The Day After: Texas A&M 26, Missouri 40

Well, the Fire Franchione-o-Meter has finally hit 0. Raise your hand if at this point you don’t think Franchione will be gone next year. Didn’t think so.

We didn’t look that bad against Missouri. It was a lot closer than the final score would indicate. We finally spit out a passable passing game, and the McGee-Bennett hook-ups that I’d dreamed about finally happened, but they were about 11 games too late (Bennett is 6-7, a freak athlete with great hands, is unstoppable, and the rest of our receivers can’t get separation to save their lives. How is it that we haven’t used Bennett like an Antonio Gates or a Jason Whitten? One of the 534,234,234 reasons that Franchione should be fired). In the end though, we couldn’t stop their offense, and I never had the feeling that we’d be able to pull the upset. Bottom line is that we’re a Top 40 team, and we played about as well as a Top 40 team would play against a Top 5 team in an away game.

I mean, other than that, there’s not much more left to say. Like I said before, Franchione’s only graceful exit would be to beat t.u. two weeks from now, but that now looks tougher than I’d thought it be. Mike Leach can whine all he wants, but his team got handed by the Longhorns. I want to know what Jamaal Charles is smoking right now because the dude is on fire. And unfortunately, Colt McCoy has picked it up too. Did anyone know that Opie could run? I’m starting to feel that God is a Longhorns fan. Or that Mack Brown has sold his soul to Satan, which I think is a more plausible explanation of the Longhorns’ season thus far.

Since all I can say about the Aggies’ loss is that we lost, I’m tacking on the quick hits across the board in this post as well:

Ohio State goes down to Illinois. All I can say is, “I told you so.” See my last Quick Hits Across the Board. I’ve been watching this Buckeyes team, and they were one of the weakest number one teams in recent memory. This Illinois team is a pretty good team, but I’m not ready to anoint Juice Williams with the holy oil as the next Vince Young. He needs to complete more than half his passes and get a lot more yards running and passing before I’d be impressed.

Boston College goes down yet again. Again, all I can say is, “I told you so.” And again, see my last Quick Hits Across the Board. What do you get when you have a team that plays no one and has a quarterback who puts up gaudy stats against cupcake teams? An overrated team. I’ve been sick and tired of hearing about national championship talk surrounding BC, and I’m glad that it’s ended.

Michigan blows it. And that’s too bad. They could have been the feel-good story of the year. But without Mike Hart or Chad Henne playing in the game, I don’t think this is a surprise to anyone. I can’t believe, however, that Lloyd Carr didn’t put those two in the game to save them up for the Ohio State game. Wisconsin exactly isn’t a McNeese State in which you can save your starters against. Carr is another bozo who the Michigan faithful won’t miss next year.

Georgia is the hottest team in the SEC. I never thought I’d say that during this season, but it’s true. Auburn got totally whooped on. It makes me wonder if we really do want Tommy Tuberville if his teams are going through their own whippings. And Auburn’s offense is ranked 90^th or something pretty bad like that. I just don’t picture Tuberville changing the A&M program into a perennial Top 10 program. I have a sick feeling about the potential hiring move, and usually I’m dead-on about these sick feelings.

LSU vs. OU should be the national championship. It’s what everyone in the country wants to see (unless you’re a Ducks fan), and there’s a good chance that it can happen, but both teams face major hurdles in the forms of conference championships. If they both win the rest of their games, they both deserve to be there. Here are some other championship scenario run-downs:

Oregon vs. OU: I might give the Ducks the edge in this game. Big 12 teams don’t match up well against Pac 10 teams for some reason.

LSU vs. Kansas: LSU in a romp. KU hung 76 on Nebraska, but the Aggies also clobbered Nebraska. Other than that, KU has yet to play a quality team.

LSU vs. Missouri: Again, LSU in a romp. Chase Daniels looked like Tom Brady against our D, but our defense doesn’t have Glenn Dorsey running after you all night.

Oregon vs. Kansas or Missouri: Oh gawd, one of the most boring national championship games ever. Should this happen, the clamor for a BCS play-off will get even louder. By the way, I will always be against a play-off system. By not having a play-off system, every game each week has significance. It’s what makes college football the most exciting sport to watch. Have you seen NBA regular season games lately? It looks as if the players don’t realize that exhibition season is over. Shaq looks as if he’s going to try to sleepwalk through the season until the playoffs start. And that’s too bad, because the way the Heat are playing, they’ll be lucky to get the 8^th seed in the atrocious Eastern Conference.

At least there’s Aggie Basketball: The Texas A&M Men’s basketball season started this weekend at #14, and the arrival of DeAndre Jordan makes me almost forget the terrible football season we’ve had. The only thing is that Michael Beasley of Kansas State is even better and will make Kevin Durant look like Adam Keefe.

Game Preview: Texas A&M vs. Missouri

And the losses keep piling. We’re going to get crushed again folks. It’ll be almost a dejavu of last week’s game, but possibly worse because of all the distractions that have been surrounding the Franchione controversy. Missouri is a pretty damn good team who played Oklahoma close in their one loss, and I’d put Missouri ahead of Kansas right now. They killed Texas Tech and destroyed an underrated Colorado team that’s poised to make a return to prominence under Dan Hawkins.

What’s more, Chase Daniels is hands down the best quarterback in the Big 12 (If you’re a Texas Tech fan, don’t even think about bringing up Graham Harrell. Please.) In fact, if you were to rank a QB based on a combination of personal stats and team’s success, Daniels would have to be the number one QB in the nation. Dennis Dixon is a close second, but he doesn’t have the eye-popping numbers that Daniels does. Plus, he’s got a stud running back in Jonathan Stewart in the backfield. Tebow is a beast, but he also isn’t in the same stats category when it comes to passing yards, and Florida has three losses. As for Matt Ryan, Ryan is the single most overrated quarterback since Chris Leak. I’ve been railing about Boston College on several of my posts, but they climbed the rankings by beating up on a bunch of patty cakes in the weak ACC, their one impressive win was against Virginia Tech in which they barely escaped, and when they finally play a Florida State team that’s starting to gel but still not a Top 25 team, they fold over. Why is BC even in the Top 10? Why is such a team even allowed to exist? Why is Matt Ryan fawned over as the next Doug Flutie when he’s going to be carrying a 2^nd string QB’s jockstrap in the NFL?

The thing that makes me sad about Chase Daniels’s ascension is that I distinctly remember our 25-19 win against Missouri last year. Both A&M and Missouri were up-and-coming teams in the Big 12, and both Daniels and McGee were seen as precocious sophomores who had bright futures ahead of them. I had the feeling that I was witnessing a critical crossroads, and I figured that the next year the game between the two squads would have significance in the Big 12 title and possibly the national championship.

What a difference a year makes. A year later, Daniels and the Tigers have taken off as I thought they would, and they’re ranked in the Top 10. If they played Oklahoma again on a neutral field, I’m not sure if I’d pick OU. But, as for McGee and the Aggies, this season has been an absolute disaster this side of Nebraska and Notre Dame. And it’s not for a lack of talent, but due to a series of joker moves by the coaching staff on and off the field. Every morning I wake up pissed off because (a) t.u. has escaped through a two-loss season when they should have five losses (I’m convinced that Mack Brown made a pact with the devil after Vince Young left) and (b) we’re stuck with an even bigger clown than Mack Brown and it’s going to cost $8 million just to buy him out. Unfreakinbelievable. Oh, and we’re losing this game 45-10.

Next update: Sunday—The Fire Franchione-o-Meter hits 0.

Quick Hits Across the Board

-Darren McFadden is one crazy mofo. 321 rushing yards against South Carolina. I don't think he'll put up Adrian Peterson's numbers next year, but he's a beast. Too bad that Arkansas plays in the brutal SEC and that my sister would be a better QB than Casey Dick. Did they really have to take away the 2 yards so that he tied the record rather than breaking it?

-t.u. continues to get lucky. Unbelievable. After their lucky escape from Nebraska, they escape yet again from Oklahoma State. I can almost guarantee that they're going to be blown out by Texas Tech this Saturday.

-Oregon, not so impressive. Allow me the first to say that I think Dennis Dixon and the Ducks are over-rated. If they played LSU or Oklahoma tomorrow, it wouldn't even be close.

-USC vs. Cal is a snoozer. Biggest disappointment game of the year. A month in it looked as if the game would decide the national championship. Now it's for 3rd place in the Pac 10.

-Ohio State could be upset. Illinois is a pretty good team this year, and OSU doesn't really impress me. I smell an upset.

-Biggest story of the week. The biggest story of the week is that Franchione is going to get bought out. Both sides can deny it all they want, but it's a done deal. I mentioned Rich Rodriguez last post, but now that I think about it, I think Jeff Tedford might be a better replacement. Cal was non-existent program before Tedford came knocking.

Next Update: Friday, Game Preview against Missouri

The Day After: Texas A&M 14, Oklahoma 42

I hate that I was so dead-on in my prediction of the A&M-OU game (see my previous post). I should give up my day job and become a gambler in Vegas. Not only was my predicted score prophetic, but just like I thought, the Aggies got nowhere with their running game, and then went to their passing game at the end to put on some garbage points in the fourth quarter. It’s this kind of predictability in our game plan that makes me want to light myself on fire. What’s worse, the Sooner just absolutely dominated us in all phases of the game. Their QB Bradford had a field day hooking up with his tight end Gresham, and he had one more touchdown the generous four touchdowns I’d predicted for him. I’ve had enough, and every faithful Aggie should have had enough by now. It’s time for Franchione to go.

The only reason that Franchione hasn’t scored a 0 on the Fire Franchione meter is because if the Aggies were to miraculously win against Mizzou, t.u., and their bowl opponent, I could see Franchione having a slim chance of keeping his job, which would be a big mistake. What’s left for Coach Franchione is to win the game against t.u. so that he can bow out with some dignity intact.

It’s time to start talking about the coaches who might replace Franchione next year. There’s been talk of Tommy Tuberville as well as the dude at Rutgers and possibly even Steve Spurrier. Auburn is having a decent season in the brutal SEC this year, but I have a hard time picturing laid-back Tuberville taking A&M to greatness. As for the Ol’ Ball Coach, I love the man, but his Fun’N Gun offense hasn’t exactly taken off in South Carolina, and I don’t see it being the best fit in A&M either. I personally think that Rich Rodriguez at West Virginia would be a good fit, and while he’s got a good program at West Virginia, I’d think that he’d be willing to leave for the right person; after all, Texas A&M offers the chance to rebuild one of the most tradition-rich programs in the nation while the state of West Virginia is the armpit of America.

Next update: Wednesday-Quick Hits Across the Board

Game Preview: Texas A&M vs. Oklahoma

I hate to be a wet rag, but we're getting blown out by Oklahoma for the following reasons:

-It's in Norman
-Sooners had a bye week to prepare
-OU needs a blow-out win to move up the BCS rankings with the season winding down
-They're pissed that they had a lackluster outing against Iowa State in the last game
-They have the 3rd ranked rushing defense in the nation, and the running game is the only thing we have going for us this year.

All of this adds up to bad, bad signs for the Aggies. Let's just hope that it's not going to be the 77-0 debacle of a couple of years ago in which Sports Illustrated felt compelled to write a whole feature piece on the route. My favorite part of that story was when Terrence Murphy was quoted as saying something along the lines of, "If I'd caught that first pass, it would have been 77-7." Painfully hilarious.

Bradford will have about 250 yards and 4 TDs, Malcolm Kelly will get his 100 yards+ receiving, and They'll gain another 200 yards on the ground. In the meantime, they'll stack eight men in the box, but we'll try to pound out the triple option anyway and gain nothing in the ground for three quarters before trying to pass when we're behind. It'll basically be like the Kansas game but worse because OU is a more talented team, and Stoops is one of the top coaches in the country. Our only chance is for Bradford to suddenly wake up tomorrow and realize that he's a redshirt freshmen who'd still be riding the pine if Rhett Bomar hadn't royally fucked up. Or for McGee and Bennett to realize that were two of the most highly-recruited players out of Texas, ignore Franchione's plays, and go ballistic on the OU defense with a tag team aerial attack between the two of them. Not gonna happen. I'm predicting that the final score will be 42-7.

Next update: Sunday--The Franchione Fire-O-Meter heats up.