2017-2018 Bowl Game Predictions

The final CFB Selection Committee rankings of 2017 were released yesterday along with the bowl game assignments.  That’s 76 different schools in thirty-nine bowl games; 37 non-CFB bowl games and 2 semifinal playoff games.

I’ve said it before.  Thirty-nine bowl games is just a smidgen too damn many.  That many bowl games have nothing to do with demand.

Disney makes money off them. ABC and ESPN broadcast almost all of them, including the whole New Year’s SIx, and ESPN even owns about a third of them outright.

I mean, would you want your company to pay money to sponsor the Bad Boy Mowers Gasparilla Bowl formerly known as the St. Petersburg Bowl between a 6-6 team and an 8-4 team on a December weekday?  Many of these games will be played in half-empty stadiums.

Of the 39 games, 38 will be broadcast by ESPN or one of their sister networks, ABC and ESPN2. The only bowl game that is not on a Disney-owned network is the Arizona Bowl which will air on CBS.  The real reason ESPN is willing to fork out big bucks to broadcast these games is because live programming fills in empty time slots.  In 2010, ESPN was available in nearly 100 million homes but is now only seen in 87 million with more and more homes deciding to “cut the cord”.

The 24-hour sports network is laying off 150 employees in the face of financial pressures and that action follows a round of layoffs in April of 100 employees and the departure of 300 people in late 2015.  Disney/ESPN has had a brutal fourth quarter.  Their operating income declined 12% from a year earlier making it the sixth quarter in a row they’ve shown a loss in their ledgers.

So, do people like me complain about there being too many bowl games that reward mediocrity?  Yes, they do.

I’ve decided to appropriate steal an idea from my SEC sister and blogger friend Diogenes and make some predictions about the News Years Six and CFB Semifinal Playoff games.  For the record, I am biased.  My predictions are based not on stats or series histories or even what the sports “experts” think.  They are my own feelings on which teams will emerge as victors in the important games that will bring this hard-fought season to a close.

I want to congratulate each team for their play on the gridiron, their courage and their heart.  These teams are the best of the best.  You may not agree with my picks and that’s to be expected.

NOTE:  Not all games have been included; only the ones that will establish the AP Top 25 rankings for Week One of the 2018 season.

College Football Playoff Selection Day: Crybaby Edition

With a blog titled Political Clown Parade you’d think I would post something relating to the scuzzy world of politics.  Not today. Nope. Not happening.

I spent my Saturday slopped up on the couch with tasty beverages and the customary snackeries required to watch the final weekend of college football before Selection Day.

As I said in my post yesterday, I was summoning the favor of the football gods for some help getting my beloved Alabama Crimson Tide into the College Football Playoffs.  I didn’t get any help from the Sooners and the outcome of the Clemson/Miami game would have made no difference.

Glimmers of hope began to overtake the crowd I had over for my slightly famous football couch-gating party.  The Jawja Bulldawgs beat the tiger crap out of Auburn.  War Eagle was plucked clean.  Nary a feather remains on the hapless foul.  I feel sorry for the wretched beast.  The weather is turning colder.  It must be embarrassing to be naked in public.

Whatever juju I had working carried into the Buckeyes/Badgers battle in the Big 10 Championship Game.  Urb’s boys had a “struggle win” against Bucky Badger.  Perfect.  I was rooting for them despite my loathing for Meyer and those Buckeyes.

I spent the morning cleaning up the tornado left from the couch-gate party and settled down to watch ESPN’s coverage of the Selection Committee’s final rankings.  The program began at noon, but the so-called “sports experts” babbled endlessly killing time until the Committee released the rankings.

Finally, 30 minutes later the rankings were tediously revealed one by one.  Clemson, Oklahoma, Georgia and…Ala-by-God-bama!

That last one sent crybaby Kirk Herbstreit into a bit of a tizzy and he walked off the ESPN set.  The crew laughed their fannies off and viewers saw an empty chair where Herbstreit had been sitting.  He couldn’t believe his alma mater had been snubbed.  It was like watching a Saturday Night Live skit, only funnier. 

Kirk Herbstreit was so shocked by the committee putting Alabama in he actually walked off set pic.twitter.com/U8cJTRobo6

— The Spun (@TheSpun) December 3, 2017

The cavalcade of sports pundits repeatedly insisted Bama’s resumé was "deeply, deeply flawed..."  Oh really? It’s not as flawed as Clemson who lost to Syracuse or Ohio State who lost 55-24 to a 7-5 Iowa State.

"The losses matter," Herbstreit said. “But when you lose the way they did, it sent a message to the committee that they just couldn't forgive. It was like an anchor tied around that program that brought them down. It's incredible to think, with Wisconsin at No. 6, that we're going to have two teams in the top 10 that Ohio State beat. Probably better than anything Alabama had, and Ohio State is a conference champ. Yet still, the people in that room just liked Alabama better as a football team. That, with the loss to Iowa kind of balanced out Ohio State's resumé."

"This is the unfortunate era of college football that we're in, where we're splitting hairs," Herbstreit said. "Winning the Big Ten is a hell of an accomplishment, but they didn't jump off the screen like they did in 2014, when they just blew Wisconsin out in the Big Ten title game and you were like, 'How are you going to leave them out?' And Saturday's game didn't feel like that and I think that's what hurt them."

No shit Sherlock.

Every Ohio State fan right now, including me #BuckeyeNation pic.twitter.com/JgUuJLuIuc

— Luke Shetler (@lukeshetler) December 3, 2017

UPDATE:  I’m including this Funny Maine video of “How Bama Fans Watched The 2017 Conference Championships” because, well it’s FUNNY.  I love how he says, “We coming to New Orleans, Louisi-BAMA."

Alabama vs Washington: CFB Playoff Semifinal

Saturday’s Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl promises to be epic.  Huskies fans have taunted “We want Bama” and they’re about to get their wish.

These two schools have met exactly four times in their history:  New Years Day in the 1926 Rose Bowl, in 1975 U-Dub came to Tuscaloosa, three years later the Tide traveled to Seattle and their last meeting was on Christmas Day 1986 in the Sun Bowl.  Each meeting resulted in a glorious victory for the Crimson Tide.

That was then.  This is now.

Alabama faithful know only too well the nation sees Alabama as villains.  The Tide is the defending National Champion with the nation’s longest winning streak.  Washington has had a miraculous one-loss season but they are a 14-point underdog.  The last time the Huskies were National Champions was 25 years ago.

Alabama enters the Playoffs undefeated and looking to keep that record intact to become the first repeat Playoff era champion.  Legendary coach Paul “Bear” Bryant won six national championships.  Nick Saban has won five.  Winning against Washington moves Saban closer to tying “The Bear”.

I believe with all my heart my beloved Crimson Tide will defeat the Huskies.  It’s their destiny.  The players want the win for school pride and they want it for Coach Saban.

So...get your hate on.  The Huskies will leave the Georgia Dome like yelping pups with their tails tucked between their legs having faced college football’s most powerful dynasty.

ROLL TIDE!

CFB Semi-Final Playoff: Alabama Crimson Tide Vs Michigan State Spartans

No. 2 Alabama is a 10-point favorite over No. 3 Michigan State in tonight’s Goodyear Cotton Bowl, the nightcap of the College Football Playoff doubleheader on ESPN.

Some dude named Stewart Mandel, a college football writer for Fox Sports, seems to have gotten his knickers in a wad because “the powers that be at the playoff kowtowed to the Rose and Sugar Bowls and exiled the semifinals to New Year’s Eve.”

He even took to his Twitter account asking his followers if their plans for New Year’s Eve would keep them from watching one or both of the semi-final games being played today.  The results were less than compelling.  Of the 5,443 people who responded, 35% said their plans would indeed interfere with watching the game.  I have to say that there are enough people out there who have the ability to simultaneously ring in the New Year and watch their beloved team on TV.  Some are even lucky enough to make the trip to Arlington, TX and Miami to see the game in person. 

When the BCS was ditched and replaced with the CFB, the Rose Bowl and Sugar Bpwl were essentially kicked to the curb.  Let them have their little “tradition”.

As a rabid Alabama Crimson Tide fan, I can think of no better way to ring in the New Year than by watching my beloved Bama boys take on the Spartans of Michigan State.  I get that the Rose Bowl, dubbed the “Granddaddy of them all”, has a 100-year-old tradition complete with a parade before the game.  I have no problem with the Rose and Sugar Bowls retaining their “place of honor” on New Year’s Day.

Not everybody wants to dress up and go out to ring in the New Year.  Like many others, we here at Casa de Curmudgeon, have planned a yuuuuuuge college football party replete with decorations that just ooze Bama Nation team spirit, all the traditional “tailgate” food and drink and three widescreen TVs so that everybody can watch the game in comfort.  Celebrating beating Michigan State while ringing in 2016 with friends is most excellent if you ask me.

The dynasty at Alabama is not dead and tonight Bama is going to prove it.  There’s no need to quote stats or repeat what Coach Saban or Coach Dantonio said in their press conferences this week.  What matters is the heart and courage of the team that wants to win a national championship the most.

Alabama has the best defense in the country and 15 national championships in its storied history.  The Tide has reached the BCS Championship game or a CFB playoff semifinal five times in seven seasons.  That is the epitome of dominance.

I disagree with those who claim Michigan State advanced to the semi-finals solely due to a flagging Ohio State.

All four teams—Clemson, Oklahoma, Michigan State and Alabama—fought bloody battles during the regular season and deserve the pedestal upon which they have been placed.

ROLL TIDE ROLL!