Good answer.

The Athens Banner-Herald has its football preview posted today.  One of its features is a series of Q&As with several players.  Every one interviewed was asked what game or games was he most looking forward to playing and why.  Most gave safe, coach-speak type answers.

Most, but not Vance Cuff.

What game are you most looking forward to and why?

“I always look at Florida. It’s strong. Playing for Georgia, it just endorses bad feelings for them and Georgia Tech, too. It’s really those two teams. The other teams I know players on. I might not be best friends with them, but I know them. But the other two, I’m like a different person when I’m on the field with them. It’s like they’re the enemy and they hurt me.”

Then, there’s the succinct word from Blair Walsh.

What game are you most looking forward to and why?

Florida. Always.

Saturday can’t get here soon enough.

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Yellow Jacket head-scratcher

Admittedly, I don’t follow the Georgia Tech program that closely, but surely this isn’t correct:

In looking for another theme on the depth chart released Saturday by Tech officials, senior wide receiver Kevin Cone figures to be the only non-scholarship player to start. [Emphasis added.]

How many top-20 teams do you figure start walk-ons (not counting special teams, of course)?

At least he sounds qualified for the job.

… At 6-feet 2, he looks more like departed wide receiver Demaryius Thomas — bigger.

“I was about 200 pounds last year, and I’m about 210 now,” Cone said. “I just wanted to get a little bigger so I can be more aggressive. Last year, I was having trouble getting off press [coverage] and staying on my man [while blocking].”

Hoo, boy.

Stat stories

I’ve got a couple of good statistical exercises to share with the interested Georgia fan.

First, Year2 finds – again – that penalties don’t have much of an effect on wins and losses over the long haul.  I know a lot of Dawg fans like to harp on the high number of penalties Georgia has incurred over the past couple of seasons as a key factor in why things went awry, but the truth is that plenty of winning teams draw lots of flags.

On the other hand, I doubt there’s a single person who followed Georgia’s 2008 season who would be surprised by this:

Here is the bottom line. There is value in determining who gained worthwhile momentum during the last 3-5 games of the season, but you should not spend even five seconds attempting to derive value in bowl performances.

Sunday morning buffet

We’re getting closer…

• Excellent rant about the stupid FWAA vote on the ’04 season.
• David Ching give us a capsule review of Georgia’s 2010 schedule; the opening line about South Carolina is worth the price of admission.
• You gotta love Matthew Stafford lobbying Mike Bobo to add a couple of things to the playbook.
• Is redshirting becoming less common?  (h/t The Wiz of Odds)
• Say what you will, Mark Richt understands human behavior – or at least that practiced by eighteen to twenty one-year olds:  “I think they probably do,” Richt said. “But like a lot of people, they don’t think something could happen to them.”
• In the for-what-it’s-worth department, Georgia enters the new season ranked thirteenth in Sagarin’s “starting ratings”.
• Matt Hinton takes a look at whether Alabama’s defense is merely reloading this season.
• Hell hath no fury like a booster scorned.  Especially when said booster is, well, going to jail for fraud.

Devaluing the regular season

Again, it bears repeating that the single most valuable asset in the world of BCS-conference college athletics is the football regular season.  That’s where the bulk of the TV money is generated, and if there’s one thing we’ve learned in the past year, it’s that TV money rules the football world.

Here’s a handy chart comparing the revenues and expenses compiled at each SEC school over the 2008 football season and the 2008-2009 basketball season:

School		F’ball Revenues	F’ball Profit		B’ball Revenues	B’ball Profit
Alabama		64,606,392	38,162,437		8,766,826	3,777,011
Arkansas		38,630,265	20,321,009		14,391,769	7,755,353
Auburn		58,618,819	29,816,951		7,187,457	2,668,494
Florida		66,150,063	43,289,638		10,016,431	1,909,310
Georgia		65,218,406	45,381,440		7,266,018	971,584
Kentucky		26,143,126	12,895,649		14,773,034	6,157,308
LSU		61,868,953	39,125,745		6,034,178	1,264,808
MSU		18,732,248	5,873,586		6,197,698	2,473,007
Ole Miss		18,688,648	9,174,092		4,725,911	2,223,317
S. Carolina		57,118,519	37,232,819		8,101,086	2,963,232
Tennessee		42,805,360	19,842,551		12,576,715	7,111,804
Vanderbilt		18,564,940	4,383,262		8,021,361	1,020,874

As you can see, football revenue and profit dwarfed those from basketball, even at Kentucky.

In the debate about D-1 football’s postseason, what you and I think ain’t that big a deal.  But if you don’t think those numbers aren’t on the minds of every president, athletic director and conference commissioner in the Big Six, you’re kidding yourself.  They’re not going to do anything they perceive might present the possibility of killing that golden goose.