Adding up the Golden Nugget numbers

So, based on who’s favored and who’s not, how would those Golden Nugget lines on SEC teams play out?  al.com has your answers.  (Order based on favored-underdog-toss up.)

• Alabama:  8-0-1
• Georgia:  4-0-2
• LSU:  7-1-1
• Missouri:  5-2
• Auburn:  5-3-1
• Ole Miss:  4-2-1
• Tennessee:  4-2-1
• Arkansas:  4-4
• Texas A&M:  3-5
• South Carolina:  1-5
• Vanderbilt:  0-1
• Kentucky 0-2
• Mississippi State:  0-6
• Florida:  0-7

First impression?  Vegas is a lot less worried about this not being the Year of the Quarterback than we are.

Nick Saban doesn’t have time for this “decline of the SEC West” shit.

You can tell he’s getting his condescension ready for the next ESPN talking head who dares raise the subject, can’t you?

“It’s officially in the system.”

And so, one more step on the road to marginalizing the regular season is taken.

A formal proposal for the deregulation of conference championship games, which would allow the Big 12 to have a championship game as early as 2016, was advanced to the NCAA Council this week and is expected to be approved in January, Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby told ESPN.com.

Before you chide me for having a case of the vapors about it, consider this:  the Big 12, a ten-school conference which plays a round robin conference schedule – the best way to decide a conference champion, in my humble opinion – is going to tack on a conference championship game.  Why?

One day, guys like Bowlsby are going to wake up and wonder where all the interest in the college football regular season went.  And then they’ll go out and add another round to the national playoffs.  More brackets!

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UPDATE:  If you’re having trouble answering my question – and I’m not sure why you would – let Oklahoma President David Boren fill in the blanks for you.

“…When we look at football playoffs and our conference is bumping up against conferences with 12 or 14 members, I believe that we are psychologically disadvantaged because we are a smaller conference.”  [Emphasis added.]

“Psychologically disadvantaged”.  Jeebus, these guys are too much.

“Yea that’s a lie get your facts right.”

My, the AJ-C headline writer for this piece sure took the mellow route.

I can just imagine the story that would be written if a former Georgia player called out the school for lying as he walked out the door.

“I think the world of Todd.”

Nick Saban defends a branch on his coaching tree.

“I know that people in Georgia criticized him a little bit,” Saban said, “but to play good defense you have to have really good players, and they really have to buy in and have the discipline to execute the scheme. Georgia always has good players, but I just think Todd is a really, really good coach. I thought he did a great job at Louisville here last year with the team that they had and had a lot of success. He’s a very innovative guy, but he’s a fundamental teacher and does a good job with players.”

Given that Saban’s last contact with Grantham came in the 2012 SECCG, where the Tide offense spent the second half running over, under, sideways and down Grantham’s charges, that “Georgia always has good players, but I just think Todd is a really, really good coach” is an interesting choice of words.

Of course, now that Georgia’s replaced that one branch with another branch from the same tree, I guess we can expect similar praise before this year’s game in Athens.  I just hope the praise for Pruitt is a lot more straightforward after the game.