See Red

Actually a pretty brilliant play by the Lions if the officials didn’t completely screw it up.  I imagine they’re trying to confuse Dallas into hearing the number end with an 8 and thinking it’s that Sewell is reporting eligible.  #70 pretty clearly never talks to the official as the official is walking away before he even gets there.

 The thing that still doesn’t make sense is that if they believed #68 to be ineligible, it should have immediately been flagged as an illegal formation since the last guy on the line has to be eligible and #68 has to report to be eligible.  But they didn’t.

16 minutes ago, BBTV said:

Also, if illegal touching is 5 yards, and then they got 5 yards for offsides, why was the next attempt from behind the 2 yard line?  Wouldn't the net have been 0?

First penalty bumped it back to the 7 yard line, but since the offsides penalty happened inside the 10, it's only enforced half the distance to the goal.

It looks an awful lot like the officials messed the reporting up and the Lions got screwed and the official in the booth said it was an illegal formation because he's uncovered but if he reports, he has to be  uncovered.

edit: Actually, I believe if the refs thought #68 wasn't eligible, they should have immediately thrown a flag for an illegal formation when the ball was snapped, but didn't.  So why didn't they do that?

Opt outs are only relevant when it's not an SEC team's players opting out.  Otherwise it's just the SEC whining and making excuses. 

Doesn't hold much water when Georgia brings in the freshmen at halftime and continues the drubbing.  Biggest blowout in bowl game history and Georgia could've put another 30 on them if they cared to.

Don’t care who was out for Florida State, they look like a mid-tier FCS team right now against Georgia. Embarrassing efffort that probably doesn’t bode well for their 2024 team. 

I would be fine with McCaffrey or Lamar Jackson at this point.  I’d probably lean towards Lamar because as much as it sucks that it’s basically a QB-only award at this point, it’s hard to argue that the player that touches the ball on every offensive possession, is responsible for getting the offense out of or into certain plays, etc. isn’t the most valuable. 
 

With Lamar specifically, even if the numbers aren’t gaudy, his mobility (even just the threat of it) is still what makes the whole thing go.

As far as Russell Wilson, this is basically to prevent him from getting injured in the last two games, which could lead to a huge guarantee in 2025. I don’t know if this means they move on from him this off-season but I believe it does mean they are making sure it’s an option. 

Hope they do release him, personally. He hasn’t been awful  awful and I don’t think the cap situation will improve much but he’s been bad enough and I don’t think I can stomach watching him panic in a clean pocket and start running backwards anymore. 

Purdy went from MVP front runner to being benched for Sam Darnold.

Russ Wilson is stealing money. Unreal how bad he is.

edit: I stand by what I said no matter how this game turns out. 

2 hours ago, the admiral said:

The existence of Hollywood Brown and Cadillac Williams made me think of how it'd be fun to have a whole squad of, like, '70s black guys. A running back named Buttermilk Jackson because "his moves are, quote, smooth like buttermilk." Even just more food-based named would be great, so like if you had a change-of-pace who went by Short Stack. Wide receiver, obviously Downtown Jones because he takes it all the way downtown.

Next year we’ll have Kool-aid McKinstry on an NFL teams roster

1 hour ago, Unocal said:

Hot Take- SF is going to go 1 and done

 

Kyle Shanahan until proven otherwise is basically this era's Marty Schottenheimer

 

This 49ers team has a 2019 Ravens vibe- unstoppable with a lead, but do you trust them down 10?

The guy who coached Jimmy G to a Super Bowl is not this era’s Marty Schottenheimer.

8 hours ago, ruttep said:

 

Not sure he would have. I think that a lot of the Eagles' issues are defensive and in play-calling, neither of which would change with Mariota instead of Hurts. The bottom line is, an offense with that much skill and talent at every position should not be constantly coughing up the ball and scoring only 17 points against a banged-up Seattle defense.

I don’t think Johnson is a particularly good  play caller and is a clear step down from Steichen (who is exceptional based on what he’s done in Indy) but both of those interceptions were on Hurts and if he has to be handheld to not make those throws, he’s every bit the problem.

I've only watched three plays of this Broncos/Lions games and it's just three plays of ref :censored:ery.  This league sucks.

On 12/11/2023 at 11:34 AM, Burmy said:

The reason I'm thinking it was an upset is that, from my history, the Heisman winner has always led his team to a New Year's Six game.

 

LSU's stuck in the ReliaQuest bowl (I miss when it was the Outback or even the Hall of Fame Bowl), playin' my Badgers who are rarin' for the big upset...to me, the Heisman is for the "Most VALUABLE Player," not necessarily the "BEST player."

Lamar Jackson won it for a Louisville team that played in the Citrus Bowl.   The award is specifically for the most OUTSTANDING player, which, to me, was Daniels. 

52 minutes ago, dont care said:

Did Tebow have a “heisman moment” the year he won?

I believe what's considered Tebow's "Heisman moment" isn't really a moment but a full game where he had 7 TD's (5 rushing, 2 passing) vs South Carolina, so I guess not.

In that same sense, maybe Daniels' "Heisman moment" would be his 600+ yard game vs. Florida?

2 hours ago, MJD7 said:

FSU's offense had more yards in their conference championship game, with their 3rd-string quarterback, than Michigan did in theirs with their starter. Louisville is also ranked higher than Iowa.

Iowa is indisputably the best defense in college football this year.  Louisville has a middle-tier P5 defense.  FSU had 224 yards against a Florida defense that was easily one of the worst P5 defenses in the country.  Louisville is ranked above Iowa because Iowa's offense is one of a handful of worst in FBS.  Ohio State's defense is better than FSU and Michigan looked perfectly fine against them.

FSU's defense, while good, wasn't in the same stratosphere as Iowa, Michigan, Georgia, etc.

Having a better record than another team is a consideration, just as playing a more difficult schedule is a consideration.  It is not the end-all.

Maybe your system is better, maybe it's more fair.  But your system is not currently in place.

19 minutes ago, MJWalker45 said:

An opinion? That's not enough to support adding Alabama. There should be more involved than that. If Rodamaker (?) whipped Louisville in the ACC Championship with 3 TDs and 250 yards, would Alabama still be involved? Unlikely. But the opinion that a team using their third string QB, who wouldn't even be the starter in the playoffs, didn't do enough is why FSU is sitting at home. 

Welcome to college football!  You’ve got, like, 104 seasons to catch up on and they’re just littered with exactly what you’re describing.  It’s all eye tests and opinions and all of that.  Again, FSU claims a national championship that sets a precedent for Alabama getting in over them AND Texas. 

And yes, all FSU had to do was look competent in either of their two games without Travis instead of fielding the second worst offense in the country.  But Rodemaker was terrible against Florida so I don’t know why anybody thinks he would’ve fared better against Louisville. 

1 hour ago, MJWalker45 said:

Alabama lost to Texas, so they should be sitting behind Texas. FSU should have been #3 and Texas at 4. I think that actually makes for better games without the presence of Alabama. Now, we're all expecting #19 for the Tide. 

You just made the single most-compelling argument for the committee to select Alabama as one of the four best teams.

I agree the sport was better off when it was less focused on championships. Now this half-assed attempt to normalize it while clinging to the older traditions has left it in the worst possible spot. Add to that NIL and the transfer portal (which are great if there’s a better way to implement it) and it’s just in a terrible place right now. 

12 hours ago, PERRIN said:

Unless the 12-team playoff format guarantees slots to conference champions, and then sorts out the remaining seeds based on legitimate statistical tiebreakers like any sane league would, I'm not optimistic that the new format is going to be any less biased and miserable as the current, though the likelihood of an obviously competitive and deserving team being fleeced would be lowered. After the top six or seven teams, there's a point where any team with 2 losses has a legitimate case for a spot, and some teams will inevitably get left out, but it would be far less egregious than what happened to FSU.

 

I'd love to see a playoff formatted as follows:

Seeds 1-4 go to Power Four conference champions, regardless of record.

Seeds 5-8 go to the next four best at-large teams, by record.

9-12 is simply chaos. There isn't really a good way to determine for sure which teams are more deserving of others if they don't have conference accolades or as impressive records compared to the above teams. So long as no 3-loss teams sneak in, unless there simply aren't enough 2-loss teams, I'll be happy.

 

This is by no means an ideal solution, but it'd be something. Use computers to decide the final seeds for all I care.

People aren’t going to like it anymore than they like it now.  Look at the top 12 right now. There’s five teams that will be in the Big Ten next year, six teams that will be in the SEC, and one that will be in the ACC.  And you can probably add another loss to all of those SEC/B10 teams and take one away from the Big XII teams.

4 minutes ago, Sport said:

Alabama doesn’t have a case, though. Their case is they’re Alabama. There’s exactly four teams with a case this season - The three undefeated teams and the team who beat Alabama. If you put this Tide team in Missouri’s uniforms then FSU is in the playoff right now. 

Their lone loss is to the #3 team, they just beat the previous #1 team, and their third best win is equal to FSU's best win as both teams beat LSU.  And also that Jordan Travis got hurt and FSU suddenly has an offense that rivals Iowa's.

1 hour ago, BBTV said:

I'm curious what message boards would have said about 1994 undefeated B1G champ Penn State not having the opportunity to play undefeated Nebaska, who was simply awarded the title.

 

Anyway, back to 2023.  There are no rules.  There are rules within the conference, but this playoff thing is a made-for-tv show.  It has no obligation to codify how it chooses, and it's just a room fool of good 'ole boys who are beholden to TV networks and ratings, so they can do whatever they want.  They're playing by the rules, not breaking them.  It's an entertainment show, not legitimate competition.

 

While I agree that the whole system is completely absurd, it always has been, and in a way, they're simply honoring that time-honored tradition.  They're actually heroes!

The year before that Florida State played against Nebraska in the National Championship game over undefeated West Virginia and a one-loss Notre Dame team that had beaten them in the regular season.

38 minutes ago, BBTV said:

Help educate me, because I really don’t know - are there published rules? Or is it simply that this isn’t in line with precedent?  If the former, and they ignored them, then I take it all back. But if it’s the latter and it’s just that it’s not normal, then as a person with no skin in the game, it seems like they got the playoff that will result in the top 4 teams playing for a title. 
 

I can understand how an FSU fan or a fan of any other program that has uphill battles for the  committee’s respect would be pissed off. If I was wearing those shoes, I’d be too. 

Here's the CFP protocol.

It ambiguously specifies that the committee selects the four best teams, and can consider "other relevant factors such as unavailability of key players and coaches that may have affected a team’s performance during the season or likely will affect its postseason performance."

They've been pretty lucky so far that there haven't been this many P5 teams that had a case but in 2014 (I think) Ohio State had suffered an injury to their two starting QBs and the injury thing was up for discussion.  But then Ohio State went out and beat a 10-win Wisconsin team 59-0 in the Big Ten Championship Game and went on the win the National Championship.

Having an undefeated P5 conference team missing is unprecedented, but having an one-loss team ranked higher than an undefeated P5 team isn't since, again in 2014, one-loss Oregon was #2 and undefeated FSU #3.

I don't think it's fair to FSU, personally, but I don't think the wrong decision was made either.  If it's "best" teams, it's hard to argue FSU without Travis is better than Alabama.  And the playoff would have been expanded this year rather than next if the ACC/Big Ten/Pac 12 alliance didn't vote against it in an effort to screw the SEC, so the irony is pretty great.

4 minutes ago, MJD7 said:

I place more importance on the "win" part than the "decisively" part, which is something Alabama wasn't able to do in every single game this season (nor was Texas). I just don't understand how an undefeated team isn't even given a shot to keep playing for the championship. That simply makes no sense.

 

I also can't help but notice that you decided not to address the fact that TCU won their semifinal game.

Do I need to?  They lost 65-7 to Georgia. I don’t care if they got one fluke win, they didn’t belong on the same field as Georgia.   And FSU sans Travis is way worse than TCU last year. 

5 minutes ago, MJD7 said:

I'm just not sure what else Florida State was supposed to do beyond absolutely dominate Florida & Louisville, which seems like a tall ask considering they were on their backup & 3rd-string quarterbacks. But they still found a way to win both of those games, which by all means should earn them at least a shot at the championship, even if Michigan supposedly would've dominated them (which I honestly highly doubt).

Win decisively.  It should not have been difficult to win decisively against a Florida team that was also on their backup QB.  Also shouldn't have been difficult to beat Louisville decisively when the officiating was as one-sided as it was.

1 minute ago, dont care said:

You say that like they ever were

There was that one year an undefeated Auburn team was left out of the BCS Championship game in favor of an Oklahoma team they were clearly better than.

4 minutes ago, MJWalker45 said:

It's also a rivalry game. Alabama was on the ropes against USF, and survived Auburn with a completely healthy quarterback. Punishing teams for the loss of one player is ridiculous. Texas earning a spot doesn't mean Alabama has to get in with them. 

Weird... that didn't stop Georgia from scoring 43.

Hm... maybe LSU struggled on offense in their rivalry game vs Florida...

Oh wait, that was the game Jayden Daniels alone had 600 yards, so that theory doesn't check out.  How else can we excuse this teams terrible play?