These directions say we go to [Tempe] Arizona!

Thoughts from 19 Sept 2008 - To The Heat I Head...

I am jacked beyond belief about Tailgate 2008 - Desert Dawg Edition. While this may not be tailgating as we know it under the shade of UGA’s beautiful North Campus and amid Athens’ gorgeous co-eds, we are slated to have a spectacular weekend in Tempe. A few friends and hordes of the Bulldog Nation are converging on invading Athens West for the weekend. We will feel at home when we make Mill Street resemble Broad Street - red and black clad fans barking loudly, discussing the finer points of our beloved Dawgs, and shouting Go DAWGS! We will make do with what ever Tempe Tailgating has to offer and represent Georgia well. Now which way to the Taco Stand?

Let me say it again...I am stoked out of my gourd about this weekend. I have been reading blogs and newspaper articles online most of the week, and thanks to a last minute grab of the Mac and PDX's free Wi-Fit, my 90-minute flight delay spent reading about the Dual in the Desert seemed much shorter - reading more blog posts and newspaper articles. Enough of this reading I say...get me to Tempe. The excitement is so rampant around the House of Davi that even The Wife is singing songs about "going to see the Doggies!" I am not making up this my friend. It is a beautiful sound to hear!

The trip has started well...Jen is safe in Tempe, and I am safely on my way now. Dinner was eaten at a red and black table with red chairs. What a wonderful start.

So I am off and going, having talked with a few people on my flight who are aware of the excitement that surrounds this Dawgs in the Desert Weekend, so this should be an indicator that things will be nuts in Athens West / Tempe. Go DAWGS! Now it is time for the Bulldog Nation to show Sparky how to...

Get Out And Romp

SEC Back-Up

Greetings from high above the Midwest as Jen and I make our way to Charlotte before our travels take us to Myrtle Beach - Charleston - Peachtree City - Alpharetta - Oakboro (rural Charlotte).  Another trip on crack, but at least I will not return to Portland and return to school.

But I digress before I even start. Is that possible? Anyway…my musings today stem from two factors. (1) I finally took the advice of my buddy Andrew and purchased Dixieland Delight (by Clay Travis), which has been part of my entertainment on my flight thus far. The book tells the tales from Clay’s 8,000 mile tour / road trip through the Southeast and the 2006 SEC football season - 1 home game at each member school - and (2) I had to be calmed while violently shaking my cozy plane seat as I was cheering on LSU who staved off elimination from the College World Series by plating 4 runners in the bottom of the 9th to beat and eliminate Rice (6 - 5).

So where does this leave us you ask?  Primary colors are great - red, yellow, blue - but seeing additional / secondary colors is a plus…they make life more, well, colorful.  That being said, we all have primary colleges for whom we devote much time, energy, and money, but I think we, like the color wheel, need secondary options, too.  What happens when you have a hankering for Chick-fil-A on Sunday when you know they are closed?  You do not vouch to never go again.  You simply find another yearning to supply your gastronomic craving and know that this is neither the first nor the last time you will encounter this exact same dilemma.  You have your primary desire, which is closed, so you find a secondary option to quench your thirst even if it is not as good as your primary drink of choice.

I am not here to help you lay out rules and hash through your options to find an alternative school for whom to cheer, but I have come to realize over the past couple of years that the Bengal Tiger Cats of Louisiana State University are my secondary color of choice.  But LSU is an SEC school you quip.  Right you are my friend, but I am not going to deny my primary Georgia squad when they meet in competition.  That would be like amputating your arm because you jammed your finger.  No way baby…that’s just not going down.  But when LSU is playing Rice, why should I not cheer for them?  My friend Molly is a Cajun, and she is one of the coolest people I know.  I have heard good things about LSU folk, and I hope to experience a night in the Bayou this October when the DAWGS head to Baton Rouge for what is expected to be a slugfest and a key game in Georgia’s run at a national title.

Quality, wholesome, jambalaya- and gumbo-making Cajuns are quality people on whom I wish no evil unless they meet my beloved Red and Black clad brethren from Athens.  You, my Bengal Tiger Cat friend, you are my Kid Sister to Georgia being My Buddy!

Get Out And Romp

Kids Who Change Their Own Rules

I just looked at the newly released polls (before the BCS games are unveiled), so you know the joy ends here.

We know that seemingly every year, someone gets screwed, but the system stays together because we typically have at least 1 dominant team. In other words, the recipe appears to work even if the ingredients are not exactally the same from year to year, which is like figuring out your family's long, lost recipe for dressing, sweet potato souffle, pumpkin pie, etc. The unfortunate piece is that at least one team (or person in the family) gets jobbed.

Welcome to 2007 college football, which, from Appalachain State's week 1 upset of Michigan in the Big House, has been unlike any college football season that we have seen in anyone's memory. Therefore, why would we expect to have a BCS situation that makes senese?

When we watch any sporting event, one essential is consistancy from the officials. If you call it one way in the 1st qtr, you better call it the same way in the waining and critical moments of the 4th qtr. We can swap officials, calls, and qtrs for pollsters / computers, rankings, and weeks to get the concept that...

Since we as college football fans are going to be screwed by a flawed BCS system, then we as fans deserve to be screwed by pollsters (and a system) that rank teams after week 1 in the SAME manner that they rank teams after the season's last weekend. The situation in which we find ourselves is reminiscent of life when we were KIDS for crying out loud. Pollsters, BCS people, and fans all hated that kid growing up who SUDDENLY and UNBEKNOWNST to the whole world changed the rules in his favor when his winning situation looked bleak to non-existent. The end result was that if things did not change, tht kid took the ball and went home while everyone else got pissed. Are you following me here?

I really feel like we are in that situation...yes as a Georgia fan...yes as a college football fan, too. The pollsters have simply changed the way they vote for what ever reason they have...maybe to ensure that the national champion is also a conference champion, which does not have to be the case as AGREED upon by EVERYONE invovled the BCS system. Nothing is stated about conference champion in BCS 101 (rules) - http://www.collegefootballpoll.com/bcs_explained.html - so why does that argument suddenly come out now when the system is showing more flaws. Maybe because LSU vs OSU is sexier than UGA vs OSU. Mabye as additional repayment for the government's total botch of Katrina. Maybe the pollsters are really Cajuns. Maybe this is all about Les Miles giving ESPN great ratings for his impromptu press conference. My guess is that like all things inexplicable about the system that always screws somebody, we have we will never know...and they will decide to tweak the rules again to try to get that family recipe almost right without having a playoff.

No matter how you look at them, losses are losses...in regulation or overtime. Deal with it. Timing is (or used to be) everything with a loss. Now the pollsters will save those they want to save. Are the Dawgs better than LSU this year? We will never know, but the Dawgs have just as much right as ANYONE else to play for the national title.

"When you lose a game, you are at the mercy of the BCS system" Richt stated. Oh how true that is, but it does not make the pain any less bearable.

No matter how big or small the screwed helping your team gets, hopefully you can stomach your portion of another BCS heeping helping of Mush.

Get Out And Romp