Tuesday in November, baby! Can't wait to get mad online about committee rankings tonight.
ICYMI:
- Women's basketball got a glimpse at greatness last night, but fell to No. 1 Connecticut 100-56.
- Ohio State issued a clear bag policy for Michigan State game. If you're going, plan for extra time to get through security.
BAMA HYPE TRAIN REAL LIT. Alabama pinwheeled Mississippi State on Saturday — you know the Bulldogs are legit because their previous two losses were against SEC teams — and the Crimson Tide is back on top of the sport — or the betting odds, at least.
| SCHOOL | 11/9/15 OODS | CURRENT ODDS |
|---|---|---|
| ALABAMA | 5/2 | 12/5 |
| OHIO STATE | 5/2 | 11/4 |
| CLEMSON | 9/2 | 15/4 |
| NOTRE DAME | 16/1 | 9/1 |
| OKLAHOMA | 20/1 | 12/1 |
| OKLAHOMA STATE | 20/1 | 12/1 |
| FLORIDA | 16/1 | 14/1 |
| IOWA | 25/1 | 22/1 |
| TEXAS CHRISTIAN | 40/1 | 25/1 |
| MICHIGAN STATE | 40/1 | 40/1 |
| BAYLOR | 16/1 | 50/1 |
| MICHIGAN | 100/1 | 66/1 |
| NORTH CAROLINA | 75/1 | 66/1 |
| HOUSTON | 250/1 | 100/1 |
| LSU | 25/1 | OFF THE BOARD |
| STANFORD | 16/1 | OFF THE BOARD |
| UTAH | 75/1 | OFF THE BOARD |
The Alabama love doesn't stop there.
From espn.com:
Ed Salmons, head football oddsmaker at the SuperBook, says he would make Alabama a "3- or 4-point favorite" over Ohio State right now on a neutral field. Salmons moved the Crimson Tide into the role of favorite because they appear to have an easier path to the playoff than the defending champion Buckeyes.
Ohio State fans will be quick to point to the result of the the 2015 Sugar Bowl, but sadly we're talking about two different teams.
As an Ohio State fan, I hope the rush to the Alabama bandwagon continues. Should both teams make the playoffs, let's hope the committee puts Alabama, who might be America's best team ever, on the other side of the bracket.
DECKER TALKS IRISH FLIP. Taylor Decker reminded us Monday of a bizarre moment in Ohio State recruiting history: Jim Bollman, then-offensive coordinator at Ohio State in 2011, did not offer the four-star product from Butler High School.
Thanks to the cold shoulder from the school for which he grew up cheering, Decker ended up at Notre Dame. After Urban Meyer landed in Columbus, he poached then-Notre Dame offensive line coach Ed Warinner for the same position in Columbus.
Decker soon followed. And while Warinner and Decker had a bond, the 6'8" OT would've reached out to any new coach regardless. That's how deep his love for Ohio State ran.
From cleveland.com:
Decker would have reached out to any new coach at Ohio State because that's the program for which he wanted to play. Meyer ended up taking the job and liked what he saw from Decker on film, but Decker would have reached out to anyone.
Warinner promised Kelly when he left Notre Dame that he wouldn't try to recruit any of the Notre Dame commits. Warinner kept his word and didn't recruit Decker as a new member of the Buckeyes staff. That was all Meyer.
"It was kind of like a perfect storm," Decker said. "Coach Meyer said, Give me one day. Come up here and visit one day, If you don't like it, I'll leave you alone. Tell me you don't like it, I'll leave you alone, I won't bother you and you can go to Notre Dame.'"
Meyer poached Warinner, Tim Hinton, and a top Ohioan OT prospect from Brian Kelly's nose in the process of two months. Whew, you know ol' purple boy was salty over that.
Throw in RB coach Tony Alford, and Brian Kelly would be wise to keep valuables out of Columbus.
BOSA TO THE BROWNS? Joey Bosa is one of, if not the most targeted collegiate defenders in the country. Thanks to the dedication to his craft, Bosa's been able to impact games despite seeing triple-teams.
The reward for all his hard work could earn him a Chuck Bednarik Award, a second national title and millions of dollars in guaranteed NFL draft money, but it could also earn him a multi-year stint with the Cleveland Browns, a 21st century football gulag.
From Dane Brugler of cbssports:
| PICK | PLAYER | TEAM | COMMENT |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | JOEY BOSA | CLEVELAND BROWNS | "Yes, the Browns have been searching for a playoff-caliber quarterback since 1999, but they've also lacked a legitimate pass rush." |
| 16 | TAYLOR DECKER | OAKLAND RAIDERS | "With Donald Penn in a contract year, offensive tackle could be a need for Oakland in the offseason" |
| 20 | EZEKIEL ELLIOTT | NEW YORK JETS | "Elliott has terrific balance, vision and lower body athleticism to move the chains every time he touches the ball." |
| 27 | NOAH SPENCE | ARIZONA CARDINALS | "Arizona has the front office, coaches and locker room to take a chance on a boom or bust player like this." |
| 28 | ADOLPHUS WASHINGTON | DENVER BRONCOS | "With Malik Jackson and Derek Wolfe set to hit free agency after this season, the Broncos might be looking for new beef at the grocery store." |
| 29 | MIKE THOMAS | MINNESOTA VIKINGS | "A lot of fingers can be pointed as to why the Vikings rank near the bottom of the league in passing yards, but the lack of perimeter weapons is a substantial reason." |
The older I get, I don't understand how professional drafts are legal. Imagine being a prodigy, yet you were entered into a lottery that favored the shit companies, and then you were forced to go work for the worst company.
Does the draft stop the same teams from being bad? Of course not.
That said, it's great to see Noah Spence earn his first-round projection back.
WARLORD DONATES BLOOD MONEY. Remember when people got unironically mad online about Jim Tressel? Those were good times and bad columns.
From cleveland.com (via FatPants):
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio -- Youngstown State University President Jim Tressel and his wife Ellen have pledged $1 million to help expand student employment opportunities on campus.
The gift will create the Ellen and Jim Tressel Student Work Opportunity Endowment Fund.
Tressel, and his wife, a YSU graduate, announced the gift Monday afternoon at a meeting of university donors on the YSU campus.
Let's hope, for the sake of humanity's future shame, columns like this 2014(!) missive from si.com's Mike Rosenberg don't survive history:
Youngstown State just hired Jim Tressel as president, and some would argue that Tressel is the wrong man for the job. Me, I think he's perfect. He excels at saying one thing while he does another, pretending he cares only about education, and insulating himself with acolytes who believe, despite ample evidence, in his purity. That describes a lot of university presidents in 2014.
Now Tressel can talk about "helping young people" (one of his favorite phrases), and he can unite a community (something he does frighteningly well), and maybe nobody will notice how absurd this is. I mean, the man is so ethically sketchy that he would have to beg the NCAA for permission to coach a team, but running a university is just fine.
Jim Tressel afflicted a lifetime of psychological damage upon Michigan Men, and it's hilarious to revel in that from time to time.
LONG TIME COMING FOR SPARTA? Unless this clock has been running since, like, 1995 then I'm baffled as to why there are so many digits available in the "day" column.
Countdown clock to Saturday's showdown at No. 2 Ohio State. #Spartans #ReachHigher pic.twitter.com/0Lv9LTTcxb
— Spartan Football (@MSU_Football) November 16, 2015
Tip from your neighborhood crazy person: Anybody who uses multiple exclamation points is insane.
TOM HERMAN IS PAID. Tom Herman needed a backup quarterback to pull-off an improbable comeback against fellow AAC darling Memphis. (It was Houston's first sellout of the year.)
Herman is following Urban Meyer's blueprint, which he apparently memorized within the first hour of getting a copy.
From uproxx.com:
There’s a story Meyer tells in his book about Herman’s interview to become Ohio State’s offensive coordinator. Meyer gave Herman the team’s playbook and told him to study it for an hour, and Meyer asked Herman to teach it to him after that hour. It was a way of keeping Herman on his toes, but when Meyer returned, Herman had the playbook basically memorized.
Herman, by the way, could soon be the subject of a bidding war between South Carolina and Missouri (at least). If you listen closely, you can probably hear Tom Herman's agent cackling as he breaks open his breakfast Swisher.
BRUTUS VS. CAESAR, THE REMATCH! There are paranoid drug lords who protect stash houses with less ferocity than Ohio State protects its trademarks.
Nothing short of a legal fund that could be called a war chest could repel the university in court.
But Caesars Entertainment Group is probably good for that. The company made $2,950,000,000 in 2013, and it's going to need some of those coins because it's drawn the ire of Ohio State's legal eagles.
From BizJournals.com:
Ohio State filed its opposition to a trademark sought by Caesars Entertainment Corp. (NASDAQ:CZR) for "The Shoe," the name of the concert venue at the Horseshoe Casino Cincinnati. Caesars has many hotels and casinos with the "Horsehoe" branding but is seeking to trademark "The Shoe" for use in relation to "entertainment services" such as live concerts.
A two-year-old casino entertainment plaza that hosts acts like Huey Lewis & The News might seem very different from a storied college football stadium, but Ohio State says they're direct competitors. It notes that Ohio Stadium, nicknamed the Horseshoe or the 'Shoe because of its original shape, has for years hosted major musical acts like Pink Floyd, Genesis and Billy Joel.
[...]
Ohio State said granting Caesars the trademark would damage the school "since such registrations are likely to cause confusion, mistake or deceive," and lead people to assume Ohio State endorses the casino's services.
As a graduate of Twitter Law School (more prestigious than Harvard these days), I've got Ohio State in six rounds by TKO.
THOSE WMDs. Guy Fieri's big gulp... Dinosaur puke fossil mystery deepens... Transplant gives new scalp, face to burned firefighter... Cats break through security, take over G20 summit in Turkey... How a driverless car sees the world... My dead coworker is now a Twitter spambot.
