The Rest of College Football

[WingsFan]

Michigan?s athletic department procured Asbury-Oliver?s skywriting services months in advance, she said. She didn?t think anything was out of the ordinary when the Michigan athletic department official asked for additional skywriting?specifically ?Go Blue? near Spartan Stadium?in East Lansing this time.

I don?t know if this is in response to Tom Izzo?s ?putrid yellow? comment during a rain delay in week one, but it is beneath the Michigan Athletic Department. There are better ways to market the Michigan brand, skywriting over East Lansing isn?t one of them.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Connie Mack, who owned and managed the Philadelphia A's for 50 years, said one time that the ideal team for him was a team that was in contention for most of the year but finished in about 4th place. That way crowds would come all year long and no postseason bonuses for his guys. Domino Dave strikes me as having a similar philosophy...do just enough to keep these Michigan Men phuckers off my back while I bleed them dry

There may be something to this characterization.

Brandon, aside from his minor contribution to M football as a player, has a much more recognizable persona as a corporate whore and political office seeking suck-up.

Stan hated the guy and I tried to defend him when he was first hired. Stan knew better and he was right all along. Jon knows too. The guy has nothing but his own personal interests in mind. Talks a good Michigan Man talk and knows how to play the media but he's basically a douche. Probably as ruthless as Carl Ichan but not nearly as smart. Not even close.

[whodean]

Jeff, share what you can that makes you think Brandon's office is about to get stormed. I just don't see it. Not from Michigan.

Even as a person who wants meritocracy, it's awfully hard for me to imagine a mid-season firing is the way to go. For those with more perspective, is this an uncommon number of mid-season firings? Seems like it to me but I'm not the closest watcher.

http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/9749859/usc-trojans-lane-kiffin-connecticut-huskies-paul-pasqualoni-join-exclusive-club-bcs-college-football-coaches-fired-early-season

[hack]

Thanks. Good find.

[WingsFan]

When it comes to protecting vulnerable, Athletic Department has its head in the sky

http://www.michigandaily.com/sports/09-sportsmonday-column-michigans-misplaced-priorities-30

[Dr. Strangelove]

I called Pasqualoni yesterday! Always thought that was a weird hire and you can't get blown out by 30 to Buffalo

[lineygoblue]

Brand-On! caught laundering money to Levin through Kwamee. 3 birds with one stone.

LOL !!

I mean it Jon, .. if I ever run for office, you are my campaign manager ... hands down ..:-D

[Hannibal]

"The effort seemed like it was pretty good, but the execution wasn't there all day in certain areas," Rodriguez said. "That's disappointing because we thought our guys were really ready to play and ready to handle the environment and the weather and all that. We just didn't play well at times."

This after the Huskies kicked Arizona's butt with a good D and strong run game.

Suppose I'm just looking for proof but the way Rodriguez puts his teams together and how he runs them in game just doesn't seem to work well when he faces competent defense. His final year at WVU was probably an unsustainable fluke.

I watched that Arizona game. It was a good old RichRod, looking like he was about to cry the entire game, and then screaming at the top of his lungs at his QB after every series, just like the Threet/Sheridan days.

I just noticed that Tony Gibson is gone from the staff. That probably explains why they were able to hold the Huskies to 31 points.

Also, I noticed that Corey Zirbel is a GA at Arizona. You may remember him as the guy who was supposedly our best lineman going into the 2008 season and had a career ending knee injury.

[entropy]

no cheating here... nothing to see...

************

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. -- If Tyler Siskey had an impact on No. 1 Alabama shutting out No. 24 Ole Miss 25-0 on Saturday, it was because of the insight he provided during the offseason and not during the actual game, according to Crimson Tide coach Nick Saban, who responded to the possibility that his director of player personnel was stealing signs.

“

Lastname He didn't really assist in the game plan, and he wasn't on a headset. He didn't talk to anybody during the game.
” -- Alabama coach Nick Saban, on director of player personnel Tyler Siskey's role during Saturday's game

Siskey, who coordinated the Rebels' recruiting efforts in 2012, was spotted in the coaches' booth by TV cameras using binoculars during the game. Ole Miss, which averaged 490 yards and 38 points per game going into the weekend, was held to just 205 yards by Alabama, stopped on a number of third- and fourth-down plays and forced into a safety late in the second half.

"He didn't really assist in the game plan, and he wasn't on a headset," Saban said when asked whether it was common for a noncoaching staff member to assist during a game. "He didn't talk to anybody during the game. I don't know if there's any rule that says he can't go into the press box and watch the games. And he wasn't in any different position than he's ever been in a game."

Rebels coach Hugh Freeze, who hired Siskey as his coordinator of recruiting in 2012, said he had not gone to the SEC to report any wrongdoing, saying simply that he was ready to move on to the challenge of facing Auburn this weekend.

"I don't know where he typically is, but certainly I'll say that Alabama had a wonderful defensive plan for us," Freeze told reporters in Oxford, Miss. "Give them a lot of credit for the work that they put in, in preparing for us, whether it was in the summertime or whether it was just in the week.

"Nick and Kirby [Smart] are two of the best in the business, and not that they need a lot of help in preparing a game plan, but I'm sure Siskey helped in some way. Tyler Siskey is a good man, and I hate that it's been quite the drama."

More on Alabama

Alabama For full coverage of the Tide, check out the Alabama blog, part of ESPN's College Football Nation. Blog
More:
• Alabama's clubhouse page
• ESPN.com's SEC blog

Saban went on to say that the benefit his team did have with someone like Siskey was studying opponents during the offseason, alluding to how wide receivers coach Billy Napier helped break down his former team Colorado State's tendencies.

But in no way did Saban intimate that Siskey was involved in the coaching of the game, which would be a violation of NCAA bylaw 11.7.2, a rule that sets a limit of one head coach, nine assistants and four graduate assistants who can coach during games.

"If there was an advantage to it, that was it," he said. "It was nothing that happened in the game, and it was really nothing that happened in the game plan. Tyler does a good job for us in the role that he does here in recruiting. That's a full-time job for him, and that's what he does a good job at."

[Mike]

Clinton-Dix suspended. Just don't ask what for and for how long.

http://tracking.si.com/2013/10/02/alabama-haha-clinton-dix-suspended-indefinitely-violating-team-rules/

[drok]

Bet that he is back for LSU

[WM Wolverine]

For sure.

[entropy]

Bob Stoops is at it again.

The Oklahoma coach took another shot at the SEC on Wednesday night, questioning the league's reputation for quality defenses just months after calling its mystique "propaganda."

"Just a few years ago, we had all the quarterbacks," Stoops said in a small session with beat reporters, according to The Oklahoman. "And now, all of a sudden, we can play a little better defense and some other people can't play defense.

"Funny how people can't play defense when they have pro-style quarterbacks over there, which we've had. They're all playing in the NFL right now."

SEC teams have had difficulty slowing down the stellar quarterbacks in their league this season, including Texas A&M's Johnny Manziel, Georgia's Aaron Murray and LSU's Zach Mettenberger.

Meanwhile, former Big 12 stars such as Baylor's Robert Griffin III, Oklahoma State's Brandon Weeden and Texas A&M's Ryan Tannehill currently are playing in the NFL after terrorizing the conference's defenses with their arms in years past.


Stoops has consistently pointed to Texas A&M, which left the Big 12 for the SEC prior to the 2012 season, then put up stellar offensive numbers in the SEC, as an example of the type of offense his Sooners had to face regularly in Big 12 play.

With Tannehill under center, the Aggies averaged 39.1 points and 490.2 yards per game as a member of the Big 12 in 2011. With Manziel taking snaps, Texas A&M averaged 44.5 points and 558.5 yards per game as a member of the SEC in 2012.

"I still don't know how (Texas) A&M was third in the country in total offense and scoring offense playing all those SEC defenses. I have no idea how that happened," Stoops said. "Oh, they got a quarterback. That's right."

[Wild Hoss]

Not that I like the SEC, at all, but I remember Bob's quarterbacks accomplishing jack shit in a couple bowl games against SEC teams. 14 against LSU, 14 against Florida, with an offense that scored 60+ in five straight Big 12 games.

[whodean]

Defense is down a bit in the SEC, LSU lost about 11 defensive players to the NFL and Alabama is down a little bit from that historic best ever defense of 2011.