iggymcfly

Bullshit. Everyone remembers that they won a title, and beyond that they don't really remember much. Unless the title's split or disputed in some way, (something like Michigan and Nebraska), everybody remembers national titles about the same, regardless of how good the team was or whether they were favored going into the game.

Not necessarily. If they go undefeated (which they should with their schedule), they're almost guaranteed a Rose Bowl berth, and I'm pretty sure the way they're judged will depend on what happens there. Unless they pull an Oklahoma against USC or pull a Texas against Oklahoma, they should be remembered very well. And by the way, what kind of a Sooner fan are you? I can see cheering for the conference when Texas plays Ohio State, but feeling bad that Texas won't be remembered well? That's just weird.

Get off your goddamn high horse.

The Huskers' demise isn't permanent. As soon as Callahan's recruits are ready to start, the West Coast offense will become effective, and Nebraska will be back on top of the Big XII North.

I don't buy that. Maybe it's true for some people. But I'd say the idiots who make statements like "So-and-So is CLEARLY one of the top 10 workers in the past 15 years" don't want that to mean "only in the WWE". <{POST_SNAPBACK}> He's right. When you've got people saying HBK is one of the best workers of all time, they clearly mean in all of wrestling. When they've never seen anything outside of WWE such a statement only looks more foolish than it already does. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Since you're obviously referring to me, I'll just say that I did mean Top 10 in North America. By no means do I consider myself qualified to evaluate puro.

OK, so as I said before, I don't make any official rankings until everyone in the country has at least had a chance to play. I did screw around with some preseason rankings just for fun this year, but these are Iggy's first official rankings since after the Orange Bowl last year. I'm still trying to lean these rankings toward actual accomplishments, but I'm also taking the general talent of the team into account a little more than before. 1. USC 1-0 2. Texas 2-0 3. LSU 1-0 4. Florida 2-0 5. Virginia Tech 2-0 6. Georgia 2-0 7. Florida State 2-0 8. Notre Dame 2-0 9. Tennessee 1-0 10. Georgia Tech 2-0 11. Ohio State 1-1 12. Wisconsin 2-0 13. California 2-0 14. Miami 0-1 15. Michigan 1-1 16. Iowa State 2-0 17. Louisville 1-0 18. Arizona State 1-1 19. Purdue 1-0 20. Utah 2-0 21. Clemson 2-0 22. Minnesota 2-0 23. UTEP 1-0 24. Texas Tech 1-0 25. Auburn 1-1 Comments, compliments, even criticisms are welcome.

Seconded. Some nasty shit there. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> What the hell are you talking about. It's like drinking Root Beer and maple syrup. Honestly, it goes down easier than just about any shot I can think of.

I've got a better idea. How about we banish Black Lushus to the HD folder for two weeks for making an annoying off-topic request that doesn't even make any sense.

After they got screwed out of their title shot last year after going 12-0, I think it's only fair to keep them in the Top 25 after one loss. They still do have plenty of talent on defense and in the passing game, and I see them probably ending up somewhere around 7-4 or 8-3 and getting a decent bowl bid. And as for Tennessee, I'm not about to give them extra credit because they "historically play bad against shitty teams". If they want to be ranked ahead of an Irish team that went into Michigan Stadium and won or a Georgia team that absolutely dominated Boise State, and then beat South Carolina in the SEC opener, they better do something to earn it. I mean if they go into the Swamp and beat Florida, I'd be glad to move them up to #3 or #4, but for now, I just don't see them as deserving of that high of a rank.

That was the time when he thought he was going to have to retire due to injury. Now, that he's recovered, he's not retired. I mean, honestly, he's been doing a full-time schedule for over three years now.

Edited. You're a schmuck. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> HBK's not retired, dumb fuck.

So basically, you're argument isn't that HBK's too old to beat Cena; it's that he's too small. If you were talking about Batista or Brock Lesnar, I might be able to see that argument, but Cena really doesn't look all that strong. I don't think that the WWE fanbase would see that as a mismatch based on size at all. I mean Angle looks bigger and tougher than Cena, and no one complained that Angle/HBK was a mismatch due to size, and that it was unbelievable for HBK to compete with him. I think HBK/Cena would work just fine. Besides, if I was booking, and HBK had beat Hogan at Summerslam, I still wouldn't have him go over Cena clean at Unforgiven. If HBK's going to work as a legitimate heel over the next few months, the fans have to have some reason to think he's undeserving. I probably would have tried to lay out the match somewhat like Rock/Jericho from No Mercy 2001. Go ahead and let HBK play the face for the early part of the match since he'd get cheered over Cena anyway, and then at the end, let him realize that he can't put Cena down with Sweet Chin Music, and that he needs to cheat to get the job done.

How about this. If the build's right, then older wrestlers can beat younger wrestlers. However, retired wrestlers that look like they're 60 shouldn't beat people that the WWE could potentially build a brand around. Is that simple enough?

My point's simple as is the comparison. In professional athletics, athletes usually compete well through their early 40s, but almost never compete even at the lowest levels in their 50s. Thus, in the WWE (which pretends to be an athletic endeavor), it is reasonable and realistic for someone in their 40s to be on top, but not so for someone in their 50s, especially someone whose body is as obviously broken down as Hulk Hogan. He looks much worse than Shawn Michaels, and I have even talked to friends who wouldn't believe that he was under 60. Furthermore, the other important point which I didn't even get into is that Hulk Hogan is a retired wrestler. For him to come in and build himself up by winning a PPV main event does nothing to help the WWE because he won't be wrestling again for the next six months. Meanwhile, HBK had a well-built character, and could have easily carried Raw for the next six months if he hadn't been jobbed out.

I kind of suspected that they were overrated to begin with, and then they almost lost to UAB in their only game this year. I'd say putting them at #9 is a gift at this point.

Your argument is flawed. If you look at professional athletes from almost any major sport, their competitive age is from about 18-20 lasting to about 40-45. However, after the age of 45, their skill level drops off dramatically, and they are no longer able to compete at the top level in their sport. Take Roger Clemens for instance. He is the best pitcher in all of baseball right now, and he's 43 years old. He's older than HBK, still able to pitch at the absolute top of his sport. However, if you look at how many 52 year olds there are on major league rosters, the answer is zero. In fact, if you look at how many 52 year olds, there have been on major league rosters in the past 50 years, it's still zero. HBK beating Cena isn't any less believable than Roger Clemens striking out Jason Bay. However, the idea that a 52 year old man who can barely walk is able to outfight any top-level wrestler is insulting both to the character and the viewer, and really damages the product.

Michigan lost at home. Simple as that. I'd count that little factor as being more important than whether Michigan eked out a win over NIU along the way. And I certainly didn't mean to imply that Texas was a bad loss for OSU, I was just saying that I don't really feel good about putting a team with a home loss in the Top Ten in the second week of the season. In a way, rankings are almost like a ladder structure to determine who plays for the national title, and a team that blew their big opportunity at home shouldn't be ahead of a team that's already accomplished something like Georgia Tech or Georgia. As for the argument that Clemson shouldn't be ranked ahead of Miami right now, I can buy it, and if I was still doing rankings completely on this year's performance, I might have Miami down that low. However, the fact is that it's still about a week or two too early to be completely objective right now, and that's why I brought up that I was including the talent of the teams in the ranking at least somewhat. I just really don't believe that Clemson will beat Florida State or Miami this year, and at least at this point, I think Miami should keep their spot. If Clemson wants to move up, all they have to do is pick up the home win against Miami next Saturday. And while we're at it, are two and three point wins over Texas A&M and Maryland really any better than a three point road loss to Florida State? I'm not sure that they are.

Wait a minute, on that list of traits, the only one you're going to call HBK great at is bumping? Who paces a match better than Shawn Michaels? I'd say probably no one in the last ten years. His story telling is likewise awesome whether he's doing a simple match to see who's the best against Shelton Benjamin or an all out war against someone like Diesel or Undertaker. His moveset's not what it one was, but before the back injury, it was one of the best in the business. Honestly, on that list the only quality that Shawn suffers on is psychology. Everyone has some weakness; it doesn't mean they're not a great worker. For instance, Bret Hart's moveset was limited at times, but he excelled in the other categories and he was still a great worker. Likewise, Benoit's pacing is off a little bit, and so was Flair's believability. That doesn't mean that all those men haven't put on mountainloads of tremendous matches, and it doesn't mean they're not all great workers. I don't know quite how narrow your definition of "great" is, but to say that Shawn's anything less than one of the top ten workers of the last 15 years is just completely wrong.

Hogan was a 40-year old balding once-retired guy in 1993. He still had some mileage left then to be a top-level wrestler. 12 years later, when he can hardly walk, wrestles three to four times a year, and does a reality show where he's portrayed as a crazy old man, he no longer has that mileage. The fact is that if you job to Hogan at this stage of his career, it means you're a joke. If the best worker/most entertaining character on the show is made to look like a joke, it hurts the product. Simple as that.

Maybe the AP shouldn't drop the Buckeyes out of the Top Ten since they were so sold on OSU and Texas to begin with, but to be honest, I wasn't. I was thinking that OSU was probably only about 7 or 8 last week, and then they lost to Texas at home. The fact that they didn't defend their home turf made me look at them a lot more critically than if they'd lost on the road. The fact is that at this point in the season, all we have to go on is one or two games, and if one of those is a home loss, I can't really justify putting said team in the Top Ten. Likewise, Notre Dame's two games consisted of a dominating road win against Pitt and then another road win over what was universaly considered a Top 5 football team. If you're going on performance, it's pretty hard not to put the Irish in the Top Ten right now. As for Miami, I know they've lost their only game right now, and I put them a slot lower than the AP and coaches ended up doing, but do you really think that someone like Clemson should be favored over them right now? I mean the fact is that they're still one of the better teams in the ACC even if they did have a close loss at FSU. It seems like every year the Noles and the Hurricanes always play ugly, and then by the end of the year, at least one of them's in a BCS bowl. Also, if FSU just beat Miami for the first time in 7 tries, I'm thinking they've got a little better squad then usual. More to the point, who would you put ahead of them? They may have struggled with Miami, but that's better than struggling with UAB (Tennessee) or North Carolina (Georgia Tech). I maybe could have swapped them with Irish, putting ND at seven and FSU at eight, but to be honest, the ND/Michigan game was just as ugly as the FSU/Miami game. At this point, I think the rankings are pretty solid.

Oh, bullshit. There's no way you can make the "cocky heel that thinks he's the biggest icon in the history of the business" character work if he loses his first big PPV match to a 52 year old retired wrestler. The loss is what took HBK off the table as a viable opponent for Cena at Unforgiven. The fact is that HBK was incredibly fresh, and the character change had everyone forgetting all the jobs that HBK's done over the last two or three years, and instantly buying him as an absolute top-level main eventer. The loss to Hogan just killed all that momentum dead, and basically forced Shawn to abandon the character and go back to being a face. As for a seven month reign for HBK crippling the business for good, that doesn't even make sense. If anything's going to cripple business, it's going to be continuing Cena's boring reign. Back when Vince was actually on the pulse of the fans, he'd anticipate an act getting cold, and move the belt to the fresh act before the fans had even fully made up their minds. However, right now we have Cena getting booed on PPV with the fans slowly but surely turning on him, and what does Vince do? He takes the only heel act with enough momentum to actually carry the belt and he kills it dead. Pushing HBK to the moon would have been the best thing Vince could have done. With the move to USA looming, he could have brought Raw back to the land of consistent 4.0+ ratings, but I can't really see anyone jumping on the bandwagon with Cena as champ. Honestly, I can't even watch Raw in front of my friends with that stupid fag as a face champ. To put it in the words of an intelligent person who hasn't watched wrestling in a couple years, (in this case, Bill Simmons from ESPN.com): Battling for the WWE title: Chris Jericho and champ John Cena, known for his mediocre rapping, a truly mediocre catch phrase ("Come get some!") and a finishing move called "The F.U." He's like a younger, watered-down version of Stone Cold Steve Austin, with a little Vanilla Ice thrown in. Needless to say, the crowd seems a little lukewarm on him. And I'm downright lukecold. That right there is the exact feeling of anyone over the age of 14 who might be mildly interested in wrestling if it weren't so damn boring right now.

Amen to that. At this point, if you don't have USC or Texas on your schedule, you're pretty much fucked as far as controlling your own destiny. My Cougs aren't going to win at USC unless Reggie Bush gets drugged or something, but at least they have the chance. I could totally see someone like Florida or Virginia Tech going undefeated and getting screwed out of the national title game again. In fact, how funny and ironic would it be if Urban Meyer coached an undefeated team two years in a row without one national title to show for it. It could totally happen.

Edited for accuracy/spelling.

Hey, Georgia Tech's moving up, it's only just starting now with the 10-9 win. It's tough to pick games when you haven't even seen the teams play yet, but once I've seen what's going on, I'm unstoppable. Trust me, I'm going to be back in the Top Ten in no time.

Why would WWE *ever* do something as stupid as this? I mean obviously they are stupid, but this is beyond even the stupidest humans. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Agreed. Shawn winning the WWE Championship at this point in his career would be a huge step back for WWE. Shawn should be making stars at this point, as should other WWE veterans who shall remain nameless. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Why would it be a step back? If heel HBK wins the title, we have the best in-ring performer, and the best mic worker in the WWE as champion. As it is, they're continuing to push a stale worker who's terrible in the ring, and is poor enough on the mic that a heel Jericho got cheered over him at Summerslam. If you want HBK to make new stars, then give him a seven month title reign and let RVD beat him clean at Wrestlemania. All that a loss to Hogan does is kill the hottest act in the WWE dead, and make the discerning fan turn off the product altogether.