Just Let L.A. Float Away
April 28, 2009 by jon · 3 Comments
Yesterday my esteemed colleague and the purveyor of this site responded to an L.A. Times article written about the attendance of the OSU Spring Game. Now let me preface this by saying that I am, of course, a Michigan fan. But don’t allow that to stop you from reading this glorious rhetoric nonetheless.
Normally, I would be glad to see an opponent kick sand in the face of every poisonous nut on the planet, but Chris Dufresne’s article was the worst drivel I’ve read in ages and yet again makes us question how very far sports writing has fallen. The basic premise behind this article was that Ohio State fans have absolutely nothing to do in their lives but go to the Spring Game because outside of that, there’s nothing but field plowing and taking your sister out on a date available to them. On the other hand, glorious Southern California is so littered with magnificence that they just have too much going on in their awesome lives to stop and support their football teams. Mr. Dufresne is then kind enough to inform us that they are true fans since their butts are in the seats when it really counts. (obligatory reference to the OSU-USC game of ‘08).
Here’s why I take issue with that: He’s trying to take an exceptional, record-breaking thing (one that I, as a Wolverine, would be most happy to possess) and turn it into nothing in an effort to reassure his readers that they’re not bad fans, they’re just cooler than the rest of us. Yes, a sports writer who asserts that he and his readers are too cool for sports.
Ultimately, his point (like his spelling and grammar) quickly loses footing when you look at the facts.
The first point that completely exposes the sadness of the SoCal fanaticism was mentioned very clearly by my associate. Los Angeles County alone has approximately 10 million people, most of whom I can assume were NOT at the beach. That point in mind, they couldn’t muster any more than 20k people to watch a consistent national championship contending team go out their for their warm ups? Seriously? Is Frisbee Golf THAT time consuming?
The second point that’s even worse is based off of the assumption that the SoCal fans are there when it counts. They’re not and that’s just a plain fact. During the season, USC barely cracks 90% attendance and UCLA does even worse, eeking in just about 80% attendance. TEN MILLION PEOPLE and you can’t even get to capacity? Are you serious?
Mr. Dufresne, the reason Ohio State fills up the Horseshoe and Michigan gets 50k people to show up to a spring game after suffering it’s worst season in history is because these are fans that actually give a crap about these teams and these schools. These schools are part of how we grew up, part of childhood memories and where we came from. A school like USC buys it’s history. Half of the reason USC gets athletes is because of climate and girls. You can try using the “exceptional educational opportunity” line, but when you barely graduate 50% of your football players, it’s not really a valid point.
In the end, the true college football fans from around the country who actually support their teams IN SPITE of the fact that we could be doing other things would like to request that you put your roller skates back on, head back to The ‘Bu and the next time you have an ingenious brain fart to write about sports, write it in the sand and let the mighty Pacific wash it away.
Sophomore Aaron Corp To Be USC’s QB
April 22, 2009 by feed · Leave a Comment
Southern California coach Pete Carroll says sophomore Aaron Corp will be the Trojans’ starting quarterback through the summer and into fall camp.
Continue reading at College Sports for NBC4i.com
Two night games for OSU
April 15, 2009 by feed · Leave a Comment
Ohio State will play two regular-season night games in 2009, the Big Ten announced today. It had been previously announced that OSU and Southern California would meet in an 8 p.m. game Sept. 12, televised by ESPN. In addition, the…
Continue reading at Blogging the Buckeyes
College Football: The Astonishing Truth Regarding What Conference Is Best
February 26, 2009 by feed · Leave a Comment
With a plethora of knowledgeable writers and pundits promoting the idea of certain conference supremacy, the timing seems ideal for a generalized view of how the entire country approaches this quandary.
What did he say?
I said “take for instance the following scenarios.”
Take Oklahoma out of the Big 12 and Southern Cal out of the Pac-10. Look at the…
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Big Ten recruiting roundup
January 26, 2009 by feed · Leave a Comment
Posted by ESPN.com's Adam Rittenberg
Ohio State will learn Tuesday whether it will earn the services of standout prep quarterback Tajh Boyd. Defensive end Craig Drummond has, in fact, picked Mississippi after originally committing to Illinois. Iowa had a big weekend recruiting haul, while other Big Ten schools are racking up commits.
Here's the latest from ESPN Scouts Inc.'s national recruiting director Tom Luginbill.
ESPNU 150 Craig Drummond picks Rebels over Illini
Craig Drummond, DE
Chicago, IL
Morgan Park H.S.
Scouts Grade: 81
ESPN150 Rank: 99
Position Rank: 7
Defensive end Craig Drummond of Morgan Park (Chicago, Ill.), rated No. 7 nationally among defensive ends and No. 99 prospect overall in the Class of 2009, has chosen Mississippi.
The 6-foot-5, 260-pound Drummond had originally picked Illinois over Wisconsin, but was wavering on his choice.
Among others, Drummond was also offered by Miami-Florida, Tennessee, Ohio State, Southern California, Florida, Michigan State and Minnesota.
Drummond, who was an all-state and all-area selection as a junior after recording 22 sacks, did not play his senior season because of a foot injury.
ESPNU 150 Tajh Boyd to choose on Tuesday
Tajh Boyd, QB
Hampton, VA
Phoebus H.S.
Scouts Grade: 82
ESPN150 Rank: 59
Position Rank: 5
Tajh Boyd of Phoebus (Hampton, Va.), rated No. 5 among quarterbacks and No. 59 prospect overall in Class 2009, plans to make a final decision among Clemson, Oregon and Ohio State on Tuesday afternoon (Jan. 27).
Among many others, Boyd was also being recruited by Florida State, Boston College, Virginia and Penn State.
Boyd had first committed to West Virginia, but had second thoughts following the Mountaineers' offensive struggles early in the season. He then chose Tennessee, but decommitted following a conversation with newly hired coach Lane Kiffin who warned him that he might not be happy with the Vols' pro-style system.
As a junior, Boyd passed for 2,059 yards and 25 touchdowns, and also rushed for 500 yards and seven scores. He tore his ACL in the third game of his senior season and is set to have surgery next month.
Big Ten lunch links: Grades sideline Gophers’ Brock
January 23, 2009 by feed · Leave a Comment
Posted by ESPN.com's Adam Rittenberg
- Penn State defensive end Aaron Maybin and several teammates are training for the NFL draft in Amish country, Bob Flounders writes in The (Harrisburg) Patriot-News.
"Last week, Maybin said he weighed in the 242-245 range. This week, he said he's gained eight pounds. Eat. Train. Sleep. There ain't nothing else to do here."
- Academic issues will sideline Minnesota starting safety Tramaine Brock for spring practice, Kent Youngblood writes in the Star Tribune. Also, check out this nugget:
"Athletic director Joel Maturi said the Gophers still are negotiating to add Southern California to the schedule in a future home-and-home series. A decision should be made within a week."
- Michigan State is recruiting the son of former Detroit Lions running back James Jones, Matt Dorsey writes in the Detroit Free Press.
- Longtime Wisconsin strength and conditioning coach John Dettman discusses the transition of power to Ben Herbert for 2009, the Wisconsin State Journal's Tom Mulhern writes in his blog.
- Rich Rodriguez's sizable first-year tab for Michigan stirs debate about reform in collegiate athletics, John Heuser writes in The Ann Arbor News.
2008 Blogpoll Ballot, Final
January 12, 2009 by feed · Leave a Comment
Rank
Team
Delta
1
Utah
25
2
Florida
24
3
Southern Cal
23
4
Texas
22
5
Oklahoma
21
6
Penn State
20
7
Ohio State
19
8
TCU
18
9
Alabama
[...]
Story By Men of the Scarlet and Gray
Big Ten bowl wrap-up with Jim Delany, Part I
January 12, 2009 by feed · Leave a Comment
Posted by ESPN.com's Adam Rittenberg
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| Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images | |
| Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany remains optimistic about next season. |
His league has taken a beating on and off the field in recent weeks, and many are questioning the Big Ten's relevancy in college football. But league commissioner Jim Delany remains resilient, albeit realistic, about the recent struggles. The Big Ten went 1-6 in bowls this year, arguably the league's worst postseason performance ever. It extended the Big Ten's losing streak in BCS games to six.
Nine years have passed since the Big Ten won a Rose Bowl, and the league hasn't posted a winning postseason since 2002. I caught up with Delany on Friday to discuss the league's bowl performance and the future.
Obviously the Big Ten's record wasn't good, but how did you feel coming out of this postseason?
Jim Delany: I would rather have gone 6-1, but that's not what the predictors said we would be. I was optimistic going in. I thought we'd win more than we'd lost, but we did not, so it was disappointing. The margins in some cases were not good. In other cases, the games were more competitive. I've given it a lot of thought. I'm not sure I've arrived at any particular conclusions, other than we're playing elite teams. Certainly Southern Cal was playing at another level. That was clear to me. While Penn State got their way back into the game, [USC] really had their way by the half. I'd seen them play earlier against Ohio State and I saw them play last year [in the Rose Bowl] against Illinois. They're very good. They've got great athletes, they're well coached and they play at a level. We don't have a team that's playing at that level at this juncture. We just don't.
How do you think Big Ten teams competed in all the games?
JD: I saw the Michigan State-Georgia game and I saw the Missouri game, I saw the Ohio State game and I saw the Iowa game. Those games were more competitive. One we won and the other ones, we were definitely in the games. Obviously, our goal is to compete at the highest level. When you don't, you have to look internally. That's a football coach's role, to see exactly what needs to be done. We've got great coaches. I would say we have, probably more than people realize, five or six programs that are in the building stages. I don't think you can say anything other than that about Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Northwestern, Illinois and now probably Purdue and Indiana. So to be fair, a program that has got a coach in Year 1, 2 or 3, is different than a program that is in Year 5, 6, 7 or 8. So that has an effect, but that doesn't speak really to the issue. The last four or five years, we've played USC four or five times. We've gotten blown out a couple of times, we were competitive a couple of times, but we haven't been able to beat them. So clearly a better program. And while LSU and Florida got us on championship day, we've gotten them in other bowl games. Michigan got Florida last year and Iowa got LSU. So I'm not despondent about our ability to compete. But I think at the very highest level the last three or four years, we have not had a team. When Florida, LSU and Southern Cal have had championship teams, to me they have been the crème de la crème in terms of coaches, athletes, et cetera.
Buckeyes hope to reverse Big Ten bowl slump
January 2, 2009 by feed · Leave a Comment
The Big Ten has lost five of its six bowl games this postseason, and most haven’t been close. If the underdog 10th-ranked Buckeyes lose to No. 3 Texas in the Fiesta Bowl on Monday night, the conference will have six bowl losses in the same postseason for the first time.
“It’s going to add to the pressure,” Ohio State offensive tackle Alex Boone said Friday.
The Big Ten’s bowl struggles haven’t happened overnight. The league last posted a winning bowl record in 2002, when the Buckeyes stunned No. 1 Miami in the Fiesta Bowl to win the national title and cap a 5-2 postseason for the conference.
Since then, the Big Ten is 15-27 in bowls, including 3-7 in Bowl Championship Series contests. The league has lost its five BCS games by an average of 20 points.
“I can’t put a finger on it,” Buckeyes receiver Brian Hartline said.
Wisconsin kicked off the misery with a 42-13 loss to Florida State in the Champs Sports Bowl. Then, No. 22 Northwestern lost the Alamo Bowl to No. 25 Missouri, 30-23 in overtime. It was the sixth straight bowl loss for the Tigers, whose lone postseason victory came in 1949.
Next, Minnesota lost to Kansas 42-21 in the Insight Bowl. On New Year’s Day, No. 19 Michigan State lost to No. 16 Georgia 24-12 in the Capital One Bowl.
The Big Ten’s only victory in this postseason came in the Outback Bowl, where Iowa hammered South Carolina 31-10.
Later in the day, sixth-ranked Penn State fell to No. 3 Southern California 38-24 in the Rose Bowl — a respectable final score after the Trojans led 31-7 at halftime.
USC played Big Ten co-champs Penn State and Ohio State on the West Coast this year and beat them by a combined 73-27.
Add it all up and a once-proud conference is hurting. But the Buckeyes know that they can polish the Big Ten’s reputation by beating the Longhorns.
“We can’t really argue with what people say because the Big Ten hasn’t played well in the bowl games,” cornerback Malcolm Jenkins said. “But that really has nothing to do with what we do as a team. Of course it’s unfortunate to see our conference play out like that, but at the same time, we can come out with a win and a lot of things will change.”
Ohio State coach Jim Tressel dismissed suggestions that the Big Ten’s bowl struggles bode ill for the Buckeyes (10-2) against the Longhorns (11-1), who came within a whisker of playing for the national title.
“I don’t know what the other bowl games really have to do with it,” Tressel said.
In college football, teams typically put aside rivalries and root for fellow conference members in the postseason. The Buckeyes were coming off the practice field Thursday when they learned that Michigan State, coached by former Buckeyes assistant Mark Dantonio, led Georgia at halftime.
“Of course we were rooting for the Big Ten, no question about it,” Tressel said. “One of my guys, Mark Dantonio, was up 6-3 at the half. We announced it to the team as we were leaving practice and they cheered like crazy.”
The cheers subsided as Georgia rallied to hand the Spartans their third straight bowl loss.
The Buckeyes seem puzzled by the Big Ten’s showing this bowl season. But they dispute the widespread perception that the conference lacks the speed and skill to compete on a national level.
“When you talk about the interior guys that these other conferences have, smaller but faster guys, we have the bigger, muscle guys. So I think in the interior, I think there is a little bit of difference in the speed,” Jenkins said. “But if you are talking about just perimeter guys, I don’t think there is any difference.”
Whether it’s fast or slow, the Big Ten has unquestionably returned to its ground-hugging roots this season with three of the nation’s top seven rushers: Iowa’s Shonn Greene, Michigan State’s Javon Ringer and Ohio State’s Beanie Wells.
The Big Ten’s top-rated passer is Penn State’s Daryll Clark, who ranks 22nd nationally.
At a time when many elite teams feature video game-like offenses, the Big Ten seems content to plod along as if this were the 1950s — except that in the ’50s, the Big Ten won six straight Rose Bowls.
Story By Buckeye Buzz
Big Ten Friday mailbag: Roses have thorns
January 2, 2009 by feed · Leave a Comment
Posted by ESPN.com’s Adam Rittenberg
Your questions, my answers …
Brad from Chicago writes: Great job on the blog this year. I think I have read it 2 to 3 times a day since you started it. My big gripe today is all this talk about how The Big Ten is not relevant in the Rose Bowl anymore. Since 1993 there has been one loss by a Big Ten team to a PAC 10 team not named Southern Cal, that loss being Washington over Purdue in 01. I am just fed up with the talk about how the Big Ten no longer can play with the elite from other conferences. The truth is USC can beat anybody, it is just every year they lose focus, get beat and then clean the clock of some Big Ten school, most recently my beloved Nittany Lions. The Big Ten hasn’t won a Rose Bowl since 2000, but only one other PAC 10 school besides Southern Cal has won it since then and 3 years in there, there was no Big ten team in the game. I guess I am just a frustrated fan who can’t figure out why most people in the media can’t comprehend that sports are cyclical, they always have been. Eventually USC will stumble, they will go on a downward slide and the Big Ten will go on a streak of winning quite a few again and all this talk of revamping the Rose Bowl will be rendered pointless. Thanks again for a fantastic job this year.
Adam Rittenberg: You bring up a good point about USC, and my advice for every Big Ten team is root like heck for the Trojans to reach the national championship in 2009. It might sound defeatist to some, but the Big Ten needs a manageable bowl lineup next year. The league would have gotten one this year if Oregon State had beaten Oregon on Nov. 29, but it didn’t happen and Penn State was stuck with USC. The Big Ten can’t compete with USC, but as you point one, no one really can right now. But the Big Ten’s problem goes beyond the Rose Bowl. The league simply has to find better players. Though I agree things are cyclical and the Big Ten will eventually rebound, things look very bleak right now.
Kenny from Columbia writes: Adam, regardless of bowl records. I still believe the big 10 is far better than the ACC or Big East. If the ACC or Big East sent there conference champ out to Pasadena every year they would be destroyed too. Cincinnati lost by 26 to Oklahoma. Virginia Tech lost to east carolina. So it’s kind of unfair that the big 10 is looked at as the worst BCS conference. All the big 10 needs is an OSU win over Texas, or a win over USC when they visit the Shoe next season to get total respect back. Also, one thing no one is talking about is the fact that PSU had over 400 yards of offense against “the greatest defense ever” so they say.
Adam Rittenberg: Despite the recent downturn, the Big Ten is not the worst BCS conference. I can write that with a fair degree of certainty. But the Big Ten has definitely fallen to fourth, at best, behind the SEC, Big 12 and Pac-10. Some would argue the Mountain West is also better. The Big Ten wouldn’t go 1-5 with the ACC’s or the Big East’s bowl lineup, and both of those leagues would struggle in the Rose Bowl, especially against USC. It’ll take more than a Fiesta Bowl win or Ohio State beating USC next fall for the Big Ten to regain national respect, though those things would be nice for the league. The Big Ten needs to start winning Rose Bowls again, plain and simple.