The greatest college football quarterbacking show of all-time, Notre Dame’s year to be in the ACC, and Clemson’s close call, in the latest Cavalcade of Whimsy.
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Sorry if this column sucks, it’s not my fault …
Even though I wrote it, picked the topics, came up with the plan, and put this thing on the field, it’s the “fat, dumb, happy and entitled” blurbs’ fault – because, of course, it can’t be on me – that the column is “very soft.”
And we’re only one month in …
In honor of the 150th anniversary season of the first college football game ever played, the sport is giving its fans the ultimate present.
Everyone, you just witnessed the most amazing first month of college football quarterbacking ever played.
I know, hyperbolize much? Yeah, all the time, but really, the game has never, ever seen anything like this.
Tua Tagovailoa, Justin Herbert, Justin Fields, Jake Fromm – be shocked if they’re not all top 15 overall NFL Draft picks, and maybe even top five.
Take those four, and let’s add in a few relatively random-good veterans who got off to hot starts: Iowa’s Nate Stanley, Baylor’s Charlie Brewer, and Utah’s Tyler Huntley.
Over the first month of the season, these seven passers combined to connect on 73% of their throws, average 9.5 yards per attempt – to put this into perspective, just four quarterbacks finished last year averaged more than that – with 84 touchdown passes, and … (wait for it) …
No interceptions.
822 pass attempts. 84 touchdowns. No picks. That’ll work, but it seems like a few others might be missing …
Jalen Hurts sucks now, of course, after finally throwing his first and only interception of the year. He can be forgiven just this one time considering he’s averaging a mere 15.2 yards per throw with 12 touchdown passes so far.
LSU’s Joe Burrow is somehow still the starter despite throwing two interceptions. The Tigers were able to overcome the issues because its quarterback also threw 17 touchdown passes while averaging 12.3 yards per throw.
And this can go on and on and on …
Remember how were all worried about Miami starting freshman Jarren Williams? Yeah … 73% for 1,027 yards and seven touchdowns with no picks.
Sam Ehlinger of Texas? He’s connecting on 73% of his passes, and averaging 8.8 yards per throw, with 15 touchdowns and a just one interception.
Washington’s Jacob Eason? 71% for 1,243 yards and ten scores with just two interceptions.
Washington State’s Anthony Gordon? He has fat, dumb, happy and entitled his way to 22 touchdown passes with six picks while completing 72% of his throws.
Oh yeah … and then there’s the No. 1 overall pick in the 2021 NFL Draft
Trevor Lawrence is still great – even if he is only connecting on 62% of his throws so far with eight touchdown passes and five interceptions.
And to continue with the theme …
This blurb reaches more than trying to make Danny Dimes a thing …
Player A through 4 games: 69-101 (68%) for 821 yards (8.1 yards per throw) with eight touchdowns and two interceptions.
Player B through 4 game: 86-118 (73%) for 842 yards (7.1 yards per throw) with ten touchdowns and two interceptions.
Player A? Daniel Jones at Duke last year through the first four games he played in – he missed two early on.
Player B? Duke’s Quentin Harris, who’s having a better early run than Jones enjoyed in 2018 despite facing Alabama in the opener.
For the most part, the replacements for the top NFL rookie quarterbacks are not only doing fine, they’re doing better. To continue with a more obvious one …
Player D through 4 games: 76-101 (75%) for 1,046 yards (10.4 yards per throw) with 13 TD passes and no interceptions.
Player E through 4 games: 60-88 (68%) for 1,028 yards (11.7 yards per throw) with 11 TD passes and two picks.
Player F through 4 games: 66-85 (78%) for 1,295 yards (15.2 yards per throw) with 12 touchdown passes and one interception.
Player D: Baker Mayfield to start out 2017, but to be fair, he went on the road and rocked Ohio State. Player E, is Kyler Murray over the first four games of last year, and Player F, of course, is Jalen Hurts.
And you see what’s coming next.
Player G through 5 games: 109-154 (71%) for 1,464 yards (9.76 yards per throw) with 19 touchdown passes and two interceptions.
Player H through 4 games: 81-116 (70%) for 1,092 yards (9.4 yards per throw) with 16 TD passes and no picks.
Okay, Player G Dwayne Haskins had a better first five games throwing the ball than Player H Justin Fields has had so far, but Fields ran for 222 yards and seven scores. Haskins had 36 rushing yards and one TD at this point.
And to belabor the theme with one more of these …
Player I through 54 games: 185-273 (68%) for 1,992 yards (7.3 yards per attempt) with 14 TDs and three interceptions.
Player J through 5 games: 167-232 (72%) for 2,146 yards (9.3 yards per throw) with 22 TDs and six picks.
But Player I – Gardner Minshew – rocks the jorts better than Player J, Washington State’s Anthony Gordon.
NEXT: But the ACC has its own network now. I hear it’s nice …
Instead, the team will spend the final month of the season jumping up and down hoping to get noticed by the committee …
The independence thing is a cash cow and all, it’s certainly fun to have the state sponsored-style TV broadcast on a major network, but considering what it just did to Virginia, this would’ve been the year for Notre Dame to be a full-on football member of the horribly mediocre ACC.
Notre Dame isn’t going to the College Football Playoff.
I know, if Georgia goes off, and that’s the one big loss in a fight on the road, there’s a real argument to be made by the Irish to get in. But it’s not going to happen in a season with so many powerhouse Power Five programs in the equation.
At the moment, Notre Dame would be behind a 12-1 Pac-12 champion in the pecking order, and that’s not even starting with all the great SEC teams that would be ahead of the line at 11-1.
Meanwhile, if you’re an Irish fan, you have a right to be ticked.
Here you are going to Athens for one of the nastiest road dates by any good team, and your Irish have to go to Michigan. Meanwhile, not only does Clemson get to roll out of bed and play a sleepy slate, but it doesn’t even have to deal with Virginia – arguably the ACC’s second-best team – until, maybe, the championship game.
Notre Dame would far-and-away be the ACC’s second-best team this year, and as North Carolina showed, Clemson might be vulnerable.
Put the Irish in the Coastal and it gets to the ACC Championship with a real shot against the Tigers. Instead, going to a New Year’s Six bowl game will have to do.
However …
NEXT: Is Clemson really that gettable?
Thank you, Clemson, for coming up with that stop, so don’t have had to spend my entire week explaining why Appalachian State would have to be ranked higher than you.
I know I keep writing about Clemson all the time, but that’s only because it’s the defending national champion in the midst of something we haven’t seen before in the College Football Playoff era.
What if a Power Five champion doesn’t beat anyone with a pulse and still is an all-but-automatic in at 13-0? We’ll save that for another day. For now, no Clemson is not playing like the No. 2 team in the country compared to what the rest of the big guys are doing.
However, before you jump ship after the close call against a mediocre North Carolina squad, remember, the 2017 Clemson team still owns the worst loss by anyone to ever make the CFP – losing to a Syracuse team that finished 4-8 – and ended up as the No. 1 seed.
The 2018 team famously needed a fourth down completion by Chase Brice – and an otherworldly day from Travis Etienne – to get by Syracuse. Everything turned out just fine after that.
In 2016, the Tigers failed against Nathan Peterman and James Conner’s Pitt squad in a 43-42 classic – and beat Alabama for the national title.
The 2015 team survived Lamar Jackson and an epic game against Louisville, snuck by Notre Dame 24-22, and struggled late in the year against South Carolina before getting pushed by North Carolina in the ACC Championship. It went on to lose in a dogfight of a national championship against Alabama.
Dabo Swinney’s teams tend to ramp it up as the seasons go on, and this one needed to do a little bit of reloading. However, with the squishy-soft schedule ahead, that’s enough of the close calls.
13-0 Clemson is getting into the CFP no matter what, but in the court of public opinion – especially in the SEC – the team doesn’t get another one of those.
You got your one clunker out of the way, Tigers, but you’re not playing LSU, Michigan State, Oregon, Texas, Wisconsin, or Florida over the rest of the regular season.
Win every game by three touchdowns or more.
Gimmicky blurb because I really am fat, dumb, entitled, and to be honest, need to pick you up a bit after a lower-than-restaurant-quality first half of the column …
With the first month of the season in the books, it’s time to play a special edition of Dead or Just Sleepy. Which disappointing teams are dead, and which ones just haven’t quite been able to wake up yet?
Dead: The ACC (for the most part). Wake Forest has been fantastic, Virginia gets a pass for its loss to Notre Dame, and Duke is more than forgiven for losing to Alabama, but the rest of this league so far has been a giant bag of whatever. Really, Boston College … Kansas?
Just Sleepy: Clemson. It’s Clemson. Don’t worry about it. When the lights go on in the College Football Playoff, the team will show up.
Dead: The back half of the SEC. Thanks, SEC, for making me look like a bigger idiot than I already am for gushing all offseason about your depth. Of course Alabama, Georgia, LSU, Florida and Auburn are magnificent, but the rest of the league has been a dud. Injured starting quarterbacks, bad losses, national embarrassments, poor caddying – it’s all been there for the rest of the world to rip on. However …
Just Sleepy: Missouri. The loss to Wyoming to start the season soured things, and not being bowl eligible puts a crimp into the campaign, but it’s a good team that should go – at worst – 9-3 and might just throw a scare into Georgia or Florida.
Dead: Northwestern. The whole Northwestern thing is great when it works. Boring is cheeky when you’re going to the Big Ten Championship, but this team can’t score, isn’t getting the good fortune of a down year in the conference, and it’s about to go to Nebraska and follow it up with Ohio State and Iowa.
Just Sleepy: Michigan. I seriously need an intervention when it comes to overrating this program – I still think there’s something there. We’ll know after this week’s game against Iowa, but even without the great running backs, and with the offensive style that doesn’t seem like it knows what it’s doing quite yet, the fundamentals of the Wolverines are strong.
Dead: USF. Who the hell loses to Georgia Tech this year? Three of the next four games are on the road to keep the dud season trending down.
Just Sleepy: Houston. This wasn’t how things were supposed to go to get the Dana Holgorsen era off and running, but the Oklahoma and Washington State losses were acceptable, and the Tulane loss was all-timer weird. Beat Cincinnati this weekend, and the season is back on track.
Dead: Conference USA. Where’s the great win after going 0-18 vs. the Power Five? Where’s the team to get excited about? Now the league gets to beat up on itself after spending the first month getting taken out by the rest of the world.
Just Sleepy: FIU. Not me, although I could desperately use two weeks on a beach earning 20%. Florida International was one of the biggest duds to start the season with a 1-3 run, but UMass, Charlotte, UTEP – that will perk things right up.
Dead: UMass. You got your one. The win over Akron last week should be it for the season, even with a few winnable games against Liberty and UConn.
Just Sleepy: BYU. And now the schedule turns. After starting 2-3, there aren’t any more games against Power Five programs, but watch out for the Mountain West dates against Boise State, Utah State and San Diego State.
Dead: Stanford. What just happened? This was supposed to be when the program turned things back around, but it’s 2-3 with Washington, Arizona, Colorado, at Washington State, Cal and Notre Dame to go, along with a home date against UCLA.
Just Sleepy: The Pac-12. It’s been an easy narrative to assume the College Football Playoff hopes are long gone, but watch out. A 12-1 Oregon, Washington or Utah will have a terrific claim to get in considering how many conference teams will be ranked late in the year.
NEXT: Five Cavalcade of Whimsy footballey opinions and, like, other stuff
Five Cavalcade of Whimsy footballey opinions and, like, other stuff
5. Clemson and the CFP rankings
I can’t WAIT for the first College Football Playoff rankings to come out at the end of October to know what the people who matter in all of this really think about this close call against North Carolina.
There’s no way by the proprietary metrics the CFP uses that Clemson – right now – would be ranked ahead of Georgia, LSU, Auburn or Wisconsin, mainly because all four have huge wins on their respective schedules. It would obviously be a tough sell to put the Tigers ahead of Alabama or Ohio State.
If the CFP were to rank teams right now, it would likely put Clemson no better than sixth, but that wouldn’t really matter considering the committee takes into account the entire body of work at the end of the season, and then goes with who it thinks the four best teams are.
Get ready to remember how this works – the previous week’s rankings get thrown out.
4. Hawaii
Forget #Pac12AfterDark – Hawaii continues to be the most fun late-night team to watch.
It’s time to give head coach Nick Rolovich and the Hawaii program a massive hug. This is a good team with a mediocre defense, and it’s now 4-1 coming off a 54-3 road win over a Nevada team that beat Purdue.
The Rainbow Warriors beat both Arizona and Oregon State – the one loss was at Washington – and now they get a shot to make some real national noise with a trip to Boise State.
3. SMU’s 5-0 start is fantastic, but …
Can we stop using the term “death penalty” when describing what happened to SMU in the 1980s? Death means dead, and SMU was merely resting in 1987 and 1988 before playing again in 1989. Maybe we call it the Coma Penalty, or the Ted Williams Cryogenically Frozen Head Penalty.
2. The easy team to root for …
Arkansas State is 3-2 on the year with losses to SMU and Georgia, and it just came off a massively important – and fun – 50-43 win over Troy on the road. The Red Wolves still have to get by a tough Louisiana team in a few weeks to potentially take the Sun Belt West, but this was a good first step.
ASU has not only had to press on after head coach Blake Anderson lost his wife Wendy to cancer, but on the field, the team lost starting quarterback Logan Bonner for the season to a thumb injury before the biggest game of the year. In came Layne Hatcher, and he he hit Troy for 440 yards and four scores in the victory.
1. Senate Bill 206
California Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law the bill that would allow college athletes to profit off of their likenesses. In a major blow to the NCAA, in a few years, players will be able to create ways to generate revenue for themselves, do endorsement deals, and eventually, open the door for a whole slew of ways to get paid without the schools having to pony up the dough to pay them as employees.
And after it was signed, the story became the lead on CNN.com on Monday morning – not like there was anything else going on in the world – as well as other outlets, and …
Crickets.
There was no sky-is-falling outcry. There wasn’t a major blasting on social media. There wasn’t an avalanche of calls and texts for radio show appearances. There was nothing.
It’s partly because it’s all still an abstract concept, and it’s partly because it won’t kick in until 2023.
But mostly, there wasn’t a major reaction because almost nobody cares. A bunch of old schoolers are all screamy in a Tebow sort of way, but it’s fine. It’s the solution to the problem, and now …
That USC gig is going to look really, really attractive once a head coach can recruit kids to come to LA and do the whole Reggie Bush marketing company thing for real.
NEXT: The sure-thing picks of the century for this week
This week’s reason I should be the SEVENTH prognosticator on the set of the new FOX College Football Pregame thingy …
I think I was on Gameday.
I didn’t hear it, but apparently there was some thing about Michigan and Jim Harbaugh, and in the montage was a quote with my voice – obviously brilliant – talking about how this was the year the program had to beat Ohio State.
My price just went up, FOX. I’ll now require chips to go along with my roast beef sub.
The sure-thing, 100%, rock-solid lock, sell the house, sell the kids, no doubt about it picks of the century for this week
PICK SO FAR: 25-10 SU, 16-18-2 ATS
I’m making a ruling, and I don’t care if you don’t think it’s kosher.
Last week I picked Arizona as a favorite over UCLA, but the line flipped to UCLA -3 once it was announced that Khalil Tate and JJ Taylor were out. The Wildcats won 20-17 and didn’t cover the 7.5 published in the column last week. Since the line moved so dramatically, I’m taking the ATS win.
With that, I went 5-2-1 ATS last week and 8-0 straight up. It’s all coming together.
Fortunately, these picks are all correct.
But first, please do your part to keep me off the pole. If you choose to dabble, sign up with BetMGM though this link to take part in any of these games or other action on the schedule.
– UConn +11 over USF (but USF straight up)
– North Carolina -10 over Georgia Tech
– Cal +18.5 over Oregon (but Oregon straight up)
– Michigan -4 over Iowa
– Florida +3 over Auburn
– Boise State -23 over UNLV
C.O.W. shameless gimmick item …
The weekly five Overrated/Underrated aspects of the world
5) Overrated: Apparently, Leonard Fournette’s 29 carries for 225 yards in the 26-24 win over Denver, because …
Underrated: “Minshew Magic” is the reason why Jacksonville got the win.
4) Overrated: Needing to say the name Gordon Ramsay three times in an ad, because he’s not quite famous enough to be known without the actors saying who he is.
Underrated: Using a cuck-tayel steek to eat quesadillas.
3) Overrated: Florida State starting 1-2, and since then …
Underrated: Hello, Alex Hornibrook. Florida State going 2-0 after the rough start.
2) Overrated: D’Eriq King
Underrated: Clayton Tune
1) Overrated: UCF up 56-0 over UConn with just under 21 minutes to go …
Underrated: Steven Krajewski’s 15-yard touchdown pass to Matt Drayton with 19 seconds left as UConn covered the 42.
Sorry if this column sucked, I wasn’t my fault …
As the self-declared champion of all college football columns when it was started 17 years ago, it’s invoking the woefully-misguided theory below for its own purposes. Even though the column sucked this week, it still won by one point, so …
