Here at KCCGD headquarters, we are drawing up game plans and doing walkthroughs for the upcoming football season. We have some goodies coming up in the next couple of weeks, including analysis, predictions, and some new looks. We’re busting a major sweat and pouring it out into everything we do here to make KCCGD the best place to go for you Kansas City college football needs. Be on the lookout. Until then, here’s this week’s Crib Sheet:
Kansas State’s lawyers are bringing the full “he said, she said” stating that no such attempts were made to quiet Ron Prince, which his lawyers accused the school of. This is a real bad case of a coach and school parting ways. It’s only gonna get worse. Please remember to hug a coach and a school official today.
Backup Nebraska quarterback Cody Spano is out for the year with a torn ACL. The Husker’s projected starter is Zac Lee and if he goes down there really is nobody left behind him. Plus, it’s his first year as a starter. Husker fans need to hope Zac stays healthy if they want to live up to the pre-season hype of a projected Big 12 North title.
15 Duke football players have symptoms of the swine flu. Usually colds and flus make their way through teams and then move on. What’s interesting about this article is that Heather Dinich called it the swine flu. Not H121. Way to go Heather! We like realistic names and not ones deemed okay to say by Congress.
Oregon football players (or as new ESPN sportscaster Jon Gruden calls it, OrEEgon) are now wearing cameras on their helmets during practice. The more tape, the better. Our guess is the next step in the evolution of video games will include this footage. Then, in turn, football players could practice by playing the video game. Geekery abound!
Colorado cornerback Ben Burney had his blog axed after the first draft. Being the blogging realm we are disappointed to see such speech revoked. Although the kid probably shouldn’t have touted how well in the sack he is. That’s not quite the inside look people are looking for in football.
New Mexico State is asking fans to pitch in for snacks for the football team after practice. Seriously? We know the economic downturn is affecting everyone, but what’s the deal with a school not springing for orange slices and Capri-Sun after a workout?
Mike DeArmond from the Kansas City Star profiles Missouri’s defensive secondary. They were the worst in the Big 12 last year and are looking for a turnaround. With many of the offensive players from last year drafted away to the NFL, the defense needs to step up and help shoulder the load (and transition).
Speaking of defense, bot the Topeka Capital Journal and the Manhattan Mercury talk about Kansas State’s defense. There’s no place to go but up for the defense as they ranked below 100 in the terms of total defense last year. To help the attempted turnaround, they are featuring nickel defense much more this season. Hopefully that will help counteract the explosive offense most of the Big 12 teams bring into the year.
Former Duke basketball starter Greg Paulus will now be the starter for the Syracuse Orangemen. We’re not sure if it’s because he’s super talented (he was a five star football recruit in high school) or if the rest of the quarterbacks on the team stunk. At any rate, the school will sell more tickets because of this guy and that’s a good thing.
Former Rivals #1 recruit Bryce Brown and Tennessee are under investigation by the NCAA for alleged violations in his recruitment to the university. The question is whether funds raised for Brown’s trip out to Tennessee was legit or not. Brown, a Wichita native, tread the news waters earlier this year when he was waffling back and forth between schools after his commitment to Miami expired, including Kansas State. This guy smells like trouble and chances are he won’t turn out well.
What is with the Crib Sheet coming out after major late night holidays? First it was Fat Tuesday, which prompted a cold, and now we have St. Patrick’s Day. The Hooley over at Lew’s Grille and Pub was rocking last night as the beer was flowing and the babes were showing. The traditional corned beef and cabbage was again very tasty but Disco Dick and the Mirrorballs disco sucked. The week of college football news did not suck, however.
It seems Colt McCoy is pulling a Tim Tebow and doing charity work in his offtime. This should help him out on his campaign for the Heisman Trophy this year. Although seriously, if Tim Tebow is coming back, there might be a chance the Tim will win a 3rd time in a row. Bolster those resumes!
Some smart folks over at the University of Kansas did a study about true home field advantages and discovered that Nebraska has the largest of them all. That makes sense considering the whole state goes to the games. My problem is, advantage or not, their home record wasn’t the best in the time of the study. Still, it’s pretty cool to play with numbers.
And a new four year deal hit the BCS with the four big daddys (Fiesta, Sugar, Rose, and Orange Bowl) agreeing to a four year extension. Expect to hear the sports media complain about it for a couple of weeks and then fall back on it, say, about the middle of the season. No surprises here.
Huzzah! An Ohio State Buckeye cheerleader, the captain nonetheless, is trying out for the football team. Looks like he can run fast. I bet he can jump pretty high. I’m thinking that the huddles might be a little too annoying. Maybe he can help them come up with better endzone celebrations.
Missouri finally settled with Aaron O’Neil’s family after his death on the practice field before the season started in 2005. I guess they had to wait a bit for the program to generate some money through the athletics before they could write them the check. Meanwhile, the family of a student, Erek Plancher, will file suit against the University of Central Florida after he collapsed and died on the field last year. It seems like the condition drills always take out some kids like that. The large heads of the coaches is the issue here. They don’t want thier kids to be soft and go the ultra pushy machismo way to do it. Maybe legal action should be allowed against the coaches in the scneario? Jail time possibly?
The Bryce Brown lottery is over with double B picking Tennessee. Okay so he had visits to the Vols the last week or so but was nice enough to keep Kansas State in the running. Don’t fret! It’s time to celebrate the last mention of Bryce for a long time.
Wow, we’re still feeling the effects from last week. As a matter of fact, last week’s festivities led to a nasty little cold. That’s better than some of the after effects some college football players ran into last week. Never fear, the Crib Sheet remedy is here! We’re dropping this in some Sprite and popping some NyQuil so hold on and go for the ride. Hopefully we’ll be 100% next week.
In the descendant department, Joe Montana’s kid Nick tackled some scholarship offers from Alabama, Flordia State, and Notre Dame. The son of a qb who’s a qb too might get better luck if he goes somewhere other than the Fighting Irish. The shoes would be too big to fill and so far the quaterbacks coming out of dome town aren’t living up to the past. Nick Cool doesn’t work, how about Nick Sweet?
Somehow Columbia, Missouri landed in the top 10 on Forbes list for top college sports towns. Well I guess Lawrence was too pretentious and Austin is more of a party town. Manhattan doesn’t even come close. I guess it’s cool that they are on the list, but they need to win a championship somewhere to deserve top 10 status.
The Bryce Brown saga continues after a couple of swerves. The NCAA is investigating Brian Butler, the mentor for Brown, to figure out if he’s more of an agent than a mentor. The former rapper has been representing Wichita football players and pimping them on his website. Not sure there’s much mentoring there. Meanwhile, some rumor mongering points to Oklahoma being on the sweepstakes for Brown. I’m not sure they’ll pull him in late, but the fact that Kansas State is on the list still is laughable. Maybe Brown will lose so much cred out of this that he’ll walk on to Wildcat territory, only to regain his rep. In my dreams. In my dreams.
Speaking of Wildcat territory, it seems some old friends are coming back to Manhattan to help Bill Snyder 2.0 out. Jonathan Beasley and Joe Gordon are coming back to fill out some spots left open by some movements. Thankfully, Bill is going to former players to help rebuild the tradition (however small it may be) of the Kansas State Wildcats.
So a Division II school in Newberry dropped their mascot name, Indians, under pressure from the NCAA. That’s fine and all, but where is the pressure for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish? If the NCAA is going to go with regulating names then it needs to be consistent across the board. Now Illinois dropped it, but Florida State got the write from Indians to use it. So is it really worth going after, or is it a PR stunt to make everyone feel good about themselves?
Let me tell you somethin’ dude, the Kiffster is gonna run wild over you! Well, maybe not that but one of the tactics he’s using at Tennessee is encouraging his coaches rip off their shirts a-la Hulk Hogan. So whatcha gonna do? WHATCHA GONNA DO?
What’s up with all of the footballplayersbeingarrestedin theoffseason. Yeah they’re young and in college, but they’re the leaders of the campus. There’s a time to party and a time to get ready for some football. The way I see it, the only players that can party now are the ones from Florida.
So we finally figure out why Andy Ludwig left Kansas State after 2 months to go back to Cali. His family all lives on the coast out there. I would call shenanigans if Tim Griffin didn’t point out that he’d be eating some salary in the deal (cost of living wise). Oh well.
It was a big week of news and the Crib Sheet is back this week to tell you what mattered. It was Signing Day last week and the ouija board nearly broke from producing signatures sprinkled out across the whole nation. There were some surprises, but most of what was expected came to be true. We mixed in some political goobery and a little bit o’ smack talk to keep things fresh. My guess is the next couple of weeks are going to be dry news wise, so let this be the spike before the long lull. Here’s the crib:
Newly appointed Jesus of Tennessee Lane Kiffin is crying wolf over Urban Meyer trying to hit up one of his recruits. Lane still got the guy, but maybe the rub off from Al Davis’ fragile shoulders are showing up in Volunteer-land. It’s nice you got the recruit, Lane, but talking smack on Urban will produce some nasty results. Just talk to Georgia. Oh and he apologized.
Missouri too, had a pretty good recruiting class. They promised some tight end play to Sheldon Richardson but realy this kid is defensive tackle all the way. At any rate, look for them to compete for the North and then choke at some point.
Nebraskasigned about 21 kids to fill out the black shirts. Look out for these guys. With the walk on program back on and some key pick ups, Nebraska will be well on their way to almost going back to the Big 12 Championship game.
Conference wise, Texas and Oklahoma went 1 and 2, again. Hey they do that every year so get used to it. Colorado had a top 4 conference recruiting ranking last year and look at how they finished. Sleep tight, Texas A&M.
Bryce Brown is hanging out and making everybody speculate the hell out of him. Everybody else is down and signed but this guy just likes making everyone wait. Also, the big rumor is he might turn pro in some other league. Really, Bryce is a huge tease.
James Franklin, the Maryland offensive coordinator, was named last Thursday as the successor to Ralph Friedgen. Overlooking the fact that Maryland has done crap the last couple of years, this pick makes sense. If the school is satisfied with mediocrity then they should continue in it.
Mike Leech is culling his old lawyer skills and is still banging out a contract with Texas Tech. So the Red Raiders are apparently pulling a Boston College and telling Leech he can’t talk or interview with other teams during his contract. If they break off now, look for him to be somewhere else after this year. Come Texas Tech, fumble this one away!
Okay, this is getting redonkulous. Now all of Utah’s lawmakers are sending a resolution to PrezBama to blow away the BCS and give in to the power of playoffs. Now with football players on hand! Please somebody tell the whole state of Utah to get over it and focus on getting the Mountain West the automatic bid. Going the political route won’t work.
Missouri pulled in LSU tight ends coach Josh Henson. It looks as thought some SEC cred might be seeping into the Big 12. Recruiting wise, this will help out the Tigers immensly. Tim Griffin’s already saying they’re going after Bryce Brown too.
Dana Dimel is coming back to K-State. So he did a great job for Mike Stoops and reviving some offense and it looks like he’ll be doing the same at K-State. Let’s hope that it will be more than Ron Prince’s “Throw-everything-up-and-see-what-sticks” offense.
In sign of bi-partisanship, Rep. Joe Barton (R) from Texas is siding with PrezBama in setting up a college football playoff. Does he really need the votes? Plus, this guy’s an Aggie. Shouldn’t he be working more toward making Texas A&M a real football team instead of playing up to the playoff people?
