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  • 09/17/13--14:01: A TALE OF TWO WEEKENDS

    • Everything you need know about the past weekend and the coming weekend in college football may be summed up in the juxtaposition of two very different items seen below.

    One:

    The get-in-the-door price is similar to the meeting of No. 1 Alabama and No. 2 LSU two seasons ago. Then it was costing around $400 to get an upper-level ticket in the end zones. A sampling of the lowest ticket price for several seat resale sites:

    -- Stubhub: $349 (Sect. 517)

    -- TicketCity: $348 (Sect. 508)

    -- TicketNetwork: $395 (Sect. 508)

    -- eBay: $399 (Sect. 503)

    -- VividSeats:  $406 (Sect. 523)

    And two:

    Screen_shot_2013-09-17_at_4

    BETHUNE-COOKMAN - FAMILY FOUR PACK Bethune-Cookman - Family Four Pack

    Includes 4 game tickets, 4 concession vouchers good for 4 soft drinks and four hot dogs and a 10% discount coupon redeemable at The FSU Bookstore or Seminole Sports Shop.

    Hey, FSU's not alone. You can get tickets on the 50 on the visitor's sideline for the Tennessee/Florida game for $82.00 on Stubhub, an internet price convertible to the real world equivalent of $17.00 and three cans of Skoal.


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  • 09/18/13--08:20: THE CURIOUS INDEX, 9/18/2013

    • A-BRILES CONTINUES TO DO THANGS. No college football weekend is worthless, at least not one where you get a rematch of Baylor and ULM, aka the team brave enough to try being the football nightmare of your Playstation dreams. Two quarterbacks on the field at the same time? Briles too turnt to care.

    Mf2a_medium

    Lache Seastrunk is also averaging 45 yards a touch. That may not be accurate, but it feels right. (It's 9.3 yards per carry at this point, actually. Which is basically 45 yards a touch.)

    FUN THINGS FROM RADIO. You're all going to die, because Bo Pelini said on Bill King this morning that he thinks he knows who leaked the tape of him cursing the Nebraska fanbase. If you see him, don't bother playing dead. He will not lose interest. He will not stop until you are bloody ribbons left in the trees.

    GAAHAHHHHHHHHHHH. DON'T CLICK ON THIS IT'S BEEN A BAD YEAR FOR USC ALREADY GIVE THEM A BREAK.

    A CYCLONE ON THE PLAINS, INDEED.

    We don't think that's a bong, exactly. Maybe a one-hitter. Hell, it may be a cellphone. However, it's still important to note that you never get Cy on your own supply, stoners of America's heartland.

    FINE, IT'S WEDNESDAY, WE'LL CRY A LITTLE. The Aggies did something phenomenal on Saturday for a cancer patient, and yes, it's firmly Rinaldi territory, and yes, it's still worth watching.

    WELL, AT LEAST THEY MADE IT IN. BuzzFeed has a great piece on the high school game we were kicked out of in Miami.

    ETC: One national hero played GTA V for 38 hours straight. Let's get GWAR to the Super Bowl halftime show.


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    The University of Nebraska has a pet problem, or at least it would if you blanked out all the names, and simply inserted "PET" into "BO PELINI" in any press release. It is one thing to issue a response to Bo Pelini's comments, released two years late, and in a tape made without his knowledge in a moment of extreme frustration. That is expected, to a degree.

    But if you want someone to forget about it, or quell rumors, you don't do this.

    We have observed, and many others have commented, that Coach Pelini’s demeanor has significantly improved since the time of this incident. Coach Pelini has given us his assurance that he understands the seriousness and inappropriateness of his comments. We believe he is sincere in his apology and in his regret. We are prepared to put the matter to rest. Our football student-athletes, coaches and staff deserve all of our support and we know the Nebraska faithful will be there for them.

    That ugly thing that happened, that thing some people have forgotten about, is most definitely forgotten. We have just issued a statement to show you how much we forgot that thing, the thing we would like everyone to forget. That time when Bo Pelini said "Fuck you, fans, fuck all of you?" We're already moving on, as we will repeat in a statement tomorrow reminding you just how over this we really are.

    Additionally, Coach Pelini's "demeanor has improved."

    Screen_shot_2013-09-18_at_1

    His eyes are bright, and his coat is shiny. He has finished two meals today (one cup wet food, and one cup dry just as prescribed by owner.) We anticipate him finishing another sometime around six o'clock. He has played well with other employees, and has been walked for a total of 45 minutes today. At playtime he behaved well, and received a liver treat for not biting another dog. His barking was loud. He slept for several hours, and probably dreamt of squirrels.

    P.S. Nebraska, don't stop issuing statements. If possible, install a cam so Nebraska fans can watch him like owners checking in on their pets at doggie day care. An app for tracking Bo Pelini's mood, perhaps.

    P.P.S. Hey, Deadspin would probably be interested in all these stories, actually.


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  • 09/19/13--07:01: THE CURIOUS INDEX, 9/19/2013

    • YESSIRRRRRR. Feldman had eight days to hang out with TAMU in their preparation for Alabama, and it is even better than that level of access would indicate. Does everyone on the Aggie staff blast Tribe Called Quest and Rick Ross? (Apparently.) Does Johnny Manziel get along with his teammates despite being Johnny Manziel? (Quite well, actually.) Did Manziel look for Evans on every play? (Yes, and would have got it to him 100 times if he could have.) Does Kevin Sumlin fear helicopter? (Yes, as he should, and even more so at night.) Is this the best college football article written this year? (Yes, and probably won't be equalled for detail, color, and depth.) Read it: even the minor details are awesome.

    BREAKING: Oklahoma State remains awesome place to play football.

    HOW GOOD IS CLEMSON? Pretty great, but maybe not as good as a three spot in the rankings indicate, per Bill C. The real takeaway from this: Nuk Hopkins was a great college receiver, and even better on third down.

    NOW WE ARE VIOLATING PLAYERS' BASIC HUMAN RIGHTS. When they came for my cost-of-attendance adjustment, you said nothing. When they said I had no value as a worker, and was merely a robot given life by the university brand, you said nothing. But when you forbade me from getting GTA V as a gift from a friend? Oh, now, now you understand the full price of amateurism's lies, do you not?

    NOOOOOOO NOT MY BABYYYYYYY. This was already plenty disturbing, Freek, but then you had to go full Carol/Sophia with Monte and Lane? HEARTBREAKING. (NSFW because zombie coaches gettin' splatted.)

    ETC: Drew decided to finally start "Breaking Bad"...at the third from the last episode. I'm Ted DiBiase! No, I'm Ted DiBiase! Three million dollars a year for this.


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    8bmk_medium

    Clemson at NC State. True story: NC State doesn't take transfers because fax machines are considered sex toys under state law. John Edwards ruined a lot of things.

    Boise State at Fresno State. If I wanted to watch two decent teams that won't mean shit come January, I'd buy a ticket to a baseball game.

    Florida International at Louisville. Love Teddy Bridgewater. Hate to see what he does to middle schoolers every weekend on the football field. I thought Ron Turner was dead. That ain't a joke.

    Vanderbilt at Massachusetts. I'm all for distance learnin', but I don't think we need a school in Tennessee settin' up campuses in Waltham. What? Massachusetts got a football team? Hell, that's like buying a bicycle with no seat when you got a perfectly good Boston College without a rear axle.

    Arkansas at Rutgers. Well, at least one of 'em got a history of success against the SEC.

    Marshall at Virginia Tech. Lotta you probably don't know I'm a bit of a Latin scholar, and I'd like to share this phrase with my good friend Frank Beamer - "dulce et decorum est pro patria mori." Means nobody's gonna prosecute if you strangle Scot Loeffler at midfield.

    Tulane at Syracuse. I don't have anything against dome teams. Some football is too ugly to expose to the rest of the world.

    Maryland vs. West Virginia. Game's in Baltimore, so I'd bet on a TitleMax being empty somewhere if you need one.

    Purdue at Wisconsin. Shame to see a Big Ten lose a game last week because they were too slow at the end, Wisconsin. Unexpected, too. Totally unexpected.

    Colorado State at Alabama. Wealthy dads always think they can treat their kids dismissively and make it up with a check, but the difference here is Lyle and Erik Menendez had each other and Jim McElwain's solo.

    Michigan State at Notre Dame. Always love this game. Amazing to see Michigan State fans confronted with bidets in the stadium bathrooms.

    Tennessee at Florida. Pretty sure God's gonna smile down on the Gators here. Just ain't sure if something heavy from his lunch gonna fall out of his teeth and kill everyone, though.

    Auburn at LSU. He doesn't even know it, but some Auburn booster in 2015 is already explaining how this win over the number 6 team in the nation "wasn't really about the coaching" as he starts the process to replace Gus Malzahn with Tony Dungy.

    Missouri at Indiana. Y'know how, in Dracula movies, Dracula's always going on about how immortality is a curse because you have to see everything you love die? Yup.

    Troy at Mississippi State. Playing Larry Blakeney is like fighting the Chinese Army. You don't have enough bullets for everyone he's got on scholarship. Also, it's because Troy University is a front for the PLA and their dogtrack empire in south Alabama.

    Kansas State at Texas. I bet Mack Brown pees sittin' down. At least that's what I made him do back at Duke. I also know Bill Snyder is the kind of man who always carries a handkerchief because you think it's polite, and because he remembers when it saved his life holdin' in the blood from a gunshot he took takin' down a bank with Johnny Dillinger.

    Utah at BYU. To me, "Holy War" will always be that thing I did in '94 where I'd unzip my fly and pull out my dangle before a coaches meetin'. Then I'd slap Bob Stoops when I caught him lookin' at it.

    Hawaii at Nevada. Interestingly, this is the only matchup between States Where Woody Hayes Killed A Cop, but only because the man was all thumbs with a blade.

    Arizona State at Stanford. Apparently there's a quiet room in some lab where you go crazy from the silence. When Todd Graham begins disrobing and slappin' his flanks for invisible ants at Stanford, well, you'll know science is real. I don't even know how you adjust for echo in a stadium. Wait, we play Kentucky every year. I do know. Apologies.

    Idaho at Washington State. I recommend watching this game if you have no interest in ever being awarded even joint custody.

    Michigan at UConn. Well, after an opponent like Akron it's only natural to need a breather.

    Wyoming at Air Force. These two coaches got into a little bit of a tussle last year. Had me a few of those myself. May have gotten a little childish revenge, too. Now I don't know if a car can run on a gas tank full of human piss. But Jackie Sherill does, and I bet that answer is no. Regrets are for criminals and polite correspondence.

    North Carolina at Georgia Tech. Paul Johnson's a lot like a horseshoe crab. He's never changed, still alive, and gets run over by me with an ATV every time I see him at the beach.

    New Mexico State at UCLA. Well, I suppose "independent" sounds better than "football orphan covered with wasps."


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    Ttfox_medium

    Oh you can keep looking. I welcome it. Relish it. Listening to you clank around with your loud flat human feet on the bleachers. Setting traps filled with food I hate. Woof woofing in your strange tongue. Oh, it is a farce, and I am the audience. And so you know: this audience is laughing. Oh, how we laugh at you.

    Screen_shot_2013-09-19_at_2

    No one has ever said "crazy like a human," right? This is correct. This dance we do, fox hunters of Lubbock: it is the sweetest tango for me. I shall watch you flail away at the darkness while I raise my children in your football palace. You shall curse when you find your hottest of dogs stolen from your freezers. I shall laugh as I eat them with my young! Oh how we shall laugh.

    Screen_shot_2013-09-19_at_2

    So try and find us if you dare. A thousand hounds shall not find a trace of us. You think you have locked us in the stadium.

    Screen_shot_2013-09-19_at_2

    But in truth, you are locked in here with us.


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  • 09/20/13--08:12: THE CURIOUS INDEX, 9/20/2013

    • AND RON CHERRY WAS NOWHERE NEAR THE SCENE.

    So your nutpunch series of events last night for NC State starts with this, which was ruled out of bounds, thus taking away the go-ahead score in a taut game against Clemson. Then it proceeds to a turnover a few snaps later, and then the bomb downfield by Tajh Boyd to turn it into a two score game, and then everything slides downhill from there, because that is what happens when you have a team fall off the steep edge of the Upset Trail. They fall all the way down, and break every bone on the way to the ground. That happens a lot anyway, but there's no reason for the officials to give them the extra push down the slope. (Still, NC State seems pretty sane about a proper screwing by the officials, and Clemson seems as happy as they can be about a tough road win with tons of flawed performances.)

    ADDITIONALLY: Rece Davis suggested "Clemsoning" was really "Florida State-ing," which is why we will kiss him someday out of genuine love. Ooh! And there was punching!UMBO HORSE RIDES LIVE ON TV. The dudes from ATVS were on the TV this morning cooking pastalaya, and it went as deliciously as expected:

    LSU remains the king of leisure football lifestyle engineering. Everyone else is fighting for a distant second.

    HELLO, EVANSTON. A Gameday at Wrigley, which makes total sense because baseball is football. If it happens, it will be well worth the BYCTOM post that results.

    GO GATORS. No, what gator? We see no man in a gator suit.

    STILL THE SAME. And now you're imagining Mike Vrabel, Red Bull in one hand and Power Bar in the other, singing "Hollywood Nights" as loud as his lungs will allow him to, driving somewhere on a recruiting trip and spitting a stripe of dip juice down the side of a rental car.

    ETC. Well, that explains everything about the past decade. Please help a recovering libertarian. Yes, we are getting a bid in on the Aztek, and possibly a barrel or two. Ball out, young stunna.


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    This is Tennessee week, and it's so very, very hard to care. This well is dry, because in order for you to properly hate, someone must rain on your parade. The precipitation should be enough to fill at least a birdbath, or at least wet the bottom of a respectably-sized drainage ditch. It should breed mosquitoes of regret in the summer, when you think about how much you hate the person who filled that well. At its worst, it overflows, and you find yourself there, where no man should ever go, quietly spraying poison on the arboreal symbolic of your other.

    You can't do that to Tennessee. For one, its mascot is an adorable dog, albeit a poorly behaved one prone to biting people it shouldn't. You can't spray pesticide on a dog. We say that because there may be Alabama fans reading, and they may consider this a real possibility. Even if your demented ethics don't prevent you from doing it, consider the danger. Smokey usually travels with an armed lunatic with a musket, and does so in a state with liberal concealed carry laws. You'll die before you get near him, or shortly thereafter attempting to escape on foot through the inhumane terrain of East Tennessee.

    You also can't do that to Tennessee as a Florida fan because they have not won since 2004, a span of nine years over which a lot of very historical things have happened. So many so, that mentioning the things that have happened in that nine year interim will make you feel old, and possibly make you cry if you were a Tennessee fan, and wondering where all the lost, irretrievable time went.

    • Tennessee hasn't beaten Florida in the Facebook era, or in the post-Mark Zuckerberg era following his assassination during a keynote speech in Los Santos. Yes, we have been playing too much GTA V. Why do you ask?
    • Bone Thugs 'n Harmony have reunited, split up, reunited, and split up again.
    • There have been four Fast and Furious movies.
    • MILEY CYRUS LOOKED LIKE THIS AND NOW YOU ARE FEELING DEATH'S SCYTHE UPON YOUR NECK
    • That sandwich you left in your desk in that career you abandoned before hiding in grad school for a few years? It's probably not good anymore.
    • The Jacksonville Jaguars have made two playoff appearances since then.
    • At least 18 of those cruises where poop just started exploding from the windows, and that's just in the Atlantic. Nothing gets reported from the Pacific, the Tom Sizemore of Oceans. (Because it has no memory.)
    • Ron Prince's entire career as a head coach. (So far. SING FOR ME, USC.)
    • Gucci Mane has released eight albums, and has also been arrested eight times.
    • Lane Kiffin has held four different jobs.
    • Someone asked this.
    • Tennessee has had 52 wins over this span. Teams with more wins over that same span? South Florida, Rutgers, Texas A&M, Central Florida, and 56 other teams who had better near-decades than you. Florida outpaced you by 31 wins over the same timeframe. The only other team with 52 wins? The UConn Huskies.

    That is a very long time, long enough to dim the fires of competition. We still remember the things that once made this so bitter: the fact that your greatest moments in this series are winning by the European cowardice of field goals, that your fans have spent so much of their time crossing their arms in pained silence at the horror unfolding before them, that you consider Florida to be classless and less than trash when we happily have no concept or valuation of those terms. We remember Casey Clausen beating Florida at home. This, this feculent error of human history...this should be enough to make someone hate forever, and with the passion of at least several burning repossessed trailer homes.

    We also know that these are old memories, and that an entire generation of Florida people don't remember a vital, non-dysfunctional Tennessee Volunteers. They probably imagine Tennessee as a step or two up from Kentucky, and several notches below South Carolina. Younger Florida fans probably hear that Tennessee was once a rival, and imagine it to be an accident of history, a blip. It would be correct to say that for a time in the mid to late '90s, this was indeed a rivalry and one whose winner held a nice path to a national title. It would be educational, and the proper thing.

    We're not going to do that. You should hope for good things to happen to Tennessee, and for their program to rebuild, and gain something of the luster a decade of mismanagement has taken off the Power T. You should hope that, since a stronger Tennessee makes for a stronger Florida, and improves the competitive balance in the Southeastern Conference. You should hope that because right now Tennessee is one more game Alabama gets to steamroll on their favorable conference schedule when it was once truly the Third Saturday in October, and a vicious battle of equals.  You should want nice things for them because you, unlike us, are a good person, and wish the best even for hated rivals.

    We are not good people. We hope you lose at everything, Tennessee. We hope eternity exists, because this means our fondest wish is possible: that you could lose at everything forever.


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    1. Alabama.

    The Process doesn't sleep, but sometimes it falls asleep at the wheel and wakes up in the middle of Colorado State carjacking them. Colorado State should really consider using something other than a bubble gun in future robberies, because Alabama still won in a lackadaisical 31-6 rehearsal for next week's game against Ole Miss.

    2. Oregon.

    Bye week, but still scored five or six touchdowns in a high school scrimmage because an addict can't just quit or they'll die.

    3. Clemson.

    An ugly, dysfunctional, and officiating-assisted road 26-14 win over NC State. So a win, in other words, hopefully celebrated with a quick stop at Cook-Out and the full appreciation that past Clemson teams would have completely blown this game.

    4. Ohio State.

    A 76-point blowout and a $900,000 paycheck doesn't even get you the FAMU band anymore. This economy, man.

    5. Stanford.

    Pummeled Arizona State 42-28 in a game that appears closer than it was, thanks to David Shaw putting away the good hammers about two quarters into a full-scale beatdown. Warning: contained extreme targeting.

    Week 5 recaps

    Stanford makes its case against Arizona State

    Notre Dame overcomes Michigan State's defense

    Florida beats Tennessee, loses Jeff Driskel

    Utah claims Holy War through 2016

    Texas throws off the Kansas State yoke

    Auburn scrappy in loss at Death Valley

    Alabama in trouble after unconvincing win?

    Michigan's seen this movie before (it's not good)

    Maryland destroys West Virginia in Baltimore

    Why not Baylor?

    Find your team's SB Nation site here

    6. LSU.

    A 35-21 win over Auburn was disturbing for so many reasons, but mostly due to LSU continuing to do something described as "scoring points intentionally, and in multiples of 7."

    7. Louisville.

    A 72-0 game is an atrocity, but put a debate over whether FIU asked for a running clock or not into the equation? Now you've got a proper dark comedy.

    8. Florida State.

    Can thank Ohio State, Louisville, and Baylor for making a 54-6 win over Bethune-Cookman seem demure in comparison.

    9. Georgia.

    A 45-21 victory over a feisty North Texas team that was basically the Colorado State-Alabama game played 273.5 miles to the east.

    10. Texas A&M.

    Kevin Sumlin paid tribute to single-back idols June Jones and Hal Mumme of SMU by only scoring 42 points on the Mustangs in a 42-13 blowout, and also by removing death machine Johnny Manziel early in the third quarter.

    11. Oklahoma State.

    Bye week spent mailing that great SI advertisement for the program to potential recruits.

    12. South Carolina.

    Bye week spent at the beach. No, seriously, that's what Steve Spurrier does on bye weeks.

    13. UCLA.

    A tasteful 59-13 walloping of New Mexico State, because a 46-point margin of victory is practically chivalry.

    14. Oklahoma.

    Bye week, probably spent laughing at Mack Brown and/or Bill Snyder.

    15. Michigan.

    Won a difficult road game at Connecticut 24-21 just a week after fending off upstart Akron! A real accomplishment! Particularly when this is looking at you from the opposite sideline and frightening the children!

    16. Miami.

    Won a 77-7 blowout of Savannah State. Savannah State is college football's equivalent of the person whose fetish is getting beaten by the cops for pleasure. Stop scheduling them, as they have lost their last three games against FBS competition by a combined score of 216-7. It's just disturbing at this point.

    A tire fire looks like a dying tiki torch when next to the exploding fireworks factory that is Tennessee.

    17. Washington.

    A 56-0 dispatch of Idaho State that, if accompanied with thank-you note, qualifies as one of the week's most courteous executions.

    18. Northwestern.

    Sleepwalked through a 35-21 win against Maine, something honors dorm kids like Northwestern are wont to do after staying up all week playing Grand Theft Auto V.

    19. Florida.

    Turned the ball over three times, blew a few coverages, lost their starting quarterback for the year to a broken leg. They still won 31-17, because a tire fire looks like the humble flame of a dying tiki torch when placed next to the perpetually exploding fireworks factory that is the Tennessee football program.

    20. Baylor.

    Did add to the carnage of this week by beating ULM 70-7, but unlike other programs  can't be blamed for it. They are Bears, and it was your fault for leaving all that food in the car, Warhawks.

    21. Ole Miss.

    Bye week spent watching Alabama game tape and having children.

    22. Notre Dame.

    A 17-13 submission victory against Michigan State. (I.e. The only kind of game anyone plays against Michigan State, ever.)

    23. Arizona State.

    On the butt end of the aforementioned Stanford hammer party in a 42-28 loss, though did make a lively second half comeback. (Before more cruel application of the Stanford hammer partying.)

    24. Wisconsin.

    A 41-10 win over Purdue with NOTHING INTERESTING ABOUT THE END OF THE GAME AT ALL.

    25. Texas Tech.

    A defensive win over Texas State, 33-7, which feels weird until you remember that Texas State is coached by Dennis Franchione and is not terrible, and also that the Red Raiders are still in the startup phase of Air Raid 101 in Kliff Kingsbury's first year.

    More from SB Nation:

    • New bowl projections: Baylor to BCS, Bama-Oregon still on

    • Longform: Bill Connelly’s Big Ten road trip

    • Stanford pounds Arizona State, 42-28

    • Notre Dame outuglies Michigan State, 17-13

    • Florida tops Tennessee, but loses Jeff Driskel

    • Players apparently participate in NCAA protest

    • Today’s college football news headlines


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    SPOILERS STOP READING YOU IMBECILES WHO BELIEVE IN SPOILERS AND DON'T UNDERSTAND THE INTERNET

    1. This is a transition episode, and the most you can hope for the run setting up the play-action bomb of the finale is for there to be something to prevent this from being a mechanism, a means to the end of getting to, well, the end.  I'm not sure "Granite State" is much more than that, though we did do the requisite gasping, horrified "NOOOOOOOOOs" and couch-clutching most end-stage Breaking Bad episodes generate in the viewer.

    2. Those were, in no particular order: Jesse watching unholy dickhead Nazi meth-head Scott Frost shoot Andrea in the head, and then watching what was left of Jesse's mind fly right out of his ear like so many scattered moths. It was nasty, brutish, short, and almost perfunctory, which sort of made it more horrifying than your usual assassination of a perfectly innocent character. Brock's going to find her on that porch. Imagine that scene. Now imagine Jesse wanting to live now, knowing he's responsible for this. He's so dead: if not by gunfire, then by his own hand, because Jesse doesn't even want to live past revenge, at this point.

    3. Oh, and hello, Todd standing over Holly, the baby who has been threatened and teased as doomed so many times in this series that it's starting to compromise your belief in her as a character, and not as a running gag of perpetual child endangerment.

    4. For a flash--amidst the horror, because holy shit, Nazis in the baby's bedroom--I just had Holly in every possible situation of negligent parenting. Skyler driving with Holly on the hood of the car through A-1's hottest, waxiest car wash; Skyler trying to open cans with Holly as an electric opener, and thwacking her on the counter to jostle her batteries; Skyler placing her theatrically on a hook, and then fishing for lions at the ABQ Zoo. (Which they do have.)  Skyler hang-gliding in the mountains of northern New Mexico, haphazardly wearing Holly in a Baby Bjorn as she does it. They've overplayed Holly-in-peril, but that's a cheap complaint at this point in the series, but it's there. Skyler just threw Holly in the pool because she mistook the baby for a skimmer. You are just the worst fucking parent ever, Skyler.

    5. The possibility of a Saul/Walt road-buddy-comedy-caper got sad fast, because Saul did precisely what you knew Saul would do: shed his skin, and happily adopt that Cinnabon manager's outfit before he ever set his feet on Nebraskan soil. Did you catch Bob Odenkirk fiddling with his hair in the picture for his new ID? That even in the worst moment of his life, Saul was vain enough to worry about his appearance? Have you considered how goddamn great Bob Odenkirk has been in this role, and that he has done the ultimate in character portrayal by making Saul inseparable from the actor? That when everyone else says it's over, they're wrong, but that Saul knows the doorway to the afterlife when he sees it? Odenkirk rules, and has for the better part of two decades. That's the point, and Saul is just one way to make it even clearer. (Goddammit.)

    6. Walt arriving in New Hampshire in a barrel--ye olde symbol of death and tranformation--was a nice touch, Vince. So was the big crate of Ensure finally telling Walt that death was here anyway, and that he might as well get on with it. Walt's worst fear isn't leaving nothing to his family. (If he really cared about them as a first priority, none of this would have happened in the first place.) It's dying like his father did of Huntington's, shrinking away to a nothing in the prison of his body, trapped and slowly losing his ability to communicate with the outside world. This should sound a lot like the cabin in New Hampshire, and with good reason. Walt's is paralyzed in "Granite State," just as his father was at the end.

    7. Net3rk is right: in an episode that was largely functional, the Vacuum Man is a naked plot device. Then again, so was Saul at times, something the series got away with via casting. (Again: Bob Odenkirk is a god.) This episode is full of those: the sudden appearance of Walt's ex-lover and former business partner on the TV; the convenience of Walt being able to walk miles to a bar in the snow with cancer raging through his body, and then disappear into the woods before the cops get there; the Vacuum Man's weird commitment to not easily robbing the cancer-ridden asshole with a barrel full of money he could just, you know, TAKE.

    8. But that's just a side effect of the procedural choices here, and something you have to deal with when you talk about endings. BB is clearly going to try and tie up those endings, and some of that means acceleration, and the brutal closing of a trap on those involved because this is a Scarface story, and involves a jackal stealing other jackals' prize carcasses. Andrea doesn't get to say goodbye. Walt doesn't get to make many choices anymore. Skyler can't walk out of that room, because those are federal agents, and she is in federal-type deep-shit trouble. Walt doesn't get a tearful reconciliation with Walt Jr./Flynn.

    9. These pancakes are ruined forever, and that's the point. The tradeoff as a viewer is that you're going to get a mechanistic, ends-tying ending. That's an opportunity cost of that choice, and "Granite State" is what you pay for getting there. The other choice on the other end of the spectrum is to leave Tony Soprano in the diner, and then cut to blackscreen, because fuck you and fictional conventions, viewer. For BB, as heavily orchestrated and deliberately wrought a show as ever put on TV, the former is really the only choice they had. The worst thing about endings is that the characters, readers, and viewers are all trapped by narrative, even in a show this good. "Granite State" is more function than form, but I'll take it, particularly since I can't remember a penultimate episode of any show off the top of my head. It's not great on the curve, but at this point it probably can't be.

    10. Huell update!

    Owfmxh5_medium

    For the second straight week: someone please bring Huell a pizza.

    11. Jesse's got astonishing grip strength, bro.

    12. Walt really does look like Gordon Freeman with the beard and glasses, another scientist who turned into a killer under weird, unforeseen circumstances.

    13. If Charlie Rose guns down Walt, well...that'd still be better than the final episode of Seinfeld.

    14. "Granite State" is worth a few allusions and associations. The state's motto is "Live Free Or Die," the name of the final season's opening episode. It is full of insane survivalists and rednecks, and would be a logical place for someone to hide the hell out when pursued by the entire American law enforcement community. Granite is an igneous rock created by cooling magma. It is commonly used for headstones. The Granite State here, for Walt and who knows how many other characters by the end of the final 75 minutes next week, is death. Happy Monday to you.


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    Ann Arbor. In 1957, men scheduled like men for a lot of reasons. For one, women weren't allowed in college athletics for the most part, and certainly not anywhere near the decision-making apparatus. Another factor: the college football season at the time was a mere nine games long, making the sport 75 percent of what it is today by volume.

    Just look at Michigan's schedule for the year. Marvel at the wall-to-wall masculinity. It's like expensive wood paneling for the eyes.

    G Date Day School Opponent Conf Pts Opp W L T Streak Notes
    1 Sep 28, 1957 Sat (10) Michigan @ Southern California PCC W 16 6 1 0 0 W 1
    2 Oct 5, 1957 Sat (10) Michigan Georgia SEC W 26 0 2 0 0 W 2
    3 Oct 12, 1957 Sat (6) Michigan (2) Michigan State Big Ten L 6 35 2 1 0 L 1
    4 Oct 19, 1957 Sat (18) Michigan Northwestern Big Ten W 34 14 3 1 0 W 1
    5 Oct 26, 1957 Sat (20) Michigan @ (14) Minnesota Big Ten W 24 7 4 1 0 W 2
    6 Nov 2, 1957 Sat (12) Michigan (3) Iowa Big Ten T 21 21 4 1 1 T 1
    7 Nov 9, 1957 Sat (11) Michigan @ Illinois Big Ten L 19 20 4 2 1 L 1
    8 Nov 16, 1957 Sat (18) Michigan Indiana Big Ten W 27 13 5 2 1 W 1
    9 Nov 23, 1957 Sat (19) Michigan (3) Ohio State Big Ten L 14 31 5 3 1 L 1
    Provided by Sports-Reference.com/CFB: View Original Table
    Generated 9/22/2013.

    Not a score in the 40s, and not a weak non-conference link on the bill ... from this perspective, at least. USC was a 1-9 team in 1957. Georgia went 3-7. In fact, there are only three teams with winning records on this whole schedule: Michigan State, Ohio State, and Iowa. The rest is mediocrity or worse, and by worse we are talking about the winless 1957 Northwestern Wildcats. (Coached by an obscurity named Ara Parseghian, who disappeared several years later and was never heard from again.) This is relevant to this weekend, both because it is more interesting than almost anything that happened, and also because it makes a point about college football scheduling being uneven even back in the days when the Big Ten was allegedly really good at things (I.e. a long, long time ago).

    Bethune-Cookman. You can still complain about this weekend in college football, and the kind of scheduling that resulted in four teams scoring over 70 points against helpless, prone opponents left to rot in the late September sun. You should: on the whole, the addition of the 12th game in the schedule has done a lot to service athletic department debt at Savannah State, and very little to entertain you, the fan. This is invalid if you find Savannah State playing a 12-minute quarter against Miami to be entertaining. It could be, if you thought of it as a lightning round, and if Savannah State got to play with two balls at once.

    P.S. They'd probably just have both stripped and returned for touchdowns, or throw a true double pass, have the balls collide in mid-air, and then fine, you're right. This is a terrible idea. We should still try it, if only to see a linebacker carrying two balls into the endzone off a double fumble recovery. Yes, dribbling does count as possession if you're whistling while doing it.

    Caniformia. Please excuse Baylor -- the Bears, from suborder Caniformia -- from this discussion. They are made to score 70 points. They do so almost on accident. They scored 70 on a good and deeply experienced ULM team, and you should praise them for not scoring 100, since they sat on 70 at the end of the third quarter. Let's say that again for effect: Baylor sat on 70 points. You're still the king, Jack Pardee.

    DeQuan Daniels. The leading rusher for the Savannah State Tigers with one carry for 75 yards and the lone touchdown on the day for Savannah State. In their past three games against FBS competition, DeQuan Daniels is the only player to score for the Tigers. It's a run of 216 points to DeQuan's 7. Give DeQuan the $395,000 Savannah State was paid for the game. He is a college student. He will do terrible, reprehensible things with that money like paying his bills, buying food, and other things frowned on by the concept of amateurism.

    Edacious. Gluttony, as in the kind where you still see a 12th game, take it despite the low quality, and eat it no matter what it contains or how badly it poisons your appetite. You can take the following from this weekend if your team played someone like Bethune-Cookman: If you enjoyed it for any more than two minutes, you are a sadist of the first degree or a crashing bore who really DID want to see what the third-stringer could do against inferior competition.

    For the record: Cardale Jones got carries this weekend. THAT Cardale Jones.

    F#$% It.

    That's how bad it is: Kirk Herbstreit giggling like a schoolgirl at basic profanities and the city of Fargo showing the hell out for GameDay are the two best things about Week 4 of the 2013 college football season. Just know that's where we're starting. The floor is all the way down there. It will be several hundred feet lower by the time we finish.

    We had to start with a schedule from 1957 to let you know that college football has always been sort of uneven, and is just continuing a proud tradition of throwing puppies to the lions. And with that said, the rest was a unique vintage of crap we almost wish we hadn't eaten.

    More: Bill Connelly ranks all 29 unbeatensNew bowl projections

    Graham. As in Moonlight, and as in players who may have only one game to their name as athletes, and particularly as college football players. I hope that isn't the case for Nathan Peterman, and that he has a long, successful college football career somewhere. I hope he doesn't finish after getting his first start in Ben Hill Griffin Stadium, playing against the SEC's best defense as a redshirt freshman, and going 4/11 for four yards, zero touchdowns, two interceptions, and a fumble. I hope he gets a chance to have a better QB rating for his final game than a 3.8, the lowest total I can remember anyone having in the history of me remembering random QB ratings.

    Henig. As a means of comparison, Michael Henig of Mississippi State in 2007 threw six interceptions against LSU and still finished with a 32.4 rating for the day. You either have to be set up for perfect failure or be perfectly awful to garner a 3.8 rating as a QB. Nathan Peterman might have been both on Saturday, but his body wisely protected him from further harm by allowing its hand to get injured, thus excusing him from the rest of the game and further pain. Struggle is to be expected for a young QB, but disaster like that takes teamwork and coaching. (Which, on Saturday at least, Tennessee had.)

    Intermediation. Please, sir, talk to my press agent and leave me be. No interviews. NO INTERVIEWS, I SAID:

    If you are running from a vampire and Jordan Hall is the other person there, you're dead, basically. He will shoot the hostage. He will run away laughing while the bear eats you.

    Jug O' Milk. Week 4 was so sad that WAC Memorial Game of Boise State-Fresno State truly was the best game of the weekend. That came out wrong: Boise State-Fresno State should have been great anyway, both because Fresno State is wildly aggressive and because Boise State is still Boise State. (Diminished somewhat in its current state, but still.) Boise's lead receiver was some random Dutch dude you've never heard of, and yes, they did get a two-point conversion on a desperate trick play late. The difference is that they lost, which seems to be a thing in 2013 for Boise, and not something anyone is used to when discussing the Broncos.

    They also lost the Milk Can, America's least transportable trophy by content. (Hell, the Battle of the Bones ribs might make it further, even on a hot day.)

    Kismet. Should have seen that second loss coming, though, Boise. After all:

    BU: "Boise Unravels." Lldogs? TWO L'S. AS IN TWO LOSSES FOR YOU, BRONCOS. Just read the signs, sheeple. They're everywhere if you look hard enough.

    Week 4 recaps

    Stanford makes its case against Arizona State

    Notre Dame overcomes Michigan State's defense

    Florida beats Tennessee, loses Jeff Driskel

    Utah claims Holy War through 2016

    Texas throws off the Kansas State yoke

    Auburn scrappy in loss at Death Valley

    Alabama in trouble after unconvincing win?

    Michigan's seen this movie before (it's not good)

    Maryland destroys West Virginia in Baltimore

    Why not Baylor?

    Find your team's SB Nation site here

    [/takes hit of Houston Nutt's mind-control gas from hospital mask]

    Leavings. Marshall wide receiver Davonte Allen dropped a perfect fade from QB Rakeem Cato to end Marshall's chances in the third overtime against Virginia Tech, proving again that Frank Beamer's strategy of waiting for the other team to screw up while playing great defense really is a great way to enjoy a 30-year coaching career. It's unwatchable, and sometimes results in two scoreless overtimes, but remember: that's not close to this year's current standard of unwatchable overtime games.

    Mallet. Stanford's got this hammer, and it's what Stanford's got for every situation. So if Arizona State, pummeled into a 29-0 coma by halftime, wakes back up and decides to mount a comeback, Stanford is just going to use this hammer to readjust the patient's attitude. They might just run eight straight times to burn the clock in the fourth quarter, set up for a final field goal, and all but squash whatever rallying nonsense you're doing, Sun Devils, because that's the forecast in Stanford now, and for as long as David Shaw is in charge. Hammer rain, then a drizzle of hammers, and then just more hammer showers steadily throughout the day until nightfall.

    Nagging. As in the feeling that in year two under Todd Graham, Arizona State is mostly a uniform redesign, a rebranding with Disney, a lot of new paint, and the same team with three or four really gifted players playing on otherwise mediocre squads. Todd Graham's gonna flip this house, though, new contract extension and all. Just watch him.

    Oenophile. Like Dick Vermeil, the legendary NFL coach who hired Greg Robinson as his defensive coordinator at Kansas City after Robinson coached on not one, but two Super Bowl-winning Broncos teams, and who then cried as he watched Robinson resign from the job after the Chiefs defense collapsed under his watch. Vermeil didn't understand it then, and probably doesn't understand how Robinson -- after participating in some of the worst collegiate coaching of the past decade -- got the Texas defense to play reasonably well in a 31-21 win over Kansas State. Then again, maybe Dick Vermeil knows something we don't: that Greg Robinson's entire career as a football coach is an exercise in proving experts wrong about everything, and not just the negatives. (Also, Kansas State may simply not be very good this year, but confounding the variables seems to be part of the Robinson process, too.)

    Palmiped. Web-footed. Just like Alabama against Colorado State, proving that even great programs phone in games. AJ McCarron agrees that Week 4 is the worst.

    Alabama should openly conduct Ole Miss film study on the sidelines the next time this happens, just to alleviate hyperventilation over a sloppy win.

    Queried. Please say someone is going to ask Nick Saban again this week if his emotions over taking the Cleveland Browns job in the offseason clouded his focus for the Colorado State game, if only to vary up the "Jobs Nick Saban Is Rumored To Be Uninterested in, But Let's Talk About Them Anyway." That list, for the uninitiated:

    • The Dallas Cowboys
    • The Arkansas Razorbacks (split with Cowboys job for Jerry Jones' pleasure and $20 million a year)
    • The Texas Longhorns
    • The Cleveland Browns
    • The Miami Dolphins (because he left some stuff there)
    • USC (literally no one has said this, but let's diversify here)
    • The Montreal Alouettes (CANADA GOT THAT SHALE OIL MONEY)

    Please let us know if Nick Saban is not considering another job he will not take, so we can set the internet on fire with that, too.

    Ron Turner Update! Two first downs, zero points, and 30 yards of offense against Louisville in a 72-point loss for Florida International. This may be my favorite Yahoo! Top Performer box ever:

    Screen_shot_2013-09-23_at_1

    Hold it down, Ya'keem Griner, since no one else at FIU is.

    Screwed. By officiating, one NC State team that imploded after a long Bryan Underwood run was called back when an ACC official announced that Underwood had stepped out of bounds. This would have been a fine call if he had stepped out of bounds. This is Underwood totally not stepping out of bounds on that play.

    NC State would fumble a few plays later, Clemson would score, and the rest of the game was a sad exercise in watching a team pick the shards of its composure off the floor. The only consolation for the Wolfpack may be that their state rivals UNC got the same blend of bad officiating and subsequent auto-destruct down pat in Atlanta in a loss against Georgia Tech, and had to do that in a bleary rain while getting their knees sawed off by patented Yellow Jacket cut-blocking.

    Typo. The box score says Memphis beat Arkansas State 31-7 and had over 500 yards of offense and NOPE NOT REAL LIFE MOVING ON--

    Unblemished. The scoring column for West Virginia in their first shutout since the year 2001, a 37-0 loss to Maryland, a school that if our memory serves us had 18 people on scholarship last year, all without functioning ACLs. Randy Edsall, we're not sorry for the jokes last year, because they were fun and you are paid a gross amount of money to coach a child's game. We do want to know how to blank Dana Holgorsen, or what horrible blackmail you have against him. (Because it has to be spectacular, and probably involve nukes, money laundering, and casinos built in abandoned coal mines in West Virginia.)

    Volacious. Fit to fly, which flyboy Troy Calhoun is not after the rematch between Wyoming and Air Force that ended with a 56-23 score on the board and 511 yards of offense and four TDs for quarterback Brett Smith. Christensen said he and Calhoun had a nice conversation before the game. They probably didn't have one afterwards.

    Words hurt like fists, Mike. If you tell a Petrino "fuck you," is it even considered a profanity? It probably shouldn't be.

    Xtremely interesting things we learned this week: Nothing. Delete everything from this week, and throw the Tennessee-Florida game down a well. Place everything but Boise State-Fresno State in the well, too. Seal the whole thing with concrete. Then encase that whole thing in lead. Have it fired into a star, but not that sun. That's the only sun we get. It provides us with life, and doesn't deserve to be fed subpar food like this week.

    Did you forget the Michigan-UConn game? Oh, you better not have forgotten it. That's like the successor to Tennessee-Florida's outbreak monkey for bad football, and it has to go in there, too. Shoot it all into a star. Reboot for next week.

    Yet. Fine, you can keep Johnny Manziel hugging six-year old cancer patient Charlie Dina after the Aggies victory over SMU.

    Toss the rest, but keep that.

    Zoanthropy. The delusion that one is an animal. See: Dominique Easley. (Spoiler: is not a delusion in Easley's case, since he is a strange beast with amazing powers.)

    More from SB Nation:

    • New Top 25 rankings good for LSU, Oregon

    • New bowl projections: Baylor to BCS, Bama-Oregon still on

    • Longform: Bill Connelly’s Big Ten road trip

    • Spencer Hall reviews the Top 25

    • Stanford pounds Arizona State, 42-28

    • Players apparently participate in NCAA protest

    • Today’s college football news headlines


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  • 09/24/13--07:26: THE CURIOUS INDEX, 9/24/2013

    • SKINNY PEOPLE DON'T BELONG IN FOOTBALL. Stanford's offense: a classy 800 pound gorilla in a tux.

    At two minutes or so: that is a nine-lineman formation. And in motion, it looks like Stonehenge falling over. Tears of joy are real, and they are falling down our cheeks as we type this. (Via)

    R.I.P., PAUL DIETZEL. The former LSU coach and father of the Chinese Bandits died this morning, per LSU's SID. Dietzel's career is hard to sum up easily, but put some perspective into how long he lived and how well he did his job: he won an ACC title with South Carolina, a national title at LSU, and coached so long ago that he left LSU for Army. ARMY.

    TEMPLE: COMFORTABLE IN THEIR MASCULNITY.Bravo to Temple for this, and not just because they didn't try to tell you they wanted you to wear "salmon" instead of pink, a color real men have always felt comfortable wearing.

    OH GOD ALL THE BLOOD. The Numerical today features Bill C. openly guessing about whether Baylor will score 100 points on accident, which barring kneel-downs might actually happen one game this season.

    YOU GOT 45 MINUTES? Watch the Selection Committee, where Kirk, Bill C, Dan and ourselves attempt to figure out the best four teams in a hypothetical playoff based on four weeks of college football. This sounds foolish and fun, and it was.

    GO FILM SOMEONE'S PERSONAL PARTS WITH A TINY CAMERA. If you had "vet prof" in the "academic staff deviant" pool at Florida, well, collect your winnings, and re-evaluate your life because betting on sexual deviancy in Florida is far, far too easy a thing to make money on, sir or madam.

    ETC: "Butter be good be good/ butter be bad/ butter be the best motherfucking thing you've ever had." Mmm, a ghetto XBox, just perfect for playing a few horrendous hours of Desert Bus. The early leaders for NOTY this year: Dr. Suparman Marzuki, Smokey Don Pipes, Fang Man, Yolanda Squatpump, and Norman Conquest. We could watch Derrick Thomas and Marty Schottenheimer yell at each other forever. The NYT is now celebrating people who openly discuss how running over a small child with a car really helped their spiritual development.


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    Miami not only went hard on the What Does The Fox say bandwagon. They made their own lyrics.

    The great strengths of the Miami fanbase has always been a total lack of shame and an uncanny ability to call someone a homosexual. The delightful lack of shame is here in being perfectly happy to look totally silly screaming out Scandinavian nonsense in South Florida heat, and that's a great thing. They didn't even call anyone gay, though, and that's--

    Screen_shot_2013-09-24_at_11

    Suuuuuuuure, it's because he has a cape. Sure.


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    Drake_pawl_medium

    click to embiggen


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    1. It is weird to play a game where neither team had much to do with each other, but no game with a total of nine turnovers is. The Florida defense barely noticed who the Tennessee quarterback was; the Tennessee offense hardly noticed who was coming, be it Dante Fowler (who is simply monstrous this year,) Dominique Easley, or Vernon Hargreaves. The strangest thing about this game is that it was less contest than a mutual seizure for a half, and then a continued seizure for one party through the second half. they had

    2. Note for no reason whatsoever: I want to call Hargreaves the Combat Wombat so badly, and have no idea why. I know why not, though: Combat Wombat is the name of an Australian rap group featuring "DJ Wasabi."

    DJ Wasabi enjoys; eating lollies, lighting and all things to do with lights, lasers etc., scratching, making beats, programming, and is nicknamed "smoke dog" a name he earned for his reputation of making turntables smoke with his hyper-charged scratching.

    So yeah, let's not do that, because sometimes your random thoughts are insanely dumb, and lead you to fruitless knowledge about Australian hip-hop.

    3. But let's just reiterate: for a half, It's not like this even resembled football.

    Two drunk teams fell off barstools for the most disgusting half of football we watched all weekend. It was an embarrassment bordered by down markers, two leprous sprinters winding around the track and seeing whose legs fell off first, a stampede of mediocre livestock off a short, ugly seawall, a bus terminal brawl between a pack of stray dogs and a doomed rabid cat, a birthday party at an orphanage, a Chinese mountaineering disaster filmed live by a dispassionate and unhelpful Werner Von Herzog, a wagon train with dying oxen headed the wrong way down into waterless deserts.

    4. Someone took Jake from Adventure Time singing the "Bacon Pancakes" song and looped it for ten hours. I would rather watch this whole thing than the first half of the Tennessee game ever again.

    At least it's about something you can believe in: bacon, pancakes, and dogs being allowed to cook over open flame. Additionally, I could eat bacon and pancakes cooked in deep, heavy fat for years before I would die. Watching this game again would kill me so much quicker, and with way more pain and discomfort involved.

    5. I know Jeff Driskel broke his leg, and that is terrible. Specifically, the guy who has worked very hard to get better, and has done everything in his powers as a very young athlete to improve, broke his fibula. Reach down on your leg and grab it: it's not your femur, but it still qualifies as one of those bones on your body that, when it starts hurting, signifies that something very large has gone wrong, and that in another century you might have been in mortal trouble. It sucks deeply that he is injured, and that anyone would take pleasure in that is horrendous.

    6. That said about Driskel: Murphy may not be that much of a downgrade for what this offense wants to do, which is mostly running the ball and occasionally taking a few tentative pokes downfield. He seems to make decisions faster than Driskel, at least in the few he was given, and scrambles effectively. Driskel holds the ball for days both because he's confident in his arm and ability to do things, while Murphy either takes off or gets rid of the ball before anything too bad happens. He doesn't seem too eager to do too much, and for an offense this dysfunctional that might be healthier than ambition. Ahoy, competent economy car quarterback. You'll probably power-slide if we take the traction control off, buddy! (Brent Pease and Will Muschamp say touch that traction control off and die, son.)

    7. The offense ran the ball and asked nothing of its quarterback in the second half. This is all this team should do, ever, since they gained almost 200 yards, squatted on the clock, and played unambitious, boring offense. I'm emotionally over this team being designed to win games 10-3. I'd just like them to start doing that, and this is a step in that direction. I'm really over it. I am. Protesting too much is bullshit. I like it. I do. I love kale. It tastes great and you're all wrong about how you can't wash the sand out of it. It's delicious. Survival is overrated. I meant underrated. Please help. Anything. Just help me watch this team play offense and fill this glass of alcohol when it is empty. It is empty. LIke my soul after watching this offense. Drink. Booze drink alcohol this offense oh god please booze. I'm not laughing Michigan State. I'm holding you as hard as I can and saying how sorry I am.

    8. The defense might be otherworldly, since even against bad teams they reduce your efforts to bland nullity at best, and tragicomedy at worst. Tennessee's only positive moments were accidents, mistakes by the Florida secondary, and their worst moments weren't just good Florida offense, but collusion via incompetence to create truly spectacular things like Peterman's interceptions. I would not blame Nathan Peterman if he never played football again: that, more than anything, is a testament to the Florida defense this year, the second in the nation in total defense right now. I would not blame a healthy young person for quitting after playing against them.

    9. This is true except for Pig Howard, who cannot give up the game because we love anyone who embraces the nickname "Pig." More agricultural nicknames for Tennessee football players, please, and more names of people you would want on your team, something else Tennessee is short on these days. In the bad old days, there were at least people you would steal if you could. Now, there's...A.J. Johnson on defense, maybe? Derek Dooley spent his days poorly at Tennessee, and had a lot of them. That's all you can think watching this team play, and looking at the barren depth chart.

    10. All a fan can ask at this point: that you be excellent, bordering on great, at one thing as a team. The reason Alabama has been so fiendishly good for so long now is never being awful at more than one phase of the game at a time. When the offense fails, defense and special teams kick in; when Alabama's defense sputters, the offensive line transforms into a herd of armored water buffalo and lets T.J. Yeldon do the rest. Florida is good at one thing, so good it almost doesn't matter. (Almost: see Miami.) That's nice. We should be happy to watch them annihilate a rival decimated by time, tide, and the DooleyKiffining. We really should, because that is living in the present, the only thing one should do.

    11. You know that thing where you say things aloud you don't mean in hope of believing them? That's this thing, but it still doesn't mean it isn't right. It also doesn't mean you're not saying these things aloud to yourself because you don't believe them. But to paraphrase Bo Pelini on bad fans: fuck me.

    11. If you did not watch the game, there would have been two things to actually see. One would have been Darious Cumming's potential Fat Guy TD rudely interrupted by Dominique Easley pushing him forward, and then inadvertently tripping on his heel. The second was Easley combat rolling on the ground in between snaps.

    Easleyrolllineflatenn_medium

    I don't know how we ever found him, but you cannot have him or his dancing between snaps, ever. Now let's never talk about this game ever again, except to say that Antonio Morrison is magnificent leading this defense, and that you cannot have him or his fondness for barking at dogs in cars, either.


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  • 09/25/13--08:12: THE CURIOUS INDEX, 9/25/2013

    • GODDDDDDAAAAAAAAAAAMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMIT.

    Early reaction on this, and the rest of the 2013 season:

    Yc6zcsy_medium

    PANKY UP. The Don, in his native element with pinky extended.

    290266_10100373580129347_1003302771_o_medium

    There's a story behind it, of course, but some things also speak for themselves.

    CONFIDENCE IS A GREAT THING. And when you've lost 26 in a row to the same team, it is all you have.

    TWIS. The best in unreasonable stress ends with a possum clutching a liquor bottle, a symbol of West Virginia's agony both now, and also in a lot of different life situations, actually.

    NO IDEA WHAT THIS MEANS. The cryptic TCU t-shirt sold for the SMU game defies all explanation, and appears to be yet another case of college football's arcane ephemera destined for nonsensical obscurity. (Oh, we bought one. EVEN THOUGH WE HAVE NO IDEA WHAT IT MEANS.)

    GOOD LUCK WITH THAT. Texas will play Baylor on December 7th, and when they do holy shit there are lot of things to worry about when you face them. Then again, they have more than two months to prepare, and certainly that's enough time for Greg Robinson, an accomplished defensive coordinator, to get them ready. [snickering] [more open snickering]

    HIS BEARD IS GONE BUT HIS POWER REMAINS. LSU fullback J.C. Copeland likes to watch Spongebob Squarepants, which isn't a surprise because everyone loves Spongebob. However, the circumstances behind his viewing are a bit different, and led to amazing pictures of the thundering badass doing this.

    HUNTING RODENTS SOUNDS FUN. It's certainly something to liven up Boston College football, and make PETA even angrier at the Eagles for having a, well...for having an eagle, their mascot, and a stupid bird who would die in the wild anyway.

    ETC: Goddammit, Trevor, that doesn't even make sense. Like a man isn't obligated to shoot imaginary gorillas by law. The Rock's cheat day looks incredible. No, stop it Alabama. Just stop it right now.


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    Shutdown Fullcast! This week we bring Matt Ufford on as interloper along with the usuals Jason and Celebrity Hot Tub to discuss the following:

    • Recasting Grand Theft Auto 5 with coaches, because we had to do that
    • How the Zerg Rush has informed Texas' new defensive approach (hint: blitz 500 angry Korean teenage gamers)
    • Talking about the Auburn fan who stole a car and rammed nine others at LSU
    • Identifying the Hoover, Alabama of New York City
    • Reader questions, including a discussion of how Bill Belichick would look in a white dinner tux
    • A brief explanation of Mongolia as the Boise State of Asia

    We are working on getting an iTunes RSS feed thing going. In the meantime, listen here directly, or in the embeddable below.


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  • 09/26/13--07:45: THE CURIOUS INDEX, 9/26/2013

    • EVERYONE IS INJURED AND WE ARE ALL DOOMED. Dominique Easley's ACL and medial meniscus are torn, which is a bit more than a tweak, Will Muschamp, but whatever. Florida's made up its own news for the better part of four years now, so why not press the trend until surgical facts change the story. Dominique Easley will be on crutches and bored, so you probably won't want to get near him if you're in Gainesville. (We're not sure why, exactly, but it just sounds like a very bad idea.)

    AN AMPED BUD FOSTER ALSO SOUNDS DANGEROUS. Apparently he gets really excited for Georgia Tech, per The Key Play's preview of tonight's game with the Yellow Jackets. Prepare security measures accordingly.

    NOPE NOT DUSTY IN HERE AT ALL SHUT UP. Josh Huff's mother once swung a 2x4 at his head in a fit of drug-addled rage, and is currently in jail, and this is all very heartbreaking and worth reading. (Bonus: Scott Frost becoming his foster dad at the program, which is lovely until you remember that Scott Frost really does look like Todd from Breaking Bad, and now we've ruined this story. Sorry.)

    MMMM, TEXAS POLITICS. Is the Mack Brown saga tangentially related to the possible impeachment of a Texas official? Oh, you bet it is.

    EAT IT, TARP. Oh, son, the modesty tarp at Baylor is coming OFF, because everyone's getting naked for Texas/Baylor including the stadium.

    ETC: Please remember that Big Freedia was twerking when you were all in twerkth grade. Goddammit, APD, that's not cool or funny at all.


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    Well looky here, Iowa State at Tulsa. I've had lovers I've cared about less than this game, and your mother can back that up since I haven't called her in 23 years.

    Saw that Duke injury report. Still gettin' those. Didn't see anybody listed as "questionable—poor."

    Georgia Tech was where I got my start coaching, and it looks like I took all the passing with me when I left. I've never been to Blacksburg, though, and any warrant that tells you otherwise is a lie.

    Here's some free advice for you, BYU: I've seen Phil Fulmer in swimming trunks, and it's ALL Middle Tennessee.

    Suspect USF's gonna have a tough time with Miami, especially because it does take at least eight months to get Holtz out of your bloodstream. Superbugs are real.

    Don't think I'm not wise to your tricks, Tennessee. You don't get to buy "South Alabama" at Big Lots and pass it off as a legit rivalry game. That thing's made out of particle board and stolen hair.

    I know Mark Richt thinks all things are possible through the Lord, but Zoroaster is a mean sumbitch and he'll hit ya late.

    Richt's one of Bowden's old boys and went to Miami. Don't tell me he doesn't know a man with a hollow leg named Red who can make a body disappear overnight. Maybe two.

    I didn't know there was a fat albino California Raisin, but I'm glad UCF didn't discriminate and hired him to coach football all the same.

    I know three things that live in Orlando: a plush rat, George O'Leary, and Casey Anthony. Helluva golf foursome there.

    Lotta people still mad at George for being untruthful on his resume, but how else are you supposed to apply for a job at a place that lies about having a good football team for years?

    True story about UCF: mascot used to be an orange with an astronaut's head, which is the kind of thing you make when your city's chief exports are human heads and citrus.

    Citronaut_medium

    Y'all ever notice how Mark Richt looks French?

    Nice that they finally installed water fountains in the stadium, though. I bet O'Leary's guest bath is just an empty Bisquick box that says "SHITTER" on it.

    Every time you see George with a new set of teeth you know there's a horse going toothless somewhere in Central Florida.

    Y'all still complaining at Oklahoma? Still gettin ten wins a year? Y'all should be grateful you have topsoil, much less Bobby Stoops.

    The human tongue can taste six types of flavors: sweet, salty, bitter, sour, umami, and whatever's left in your mouth after watching Wake Forest play.

    I don't know if Ole Miss can beat Bama without a Manning, but if you put Bo Wallace in a tasteful sweater set he might could pass for Olivia.

    It's not a four interception game, it's an emotional tribute to Archie Manning.

    Archie doesn't send me Christmas cards. Assume they were intercepted goin' through Tuscaloosa.

    I don't get cards from Jackie Sherrill, either, but stamps are expensive in prison.

    Winner of Minnesota-Iowa jumps to the top of the Legends Heap, because the Big Ten is the Monday crossword and Urban Meyer kidnapped Will Shortz.

    Colorado-Oregon State is gonna be just like them X-Games, except sometimes a ramp can play defense.

    Ole Miss's first mascot was an old racist white guy, and now it's a bear? Gotta borrow everything from Alabama, don't they?

    I don't know if Arizona's gonna hang with Washington, but they're two more full Rich Rodriguez seasons away from provin' Michigan's the real racists.

    (I know they ain't gonna make it, but a man's gotta have hope. That's why George O'Leary keeps getting his Viagra scrip refilled.)

    Y'ever wonder if we did too much to protect our children from potentially lethal household accidents? Me neither, Monte Kiffin.

    Don't feel bad for Kiffin. if there's anything more undignified than knowing you'll be out of your job before Todd Graham leaves his, it's coaching Tennessee to a Music City Bowl loss.

    Todd Graham steals toilet paper from bathrooms wherever he goes. Must be a kleptomaniac or large-anused. Don't laugh, they're both serious problems. Just ask Ray Goff.

    Can you check freshly stripped copper wire through TSA? That's a real question, because Southern Miss fans don't travel without gettin' at least some of that airfare back while they're there, Boise State.

    Science has discovered nine elements on the periodic table since Kentucky last beat Florida but somehow we still ain't got a cure for Salami Arms, a disease which afflicts 110% of Kentucky residents because some of 'em got it double.

    How's that fat boy doin' at Arkansas?


    0 0

    THE PEOPLE HAVE SPOKEN

    THE PEOPLE HAVE SPOKEN. This is what democracy looks like.

    Well, at least he's number one at something.

    ALMOST BORING. That's a key qualifier with Alabama, who is almost tedious in their degree of domination of opponents. We didn't even watch the fourth quarter on Saturday night, and only missed Zach Mettenberger's horrific Lt. Dan crawl off the field, which in retrospect was something we were totally okay missing entirely.

    Yeahhhhhh.

    RELEVANT TO THE TOPIC OF INSANELY TOUGH QUARTERBACKS. Marcus Mariota says he's good to play against Utah, and that his knee isn't an excuse, and if we know Marcus Mariota as we think we do this means the knee is just bone grinding on bone held together by staples and superglue.

    COME ACROSS THIS RAVINE WE DARE YOU. We'd like it if Alabama and Auburn were this close just to watch even more extravagant attempts to differentiate one fanbase from the other. It'd be like the Butter Battle Book, but with actual casualties.

    CLEARLY THE GREATEST SPORTS STORY EVER WRITTEN. "It was one great, grim, savage battle under a blazing sky, in an ampitheater rimmed with maniacs--that's what it was." (Note: very similar to Andy Griffith's classic in the ending.)

    ETC: The CFL has the best twists of fate. We don't even know where to start with this, or end, but it is amazing. We don't believe a damn word of this entire story because LSU fans would shoot for the chest or head.


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