Unverified Voracity Is Small, Fiesty
Um... okay. An excellent summary of the trouble newspapers find themselves in:
Check out top recruit McGuffie on the Web...says the Free Press; then they suggest you go to youtube and type in "McGuffie" to get some highlights. One: duh? Two: when they put this story on the web it did not contain even a single link, let alone actual embedded video. So the offline version basically reads: "the internet is more interesting than this"; the online version reads "we are clueless at the interent."
A watershed moment in this blog's history came when some poor misguided soul wandered by looking for pictures of "tim tebow shirtless." This led to the OMG shirtless scale of recruiting hottness -- Tebow was, at the time, a totally shirtless five-star recruit. Well, SMQB has done me one better.
Spielman says we are the winrar. Freep:
What are your thoughts on the Big Ten season? I like Michigan. I think (defensive coordinator) Ron English will do a good job. The middle of their defense is pretty solid with Terrance Taylor, Jamar Adams, Morgan Trent on the corner, Shawn Crable back at linebacker. I think the most dominating tackle in college football is Jake Long. As far as physical run blocking, he knocks them out. Chad Henne, he's gotta be working on his doctorate by now, it seems. Mike Hart's a Heisman Trophy candidate. Mario Manningham. ... They're going to be good. Wisconsin's going to be good. Penn State's going to be better, and Ohio State's going to be 8-0 when they play Wisconsin. That's how their schedule sets up. Ohio State's defense is going to be stronger than they were last year. It's just a matter of the young offense growing and getting better each week.Yeah, about that. David Jones has no fans in Pennsylvania, where he covers collegiate athletics much like Drew Sharpe does: LOOK AT ME LOOK AT ME I AM NEGATIVE. So they'll love this cracked-out speculation:What are the chances Michigan goes undefeated? As good as they've been in a long time for Michigan. Now the question is how are they going to replace a pretty darn good defense? Now I know they have some players back, but when you lose guys like Alan Branch and Leon Hall, you're replacing future NFL players. ... They certainly have all the tools in place to go on a big run this year. And they finished poorly last year. I did that (Rose Bowl) game last year for ESPN radio, and that wasn't the Michigan team that I covered numerous times last year. I didn't know what that was. That wasn't the team that I expected to see.
If you're thinking contiguous states -- West Virginia, Pittsburgh, Louisville or Missouri -- start thinking outside the box. Way outside.Texas is a weird suggestion, but has some precedent because when the SWC started breaking up the Longhorns and Big Ten had serious discussions about the possibility of a union. Florida has no such history and is in a stronger conference in a location farther away. But hey, it's in a newspaper so it's got to be credible.Texas is known to be displeased in the Big 12, both because of a low revenue stream and a dearth of big-market, high-academic-profile schools such as itself. I would bet anything that if Delany and the Big Ten presidents can't court Notre Dame in a third try, UT would be a great fallback position. Six million TV sets in the state of Texas.
And former Big 12 commissioner Kevin Weiberg's recent move to the Big Ten Network only adds to the intrigue. He knows about Texas' TV clout better than anyone.
And if not Texas, stay south. Florida? It's by no means out of the realistic realm. More snowbirds are from the Midwest than any other area. Think UF wouldn't move? Think again.
(via Dave Heller.)