iggymcfly

You should be able to talk about other teams in here. Just because Oklahoma's a big part of the chase for the Orange Bowl doesn't mean that general chat about who's gonna get to the Orange Bowl has to be in the special OU thread.

If Iowa State holds on, maybe I should go to the Idaho game, and cheer for Arkansas State. That's probably gonna decide my contest game this week, and they're playing on our campus, letting all WSU students in free.

First of all, regardless of what they do with the regular season, they need to expand the LDS to 7 games. The idea that you can play 162 games and then lose your whole season by losing three is just ridiculous. Remember, in a three game series, the Yankees could have swept the Red Sox this year. Second, I'm not really against shortening the season. In fact, I kind of like the idea. No pitcher's ever going to win 30 games again, and all the offensive stats are so inflated that shortening the season just balances them out a little. Without the statistical concerns, there's really no reason not to shorten it, as the season's so long that it becomes increasingly meaningless. The sheer fatigue of the season would be cut down a little bit, if they took a few games off the top.

From the LP official site: They do try awfully hard to win smaller elections, and that's obviously where the support grows from. However, if they don't run a candidate for president as well, it's impossible for them to be taken seriously as a national party.

The forfeit doesn't factor into your strength of schedule, which is weaker than most of the people in the top ten (including me). The point is, if MY strength of schedule is keeping me from the #1 or #2 slot, you're in worse shape than I am. You can't consider yourself the "uncrowned #1 or #2 seed" because you have beat a few weak opponents (weeks 2, 4, 6, 7, 8 and 9) on the way to an undefeated record since you took over. Actually, you're strength of schedule is sixth out of 32. The main component holding you back is your record. And looking once again at your handy-dandy results, if you'd played my "easy schedule" since I took over 6 weeks ago, you'd be 4-2, not 6-0.

I honestly don't know, so I thought I'd ask. What are Badnarik's policies? If elected, how would he make the country better? And just why is he a better alternative to either Bush or Kerry? I personally know a few people that have voted or are planning to vote for Nader/Cobb/Badnarik, but they're not exactly sure why. Throwing your vote away on a party that has no chance of winning seems silly, especially if you don't even know where the candidate stands on important issues. I'm hoping you can help me better understand the mind process behind voting a third party candidate - specifically Badnarik - with a better reason than "He's not Bush or Kerry." I genuinely do want to know. I voted for him and I can give you a basic overview of his main policies if you like: 1. Cut taxes, but instead of building a gigantic deficit like Dubya, actually cut spending dramatically to keep pace. 2. Pull American troops from Iraq, and generally just stop interfering in countries that have nothing to do with us. He's not against leaving troops in Afghanistan since they actually attacked us; just stop being the policemen of the world when it's none of our business. 3. End the drug war, (saving tons of money), leading into eventual legalization and taxation of recreationgal drugs (getting more money.) If people want to use drugs, it's not the governments responsibility to imprison them for it. 4. Protect privacy and get rid of ridiculous legislation like the Patriot Act, that lets the government interfere in any aspect of your life that they want to. 5. Generally go back to more of a Jeffersonian mentality, where the government uses the Constitution as a guide for what they should and shouldn't be able to do, rather than trying to control every aspect of their citizens' lives. There's more obviously, but those are just the basic tenets, which I absolutely agree with, and think the country would be much better off if we could move toward.

Bravesfan, obviously if you count the forfeit, I'll be way behind you. I was just saying that since I took over the Bowling Green team, I've done better than everyone except for maybe Mike. I've been undefeated since taking over, and even if my strength of schedule hasn't been as good as yours, I've still got three more picks right by the data that you so handily provided.

Peterson's absolutely more valuable than White. He had 225 yards and 249 yards in Okahoma's two biggest games of the season. He's averaging over six yards a carry, and he hasn't been held under 100 yards all year. No way OU's undefeated without Adrian Peterson.

However, voting for Kerry to protest Bush's spending is like shooting yourself in the mouth because you have a real bad toothache. -=Mike Oh, I know that's his point, and that's not what I did, but I did vote for Badnarik when I mailed in my ballot a few weeks ago.

I don't think it has anything to do with a playoff system. I like the idea that conference winners get a free berth, as if there's a situation with a conference winner like KSU last year who stepped it up at the end of the year to win their conference, they certainly deserve a free berth. The only adjustment I would make is to revoke the Big East's automatic berth, since they are no longer an elite conference on par with the other five major conferences.

He actually makes some pretty valid points. Bush is a terrible conservative, and his reckless spending and unnecessary foreign war is exactly the opposite of what the Republican Party should stand for. Regardless of whether Bush or Kerry wins, my real hope of this election is that the Republican candidate in 2008 is nothing like George W. Bush.

Name-calling's always a good tactic to resort to when you can't refute a rational point. Way to go, Rat's Milk.

I agree completely, and that's kind of what I was trying to say in my post. Since you're not going to influence who wins the election, you can just as easily change the direction of the country by voting for a third-party and getting the mainstream to change some of their positions. Basically Bush and Kerry are so close together in filth right now, that I don't want to vote for either one, so I'm letting the Republican party know that if they want my vote, they have to move away from the middle, instead of even further towards it. And when I say away from the middle, I mean on fiscal issues, not on George Bush's right-wing christian, gays are bad, fight wars, and spend million of dollars on drug wars bullshit.

While finishing in the Top 6 would guarantee Utah a BCS berth, they don't need to finish in the Top 6 to get one. Unless there are two at-large teams in the top 4, it is up to the Fiesta Bowl to pick whatever team in the Top 12 they feel would be the best draw. The Fiesta Bowl has already expressed interest in Utah due to the high number of fans that would likely travel to the game, so if Utah finishes undefeated, they're almost guaranteed to get a BCS berth. Also, if Tennessee wins the SEC Championship, they will automatically go to a BCS bowl as the SEC Champion, and it would be Auburn that would need to finish in the Top 4 and get an at-large berth. Looking at these rankings, I think I figured out what my dream scenario is. I want to see OU and Auburn both lose the rest of the way while Cal keeps their computer points, so that Cal and USC have a rematch in the Orange Bowl, while an undefeated Wisconsin team faces off against Miami or Utah in the Rose Bowl. It would probably be the right matchup, but the public outcry would be hilarious.

Actually, I might have made it more complicated than it is. Looking at the BCS rankings, if two unbeatens lose, it would probably be Wisconsin, and if three lose, it would probably be Utah. It's only after four out of those five lose, that you would be likely to worry about Cal, Tennessee, or Georgia.

Yeah, I think you're assuming completely wrong there. If three unbeatens lose, with Georgia beating Auburn and USC losing, then it would probably be Georgia. If everyone loses but USC, it would probably be Cal. Meanwhile, if USC loses, and Auburn doesn't lose or loses to someone other than Georgia, than I'd guess it would be Utah. It's pretty much up in the air at this point. Of course, I'd be really surprised if there aren't at least two major conference unbeatens left when the season's done, so it's probably a moot point.

Sorry, that's not gonna happen. Even if Georgia beats Auburn, they won't have the tiebreaker with Tennessee, and they still won't make the SEC Championship game. In that situation, Georgia and Cal would probably each have about a 50/50 shot at making the Orange Bowl if the undefeateds lose.

I do agree that the Libertarian party needs to make some changes if they want to be taken seriously. For one, they need someone who has some political experience to run for President. Gary Nolan was at least somewhat respectable, and IMO, he would have been a better candidate than Badnarik. However, Bush and Kerry are both so bad and similar that it's just promoting the direction the country's going to vote for either one of them. At least voting for Badnarik sends a message that we won't be happy with the crap that the major parties are feeding us. And as for the "wasting your vote" argument, you're always wasting your vote. One vote's never decided a presidential election, and it never will. At least vote for someone that you feel positive about, and that you think might make some sort of difference in a positive way.

This is one of the longest threads ever. One time I actually tried to read all the way through it and catch up with the discussion, but I only got to about page 9 before I finally fell asleep. Anyway, the basic point is that the idea that God is loving, and the idea that God sends people to hell for not believing in him are utterly contradictory. If there is a subsequent point that seems as relevant, it's that no matter what you believe in, it is obvious that hundreds of different religions have been made up that contain the common denominators that they comfort people about their fear of death, and leave responsibilities to a higher power. The idea that hundreds were made up and one was supernaturally inspired is much less likely than the idea that they were all made up. Whether or not you can utterly "prove" that your particular fairy tale is false, does not mean that any rational and impartial observer would not determine that there is no God.

By the way, I can't really say that I understand it or agree with it, but here's something from Sagarin's conference rankings that Damaramu will love. (If I were to guess, I'd say they punished the entire SEC for Auburn's weak non-conference schedule. As for the ACC being below the Big XII, I don't know.) CONFERENCE CENTRAL MEAN SIMPLE AVERAGE TEAMS 1 PAC-10 (A) = 78.79 79.47 ( 1) 10 2 BIG 12 (A) = 77.69 78.49 ( 2) 12 3 ATLANTIC COAST (A) = 76.76 76.89 ( 3) 11 4 I-A INDEPENDENTS (A) = 76.56 76.56 ( 4) 2 5 SOUTHEASTERN (A) = 75.62 75.48 ( 5) 12 6 BIG TEN (A) = 74.56 74.18 ( 6) 11 7 MOUNTAIN WEST (A) = 72.20 73.18 ( 7) 8 8 BIG EAST (A) = 69.20 69.20 ( 8) 7 9 CONFERENCE USA (A) = 67.26 68.15 ( 9) 11 10 WESTERN ATHLETIC (A) = 66.27 67.46 ( 10) 10 11 ATLANTIC 10 (AA)= 65.34 64.83 ( 11) 12 12 SUN BELT (A) = 62.82 62.95 ( 12) 9 13 GREAT WEST (AA)= 59.42 59.42 ( 13) 6 14 SOUTHLAND (AA)= 56.95 56.79 ( 15) 6 15 MID-AMERICAN (A) = 56.73 57.32 ( 14) 14 16 BIG SKY (AA)= 56.60 56.36 ( 16) 8 17 IVY LEAGUE (AA)= 55.79 55.63 ( 18) 8 18 SOUTHERN (AA)= 55.11 55.90 ( 17) 8 19 GATEWAY (AA)= 54.24 55.47 ( 19) 8 20 PATRIOT LEAGUE (AA)= 52.25 51.35 ( 20) 7 21 I-AA INDEPENDENTS (AA)= 49.53 49.61 ( 21) 5 22 OHIO VALLEY (AA)= 47.63 47.48 ( 22) 9 23 BIG SOUTH (AA)= 42.77 42.78 ( 24) 5 24 MID-EASTERN (AA)= 42.45 42.81 ( 23) 8 25 SOUTHWESTERN (AA)= 39.84 38.89 ( 25) 10 26 NORTHEAST (AA)= 38.81 38.55 ( 26) 8 27 PIONEER (AA)= 31.32 32.09 ( 27) 9 28 METRO ATLANTIC (AA)= 26.27 27.49 ( 28) 5 29 ***UNRATED*** (**)= -90.00 -90.00 ( 29) 1

Yeah, they were more overrated last year. I'll agree that they're still slightly overrated, as if you'll look at my fascinating weekly rankings thread, you'll see that I only have them at number nine, whereas the national polls have them ranked at six and seven. I'm just saying that they're comparable to Georgia and Tennessee this year, and that if you're comparing Oklahoma to Auburn, you can count the wins as pretty close to the same.

What's your point on Arkansas? They're a tough team at home. Georgia was one possession away from losing at Arkansas as well. Texas is a top ten team, just like Georgia and Tennessee.

That's the fun thing about being a Libertarian. When, I'm with a group of strong Kerry supporters, (like my job this summer), I can agree that Bush has been a ridiculously bad president, but when I'm with chiefly conservatives (like believe it or not, college this fall), I can agree that Kerry would probably be even worse. Fortunately, I'm strong enough in my views, that when someone asks me why I'm Libertarian, I can actually explain why, and show what parts of Bush's agenda are too far off from my worldview to support him.

I don't know. I've kinda got a feeling that Kerry's going to take the election. Those new ads he's got are probably the best ads run so far, and it might be enough to sway the last few undecided voters. I'm kind of anxious about the Kerry administration, as it seems that he's going to help drive the United States a little bit further into socialism, but on the other hand, he can't be that much worse of a president than Bush has been. I'm still slightly hoping for Bush to win, but if you gave me the choice of Bush winning the election, or Badnarik getting 10% of the vote, and the Libertarians picking up one or two seats in Congress, I'd take the latter.

Well, apparently it's not going to happen, but Angle coming to Raw is one of the few things that could actually make me want to watch Raw again. I can't stand watching his shitty angles on Smackdown (Luther Reigns drives me up a wall too), and Raw's too stale and boring for me to watch right now, but Angle on Raw sounds really interesting to me for some reason. If I was writing, I think it would be kind of tight for Angle to start his own heel faction on Raw that always tries to one up Evolution. i.e. Evolution beats down Orton and Jericho, so Angle's faction walks by Evolution on the ramp, Angle stares down HHH, before his faction comes down, and puts both of them through tables. To make the group, I'd start with a Shelton Benjain heel turn, for some semblance of continuity, and then Angle could add on maybe Val Venis or a heel William Regal to help fill out the faction.