Bubblelicious

Shorter Seth Davis: stupid college football fans who think regular season college basketball games are meaningless don’t appreciate how meaningful some mediocre programs’ regular season games are to other mediocre programs.

There oughta be a law.

ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith, talking about bloggers:

… And when you look at the internet business, what’s dangerous about it is that people who are clearly unqualified get to disseminate their piece to the masses. I respect the journalism industry, and the fact of the matter is …someone with no training should not be allowed to have any kind of format whatsoever to disseminate to the masses to the level which they can. They are not trained. Not experts. More important are the level of ethics and integrity that comes along with the quote-unqoute (sic) profession hasn’t been firmly established and entrenched in the minds of those who’ve been given that license.

Therefore, there’s a total disregard, a level of wrecklessness that ends up being a domino effect. And the people who suffer are the common viewers out there and, more importantly, those in the industry who haven’t been fortunate to get a radio or television deal and only rely on the written word. And now they’ve been sabotaged. Not because of me. Or like me. But because of the industry or the world has allowed the average joe to resemble a professional without any credentials whatsoever…

“… someone with no training should not be allowed to have any kind of format whatsoever to disseminate to the masses to the level which they can.” Jeezus. What does he propose doing to prevent this scourge from continuing? Lock all the sports bloggers up in concentration camps? Take away our computers and send us to time out in the corner?

We’re dangerous. Unlicensed. Saboteurs. Something must be done. Because clearly we need to leave stuff like this to the professional experts at ESPN.

I swear, as the cliché goes, you can’t make this stuff up. You really can’t.

(h/t The Agitator)

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James Carville won’t watch the Zooker.

Making the rounds right now is a pretty fervent anti-BCS rant from James Carville on ESPN. The man knows how to work an audience.

One thing he’s pissed off about is the Rose Bowl matchup between USC and Illinois:

… The reason we get stuck with the Rose Bowl and Southern Cal vs. Illinois, a game nobody wants to see, instead of Southern Cal vs.Georgia, a game everybody wants to see, is because the Rose Bowl has to do this Big Ten thing because that’s the only way the Big Ten can make money, nobody wants to watch their stinkin’ teams after their champion …

Well!  Take that, Mr. Delany!

Only one problem:  that doesn’t really seem to be the case. If you go here, you can see the TV ratings for the BCS for the ’02-’03, the ’03-’04, the ’04-’05 and the ’05-’06 seasons. The Rose Bowl was never worse than second in viewing audience in any of those periods. In those years, the only game that had more viewers than the Rose Bowl was the BCS title game, wherever it was hosted.

That’s played out in the list of all time BCS TV ratings (1998-2006) at the bottom of that page. The top six are title games; thereafter the Rose Bowl dominates the listings. There are Rose Bowl games that have outdrawn title games. All of which means that somebody is watching the damned thing year after year.

So it would appear that Mr. Carville is a better polemicist than historian. (Either that, or maybe those ratings are something else that’s the fault of the vast right-wing conspiracy.)

It’s fine to debate how to address the perceived flaws of the BCS as it stands now. But if you’re going to start ripping things up on the way to establishing a new world order, at least get the facts straight before you pull out your knife.

Dawg stat watch: maybe next year

For a while here, I tracked seven SEC statistical categories because they had in common that they were areas that Georgia excelled in during the three years that the Dawgs played in the SECCG under Mark Richt. (You can read the background on my analysis here.) I did this wanting to know if Richt would be able to capture lightning in a bottle in the ’07 season.

Anyway, the statistical goals I followed were

1. Hold opponents under 17 points per game.
2. Finish at least +8 in turnover margin.
3. Average better than 380 yards per game on offense.
4. Finish in the top five in total defensive yardage.
5. Finish in the top three in first downs.
6. Finish no worse than third in passing yardage.
7. Finish no worse than third in sacks.

I quit tracking these when Georgia went in the tank at Tennessee. Of course, after I stopped, the Dawgs started winning and I didn’t want to tempt fate by revisiting this analysis. But that’s a moot consideration at this point.

So, with the regular season in the books, here’s where the Dawgs wound up in the SEC in each of these categories:

1. Points allowed per game: 21.0
2. Turnover margin:+4
3. Total offense per game: 379.1 yards
4. Total defense per game: 324.7 yards, 3rd in the conference
5. First downs: 232, 8th in the conference
6. Passing yardage per game: 200.3, 8th in the conference
7. Sacks: 34, 1st in the conference

In the end, Georgia only covered two of the seven goals, although they were close in a third. Yet they came within a whisker – more accurately, a missed field goal or three – from making it back to Atlanta for what would have been a remarkable fourth time in seven years under Richt.

Coming that close in the standings while being that far off statistically from what worked before makes me wonder if something has changed, either with the conference as a whole or with Richt’s philosophy on how to win in the SEC, that could explain this. Or maybe it’s completely random, who knows?

It looks like something I might occupy myself with on a rainy Saturday in February. Consider yourselves warned.

It doesn’t get any easier.

If the reports are true, Arky is set to hire Jim Grobe as its next head coach. That’s a fine move. Grobe is a guy that’s taken one of the most abysmal programs in the country to a BCS game and a conference title. What he might be able to do at a program that has some actual resources is interesting to contemplate.

My only advice for him would be to make sure that he doesn’t use a cell phone paid for by his employer.

So the net for the conference in terms of head coaching talent has been to swap Orgeron for Grobe. Pretty impressive.

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UPDATE: On second thought, never mind. (h/t EDSBS)

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UPDATE #2:  Maybe it’s part of a secret plan to bankrupt the ACC.