The incredible shrinking football team

What’s the over/under on the number of scholarship players Georgia Tech suits up when it comes to Athens November 29?

“I bet you in the next 10 years there’s not an undefeated team in our conference.’’

Over at MrSEC.com, Jimmy Hyams interviews eight SEC coaches about their feelings regarding a D-1 football playoff.  The consensus seems to be that they wouldn’t have a problem with a plus-one format, but a larger field than four would be problemmatic.

Here’s what Richt had to say.

… Richt, who didn’t seem to favor any type playoff before last season, sounded like a coach who didn’t want to disagree with his president. He said he didn’t think a playoff would hurt the regular season as long it was limited to no more than eight teams.

“If you go 16 teams, you definitely hurt the regular season,’’ Richt said. “An eight-team playoff could possible devalue the regular season, maybe. I don’t think a Plus One would change anything at all. We’d continue to have a great regular season.’’

Richt said an eight-team playoff would “drastically change’’ the current postseason arrangement.

“I think a Plus One could be accomplished without an awful lot of change,’’ Richt said. “I think it’s more realistic.’’

The true shocker in the article is that Tuberville admits that USC might have beaten his squad in 2004.

`Did we get shafted in 2004?’’ he said. “Sure we did. I’m not sure we could have beaten USC, but I think we could have because we had played them two years prior and had a better team (in 2004) and they didn’t have quite as good a team…

On the Plains, them’s fightin’ words, Tommy.

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The rising cost of cupcakes

Inflation hits the non-conference opponent monetary guarantee:

Monetary guarantees for non-conference home football games are rising at “a fairly alarming rate,” according to a top athletics director, and in some cases surpassing or approaching $1 million.

Ohio State, for example, will pay $1.4 million for Navy to come to Columbus in the 2009 season. Wisconsin will pay “just under $1 million” for each of two home games against Northern Illinois, according to athletics director Barry Alvarez. Texas is paying $900,000 to Florida Atlantic this fall. Arkansas is paying Tulsa $850,000, and Georgia and Tennessee are paying more than $800,000 for a single home foe.

It’s the result of good old-fashioned supply and demand. The latter rose dramatically with the advent of the twelfth game. And it doesn’t sound like it’s going to slow down any time soon.

“You talk about coaches salaries skyrocketing,” said Georgia athletics director Damon Evans, “now the guarantees are just skyrocketing.

“We haven’t had to pay a million yet, but we’re looking at it. It wasn’t that long ago that we were paying $350,000 to $400,000.”

Said Oklahoma athletics director Joe Castiglione, “The needle is north of $800,000.”

As the pressure from demand increases, so does the leverage the little guys have, as Oklahoma recently learned to its dismay. And you can’t really blame the MTSU’s of the world when they’re given the opportunity to better their scheduling.

In the end, I still think it’s inevitable that, whether the coaches like it or not, the big boys expand conference scheduling. From the SEC’s selfish standpoint, it’s preferable for Mississippi State to play a road game against Tennessee than Middle Tennessee State.

I can’t figure Matt Hayes out.

He ranks the OOC schedules for the SEC and ACC.  I assumed jumping in that he would list Georgia’s as the toughest in the SEC.

Wrong, bacon breath. The Dawgs show up at #3, behind Florida and Tennessee.

Just as a reminder, here’s what he’s comparing:

1. Florida: Hawaii, Miami, Citadel, at Florida State
2. Tennessee: at UCLA, UAB, Northern Illinois, Wyoming
3. Georgia: Georgia Southern, Central Michigan, at Arizona State, Georgia Tech

I’m hard pressed to see the rationale to that.  It’s even more puzzling when you see a couple of his comments.

Imagine if this season were earlier this decade, and look at Florida’s schedule. Even with FSU and Miami’s decline — and Hawaii’s natural regression this fall — the Gators still have the league’s toughest noncon schedule.

But, dude, it’s not earlier this decade.  Miami didn’t even go bowling last season.  And if those are such tough games, why didn’t any of them make this list of yours?

Top five games: Georgia at Arizona State; Auburn at West Virginia; Alabama vs. Clemson (in Atlanta); Tennessee at UCLA; Arkansas at Texas.

The topper comes with a comment of his in the ACC section.  FSU, Clemmins and Georgia Tech get marked down in part because their toughest OOC games are against in state rivals that they have to play.  Um, Matt, you wanna go back and look at Florida’s, Tennessee’s and Georgia’s toughest OOC games again, buddy?