The Blue and the White Sports Debate
Blue View is by David Baker
White View is by Sam Bryner
Bowl Championship Series Bonanza
Blue View This could be one word long-playoff. There it is. One word. Two syllables. It’s that simple. Especially now, in this most twisted, complicated mess of a college football season. The whole season had more plot twists than a Spanish-language soap opera, and it’s been just as confusing to understand for a clearly not bilingual population of college football junkies. With the Bowl Championship Series announcement on Sunday, things only got more terribly troubling.
LSU and Ohio State? I’m not happy, but at least LSU will beat OSU. Hawaii got in, so that’s good for USU’s coffers, but Georgia will make sure they don’t finish 13-0. I’d like to see Georgia play Oklahoma for the title, but it doesn’t matter. Any college football is better than watching the Rose Parade. Plus, when Kansas plays Virgina Tech in the Orange Bowl, I’ll get to continue playing my drinking/guessing game, what did Mark Mangino eat today? And that’s just good, wholesome family entertainment.
White View Missouri went from being the No. 1 team in the polls to falling out of a Bowl Championship Series game altogether. LSU moved up into the second spot after falling to No. 7 the week before. Hawaii’s strength of schedule was 117 out of 119 teams, and they find themselves in the Sugar Bowl. A lot of things about the BCS I don’t understand. With Hawaii getting in this year, the method for non-BCS teams to bust the BCS has been pretty much been set in stone. Go undefeated. It doesn’t matter who you play or what the final score is, simply just go the entire season without a loss and you’re into a big-money bowl game. Despite what you think about BYU, head football coach Bronco Mendenhall said it best when he talked about how the Cougars have realized this technique, and if dumbing down your schedule and going undefeated is the only way to get into the BCS, then that is what they will do. BYU won’t be the only school employing this technique as other mid-major schools will do the same thing to try and sneak into the BCS. This will only hurt college football in the end, because the overall quality of play will decrease as these quality programs continue to play lower-level teams. Also, the BCS has lucked out because so far there has only been one non-BCS team in a year to go undefeated. What will happen when one year two or three non-BCS schools run the table?
Sports wish list/gift list
Blue ViewMy wishes: 1. Bill Belichick gets busted in a major international cock-fighting ring and is sentenced to 16 years in a dirty jail in a third-world country, where American tourists – for a price of about 15 cents, American – could throw rotten eggs, fruit and meat at the Patriot’s coach. 2. A YouTube video of John Madden opening his jaw like a snake and eating a turducken whole, and then going around like Godzilla devouring schoolchildren and goats in small Asian countries. In the final scene, Madden would climb the Empire State Building with hottie sideline reporter Erin Andrews in hand and meet his demise at the end of a Tomahawk missile, while I swoop in and rescue Andrews. 3. Have Mike Gundy on retainer so whenever I flash a specific lighted signal into the night sky – like the Batman signal, but more footballish – Gundy would show up and yell things like, “I’m a man. I’m 40,” or “They’re garbage” at girls, professors or random people who are pissing me off. Maybe I could get a Dan Hawkins model that would berate people about intramurals, too. 4. We run out of little girls from Cache Valley to come shake it at halftime of basketball games. It’s all too cute, the waves and waves of ever-smaller girls paraded out on the floor to dance to awful, sexual rap songs. It’s getting ridiculous. I think some of the last crop were crawling around on the floor, not because it was a part of the dance, but because they hadn’t learned to walk yet.
My gifts: 1. A powerful animal tranquilizer gun, so Chris Fowler can shoot Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit, preferably in the neck. It’s really my gift to all of America. 2. For Brent Musburger, a violent full-body massage administered by an 800-pound., rage-filled gorilla wielding a sledgehammer. 3. A couple of books for Michael Vick. One called “How to Beat the American Justice System,” co-written by OJ Simpson and Kobe Bryant. Another by Caesar Milan called “A Dog Whisperer’s Guide to Dog Fighting.”
White View Ah yes. Christmastime. The time of year to receive and give gifts. I think we all enjoy receiving gifts and if given a chance, any given sports fan could probably rattle of their sports wish list to you. Since I have the chance, I will attempt to do that now. I wish college football would move to some sort of playoff system. I am tired of seeing teams go undefeated and the o I wish Utah State basketball would, once or twice a year, play a big-name team in basketball. I know it would be on the road, and that’s OK. If Utah State wants to take a step forward as a basketball program, they need to start playing a tougher nonconference schedule. The problem is, I think, that Stew Morrill is fine with where the program is at right now. The team has great fan support, they win more than 20 games every year and are nationally considered a good program. The last sports wish that I have deals with the Utah Jazz. In my lifetime, I have spent a good portion of time cheering for the Jazz. I have seen them beat the best teams in the NBA year in and year out. Throughout the majority of my life, I saw the Jazz produce the greatest duo in sports history with Karl Malone and John Stockton. Twice I saw my beloved Jazz play in the NBA finals and lose to Michael Jordan. The dynasty that was called the Utah Jazz in the ’90s separated and then began to rebuild to where they are now, which has some eerie similarities to the old Jazz – a team that beats the NBA’s best and a team that contains one of the greatest duos in all of sports with Boozer and Williams. The dynasty of the mid 2000s that is beginning to be known as the Utah Jazz has one thing that I really wish for and want to see-an NBA title. I am now being greedy, but I wish for the championship this year. Not next year, not five years down the line, but this year. Why not? They have potential, talent and great coaching. Win it all this year, that’s what I wish for.
Rant
Blue View It’s the end of the semester and the holiday season, I don’t feel like spewing hate in today’s rant. And, to be honest, I’m tired of trying to piss people off and getting blank stares. Just kidding. I don’t care. This is sports therapy for me. And if I wanted to piss people off, I’d just say something about Jaycee Carroll’s new haircut making him look like a Hitler youth. But, the thing is, he can wear a coonskin cap or sell ad space to dot-com companies on his forehead for all I care, so long as he keeps scoring 25 a game. Jaycee – not that you’re listening – but let me reiterate, I don’t think you look like, or are in any way, a neo-Nazi. Keep up the good work. Your follicle decisions are between you, your god and your wife. Really, I’m just jealous because my shaved head looks like one of those globes with the raised landforms. It’s not flattering.
White View A couple of thoughts came to mind when choosing what to rant on this week. The first was collegiate wrestling, and the second was watching people walk around in the snow and ice. Talking about how the No.1-ranked Iowa Sate Cyclone wrestling team will beat Iowa on Sunday would interest few people in Utah and pretty much the entire state of Iowa. Since the one or two people who read this are located in the state of Utah, I’ll talk about ice and snow instead. With the first snow storm of the year, I was quickly reminded of one reason I love the wintertime at Utah State. Watching students and faculty traverse the icy pathways on campus is one of the most entertain
ing things to see. I don’t know why, but something about seeing people slip and fall just makes me laugh. I venture that all of you are the same way. One word of caution though-nothing looks worse than when you laugh at someone who slipped and fell and then you slip and fall. So Aggies, be careful out there, but not too careful, because I need my entertainment.