You know, I was hoping the big news of the week would be the start of the college football season.  The only thing that could overshadow it was Texas A&M leaving the Big 12.  Welp they announced their intention to do so.  Now that it’s official, the Big 12 must look to expand, which is more than what they did last year.  Everyone is saying that BYU is the most likely candidate, and they are being very careful with their words .  Even though they have been talking with the Big 12.  Will it happen?  Who knows, but there will be a boatload of speculation in the meantime.  Well and Oklahoma is looking to take the lead in blowing up the league.  Let’s hit up the Crib Sheet while we wait:

• Tennessee coach Derek Dooley has had enough of his mom.  So he yanked her off here regular gig on radio.  Apparently she just says what she thinks, with no speed bumps.  Every mom does that Derek, you should’ve known that from the beginning.
• Eric LeGrand, the Rutgers lineman who suffered a spinal injury last year, will sign on and do analysis for the Rutgers radio network this season.  Good for him, he should have some deep knowledge of how Rutgers plays the game.
• Oklahoma will honor fallen comrade Austin Box this year by having one person wear his number 12 each week of the season.  Landry Jones also wears that number.  It’s going to provide a heckuva lot of inspiration for the Sooners this year.
• Two mascots from the Big 12, Boomer and Cy, are in the Capital One Mascot Challenge this year.  Check out their videos on ESPN Big 12 blogger David Ubben’s post.  Then go vote!
• Speaking of mascots, Kansas State has one called the EcoKat now.  It’s the environmental mascot!  And boy does it suck.  Just never replace Willie okay?
• Joe Paterno coached from the booth against Indiana State over the weekend.  I knew my prediction of him kicking the bucket on the field was off.  It will be in the press box!
• A couple of new tidbits for the Big 10 Championship Game:  if a team gets a bowl ban, they will not be eligible for the Big 10 title game and there’s a set of tiebreaker rules to get into the game.   Let’s hope they avoid any controversy from this.
• Bruce Feldman dumped ESPN for CBS, all because of his suspension from the help he had writing Mike Leach’s book.  Basically ESPN gave him the screw job, because his book pointed out things that were a little under the table in Bristol.  Just goes to show the it’s more Entertainment than Sports up there.  The most important takeaway? Craig James is still a douche.
• Apparently Texas approached Texas A&M with a partnership deal for TV over 4 years ago.  At least that’s what athletic director DeLoss Dodds says.  You don’t know who to trust anymore.  But if the Aggies turned them down, then that means they just didn’t want to create a television network.  They’ll be happy having someone else do the work.  Nothing wrong with that at all.
• So Ohio State had all of that trouble last year.  Now 3 players are suspended for taking benefits this year!  Okay so there’s a lack of institutional control going on over there.  Will the NCAA step up and drop they hammer?  Let’s hope they do.  Or just pay all of the players.  This is getting ridiculous.
• Baylor launched the Robert Griffin III  for Heisman website right before he helped them upset TCU last week.  Coincidence?  I think not!
• Missouri head coach Gary Pinkel shot some fires at Texas and Dan Beebe before the start of the season last week.  It seems like he’s pretty frustrated with how things are being handled.  I agree with him.
• Meanwhile he dismissed troubled safety Tavon Bolden from the theam.  He was going to be reinstated after his suspension for violating team rules but they opted to dismiss him instead.  A couple of other players are out for this weekend’s game and runnig back Kendial Lawrence broke his fibula. They are all of the sudden starting to look a little light.
• Kansas apparently is the first team to buckle under the pressure of the Longhorn Network and signed a deal to have their game against Texas on the network.  Things are tumbling, tumbling down.  Although, what fan from Lawrence is going to go all the way down to Austin to watch a shillacking?
• Missouri will launch their online network on December 1.  Man they needed to get on the ball faster and debut it before the start of football season.  I merely refer you to K-Statehd.tv for reference.
• Mark Cuban, of all people, wants the Big 12 to stick together.  His ideas are fairly well thought out, even though he does want a college football playoff.
• So Jeremiah Taylor of Marshall was suspended for one game, and it could have been more, by the NCAA for not filling out a form.  Huh?  So he needed to fill out something that said he didn’t take a salary or any money for playing football.  That’s pretty dang goofy.
• So we found out from a deposition that Bill Snyder had a change of heart after two weeks into his retirement announcement.  The problem was then president John Wefald didn’t believe that his heart was in it.  Now that’s a big what if to chew on.
• Maryland’s uniforms are ugly, thanks to the CEO of Under Armour and former Maryland alum.  People too their potshots in their game against Miami and I’m guessing it won’t stop there.
• Well that was fast.  Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly benched Dayne Crist after their loss to South Florida and will start Tommy Rees.  No patience indeed.
• So the Kansas Board of Regents prefers that Kansas and Kansas State stay together if conference realignment happen.  Note the word ‘prefer.’  All I’m hearing that KU would dump the Wildcats in a heartbeat.  Although that rumor about Kansas, Kansas State, and Missouri going to the Big East sounds mighty good right about now.  At the end of the day, though, I think it’s KSU that will be left in the cold.