iggymcfly

The Giants are fucking taking it. They already got the toughest game out of the way, beating Peavy, so it should be all downhill from here. Besides, when Tomko picks up the win tomorrow, the Padres are going to start to get demoralized about the way they're blowing the division, and then things will really go to hell for San Diego. Really, if the Padres want to win the division, they have to win tomorrow, or else the Giants will roll through the series, finish off the sweep, and then ultimately win the division at 79-83.

Iggy's Top 25, updated through the LSU/Tennessee game: (changes in bold with weekend interim ranking in parenthesis) 1. USC 2. Virginia Tech 3. Texas 4. Florida 5. Florida State (6) 6. Tennessee (12) 7. Michigan State 8. Ohio State 9. Georgia 10. Wisconsin 11. Miami 12. LSU (5) 13. Notre Dame 14. Minnesota 15. Arizona State 16. California 17. Alabama (18) 18. Iowa State (17) 19. Texas Tech 20. Boston College 21. Michigan 22. Purdue 23. Penn State 24. UCLA 25. Georgia Tech Quick explanation: The way I see it, Tennessee splitting road games with LSU and Florida is something that they should be rewarded, not punished for. And with the team coming together behind Clausen, the Vols look rejuvenated for a run at the SEC Title. Beating LSU on the road, especially in the fashion they did is 100 times more impressive than beating Iowa at home, and given that they never lost at home, I think they should definitely be above Ohio State. Finally, I think Michigan State's enough of an unproven commodity that they shouldn't be put above a proven Tennessee team just yet. If they beat Michigan this week, it might be a different story. As for LSU, they lost at home, which is something that you can't say about Miami right now, so I really can't justify putting them above the Hurricanes. The parallels with Notre Dame are obvious, (big road win followed by a big home loss), so that's more of a judgement call, but I think LSU's quality of opponents has been just a smidge higher. Finally, on Alabama and Iowa State, I made a minor error and I fixed it. The other rankings were interim and these ones are final, so I think that's fair.

All right! #7! BAM! I'm coming for the top spot; it's only a matter of time.

Matt Leinart is the most overrated player in all of sports. I'd say that you could take at least 30 or 40 QBs, replace him with them in the USC offense, and they all win the Heisman trophy. Replace Reggie Bush with anyone meanwhile, and USC doesn't win the Pac Ten.

And speaking of LSU, wow. They look unstoppable right now. CFN might be right about them being the second best team in the nation. If they keep this up, I could see them running the table, and unlike Va. Tech, they could actually pass Texas in the polls with their schedule.

Yeah, there's no way in hell the Jets are going to do anything now. Their season's over. I mean Brooks fucking Bollinger is starting at QB next week. I was honestly thinking 6 wins before this story, so now I'd say maybe 4-12 sounds reasonable. Oh, and I pray to god that the Jets don't end up with Leinart. If he didn't go to USC, he'd probably be a fourth or fifth rounder. He makes all kind of bad throws, and just gets his stats pumped up because Reggie Bush can take a three yard slant pattern and turn it into a 97 yard touchdown.

The huge Giants/Padres series starts tonight for the NL West. The Giants are four games back entering this four game series, so they still control their own destiny with a record of 73-82. They have to go against Peavy tonight, so I think that if they win this one, they've got a good chance to sweep the series and tie for the division lead. I honestly think they can do it. The Giants have gotten a huge emotional lift from getting Bonds back, and the Padres are still dicking around, just trying to win as many games as they lose. Furthermore, if the Giants do make up a 7.5 game lead in the last month of the season, it would give them a bigger lift that could allow them to actually go far in the playoffs. Mark my words, we could easily see an 87-88 Giants team representing the National League in the World Series this year.

No your rankings are. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I assume this is just a little cute snappy retort, based on absolutely nothing other than the fact that you know I rank college football teams. However, I challenge you to look through my rankings and find anything remotely as anamolous as ranking a team that doesn't belong in the top 100 in the Top 25 or Top 50 if you look at the poll as a whole. In fact, I challenge you to find anything wrong with them, other than teams being adjusted three or four spots based on subjective opinion. I swear to god they're better than any of the three major polls, or the rankings that CFN does. Oh, and for the record, my rankings aren't a poll since they're made up of one person's opinion rather than that of multiple people.

Actually, I agree that I might have made a mistake with Alabama. They should at least be above Iowa State, and maybe Cal as well. I've been trying to base it on this year' performance, which is why I don't have them too high, but they were my national sleeper before the year started, and I honestly believe that they'll beat Florida next week in Tuscaloosa. The way I see it, they'll probably go 10-1, win the SEC West, and then lose a rematch to Florida in the SEC Title game. And as for CFN, what surprised me is not just that they kept GT at 13, but that they only have VT at 6. I mean really, how do you reconcile that? Teams seven spots apart don't beat each other by 44 points. Either VT's awesome, and that's why they beat Ga. Tech so badly, or else the Jackets just aren't that good. Oh well, I guess they're still better than the Harris poll.

Oh my god! The national championship's going to be decided partially by a poll where Idaho got five points! 0-4 Idaho! Idaho that got shut out by Hawaii at home last week. This is the WORST POLL EVER! Honestly, I just can't believe some of the votes there. It's like the commercial they had for that video game a few years ago, where the voters have the giant dartboard with 117 teams, and they just vote for whichever one the dart hits. CFN may not have the most accurate rankings from 1-25, but from 1-119, they're about as good as they come, and they have Idaho ranked at 105. Supposedly, every voter's vote will be public in the Harris Poll, so I think they just need to find the people who voted for winless Idaho, find the people who voted for winless Syracuse, find the people who voted for 1-2 Arizona, and revoke their votes immediately.

If they run the table then they will remain #2 and recieve the bid to play in the National Title game. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> That's not a given either, with how well Virginia Tech is playing. If they go undefeated, I can't see how you would take Texas over them, given Va Tech is in the ACC and Texas is in a down Big XII. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Yeah but with Texas beating tOSU in Columbus and then they're probably going to go out there and roll through the Big XII(which does have some Top 25 teams) means that Texas will probably remain #2. Yes the Big XII is down this year but seriously....I try not to listen to this board about the Big XII b/c well it's a pretty anti-Big XII board. If we listened to the board then every team in the Big XII has never been good in their history and only win by facing weak opponents. Now I agree that the Big XII is down this year but even if they were all world beaters this board would still be down on them. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Wow, what a surprise. Damaramu follows up stupid generalizations with...........stupid generalizations. I have nothing against the Big XII at all. Two years ago, I was saying how Oklahoma and LSU deserved to be in the title game over USC because the Pac Ten was the worst major conference in college football. Then, the Cougars beat the Longhorns in the Holiday Bowl and I started to rethink things a little bit. Lo and behold, the Big XII does terrible the next year with no team in the North reasonably in the Top 50, and the South getting fat on the basis of the three free wins they got off them through the course of the season. After seeing how they compared to the newly improved Pac-Ten, I hypothesized that Oklahoma wouldn't be able to play with USC, and they proved me right losing by about 40 points. All of a sudden, the Big XII looks to be down going into this year, but I don't get impatient, I wait for results. Well, the results I get are as follows: Oklahoma, the supposed second best team in the conference loses to TCU and UCLA, and almost loses to Tulsa. Texas A&M, the supposed third best team, loses to a Clemson team that looks worse each week, and is currently 2-2. Texas still looks like one of the top teams in the country, but they won't play another Top 18 team for the rest of the year. Given that Virginia Tech and USC already look more impressive than Texas, it kind of seems like bullshit that the Hokies are likely to get screwed out of the title game unless USC picks up a loss, even though they beat (what was) a Top 15 team last week by 44 points, and they still have two games remaining against Top 12 teams. The fact is that the Big XII looks to be the worst it's been in it's history with one legitimate team (Texas), one team that looks kinda good, but whose only I-A non-conference game was at home against Florida International, and a bunch of teams that look like shit. The reason people rail against the Big XII is that it sucks, it's overrated champion screwed an undefeated team out of their chance at the title last year, and it looks like the same thing might happen again this year.

Yeah, the Minnesota/Notre Dame spot was the one I struggled with the most after Texas/Virginia Tech for #2. Finally, though, the way I see it is that Minnesota did what they were supposed to do, winning at home by the absolute narrowest of margins. Meanwhile, the Irish really accomplished something, picking up a big win over the Wolverines in Michigan Stadium, so the narrow home loss can be somewhat forgiven. However, the ranking is close enough that if Minnesota beat Penn State on the road, and the Notre Dame/Purdue game somehow got postponed, I'd move the Gophers up. Oh, and if you don't like Texas Tech, you'll love the rankings on collegefootballnews.com. They've currently got the Red Raiders at #26 behind teams like Clemson and Washington State.

Dama, your generalizations are really annoying. "Everyone" didn't complain about USC gettting screwed out of the title. From when the BCS title game was first announced, through the entire offseason, I maintained that USC didn't deserve to get into the title game, and that LSU was the rightful champion. Secondly, I didn't say that Cal got screwed by Texas (although they did play better in the regular season.) I said they got screwed by Pitt. We were discussing how the Big East no longer deserves an automatic BCS bid, and how teams like Cal, Boise, and Louisville should have filled out the Fiesta Bowl in favor of a 7-4 Pitt team. And also, the idea that college football will never have a playoff is silly. There are millions and millions of dollars just sitting on the table that the NCAA could have if they set up a playoff properly, and eventually they're going to fix it. You can say that it's been 100 years with no playoff, but that doesn't change the fact that there's been tons of movement to determine a fairer national champion in the last 15 years. Before 1992, there was no attempt whatsoever to have a real #1 vs. #2 championship game. The teams merely played through the regular season, played their bowl games based on conference ties, ans that was that. Then the Bowl coalition came together where a few major bowls offered to try and trade teams if it would make a #1 vs. #2 championship, but only if their own personal goals weren't compromised. For instance, the Big 8 champion and SEC Champion could not play each other in a bowl game. Then, in 1995, the Bowl Alliance was formed whereby the top two teams in the country would be pitted against each other no matter what, unless they were from the Big Ten or Pac Ten. Then, after the split championship between Michigan and Nebraska in 1997, the Rose Bowl came aboard as well, forming the BCS, whereby the top two teams would play for the national title, regardless of conference affiliation. Given that the system has changed three times over the last 15 years, and the college presidents narrowly shot down a vote to add a championship game after the bowls before the Auburn controversy, there's no reason to think that the system won't change somewhat in the near future. If another undefeated team does get left out, and college football fans do keep bitching, eventually some sort of a playoff will take place. Maybe it will be a four team playoff in 2012, and then become an eight team playoff in 2030, but eventually, change will come.

I'm bored, and I figured I'd do my rankings while the week's games are still fresh in my (and everyone else's) minds. Also, I'm feeling pretty good about college football right now, since I went 10-2 on my sports bets, winning all my large bets and only losing a couple minor ones. Since I know that simple rankings are a little dry, I also decided to add a little commentary. (Previous week's ranking is in parenthesis.) 1. USC 3-0 (1) Despite an early hiccup, the Trojans looked to be everything they were advertised to be against Oregon. USC pretty much made as many mistakes as they possibly could, and they still won by 32 points. If they're actually on their game, USC will be completely unstoppable. 2. Virginia Tech 4-0 (5) This is a close call between VT and Texas, but at this point, the Hokies just are too dominant to ignore. GT established themselves as major players against Auburn, and VT treated them like a I-AA team. The Hokies have only given up 7 points in their last 3 games, and the offense is getting better by the week. If anyone can beat USC, it's Virginia Tech. 3. Texas 3-0 (2) The Longhorns are still an extremely good team, and could easily end up in the Rose Bowl. The road win over Ohio State is far and away the most impressive victory by any team in the country this year if you merely look at the quality of the opponent, and ignore how well they played in the victory. However, Vince Young does make mistakes in the passing game, and Texas just doesn't seem to be at the clinical level of precision that VT is at this point. 4. Florida 4-0 (3) Florida's offense had their most impressive outing of the year against Kentucky rolling up 49 points in the first half. This team looks like they're coming together week by week, and getting even better as the year goes on. If they can get by Alabama in Tuscaloosa next week, they could finish the season at 12-0. 5. LSU 1-0 (4) The Tigers did have a great win against Arizona State who's looking better by the week. However, it's hard to completely evaluate them on the basis of one performance. Monday's game against Tennessee should go a long way toward showing just how legitimate the Tigers are. 6. Florida State 3-0 (6) The Seminoles are sort of flying under the radar as a Rose Bowl candidate, but they might have the most impressive two victories of any team in the country. Defeating Miami and Boston College on the road is enough to show that the Seminoles are back in a big way. 7. Michigan State 4-0 (7) Michigan State showed their win over Notre Dame wasn't a fluke, following it up with a 61-17 pasting of Ron Zook's Illinois squad. They appear to have the best offense in the Big Ten, and if their defense can keep pace, even reasonably well, they have a great shot to win the conference. 8. Ohio State 3-1 (12) The Buckeyes finally got a big win, absolutely destroying Iowa in the Horseshoe. Still, they do have a home loss, and that's going to be hard to get past if the Buckeyes want to be legitimate Rose Bowl contenders. 9. Georgia 4-0 (9) The Bulldogs opened the season with a bang, dissecting a highly ranked Boise State team 48-13. However, since then, the Boise State win has looked less and less impressive, and Georgia has been a little sluggish as well, barely getting by South Carolina, and then grinding their way past Mississippi State. The Dawgs defense has been consistently strong, which should be enough to keep them a contender in the SEC, but until they play a big name program, it's going to be difficult to tell just how good this Georgia team is. 10. Wisconsin 4-0 (17) Early in the season, the Badgers showed off their offense looking great against sub-par competition, and this Saturday, they followed it up with a huge quality win, defeating Michigan in Camp Randall. They get to skip Ohio St. and MSU this year, so if Wisconsin can win at Minnesota, they just might cruise towards a Big Ten title. 11. Miami 2-1 (11) If Miami had gotten one or two kicks to go their way against FSU, or played the Seminoles at home, they might be an undefeated Top 5 squad right now. As it is, they still have a great chance to win the ACC, and have to be considered one of the top programs in college football. 12. Tennessee 1-1 (13) This is another tricky case, as Tennessee's only games have been a too-close win against UAB and a two possession loss in the Swamp. If they want to get their season back on track, they need a win at LSU in a big way. 13. Notre Dame 3-1 (14) The Fighting Irish looked very unimpressive against UW, and one has to wonder if their win over Michigan was somewhat of a fluke. Still, a big-time road victory is a big-time road victory, and going 3-1 with their early schedule should be rewarded. Also, one has to expect the Irish to improve over the course of the season, as the players adapt to Charlie Weis's new system. 14. Minnesota 4-0 (22) The win over Purdue was absolutely huge for the Minnesota program, as it shows that the Gophers might finally be able to make "the leap" to being an elite Big Ten program. The Gophers showed great heart coming back from a late deficit to win in double OT. Still, one has to wonder if they could have made that comeback going into the teeth of a hostile crowd. They're going to have to prove themselves on the road before they can be considered a Top Ten program. 15. Arizona State 3-1 (19) The Sun Devils have looked great the last couple weeks, posting double digit victories against Northwestern and at Oregon State. Their home date against USC next week might be the toughest test the Trojans face all year. 16. California 4-0 (18) The Golden Bears have done well to maintain composure in the face of numerous injuries, but they still haven't really been tested. They do have a couple weeks to get healthy before they get into the heart of the Pac-Ten schedule, but their current level of play won't be enough against teams like USC. 17. Iowa State 3-0 (16) The Cyclones are still undefeated, but they played about as bad of a game as they could have against Army and really need to play better against Nebraska next week. It's starting to look like the big win over Iowa might have been more a result of the Hawkeyes' incompetence than a great deal of improvement from ISU. 18. Alabama 4-0 (20) Yes, Alabama looked rather weak against Arkansas, but the Crimson Tide just aren't the kind of team to blow out a mediocre opponent. Their big win at South Carolina was much more indicative of their actual talent level, and if they don't make too many mistakes, they're definitely good enough to beat Florida next week. 19. Texas Tech 3-0 (23) Sure, it would be nice if they played a real opponent, but it's hard to fault what Texas Tech's done thus far. Their offense is perenially one of the best in the country, and if they can get their defense to hold up, even a little bit, there's no reason the Red Raiders can't be a BCS squad. 20. Boston College 3-1 (NR) The Eagles followed up a tough loss aganst FSU with an incredibly gritty road win at Clemson. They may not be able to overtake the Seminoles for the division lead, but they're showing themselves to be a solid bowl team nevertheless. 21. Michigan 2-2 (22) It's tough to give a very good ranking to a two-loss team at this point of the year, especially when one of those losses was at home. Still though, the Wolverines played about as badly as they could against Notre Dame, and still nearly pulled off the late victory, and likely could have beaten Wisconsin had they played them at home. It's way too early to write off Michigan in their quest to repeat as Big Ten champion. 22. Purdue 2-1 (21) The Boilermakers certainly didn't want to lose their Big Ten opener to their perennial whipping boys from Minnesota. However, the loss isn't that bad. If they'd stopped the two-point conversion at the end of regulation, or the fourth and goal in the first overtime, they would still be undefeated. When they lose a road game by that close of a margin to a Top 15 team, it's hard to punish the Boilermakers too much. 23. Penn State 4-0 (NR) Penn State kept their winning streak going, getting an impressive road win against Northwestern. They're still a big win from being serious Big Ten title contenders, but they've done everything they need to do thus far. Also, the opening win against South Florida looks much better after the way the Bulls dismantled Louisville. 24. UCLA 3-0 (NR) I'm not giving Oklahoma credit for beating a real team, so there isn't really a big win for UCLA thus far. However, in every game they have played, the Bruins have won by at least 17 points, so they're certainly doing their part to establish themselves during their non-conference slate. 25. Georgia Tech 3-1 (10) Yes, the Yellow Jackets got absolutely massacred by Virginia Tech. Murdered, destroyed, whatever descriptive verb you want to use. Still though, this is the second best team in the country that did this to them, and it doesn't necessarily mean that GT isn't a good football team. Sometimes, certain teams are so great that they can take a good team and just absolutely terrorize them, just like the Hokies did today. If the Jackets don't let this game get to them emotionally, they could still finish the season somewhere around 8-3 and go to a good bowl game.

Yeah, it would be stupid to give out another automatic conference-tied bid. The point is to open up the bids to all of college football, so that when there is a deserving team out there like Cal or Boise State last year, they don't miss out in favor of a team like Pitt that gets in for no reason other than the fact that they consistently play crappy teams in their shitty conference.

This is why ABC fucks over those of us that actually give a shit about good college football. From one of their polls: Which is the best college football game this week: Georgia Tech at Virginia Tech 12.0% Iowa at Ohio State 18.6% Notre Dame at Washington 15.5% Tennessee at Florida 33.9% USC at Oregon 19.8% I don't know what's more asinine, that ND/UW got more votes than GT/VT or that a game that isn't even being played this week got 33.9% of the vote. I give up; really I do.

155. We have a great show for you tonight. Oh, who am I kidding. Tonight's show is terrible. Just do yourself a favor and turn off the television right now.

Wow, I missed two episodes in a row. I don't think I did that once all through Season 2, and I certainly didn't in Season 1 once I caught on to what a good show it was. It wasn't completely intentional, I was off playing poker, but I didn't even remember it was on until someone made a joke about it at the table, and even then, I wasn't into it enough to leave the game. Considering how much TV I've been watching lately, you'd think I'd make time for the OC. I guess that first episode just turned me off that much. I'm not giving up though. I will try to catch the show for sure next week, as if they can just catch a little bit of the spark they had before, it will be worth it.

I can't believe everyone's focusing on the White Sox "collapse". They still have the second best record in baseball, and they've known they were going to make the postseason for about three months now. Sure, Cleveland might catch them for the division, but there's no way they're going to slip below both Boston and New York. Now if you want a collapse, I think the Red Sox would be much more appropriate. Not only did they lose a large divisional lead, but they have no wild card to fall back on either. Going from the defending World Series to missing the postseason because of a mediocre August and September, now that's a legendarily fun collapse.

If you think you were pissed last year, just wait until the end of this season. I honestly believe that USC, Texas, and Louisville are all going to be undefeated, and I think you can guess which one of those three won't be making it to the Rose Bowl. In fact, the way it's set up, an undefeated Louisville would likely be going to the Fiesta Bowl to face the very worst BCS team remaining. It will be just like it was for Utah last year except that no team as crappy as Pitt is likely to qualify for a BCS game this year. The lack of a playoff does piss me off, as an 8-team tournament at the end of the year with every team that currently qualifies for the BCS involved would be absolutely huge, and is the only fair way to determine a national champion. However, even with the flaws in that manner, I still can't bring myself to care about the NFL anywhere near as much as I do about college football. I think that in about four or five years, they're going to throw us a bone with a de-facto four team playoff matching the top 2 teams after the bowls, but a real playoff is still a long ways off.

130. Because Conan O'Brien has the best hair in the history of late night talk shows. 131. Conan goes twice as long, and still has better material. 132. Conan's monologue doesn't consist of 10 minutes of making fun of Bush every week 133. Conan does his own skits. 134. Only Conan would think to make a running joke out of a goofy-looking audience member for the whole first half-hour of his show. 135. Conan's been going for over ten years, has been through multiple presidents, and still hasn't run out of material. 136. Because TSMers prefer Conan to Jon Stewart by an overall margin of 23-2 according to latest poll results.

They never do that any more; it really pisses me off. Last week, I kept going over to the last couple minutes of the UCLA/Oklahoma game in hopes that they'd switch over to Clemson/Miami. Not only did they not switch over during the game, they didn't switch afterward either. Instead, they went straight to an infomercial for some weight loss show called Billy's Booty Burning Party or something. The only way I even got to see any footage of the overtimes was through the "live look-ins" on ESPNEWS.

Wow, I figured Conan would be ahead, but not by this much. It makes you wonder how NBC can be stupid enough to leave Leno in the 11:30 spot when Conan's obviously so much more popular.

Fuck yeah! Moises Alou's the man! I'm just watching on Gamecast because it's not televised, but anyway, he hit a 3-run homer in the top of the 9th to give the Giants a 4-2 lead. If they hold on and the Padres don't come back, SF will move within 5 games of first in the NL West tonight. Go Giants!

The other thread about why Conan's better than Jon Stewart made me think of this. I was thinking that at this point, Conan's surpassed the shows with better time slots in terms of popularity, although just by how much is open to interpretation. I figured that posting this poll would give me an idea of how many people, if any, still prefer the traditional alternatives.