from the other team. My comments in regard to Florida quarterback Tim Tebow were misinterpreted and were intended to reflect the style of football that we play at LSU.

"We have great respect for Tim as a player and a competitor. By taking him out of the game, I meant as a defense we are going to try to make him ineffective. I'm sorry that my initial comments were interpreted another way."

You can read the full story from ESPN.