Mr. Conventional Wisdom goes to antitrust court.

Hey, Tony’s got this whole player compensation thing sussed.

And there are two realities that the powers that be in college athletics have to face at this point in time:

1—Maintaining the status quo is no longer an option. We have reached a critical mass where something has to be done. If not, there are hundreds of lawyers who can’t wait to take on the system because they know they are going to win. And the NCAA member institutions know it too.

I’m not a lawyer but I raised one and I think a pretty strong case can be made that the current rules on this constitute a restraint of trade.

Oh by the way, Congress can’t wait to jump in on this one with both feet. Representative Mark Walker of North Carolina has introduced a bill that would strip the NCAA of its tax exempt status if it doesn’t allow the players to test the market place to see what their name, image, and likeness are worth.

2—You can’t just pay the players for services rendered. You can’t. As much as some players and some fans would like to just cut the guys a check and be done with this issue, there are clear reasons why that can’t happen.

Title IX says that if football and men’s basketball players get a check from the school, then the members of the volleyball team get the same check. It doesn’t matter that football and basketball generate billions and volleyball does not. College athletics is a multi-billion business but it operates under the umbrella of an educational institution.

If players are paid, then they become employees. If they become employees then they can unionize. If they unionize they can strike over compensation and benefits.

Does anyone want to tell him the players are already being paid?  Eh, what’s the point.

By the way, if you’re looking for your dose of quintessential Mr. CW, check out his conclusion:  “If this can gets kicked down the road again, it will get very, very ugly.”

And to think you can get that kind of deep analysis for free.

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Beasting on the East

More SEC East dominance from SDS’ Connor O’Gara:

Obviously the stat everyone knows is 12-0. That is, Georgia went 12-0 against East foes the past 2 years. What you might not know is that all of those games were won by at least 14 points with an average margin of victory of 25.3 points per contest. The East team that’s been the closest to them on average over the past 2 seasons — smallest margin of defeat — was South Carolina at -19.

But wait, there’s more!

Mizzou is the only East team the past 2 years to hit 28 points in a single game against Georgia. In fact, non-Mizzou East teams averaged 12 points per game against Georgia in the past 2 seasons.

One other thing that contributed:

One thing that stuck out when looking back at these games was the turnover margin. Overall, Georgia is +11 against the SEC East in its past 12 games, but what really stood out was the fact that only once have the Bulldogs committed more than one in a game. That came against Kentucky in 2018 and Georgia forced two turnovers of its own in that game.

In 2017, Georgia was +4 in the turnover margin and it was +7 in 2018.

O’Gara goes on to ask,

Speaking of sustaining that rate, is there an end in sight to this?

Like, who’s going to be the first East team to lose by fewer than 14 points? Who can actually hold a lead against Georgia for more than 7 minutes? Who will reach 30 points? And can anyone from the East, dare I say, actually beat the Bulldogs?

Who’da thunk those kind of questions would be legitimate to ask?  Any given Saturday thoughts aside, who’s your choice to have the best chance of upsetting the Dawgs?

Not your expected QBR story

Well, looky here:

85.1: The Total QBR for Georgia QB Jake Fromm in 2018, behind only Kyler Murray and Tua Tagovailoa.

Of course, that doesn’t include G-Day, so it’s really not definitive.

Nothing like playing both sides of the street

Mike Bianchi has some advice for Dan Mullen and it doesn’t involve how to troll Kirby Smart.

Friday morning buffet

Go ahead and get you some.

• Pete Fiutak’s succinct description of this year’s Georgia Tech offense:  “Square peg, meet round hole.”  (Although he does predict a six-win season for the Jackets, which, should it happen, should vault Collins into serious consideration for ACC Coach of the Year.)
• I know folks try to make hay about Nick Saban’s age on the recruiting trail, but he sure sounds credible denying he’s ready to retire.
• Here’s a list ranking ACC schedules by difficulty, and, no, Clemson’s isn’t the easiest.
• Kirby Smart, on last year’s team’s mentality:  “Players are taking ownership, which we didn’t have as much of that last year at this time. There was a lot more entitlement.”
• Mike Leach’s class wrapped up, with a final assignment to design three plays, under the premise that he might use one of them in Washington State’s game next season against Houston.  He reviews five of those here.
• Details from Rush Propst’s personnel file ain’t pretty.
• Good point from Groo:  “What stands out among this smaller senior class is that a good chunk of them are defensive linemen. Georgia returns six seniors along the DL next year…”
• North Carolina and Wake Forest have scheduled a non-conference home-and-home series.  That’s got to be cheaper than what cupcakes are demanding these days.
• C’mon.  You know you want to read a StingTalk thread entitled “Why do we hate them?”.

Musical palate cleanser, just around the corner edition

We’re 100 days from the 2019 season kicking off, so it seems appropriate to hear the late, great Ms. Sharon Jones knocking out a live version of her “100 Days, 100 Nights”.