@the-gipper said:

As I suspected after doing the whole thing:   Kentucky is much closer to most Big Ten Schools than it is to most  SEC schools:

KY to SEC schools:

Tennessee   173;  Vanderbilt  215;  Georgia  404;  South Carolina  433;  Alabama  460; Missouri  460;  Mississippi  464;  Auburn 486;  Miss.  St. 491; Arkansas  694; Florida  717; LSU  801;  Texas A&M  976

KY to Big Ten schools:   Indiana  180;  Ohio State   190;  Michigan 296;  Illinois  311;  Maryland  312; Purdue 322; Michigan St. 328;  Northwestern 389;

Penn St.  505; Wisconsin  520;  Iowa  550; Rutgers  560; Nebraska 777;  Minnesota  780

Congrats

@bob806 said:

Lol...ok let's say I agree that not traveling for Bowl games  is irrevelant. I suppose you're correct that it's not the SEC's  fault people prefer better climates for Bowl games. The PAC 10 has enjoyed the home field advantage in the Rose Bowl for decades, as teams from the midwest see tgeir first bikini in 4 months?

So of your million data points, you're ok with Bama, Florida and Georgia staying within a 500 mile radius? Rarely/never even traveling to Syracuse, Boston College, Ann Arbor, Madison? 

I know it's a 2 way street. In my Buckeye fan homerdom, spanning 48 years, they've had home -and -homes with USC, UCLA, Washington, Texas, Oklahoma, Virginia Tech, Florida St, LSU, Missouri, West Virginia; Syracuse, Notre Dame, Boston College, Penn St before PSU entered the Big 10, BYU.....

I suppose you will say that's irrevelant too. 

And it's not nearly enough. Not nearly enough intersectional games by my Buckeyes. They schedule a lot of MAC teams, which I despise.

How's that? A Buckeye homer admitting their TEAM has scheduling flaws despite taking RISKS occasionally. 

Happy New Year.  Hope my post helped clear the air on my SEC angst.

I thought you were arguing about bowl game locations. Yeah, I'll agree that there should be some more homes and homes, but I think there are probably as many in the SEC as any other conference. We have Clemson. Georgia and Clemson had a series recently. So did Auburn and Clemson. Texas scheduled LSU and Alabama. Florida offered to go to UCF (not your point, just saying), and four of our teams have quality teams from other conferences that they play every year (Georgia, SC, Kentucky, Florida), Tennessee went to OU, etc.

@the-gipper said:

Well..."recently" is when the cupcake walk for the SEC has existed.....not sure how far back it goes. 

Penn State a cupcake?

@the-gipper said:

  How far back in history do you want to go. Tell me when they started the cupcake walk. 

For determining what is the best conference right now? Recent would be what matters most. I don't think I've ever argued that the SEC is the best conference all time (maybe it is, who knows, I've never looked into it because it doesn't matter).

@bob806 said:

There's that "we" word again.

Anyway, Merry Christmas. There's no way you're going to objectively look at my points it's obvious.

I've been in Browns Backers bars in the south, a lot of Fun, but an extremely narrow view on NCAA Football.

Well I gave you a million data points and so far your only one is "well y'all don't travel for bowl games," and I showed you why that is irrelevant. I am awaiting better info.

@mjp28 said:

I'm a big BIG TEN fan always have been but the SEC is the hot conference of the P5 right now especially with ALA on a hot streak.

The BIG TEN has it's bright moments as long as OHIO STATE remains a top 5 team.

I agree and I think the Big 10 is far and away the second best conference.

@bob806 said:

Dominate? Get over it?

You missed a key point. They don't travel. They don't feel they have too.

Their Bowl games are in their backyard. They should win most of those.

This is the most irrelevant and reachy point that I hear. Most bowl games have like 25,000 people in the stands. Who cares? We do play a lot of neutral site games. If you don't like it, don't schedule them. We will see you in the playoffs and history has proven one of our teams will win....

@the-gipper said:

I am not sure that the SEC dominates any of those.   Alabama alone may...but not the SEC.  I believe the SEC had a losing record in bowl games last year.  For a couple of years running the ACC had the season edge in games vs. the SEC....and the SEC had a losing record vs. P5  interconference competition.

The DO however dominate in putting together cupcake nonconference schedules.  They are excellent at that. All those games against the Citadel, Furman, and Louisiana-Munroe.

4-3 in bowl games last year.

The ACC "had the season edge in games vs. the SEC" in 2014 and 16. That's pretty much it. Every other year since 07 the SEC has been on top of that.

"the SEC had a losing record vs. P5  interconference competition." Yes, it was 10-12 last year and it was sub .500 in 2016 as well. This year it's 9-3, and the SEC's had a winning record against other P5 competition all other years since 2005.

@bob806 said:

No doubt the game was entertaining, especially for the southern region who roots "for a conference."

I'm not trying to be an a$$ but the orange print is exactly why college football is screwed up.

LSU at #7 is a joke.They played one good game all year when they beat Georgia. Pulled one out against over rated Auburn (at the time Auburn was #7). Your Aggies beat 'em in an undoubtedly exciting game, but weren't they down a bit this year?

The Top 20 was expanded to the Top 25 in 1989. Ever notice how many of the SEC teams appear at #21-25 every week, so it protects teams like this year's LSU? LSU can then say, for example..."hey we beat #21 Mississippi St and #24 Missouri." 

While the same criteria doesn't happen in the Big 10, Big 12, PAC 12. Those teams get penalized by losing to conference foes, or barely winning vs conference foes..."the PAC 12 is down,"...."Penn St. isn't a good win for tOSU, they're down this season,"...."the Big 12 doesn't play defense." etc etc etc.

Sorry man. At one time I totally agreed the SEC was the best. Then the internet happened and I found out teams like Florida and Georgia never travel outside of 500 miles. Alabama, yes the standard of excellence, hasn't played an out of conference road game vs a ranked opponent anywhere except a bowl game or Kickoff Classic in 20+ years. 

Boy, I wish they didn't have these bowl-tie ins. tOSU would defeat Georgia. So would West Virginia. Both would destroy LSU. 

Sorry to rain on your parade. I love football but NCAA football is getting ruined.

This would be a halfway decent argument if the SEC didn't dominate the bowls, dominate interconference competition, dominate the NFL draft, dominate the playoffs, etc. Get over it.

I like the rules, but it should be a separate score and stat sheet. Just play out the OT periods then go back and add 1 point to the winning team's regulation score. I'm sick of people saying we have a bad defense because we gave up 72, when it was 31 at the end of the game. 

@mld-woody said:

I'll make just one post. I'm not  gonna sit here and argue with trolls. Either DH that's just a troll or Gip who's  an idiot turned into a troll.

That was fucking awful. OSU's better athletes showed as they abused our one Hoke leftover CB. We tried to make adjustments (much too late)  and even if it looked like they were helping the injuries just sealed it. Sure, losing these guys made it worse, but even with that it was fucking awful. 

I thought we'd finally get the lucky play for once, then OSU evened that right back up. It is just like we're cursed to continue to lose. You think there'd be some kind of karma for everything that went on, but no. There is no karma. Nothing matters. 

I WISH we could have had this reffing crew in 2016. But again, too little too late. Otherwise they seemed to do a very good job. 

The offense played well, but the playcalling was so archaic. I'll give  it up to OSU, their D looked like shit all year then all of a sudden learned how to play (early on at least). Once we finally gave up on repeatedly running it for 1 yard on 1st down, and passed to our very good WRs, things got moving. But too late. And with the shitshow the D put on, it didn't matter.

We  are just cursed. Idk what else there is to it. You all have no idea what this is like. Every year. Doomed to just fuck it up. You'll post, and you'll troll, and you'll insult and you'll continue to be insulated in you bubble wrap. I don't know what it is. I can only hope Meyer retires this year for "health reasons" (or more shit comes to light) and then maybe, MAYBE OSU makes a bad coaching hire. 

And no, Harbaugh isn't going anywhere. Before that whole thing starts. No, he isn't on the hot seat. 

Hopefully our players can get through the bowl game healthy and go have good NFL careers. Hopefully we continue to recruit well and close the talent gap with OSU.

Who the fuck knows. 

Now please, feel free to respond. Feel free to troll. I'm not hopping back in here. I'm not going to try to deal with the trolling and the bias. It is bad enough on a normal day. 

Oh, and Haskins should go pro. Not because I don't want to face him or anything. Just because his stock is about as high as it is going to get. Throwing a  bunch of screens and crossing routes for another year isn't going to improve his stock any more. He needs to do what Cardale should have done. 

You do realize no one would troll you nearly as hard if you didn't hype Michigan so much right? Like the fact that you think they are recruiting "well." If you're trying to beat Ohio State, "recruiting well" is top 5 classes. Y'all aren't getting those. Ohio State is (every. single. year.). 

If your posts were more like this throughout the year, probably no one would troll you. Trust me, I have always been surrounded by fans of more successful programs. I know how to do this ; )

Big 12 is a complete and utter joke.

@mld-woody said:

Yeah you guys crushed.... *looks  at schedule*   Louisiana Monroe 

That team you barely beat lost to Akron....

@the-gipper said:

Keep ducking the subject. TAMU  left the Big 12  out of greed and jealousy. Plain and simple

I just saw this. Texas was the greedy ones in the whole deal. Until you admit that, you're not being honest. But then, that would be no surprise.

Why do millennials say "talk me out of...."?

Win or lose tonight, Dorsey is bad.

Start of a new era. 

According to Ourlads, Bama has 2 redshirt seniors on the starting lineup. Ohio State has 4. Auburn and Georgia have 1. Clemson 4. Oklahoma 3. Notre Dame has ZERO.

@mld-woody said:

You can call it what you want then to make it sound bad, that's fine. We clearly aren't going to agree. If you refuse to acknowledge the context and recent history leading to where we are now, alright.

Wisconsin, which consistently produces a very good OL, has an entire starting lineup with a Redshirt. Two starters are Redshirt Srs. 

I'm sorry, but no. Last year's recruiting class, and the true freshmen OL in it, are not expected to play the vast majority of the time. They are not expected to play a major role in this current years OL depth and performance. 

Harbaugh has had 3 full recruiting classes (though even the 2016 class was working from behind some).

According to Rivals:

- 2016 - 4th

- 2017 - 4th

- 2018 - 24th 

2018 was obviously not great. Regardless, I think you're trying to make Harbaugh's recruiting seem worse than it is, basing it much more on his recent class. No reason to panic.

In that time A&M was 17, 10 and 16. We'll see how much Jimbo can affect that. 

Wisconsin is a mostly white nerd team that will never win a national championship. Is that your goal? How many 5th year seniors starting do Bama, Ohio State, Georgia, etc. have? Don’t look to Wisconsin as an example if you want to win really big. If you want to win 10 games a year, then go emulate Wisconsin. Otherwise not relevant. 

I never said true freshmen OL should play (though again, many of the big time squads have had those). 

And I concede A&M didn’t recruit enough (in fact wrote lengthy blog posts about as much on NSD both 2015 and 16). Jimbo will affect that don’t you worry. Sumlin was an overrated recruiter, never addressed needs, and loved to load up on 4 star receivers while they rest of the SEC stacked the front 7 . 

@mld-woody said:

Again, no it isn't. It's not "playing a card". It is just stating facts.

Going back to the tail end of the RRod era through the Hoke era, OL recruiting was pretty bad. This caused us to have to start a true freshman out of position at  LT, Mason Cole (who I believe is now starting as a rookie for the Cardinals at C). If there was normal depth, Cole would have been redshirted, as are most OL, allowing him to still be playing this season. 

The following season was Hoke's great fall, and the recruiting class reflected that. We had one tackle destined for the NFL and he had a career ending injury. Harbaugh attempted to pick up the pieces in a 3 week transition class. 

The next class, Harbaugh's first "full" class (though, the staff is still a little behind as most recruiting starts before a player's Sr year) has its own issues. Those are on Harbaugh. A late decommitment and passing on an OT. That would prove to be  disastrous after the career ending injury above. The following year was similar, though not as bad. They aimed high and couldn't walk away with any big names. We would eventually fire our OL coach...

As for last year's class, that shouldn't matter. True freshman should very, very, very rarely ever start at OL, and when they do its usually out of desperation, not talent. Linemen usually need that year to bulk up. Even then, we might turn to one of the true freshmen to try and start this year (desperation). But last year's class being the worst of Harbuagh's main three so far doesn't really play into the situation we're in now. 

Call it what you want. Saying some of Harbaugh’s failures in preparing this particular team are in any way Brady Hoke’s fault is “playing the Hoke card.”

So a guy not being able to play his 5th year is a good reason? Seriously? Most of the big time programs have very few guys staying until their 5th year. They’re either run off before then or go to the NFL. 

Everyone does the whole transition class thing. That’s no excuse. 

Every class matters. The effects of depth trickle upward. The true freshmen push the 2nd stringers which makes the 2nd stringers better which pushes the starters. Gotta sign a top flight class every year. Nevertheless, my point was that I might give a pass on Hoke’s bad recruiting IF Harbaugh was signing consistent top 5 classes. He’s not, so I won’t. If Jimbo ever signed a twenty-something class, I’d panic a decent amount.