Because I love Florida, I’ll wrap up legit reasons why Mo should stay.

Because my good friend Gatorpilot hates Duke, I’ll use J.J. Redick as a sacrificial lamb in this one.

Speights already has conditioning issues from college. And Mo, if you thought that was bad, you ain’t seen nuthin’ yet.

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YOU’RE A FREE MAN NOW FREEMAN
 
Rumor has it that Miami Hurricane quarterback Kirby Freeman has been kicked off . . . errr . . . asked to give up his scholarship . . . errr . . . is seeking a transfer from the team.  For those following the soap opera that is the Miami program this was mentioned a month ago but is just now leaking to the press.  According to the Miami Herald neither Freeman nor his father would comment on the report.  The bottom line is that Freeman was the only Miami quarterback with any game experience.  Next year we can expect either redshirt Robert Marve or true freshman Jacory Harris to start for the Hurricanes in the Swamp.  Barring injury (say another preseason car accident) I expect Marve to be the sacrificial lamb in Gainesville.
 
The sad part is that the return game (well . . . it will be played in Orlando since it will be mostly Gator fans no matter where the game is played and UM doesn’t actually HAVE a home stadium) is in 2013 so Marve’s only opportunity to play the game will be on the receiving side of a road blowout.  The second game could have been played BEFORE 2013 but apparently the Canes already have Oklahoma in 2009 and Ohio State slated for 2010 and 2011 (don’t ask me why 2012 couldn’t happen) and felt their schedule was tough enough those years.  Shannon is jettisoning players by the bucketful in order to sign a HUGE class for this year.  The strategy makes sense, he needs to clean house and start from scratch.  Unfortunately this is a long term strategy and Miami probably won’t give Shannon the chance to see it through unless they have no choice (financial issues).  My guess is that whomever replaces Shannon as the next UM coach will find the cupboard stocked with talent.
 
MCFADDEN IS NFL READY
 
Apparently Arkansas fans were DEAD ON with their description of Darren McFadden being an NFL caliber player.  Apparently he’s already acting and spending money like an NFL player.  DMac was recently spotted cruising in his new Cadillac Escalade except . . . . ummm . . . how does a struggling college student afford a brand new Cadillac Escalade???  Apparently agent Mike Conley arranged the purchase in McFadden’s mother’s name at a local dealership.  Darren was reportedly at the dealership during the purchase.  I guess DMac couldn’t wait another couple of weeks to start spending the money he doesn’t have yet?  Maybe he didn’t realize that having your agent buy you a car is sort of against NCAA rules.
 
If McFadden is ruled ineligible for the Cotton Bowl then what looked to be a matchup that favored the Missouri Tigers looks to be an absolute mismatch.  The Arkansas offense depends on and runs through McFadden.  He will have let his team down in the biggest conceivable way in his last game.  For someone who had been promoted by the Arkansas media as a poster boy for everything that is right about college athletics prior to the Heisman Ceremony he sure seems to be reshaping his image into the typical greedy, self-indulgent modern athlete we all know and hate.  Thank goodness DMac didn’t win the Heisman, the last thing we needed was 2 out of the last 3 Heisman winners to be involved in a scandal that questions their eligibility (Reggie Bush in 2005 being the other scandalized winner).
 
PATRIOTIC HISTORY
 
Much has been made this year about New England and their attempt to become only the second team to go undefeated in an NFL season and the first team to do it since the season expanded to 16 games.  I’ve heard a number of media pundits (many of whom have a very over-inflated value of themselves) declare that the Pats should rest their players for the Super Bowl because the only thing that matter is, of course, winning the Super Bowl.  Uh oh –**RETARD ALERT**– something set off our dumb*ss alarm!!!  Goodness gracious, what could it be?  Maybe that . . . oh yeah, Bill Belichick and the Patriots have won THREE Super Bowls in the past 5 years.  Clearly the pinnacle of all sports achievement would be measured by winning 4 out of 6 years???   Arrrrrgghhhh!!!  The ignorance here is SUFFOCATING!!!
 
The Patriots have a chance to go down in history as one of the greatest teams EVER and accomplish something that has never been done before (winning 19 games in a season).  Go ask Ben Roethlisberger how that Super Bowl win two years ago makes him giddy like a school girl after ever loss this year.  Super Bowl wins are a great way to finish the season but . . . if they are so important then why do we play a new one every year???  This isn’t like when the Buccaneers, a perennial loser, made it to the Super Bowl for the first time.  These are the Patriots - the most dominant NFL franchise this decade.  Whether they win a Super Bowl this year or next year or the year after, their place as the dominant team of the decade is safe.  Only if the Colts were to win the next two Super Bowls could they make a strong claim to that position. (more…)

So: after having been properly rebuked for unsubstantiated reporting by our friend Truzenzuzex, who is a paragon for journalistic ethics, we’re going to roll like Pigs in slop with some good old fashioned message board rumormongering. From Gatorcountry:

Well, I have been trying to get dirt on this for weeks, and tonight, I finally caught up with one of my best sources for info here in Tally. You will never believe who got all of this started for FSU, the one and only GENO HAYES.

There is a computer course they were all taking, and had a tutor for the athletes that was giving them the tests verbatim before they would take them. The key is he told them that they had to take their time so it would not be overly suspicious they had the answers beforehand. So what does smart ole Geno Hayes do ?! He goes in there and takes a 50 question test in 8 minutes, aces it, and walks out the room like he just sacked Tim Tebow. We all know that’s not possible, so the professor got pissed and flagged it. Low and behold all the athletes were acing it.

As one Paul Harvey would say, And now you know “The rest of the story…..”

Rumor? Yes. Did this probably happen? Again, yes. This so fits Geno “Big Mouth, Little Brain” Hayes that it’s almost impossible not to believe.

Thanks again, Geno, for all that you do!

Imagine it: an exciting conference championship matchup between two Top 15 teams. One, Virginia Tech, ranked 6th in the nation, still harbors national title aspirations. The other fields a quarterback who led the Heisman Trophy Race earlier in the year and was at one time the #1 team in all the land.

The game comes down to the wire; it’s tied up in the third and both teams are giving it everything they’ve got. This game… means everything. Riveting! Right?

Not so much.

In the ACC, even the conference’s best is apparently not all too exciting a product for your average college football fan. Gator Bowl officials are putting a brave face on it, but in the end, this one’s a laugher:

ACC officials said they are hoping for a big push before Saturday’s kickoff, working to get 65,000 seats sold — they still have between 10,000 and 15,000 tickets to go.

Hmm. Methinks there’s some very optimistic accounting going on. I’m betting they had more like… 40,000 seats remaining unsold. The camera dunna lie.

We Gator fans sat there — right there, in that very stadium! — on the west side, watching Georgia whip our beloved Boys from Old Florida. It was sold out. Not an empty seat in the place.

And that wasn’t a conference championship game. That was just another weekly SEC matchup. They all look that way.

I guess when BC can lose to a team as awful as FSU, and when Virginia Tech gets blown out 48-7 by LSU, it’s hard for the college football viewing public to take the ACC seriously.

Can’t say that I blame ‘em, really.

Bianchi writes:

The pregame trash talking from Hayes turned into a postgame nightmare for Florida State. Hayes wouldn’t talk to reporters afterward and got into a profanity-laced verbal altercation with Associated Press writer Brent Kallestad before UF Athletic Director Jeremy Foley stepped in as the peacemaker. Hayes couldn’t bring down Tebow as he predicted, but, hey, he nearly took down a 62-year-old wire-service reporter.

Did anyone notice? At one point in the 2nd quarter, Geno Hayes was lying on the ground near Tebow after a play was over. Tebow walked over to Hayes and outstretched his arm, offering to help Hayes to his feet. This was after Hayes had already tried to “stare Tebow down” by mashing his facemask into Tebow’s helmet.
Hayes slapped Tebow’s arm away.

Real class. That’s Geno Hayes. That’s FSU.

For the record, Bobby Bowden didn’t have any problem with Hayes’ pre-game comments about Tebow. I’m paraphrasing, here, from Bowden’s post-game audio:

“What did he say? That we have to stop him to win? Isn’t that what he said?” The room, filled with FSU beat writers, responded with not a small amount of sarcasm, “No, he said ‘Tebow’s going down’.” Bowden chuckled and said, “Well, wasn’t he right? To win, we would have had to have done that. Wasn’t he right?”

And Bianchi must think highly of Bowden because he generously changed one of Bowden’s more eccentric remarks.

“That bulletin-board material doesn’t bother me,” Bowden said when reporters asked him about Hayes’ pregame comments. “I don’t think it bothered Tebow, either, do ya’ll?”

Nice, but what Bowden really said was “black boy stuff“. As in, “That black boy stuff doesn’t bother me.” The post-game audio was posted at Warchant.com, but has since been removed.

Some have postulated that Bowden might have said “black board stuff”, which doesn’t really make sense either, but if you have a chance to listen for yourself, you’ll hear that he says “black boy stuff” clear as day.

Again, classy.

Ed. note: as Gatorhippy pointed out in the Comments section (below), Bowden did in fact say ‘black board,’ not ‘black boy’. On the audio source I listened to first at warchant.com, there’s no question that it sounds just like ‘black boy’. However, in the Sun Sports post-game video, Bowden’s mouth clearly shaped the word ‘board’, not ‘boy’. I apologize for the error.

When the head coach has no problem with his players threatening to hurt kids on the opposing team… and when players are so far removed from any vestige of sportsmanship, you know you’re talking about a program that’s rotten and corrupt at its core.

And that’s the one, the only, Florida State University.

‘Nole fans, we look forward to seeing you next year in Tallahassee.

The Orange Bowl: a place filled with the glorious memories of a historic football past. Some of the famous games played there include the AFL New York Jets victory over the NFL’s Baltimore Colts, the overtime playoff game between the Dolphins and Chargers (that many have deemed the greatest game ever played) and the unbelievable Boston College Hail Mary pass against the Miami Hurricanes that assured Doug Flutie of the Heisman Trophy. The Miami Hurricanes won 58 straight games at the Orange Bowl while the Miami Dolphins became the only team to ever achieve a perfect season while playing there in 1972.

Since the Dolphins moved to Joe Robbie Stadium, the Orange Bowl has been synonymous with the Miami Hurricanes. Numerous future NFL All-Pros and college stars played for the Hurricanes in that stadium. Now that the Hurricanes have decided to pick up and change venues (also to Joe Robbie Stadium/Dolphin Stadium) the reminiscing and fond farewells have begun. At least that might have been the case had it not been for one important factor. The 2007 Miami Hurricanes are stinking up the joint!

Randy Shannon came in and promised to instill a new attitude to the Canes. He took the player’s names off the jerseys, demanded players maintain a 2.5 GPS, decreed that players must wait two years before moving off-campus and instituted a zero tolerance policy on firearms. Everything about Shannon screamed change and discipline. It was as tackle Chris Barney stated during spring practice, “You do it right or you run.” All I can say is… holy crap! Based on what we’ve seen on the football field thus far this must be the team of marathon runners by now. They may not be able to win many football games but I’m thinking they could REALLY improve the Miami track team!

Shannon has managed to prove a couple of things so far this year. One of his confirmed discoveries is that decent quarterbacking is essential to a successful offense. By utilizing two mediocre quarterbacks behind an inferior offensive line combined with slow and unathletic wide receivers, Shannon has implemented a dead zone offense which shows no signs of life whatsoever. Pairing this with a cleverly conceived “Break but don’t bend” defense, the Hurricanes are on the verge of a losing season or, should they manage an upset in one of their remaining contests, a return trip to the Big Blue Rug of balmy Boise, Idaho. Outstanding, Coach Shannon!

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Wake Forest now owns a two-game winning streak over the Seminoles.  I know I swore off FSU schadenfreude earlier in the season, but this is just too awesome not to share:

Yep, there you see one of those clever Wake Forest players celebrating the Deacons’ 24-21 over the ‘Noles in classic fashion.

FSU, we thank you for making Thursday night football games enjoyable again.  That will be all.

Yeah. I think they would. In fact, if they played, I’d be willing to bet on it.

The Bulls knocked out an admittedly weak Auburn team, but they did it on the road, at night, with no credentials other than some brass cajones in their jockstraps. The Gators can attest to the fact that Jordan-Hare is not an easy place to play even under the best of circumstances.

UCF gave 6th-ranked Texas every last inch they could handle, and were in a position to win the game when a key turnover late in the 4th secured the Longhorns’s victory.

Does anyone really believe Miami or Florida State could give either Auburn or Texas a game? By default, doesn’t that mean that UCF and USF ought to be able to roll the ‘Noles and Miami? Maybe even without troubling themselves too much to do it?
Let’s start with FSU.

FSU is a shadow of its former self. When I look at FSU’s roster, I don’t see a single player who would start at UF. The talent is gone, the playcalling is anemic, and FSU is struggling to beat teams like UAB and Colorado. The Blazers actually held a lead over the ‘Noles for the first half of play in Doak-Campbell, and the game was tied well into the fourth quarter. Prior to that matchup, Nole fans were posting on their message boards that they were looking forward to an “easy blowout” just so they could see some decent football again. Instead, the ‘Noles fought for their lives and Bobby Bowden whistled through the graveyard in the postgame and on his horribly-produced TV show, in which he acted like FSU had beaten a ranked opponent in the days of old.

Against Colorado, FSU could score only a single touchdown. Despite a 16-6 final score, the Buffs scored a late TD (2-pt. conversion no good), then forced a 3-and-out on the Noles and advanced right back to the endzone again where they nearly scored in the final seconds. They were two blown plays from going to overtime.

With all due respect to Dan Hawkins, Colorado’s not very good.

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What began as a year full of promise for Seminole fans has already turned ominous, and revealed a glimpse of horrific things to come. The cracks in the foundation of the program based at Joke Shamble Doak Campbell Stadium are once again beginning to show.

It’s hard to believe that Florida State was once the darlings of college football. The Noles played an exciting brand of football that attacked on both sides of the ball, were loaded with top athletes who turned into human highlight reels and were led by a folksy, charming, affable coach whose country quotes littered the morning papers and evening sports segments. Some of the accomplishments of the program are truly staggering: 14 straight years of finishing in the top 5 in the polls, 9 straight ACC titles, 11 straight bowl wins, etc, etc.

But something peculiar happened to the Seminoles. They went from 12 straight seasons of 10 or more victories to just one in the last 5 years (2003). It’s true that there have still been first round draft picks (7 in the past 3 years), but the overall talent of the program has fallen to where FSU is now on par with Clemson, Georgia Tech and Boston College.  Worse, it now ranks below that of Virginia Tech and Miami. Peter Tom Willis made the comment that before the internet allowed kids to scour the rosters of Florida State — and examine the 3 deep — that all the top recruits used to pick FSU (link). I wonder if his point is that there is too much information around these days to simply lie to kids and promise playing time as there used to be - “That’s right Billy Joe Martinez, ole Deion Sanders is going to the NFL and that means his spot will open up for ya.” - without acknowledging the 6 other high school All-Americans already on the team backing Deion up.

I don’t believe it is the internet, with all due respect to Peter Tom, that has caused Florida State to fall to this level, although I do acknowledge it might have played a contributing role. The bottom line here is that for whatever reason the talent just isn’t there due to the recruiting slip of the past 6-7 years. Part of this is probably due to losing too many in-state battles with Florida and Miami. But most of the blame must be directed toward the rise of the schools on the states that border Tallahassee and comprise part of their recruiting region (Georgia, Alabama, Auburn, LSU, Texas). If you look back ten to twenty years, when the Noles rose to prominence, those schools were shells of their current selves. Even Florida was limping along with NCAA sanctions on its back. Times have changed and FSU has suffered to the point where their playmakers are few and far between and their depth is virtually non-existent. (more…)

Watched the Clemson-FSU game Monday night. Cheered for the Baby Bowden, which felt vaguely dirty, but Clemson is definitely your rooting interest when Florida State is on the field.

It was a rough outing for the S.O.W. Drew Weatherford, who to my recollection might be the worst three-year starting quarterback in FSU history (can you remember someone who was worse?), had the type of night quarterbacks want to forget about, completing 17 of 34 throws for 142 yards with one touchdown. The stats make his outing look far better than it was. Weatherford sprayed passes all over the field, connecting mostly on short out routes or screens for 1-2 yards per pop, and avoiding interceptions only by the divine intervention of the football gods — his passes bounced high off the hands of his receivers and flew into the defensive backfield, but no Clemson defender ever happened to be close enough to snag the leather for a pick. Here it is quarter by quarter:

• 1st quarter: 33 yards, all three-and-outs and except for one first down on the first play of the game.
• 2nd quarter: 19 yards, also all three-and-outs. One of these drives started at the Clemson 20 after a fumble recovery, but the Noles could only get 2 yards before booting a field goal.
• 3rd quarter: the ball finally moves! 101 yards of offense in two drives result in a turnover on downs and a touchdown.
• 4th quarter: 80 yards. Another turnover on downs plus one additional touchdown.

Yes, that’s all of 52 yards of total offense in the first half, and 181 yards in the second half. Even when the ‘Noles could move the ball in the last two quarters, it was largely on the strength of their running backs, or short passes from Weatherford which connected with players behind the line of scrimmage who fought forward for positive yardage. And Clemson had some sort of weird shoot-yourself-in-the-foot thing going on.

In short, even when FSU was ‘coming back’ in the second half, it was painful and ugly to watch. Weatherford was sacked five times. FSU’s young offensive line is clearly inexperienced and out of their league. The running game is anemic. This is just not a good team, and for once, the defense wasn’t above average, either. One thing you can usually say about FSU even when they’re down is that their defense is still pretty good. Not this time around.

So for the first time ever — and I do mean ever — I didn’t feel rapt joy watching the Seminoles implode.

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