Trent Richardson

3 Responses to Trent Richardson

1. Alan S. says:

   November 28, 2011 at 7:46 am

   Jay,

   Just putting aside the Bama hat and the biased polls for the moment, do you think a team that has already played the #1 team and lost, that will not even win its division much less its conference, should have a do-over ahead of other conference winners or undefeated teams?
2. Jay Guin says:

   November 28, 2011 at 11:08 pm

   Alan S,

   Are you kidding me??? Let’s consider the arguments pro and con rationally —

   1. UA didn’t win its division, much less its conference.

   True, but only because we happen to be in the same division as the obvious no. 1 team. Is there a rule that the second-best team can’t play in the BCS championship if it happens to be in the same conference as the best team? When did that get adopted?

   In fact, there have been cases of other teams that didn’t win their conference going to the BCS.

   2. UA looked bad against LSU

   UA led much of the game and was tied at the end of regulation. It was only ugly to those fans who don’t appreciate defensive football. Alabama leads the country in nearly every defensive category there is. LSU is second in several. It was a tough game against two of the best defensive teams to ever walk a collegiate football field. (Okay, I’ll admit our field goal attempts were pretty ugly.)

   Of course, Big 12 and Pac 12 fans don’t appreciate defense. (Does the Big 12 even play the same sport? It sometimes looks more like Arena Football to me.) Uninformed fans seem to consider a 48 to 47 victory indicative a good team. But teams that allow 47 points don’t win in the SEC. The other team will play defense.

   But Alabama also has one of the best offenses in the country. It’s not as “exciting” as some (if “exciting” means long pass plays against inept defenses with constant blown coverages), because we run the ball and take 8 minutes per drive. But that’s because we play teams that have defenses — and still score lots of points because we score nearly every possession.

   And BTW, did you see UA vs. AU? Didn’t look like winning ugly to me. The fact is, whoever plays LSU is going to struggle because they’re a great team.

   3. Alabama isn’t the second best team. It’s really …

   So if Alabama isn’t the second best team, who is? Oklahoma State in only number 5 in the human polls. Virginia Tech was crushed by Clemson (33 – 3 or something like that), and Clemson was just clobbered by South Carolina (5th best team in the SEC) and beaten by North Carolina State (not ranked and never been ranked and never going to be ranked). Va Tech is just not a serious contender.

   Stanford? How can Stanford be second best when the lost to Oregon which has now lost twice (Southern Cal and LSU).

   Frankly, the third and fourth best teams are Southern Cal (on probation) and Oregon (but only on a good day). And they aren’t anywhere near UA in the polls, because USC is on probation and Oregon has two losses.

   So to make the case that it should be someone other than UA, you have to prop up some pretender … which is why there is no hue and cry for a particular other team, just someone else.

   4. Wouldn’t it be fun if …

   I would personally greatly enjoy seeing LSU disassembled Boise State, Stanford, or some other pretender from the Big 12. I’d love to see what those hot shot teams look like against a great SEC defense. That’s why we need a playoff. You see, I’d also love to see the best of the rest against Alabama. That is, not the ACC winner (no better than 6th in the SEC if they were part of our conference) or Big East (why on earth do they still get an automatic bid?) but a highly touted team from the Big 12 or Pac 12 or even Boise State. It would be so much fun …

   But until we have a playoff, we’re stuck with having no. 1 play no. 2. That’s the system. And that’s the rules we all agreed to play by. And only sissies try to change the rules in middle of the game.

   5. Alabama didn’t beat anybody good

   Well, we beat Arkansas, ranked 8 (3 at the time), and beat them bad, We beat Penn State (21) bad. We tied LSU (1) in regulation. And Auburn was ranked when we played them – not to mention being the defending national champions. But we beat them so bad we drove them right out of the rankings.

   The most important indicator of how good you are is how well you play against the very best. And we beat Arkansas by the very same spread as LSU. Study the scores, and we look to be LSU’s identical twin.

   And you might check out Football Study Hall (http://www.footballstudyhall.com/) for truly sophisticated statistical analyses comparing football teams without regard to the polls. UA and LSU have been 1 and 2 (or 2 and 1) all year — by a substantial margin.

   Conclusion

   Every complaint is best answered by a playoff system, and there we surely agree. Put in a common sense playoff system, and we’ll have a much better, much more fun post-season. Until then, there’s only one game that matters — 1 vs. 2.

3. Pingback: One In Jesus » Alan S’s Complaint about LSU vs. UA

Comments are closed.