Meanwhile, in Starkville, Mississippi

If this report is true, that hire’s a home run for the Bulldogs.  And they sure went about their business quickly and without drama.

Man, the SEC doesn’t get any easier, does it?

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UPDATE: From the horse’s mouth, not gonna happen.  If the story below Petersen’s denial is true, that’s a boatload of money he turned down.

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Change I can drink to

Never forget December 5th, my friends.  Sometimes our government corrects its mistakes.

Good to the last drop.

Have a few on me.

Envy and jealousy: Auburn coaching angst division

At The Joe Cribbs Car Wash, Jerry outdoes himself with this paragraph about someone who should be persona non grata in the Auburn head coaching search that’s gotten underway:

Bobby Petrino. This is not an option. There’s the no-compete clause in his contract, the fact that he just arrived at Arkansas and Auburn won’t pay him THAT much more, the fact that we all know he may be the brightest slimeweasel in college coaching today but that he’s still a slimeweasel. Seriously, if Auburn hires this guy, Jacobs might as well bring a cardboard cutout of Tubby to the press conference and take a dump on it, so we’ve got the clearest understanding possible of how much respect he’d have for Tubby’s legacy.

Yeah, that would be clear.  Although I bet they could sell tickets to the press conference if it happened.

Wow moment.

Forget about Bob Stoops as a defensive genius for a moment and don’t concern yourself with how weak the defenses in the Big XII may be this season.  By any measure, this is amazing:

… If the Sooners can maintain their 53.3 point per game clip in the Saturday’s championship game and a bowl game, it will make them one of three teams in college football history to score more than 700 points in a season. And a huge finish might provide them with an outside shot to break the college football single-season scoring record of 765 points, set by Harvard in 1886.

Plus, as HeismanPundit points out,

… OU is on the verge of becoming the first team in NCAA history with a 4,000-yard passer, two 1,000-yard rushers and a 1,000-yard receiver.

If I were an AD at some place like Mississippi State, I’d be trying as hard as hell to arrange a job interview with Kevin Wilson right now.

SECCG thoughts

After surfing the ‘net and listening to the radio and TV pundits, I think it’s safe to say that this is a consensus opinion on how tomorrow’s game lays out for most folks.

I’m going to stick with a comment I made a couple of weeks back, though.  Barring the usual turnover disclaimer, I think the SECCG boils down to which John Parker Wilson shows up.

Take a look at cfbstats.com’s passing game log for ‘Bama this season.  Whatever adjective you might want to use to describe JPW’s year to date, “consistent” isn’t likely to be your first choice.  I’m not saying he has to turn in a game like he did against Georgia for the Tide to have  a chance to win (although that sure wouldn’t hurt), but if he gives an effort tomorrow like he did against Tulane or even LSU – where he got bailed out by a worse performance from the opposing QB – I don’t see how ‘Bama can stay in the game.

The good news if you’re a ‘Bama fan is that Wilson saved his three best performances for big games – against two ranked opponents and the Iron Bowl.  It doesn’t get any bigger for Alabama this year than tomorrow.

Sometimes the more things change, the more things change.

It looks as if there’s been a permanent turn in recruiting philosophy in Athens.

… Prior to landing offensive lineman Vince Vance and defensive linemen Corvey Irvin and Jarius Wynn from Georgia Military College, Georgia shied away from recruiting junior college players. The three transfers, however, have proved so successful, that Richt is hoping to land another group of stars this year.

“After our experience with Jarius, Corvey and Vince Vance, that was a very positive experience with those guys,” Richt said. “We went there as kind of a desperation situation, and not to say that we’re going to spend the rest of our lives there, but there are some very quality players and quality people, and we found three of them.”

According to Rivals.com, Georgia is recruiting three junior-college players this season: wide receivers Cameron Kenney from Garden City (Kansas) Community College and Leon Berry from East Mississippi Community College, along with junior college All-American defensive end Jason Pierre-Paul from Fort Scott Community College in Kansas.

I don’t think this is necessarily bad, but I do find it interesting, given how strongly Richt felt in the past about not recruiting JC players.   With the size of this year’s recruiting class, you just hope the coaches have done as accurate job evaluating these kids’ ability to contribute immediately as they did with the previous three.

Is Auburn man enough?

After reading this, my first thought was why not go for the Full Monty?

If Kansas State can bring back Bill Snyder, why can’t Auburn bring back Pat Dye?  I’m sure he’s the middle Alabama equivalent of tanned, rested and ready.

Just sayin’…