Some football nuggets to nosh on

A few articles from the big boys, as the college football season is now less than 100 days away:

• Dienhart gets around to rating the SEC schedules here. No big surprises, really, as he lists Georgia with the toughest and Arkansas with the easiest. One little point of interest: Georgia and Tennessee each play nine teams that were in bowl games in 2006.

• The Worldwide Leader turns its eye to the SEC, as well. Schlabach breaks down the conference team by team, with a pretty good analysis of where the pluses and minuses are right now. But the Maisel/Schlabach “Three things I’d like to see” feature is bland, at best. Although we do get our first hint of how the WLOCP will be promoted by the media if Stafford gets off to a good start next year:

Who is the better quarterback two years from now — Georgia’s Matthew Stafford or Florida’s Tim Tebow? Tebow has a better supporting cast of receivers, but Stafford has a stronger arm and more experience in the SEC. Both players seem destined for greatness, but Stafford would go a long way in legitimizing his hype by beating the Gators on Oct. 27 in Jacksonville, Fla.

• CFN’s Pete Fiutak throws out his (admittedly) very early BCS projections. Michigan and Hawaii in the Sugar Bowl is pretty bizarre looking. And yes, Southern Cal vs. LSU for the MNC is a safe pick on paper, but I’m predicting now it won’t come to pass.

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Playoff blowback

I have to give Bernie Machen some credit. He does stir discussion on the BCS/playoffs. Here’s a couple of responses he inspired.

Somebody really, really doesn’t like what USC president Andrew Sorenson had to say about a playoff in college football yesterday.

It’s the birth of a catch phrase: “You have to be insane not to want a playoff!”

And a while back, I tossed out a modest proposal to reform college post-season play. This guy trumps my ass. In spades.

I wish Machen would pick up on an idea I was fooling around with back in the fall: The SEC should secede from the BCS, challenging the “champ” of the rest of college football to a post-bowls title game that guarantees the opponent an unprecedented $25 million payout.

(1) Who is going to turn down that money? (2) It’s not like everyone doesn’t agree the SEC is the best league, year in and year out. (In fact, some are already claiming that the SEC in 2007 is quite possibly the toughest conference in CFB history.) (3) Without incorporating the SEC (at all), I’d like to see the other schools try to claim they are the best.

(h/t AOL Fanhouse)