In the first contest, the 2 combatants were too close to call; such a brutal back and forth that when the final whistle sounded nothing was resolved. It wasn’t until after the bell that one of the parties finally was awarded the narrowest of victories.

After the contest, loud voices complained about the outcome – they didn’t feel like it really resolved anything. One of the parties had disappointed – not performed to their ability. A re-match would truly resolve who is better.

After a rancorous argument, it was finally agreed that the two would meet again.

The coach of the losing side from the first match– a small, unlikeable man that is beloved by his athletes but isn’t liked by many others – spent the time leading to the re-match scheming and coming up with a new strategy to surprise his superior opponent.

Once the re-match began it was as hard-hitting and brutal as the first contest. In the end, the loser of the first bout rose and was able to out-last and emerge victorious.

If we had all just thought about it a little more, we would have realized that Rocky Two had already shown us the script of this year’s BCS title game.

Once again, last night, the BCS announced its bowl line-up to a resounding audience of boos and derision. I wish that instead of ESPN trotting out the same analysts contractually obligated to promote the system, they could present the BCS bowls to the Dancing with the Stars judges, just to hear that one guy not only mock a Virginia Tech vs Michigan Sugar Bowl but, while doing it, find a way to make a sexual joke involving Bud Foster and Brady Hoke.

Creating a national championship between 2 teams that have already played when there are other equally deserving teams is one thing. A remaining BCS bowl line-up that doesn’t include the #6, #7, #8, and #9 teams from the BCS’s own ranking system truly eliminates any value from this system.

If we end up with a game no one wants, that we have already seen and then nearly half of the 10 best teams in the country don’t even make a BCS bowl, what exactly has this sham accomplished?

Beside make the member conferences and Bowl games rich of course.

The BCS was instituted in 1998 to try and remedy a college football bowl system that repeatedly faced situations in which the widely agreed two best teams couldn’t meet to play for a national title, due to conference tie-ins with bowls.

Just the year before, Michigan and Nebraska split a national title because the Wolverines had to play in the Rose Bowl and the Huskers had to play in the Orange Bowl.

In 1996, Steve Spurrier won his only national title because Florida gained a re-match against FSU solely because #2 Arizona State was contractually obligated to the Rose Bowl (where they lost to Ohio State).

But in an attempt to serve multiple masters, the BCS has ultimately failed to achieve any of its goals and in the process with its constant masterbatory approach to trumpeting its ‘championship’, it has become the biggest running joke outside of the U.S. Capitol building.

The BCS obviously has a million flaws that have been discussed exhaustively, but in the end they all come down to one common thing: it attempts to serve too many masters. It tries to make member conferences happy. It has been forced to account for non-member conference members. It wants to use polls to account for ‘the eye test’. It wants to use computers to remove the bias of coaches with long held grudges that are often a little too busy on Saturday to watch other teams play. It wants to maintain the Bowl system. It wants to ‘definitely’ identify a national champion.

Like me watching Tim Tebow lead my Broncos, the BCS is as conflicted as a Log Cabin Republican.

In the end it isn’t any inherent evil or greed that makes the BCS a joke. It is the compromises. Which is why it needs to go. And there are 2 options to replace.

A true playoff. Or, the option never discussed, a return to the pre-BCS system.

There are a million playoff systems out there, from the simple Plus-One to a full march madness style 16-team bracket (December Delirium?). The people that argue against a playoff always say something along the lines of ‘a playoff devalues the best regular season in sport; in college football every week is a playoff’ but that pretty much goes out the window when our ‘national championship’ will be contested between 2 teams that played a month ago.

While I am in favor of the playoff there are so many ardent proponents, I don’t need to pile on here. Rather, let’s look at an option rarely discussed: a return to the true Bowl system.

What was so wrong with the old system? There was little controversy. There was tradition. The worst thing that could happen was a split national title. Is both Nebraska and Michigan claiming to be 1997 national champions really any worse than the mess this year if Alabama beats LSU? Do we really need to be forced to sit through another horrendous ACC/Big East Orange Bowl just because the BCS tells us there must be a Big East team represented? Would the Big Ten teams that, for years, missed out on playing for national titles because of their Rose Bowl commitment really complain now that they get exposed every time they do play a southern team in a bowl?

In its 13 years of existence how many times has the BCS been able to create an undisputed national championship match-up that couldn’t have existed under the old system? I can think of three times (Miami v Ohio State, USC v Oklahoma, USC v Texas). Every other game was either perfectly do-able under the old system or involved such a jumble of equal teams, declaring a split national champion (or no national champion) would have been preferable to declaring a team ‘undisputed national champion’.

If the BCS and NCAA is unwilling to go to a playoff for whatever reason (no matter what they say just overlay every 3^rd word with ‘money’), then we need to return to the classic bowl system.

The BCS is a poorly designed compromise that has made a worse mockery of the best sport on Earth than any split national title ever could.

Over the course of a protracted trial and appeals process, the media – always desperate for ways to make you care about they write – over-sensationalized and over-romanticized the Amanda Knox murder trial to the point of absurdity. Least of which was alternately labeling Knox a Femme Fatale or innocent abroad (depending on which country was viewing the report).

Really the least reprehensible of their myriad of reporting crimes is labeling a relatively mundane looking girl ‘Foxy Knoxy’.

(Come on, she has been set free, so we can now be honest without piling on. She just isn’t that ‘foxy’. She will not be playing herself in the Lifetime movie).

Desperation by media companies to keep your attention in increasingly crowded, hyper-competitive new world requires something more than Walter Cronkite these days, and people without the journalistic skills or the intelligence required to bring a new point of view, will just sensationalize the mundane until we all lose brain cells.

You also know it as the TMZ business model: if something isn’t news just keep repeatedly telling us it is news until we believe you.

This disease also infects the world of sports writing.

Woody Paige has spent the last 9 months lobbying incessantly for Tim Tebow to start for the Broncos and then, with the appropriate level of self-awareness for a man only slightly less orange than Beaker’s hair, writes that the Broncos coaching staff has to address ‘the Tebow situation’ because it just won’t go away. Never does it dawn on Woodrow that it might go away if he would shut up about it on occasion.

But Woody isn’t alone. There are plenty of man-made stories floating around the internet these days. Ostensibly meant to inform, they really are just meant to get you to read. Whether they are true, false, intelligent or dumb doesn’t matter as long as you click. Call is the Bleacher Reportization of sports news.

Well, Knoxy was finally set free, so let’s review some of these and see if they are guilty or innocent.

The Coming BCS Nightmare

It happens every year. Someone jumps to the conclusion that because we have made it through a few marquee games and several weeks of the season, we are destined for a BCS nightmare in which 5 or 6 teams finish the season undefeated, a BCSpocalypse results and the zombies take over.

Or something – I have never been clear on the worst case scenario. So undefeated teams end up not playing for the title? We have been there before and didn’t need a speech by the President the next morning to see the sun rise.

This year, the generally very entertaining and intelligent Clay Travis was the first to jump on this wagon. Clay lays out some compelling arguments for us having 6 or 7 undefeated teams. But allow me to respond, with an equally well reasoned argument.

This is college football. Crazy, unexpected shit always happens.

Last year at this time, there were 16 undefeated teams in the Top 25. You could look at the top 6 and see no way they could lose (unless to another undefeated team). Yet, by the end of the regular season, all but 3 had lost.

In 2009, we had 10 undefeateds at this time. By the end of the season, 5 remained with 2 from power-conferences so far ahead in the minds of pollsters it was moot.

It will happen again this year. Stanford falls to Oregon. Michigan State shocks Wisconsin. Georgia Tech knocks off Clemson. It happens every year.

If the favorite always won, none of the casinos out in Vegas would be the size of the International Space Station.  

The New NFL Heavyweight

The Lions now sit at 4-0. They have a good young quarterback, dominating defensive line and the most freakishly talented wide receiver in football. They have two improbably comeback wins in the last two weeks, both on the road. People are starting to look at them as one of the short list of Super Bowl contenders.

But take a look at those wins again. They have had more than 100 yards rushing once. Their defense is ranked #20 against the run. The combined records of the teams they have beaten are 6-10, with half of those 6 wins by 1 team.

I know it is fun to see new, young teams seemingly mature in front of our eyes and god knows, it is exciting to look forward to a meaningful Thanksgiving morning game. But beyond being exciting and new, young teams are also always…umm…young (take that analysis footballoutsides!). And youth is erratic and emotional.

The last two weeks the Lions have had 2 stirring come from behind victories. But, while their never-say-die attitude was refreshing and fun, a key component of coming from behind is falling behind in the first place (more cutting-edge analysis!).

In the first half yesterday, Tony Romo picked apart the Lions defense like it was the top ten at a Ms. Texas pageant. If the residue from Texas A&M’s epic collapse from the day before in the same building hadn’t been rubbed on Romo’s arm in the 2^nd half, the Lions would be a nice story but nothing more.

The week before, the Vikings led the Lions 20-0 at halftime. With Donovan McNabb’s decaying carcass playing quarterback. By design. Seriously.

The Lions are a nice story and I truly do hope they make the playoffs at the expense of one of the vastly overrated NFC East teams that always get shoved down our throats, but for all of those putting money down on those ever-shrinking Lions Super Bowl odds, see my note above about the size of casinos.

Hank Williams Jr. is an Idiot

….Ok, who am I kidding – Hank Williams Jr. IS an idiot. When you say something so profoundly dumb that even Fox & Friends can’t believe you said it, you are setting a new high (low?) in idiocy. I can only hope that the first episode of the new Beavis and Butthead includes the pair watching Hank’s comments and making fun of him just to drive home how truly dumb it was.

If I were Hank’s PR person, the only way to avoid becoming Mel Gibson-esque unemployable would be to now claim you were trying to make a bigger statement. Try to claim that by saying something so moronic and mis-informed you were actually making a larger statement about the education system in the U.S.. The fact that there may be a fraction of people out there who agreed with him just proves our education system is a shambles and needs to be addressed before all of our children confuse unpopular economic stimulus and health care plans with genocide.

Tony Romo and Mark Sanchez are the Worst Quarterbacks to ever play

No matter what the experts say today, Tony Romo and Mark Sanchez woke up this morning the same quarterback they have always been. Both players have long gotten a pass from a media more interested in the human interest story than play on the field. But after high profile disasters, suddenly Romo-Sanchez bashing has become a more popular sport than quidditch.

Romo is a proud limb on the Favre quarterbacking tree: a player that smiles a lot, makes friends in the media, makes some beautiful plays but combines them with inexplicably dumb plays. He has been that player since he came to the league and he will be until he leaves. Some people can pretend that the meltdown against the Lions was something new. It wasn’t. It was the same player we have known since he dropped the snap on a short game-winning field goal at Seattle in the 2006 playoffs.

In another week or two, the Cowboys will beat the Eagles or Giants and once again America will love Romo. Until then we will have to hear about all of his mistakes. As if this is new.

Sanchez on the other hand has always confounded me. I admitted as much in the pre-season. His play is ugly but his team seems to usually find a way to win – whether because of or in spite of him. After getting picked apart like a Thanksgiving turkey by the Ravens defense, a fresh round of hand-wringing and ranting is polluting the airwaves and bandwidth of New York.

But like Romo, when he upsets the Bills or Patriots in a few weeks’ time, he will be right back to being the toast of the city.

Amanda Knox had to wait 2 years to be freed of murder charges. In the meantime there was constant baseless speculation and conjecture to fill the hours.

Sometimes, it would be better if we would all step back and take a breath before we reach a conclusion.

The professional talking heads on ESPN today are all up in arms after St. Mary’s coach Randy Bennett said that the NCAA selection committee should go to a BCS-like system in selecting that NCAA tournament field.

The world has reached the point where those 3-letters elicit a stronger reaction than most 4 letter words. The heads on ESPN freaked out that bringing THOSE LETTERS into March Madness would ruin the greatest sporting event in the country.

However, in all of their hyperventilating hysteria they missed the most important thing about this statement. Bennett is right.

Now before King Blowhard Skip Bayless has an aneurysm about this, the important thing is to not take 3-letters out of context, but instead read the whole quote.

Yes, I know it is asking a lot of TV personalities to actually read a whole quote as opposed to a fragmented sound bite and immediately overreacting to it, but let’s play pretend for a moment. Here is the quote:

“Go to BCS, go to something where there’s a standardized number how you figure out who’s in and who’s not,” Bennett said.

Bennett isn’t advocating for system that dictates the next national champion. He isn’t saying throw away the tournament and use a formula to decide that the national championship game will be played between Ohio State and Kansas.

He is instead saying that there should be actually definitive criteria used instead of the inherit whims and biases of a bunch of people with little basketball knowledge and political agendas anonymously making decisions from a secret room. Imagine that.

Having defined criteria, so every team and player knows on what basis they are being judged.

Clear criteria as to why a team is invited to play for a chance at a national title. Consistency of decisions applied across teams and years.

Who would want that?

Instead, we have arbitrary decisions, massaged and adjusted to fit the pre-formed and biased decisions of the selection committee.

In the end, we are mostly arguing over teams with minimal chance at winning the title anyway. But wouldn’t a defined seeding system help as well? That way we would understand why Florida is named a #2 seed hours after getting crushed by Kentucky (for the 2^nd time) who is then labeled a #4 seed.

Beside just assuming one of Urban Meyer’s players has kidnapped one of the committee member’s children and is holding them for ransom.

Yes, I recognize Bennett made the mistake of using the ‘acronym that shall not be named’ in his plea but his point is a good one.

If we are going to spend hours arguing and yelling about something on TV, let’s at least argue the actual point being made.  

Leave the Sarah Palin approach to debate over at Fox News

With the NFL Wild Card weekend now in our rear view mirror, it is time to turn our attention back to the college kids one last time. And it can’t come soon enough if you ask me.

While the pros use this weird format to determine a champion in which all the teams play each other to find a winner, the NCAA continues to determine the best team as God and Tim Tebow intended – by a complicated formula involving biased media members, former players, coaches and computers.

The all-knowing members of the NCAA and their minions in the BCS would never let a team like the Seahawks have an opportunity to play for the title. Members of the media saw them play earlier this season, and therefore their opinion has been locked in stone. Sorry Seahawks. You may have beaten the Bears in Chicago earlier this season and the defending champion Saints resoundingly last weekend but that doesn’t mean you have earned a chance to win the title.

No, thanks to the BCS we will never have to worry about a Cinderella story winning the title – and I say thank Tebow for that!

Give me an underdog story that stars a quarterback that was a highly regarded recruit, got kicked out of an institution with a moral code on par with the North Korean government, and was used as an auction item by his Pastor father to one school but ended up at another without any wrong-doing at all.

That is the sort of all-American story I can get behind and have been genetically engineered by the NCAA to desire.

The NCAA, in its infinite wisdom, has decided to have a championship game involving two teams that have not been traditional powers and the vast majority of the country has little feelings for or against.

So, what to do? Sit back and enjoy the game impartially, hoping for a combined point total north of 100? Half right.

It isn’t a real game unless you are cheering for a team, so your humble Hierarchy of Hate guides are putting our collective minds together to come up with a sound, logical rationale for cheering for one team over the other.

You are welcome.

Shadow: I will admit that I am now officially in Bowl Fatigue mode…especially now that the NFL Playoffs have started.  They really need to stop spreading it out this much, no pun intended to the Oregon or Auburn offenses.  Let’s see who I will be rooting for Monday night in frigid Denver, CO.

1 – Coach’s name that sounds more like a bad guy in a 1940′s gangster movie: Gene Chizik or Chip Kelly

SD: This is a trick question as both names sound like gangster movie bad guys. But the difference is that Chip Kelly sounds like more of a middle manager: one of the hired gun types that ends up dying at about the 82^nd minute mark. However Gene Chizik sounds like the head bossman. In fact, I am about 47% sure that Gene Chizik was the name of the bad guy in Johnny Dangerously that kept calling everyone ‘farging iceholes’. Always go with the boss over the hired help. Auburn 1, Oregon 0

Turner: Chip Kelly, just sounds mean and nasty.  No one in the 50′s could figure out how to spell Chizik  (Oregon 1 point)

Shadow: Gene Chizik is too ethnic sounding to ever pop up in a 40′s gangster pulp fiction film.  Gangster names need to be more generic sounding (like Johnny Dangerously), and Chip Kelly fits that bill.  Oregon 1, Auburn 0

2 – Quarterback’s name that sounds more like the oldest son on 1950′s sitcom: Cameron Newton or Darron Thomas.

SD: Can’t you just picture a June Cleaver type yelling up the stairs for either of these names? I can. But maybe that is just me. Or maybe it is because I think Darron Thomas was one of the guys that married Samantha on Bewitched. I always liked that show. As a young man battling puberty I liked to imagine what other things Samantha could do by twitching that nose of hers….wait, is this thing on? Auburn 1, Oregon 1

Turner: Going with Cameron Newton on this just because of the spelling of Darron.  No one in the 50′s would have taken a name that should be spelled Deron and change it to Darron.  (1-1)

Shadow: Wally, Ricky, Bud, Cameron, Darron.  Hmmmmm…..neither of them are a super fit, but Cameron seems a little more “out there”  Darron it is.  Oregon 2, Auburn 0

3 – School name more likely to be on the Top Ten Baby Name list in 2028: Auburn or Oregon

SD: When your cute little Morgan grows up and wants to prove to her Brooklyn neighbors how cool and hip she is, I think she goes with Auburn over Oregon. If for no other reason than all the hipsters in horn-rimmed glasses and skinny jeans know where Oregon is but have no idea there is a school and city in Alabama named Auburn. They will all think she made it up. Unless 4 skinny white guys around the corner are already using it for the name of their band.  Auburn 2, Oregon 1

Turner: Has to be Auburn on this one.  If people name their kid Oregon, then they should be jailed.  While Auburn would take some getting use to, I think it could pass. (2 – 1 Auburn)

Shadow: Oregon 2, Auburn 1….although Auburn will be given a good run by a comeback of Esther, Margery, and Norma.

4 – Better use of unnecessary prefix in a name: Quindarius Carr or LaMichael James

SD; Adding the prefix ‘La-’ to a name is so 2009. ‘Quin-‘ is really on the cutting edge of absurd prefixes used to create unique names, so I will go with Quindarius here. Sidenote though, Turner and I saw the future of crazy names last weekend: member of the South Carolina basketball team Johndre Jefferson. Forget the pre-fix, the name of the future is two unrelated names mashed together. Who knew Brangelina was such a groundbreaker.  Auburn 3, Oregon 1

Turner: LaMichael.  Mostly because of the common place of ‘Michael’ and the lack of commonplace of Darius.  I would have handed out bonus points if either had an apostrophe in their name (2 – 2)

Shadow: Adding a ‘La’ in front of your name seems to be a requirement to be a RB at Oregon, so I will go for the more original Quindarius Carr.  Anyone remember the episode of Knight Rider where K.I.T.T meets K.A.R.R?  But, I digress.  Oregon 2, Auburn 2

5 – Player more likely to get unwarranted announcer love thanks to the Hansbrough Effect: Philip Lutzenkirchen or Jeff Maehl

SD: Not only does Lutzenkirchen’s name sound like an alcoholic shot I did last year at Oktoberfest that caused me to have a night like the guys from The Hangover, but he is a fullback. As anyone who has ever watched Peyton Hillis knows, if there is one thing that announcers love more than an over-achieving white guy, it is an over-achieving fat white guy. Sadly, for Jeff Maehl, he is a fast, normal sized white guy. Sort of the Riley Cooper of Oregon, without the ambiguously gay relationship with the quarterback. Give me a double of Lutzernkirchen and I will see you in the morning.   Auburn 4, Oregon 1

Turner: Has to be the Lutzenkirchen.  They will spend 30 minutes just talking about the pronounciation of the name (3 -2 Auburn)

Shadow: Jeff Maehl will get more unwarranted love because his name is easier to pronounce.  No way Kirk or Brent want to try to say Lutzenkirchen multiple times throughout the night.  Oregon 3, Auburn 2

6 – Alumni that will get more face time from sideline: Bo Jackson or Phil Knight

SD: Bo Jackson has been driving the Auburn bandwagon almost as blatantly as when Barry Switzer used to show up for Oklahoma games once Bob Stoops had finally cleaned away the filth left by Switzer’s decades of blatant cheating.  Knight on the other hand, is the patron saint of Oregon athletics, pretty much single-handedly funding the improvements in the athletic department and illegal recruitment of great athletes. Oh, wait sorry. Alleged funding of the improvements in the athletic department. I am going with Knight, because every time ESPN’s shows whatever hideous jersey Oregon will be destroying our HD TVs with, it is only fair they also show Knight in his box seats so we know who is responsible. Auburn 4, Oregon 2

Turner: Uggg.. I want this to be Bo but not knowing what uniforms are coming out, I’m afraid it is going to be Knight. My only caveat on this is that Bo will likely be on the sideline and Phil in a press box which would push the advantage to Bo.  I’ve changed my mind and will now settle on the ‘Bo Knows’ Factor and go with Mr. Jackson (4 – 2 Auburn)

Shadow: Although Phil Knight attempted to provide new Nike’s for all the cameramen in order to ensure he has more face time than a Kardashian at a Super Bowl, Bo knows College Football, and still has that smile.  Oregon 3, Auburn 3

7 – Former player/NFL bust that more alumni pretend didn’t go to their school: Aundray Bruce or Akili Smith

SD: Aundray Bruce was one of the original draft busts, being taken #1 in 1989. A draft so long ago that Mel Kiper still needed to add the Junior to his name and most of the players in this game weren’t even born. Akili Smith was the Oregon QB taken as part of the 1999 draft class that included Tim Couch, Donovan McNabb, Daunte Culpepper and Cade McNown all taken in the first round and was (probably) compared to the class of 1983, which in hindsight is only appropriate when comparing Cade McNown and Todd Blackledge. I am guessing more Oregon fans have tried to wipe Akili from their brains than their Auburn counterparts, so I will pick him here. I would guess the unintended consequences of gallons of Busch Light in the oppressive heat and humidity of southern Alabama have done the job of wiping Bruce from Auburn fans memories without any effort. Auburn 4, Oregon 3

Apparently, I will be yelling War Eagle all night for the game. I am a fan of $180,000, so maybe this is appropriate.

Turner: Has to be Achilles Smith.  Just the Blunderer with the Bengals and the QB position brings such a high profile failure to be ignored forever (over/under on if he is on the Oregon sideline??)

So with that, Auburn wins it 4-3 or more than likely 56 – 55.

 Just wait till next year all – it will be Boomer Sooner for their 2nd straight BCS victory, this time for everything, why?  Because Broyles is coming back!!

Shadow: 52.8.  That was Akili’s QB rating for his career.  Aundray Bruce didn’t live up to expectations either, especially in light of being drafted with the top pick, but the dude had 30 some sacks in his career.  That has to be better than a 52.8 lifetime QB rating.  Oregon alum change the subject when Akili’s name comes up.   Auburn 4, Oregon 3

So, in the end, Auburn pulled it out.  Take it the bank that Cameron and the boys will top the Ducks something like 124-117.  After which he will get drafted in the top 10 and try to have better than a 52.8 QB rating for his career.  Good luck Cam.  And goodbye to College Football for another year.  Already looking forward to the FSU-OU rematch and Iowa pounding Nebraska in Lincoln on Thanksgiving weekend, then winning the inaugural Big 10 Title Game against Ohio State.  I can’t wait!

I had never thought about it before, but it seems pretty obvious now. The Athletic Directors of the major conferences that make up the BCS are fans of 1990’s rap. Whether it was Deion Sanders’ ”Must be the Money” or P. Diddy/Puff Daddy’s “All about the Benjamins”, the AD’s that decide the BCS bowls clearly only care about making money for themselves and their major conference constituents.

It is no secret that after the BCS Title game, all other bowl games are typically slotted based on maximizing the revenue of the individual bowls. Teams with large, active fan bases or teams with major national followings always get the nod over the up-and-coming, unknown feel-good story (see: Notre Dame, BCS appearances: 2005, 2006). However, this year the AD’s not only set up the bowls to make money this year but they also went to an extraordinary effort to ensure that those pesky non-BCS conference teams are marginalized as much as possible.

I am speaking specifically about the Fiesta Bowl match-up of Boise State and TCU. This is the biggest cop out in the history of the BCS. Every year we have a team or two from the non-BCS conferences that argue they are as good as the big boys. This year we have two of those. Yet, rather than matching them against BCS conference foes to help settle the debate, the geniuses at the BCS committee matched them up against themselves which proves….well nothing except that the BCS committee is scared to death of their mighty conferences getting taken down by another upstart.

After seeing Bama trounced by Utah last year and Boise’s miracle against OU a few years ago, the last thing the BCS committee needs is another proof point that says they can’t treat the WAC and Mountain West as second class citizens. If pollsters and the public begin to believe that those conferences have teams as strong as the major conferences, then the BCS committee fears the day when we will be arguing for a one-loss BYU team over a two-loss USC or Florida team.

Given that the members of the BCS represent those very same major conference teams, it is obviously in their best interests (of their conferences and the guys who want to keep their jobs) to get as many major conference teams in – which means keeping non-major conference teams out. If it is proven that those teams are as strong as the major conference teams, then the BCS as set up spirals into self-destruction. What happens to their precious BCS championship if TCU goes into the Sugar Bowl and routs an uninspired, disjointed and dispirited Florida team?

No, the only way to ensure that the non-BCS teams remain second class citizens and therefore can be routinely overlooked and marginalized is to just pit them against each other. Then the winner of that game is no more important than the winner of the Best Supporting Actor Oscar.

For the record, I think Boise State would get trounced by any of the other major conference BCS teams – sort of like Hawaii a couple years ago; they played an incredibly weak schedule and gave up way too many points.

But I sure would like to be able to prove it.

On to some other thoughts from Championship Saturday:

- Obviously we have to start with UF/Bama. I can’t remember a more dominating performance by a college team over another highly ranked team. There was literally only one time in the entire game where I thought UF would win. After UF scored to make it 12-10 Bama, I made the assumption that this is when UF takes over and Bama folds like a cheap lawn chair. But on the next offensive play, Mark Ingram took a perfectly called screen pass 69 yards and Bama scored a play later. After that, UF never had a chance, the Tebow Crying group was formed on Facebook and I spent all Monday morning trading emails with funny pictures of Tebow crying on the sidelines. Really, it was a perfect game in every way.

- This despite the best efforts of Gary Danielson. They often say Tebow wills his team to victory. On Saturday, Danielson was the one willing the Gators. For three quarters, he kept claiming this game was similar to last year’s when Bama lost a 3-point lead going into the 4^th quarter. Except this time it was a 13-point lead and Bama had been utterly dominant on both offense and defense the entire game. Other than that, it was the exact same Gary.

- Mark Ingram will probably win the Heisman this weekend but shouldn’t it be taken into consideration that (1) he wasn’t most the important reason Bama won this game and (2) there is a decent chance he isn’t the best player at his position on his own team. After watching Alabama the last two weeks, I am convinced if Tony Richardson was given the ball instead of Ingram, he would have as good if not better stats than Ingram. Can we really reward a guy with the Heisman for just being first string?

- While Ingram is at the podium next weekend in New York I hope he thanks his quarterback and offensive coordinator. This game was won by Greg McElroy’s flawless playing and the play-calling of offensive coordinator Jim McElwain. McElroy did more than was asked of him, making perfect passes and even taking off on two clutch runs that may have been the difference in the game (or as only Gary Danielson would say “he out-Tebowed Tebow”). Combine his flawless execution with McElwain’s play-calling and UF never had a chance. The UF defense was unprepared the entire game – except for one Wildcat play in the first quarter that (not so coincidentally) led to a three and out by Bama. After that play, UF never knew what was coming. Each new drive brought a new wrinkle and UF was reacting one step late all day.

- Each year there is a question of conference superiority and each year I argue against the SEC. Well, I may need to change that stance this year. Did you see that halftime contest of throwing footballs into giant Dr. Pepper cans? At the SEC game, a female med student from Bama hit 9 of 10 to beat a taunting, idiot from Gainesville (is there any other kind?) who made 8. In the Big Twelve game later, a woman from Nebraska won by making 2 over a woman from Texas who made zero.  9 to 8 versus 2 to 0? That sums up the SEC versus the Big Twelve better than I ever could.

- Speaking of the Big 12, am I the only one that was underwhelmed by Texas needing a last second field goal to beat a team with possibly the worst offense in America? Seriously, Nebraska had a better chance of winning if they had just punted on first down every time they got the ball to get their defense back on the field. The Bizarro Bama offense combined poor execution (my 70-year old mother has a more accurate arm than Zac Lee) with poor play-calling. Isn’t the definition of insanity doing the same thing over again and expecting a different result? Then what do you call a coordinator who calls the same off-tackle running play, 3 times every offensive series for an entire game when it didn’t work once?

- Last week, a local columnist here in Denver wrote an article arguing that Nebraska defensive lineman Ndamukong Suh deserves the Heisman. I thought it was just precious – like when a little girl asks for a Unicorn for Christmas. That changed on Saturday night, when Suh took over the Big Twelve title game. Really his only two mistakes were not lobbying to come in to play quarterback for Nebraska and rushing McCoy on that final play. If he hangs back, McCoy absolutely runs the clock out. The imminent Suh sack was the only reason McCoy threw the ball out of bounds when he did, saving the one second Texas needed to make it into the title game.

- The other Heisman trophy candidate who really stood out to me on Saturday was C.J. Spiller. If a Heisman candidate rushes for 230 yards and 4 touchdowns in a conference title game and no one sees it, did it actually happen? How mad is C.J. today that someone decided the schedule the ACC title game opposite the Big Twelve title game? He has a true statement game, and yet I am pretty sure no one outside the Atlanta/Clemson corridor watched more than a snap.

- I guess rather than complaining about all the deserving players that won’t win the Heisman (see: Suh, Ndamukong; Gerhart, Toby; Spiller, C.J., Ponder, Christian…ok, just testing to see if you are paying attention), we should congratulate Mark Ingram on being the first running back to win a Gino Torretta memorial ‘best player on the best team’ Heisman award this year. Groundbreaking indeed.

And only fitting that our Heisman trophy winner, much like our BCS Title game, was chosen more based on uniform than qualifications.