teke184

I'm not a gambler. I write sports for the campus paper and all the paid sports writers have to put their College FB picks in the paper on Fridays. We compile our records over the season and me and the other guy have come down to being tied for 1st right now with only two differing bowl picks. I remember a sportscaster(i think it was one of the college gameday guys) saying that the SEC was down this year.........yeah he was wrong. The reason people think the SEC is down deals with the supposed lack of offense... Which is mainly due to the quality of defenses they've been playing against. Take LSU for example. They got shut down by Georgia and needed OT to beat Alabama and Auburn. They blasted Miami 40-3.

I don't give a rat's ass where he ends up... I'm just hoping some sucker will take him off the Saints' hands, believing that his abilities will make up for the fact that his IQ test came back negative.

That one has been on the table since he was benched in favor of Todd Bouman. The question is whether they'll find a taker for him (NY Jets, Oakland, Arizona, St. Louis, Miami, Buffalo, etc.) or if they'll just cut his worthless ass.

I think Cole showed enough that he can be trusted to at least be decent next year. I like Mike Patterson and think he will be a quality player, but they desperately need to get someone else in there with him at DT (Walker is way too inconsistent, Rayburn is a 3rd DT nothing more, Thomas...um he is a nice guy). I think they need to either pray that he falls or move up to grab Ngata. By the way, I have a serious man crush on Garrett Mills out of Tulsa and think he would be a nice compliment to LJ. Ngata would be awesome, but I don't think he falls to 14th. I'm starting to think that they go for an OL more now. Nagata could possibly go top 5 depending on how the teams up there feel about him. Take a look at the teams in the top 5 and see who's looking for DTs and is willing to spend big money to do it. I don't see a team in desperate need of a DT before about 10th or 11th, as most of the teams in the early part of the draft are thinking QB (Leinart), RB (Bush, D'Angelo Williams), CB (Jimmy Williams), LB (AJ Hawk), etc.

Realistically, no worse than 3rd barring a Willis McGehee type of injury in the Rose Bowl. The Titans, despite having Chris Brown and Travis Henry on the roster, don't exactly have a game-breaking RB right now.

Since I'm a Saints fan, I'd like to see them wheel and deal that #2 pick... The Saints don't need Bush, they're not going to draft D'Brickashaw Ferguison the year after trading up to get OT Jammal Brown, and I'm not sold enough on Leinart translating well to the NFL to invest #2 pick money in him. (If Leinart's still on the board at #4 or #5, though, I'd be more willing to risk it. However, the top 2-3 contracts in each year's NFL draft are insane these days) I'd like to see the Saints move down about 3-4 picks so that they can get some extra draft picks and still pick up a top piece of talent that they need such as AJ Hawk. That is dependant, though, on the Saints either moving Adrian McPherson to start at QB, picking up a veteran, or working out some trade to bring in a young stud QB like Phillip Rivers or Aaron Rogers. (I don't particularly like Rogers but I'm more willing to take him AND a 1st Round pick rather than Leinart at #2 with a huge contract.)

It goes by reverse Strength Of Schedule... The team with the weakest schedule gets the lowest pick. *NOTE* These SOS calculations were made before the end of Dallas vs. St. Louis 1. Houston Texans (2-14) 2. New Orleans Saints (3-13) 3. Tennessee Titans (4-12) .457 4. Green Bay Packers (4-12) .480 5. San Francisco 49ers (4-12)* .5195 (Played Rams twice, Cowboys once) 6. NY Jets (4-12) .5234 7. Oakland Raiders (4-12)* .539 (Played Cowboys) 8. St. Louis Rams .480 (Assumes a loss to the Cowboys. If they win, they move to at least 11th) 9. Arizona Cardinals .4960 (If St. Louis Wins, they may move to 10th.) 10. Buffalo Bills .500 (If St. Louis wins, they may move to 8th) 11. Detroit Lions .503 Depending on the results of the St. Louis vs. Dallas game, several of these spots may flip or may be subject to a coin-toss to determine the draft order.

I don't like it and the bowl committee probably isn't much happier, but those are the realities when you start tossing that much money around. The Chick-Fil-A Bowl is tossing enough money around that it's replacing the Gator Bowl as the destination for the #2 team in the ACC and has the potential to rise up the SEC bowl hierarchy and challenge the Capitol One (Citrus) Bowl for the same right. Currently, the bowl pays out about $2.35 million per team, which ranks them as 8th out of 27 bowls, behind the BCS bowls (Sugar, Rose, Fiesta, Orange), the Capitol One Bowl, the Outback Bowl, and the Cotton Bowl. Their new payout of $3+ million per team moves them up to 6th, behind only the BCS bowls and the Capitol One Bowl. Combine that with the quality of the Georgia Dome vs. some of the other stadiums at similar-tier bowls coughCOTTONBOWLcough and Atlanta's reputation as a transportation hub and you've got the formula for a strong bid at becoming the next BCS Bowl when they add a new game over the next few years.

4th place... Pretty nice. The main questions for me deal with the number of people who picked Texas over the University of Spoiled Children.

Certainly fits with past precedent for LSU... The first First Down of the Les Miles era was against Arizona State when, on a 4th down, punter Chris Jackson faked and threw a pass to Ronnie Prude. What makes it so ballsy is that LSU was *WITHIN THEIR OWN 20* at the time. That play turned out to be an "automatic", which is an audible in which the punter is allowed to take that chance if he sees it's open.

And from the ESPN reports after the game, the only player known to get his ass whooped seemed to be from Miami as well... Who'd have ever thought there'd be a day when the dirtiest players in the game, Miami, are the ones getting their asses whooped in a brawl?

I'll refrain from expressing how happy I am... I really thought they'd be in serious danger of GETTING humiliated, not humiliating Miami.

Flynn to Addai~! I think Miami is officially bent over right now, as it's 20-3 going into the half.

(Dwayne) Bowe knows receptions.

NFL > Bowl games in ratings

Jesus... Flynn and Addai are shredding the Hurricane defense on this drive.

Flynn's doing pretty good right now... He's sure as Hell more mobile than JaMarcus Russell and he was able to sail a pass right into Buster Davis's hands for a 12 yard gain a second ago. TOUCHDOWN!!!! FLYNN TO BUSTER DAVIS!!!!!! (Originally posted in wrong thread)

Oops... wrong thread.

Yes. Once Russell was named as starter before the season, Perriloux got red-shirted. There's no use in burning his red-shirt over one game.

LSU RBs- Joseph Addai is the defacto starter. He was the starter for the first half of the National Championship season, in 2003, until getting hurt just before the Florida game, which as LSU's lone loss that year. This year, he stepped up and was the most like injured Alley Broussard, whose trademark was fighting through tackles and getting every bit of extra yardage he could. Broussard injured his ankle earlier this year and has not been in a full game since. Shyrone Carey, who I refer to as "Superbug", is about 5'6", which is VERY short for an RB. He tends to find holes that no one else can, although he has problems when attempting to make sharp cuts to avoid tackles. (He appears to lose his balance and fall down) Justin Vincent was the breakout superstar of the 2003 National Championship season, as he emerged against South Carolina the week after the Florida loss. He was the MVP of the SEC Championship and Sugar Bowl that season. However, he had a severe "Sophmore Slump" last year and moved behind both Addai and Alley Broussard on the depth chart. He re-emerged in the offense after Addai's injury earlier this year. If Addai is unable to start, Vincent is the most likely starter. QBs- Matt Flynn is the announced starter for the Peach Bowl. Flynn has only played in about 4 games this year. Of those, by far the most impressive appearance was against North Texas, in which Flynn entered at the start of the 4th quarter, immediately threw a TD pass to Bennie Brazell (whom I refer to as "Stonehands" as he's a world-class runner but can't catch for shit), and finished 8 for 8 with 3 TDs, which were all made to different receivers. Flynn is at least as talented as JaMarcus Russell, the injured starter, but has a different style. Russell uses a lot of brute force, which is partially why there are so many dropped passes by the LSU WRs. Flynn has a more traditional style, which allows him to sail the ball exactly where it needs to go. This is especially necessary when dealing with someone like Bennie Brazell, who has speed but horrible hands. If Flynn goes down, the next QB to step in could be one of many people... WR Skyler Green, CB Ronnie Prude (the goat of last year's Auburn and Iowa games), and P/K Chris Jackson all played QB in high school, with Jackson leading John Curtis HS to the Louisiana Class 4A Title for one,

More power to Hawkins... Taking a low-end team like Boise State from obscurity to multiple Top 25 finishes deserves to be rewarded. I'm sorry to see him bailing on Boise but, despite being the capitol of Idaho, it's in the middle of goddamn nowhere and not the easiest place to recruit for... If it was a school like TCU or Southern Miss, I'd have harder feelings about it because those are in prime recruiting areas and are around major cities (TCU is in Ft. Worth, next to Dallas, and Southern Miss is 1 hour north of the former metropolis of New Orleans).

Agreed. Evangel HS, which produced John David Booty, Josh Booty and Abram Booty of LSU, and Brock Berlin of Miami, has had some SERIOUS problems with their players not hacking it on the national level. The problem is that the kids get a SERIOUS f'in attitude problem by playing at one of the top football factories within Louisiana, along with West Monroe, John Curtis, Catholic of Baton Rouge, St. Augustine of New Orleans, etc. The difference is that I never hear of Catholic-BR players having a serious attitude problem, even though they produced some huge college stars like Heisman Trophy winner Charlie Ward, Falcons running back Warrick Dunn, and Texas Longhorns QB Major Applewhite. Evangel players, though, seem to have a very high opinion of themselves, which tends to mean they try to force bad decisions as well as piss off their teammates. Witness the Miami team's comments about Brock Berlin over the last few years. (Granted, noted dickhead Kellen Winslow Jr. was the one making some of them...)

1st- Deuce (injured, dropped) 2nd- Rudi Johnson (solid yardage, few TDs until the Indy game) 3rd- Tom Brady (This was supposed to be a "reach"... paid off well though) 4th- Roy Williams (Injuries hurt, but the last month has been golden)

Man, I am SO pissed at Joe Jurevicius right now... I had a 2 point lead in my game with him as my only player left and the Philly D as the only player left for my opponent. The problem is that Joe hasn't caught a damn thing all night and, since Philly gets return yardage in my league (50 yards = 1 point) and hasn't gotten into negative points yet (they need at least 6 more points given up by the D), I think I've just gotten edged out of the playoffs.

NBA- Shaquille O'Neal (Always a fan of him going back to his LSU days... my first year as an LSU basketball fan was his freshman year)