Let’s just get it over with already.

Per ESPN’s Joe Schad, the coaches are preparing to take another shot at pushing for an early signing date for football recruits.

“We’re looking for an early signing day in the third week of December,” Rob Ianello, Notre Dame assistant and head of the AFCA FBS Assistant Coaches Committee, said at the coaches convention in Nashville. “There are more than 1,000 verbal committments right now, and about 15 per school. Why not sign them? Is it a reservation or a committment? What we’re seeing is oversigning and late switches. An earlier signing day would also be cost effective.”

Whatever they come up with, it probably can’t come soon enough for Spurdog.

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May the best lawyers win.

If you’ve been looking for a summary of where things stand with Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff’s threat to pursue an antitrust claim against the BCS, this is as good a place to start as any.  Here are a few thoughts and questions:

• Shurtleff’s showboating has received some editorial page criticism for wasting taxpayer resources, to which Shurtleff responds (at his blog!) by saying that it’s his “duty” to look into this.
• If you read his response in detail, it seems that Shurtleff is trying to right two wrongs:  give his beloved Utes a clear shot at the title and revenue distribution from the haves to the have-nots.
• As the post at TNR points out, the former argument looks a little shaky.  Every school stands on even footing under the BCS rules in terms of qualifying for the title game; where the potential problem for the BCS may lie is in the other BCS games, where there are restrictions on which schools can participate.
• As for Shurtleff’s other goal, my question is why should the haves share?  As I pondered a while back, why should anyone expect the president of the University of Kentucky to share his school’s football revenue stream with, say, Utah State, a school which will never put asses in the seats or eyeballs on the TV at the same rate as UK (which is a mid-level BCS conference program, don’t forget)?
• “Hopefully the NCAA will get back to the basics and take back I-A football and create a fair and equal playoff system.” Shurtleff may be the only politician in a football-crazy state in the country that welcomes the NCAA as a savior.  He must not have talked with many Alabama fans at the Sugar Bowl.

None of this is to say that I’m opposed to seeing a little litigation here.  The last major antitrust action, remember, resulted in television being forced to open up, which has been a major boon to college football fans everywhere.

The thing is, in the end, that, too, has benefited the big boys more.  Where does most of the TV money from football flow to these days?  Not the Sun Belt, Jack.

I suspect that if the BCS takes one on the chin, the end result would be a major restructuring of the D-1 conferences, with a few of the mid-majors being scooped up into a new arrangement of super conferences while groups like the Sun Belt and MAC would be relegated to a new tier occupying a sort of no-man’s land between the top shelf and 1-AA.  Personally, I think a top football division of about eighty teams would be great, especially if scheduling were tightened up and a playoff consisting of conference champs only was instituted.

Encore, encore.

So, the GPOOE™ has decided to answer the curtain call and return to Florida for his senior year.  A few thoughts:

1. As someone who was devastated by Herschel’s decision to take the Donald’s money and run, I’m a little jealous.  Gator fans, trust me, you’re a lucky bunch.
2. That being said, I’m more than a little curious to know exactly what the NFL had to say about his draft chances.  This article makes no sense to me; nobody with that many question marks goes mid-first round.  Can he play QB on Sundays or not?
3. I don’t see Meyer rejiggering his offense to get Tebow ready for the next level.  First off, who puts the needs of one player in front of an entire program?  The kid is the perfect quarterback for the offense that Meyer runs and it makes no sense to mess with that.  Besides, where has Meyer shown any indication that he can run a pro-style offense at the same level of success that he’s run his version of the spread option?
4. The other good thing about the decision:  while guys like Stafford will be honing their passing skills in preparation for the draft, the GPOOE™ will have the opportunity to do the same with his circumcision skills.  Thom Brennaman swoons just thinking about that.
5. The down side to this, it seems to me, comes if Florida makes a couple of missteps and doesn’t stay in the MNC hunt and that in turn costs Tebow a shot at a second Heisman Trophy award.  How do you stay motivated when all your goals disappear?

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UPDATE: Chris Brown adds some more thoughts here.  I hadn’t thought about this one in particular:

… Finally, one factor plays a part with Tebow that normally wouldn’t with other quarterbacks, but often does with runningbacks: hits and shelf life. NFL runningbacks have a limited shelf-life, before their skills and ability quickly diminish. The common wisdom is that this is a factor of the hits and punishment their bodies take. Tebow, unlike most future pro quarterbacks, takes many hits like a runningback; indeed, he often delivers them. It’s a crude measure, but compare the total carries by Tebow to Texas Tech’s quarterback, Graham Harrell, over the last two seasons. (In college “carries” includes sacks.) In 2007 and 2008, Harrell had 79 total “carries.” Tebow? 386. Adding another 200 carries, sacks, and other hits might just start to wear on his body. And we all know NFL guys will be trying to hit him hard and often when he gets there, so body preservation might be reason alone.

Ladies and gentlemen, your Mumme Poll national champ is…

the University of Florida.  The Gators were on all 32 ballots, were on everyone’s top five list and garnered the most #1 votes (21).

Here’s how the final results look (top five and #1 votes appear in parenthesis):

1.    Florida (32, 21)

2.    Utah (32, 8 )

3.    Southern California (32, 3)

4.    Texas (31)

5.    Oklahoma (29)

6.    Alabama (2)

T7.  Penn State

T7.  TCU

9.    Georgia

10.  Ohio State

11.  Texas Tech

12.  Mississippi

13.  Boise State

14.  Oregon

15.  Virginia Tech

16.  LSU

17.  Missouri

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COMMENTS:

• I’m a little disappointed in the final turnout.  Was it something I said?
• Southern Cal wound up getting a few first place votes, but poor ol’ Mack Brown couldn’t garner any sympathy from us for Texas.
• Georgia seems a little high to me at #9, so maybe some of that local bias bled through at the end.
• Two teams received top five consideration without appearing on all of the ballots:  TCU and Penn State.
• The order of the top five in the final coaches’ poll was Florida, USC, Texas, Utah and Oklahoma.  I like our order better.

Again, thanks to all who participated and made this a success.  I had a great time doing it, and presuming that there’s enough voter interest next season, plan on running it again in ’09.

Please take a minute to post your final ballots, comments and any other words of wisdom in the comments section.  I’d like to hear from all of you.