I have no idea whether this blogger spat over the new postseason format is contrived or not – it’s ESPN, after all, so that could go either way – but mocking Southerners for our love of Chick-fil-A (“Perhaps that will placate the SEC loudmouths who couldn’t pull themselves away from Chick-Fil-A long enough to bother reading the actual specifics of what the Big Ten proposed”) is beyond the pale.
Methinks an apology is in order, WWL. And while you’re at it, you could bring Uncle Ron back in an act of contrition. Forgive, forget and kill two birds with one sandwich, so to speak.
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UPDATE: Spencer Hall, my hero.
DON’T EVEN TRY IT. The Senator is right: if the ESPN Big Ten bloggertariat wants to do this, it’s not even a starter to begin with Chick-Fil-A, and worse to build a defense on anything Jim Delany’s said, ever, about anything. Like this weak shit:
Some in the South also took thinly veiled shots at Delany.
No, no, no. People like us called Jim Delany and the presidents of the Big Ten the petrified chunk of food blocking the alimentary canal of college football, or if you like the spiny, calcified kidney stones stuck painfully in the uretha of college football’s glorious pee-hose. [/takes huge bite of Chick-Fil-A sandwich you probably have to drive 200 miles to get.]
Get The Picture 
Bring Uncle Ron back to the broadcast booth in a meaningful game, and nearly all is forgiven.
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I’ll second that about bringing Uncle Ron back.
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Just a contrived attempt to drive up pageviews (from both SEC and B10 partisans). Couldn’t care less about an apology, but seriously, do better, ESPN.
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Don’t be dissin’ the Chick-Fil-A…cows will be coming for him.
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Talk bad about my confrence all you want, but leave Chick-fil-A out of this. This aggression will not stand, man. Bless Rittenberg’s heart.
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This guy is so not right…. http://www.blackheartgoldpants.com/2012/6/6/3067540/chik-fil-a-is-still-just-a-chicken-sandwich
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I’m on the mother.
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Everything ESPN does is contrived. Remember when they tried to bump up ratings for their NFL midweek shows by trying to pit Sean Salisbury and John Clayton against each other with contrived, poorly written one-liner insults? I’m sure this is the same thing.
That said, anyone who doesn’t live within 30 minutes of a Chick-fil-A is jealous of those of us who do, and you should never believe a single word they say to the contrary.
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espn drive up pageviews??? GTFOH… please see Stephen A. Smith on your way out.
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They need to leave football and the chicken sandwich to the experts.
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Next thing you know, ESPN will discuss barbecue…….and other things about which they know nothing.
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Always amusing to listen to a region that invented fried cheese mocking another region for its fried chicken sandwich. They can’t even fry right.
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It used to be Damn Yankees but now that is too mild for them F***g Yankees is more like it.
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I hate to ruin the meme, but I do wonder…if we like the importance of the regular season, shouldn’t we get on board with the Big 10? *ducks and runs*
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Before you duck and run, you might want to explain yourself, because your point makes no sense – especially since the B1G isn’t on board with itself. Perelman says one thing, Delaney says another, Corch just thanks Heaven people are talking about playoffs instead of the litany of arrests and secondary violations he’s ringing up before his first game.
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Admittedly I have not followed this closely, but doesn’t the Big 10 want a playoff of conference champions, and the SEC wants to ignore the viability of the regular season and allow teams who might have finished second in their conference?
I mean, I get the SEC’s argument as I understand it– I too would be on the side of the four best teams regardless of conference according to whatever (ridiculous, labyrinthine) system is in place to select them. But on a small level that does diminish the importance of the regular season–ceratainly more so than requiring a conference championship. (I mean, if’n I freeze, I can’t rightly drop, and if I drop I’m-a-gonna be in motion. So which is it, young feller?)
Perhaps I have it wrong?
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Does “conference champion” mean something? Depends on the conference, depends on the circumstances. If Michigan beats Alabama this year by 15 and then loses to Ohio State by 1 to get knocked out of their conference championship, then the Ohio State game means everything and the Alabama game means… nothing. How is that valuing the regular season?
I’d have no problem distinguishing between 4 and 5 if 5 won the conference and 4 didn’t – unless 4 beat 5 head to head. See? Nothing’s easy in this.
There is no magical quality to being a “conference champion.” It’s a Trojan Horse for “only 1 team per conference.” And it would directly penalize teams for scheduling “up” out of conference. More chance for injury, more likely to have to show conference opponents something about your scheme in a “meaningless” OOC game.
No thanks. The “conference championship” format solves nothing, IMO, and makes the bad parts of CFB even worse.
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But how else do we value the regular season, if not for conference championships? Or you saying that valuing the regular season should be less important than using off-the-field-metrics such as polls and ratings to determine the best teams, even if two-loss LSU is taken over, for example, no-loss weak-schedule Iowa?
Mind you, I take the latter…but I’ve never been a regular-season conservationist. 🙂
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Obviously, if you’re picking by conference champ, then only in-conference games can get you to the promised land – meaning non-conference games don’t count. So that’s 1/3 of the regular season that might as well be an exhibition. The odds that an early season win over LSU or Oregon is going to be the difference between the P12 champ and the ACC champ are way less than the odds of that game hurting you.
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1) Can’t “Top 4” penalize you even more for scheduling up? Oregon would have missed this last year because they scheduled LSU. We’d see even fewer worthwhile OOC games than we already do. Why take the risk if you’re a name-brand program? I want MORE LSU/Oregon and Michigan/Alabama and Ohio State/Texas, not less.
2) To that end, if you knew an OOC loss wouldn’t hurt you, wouldn’t you be encouraged to possibly do more home-and-home series with real opponents to get you better prepped for your conference road games in hostile environments, rather than scheduling a bunch of Sun Belt/MAC/FCS teams?
3) I don’t want “Top 4” if the polls have anything to do with it, because the poll voters will screw it up.
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This isn’t CBB. It’s CFB. Big difference.
LSU, Alabama, and Georgia all played an early season game last year that they didn’t have to. Boise had to – their conference stinks. Oregon didn’t have to, and neither did PSU.
So, if it’s a conference championship criteria, no one schedules Boise State anymore – why give them the credibility that could cost your conference a shot in the playoffs? And why would anyone risk showing something on tape to conference opponents, much less injury?
Anyone with any sense understands that a conference champion playoff makes these conferences scheduling islands. If you want more big games, then you want to keep the current system – because we get those games with the current system. We will get less of them with playoffs, and fewer still with a conference champion format.
The game of the year in CBB last year was Carolina-Kentucky in December. Epic game. No one watched.
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Well put.
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Dude is from freaking Louisville. He hates the SEC because he hates Kentucky and he hates Chick-fil-a because of its superiority to KFC.
You grow up in Louisville and you typically get a chip on your shoulder about one of two things: you resent your friends from the midwest and northeast thinking your city is part of the ‘backwards’ South or you resent your friends from the South for thinking your city is nothing but the southern outpost of the Midwest. Clearly he grew up with the former.
Seriously…he lives in a town with 4 or 5 free standing chick-fil-a’s and a murual of Col. Sanders that you can see from the interstate. Those is glass houses something something.
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That Col. Sanders mural is pretty cool though.
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It’s kind of a weak taunt anyway. If he had the stones, he’d throw down on Zaxby’s.
Chick-fil-A is southern fried chicken in a genteel bridge club kinda way. The kinda place Me-Maw goes for biscuits before driving to the Tanger outlets.
Zaxby’s is the Intimidator of southern fried chicken chains. Shirtless, shoeless, chaw of dip and ain’t takin’ no shit. Lotta guys with work trucks named Ricky Bobby in there.
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Right on brother
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Living on the West Coast, I was ecstatic when they opened a Chick-Fil-A only 20 miles away. I like to go in on a Saturday and buy a dozen (or more) sandwiches. That way I can freeze some, then call my sister and brag about eating a Chick-Fil-A on a Sunday…
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I love Ron Franklin and Chick-fil-a—don’t be messin with Truett Cathy +1 Scott W
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Adam Rittenberg is a dick. He probably earned three varsity letters in football at his Rust Belt high school, yet still cannot understand how the Big Ten keeps getting embarrassed by the SEC in every sport we care about.
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Can’t we all just get along? Look, Chick-Fil-A’s come from southern chickens feed with mid-western corn. Couldn’t get one without the other.
Spicy chicken comes from Mexico, I believe….
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where does chocolate milk come from? Brown cows?
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