What a long crazy week (and month) its been. It’s been so much fun that I haven’t had the opportunity to blast out another sweet tasting Mascot Monday. Welp, have no fear, I am back now ready to rock in full swing with another entrant into out mascot menagerie. Oh what? You want to know why I’ve been all weird and stuff? Welp, my only clue I’ll give you now is within this week’s mascot, Scrappy. North Texas is more than just Mean Green and Scrappy here is out to prove it. Can a mascot survive a school nickname that’s different and still be relavant?
It’s warmed over, too. This week’s Crib Sheet celebrates Easter by dropping news eggs all over the place. Grab your basket and find them buried in the grass of the Crib Sheet. Don’t get your fingers messy:
It looks like Texas new defensive coordinator’s had a weird upbringing in coaching terms. He’s been at ESPN first, then a video guy at Florida State, and then on to coaching positions. It also looks like he takes inspiration from other sports, too. Will this shake things up enough for the Longhorns and turn the defense around? We’ll find out.
The Big 12 Conference announced a mega-deal with Fox for broadcasting rights. Dan Beebe was right. They reportedly negotiated a $90 million a year deal through the next 13 years. The big plus? Every home game will be on some form of television starting in 2012. Well that and each school has a the chance to kick up their own network.
The officer who shot and killed the Pace University football player, Denroy Henry Jr., received the Officer of the Year Award from the police union where he works. Their reasoning is that the officer showed bravery through that time and all of his time working for the department. This angered alot of folks. It depends on who you believe on what happened. I just don’t like that it’s a union that gets to dole out the award.
Not to be outdone by fellow conference fashionistas Oregon, Arizona State unveiled their new uniforms for the year. They will be changing colors left and right. On top of that, their helmets are new, with big giant pointy tridents. The Ducks did this and they won but they also hired the right coach. That’s the kind of makeover the Sun Devils could really use.
In another case of me-too’s, Auburn will build statues for their Heisman Trophy winners, like what Florida did. The only difference is that there’s a darker cloud hanging over Cam Newtan than there is hanging over Tim Tebow. I wonder if they’ll add that to the design. Oh, and Nick Saban had his own statue erected, too.
Dennis Dodd of CBS has an interesting article on 7-on-7 leagues in high school. It seems they are the AAUs of football. Jay Paterno is correct about how coaches can’t tell if a kid can take a hit. I hope something gets down soon about these because I don’t want football to turn into a ballet. We could use a couple of big hits in a game.
A couple of rule changes are coming down the pike for next year. The NCAA approved more stringent below the waist penalties and gave the option for teams to run 10 seconds off the clock on penalties within the final minute of the half. Nothing earth shattering but an improvement indeed.
Notre Dame released the investigation report relating to Declan Sullivan’s death earlier this year. They found the no single person was responsible but there was a lax in safety. Apparently the weather data was out of date. This does seem kind of fishy, I hope the school pays tons of money to parents of Sullivan to avoid a lawsuit.
There was a tussle online about the Boise State’s AD, Gene Bleymaier, and his fiery words about the BCS. That’s just talk. What’s more important to me is that the school trademarked the blue turf and will protect the likeness of the field in FBS terms, while allowing it to happen to divisions below. Since when is a blue field trademarkable? That seems a little too much to me. At least one coach in the Mountain West Conference, sees it as an unfair competitive advantage as well. San Diego State’s Rocky Long hates it and I suggest the Aztecs change their field to candy striped or fractal like patterns.
So while the NCAA is busy messing up student athletes and their lack of scholarship funding, they find time to make some even dumber team name penalties. North Dakota passed a state law to keep the Fighting Sioux nickname but it will not stop the NCAA from administrating penalties because of their perception of the name. The NCAA considers it offensive and will take money away from the school. The deeper issue is that two tribes in the area are split over the decision. Why is the NCAA trying to influence an issue that clearly doesn’t involve them? Let the tribes and the state figure it out and get out of the way.
The NFL Draft is coming up quick, no matter how weird it is, and will blow by even faster. This week’s Crib Sheet is just as windy. And it’s almost as windy as the weather is outside in the KC metro area. Hold on tight:
Spring is in the air and unfortunately, some of it stinks. Now I could be talking about the Fiesta Bowl scandal or perhaps the NFL lockout. Nope, it’s none of that. It’s the fact that I have to suffer through another summer of baseball before the real American pasttime takes the stage. Fortunately for me I have the Crib Sheet to keep my occupied. Oh and thank you Beano Cook for being awesome.
A former Texas A&M coach said that Willie Lyes, the same guy who was paid $25,000 from Oregon and is under NCAA investiagion, approached him and stated that he had beat $80,000 for a star recruit. With all of this money blowing up and flowing around college football, it was onlya a matter of time that recruitment services looking to get a cut of the pic made moves like these.
The Pac 10 is open for business and they’re letting the world know it. The exclusive negotiating rights for Fox expired and now it’s time to shop the conference across all of the television networks. Oh, they’ll get bank. It’s the big time now.
ESPN filed suit against Conference USA for dipping into the FX deal for prime time football games. It’s always cute when television stations and football conferences fight.
Soslan Gagloev was a Russian in Japan’s waters and kicking it sumo style. And he was winning. But he was busted for weed and now he’s playing some college football at Webber International Univeristy. Defensive back he ain’t. That said, sumo and any other kind of wrestling requires leverage work and that applies fantastically to line work in football. He should do alright.
Here’s a shocker: drug policies across all facets of college sports completely varies in policy. I think the AP suggests to streamline the whole process.
Colt McCoy’s younger brother, Case, is looking to take the reigns for the Texas Longhorns. He had a stellar spring practice. Who knows? Maybe that magic can happen again.
Speaking of Texas, their new network will be called the ‘Longhorn Network.’ There’s no deal for satellite deistributors but I’m guessing that it will blow up once they annoucne a couple of football games on the network.
Baseball’s right around the corner and I figured the news would be super quiet for college football. Boy was I wrong. There’s tasty chunks of news going around all over the place. I’m done salivating you taste buds, time to feast on this week’s Crib Sheet:
Whoops! I guess I missed a Crib Sheet last week. . You know, I was in the midst of SXSW and was about to endure the worst Montezuma’s Revenge on this planet. I’m all caught up now and will deliver on this week’s Crib Sheet. That’s right, it’s a double sized version of the Crib Sheet. Whip out the bib we are about to get messy:
Stanford’s getting rid of their ‘easy’ classes for student athletes. Um, since when is any class at Stanford easy? Oh wait, I guess ‘Beginning Improvisation’ or ‘Social Dances of North America III’ can be classified as easy. Hey, Stanford’s rep is that they are in the upper echelon of scholastics so they need to make sure that everyone falls in line with it.
Oklahoma made about $10,000 in the Fiesta Bowl due to a policy in the Big 12 that states that the conference absorbs unsold tickets for the bowl game. Man, too bad UConn and the Big East didn’t have that one, the Huskies ended up losing out big time for the game.
On that same trip, let’s see what the Big 12’s finances were for the school last year. Obviously Texas made and spent the most dough. I think it’s interesting that Kansas State spent the least amount of money in the conference and still made a bowl game. Facts to chew on.
So while I was out, a rumor popped up that Fox was in the running for a new television deal with the Big 12. Numbers are flying all over the place but the important point is that there is demand. Predicted demand. I can fall asleep a little better tonight knowing that the smoke here will fire up the flame to keep the Big 12 warm for a long time.
So a lawyer, and former Ohio State player, tried to warn Jim Tressel about violations and it got Tressel in big trouble. So Jim Tressel violated NCAA rules and apologized to all about his err of ways. Being the great guy that he is, Tressel then decided that his two game suspension was not enough and took the same 5 game suspension that the players who broke the rules got. The only thing I see coming down from this is that the Big 10 next year is wide open. Maybe the streak for Big 10 titles for Ohio State will end next year?
I don’t like talking NFL as much, but former Missouri quarterback Blaine Gabbert is tearing it up. Not only was he sharp on the ball, he was also sharp in the Wonderlic. Having taken the Wonderlic myself recently, I can say that it’s very impressive to score as high as he did. Gabbert just may be the real deal.
In no surprise to everyone, Indiana regulators fined Notre Dame for six violations that led to the death of a 20 year old student. Hopefully everyone can take a look at this and try harder to make sure all personnel involved in college football are safe.
Kirk Herbstreit moved out of Ohio because the locals don’t get that being an analyst means that you should be objective. I guess the fans there complain about fairness and give away freebies to the local players. Great state that Ohio is.
Oklahoma head coach Bob Stoops talks about his Twitter policy. I’m glad they didn’t ban it altogether but it is a little creepy that school officials are monitoring the accounts. But hey, everyone is monitoring everyone’s Twitter accounts, right?
It’s a tasty Crib Sheet this week as I’m packed up and ready to head to Austin for SXSW. I might stop by Daryl K Royal Stadium and give homage to the team that Kansas State has owned the last couple of years. That is if I can make it there between the haze of tech and music. The next Crib Sheet might be heavily abbrieviated. Just sayin. Here’s this week’s Crib Sheet:
Spring practice is kicking up the mud hidden from under the snow but I’m not finding it too exciting. I could talk about the NFL Combine but it would be all about the Wonderlic Test. So on this week’s Crib Sheet, I will talk about the Groundhog. I remember him saying something this year about an early Spring. Then about 5 inches of snow dumped on me. I’ve got the grill ready, somebody bring me the Groundhog. That will make things warm real quick. On to the Crib Sheet:
We’ll get to the big story of the week in the Crib Sheet, but first I wanted to preface that by saying, ‘Huh?’ I can understand that tradition is the lifeline of college football. I get that. I’m just having a hard time imagining why there’s all of this hooplah surrounding the first news item. I mean when I went to K-State, we used to toss spray painted chickens on the court before the Kansas again. PETA was all up in arms and that was it. It seems like everyone in the world is sad about this latest stunt. Read on for the story:
Back again and were in love. The Crib Sheet today reminds us that every single thing, including the offseason lull, makes up the whole of our love for college football. Now, I’m not going to get all smushy and corny, but I will say that if college football was a person, I would hand it a candied heart that says, “Don’t Stop.” Now on to the Crib Sheet:
So a thrid party approached Wisconsin and TCU about a week and half after the Rose Bowl to see if they were interested in an opening day rematch next year. Wisconsin was all about it and TCU had better things to do. My guess that someone from the Big 10 couldn’t stand a mid-con whupping up on a stalwart in the hallowed gardens of the rose. This bit of news just made my day.
So instead of using students to make sure Kansas players go to class, the school is using really old people. It’s like the movie Red without the bullets and missles. I guess it’s a dream job for that retiree who wants to relive the glory days of Kansas and it’s great basketball team and weak football team.
Congrats to former Kansas State alum Jordy Nelson on his Green Bay Packers Super Bowl win. The game was pretty entertaining as I watched with friends. Maybe Jordy took a chunk out of Cowboys Stadium like I did for Chowboys Stadium? INSERT PHOTO
It looks like college football will once again try to emulate the NFL by adopting some of their rules again. The biggest one seems to be the 10 second run off rule. Let’s just hope that college football doesn’t adopt the ridiculous overtime rules the NFL had for the playoffs. INSERT LINK
Ruh-roh. The Fiesta Bowl hired a lawyer that specializes in the federal crime defense. I wonder what’s going on here? Maybe that Playoff Action Committee is pushing the right buttons? Or is the fact that chairman John Junker being placed on administrative leave have something to do with it? It looks like he dumped some money on politicians. I’m not sure this will damage the BCS but this will get interesting.
Oklahoma State head coach Mike Gundy has a bromance with Justin Bieber of all people. It seems Bieber has Gundy’s “I’m a Man! I’m 40!” rant as a ringtone and Gundy has a Bieber song on his. Oh that’s so cute.
We’re still tucked away with snow here at KCCGD headquarters and it’s time to finally wind things down, college football wise. Spring practices and the draft is coming up, but that won’t be for a couple of months. This week’s Crib Sheet surely reflects that. Now I could waste a couple items with arrests and dismissals, but that happens every couple of weeks anyway. So grab yourself some hot cocoa, sit right back, and enjoy a nice little Crib Sheet:
Freshly signed Kansas State quarterback Daniel Sams opened up his tenure dropping the bomb that Collen Klein will move back to wide receiver. How does that bode for the Wildcats? Maybe Sims is that good that the best quarterback from last year gets bumped to wide receiver. Either that or the recruiters told him a fib. At any rate, Sams will be running some laps for opening his mouth.
Apparently transfer hungry Michigan quarterback Tate Forcier is looking at Kansas State as well as other schools. Will the Wildcats get this former Wolverine? You know, the other transfers from RichRods epic fail went on to do wonders for their team (think Ryan Mallet). Because of that, however, I’m thinking Forcier will head to a bigger school for his second chance. Still, it’s fun to dream.
It’s national signing day! Okay, so it’s not that exciting, but we have some Big 12 updates flying in and I don’t want to take away from the exciting coverage. Usually half the kids that are worth something don’t pan out anyway. It’s a good thing that ESPN covers this overhyped event in the only way that ESPN can over hype. Now on to the Crib Sheet:
Another person involved in the Kansas ticket scandal, Charlette Blubaugh, plead guilty in court. Her husband will soon plead guilty as well. It looks like legal system works in the case of these folks.
ESPN’s Erin Andrews is kind of a freak of media exposure. By exposure I mean the nude video taped in the hotel room that begat her appearance on Dancing With the Stars. Now, she’s taking that controversy and lackluster sideline reporting to Reebok. Some journalists are complaining that this throws the ethics out the winder but I’m afraid they forgot that Andrews is more of a pretty face than an actual sports reporter.
Florida State quarterback Christian Ponder looked great in the Senior Bowl as he led the South over the North in a 24-10 victory. Texas A&M’s linebacker Von Miller had the defensive tops as well.
USA Today talks about the trend of colleges oversigning players. Schools will dole out scholarships only to revoke them later for someone else or make kids ‘greyshirt’, which means have them enroll in January instead of the fall. Florida president J. Bernard Machen agrees that greyhirting blows. They talk about how the kids are the victim of this. It looks like one more reason to pay the kids that play big time ball to me.
A bunch of Missouri players sold tickets to former footballs players in 2009. So the current players got a cut of the kickback for them. That’s a secondary violation for the NCAA. Yet another why the NCAA is useless.
The coaching carousel is almost at a stop and now we are getting closer to signing day. Who will go where? I don’t know. But one thing I do know is the Crib Sheet will keep you updated with all of the latest commitments and decommitments:
Jim Leavitt is going to the big time. Not Kansas State Defensive Coordinator, but San Fransisco 49ers linebackers coach. It stinks for Wildcats fans as they were hoping Leavitt would come in and fix the defense. Maybe Bill Snyder 2.0 has something else up this sleeve? Meanwhile, defensive backs coach Keith Burns is taking his show back to Ole Miss.
ESPN and the Texas Longhorns reached a 20 year, $300 million deal for a Longhorns Network. The school will be up for a tasty profit while the broadcast network will food the technical bills. Is this the end of the Big 12? Check back here in about 2 years.
Speaking of the Red Raiders, a Texas judges tossed out a portion of Mike Leach’s suit against the university, only allowing non-monetary claims for the firing of Leach over Adam James’ concussion. If you’re wondering why Leach has yet to be yired, look no further than here.
It seems Kansas is picking up the trail on the recruiting side of things. Turner Gill’s stealing recruits from neighboring states. I’m guessing his pitch is like this, “I’m a Nebraska guy that’s still in the Big 12. Kansas will be the new Nebraska of the Big 12.” That can seal some kids right there.
Fired sportscaster Ron Franklin is suing ESPN over the incident where he called a woman, “Sweetheart” in a production meeting. She objected and he called her an a-hole. I don’t know what to think about this. In the workplace, you can’t trust anyone when you say something because they may be out to get you canned, especially if it’s gender-related. I would say it’s safer to just be quiet and act professional. That said, “sweetheart” and “a-hole” is a pretty weak case to get fired over.
Here’s your BCS payout sheet. So the Big 12 was on the lower tier of payouts for the 6 BCS Conferences. Not bad, but if they had 2 teams in the BCS bowls then they would’ve been up higher. Notre Dame gets a pretty good chunk for being independent. The argument against the BCS right here is that the small guys are getting the smaller piece of the pie. I will merely point to TCU and how they are moving up by winning.
Some donors have high expectations. Take Robert G. Burton, major booster for UConn. Apparently he doesn’t like the athletic director and wants his $3 million in donations back and his name taken off the stadium. I’m pretty sure once you donate something, you can’t expect to get it back. But then again, if I had that kind of cash then I’d feel like I can run anything, too.
Ex Kansas athletic director Lew Perkins agreed to a $4,000 fine for improperly receiving exercise equipment as a gift. This should be the last we hear of this guy.
This Purple Yeti is too busy chopping wood for the fire to bring you much for the rest of January. Look for some new giblets starting February. In the meantime, I have the Crib Sheet to you warm. Check it out:
So ESPN’s David Ubben points us to the overall bowl record for conferences. The Big 12 finished at the bottom, tied with the Big 10. It’s pretty bad for the conference when they notch the same record as an overrated conference that needed to expand to stay relevent.
Michigan contacted Gary Pinkel’s agent to ask for an interview. Pinkel turned it down. One dis from the Big 10 deserves a dis right back. That and Missouri already competes for the title now. It will take Michigan a couple of years before they get back on track.
RichRod dumped about 430 maize and blue gear on the Salvation Army on his way out of Michigan. At least he did one good thing while he was up there. I wonder if he cried on his way out of the store.
That said, things are looking up for Michigan, now that they’ve replaced RichRod with Brady Hoke. The ‘Predator’ Denard Robinson decided to stay and Hoke landed the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens defensive coordinator Greg Mattison. I swear this is the last Michigan news for a long, long time.
Texas Tech was so impressed with Tommy Tuberville’s first year that they’ve already given him an extension. Can he keep it up? It’s doesn’t matter now because his buyout will probably be sweeter.
The bowl season ended Monday and there was a ton of news that happened over the last week. It’s mostly who’s coming and who’s going. It’s what I like to call the Carousel Hell. So put your seatbelt on get ready to go round and round, here’s this week’s Crib Sheet:
Mike Leach’s legal battle with Texas Tech may have cost him the Maryland job. He said that he thought he was the frontrunner, but the Terps went with UConn coach Mike Edsall. He hasn’t been contacted by other schools at the moment.
RichRod is officially out of Michigan now. Blow up the program part two. It makes me warm inside to think the same thing that happened to Nebraska a couple of years ago with Bill Callahan is now happening with another team I dislike immensely. Good days.
It’s even better for Brady Hoke. The former Michigan alum and former San Diego State head coach is now your new Michigan head coach. They wanted a Michigan man and they got one. I give it about another 3 years before a turnaround happens.
After showing up Michigan’s Denard Robinson and holding the team to 14 points, Manny Diaz will take his talents to Texas as defensive coordinator. He leaves Mississippi State and will be belting buckles in Austin. Let’s hope he didn’t fall for that ‘coach in waiting’ stuff.
The Playoff PAC is looking to stir up some smoke on the BCS. They are filing a complaint with the IRS regarding a cruise the Orange Bowl put on for college athletic directors over the summer. Shady or not, this seems like arrows instead of missiles for the Playoff PAC people. If there’s going to be a change, they can’t dink and dunk it.
So TCU won the Rose Bowl. Someone then paid for a billboard congratulating the team. Except it was in Columbus, Ohio. Yeah someone with big pockets wanted to rub it in the Ohio State President E. Gordon Gee’s face. He was running his mouth earlier about the mid-con teams not being worthy and now I guess he gets to eat crow.
Speaking of the Horned Frogs, head coach Gary Patterson notched himself a 2 year extension with the program. You go undefeated in two regular seasons, you deserve that and a ham sandwich.
Texas Tech told the NCAA that they texted too much. That’s alliteration. And that’s the news!
Head BCS Honcho Bill Hancock reminded everyone that a playoff is way below in priority for the college bowl partners. He said that even the old way of bowls would be considered first. Seriously, he does a great job of stirring the pot.
The BCS Championship Game happened Monday and it garnished the best cable ratings ever. Yet, the actual viewership is down. This is what happens when the biggest game of the year ends up on cable. Seriously, why didn’t Disney toss the game on ABC instead of ESPN? Television is becoming more live sport driven than anything else. Still, until I can replicate the experience of a sports bar in my basement, I will be going out for the games.
LSU’s Les Miles went to Michigan to talk about an open job but decided to stay with the Tigers. Listen up childrens, this is the classic strategy head coaches employ to get them off the hot seat or get a raise.
Man we feel for UGA VIII, the mascot of the Georgia Bulldogs. He didn’t make the trip to the bowl game last week and now we know why. UGA VIII has lymphoma. Jinkies, is the team as cursed as this dog is?
Former South Florida football coach Jim Leavitt settled out of court for some extra cash from the school. He was canned for reportedly striking a walk on student. He’s a defensive guy and because of that, the rumors are now flying about Leavitt coming back to Kansas State to take a defensive coordinator position. Tune in next week, this is getting hotter.
