I can’t say I’ve lost any sleep over this.
Is Aschoff referring to Gator fans or his bosses at ESPN as he slobbers all over the Alabama-Florida game?
I can’t say I’ve lost any sleep over this.
Is Aschoff referring to Gator fans or his bosses at ESPN as he slobbers all over the Alabama-Florida game?
Filed under Media Punditry/Foibles
“Those 13 jerseys are going to be around a long time.”-- Brock Bowers, The Athletic, 1/10/23
Is that piece journalism of something the local high school paper printed up?
LikeLike
Wow….umm ooops.
Is that A piece OF journalism OR something the local high school….
LikeLike
I’ve never understood the build-up for the atmosphere in the Swamp. I’ve been to two Florida-Tennessee games (both 3:30 kicks) and one Florida-Miami game (8:00 kick) there (in addition to a couple of cupcake games) and none of them were any more intimidating an atmosphere than a normal big game at Auburn, Alabama, South Carolina, Georgia, or Tennessee. Bama won’t have any harder time with Florida’s crowd than they did with Penn State’s.
LikeLike
I’d rather it be an afternoon than night game, for sure, but usually the better team prevails.
LikeLike
Personally, I’m fine with how the last two games turned out.
LikeLike
I’ll be fine if this upcoming Bama-FLA game turns out the same as the last two, also.
LikeLike
Please send word to Donta Hightower that he is to break Demps or Rainey, preferably both. If he ever got a clean shot on them, I imagine it would just be a puff of blood, guts, chicken feathers, and some glitter with Hightower walking calmly back to the huddle. Of course, I understand that getting a clean shot on those guys is the challenge.
LikeLike
Personally, I think they were too close, and Bama should try and win by a bigger margin. 62-19 or so would be nice.
LikeLike
I know it’s tough for a media member to hide their allegiance to their school, but Aschoff barely attempts that with this little doozy:
“We need for this rivalry to return, and that means Florida has to win, or keep it close until the end. An Alabama blowout will do nothing but remind us how good the Tide are and how far Florida still has to go.”
Wow, just . . . wow.
LikeLike
Since when did any fan of a team want a game to be close? I guess this article is talking to the casual fan that doesn’t care who wins.
As a partial observer who wishes nothing but implosion and ineptitude on both teams, I am rooting for a team bus wreck on the way to the stadium.
Wait thats wrong right?
LikeLike
No it is not wrong. I could care less if Alabama vs. Florida again is special. If there was a way for both teams to lose, that is the only scenario I can endorse.
I love UGA and pretty much hate everyone else. Don’t get, understand, endorse or applaud the “S-E-C” chant. I don’t care whether the conference has won the last 5 National championships … Auburn, Alabama, Florida, LSU, Florida … DOES NOTHING FOR ME AS A GEORGIA FAN.
I want Georgia to win and everyone else to lose, every single stinkin week. At the end of the year, I would like for us to be 14-0 and the rest of Div. 1 to be 0-14. Mathmetically I know it is not possible, but that for me is the ultimate perfect record.
Go Dawgs!
LikeLike
As a Bama fan, I share your sentiments exactly. I have no SEC allegiances. I do root for other SEC teams from time to time, but it’s usually when that particular team is playing Auburn.
LikeLike
I’m with you on the S-E-C chant. It should be U-G-A.
LikeLike
+ a million infinities
LikeLike
Preach on.
LikeLike
I am ashamed to say that I used to pull for other SEC East teams when they played OOC games or in bowls. I have seen the error of my ways and now hope that every damn one of them get the sh!t kicked out of them in every game.
LikeLike
The general perception of SEC superiority can only be a good thing for Georgia, even during slumps like the one we’re in now. And it is for that reason, and only that reason, that I typically root for SEC teams during the postseason, for instance. Except Florida.
LikeLike
I agree with the good Turd.
LikeLike
“Since when did any fan of a team want a game to be close? I guess this article is talking to the casual fan that doesn’t care who wins.”
Easy – when his team is an underdog and working under an unproven head coach.
LikeLike
Also, “Florida isn’t backing down from the tenacious Tide”, really? Cuz all them-there SEC schools hardly ever get up for those big-ol’ games, right? So thanks for filling in that line Captain Obvious, great read!
LikeLike
Personally, I’m just grateful when the ESPN folks refrain from gator chomping while they’re on air.
LikeLike
So true. They are just so happy to have Corch around these days.
LikeLike
I mean, seriously. I get his point that we need big matchups to watch, but the idea that it’s got to be Alabama-Florida is a joke. In the SEC alone, we’re going to get to watch Alabama-LSU this year, which should be a top-3 matchup. We’re going to get a rematch of the Iron Bowl, where Auburn’s not a world beater, but Alabama is going to have to go into Jordan-Hare. And don’t forget the Egg Bowl! Seriously, there are going to be big matchups every week, college football doesn’t need to pray that Florida stands up to Alabama. ESPN loves Red Sox-Yankees. The rest of us who aren’t from Boston/NY/Orlando got sick of it a LONG time ago.
LikeLike
They may be refraining from the gator chomp on air, but there is no proof that they are not wearing jorts under the sports desk.
LikeLike
I’m pretty sure my 11 year old daughter could write a more balanced and well-thought out article.
Senator that title is once again spot on. Who is the “we” that needs a Bama/Florida rivalry? or to legitimize Florida has returned to the national spotlight?
I will be settled down in Bulldog Park sipping some whiskey cheering on the Tide come this Saturday night. Saturdays don’t get much better than a UGA win coupled with a UF beatdown.
LikeLike
We’re all Alabama and Auburn fans this weekend.
LikeLike
+1.
LikeLike
The exception to my rule stated above.
LikeLike
South Carolina has other losses on the schedule. I’ll never root for Auburn.
LikeLike
I won’t be rooting for them, but I won’t get pissed like I usually do when Auburn wins either.
LikeLike
My sentiments as well. AubieCanes last January are the first SEC team I didn’t support in bowl games. Hope they get the death penalty. What an upgrade it would be if we were to get A&M and drop our biggest embarrassment.
LikeLike
but we all feel kind of dirty about it.
LikeLike
Can we just put it that we are fans of UF and USC losing? Just sounds better that way….
LikeLike
+1 Well put.
LikeLike
+1 yes
LikeLike
Honestly, as a lifelong Bama fan (approaching 40, much to my dismay), I’ve never felt like Bama had a rivalry with Florida. Nor have I felt like I needed one.
If you’ve watched 7 years of SEC football, I can see why you’d maybe think there’s a rivalry. There’s not and hasn’t been (at least for 30+ years).
LikeLike
Exactly. Yes, they’ve met several times in the SECCG. Yes, in the last couple of years, there was a lot more than the SEC title on the line. But to try to shrink-wrap it and package it as a “rivalry” for ESPN is a little silly.
LikeLike
Agree, where’s the rivalry? Off hand, all I recall from previous games of these two teams were mostly a$$ whippings administered by bama.
How did CBS not pick this as the 3:30 game of the week? Every football fan across the nation enjoys seeing florida get beat!
LikeLike
Because they picked it as their primetime game – they have a doubleheader that day. 8 PM on CBS.
LikeLike
Translation: “Florida needs to be in the SEC championship game.”
Only for Gator fans, Ed.
LikeLike
This article reminds me of the wake of the 2008 season when the hot meme was that the SEC title game would be a Alabama – Florida battle for years to come. Neither team returned to the dome the following year. This is just Aschoff trying to keep that dream alive.
LikeLike
Who played in the SEC title game in 2009?
LikeLike
In baseball, basketball or football?
LikeLike
Excuse me, I’m a year off on my timeline.
LikeLike
This is just another fine example of the ESPN/UF bias. This guy needs to go back to Journalism 101 and study the objectiveness as a reporter chapter.
LikeLike
Not to be a contrarian, because this piece sucks, but he isn’t functioning as a “reporter,” he’s writing a blog. He isn’t bound by rules of objective journalism, and neither are sports columnists, and is free to throw hearts or slings and arrows.
Shame he doesn’t do it better, though.
LikeLike
Maybe so, but there’s more than a little having his cake and eating it too going on here – Aschoff, just like his other ESPN blogging colleagues, will be the first to tell you that he’s taken off his orange and blue hat when he writes for the ESPN SEC blog.
LikeLike
Not just that, but he didn’t just sign up for a Blogspot account with a two-post-a-day blog that only his friends and grandmother visit. He’s writing an ESPN.com blog with traffic driven from the networks and the .com. There’s a different journalistic standard there, just like there’s a different standard for the editor of a newspaper writing an editorial than there would be for you sitting down and writing a blog post. If the purpose of that blog is to let the guy let it all hang out, then fine. But it’s going to color your opinion of everything else he does. That’s why he’d claim that he puts the orange and blue stuff away when he goes to work. But you don’t get to have it both ways.
LikeLike
As soon as I read, “Dubbed by some as the next great rivalry in all of sports” I stopped reading and searched for his bio to see if it was written by a UF grad. Ok, that explains it. Big game, but I can’t imagine anyone outside the Gator folks who think this way about Bama/UF.
LikeLike
Bama will crush, yes crush, UF. Rolling heavy on this one, great to get paid for something you love so much.
LikeLike
+1. I do not wish injury on any players from a future opponent but if the Gators continually run Rainey and Demps between the tackles in that game……let’s just say I will shed no tears at what happens. Same thing regarding the Florida-LSU game.
LikeLike
Pity the poor bull-dregs. No one – not CBS, not ESPN, not FoxSports South, not even WGAY (Athens’ sports leader) – can make anyone give a shit about UGA football. Not sure which I found more astonishing: your obvious jealousy over two relevant teams playing this weekend or your insidious desires for injuries to the Gators. You should all be ashamed of yourselves. I used to think Clemson had lousy fans, but you low-life scumbags are making them look platinum by comparison. Enjoy your continued and ongoing irrelevance.
LikeLike
Wow, four wins over a group with a combined 4-9 record and somebody’s chest is all pumped out.
Congrats on your program’s relevance.
LikeLike
No need to get your jorts in a wad. Go Gaytaa!
LikeLike
Damn, imagine how poorly he’d view us UGA folks if we’d sent a text message to one of them saying “Time to die, bitch!”
LikeLike
Just right. We’re hoping the Bama LB’s try to poke out the eyeballs or your RB’s. Sweeeeeet!
LikeLike
Apparently I hit a nerve. I clearly did say: “I do not wish injury on any player from a future opponent,” though. I just think it is stupid and dangerous to run small guys into the Bama and LSU defensive lines. If you have a problem about that I suggest you take it up with your current Jortsmeister.
LikeLike
LOL. Gators are funny.
LikeLike
Relevant??!!! LOL. You guys are showing up Saturday night for a straight up raping. I hope you enjoy your relevance. You know what your relevance will equate to next week? Being the victim in all the Alabama highlights next week. My only question is – will the media chalk it up to how far Alabama has come or how far Florida has fallen?
Enjoy October, dickhead.
LikeLike
“of,” dangit.
And having lived in north central Fla (G-ville), I have a keen appreciation of the term “low-life.”
LikeLike
This week only – The greatest rivalry in The SEC
http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/sports_college_uf/2011/09/will-muschamp-nick-saban-and-their-jedi-master-padawan-relationship.html
LikeLike