I live in Fort Walton Beach, Florida. That means I’m deep in SEC territory. We are literally surrounded by SEC schools. LSU is to the west, Alabama is northwest, Auburn is northeast, and Florida is southeast. In addition, Florida State [an ACC school whom I call ‘Free Shoes University’ – thank you Steve Spurrier] is close by. All are within just a few hours’ drive from here. When it comes to college football, that’s all one hears about around here – SEC, SEC, SEC until you puke. Notre Dame has their own TV network [most people refer to it as ‘NBC’], and the SEC has ESPN. ESPN owns the SEC Network, which is on THREE cable TV stations. And their games are televised on ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, ESPN Deportes, and if that wasn’t enough CBS has a slice too. ESPN’s coverage of SEC sports is a bit, shall we say, biased. Since they have a financial stake in the SEC, ESPN is in the tank for them. No objectivity is allowed here. “Analyst” Mark May is notorious for his disdain for things not SEC, especially the Big 10. He argued Ohio State shouldn’t qualify for the playoff because the Buckeyes were down to their third string QB. I think he’s got a hard-on for Ohio State because when he played at Pitt, Ohio State beat his team 72-0. He’s a moron - period. If anybody says anything good about a Big 10 team, a sports fan might turn the TV dial to another network, and that affects ESPN’s bottom line. Is there objectivity at ESPN? I don’t think so, even with a homer like Kirk Herbstreit on staff. Sports radio on the Emerald Coast isn’t any better. Jim Rome’s national show used to be carried by the only sports station around here. When it was aired here, you could at least get some perspective on football played in other parts of the country. Now even that outlet is gone, replaced by talk shows that talk only about southern college sports. They don’t even touch on professional sports. The constant drumbeat of SEC sports is enough to make a displaced Yankee want to slit his wrists.
After Ohio State won the national championship against Miami [“The U”], they acquired the epithet “Luckeyes” from sports writer Skip Bayless. This all stemmed from a late pass interference flag thrown against Miami, which kept Ohio State’s scoring drive in overtime alive. I won’t debate whether the referee made the correct call, but there is no disputing that if it were not for the flag, Miami would have won the game. Guess who Skip Bayless worked for when he made that “Luckeye” crack? If you guessed “ESPN,” give yourself a prize. After Ohio State’s beatdown of Oregon, how does Skip like them now? It probably doesn’t matter anyway because Skip is ESPN’s resident troll. When you’re the Number 4 seed and you beat the Number 2 seed in the championship game by three touchdowns, you can’t put that down to “luck.” The Buckeyes are “Luckeyes” no longer.
What can be said about Cardale Jones? When I saw him play I thought I was seeing the second coming of Vince Young. You wouldn’t know by watching him that he was starting only his third game. He’s a third-string QB. In his first start, he won the Big 10 Championship Game. In his second start, he beat the Number One team in the country and won the Sugar Bowl. In his third start, he won the National Championship. What does he do for an encore? Ok, he didn’t win the games all by himself – he had lots of help. Considering he was an afterthought at quarterback when the season began, losing the first two QBs could have spelled disaster for Ohio State, but things didn’t turn out that way. Nothing fazed this kid – he refused to be rattled. What happens when Braxton Miller and J.T. Barrett come back healthy? Miller was the #1 guy when he went down with a bum shoulder two weeks before the first game of the season. Redshirt freshman Barrett got them to the cusp of the Promised Land when he went down with a broken ankle against That School Up North. It might be hard to argue against the guy that won the ring, even though at times he looked like he did film study of Jameis Winston v. Oregon game films. That being said, he recovered and you know the rest. This is a good problem for Urban Meyer to have.
Ezekiel Elliott [“Zeke”] played like a man among boys last night. Whenever the Buckeyes needed a big play on third down, Zeke got the call [when Cardale Jones didn’t call his own number or improvise]. Pick whatever superlative you like about Zeke [Beast, Stud, etc], it applied to him. The man had three successive 200-yard plus games against stiff competition. It wasn’t for nothing that he was the offensive player of the championship game. Here’s a scary thought for the rest of the NCAA – Zeke is only a sophomore this year. The question for Zeke now is this - will he turn out like Eddie George or Maurice Clarett?
I must confess that in each of the last two games I had Ohio State as the underdog. I thought they’d do fine against Wisconsin in the Big 10 championship game, but I didn’t see a 59-0 blowout coming [I don’t think anyone else did, either]. I had my doubts against Alabama and Oregon since I saw more of them than I saw of Ohio State, but I was more than happy to be proven wrong. After the Buckeyes evened the score against Oregon, and the way they did it, my doubts went away.
Will the Buckeyes repeat next year? They have a good shot. Most of their starters from last night’s game are coming back. Their enemy will be complacency. And, everyone will paint a target on them. Will Jim Harbaugh work any miracles up north? Who knows, but one thing is certain – the playoff system worked. And since the Buckeyes ran the table against teams ranked ahead of them [and each of which had a Heisman Trophy finalist], their championship is legitimate. Nobody can argue that they lucked out to get where they are now. Well done, Buckeyes.
This is for Mark May, Skip Bayless, and all the other nay-sayers at ESPN...
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