The COVID Season

Much to my surprise the 2020 COVID season has been better than I expected. I thought for sure it would have been cancelled by now. I was way off. It appears we'll even crown a champion - albeit with an asterisk.

This COVID season has really turned into a competition of not only game planning and execution, but also maintaining the health of the players and coaches. Teams that took care of the COVID side of things have been able to play their games and get exposure. Others, PAC-12 and BIG-10, really won't get a real season given their late start and then COVID issue to boot. That has hurt their chances at being part of the playoff.

But 2020 has allowed some other teams to get a little more air time (Cincinnati, BYU, Liberty, Coastal Carolina). We'll never know if they would have shined in a normal year but they did show enough Ws and team health to be in the conversation.

Do those teams deserve a shot? Yes - they do. Even in the BCS era undefeated Boise State and Hawaii and others were given their shot in BCS bowls. There's no reason we should not consider these non-Power 5 teams. They did what other teams didn't (schedule, wongames, stayed healthy) and we all want to know if they can hang with the big guys or not. Give 'em their chance to prove themselves.

BYU - Sure, it hasn't been the schedule they wanted but they put together a 10-game schedule and then executed at a high level. Regardless of the strength of your competition if you can execute with accuracy like they have, and on both sides of the ball, then you got something good going on.

GEORGIA - The Dawgs just weren't ready for this year. What we fans thought would be another SEC-East championship year at the least started out slow and worrisome. Bama and UF took advantage of the early and evident weaknesses. But, it looks like they'll end on a good note and high hopes for next year given the youth of the team.

2020 - What a Mess

To play or not to play? Risk player's health - and that of their coaches and staff? Or, cancel the season along with the players' dreams? Risk the financial foundation of college sports and of the many who rely on college sports to support their business?

There is no right answer as of this writing. Only Father Time has the answer, and he'll hold off for now. We'll know in a few months which schools made the right decision and which didn't.

2019 Season Wrap-Up

They got it right this time. The right four teams in the playoff. The right bowl matchups. The right Heisman winner.

Overall - we naysayers have little to fuss about this past season. Sure we can rant about the overrated teams (Penn State, Utah, Minnesota) and who really had the toughest schedule (Bama?) or even the final rankings (why was Georgia so high). But "they" really are getting better at putting together the playoff and I hope it continues.

Some great bowl games
BYU-Hawaii was fun with the Warriors taking a quick 14-0 lead only to be held nearly scoreless the 2nd half by BYUs defense. BYU pulled ahead but then made some odd calls down the stretch as if they wanted to give Hawai'i a shot - and Hawai'i took it to pull out the W.

Georgia payed better than last year's flat bowl loss to Texas. Maybe they manned-up about losing out on the playoff and went out and did what they should of done last year. It was their best game since early-season.

Speaking of Texas, they may stumble during the season but their past two bowl outings have been dominant wins over Georgia and Utah. And somethin' just ain't right  at Utah. For Whittingham to have his worst games in the Pac-12 Championship and then not be able to nullify that loss with a solid bowl win is just very un-Utah like. There must be something else going on behind the scenes...


The playoff games were a blast, as they have been the past few years. Usually in a blow-out win like LSU over Oklahoma I stop watching in the 3rd quarter. But I couldn't look away - LSU was just too good to not keep watching. And the Clemson-Ohio State back-and-forth even kept my wife interested!

Weird seeing Alabama out of the playoff but they took care of business as expected. The SEC in general did, winning 8 of 10 bowl appearances. The PAC-12 didn't live up to its "yea but we play each other" hype as evidenced in a 4-3 bowl season. And the Big 12 with one win, just one?

The Championship Game
Once LSU figured out the Clemson defense there was no stopping them. Kudos to Clemson for controlling early and confusing the LSU offense from the start - they did their homework. But championship teams are the ones best at making in-game adjustments and the LSU coaching staff did just that to perfection. Clemson tried to do the same but simply had no chance once LSU got rolling. What a great overall team - coaches and players and fans. Congrats!

Strength of Schedule Rant

Sure - college football is a business and no business is going to make their work any harder than necessary. But all businesses are subject to all types of unexpected swings in the economy, consumer confidence, competitors, and the "easy wins" and the end result of those swings - good or bad.

Clemson, Alabama and others, are being faulted for their lack of schedule strength when compared to teams like LSU. But is it by design? Did Clemson plan for the entire ACC to have a down year? Did Bama plan their light schedule?

The upside to playing cupcakes is three-fold: A high number in the W column, less chance of injury to your starters (because you can play the 4th and sometimes 3rd quarter with back-ups), and thus your backups get enough reps to step in when actually needed.

The downside is you are plagued with endless Twitter comments about your cupcake schedule, and in today's playoff system you risk getting a lower ranking by a team with less but stronger wins. And that is probably right - the teams that toughed it out against stronger opponents spent more time planning and practicing and took more risks than you did.

A pretty big risk when your fan base / boosters / TV contracts expect championships.

Most teams are locked into mostly conference games but have leeway with their non-conference schedule. That leeway can help or hinder your playoff chances. But you don't know and simply cannot predict how your conference or even your non-conference opponents will be year-to-year. Remember App State over MIchigan? And how many others like that?

Now I'm a fan on big teams playing lesser teams on occasion. Why? It gives the little guy some time on the big stage, it gives the teams with fewer boosters much needed money to improve their facilities, and it gives the fans something to talk about on the rare occasion when the cupcake takes down the big cheese.

If you want to play with the big boys (playoff teams) then schedule accordingly. If you just want wins and a decent bowl then schedule accordingly. It's your business and like any business the payout depends on the calculated risks you take and the amount of real work you put into the game. Remember: It's a game and an easy win really isn't that much fun.

Start It Up

Here we go again with the same old rants (and it's really kind of fun and practically tradition) - SEC bias, strength of schedule, they haven't played anybody, they had that one bad loss, quality wins, style points, etc. etc.

Alabama has no business in the top four after yesterday. They hung with LSU...as did Florida and as did Auburn. Bama is indeed a Top 10 team but they should not be in the CFP discussion. They will not win their conference, have no quality wins, their defense gave up 46 points, and the one game they needed to win they didn't - at home.

And unless Georgia wins out, they should not be ranked as high as they are. Georgia has a lot of good players in place but they are not on the LSU/Bama/Clemson level. Maybe not even the OSU level (as much as that pains me to say).

My Top 10 picks given the current situation would be as follows. Of course, the OSU/Minnesota and the LSU/Georgia things will work themselves out in the next month.

1. LSU (will win out)
2. Ohio State (likely to win out -but I'm tired of them scoring style points to make up for their moderate schedule)
3. Clemson (likely to win out)
4. Minnesota (may have to play OSU)
5. Oklahoma (should win out)
6. Alabama (will not win their conference and will have no quality wins except maybe Auburn)
7. Georgia (must win out and then play LSU; win the SEC and they should be in the mix even with the 1-loss)
8. Oregon (will have to face Utah and look impressive from here on out; no quality wins)
9. Utah (will have to face Oregon and look impressive from here on out; no quality wins)
10. Penn State (outside looking in for a shot at the conference title)