The SEC Myth

[SunCoastSooner]

http://www.thepostgame.com/commentary/2 ... on-sec-bcs

Is the SEC really the best conference in college football "top to bottom," as it's so often described? And if it is, why since the start of the BCS era in 1998 does the conference have overall losing records against the Pac-12 (11-12) and Big East (19-23) and superior but not dominating records against other major conferences? Might the nationwide perception of SEC superiority simply be part of a well-constructed ESPN business plan meant to protect and enhance the network’s $2.25 billion partnership with the SEC? As part of his admittedly left-coast-leaning inspection of myths and misconceptions about the South, author Chuck Thompson dug out the numbers and facts in devoting an entire chapter to Southern football amid critiques of religion, politics, education and racism in his new book Better Off Without 'Em: A Northern Manifesto for Southern Secession (Simon & Schuster). Here's an excerpt:

In his seminal work, The Burden of Southern History, historian C. Vann Woodward wrote: "The South has had its full share of illusions, fantasies, and pretensions, and it has continued to cling to some of them with an astonishing tenacity that defies explanation."

Few enduring southern delusions do more to illustrate Woodward's point than the region's storied devotion to college football and the myth of the superiority of the SEC, the twelve teams collectively regarded in the South -- and much of the rest of the country -- as whales to krill, The Beatles to Herman's Hermits, jackhammer sex with Mila Kunis to dry humping your junior prom date standing up in her parents' garage.

Claims to SEC superiority are based on a simple set of arguments, foremost of which is that of the 14 national championships awarded since the 1998 advent of the BCS system, eight have gone to teams from the SEC, including, remarkably, the last six in a row.



Yet SEC dominance is a very recent phenomenon.

Since the inception of the BCS, the SEC has been crowned national champion 57.14 percent of the time. That's a stunning turnaround when compared with an undisputed national title rate of 10.42 percent over the half-century prior.

So what's behind such a radical shift in fortune, such a statistical improbability?

It certainly isn't on-field performance. Judging by inter-conference records -- that is to say actual games as opposed to media guesswork and bestowed rankings -- the SEC plays other BCS conferences about equally. Witness the record since the start of the BCS era in 1998:

SEC vs. PAC-12 regular season: 10-12
SEC vs. PAC-12 bowl games: 1-0
SEC vs. Big 12 regular season: 6-10
SEC vs. Big 12 bowl games: 21-8
SEC vs. ACC regular season: 42-36
SEC vs. ACC bowl games: 16-9
SEC vs. Big 10 regular season: 7-4
SEC vs. Big 10 bowl games: 19-19
SEC vs. Big East regular season: 16-15
SEC vs. Big East bowl game: 3-8
The record is clear. In head-to-head match-ups against other major conferences, the SEC has either a combined losing record or one that's generally only a little better than even.



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To SEC apologists who claim that the SEC's overall winning records in bowl games is evidence of success in "games that matter" against "quality opponents," I offer the counter-argument that because bowl game pairings are more easily manipulated than regular-season games, and because SEC teams frequently play in bowls near home stadiums, they often result in more favorable match-ups for SEC teams.

This tilt renders postseason play a less valid measure of strength than the more random sampling of results produced by regular season games.



In 2012, for instance, the SEC was able to even its BCS bowl record against the Big Ten at 19-19 when the Florida Gators beat Ohio State in the none-too-partisan Gator Bowl. The game was played in Jacksonville. No bowl games are played in Ohio.

So, if the SEC plays other conferences about even, why do SEC teams keep winning national championships?

That answer, of course, is the BCS and its corporate underwriters, who have created a reliable business model for determining national champions that is in all respects a self-fulfilling prophecy designed to protect its primary investment.

The BCS business plan works like this: preseason rankings typically include two, three, or four SEC teams among the nation's top ten, more than from any other conference. From the outset, this bias for SEC teams builds into the system a near insurmountable advantage.

Start the season with two of the top four teams being from the SEC, as was the case in 2010 with Alabama and Florida, and in 2011 with Alabama and LSU, and the conference is virtually guaranteed to be represented in the title game -- and this is an important point -- even if neither of those two schools end up winning the conference.

To be the best, so goes to the old sports adage, you've got to beat the best. But since only SEC teams are consistently declared the best, only SEC teams get the chance to prove themselves against "the best."
It's a chicken-or-the-egg situation. Does the SEC get favorable rankings because it's so good? Or is the SEC so good because it gets favorable rankings? I argue for the latter.



In 2010, for example, the Auburn Tigers began the season with a consensus ranking of #23, behind SEC rivals Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, and Georgia. The only way a team regarded so lightly early in the season can possibly climb into the national championship game -- which Auburn did that year -- is to beat a slew of highly ranked opponents, which Auburn also did that year. Because polls are arranged from the outset so that SEC teams will face the most highly ranked opponents over the course of a season, only teams from the SEC are time and again able to manage this feat.

Consider again that the BCS was created by then-SEC commissioner Roy Kramer, also known as the "godfather of the BCS," a man who "attached plastic explosives to college football" and blew it up, according to an ESPN web post. ESPN, of course, is the commercial entity that dominates the college football landscape, and which has a near incalculable economic interest in promoting the nationwide perception of the SEC's elite status.

Actually, you can calculate that interest.

In 2008, ESPN and the SEC signed that a 15-year, $2.25 billion agreement allowing the network to televise the conference's games. In addition, ESPN owns the rights to televise all BCS games, including the national championship game.

In 2011-2012, ESPN and its partner ABC broadcast thirty-three of the thirty-five college bowl games. Which is to say that for all intents and purposes ESPN, a subsidiary of the Walt Disney Company, the most successful spinner of dreams and fables in world history, owns college football as a commercial entity.



Because ESPN essentially owns college football, the SEC agenda it pushes invariably sets the tone followed by other media. In February 2011, more than half a year before the start of the football season, ESPN placed three southern teams in its top-five ranking for 2011 and published an Internet story beneath the headline, "SEC teams dominate early look at 2011." The story referred to the rankings as though they were the result of some organic process.

A more honest headline would have been: "We've invested $2.25 billion in the SEC and we've decided to tell you, yet again, that SEC teams will dominate college football. Surprised?"

This is also why in June, as soon as SEC presidents and athletic directors announced their support of a four-team playoff -- so long as that four-team playoff might include the theoretical possibility that all four teams would come from the SEC, rather than from an equal dispersal of conference champions -- ESPN's flagship opinion show Pardon the Interruption instantly sanctified the decree by stating, "I'm in agreement this time with the SEC" (co-host Michael Wilbon) and, "I'm in agreement, too ... because as you know it's all about the Benjamins." (Fill-in co-host Jackie MacMullan.)

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Here's how the self-fulfilling BCS prophecy breaks down in the SEC's favor over the course of a season.
The preseason top twenty-five is stocked with the usual high-profile teams from across the country -- teams, not coincidentally, already scheduled for heavy broadcast exposure. Thanks to its gaudy TV contracts, many of these ranked teams come from the SEC.

Once the season is underway, if a highly ranked SEC team beats another highly ranked SEC team, the winner rises higher in the polls than it might normally, based on the fact that it's just beaten a "top-tier" team from the country's "elite" conference. By the same coin, the losing SEC team in this scenario doesn't drop as far as it might otherwise, since, after all, it has lost to a presumably powerful "top-tier" team from the country's "elite" conference.


When "good" SEC teams suffer losses in league play, this allegedly proves how tough the SEC is from top to bottom. If an SEC leader wins all of its league games, this allegedly proves how great that team is, given that it somehow managed to go undefeated against a monster SEC schedule -- ignored is the fact that SEC teams have pulled off this putative miracle for the last four straight seasons.

For God's sake, it's tougher to go undefeated in the Colonial Athletic Association than it is in the SEC.
If the same things happen in other conferences, however, the collective football media reverse the logic, claiming that if, say, a Mountain West Conference league leader loses to a lower-ranked Mountain West team, this merely proves how bad that losing team is, not how good the Mountain West is. In the same way, if a league leader goes undefeated in the Mountain West, the feat is said to merely demonstrate how weak the conference is, not accepted as proof of the strength of the unbeaten team.

Though its teams are rarely given the opportunity, the Mountain West, not the SEC, has the highest winning percentage of any conference in BCS bowl games (.750), even though its teams travel further to play in BCS games than just about any others and with fewer supporting fans.

The double standard also allows non-conference victories rolled up by "champions" such as the 2009 Alabama Crimson Tide against the likes of Florida International, North Texas, and Tennessee-Chattanooga to be regarded as evidence of gridiron distinction by those inside the solipsistic cocoon of the self-congratulatory SEC echo chamber.



As though empirical evidence is akin to fossil records and climate change data, it's as if no one in the evangelical South is capable of copping to the evidence at hand. In the 2010-11 bowl season, for instance, the SEC posted a .500 record (5-5), same as the then Pac-10 and MAC, slightly worse than the Big East (4-2), and slightly better than the ACC (4-5). Those results moved the wonks at statistical aggregator SportsRatings to report, "In the end, no conference really dominated the bowl season, with most leagues overperforming [Big Ten] or underperforming [SEC] only marginally against expectations."

Despite this underwhelming performance, however, the 2011 preseason table was set up once again to facilitate an SEC title run based on an utterly manufactured and bogus perception of strength.

The chicanery is only getting worse. The most bald-faced example of poll rigging occurred in 2011 when the Pac-12's then number-three-ranked Oregon Ducks lost a September game in Dallas to then number-four-ranked LSU by a score of 40-27. Following the defeat, the Ducks dropped 10 spaces in the polls, to number 13.

With the demotion, Oregon's championship hopes were essentially obliterated from the first week of the season.



Fine. This is the way it goes in a college football's "every game counts" season.

When the SEC's then #2 Alabama Crimson Tide lost at home to #1 LSU in November, however, it dropped only one space in the polls, to number three.

I was in the stadium for that 2011 alleged "game of the century" between LSU and Alabama, traveling to Tuscaloosa and paying out the ass for a scalped ticket because I was eager to see how mighty legends of the SEC take care of business at home.

It turned out to be a tough night for Alabama fans. The home team eked out only two field goals while converting on just three of eleven third-down opportunities and passing for a Pee Wee football-style 91 yards on nine total completions.

While LSU fans celebrated their 9-6 win in The Houndstooth Sports Bar after the game, I watched as pundits on ESPN went right to work setting up expectations of an LSU-Alabama title game rematch, virtually ignoring the Tide's dismal performance. The original "E" in ESPN stood for "entertainment," after all. Sports have always been a secondary concern.

Within two weeks, just-beaten Alabama had been scooted back up to number two behind top-ranked LSU, and yet another SEC team (Arkansas) had been quickly installed at number three, thus ensuring that no matter what happened next, the SEC would be guaranteed a national title. The system of propaganda reached its torrid, circle-jerk climax with the 2012 BCS title game between LSU and Alabama.



Computer programmers have a term for formulas that rely on flawed or biased original data: GIGO. Garbage in, garbage out. Relying as it does on a garbage premise from the get-go, the entire BCS formula is incapable of producing anything other than garbage results. This will become even more true, not less so, with the additional variables introduced by a four-team playoff.

My overall argument here is not that the SEC sucks. Clearly, it does not.

My argument is simply that if you look at results on the field -- not guesswork from writers, network suits, and BCS computers -- teams from the major conferences, and some schools from smaller conferences, are actually a lot more evenly matched than most fans believe.

Despite being approximately equal to other conferences in most quantifiable categories, the SEC and other southern schools are unfairly presented with championship opportunities and favors on what is far from a level playing field.

The SEC is better than other conferences at media manipulation and pretending that fiction is fact and fact is fiction. But as a top-to-bottom conference it is not better at football. The numbers bear that out.

Discuss

[M2]

Yeah, I read that article last week.

But until the SEC has to play by the same scheduling rules as the 'Big Boys' (PAC 12, etc.) they do have something like 6 BCS titles in a row.

So, there's that.

[Dinsdale]

Yes, it is all rigged. :hugerolleyes:

I'll discuss further at the end of the season, when the SEC wins yet another national championship.

We have an early entrant tossing his hat in the ring for Board Bitch of the Year.

The writer quite clearly explains why it's rigged, and your rebuttle involves "it's not rigged, because the SEC won the MNC."

You get laughed out of court frequently, I'm guessing.

Instead of discussing it further at the end of the season, why don't you tell us which parts of the article you dispute now?

[Van]

jackhammer sex with Mila Kunis

Yes.

[Van]

Sam, the most damning and pertinent point the guy made has to do with how important the preseason rankings are, and how they're always skewed to such a blatant degree in favor of the SEC that there's almost no way for the SEC not to come out on top. Win a game in the SEC, and your artificially high ranking soars. Lose a game in the SEC, and your artificially high ranking barely changes.

Because of this, every SEC tilt inherently shines with a patina of wildly exaggerated achievement.

Explain to me what Arkansas did last year to earn their ranking. Explain to me what Georgia has done to earn this year's ranking. Explain how at year's end they will deserve to be ranked so highly despite playing that schedule.

That's the problem.

[Dinsdale]

If you want claim to be as good as SEC teams, perhaps a good place to start would be to actually beat SEC teams.

Did you miss this?

SEC vs. PAC-12 regular season: 10-12
SEC vs. PAC-12 bowl games: 1-0
SEC vs. Big 12 regular season: 6-10
SEC vs. Big 12 bowl games: 21-8
SEC vs. ACC regular season: 42-36
SEC vs. ACC bowl games: 16-9
SEC vs. Big 10 regular season: 7-4
SEC vs. Big 10 bowl games: 19-19
SEC vs. Big East regular season: 16-15
SEC vs. Big East bowl game: 3-8
The record is clear. In head-to-head match-ups against other major conferences, the SEC has either a combined losing record or one that's generally only a little better than even.

So, by your logic, the PAC and B12 are better conferences than the SEC, right?

[Goober McTuber]

You have to wonder how the BCS standings might have looked over the years if the polls they were using weren’t allowed to generate any rankings until mid-October. That might have eliminated the SEC pre-season bias.

[Van]

Sam, obviously the media goes a very long way towards determining the rankings.

As he said...

Consider again that the BCS was created by then-SEC commissioner Roy Kramer, also known as the "godfather of the BCS," a man who "attached plastic explosives to college football" and blew it up, according to an ESPN web post. ESPN, of course, is the commercial entity that dominates the college football landscape, and which has a near incalculable economic interest in promoting the nationwide perception of the SEC's elite status.

Actually, you can calculate that interest.

In 2008, ESPN and the SEC signed that a 15-year, $2.25 billion agreement allowing the network to televise the conference's games. In addition, ESPN owns the rights to televise all BCS games, including the national championship game.

In 2011-2012, ESPN and its partner ABC broadcast thirty-three of the thirty-five college bowl games. Which is to say that for all intents and purposes ESPN, a subsidiary of the Walt Disney Company, the most successful spinner of dreams and fables in world history, owns college football as a commercial entity.

Because ESPN essentially owns college football, the SEC agenda it pushes invariably sets the tone followed by other media. In February 2011, more than half a year before the start of the football season, ESPN placed three southern teams in its top-five ranking for 2011 and published an Internet story beneath the headline, "SEC teams dominate early look at 2011." The story referred to the rankings as though they were the result of some organic process.

A more honest headline would have been: "We've invested $2.25 billion in the SEC and we've decided to tell you, yet again, that SEC teams will dominate college football. Surprised?"

...never mind the fact that ABC/ESPN isn't the only major media source with an obvious vested interest in making sure the SEC is on top. Remember, there's also that little sweetheart deal rival network CBS has with the SEC.

If you think the media isn't crazily biased towards the SEC, you're off your rocker. If you also think that this crazy media bias doesn't directly influence every voting entity in the country, you're hopelessly insane. Even the computer polls still work off of these ridiculous rankings put together by media-biased humans.

College football is not an objective enterprise. It's entirely subjective. Lacking any way to create a level playing field, college football is nothing but one big beauty pageant, with the media serving as the sole judge. In this case one of the contestants is the daughter of the judge, rendering the whole thing a farce.

The system has been rigged ever since 2008, when ESPN bought the SEC. Add to that their ownership of the BCS and this becomes nearly a fait accompli. Ever since ESPN bought both entities no title game has been played without an SEC team involved, even in years when teams from other conferences had the same (or better) record as the SEC squad.

Mere coincidence?

Are you an idiot?

[Van]

ESPN is a national media outlet based in Bristol, CT. All those television sets and computer screens in L.A., New York, Miami, Chicago, Houston, etc., receive their college football news almost exclusively via ESPN. And when it's not ESPN it's often CBS, who are also in bed with the SEC.

The SEC doesn't win all those championships if the system hadn't been rigged to give them those opportunities. Of the last six title games, at least three of them easily could have involved no SEC teams.

[Dinsdale]

Has nothing to do with, you know, actually winning championship games.

Bad, bad lawyer.

Didn't a certain SEC team get to the BCS game with 2 losses on their record?

Funny how when you're handed opportunities to play for a championship, you tend to win more of them.

The other conferences actually have to earn a spot in the game.

[SunCoastSooner]

Because Baton Rouge, Gainesville, and Tuscaloosa are much larger media markets than Los Angeles. And Houston, and New York, and Chicago, and Miami ......

Has nothing to do with, you know, actually winning championship games.

You're supposed to be an attorney? I feel bad for your clients . . .

Remind me what Major BCS Universities are in NYC or Houston? The only two in Chicago or Miami are Northwestern and University of Miami; both are private schools and neither has an enrollment of more than 18k students. And are you trying to claim Miami media isn't in the SEC footprint with the University of Florida? And what the hell does that have to with them in comparison to college towns in the SEC?

Of communities in the United States with the most mass media the SEC has TWENTY-THREE that are in the top 100 BEFORE THE INCLUSION OF MISSOURI AND TEXAS A&M!!! That's a hair shy of one in every four of the top 100 media markets in the country within the SEC footprint and you're claiming other conferences have some sort of advantage in media exposure over the SEC?!?! are you fucking brain dead? Nashville (30), Atlanta (9), Memphis (44), New Orleans (54), Birmingham (40), Tampa (12), Miami (16), Jacksonville (50), Louisville (48), Palm Beach (38), Orlando (19), Ft. Myers/Naples (64), Knoxville (60), Lexington (63), Mobile/Pensacola (59), Shreveport (81), Columbia (83), Huntsville/Decatur (84), Chattanooga (85), Jackson (87), Baton Rouge (93), Savannah (99) and Little Rock (57) are all top 100 in the country media markets. And once again this is all not even taking into consideration the markets that Missouri and Texas A&M are bringing you!!!

[Van]

And none of that even matters because the power of ESPN and CBS dominate all across the nation. Their influence is paramount wherever voters can be found.

[Dinsdale]

Dude... they lost to Kentucky.

SECBSHism at its finest.

[Dinsdale]

And drilled Ohio State. Thus making the very point the writer wishes to dispute: that the SEC is strong top to bottom.

For real?

More SECnology at work.

Kentucky beats LSU, it means the conference is "strong top to bottom." So, y'all's redneck science also applies this to the other conferences, right?

Wait... it only applies to the SEC, and a cellar-dweller beating a top team from any other conference means "the conference sucks."

Done KYOA yet? I'll bet not...

But just what teams would you care to rank in the top ten ahead of the SEC teams that are there? You see some teams in other conferences that you feel are better?

Georgia. You're defending Georgia's inclusion.


For the 8 millionth time, are you starting to understand why the people in regions that are considered more intelligent than y'all's (meaning everywhere) make fun of you?

[Dinsdale]

By all means, someone please point out the teams that you think are top ten teams in the place of the SEC schools ranked there now.

OK.

Georgia is a fucking joke... every bit as deserving of #6 as Kal.

West Virginia, Wisconsin, Michigan St, and Clemson should all be ranked ahead of Georgia, South Carolina, and Arky.

Re your other mention: I don't see Indiana beating Ohio State often. Nor do I see Washington State knocking off USC or Oregon.

About as often as Kentucky beats LSU, or Vandy beats Bama.

Just a stupid fucking argument, so please stop it.

BTW, the 'Over-rated/Under-rated' chart posted elsewhere had 5 SEC teams in the top 25. Hmmmmmmm..........

Because a shit-ass SEC team beats a higher ranked SEC team, therefore they must be the best team in the land, right?

Jeebus dude -- did you even read the article? I know it didn't have pictures or scratch-n-sniffs, but give it a whirl. You obviously didn't (or get a Yankee to explain it to you), or you'd realize every argument you (and JSC) made was shot full of holes before you even made it, since SECBSH is a firm believer in repeating something so often it becomes reality.

[Van]

Dude... they lost to Kentucky.

And drilled Ohio State. Thus making the very point the writer wishes to dispute: that the SEC is strong top to bottom.

That doesn't make the point at all. The only way it would make that point is if Kentucky drilled Ohio St.

I honestly do see the point y'all are trying to make as far as the early rankings. No doubt there's an advantage to being ranked high right off the bat. But just what teams would you care to rank in the top ten ahead of the SEC teams that are there? You see some teams in other conferences that you feel are better?

There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to assume there aren't. Why must we assume sight-unseen that these middling SEC teams automatically deserve high rankings while similar teams from other conferences don't?

[Van]

Re your other mention: I don't see Indiana beating Ohio State often. Nor do I see Washington State knocking off USC or Oregon.

Just like you rarely see Kentucky, Mississippi St or Vandy knock off Bama or LSU. What about it?

Btw, Washington St is 33-43-6 vs Oregon and 8-58-4 vs USC.

Kentucky is 2-35-1 vs Bama and 16-39-1 vs LSU.

Vandy is 18-61-4 vs Bama and 7-22-1 vs LSU.

Mississippi St is 16-73-3 vs Bama and 34-65-3 vs LSU.

Indiana is 12-68-5 vs Michigan and 9-52 vs Michigan.

So of all of those, Kentucky is the worst. They beat the better SEC teams less often than the dregs from other conferences beat their better teams.

[Van]

Obviously all the voters and all the computers...even though they're scattered all over the country...are owned by ESPN and CBS.

Owned by? No. That would be the BCS and SEC, lock, stock and barrel. GREATLY influenced by? You betcha. When it comes to opinions on college football, there isn't a corner of this country whose perceptions aren't overwhelmingly influenced by the nonstop barrage of SEC!SEC!SEC! being administered to them by ESPN and CBS.

[Van]

Sam, it's exactly the opposite of that, because the national media constantly paints an enormously unflattering picture of life in the South. In terms of college football, however, all the national media (ESPN and CBS, primarily, since those are the two juggernauts of college football coverage) ever does is ram down our throats this constant message of how deep and tough the SEC is from top to bottom, when clearly that is not and has never been the case.

[Van]

Auburn only purchased their way to one title, so quit shamelessly ballsacking teams you're supposed to hate with every fiber of your being.

It's really quite unseemly.

[M Club]

Because Baton Rouge, Gainesville, and Tuscaloosa are much larger media markets than Los Angeles. And Houston, and New York, and Chicago, and Miami ......

Has nothing to do with, you know, actually winning championship games.

1. ESPN doesn't have to sell SEC football to SEC fans, it has to sell it to people who otherwise could give a fuck. They all live in LA, Houston, NY, and Chicago.

2. CFB doesn't have a championship game. It just arbitrarily decides a matchup and gives the winner a trophy.

3. You suffer from Stockholm Syndrome. LSU was the obvious #1 team last year yet even you acknowledge a team that couldn't even win their conference division as the national champion. (Wonder what your argument in 06 about a Michigan/Ohio State rematch sounded like...)

[M Club]

You know, I took a nice big doodie today. Pretty sure your next post will be about how that also relates to USC, dumbfuck.

[King Crimson]

so quit shamelessly ballsacking teams you're supposed to hate with every fiber of your being.

It's really quite unseemly.

agree with this part. this is what i've been posting about since Texas won in 05 and the weird SEC solidarity thing happened. fuck texas. i wanted them to lose in 05 against USC. badly. the world is a beautiful place without a UT BCS title. now, it's the same apocalypse horror we are trying to come to grips with. the media driven weird "confederacy" of SEC brotherhood is weird and media created. by ESPN. and they've done it masterfully. listening to Gary Danielson blow the SEC on a network game is brutal. "that's a 4 yard gain.....and shows you why this is the best football ever played anywhere".

now we have Auburn and Alabama fans bunny humping each other and UF or whoever all over the place. fuck that.

props on the titles, all scoreboard....but a lot of us remember when the SEC was a pansy conference and none of this is eternal. or ever was. for all this new smashmouth identity, we all remember the spread old ball coach NC and probation at Kentucky for Hal Mumme.

[Van]

Except they don't, at least in 'Spray's case. He openly roots for Bama come bowl season. (LSU, too, another natural rival of Auburn's.) The guy was absolutely giddy about Bama's first title under Saban, and I was... :doh: "Dude, do you realize how bad this is for your team? If Saban sticks around, they're going to own the state of Alabama. That hurts Auburn, you know."

And sure enough, other than for the one year when Auburn caught lightning in a cash-filled bottle with Scam Knewnothing, Auburn has diminished to irrelevancy while Bama is back atop the college football world, with no signs of either situation changing.

[Dinsdale]

Except they don't, at least in 'Spray's case.

Not in any of their cases.

There's two things about SECFan that I don't like...

his face.

[Van]

Well, true. It's not as if Jsc doesn't also openly root for his team's natural rivals Bama, Auburn and Florida.

[Dinsdale]

They claim such hate, then pull that shit... but BSH is no stranger to KHOA.

I always root for PAC teams in OOC games, always with one exception -- I don't want UDub to lose every game... I want their fucking plane to crash on the way to the game. Every win UDud racks up is a knife in my back. I go to yard sales and buy up old VHS copies of The Color Purple so I can crap on them. I run every car I see on the road with that stupid W sticker into the ditch, because those people deserve to be punished every minute of every day.

But it's odd how quickly BSH changes their tune when they think they can become less of a mouth-breather for a day.

[Van]

You will NEVER see me rooting for Auburn. Maybe I'm old school 'cause I'm old, but I don't know any UA or AU fans who want anything but defeat for the other team.

You do too. You know 'Spray, don't you?

[Van]

Spray's being from Georgia may make his appreciation of the hatred betwixt Auburn and Alabama fans less intense.

Callin' out 'Spray's Iron Bowl bonafides?! Ooooh, now them's fightin' words!

[Left Seater]

the 06 Michigan team that was demolished by USC in the bowl game? USC would have beat Ohio State just as badly but you cant win a national title if they dont allow you in to the game

Get over yourself. USC was going to play in the title game in '06 till they lost to UCLA on the last weekend of the season. It was your spot to lose and you did.

No one but USC kept them from playing in that game. Well and maybe UCLA had a little to do with it too.

[SunCoastSooner]

Hmmmm...I Googled Alabama coeds to find that pic, so I don't know....

Look, you non-SECers can probably rest easy this year. Either Alabama or LSU is gonna lose a game...that's a given. Odds are the SEC champ will have a loss as well.

Wisconsin could easily go undefeated. Oklahoma could easily go undefeated. Florida State could easily go undefeated.

There you go.

No SEC team in BCS title game.

I find it unlikely that any of those three teams go undefeated.

Oklahoma has a brutal late season schedule. Florida State has a weakling schedule but is over-hyped as usual. Wisconsin always finds a way to trip on its own dick in the regular season.

[M2]

Okay. Then whatever school gets there...just beat the damn SEC champ.

Hmmmmmm.... I get it.


Since the SEC Champ is basically Notre Dame (lite) they get an automatic bid to the BCS Championship game with 1 loss, whereas teams with 1 loss from a different conference like Okie State (last year) and furd (last year) have to sit and watch the game on TV because of the lack of preferential treatment bestowed upon them.


Sounds fair to me.

[M2]

"routed"

Even an SEC fan should be expected to do better than that.

[Van]

Where have I ever openly "routed" (sic) for Alabama?

Try the title game against Texas, for starters. That's when I really started giving you shit about how badly you're cutting off your nose to spite your face. You'd rather ballsuck the SEC than root for what's best for your own team.

I couldn't believe how blatantly you were rooting for your supposed blood rival to win a national championship. After all your talk about how no other rivalry can even come close to the Iron Bowl in terms of matching each fanbase's level of real hatred for one another, seeing you so hungrily lave Crimson Cock just blew me away.

You also rooted for them against Michigan St. I don't recall to a certaintly but I'd bet anything that if we could roll the tape back we'd see where you additionally rooted for Bama against Utah, your argument being that Utah had no business playing in the Sugar Bowl.

[M2]

"routed"

Even an SEC fan should be expected to do better than that.

See my sig.

Did you somehow miss my post to you... or are you just trying to divert ?

[M2]

Did you somehow miss my post to you... or are you just trying to divert ?

Beg your pardon?

Really ?


Ok, it's 5 or 6 posts up and quoted you.



Let me know if you need some more help and I'll gladly post the quote for you.

[Van]

Stanford also beat USC in the Coliseum. Care to name anything that even approaches a similar quality of win by Bama during the regular season?

[M2]

Okie State lost to Iowa State. Bye bye.

Didn't LSU lose to Vandy one year and played in the BCS Championship game with 2 losses

Stanford lost by 23 points to team beaten by LSU. Bye bye.

LSJU handled U$C in LA... and that same U$C beat Oregon in Oregon.


Remember... Oregon had to come down south and play LSU on the border of Louisiana, and didn't play them in Oregon.


Looks like LSJU and Okie State have a better case than LSU or Alabama.


See how this works ?

[Left Seater]

Did you somehow miss my post to you... or are you just trying to divert ?

Did you somehow miss my post to you... or are you just trying to divert ?

Sincerely,

LAX

[SunCoastSooner]

It's unfortunate that we have a poster like butspray who makes all those northern stereotypes about people in the south being uneducated morons appear true. :?