Rantings and Ramblings - 1-7-2012

The College Bowl season sure has been interesting this year and I’ve been a terrible prognosticator of how well the SEC would do. I predicted a 5-4 performance (6-5 if you add A&M and Missouri). The SEC will go 8-3 and crown its 6th consecutive BCS National Champion Monday night. I, on the other hand, went 3-6 with the BCS title game still to be played. 

• Florida v Ohio St - I can’t stand either team, but I thought OSU would get this win…LOSS
• S Carolina (9) v Nebraska (20) - How does South Carolina keep winning without Lattimore and with Connor Shaw as the QB? The Old Ball Coach gets 11 wins at USC and I get another LOSS.
• Georgia (16) v Michigan State (17) – my dad and I agree on a lot of things in sports, with the main thing being that the “PREVENT” defense only prevents you from winning. I feel bad for Brendan Walsh. He’s had a horrible season, but Richt’s 3rd down FG attempt was the wrong call and gave me another LOSS.
• Texas A&M v Northwestern – A&M wins their Big 12 swan song. Welcome to the SEC! WIN
• Auburn (25) v Virginia – No surprise here. Tigers were the better team. WIN
• Miss St v Wake Forest – I took Wake on performance against Clemson…nuff said, right? LOSS
• Missouri v N Carolina – I went 2-0 predicting the SEC newbies. UGA v Missouri on September 6th will let us know where each school stands. WIN
• Arkansas (6) v Kansas State (8) – Took K-State more b/c I figured it would be a letdown game for Arkansas. LOSS
• Vanderbilt v Cincinnati – SEC loses against the Big East in FOOTBALL?!?!?!? I forgot about UGA getting whipped by WVU a few years back. LOSS

To add more misery to my already horrible predictions for the SEC, my secondary favorite football program, Clemson, got waxed by West Virginia in the Orange Bowl. Understand, my new found like, and I stress LIKE, of Clemson is only because my daughter, Elise, is a sophomore there. I also love Dabo Sweeney. How refreshing is it to see a coach excited for his team after a big win? But to give up 70 points in any football game is pitiful. When you are the ACC Champion playing in a BCS bowl game and you give up 70 points, well, that is just embarrassing.

Speaking of West Virginia, props to the Big 12 for adding WVU. I feel the SEC made a big mistake taking the Missouri Tigers over the Mountaineers as the 14th member of the SEC. Sure, Missouri comes from the Big 12, expands the SEC footprint westward, and makes for a natural rival to Texas A&M and Arkansas, but West Virginia has been the better program over the past 10 years than Missouri. Let’s look at the comparison.

BCS Bowl Appearances  WVU - 3 (3-0)              Missouri - 0 (0-0)
10 win seasons                WVU - 3                        Missouri - 3
Conference Titles             WVU - 6                        Missouri - 0 (2 division titles)
Top 25 Rankings             WVU - 7                         Missouri - 3
Top 10 Rankings             WVU - 3                         Missouri - 1
Record                            WVU - 85-30 (48-14)    Missouri - 81-47 (44-37)

The Big East takes a big hit for not being a very good football conference, and rightfully so. But West Virginia has shown over the past 10 years that it is a program worthy of playing with the elite conferences. Just so we don’t forget, the University of Miami and Virginia Tech were former members of the Big East who now play in the ACC.

Indiana basketball is back!!! The Hoosiers are 14-1, ranked #12 in the country with wins over then #1 ranked Kentucky and then #2 ranked Ohio State. This was supposed to be an improved year for IU hoops, but it was thought that next year would be when they would make noise in the national picture. I just hope IU doesn’t pull a Clemson on the back half of the schedule and get sloppy.

The 2012 PGA Tour season started yesterday with the Hundai Tournament of Champions at the Kapalua Resort in Maui. I had the chance to play the course in 2008 for my 40th birthday, and I have to say the TV coverage doesn’t do justice to the course. That has to be one of the toughest courses I have ever played. The views are spectacular from almost every hole, especially from the tee on #18, looking down that huge slope. A good drive will see the ball roll forever down that slope.

Will 2012 be the return of Tiger? I hope not. I hope that The Golf Channel and the networks get away from showing every shot Tiger Woods makes, even when he is out of contention. I can’t remember Nicklaus, Watson, Couples, or Norman having every shot of every round shown on the TV.

The 2011 golf season was great to watch and showed that golf will be fine without Tiger Woods. We saw McIlroy collapse on the back nine of Augusta National on Sunday, only to dominate the US Open at Congressional. Keegan Bradley become only the third man to win a major on his first attempt (can you name the other two?) and Darren Clarke get his first career major at The Open Championship. Luke Donald surged to #1 in the world on the strength of 4 worldwide wins and a slew of top 10 finishes that allowed him to become the first player to ever win the PGA Tour Money Title and the European Tour Order of Merit in the same season. And let’s not forget Bill Haas’ incredible wedge from the water at the Tour Championship that helped propel him to the Fed-Ex Cup title, denying Webb Simpson the money title and the Fed-Ex cup.

The NFL playoffs start today, and I am not joining the Tim Tebow for God’s right hand man bandwagon and putting them in the Super Bowl. Tim Tebow will be “Tebowing” on the sidelines a lot this weekend getting the cobwebs out of his head from the vaunted Steel Curtain sacking him all day long.

With that said, here are my playoff predictions for this weekend. If they are anything like me SEC bowl picks, I’d be placing a lot of money on who I don’t pick.

• Bengals v Texans – T.J v A.J – I’m going with the DAWG – Bengals get revenge for 20-19 loss a few weeks ago and win 23-17. 
• Lions v Saints – Stafford v Breese – The DAWG loses this one as the Saints roll 38-20.
• Falcons v Giants – Falcons have a history of losing when they should win (Danny White to Drew Pearson is forever etched into my memory banks). Falcons fail again to weaker Giants 21-20.
• Steelers v Broncos – Broncos are 7 point dog at home. Take the Steelers and give the points (20-3)

Ray Lewis gets John Harbaugh a ring before Jim as the Ravens beat the Saints in Super Bowl XLVI.

Until next time…

John

PS – Francis Oiumet (1913 US Open) and Ben Curtis (2003 Open Championship) won a major on their first attempt.