SEC, Bitches

By MoonDog | August 27, 2008

The SEC’s new television deals with CBS and ESPN go well beyond dollars.

Most everyone has heard the news that ESPN has inked a deal with the Southeastern Conference that will begin in 2009. While the financial terms weren’t officially released, a published report in the SportsBusiness Journal said the ESPN deal would pay the SEC $2.25 billion over a 15-year period.

Coupled with the SEC’s renewal of their television deal with CBS, the conference will have the most comprehensive coverage of all sports than any conference in the nation.

The combined deals will pay the SEC $205 million annually over the life of both contracts. Considering that amount only reflects monies paid for television rights, the SEC has positioned itself financially to secure the long-term well-being of its members.

For those who’ve come to dislike the SEC, I can only imagine how you must feel knowing you’re going to be fed an even greater amount of coverage of the nation’s most dominant conference. The television deals with CBS and ESPN go well beyond the dollar amounts being paid.

It clearly dismisses any notion the SEC is “overrated,” a myth only those disliking the conference subscribe to. Major television networks don’t dole out over $3 billion for inferior products and the SEC has proven time and again it is a superior brand.

Factoring in the SEC’s nine bowl tie-ins, including monies generated from the BCS and the NCAA men’s and women’s basketball tournaments, no conference in America will produce more revenue.

As was the case prior to the ESPN deal, only Notre Dame could claim having a guaranteed nationally televised game each week in addition to the SEC. The ESPN deal will expand the SEC’s football coverage to include every conference game being televised either on CBS or one of the various ESPN family of networks.

Basketball coverage will expand dramatically as well, with ESPN tripling the number of men’s basketball games it shows while the women’s basketball games will double.

Unlike the limited regional coverage of the ACC, Big East, Big 12 and Pac 10 conferences on ABC, ESPN and FSN, the SEC will have a multitude of platforms showcasing the conference’s sporting events. Moreover, the respective television deals are in stark contrast to the Big 10 Network where viewers are required to pay an annual subscription fee.

All national programming on ESPN will be branded as the “SEC on ESPN.” No other conference will have such an arrangement branding television coverage.

The SEC has effectively forced the other BCS conferences to seek alternatives that may not be available to them. NBC isn’t an option because of the renewed contract with Notre Dame to continue covering the Irish’s home games.

And considering Disney owns ABC and ESPN, it’s highly unlikely ABC would negotiate a deal with another conference to showcase games similar to the SEC deal.

That leaves Fox as the only network that could potentially offer the other BCS conferences long-term deals. With FSN already covering regional Big 12 and Pac 10 games and Fox covering the BCS bowls, the NFL and MLB, it’s unlikely they would want - or have - the available monies to spend on such an arrangement.

The SEC’s deal will also have a huge impact on non-BCS conferences. Already struggling to compete, the smaller conferences have all but been blocked out of signing television deals that would at best provide them with minimum exposure.

The non-BCS conferences may potentially have to rethink their respective positions and determine a course of action to ensure their survival. As it stands now, their aren’t too many viable options available and the pool of money that can be paid is drying up quickly.

While those outside of the southeast may not like it, the superior conference now has the superior television deals and superior revenue streams. For many deriding the SEC for any number of reasons, you can’t dismiss the importance of these new contracts and the effect it will have on the landscape of college athletics for years to come.

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Topics: NCAA Football, Southeastern Conference | 2 Comments »

Big Orange Roundtable Vol(ume) 8

By MoonDog | August 27, 2008

We begin the first game week of the season with the eighth edition of the Big Orange Roundtable. Fresh off of his banishment from the MGO Blog Poll for being a “marginal” Tennessee site, our friend Jai at Losers with Socks serves as our host.

Jai has compiled a good list of questions for us this week and I’m confident all of us will have plenty of interesting responses. At the end of the post you’ll find links to the other participating sites so please check back over the next few days to review their answers.

Without further delay, let’s get down to business.

1. In a perfect world, what time would your UCLA Kick-off start?

I love college football so much, anytime is the perfect time for kick off. With the Vols-Bruins contest set to begin at 8:00 p.m. Eastern, I realize most people have to work the next day. Not that I don’t have to work, but I at least get to do it from the comfort of my home.

I imagine the ideal day would have been Saturday and perhaps the same time. It’s a great opportunity to have a few friends over and watch the game.

But considering the game will be nationally televised it will give the Vols a lot of exposure. It will be the showcase game of the day and it culminates the three-day weekend. All in all, this isn’t a bad day or time slot for the Vols to begin their season.

2. Sometimes doing the right thing is tough. Sometimes we have to choose between bad and worse. I have known snipers that get bothered even though what they did was absolutely right. It seems being a coach would have some similar circumstances. Did you think that Coach Fulmer and staff ever lose any sleep over their choices?

Of course. Who among us hasn’t regretted some of the choices we’ve made in life? Being a head coach at a major program like Tennessee is a demanding job and one fraught with potential pitfalls. Recruiting, NCAA rules compliance, fund raising, booster relations and a host of other issues fill a head coach’s day. And oh by the way, there is some x’s and o’s you’ve got to deal with too.

Fulmer has probably regretted many decisions he’s made. Kicking off short against Georgia late in the fourth quarter in 2001 ultimately led to the Vols losing that game - the only regular season game they would lose that year.

He’s probably given a lot of thought to the way he’s handled troublesome players. Some have been dealt with appropriately and others too leniently. There’s a always a fine line each coach has to contend with on a multitude of subjects.

At the end of the day, Fulmer is no different than the rest of us. He takes what he believes is the best course of action and you hope you’ve made the right decision. If you discover that the decision you made was wrong, you learn from it and move along. I call that life.

3. Nick Saban is going to start 10 freshman against Clemson. Why is he doing this and did he just buy another year of grace from the Red Elephant Club?

I’d say Saban is making an effort to justify the nation’s top recruiting class. Either that or the cupboard is bare, which I don’t believe, or he isn’t terribly impressed with the players he had on the roster when he took over and he’s more comfortable using his recruits.

Either way, while the incoming class is very talented it’s a dangerous way to make a living in big time college football. Freshman are going to make mistakes, more often than not they’re going to make mistakes that ultimately cost you a chance of winning the game.

I doubt very strongly that Saban would be fired if he has another sub par season in Tuscaloosa. Of course, a sub par season at Alabama is an 8-4 record, which if the Tide can accomplish that this season, I’d say Alabama had a very successful year.

Taking into account the Tide’s schedule and the number of true freshman on the roster, Alabama is still another year away from being serious contenders to win the SEC championship. But I do believe if there hasn’t been marked improvement by the end of the third season, the grumblings will begin.

Paying $4 million per year for a coach to produce average results isn’t going to cut it at Alabama - or any other big time football program either.

4. Critique Lou Holtz as a ESPN “analyst.” Irish and Cock Homer or scripted live rassler?

Maybe it’s the lisp or perhaps it’s the fact he’s goofy or - I could go on - but Holtz just drives me crazy when I’m watching ESPN’s college football coverage. It’s the whole crew to be honest - Corso, Herbstreit, Fowler, May and Holtz comprise the most dysfunctional cast of characters that could possibly be assembled.

As we’ve come to learn, most of the “analysis” is nothing more than tear-jerk reactions by a bunch of former players and coaches that are so far removed from the game that there isn’t any real insight being offered.

It’s all about hype, pomp and circumstance with the ESPN cast and generally they’re doing more carrying on for the camera or engaging in self-promotion than they are actually reporting the news.

Holtz is definitely a homer when it comes to the Irish but I honestly believe he’s the only genuine personality ESPN has covering college football.

Corso’s act has become tiresome and Mark May sounds like a broken record droning on about nothing. Herbstreit is too busy citing his “sources” and Fowler is clearly biased and has an obvious distaste for the SEC.

It’s reached a point where I don’t even watch the pre-game show because it’s nothing more than a contrived act that offers little to nothing for the educated fan.

Check out the answers from the other participating Volunteer blogs.

YMSWWC

Third Saturday in Blogtober

Southeastern Sports Blog

Rocky Top Talk

Gate 21

Fulmer’s Belly

The View From The Hill

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Topics: NCAA Football, Southeastern Conference, Tennessee Vols Football | 1 Comment »

Pac 10, Big 10 Fans - Stop Whining

By MoonDog | August 26, 2008

I posted an article a few weeks back, Do you Hate The SEC? Get Over It!, highlighting the teams I felt were the legitimate contenders to win this season’s BCS championship. In response to that post, I received quite a few e-mails, many of which were from fans that took umbrage to a comment I made within the article stating my belief the Pac 10 Conference would be weak this season.

Frankly, I don’t understand why so many got upset with that comment. Outside of USC, the Pac 10 doesn’t have a team with a legitimate chance of winning the national championship. Arizona State, Oregon and perhaps Washington will be the only teams from the Pac 10 that will spend time in the Top 25. Moreover, I see the Pac 10 having trouble filling all of their bowl tie-ins for a lack of teams having the qualifying six wins.

Some of these e-mails were completely off-topic and were mindless ramblings of those attacking the SEC and my belief it is the best football conference in the nation. Some suggested SEC teams weren’t scheduling tough non-conference opponents and thus were padding their records giving them a better opportunity to earn a berth in the BCS championship.

I’ve already proven that argument is baseless, writing an article several months ago about college football schedules in the coming years. Instead of regurgitating the facts, please read the article here.

Other e-mails suggested the SEC was overrated; anyone knowing college football and having a modicum of common sense would understand the SEC is never overrated. The statistics speak for themselves and I wrote another article proving the SEC’s success against the other BCS conferences. Take a moment to read that piece here.

Then the Big 10 fans started chiming in with e-mails complaining about the SEC having an unfair advantage because the majority of bowl games are played in the south. Bowl games have been played in the southern and western states for decades and for good reason. Not to mention, the Big 10 Conference gladly negotiated these bowl tie-ins knowing where the games would be played.

Several months back Lisa Horne wrote a great piece about this subject and I highly recommend you take a moment and read it here. For the record, Lisa is a California girl and a supporter of the Southern Cal Trojans so you SEC haters can’t claim the opinion was from a biased source.

As if that wasn’t enough, Big 10 and Pac 10 fans were claiming the SEC had an advantage because they play a conference championship game. I wrote an article addressing that subject as well. Please read it here and you’ll discover the SEC, ACC and Big East don’t necessarily have as big an advantage playing a conference championship game as some suggest.

What I found most amazing is the responses I received didn’t have anything to do with the subject of the post. As mentioned above, the article was about the teams I felt had a realistic chance of playing for the national championship. Somehow a multitude of readers got off track and turned the comment section into a hate fest, with supporters of the Big 10, Pac 10 and SEC bad-mouthing one another.

I was having trouble understanding why so many fans of the Pac 10 were writing me even when I’d selected USC as one of the teams I believed would appear in the BCS championship game. Did you read that Pac 10 fans? I said USC - a Pac 10 team - would be in the BCS championship game.

Do me a favor - before you write me, I’d appreciate it if you actually read the entire article. At the end of the day, I really don’t care which teams play for the national championship. I just want to see the two most deserving teams play for college football’s ultimate prize.

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Topics: NCAA Football, Southeastern Conference | 2 Comments »

2008 Memphis Tigers Football - Defense

By MFSKEN | August 25, 2008

The Memphis Tigers defense has struggled the past two seasons and new coordinator Tim Walton is tasked with bringing the swagger back to the defensive side of the ball in 2008.

Walton hopes he can turn around a unit that was torched with regularity last season. Walton spent the last four years at Miami and he is hoping to improve a squad whose numbers were toward the bottom of every defensive category in 2007. The defense returns 26 lettermen and nine starters from last year’s squad.

Memphis allowed 441.8 yards per game last season, ranking them 100th nationally. The rush defense allowed 202.4 yards per game, the pass defense gave up 239.4 yards per game and the Tigers gave up an average of 32.2 points per game.

The defensive line returns a group of veterans in 2008 and is led by senior Clinton McDonald, a 6-3 285-pound senior. McDonald was selected by his teammates as one of the Tigers captains last season as a junior and he was a first-team pick on Phil Steele’s Preseason All-C-USA Team.

McDonald started all 13 games on the defensive front last season and led the Tigers in tackles for loss with 9.5 for minus 31 yards. He closed out the season ranked fifth on the squad in total tackles with 55.

McDonald is joined in the middle of the line by senior Freddie Barnett, a 6-2 300-pound senior. Barnett totaled 33 tackles, including 8.5 tackles for loss for minus 29 yards. He was a third team pick on Phil Steele’s Preseason All C-USA Team. His most heralded play in 2007 was the 88-yard fumble return he made for a touchdown against Arkansas State, the longest fumble recovery in school history.

Anchoring the outsides of the line are senior Corey Mills and junior Greg Terrell. Mills, a 6-4 270-pound senior is a transfer from Mississippi and is aggressive on the left end. He missed one game last year due to injury and made one start against Marshall.

Terrell, a 6-4 255-pound junior started all 13 games and was listed as a third team pick on Phil Steele’s Preseason All-C-USA Team.

The line has plenty of depth this season, with junior Steven Turner (6-3 270), sophomore Tommy Walker (6-3 270), senior Brandon Douglas (6-3 291) and junior Jada Brown (6-2 265) all saw considerable action in 2007.

The Tigers also announced that defensive lineman Jarrett Crittenton will join the squad for the 2008 season. Crittenton (6-6, 288) is a transfer from North Dakota State College of Science where he led the Wildcats in tackles. He logged 15 solo stops in 2007, 14 of which were for losses.

As a sophomore, he was named first-team All-Region by the Midwest Football Conference. He was rated the 29th best junior college player in the nation by Rivals.com and was touted as the 27th best JUCO player by SuperPrep.

For the defense to be good it is important to keep the linebackers healthy. The Tigers should receive a big boost from the return of junior Greg Jackson and sophomore Winston Bowens. Both players suffered knee injures that cost them much of last season and their return to the lineup should pay immediate dividends.

Jackson was injured in the Tigers second game last season, an injury that prevented from returning in 2007. Jackson, (6-2 212), was listed on Steele’s Preseason All-C-USA Third Team.

Winston Bowens opened the ’07 season as starter at middle linebacker for the first four games. The 6-0 250-pound sophomore worked out with the team this spring and is challenging for a return to the starting lineup.

Adding depth at the linebacker positions will be junior Josh Weaver (6-3 220), junior Jeremy Rockette (6-3 225), junior Tommy Phelps 6-3 245), senior Tyler Griffin (5-11 205) and sophomore Corderick Govan (6-2 225). All saw game action last season and should be a strength for the Tigers defense in 2008.

The secondary has been torched the last couple of seasons, but the return of senior safeties Brandon Patterson and Tony Bell give the Tigers hope for improvement in this area.

The 6-1, 195-pound senior had 77 tackles and a team-best three interceptions last season, while the 6-2, 215-pound Bell made 40 stops and had two picks. Bell was selected to the Phil Steele’s Preseason All-C-USA Second Team. Both players could post breakthrough campaigns in their final season.

Throughout spring practice, junior Deante’ Lamar (5-9 180) and sophomore Darius Davis (6-0 190) were working at the right corner, while senior Michael Grandberry and Curtis Echols worked the left side. None of the four have started a game in the secondary, but all bring speed and agility to the position.

Grandberry, a 5-10 172-pound senior and Echols, a 6-3 190-pound sophomore share something in common as both started out as receivers and have made the transition to the other side of the ball. Echols made the switch this past spring, while Grandberry moved during the middle of the 2006 season.

Junior college transfer D.A. Griffin was signed in the spring and is expected to add experience to the position this fall.

“We’re better defensively,” Memphis coach Tommy West said. “We’re much more aggressive. We’re still learning. We’re still giving up a few too many big plays right now, but as far as the everyday play, it’s been good.”

The Final Analysis

The Memphis defense has a lot of holes to fill in a unit that ranked near the bottom in all statistical categories in 2007. The keys to a good season will be getting pressure on the opposing quarterback. The Tigers need to record more than 15 sacks this season.

The linebackers must remain healthy; the starters are good, but depth can be a problem. In the secondary it is important for Patterson and Bell to have a good year. The secondary simply can’t give up large passing numbers to be effective.

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Topics: Conference USA, NCAA Football, University of Memphis News | 2 Comments »

Big Orange Roundup - Escape From Cardboardia

By MoonDog | August 24, 2008

Having mostly freed myself from what seemed an insurmountable mountain of cardboard, I’m excited to announce Fulmer’s Belly has posted this week’s Big Orange Roundup, the best of the best from this past week’s Big Orange Roundtable.

Jon and Don were kind enough to label me a traitor and insinuated I was a closet Georgia fan. I was also admonished for not answering the bonus question which admittedly I didn’t see because there were boxes piled up in front of my computer.

Despite all the setbacks and the trauma of moving, I was able to get one of my answers highlighted - a testament to my greatness and powerfulness.

This culminates yet another landmark week for the Big Orange Roundtable. Jon & Don did a solid job this week and should be commended for a job well done. Stay tuned later this week for another edition.

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Topics: NCAA Football, Southeastern Conference, Tennessee Vols Football | 1 Comment »

Boo-Hoo Buckeye Fans

By MoonDog | August 23, 2008

To all of you Ohio State Buckeye fans responding to the post For Buckeyes, Failure Breeds Failure, I have only this to say.

Stop crying and get over the fact you got spanked by superior teams. Don’t talk to me about where the games were played; if you want to be a champion you have to defeat your opponent wherever, whenever.

And please, don’t tell me you’re glad you don’t live in the south. We wouldn’t let you live here anyway - we don’t want you contaminating us with your version of weak football.

Take a moment to further educate yourselves on why you’ve never beaten an SEC opponent.

Do you understand now? Why must I have to continually explain the obvious? If you want to shut us up then defeat an SEC team this season in a bowl game.

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