A universe where college football never ends…

I mentioned the other day that I don’t think this pro football business model will have much impact on the college game.

On the other hand, I don’t know if these guys have a chance with their version of a pro football league, but it’s an interesting concept.

“The intention,” Don Klosterman tells me, “is to play in areas where there are two sports: football and spring football…”

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Fergit, hell!

Yet another illustration of the passion that draws me to college football:

… During a Nov. 7, 1964 college football game between Navy and the University of Maryland, a Maryland player, Jerry Fishman, twice gave Navy fans the bird. For the next 40 years, Navy refused to schedule Maryland in football.

That’s good enough right there, but when the Baltimore Sun tracked Fishman down in Florida in 2005, when the two teams were at long last scheduled to play again after four decades, the 61-year-old Fishman was totally unrepentant.

“What do I need to apologize for?” he said. “It’s a rivalry. When we played, the Maryland fans hated Navy, and the Navy fans hated Maryland.”

Navy.  Maryland.  Hate.

You gotta love it.

Making the rounds, bloggy style

• Like many of us, LD judged Tom Dienhart and found him lacking. Unlike many of us, LD is doing something about it.
• No, it’s not about football, but Saurian Sagacity goes from wistful to hopeful to funny in three easy steps. Also, Mergz shows himself to be a red pants hata in a sad display of fashion envy. It’s not easy being orange!
• Over at Statistically Speaking, Matt takes a look at whether there are any significant corollaries between six statistical categories and teams winning close games. The verdict? Coin flip city.
• Bloggers like writing about Nick Saban. Especially when he’s catty with Mark Richt.
• HeismanPundit’s back from spring break with a couple of cutting edge posts about SEC non-conference schedules (been there, done that – in spades) and Urban Meyer and the rise of the SEC (at least he didn’t bring this up again). I just hope the Rich Brooks reference was a lame attempt at a joke.
• And if there’s one thing that should brace you, it’s when ArtofTroy starts a post out by writing “I had some time on my hands”.

Welcome back.

CFN has a column up listing the numbers of returning and departing lettermen for each D-1 program.

Here’s the list for the SEC:

SEC
Alabama: Returning Lettermen: 48, Lettermen Lost: 16
Arkansas: Returning Lettermen: 48, Lettermen Lost: 21
Auburn: Returning Lettermen: 51, Lettermen Lost: 23
Florida: Returning Lettermen: 38, Lettermen Lost: 25
Georgia: Returning Lettermen: 45, Lettermen Lost: 24
Kentucky: Returning Lettermen: 60, Lettermen Lost: 20
LSU: Returning Lettermen: 46, Lettermen Lost: 21
Ole Miss: Returning Lettermen: 47, Lettermen Lost: 17
Mississippi State: Returning Lettermen: 43, Lettermen Lost: 22
South Carolina: Returning Lettermen: 54, Lettermen Lost: 12
Tennessee: Returning Lettermen: 45, Lettermen Lost: 25
Vanderbilt: Returning Lettermen: 53, Lettermen Lost: 12

As you can see, Georgia ranks third in lettermen lost, behind two SEC East rivals, Florida and Tennessee.

As an abstract statistic, it’s somewhat hard to judge how meaningful this is. But I would guess that the better the program, the more it matters. I would expect that the better programs have more kids that excel and leave early for the NFL, for example.

Nationally, the two numbers that jump out are USC’s and Notre Dame’s. Southern Cal returns an astonishing 79 lettermen (the majority of whom were highly rated recruits), while Weis is only looking at 30 lettermen coming back in ’07.