Aren’t we getting a little ahead of ourselves here?

I mean, I know playing for Nick Saban makes everyone more awesome, but calling a guy who’s not even enrolled yet a second-tier Heisman candidate seems a bit premature, don’t you think?

“Mr. Doughty was aware of his medical status…”

Yeah, this story chaps my ass.

Seven years of helplessness have passed for Stanley Doughty. A cervical spine injury he sustained as a University of South Carolina defensive lineman leaves him living on disability checks from his parents’ home in Louisiana — frustrated, humiliated and broken.

At one point, Doughty lived out of his car for a month. He once had a job at Waffle House but couldn’t keep it because of the burning sensation he felt whenever he lifted plates or reached for a shelf.

“At job interviews they ask if I ever had any injuries,” said Doughty, now 30 years old. “No one wants to put you on a job with a cervical spine injury because you’re a liability. I haven’t been able to do what I need to do to provide for my kids and feed them and clothe them. It’s been devastating.”

If it takes a union threat to get the NCAA to step up and do the right thing, so be it.

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Between the hedges: 10 favorites

Someone asked me a month or so ago to list my ten favorite home games that I attended.  I had to think about it a little.  Some games are special because of what happened on the field, some because of what they meant, some because of the crowd, but all resonate in a special way with me.  Here they are, in chronological order:

1979:  Virginia 31 Georgia 0.  Yeah, I know.  But you’ve got to understand that college football and I were in a bad place before that game.  Four years of football in Charlottesville had completely soured me on the game.  But one afternoon rekindled my interest.  I followed that up with my first trip to Jacksonville, something I haven’t missed since.

1982:  Georgia 17 BYU 14.  The meeting of Herschel Walker vs. Steve Young turned out to be a defensive struggle.  I remember it kept raining picks.  And Walker was big on the winning drive.

1984:  Georgia 26 Clemson 23.  Perhaps the most iconic game I’ve witnessed in Sanford Stadium.  It looked like the Dawgs were going to be run out of the stadium in the first half, but somehow they gained traction, wore the Tigers down and won on an incredible Kevin Butler field goal.

1991:  Georgia 27 Clemson 12.  Georgia steamrolled a ranked and favored Clemson team, which was nice.  But what really sticks with me from this game was that it was the night the Atlanta Braves clinched their first division title in a decade.  Upon hearing the news, the entire crowd, home and visitors alike, tomahawk chopped and chanted together in a real goosebump moment.

2002:  Georgia 51 Georgia Tech 7.  Total dominance in a way I’ve never seen again in that series.  I’ve never seen a Tech team give up like that, either.

2004: Georgia 45 LSU 16.  We may never see a Nick Saban defense humbled like that again, my friends.  Five TDs passes for David Greene and some measure of revenge for what happened the year before.

2004: Georgia 19 Georgia Tech 13.  I know the weather was lousy, but between David Greene’s fourth quarter heroics and Reggie Ball’s math shortcomings, how could a Dawg fan not love this game?

2007:  Georgia 45 Auburn 20.  Blackout game.  I’m not sure the players and the crowd ever enjoyed themselves as much as we all did that night.  And maybe learned a lesson that while jerseys can be copied, spontaneity can’t.  Take it away, Uncle Verne.

2013:  Georgia 41, South Carolina 30.  Remember when these games used to be grind ’em out defensive struggles?  The bomb to Scott-Wesley sent the crowd into a frenzy.  But it’s what happened in the last eight and a half minutes that really made the game special.  Spurrier eschewing the timeout at the end was the cherry on top of the sundae.

2013:  Georgia 44 LSU 41.  We didn’t want a defensive struggle in this one and we didn’t get one.  In terms of sustained crowd loudness, this one surpassed every other one I’ve attended in Sanford Stadium (ironically, the second loudest was during the 1987 loss to LSU).  Mettenberger’s miss on LSU’s last possession was cathartic. So much emotion.

So there you have mine.  Let’s hear about yours.

Musical palate cleanser, loved you in Die Hard: With a Vengeance edition

Sam Phillips’ “I Need Love”, from her album Martinis and Bikinis, popped up on my iPod this weekend and I cannot get the chorus out of my head.  Maybe it’ll earworm its way into yours.  Here’s a great live version she performed with her then-husband, T Bone Burnett:

And, yes, she is one and the same as this:

Kind of ironic they cast her as a mute in the movie.

The real point to sticking to an eight-game conference schedule

Here’s a question the SEC would prefer we not discuss.

The SEC could stand to play nine or 10 league games a year as its own league has the usual breathers because of the natural order of things. Auburn, Kentucky, Arkansas, Missouri and Tennessee were a combined 5-35 in the SEC in 2012 with Kentucky and Auburn going 0-for-16. Last year, Arkansas, Kentucky and Tennessee went a combined 2-22 in the SEC with Arkansas and Kentucky going 0-for-16. With built-in bottom feeders like that often enough, you’re telling me you can’t play nine or 10 league games?

The problem isn’t with the powerhouse programs at the top of the conference.  It’s with the teams on the margin, the ones that struggle to become bowl eligible and the ones that may need an extra win to play on January 1st instead of December 27th..

The way it is with just an eight-game SEC schedule even with the new rule coming to play the above four BCS leagues, members will be able to continue to play such light fare as Sam Houston State, a lower division school that will open LSU’s home schedule this season on Sept. 6, and Louisiana-Monroe, a 70-7 loser to Baylor last year that LSU hosts on Sept. 13, and New Mexico State, a 2-10 team in 2013 that LSU hosts on Sept. 20.

Most SEC teams were playing two or three breathers a year while already scheduling good non-conference games before this new rule. Alabama plays Georgia State and Chattanooga this season. Auburn has Samford, Louisiana Tech and San Jose State. Georgia has Troy and Charleston Southern. South Carolina plays Furman and South Alabama.

Those “off weeks” may get down to two or one in the future with the new scheduling rule, but how about zero breathers? If the SEC is that good, why is Charleston Southern on a SEC schedule?

SEC need, baby.

All hat, no cattle

Texas haughtily refuses to play Texas A&M, but that didn’t stop Texas DC Vance Bedford from taking shots at TAMU’s offense.

Bedford can backtrack pretty quickly, though.  Now if he can just teach that technique to his DBs…