So unfortunately, I was up early today because the gas man had to come and turn on my stove, so I turned on ESPN. Cue interview with Craig James about the poll. The first question was of course about Florida. Not will they win the title, but how is Florida not the unanimous #1? Remember this same bitching with the Tebow controversy? I think Florida got 53/59 first place votes. Again, who cares. Credit to Craig James who actually gave a good interview. He said he didnt know, but went into talking about how he thinks they should win every game, could lose a game (@ LSU), but are by far the favorites to win the title, even if they lose a game. I couldn't agree more. To me, I haven't seen anyone have Texas, Oklahoma, or USC as the #1 team preseason, but I'm not totally shocked that someone did vote for those teams. James also said that they need to release the coaches votes from now on so they can't hide behind the anonymity of the process. I agree 100% again.
Then they asked if James was surprised that Texas was ranked ahead of Oklahoma? Why the fuck would he? By the way, Dari Nowkhah was conducting this interview. I dont know who this guy is, but I could think of about 10000 more interesting questions about the coaches poll alone than this guy came up with. Upon some research, I found out he got his Bachelor's Degree from Oklahoma, so I could see how he would come up with a dumb question like that. James just simply said, "no, I am not surprised".
Unfortunately, I turned on ESPNews then (I think I get every version of ESPN), I found out that during the year there will be live updates throughout all of Saturdays and live look-ins, stuff like that. I said, "this will be good", because there is always some sort of a lull. You can switch to it during commercials, during an odd hour such as dinner time when games arent on, when a game is particularly painful to watch, (Mike Patrick announcing), etc. Then I found out that the three anchors doing this would be Dari Nowkhah, Shaun King, and Kordell Stewart. Ughhhh. Which is the least of the three evils?
Then Nowkhah asks James who he thought would be a sleeper in the top 25. Wouldnt them being in the top 25 make them not a sleeper? James either misunderstands or just blows this guy off for being an idiot and says Kansas (not in the top 25). I agree with James again. Kinda scary actually.
So that was that. Nowkhah managed to slip in one more comment about Florida --- that Tebow and Meyer are going to use their non-unanimous selection as bulletin board material. Is that a joke? Urban Meyer has 2 titles. Tebow has 2 titles, a Heisman, passed on millions of dollars in the NFL to play another year, to do his missions across the globe, he could end up going down as the greatest player of all time if he wins another title and Heisman - but he needs a preseason coaches poll (or going back a week, the preseason All SEC- First Team) votes to get excited? Im sure.
I know that I ranked the Big East ahead of the MWC in my rankings, and I regret it day by day. But, I will say this. It doesnt seem fair that a conference that has 0 teams ranked in the top 25 (Big East) gets an automatic bid and all that money I talked about in the BCS article, and a team that has 3 ranked teams (MWC), doesnt get squat guaranteed. So if BYU, Utah, and TCU beat each other up, and somehow they all go 11-1, one of those teams wont get picked to play in the BCS, but Wanny can go 8-4 with Pitt and go to the Orange Bowl? Dont laugh, its already happened (although not under Wannstedt).
Then a news flash came across the board, and they said, we are going to go live to the Charlie Weis press conference. I half expected him to already be upset/yelling at people, for people to be grilling him, etc. All it was was him talking about what type of workouts the offensive linemen do. He was talking about how they dead lift and squat, and how much, in general, they increase in strength. Upon realizing that nothing special was going on, ESPNews aborted coverage.
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Recruiting is on the forefront of my brain, just because ESPN just named their top 150 players. Recruiting to me is a little overblown. If it were just a matter of who recruits the best, the same teams would win every year. Conversely, a team like Utah would never be able to go undefeated like they did. Eventually, it comes down to coaching, developing the players, and playing and winning the games. Seems like this would be common sense, yet everyone always get caught up in the hoopla of recruiting.
Second of all, how hard is it to recruit really? If you are Texas, Florida, USC, etc. is it really hard to go in and sell yourself to an 18 year old kid? If you're a kid, you realize you don't have to hang out with Mack Brown every day, but if he comes knocking on your door and says come play for the University of Texas, Im sure you are giddy. Some big names get filtered down to the lower schools because they can promise playing time, $$$, Escalades, whatever. I dont see where the difficulty lies.
Just because you get the top players doesn't mean that they turn out to be the greatest either. Things happen; they get hurt, they transfer, they go to prison, etc. Lets look at some players that were instrumental in the championships of the past. Lets look at Florida:
In 2003, under Ron Zook, they got the following players that were in the top 100 from Rivals.com:
Andre Caldwell (4), Dee Webb (12), Joe Cohen (16), Chad Jackson (17), Jarvis Moss (25), Chris Leak (26), Reggie Nelson (61), Marcus Thomas (73).
That Zook is a hell of a recruiter, -- too bad he never won any games. Those guys were seniors on the Championship team that Meyer coached. Lets look at those who would have been juniors in 2004:
Derrick Harvey (8), Brandon Siler (34), Kyle Jackson (54), Cornelius Ingram (62), Drew Miller (65), McIntosh Nicolas (85).
Not as strong of a recruiting class. How the hell did Meyer win with these guys as juniors!?!?! (Im being facetious, sometimes that doesnt translate well through the computer). People who say that Meyer won the title with Ron Zook's players are the biggest idiots Ive ever met or heard. True, Harvey had about 100 sacks in the title game against Ohio State, but other than Ingram, have you even ever heard of those guys?
Now for 2005. This class is important because these are the guys who will be seniors on Florida's 2nd national title (last year).
Avery Atkins (84).
Thats it. WHAT THE FUCK!?! Master recruiter Zook only landed one player in the top 100 in his final year. Maybe its because everyone knew he was on his way out (remember fireronzook.com?) Maybe its because his charade was over. This isnt 100% surprising because we know that Florida had very few seniors last year. That is true. Thus, only 1 was even in the top 100 of his class. Yet, they won the title. Lets look at all of those juniors they had last year/freshmen on the 1st title team.
2006: Percy Harvin #1
2006: Brandon Spikes #13
2006: Tim Tebow #22
2006: Carl Johnson #28
2006: Jarred Fayson #47
2006: Riley Cooper #99
And thats it for the top 100. Those were all Juniors last year on Florida's team. They didnt have that many in the top 100 (only 6). Tom Luginbill (like the Mel Kiper of the High School to College transition) gave Florida an A for recruiting. These guys were Freshman on their first title. You hear of any of those guys. Other than the obvious Harvin-Spikes-Tebow block, even Carl Johnson excelled at Tackle, and Riley Cooper figures to be big at WR this year. They didnt miss on any of their picks.
Heres 2007, these are all the guys who want to play for Florida because they just won a title game, and they were sophomores last year:
Carlos Dunlap (5), Torrey Davis (9), James Wilson (12), Cameron Newton (28), Jerimy Finch (37), Major Wright (43), John Brantley (47), Deonte Thompson (49), Joe Haden (59), Aaron Hernandez (66), Chris Rainey (89).
Thats a lot of players. Dunlap, Wright, and Haden will all be featured big time on their defense this year. You havent heard of Brantley or Newton because theyre both QBs, and obviously playing behind Tebow. All those other guys? You might not have heard of them, but you will soon enough.
But here is the important part. Florida returns 17 starters, 6 on offense and 11 on defense. Lets name them, but lets also put their rank from their class when they were recruited:
Tim Tebow (22), Aaron Hernandez (66), Mike Pouncey (NR), Maurkice Pouncey (NR), Carl Johnson (28), Riley Cooper (99). And thats it. Are those numbers that blow you away? They shouldnt.
Defensively:
Carlos Dunlap (5), Lawrence Marsh (NR), Terron Sanders (NR), Jermaine Cunningham (NR), A.J. Jones (NR), Brandon Spikes (13), Ryan Stamper (NR), Joe Haden (59), Janoris Jenkins (51 [only a Soph, ranked 51 in 2008 rankings]), Ahmad Black (NR), Major Wright (43).
Does anyone else find that astounding? They return 17 starters from their national championship team. Of those, half (kinda half, 8), werent even top 100 players when they were recruited. So they arent filled with a team that was just ranked 1-22 in the rivals polls. Not only that, but from above, what else did we see? Those that were taken in the top 100 are proving to be useful. They dont have any wasted picks.
(For example, ranked within 5 on each side of Tebow in 06 were: Robert Rose, Stafon Johnson, A.J. Wallace, Al Woods, Ricky Sapp, C.J. Gable, Brandon Warren, Eddie Jones, Stephen Schilling, James Aldridge. So, all those players will be seniors or RS Juniors. How many have you heard of? Gable, Johnson, Aldridge, and thats it right? And despite having heard of them, we can all agree they arent Tim Tebows.)
Well here's the point, and I probably could have just written this instead of everything I did write. IT ISNT ABOUT RECRUITING. Its about coaching. Florida has good recruiting classes; Im not gonna sit here and say 'poor Florida, they dont get anyone good', but theres a reason they have won 2/3 titles. It isnt because of Ron Zook. Its because you do exactly what you think you would do. You get players, you coach them, you improve them, you put them in a position to succeed, and when you are the best at it, you win. Period.
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To close, I have some random thoughts. I try to stay away from the NFL as much as possible. Im trying to quit fantasy football like people try to quit doing H (and failing at it just as much as they fail too), I hate Trey Wingo, host of NFL live which puts a wrench in the works if you want to find out whats going on, etc. I love watching NFL matchup, the pregame show on ESPN, all the games (despite the commercials, officiating, and announcing), but thats all during the season. During the offseason, I dont follow it. There will be situations where Week 2 of the season, I will be surprised that someone is on another team, because I didn't follow it during the offseason.
That being said, I have a few NFL comments.
I turned on the last 3 minutes of NFL Live at 1:27 because I wanted to watch Jim Rome at 1:30. This should be funny for anyone who does or doesn't know this already. Herm Edwards and Matt Millen were there. MATT MILLEN. I kinda knew this already; I think Bill Simmons mentioned it in his column when it happened, so this is kinda old news. But when you dont watch it ever, it might as well have been that I just found out about it today. Dude.......stop and think for a second.
Matt Millen.
I didnt even notice if Wingo was there or not, I was so blown away. Remember when Cartman sees the people with butts for heads and blows a funny fuse? After seeing that, he can't laugh at anything else that would normally be funny. Well I blew a shock fuse after seeing that. I will no longer be in shock when I see anything on tv. How did that interview go?
Did Millen apply to ESPN, or did the executives see that he was fired for being the worst GM ever and greet him as he was escorted out of Lions headquarters and offer him a contract? If he applied, did the executives of ESPN know who he was? Did Millen create a resume? You know when you make your resume, and you put your college, your GPA, and if you were on the Dean's List or something? Does it say Detroit Lions, 31-84, playoffs 0 years? I cant even go into his resume, its too sickening.
But at the end, they asked, what player will be the biggest acquisition in 2009? Edwards says Tony Gonzalez, good pick. Millen says 3 people:
"Jay Cutler, Rod Marinelli, and losing Jim Johnson hurts the Eagles".
Uhhhhh.
Cutler is the biggest Free Agent move of the year, so theres no guts in saying that. Rod Marinelli? Not only is he not a player, but is this the start of a Matt Millen redemption tour? Is he thinking "well I hired Marinelli in Detroit, and we were terrible, maybe if I say hell be a big acquisition, then theyll think hes a good coach, and that it wasnt his fault, and in turn, not my fault. Hey, that almost makes sense!" And finally, do I really need to mention the Johnson part? I dont really want to get into it, because I liked Jim Johnson and thought he was a good coach, but how can "losing" someone be an acquisition? Not only that, but this idiot Millen uses it in the casual language that sports reporters use as if they just dont have Johnson hired anymore, not that he has passed away.
For example: "The Colts lose Marvin Harrison" as in he isnt on the Colts anymore.
Millen: "The Eagles lose Jim Johnson" as in, hes dead.
It is just mind boggling that this guy has a job, still.
Do you think that Dan Marino thinks to himself "I have 0 super bowl rings, and Matt Millen has 4" at least once a day?
Millen has also become reason #1021 that I dont like watching the NFL during the offseason. I hope he doesn't get added to the morning show NFL Countdown, but like I said, my shock fuse has been blown.
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