Time to suck it up, boys.

This puts a damper on things.

University of Georgia football student-athlete A.J. Green must miss four
games as a condition of becoming eligible to play again, according to a
decision today by the NCAA student-athlete reinstatement staff.

The university declared the student-athlete ineligible for violations of
NCAA agent benefits rules. According to the facts of the case submitted by
Georgia, the student-athlete sold his Independence Bowl game jersey to an
individual who meets the NCAA definition of an agent. Green has repaid the
$1,000 value of benefits to charity.

The agent part of this is interesting.  Did A.J. know who he was dealing with?  (And that’s a person who ought to think carefully about, say, changing planes in Atlanta, once his/her name gets out.  Which it will, eventually.)

The school is appealing, but the upshot is that he’s definitely out this week.  Worst case scenario is that they won’t have Green back until the Colorado game.

I’ll wait to hear what his motivation was, but seeing as he’s at the school that was the source for the NCAA rule in the first place, this wasn’t a smart move, at least on its face.  (And, yes, there’s something crappy about a player prohibited from capitalizing on his name, while the school plows ahead and does so.  But that’s a subject for another post.)

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So what’s each team’s margin for error on Saturday?

Chris Low sets up the stakes, historically speaking:

… Only three times since league expansion in 1992 has a team lost its first conference game to a divisional opponent and gone on to play in the SEC championship game.

The most recent team to do it was Tennessee in 2007 after the Vols opened their conference schedule with a loss to Florida. Arkansas also did it in 2002 after losing to Alabama to begin the SEC slate, and Tennessee pulled it off in 1997 after losing to Florida in the league opener. The Vols, quarterbacked by Peyton Manning that season, remain the only team in the league to have won the SEC championship after losing their league opener to a divisional foe.

That being said, it looks like South Carolina has a tougher road ahead with a loss than does Georgia, because of which teams from the West each plays.

…  Something to keep in mind is that Florida has to go to Alabama this season with South Carolina getting the Crimson Tide at home. Georgia doesn’t play Alabama this season.

Of the three, South Carolina is the only team that has to face Alabama, Arkansas and Auburn this season – making Saturday’s game all the more critical for the Gamecocks.

If you figure that Georgia and South Carolina play out Arkansas and Auburn similarly, that means with a loss Saturday, the Gamecocks would likely have to beat both Alabama and Florida to have a shot at a trip to Atlanta.  If they pull that off, they’ll certainly deserve to go.

A Georgia loss means that the game in Jax becomes a must win.  But it probably shapes up that way for Georgia win or lose Saturday.

The Hat gets a challenge.

With the addition of the 2011 season opener against Oregon, LSU’s got quite the schedule next season.  Check this out:

Sat, Sep 03	Oregon	at Arlington, Texas (Cowboys Stadium)	TBA
Sat, Sep 10	Northwestern St.	Baton Rouge, La. (Tiger Stadium)	TBA
Sat, Sep 17	Mississippi St. *	at Starkville, Miss. (Davis Wade Stadium at Scott Field)	TBA
Sat, Sep 24	West Virginia	at Morgantown, W.Va. (Milan Puskar Stadium)	TBA
Sat, Oct 01	Kentucky *	Baton Rouge, La. (Tiger Stadium)	TBA
Sat, Oct 08	Florida *	Baton Rouge, La. (Tiger Stadium)	TBA
Sat, Oct 15	Tennessee *	at Knoxville, Tenn. (Neyland Stadium)	TBA
Sat, Oct 22	Auburn *	Baton Rouge, La. (Tiger Stadium)	TBA
Sat, Nov 05	Alabama *	at Tuscaloosa, Ala. (Bryant-Denny Stadium)	TBA
Sat, Nov 12	Western Kentucky	Baton Rouge, La. (Tiger Stadium)	TBA
Sat, Nov 19	Ole Miss *	at Oxford, Miss. (Vaught-Hemingway Stadium)	TBA
Sat, Nov 26	Arkansas *	Baton Rouge, La. (Tiger Stadium)	TBA

That’s three away games in the first four, all against BCS-conference schools. Plus Florida. Plus Alabama. At Alabama.   (At least it’s after a bye week.)

Either Les Miles is a masochist, or he’s got an athletic director who’s looking to punish him.  That’s an insanely brutal schedule.

Fun with first week SEC rankings

It’s a kick to look at the first week’s statistical rankings comparison up at the SEC site:

2010 SEC Football
Conference Statistical Ranking Comparison Through games of Sep 06, 2010
Offense                                                                   Defense
Team   Rushing Passing Tot. Off. Scoring Rushing Passing Tot. Def. Scoring
Alabama   3               2              2               5               9              1                  4           2
Arkansas  10             3             6               7               6              3                  3           2
Auburn      1               5              1               2               5            10                10         11
Florida      12            12            12             9                1             7                  5            6
Georgia      9             10            10             1                2             4                  1            4
Kentucky   5              7              7             11             12            5                  7            8
LSU             11            11             11            10              3            12                12         10
M.  State     7             1               3              4                4             6                   6           4
Ole Miss      4             4               5              5              10            9                   8          12
S. Carolina 6             8               8              8                8            11                 11          7
Tennessee  2             9               4              3               7              1                   2           1
Vanderbilt 8             6               9             12             11             8                   9          9

Team     Kick ret. Punt ret. Interceptions Sacks  TFL Turnover Mar.
Alabama  10              7                       3                 9          12             6
Arkansas  6                6                       6                  3           4              9
Auburn     9                4                       6                  1            3             9
Florida      4                5                       2                  6           7             3
Georgia     1                2                       4                  3            4             1
Kentucky 2               11                      6                  6            7             1
LSU            3                 1                       6                  1             1            9
M. State    7                3                       5                  9            9            3
Ole Miss   11               8                       6                  6          10          12
S. Carolina 8              8                       6                  9           11           3
Tennessee 12           11                       1                  9            4            6
Vanderbilt 5            10                      6                  3             1            6

Keep in mind that only Vanderbilt and LSU faced BCS-conference level opposition.  Every other school played down.  Even with that in mind, a few things jump out:

• Florida’s offense was really, really bad.  Really.
• So was Ole Miss’ defense.
• For winning so dominantly, South Carolina came off with some rather pedestrian rankings in comparison to the rest of the conference.
• I’m surprised at how low Alabama’s sack and TFL rankings are, not that it affected the end result.  How much of that was from Dareus being out?
• Auburn’s the early class of the conference on offense (not much of a surprise).  Georgia’s the early class of the conference on defense (that’s a surprise).

Wednesday morning buffet

Thousands served daily…

• “Spurrier did say Georgia was South Carolina’s premier foe in the SEC East…” Of course he did, bless his heart.
• Georgia is getting its offensive pieces back this week.
• Bryce Brown vs. The University of Tennessee?  Bring it on, I say.  Maybe Derek Dooley can do a little pro se work.
• Boise State is as good as any team in the SEC, but…
• Here’s another reason Florida may have looked so sloppy in its opener:  fifteen true freshmen played, more than any other team in the SEC.
• Tortured analogy of the day – and in the end, you still need to hit something when you fire, right?
• A.J. Green remains as puzzled as the rest of us about last year’s celebration penalty:  “I still don’t understand that call. I was trying to get back to the sidelines, but the guys wouldn’t let me get back there. They were lifting me up and then the ref threw the flag. To me, that’s part of the game. It’s an emotional game. As long as I’m not doing anything to taunt the other team, then it shouldn’t be a penalty. I hope they change that rule.”
• Spurrier utters a few choice words over Willie Martinez’ casket:  “It’s a typical Georgia team: very good and seem to be playing with a lot more fire on defense than they have last year or two.”
• Colin Cowherd doesn’t think much of Virginia Tech.

Needing closure.

At this point, I’m sure you’ve all heard what A.J.’s issue is with regard to the NCAA.  Here’s hoping that it’s resolved in the very near future (today would be fine, thanks).

Stephon Gilmore and his mates in the South Carolina secondary did a nice job shutting down Southern Miss star WR DeAndre Brown last week, but their track record with Green isn’t quite as successful.

He made Joe Cox look like a stud.  I suspect Aaron Murray wants some of that, too.

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UPDATE: Gentry Estes issues a word of caution.

… A few years covering SEC football and various NCAA matters has taught me this: Do not ever, ever, ever assume or speculate anything when it comes to the NCAA. While it’s likely Georgia will receive an NCAA RULING soon on Green, I think it’s premature to say for sure that he will be CLEARED to play against South Carolina. I know Dawgs fans may not want to hear that, but past precedent in NCAA cases teaches that it is very rare for a player to miss a first game and suddenly have the suspension announced as time already served. Usually the punishment is issued well before a player actually returns — if he has already missed a game.

Now, I just got off the boat here in Athens. So maybe past cases aren’t a true indication. Maybe this really is different, but I’m telling you, I’ll have to see it to believe it.

In terms of punishment, what Green actually did (and the general thinking is this will ultimately prove to be tied to the rumors of a jersey sale) isn’t as important as the perceived value of the violation. If reports are true that the nature of Green’s transgression was in the range of $1,000 (which I’m not completely sure — through sources — that they are), that in itself would probably mean more than a one-game suspension.

The NCAA said that Alabama defensive end Marcell Dareus was actually down to miss four games, but mitigating circumstances (his mother died around the time of the trips to Miami) reduced it to two. Dareus had to make restitution for roughly $1,800.