College Football Quiz: 1) Who leads the nation in touchdown passes in Division I (FBS) this year? [Hint: On a top 25 team.] 2) Who is college football’s all-time leading rusher (FBS) with 6,397 yards? Answers below.
BCS Review
1. Alabama .988…Auburn, Sat., 3:30 PM ET…be there!
2. Florida State .970…Florida
3. Ohio State .920…at Michigan
4. Auburn .824
5. Missouri .808…Texas A&M…a win and Mizzou goes to SEC title game
6. Clemson .773…at No. 10 South Carolina
14. Northern Illinois .462
16. Fresno State .412
So here’s the deal with Nos. 14 and 16 and the quest for an at-large BCS bowl bid. Northern Illinois is ranked 20 and 17 in the two human polls that are part of the BCS calculation (Harris and USA TODAY), but No. 7 in the computer rank*! Fresno is 13 in both human polls, but 17 in the computer ranking. Of course the Huskies are not the 7th best team in the country as the computers have it, but it’s amazing how Northern Illinois vaulted over Fresno. The Bulldogs must be pulling their hair out, even though for much of the season I thought Northern Illinois was better.
*NIU was 12th in the computer ranking the week before.
However, NIU (12-0) now has just one game left against Buffalo or Bowling Green in the MAC championship, after defeating Western Michigan (1-11) 33-14 on Tuesday night, while Fresno plays at San Jose State (5-6) and then either Utah State or Boise State in the Mountain West championship, i.e., a tougher ending that could gain the Bulldogs some computer points.
The only other two big anomalies in the BCS are Clemson, 4 in both human polls but a computer rank of 10, and No. 12 Arizona State, 18 and 16 in the human polls, but 6 in the computers.
–In NIU’s win against Western Michigan, quarterback Jordan Lynch broke his own FBS record by rushing 27 times for 321 yards and three touchdowns in a game played in awful conditions.
–Officials in the State Attorney’s office in Tallahassee told CBSSports.com and ESPN.com on Tuesday that their investigation into the Jameis Winston sexual assault case won’t be filed until after the ACC championship game and Heisman trophy voting deadline. The title game is Dec. 7 and Heisman votes must be in by Dec. 9 for the Dec. 14 award show.
—Hawaii is 0-11 this season, but has two overtime losses, plus defeats by 2, 5 and 7 points (5 points to Fresno State).
–So I posted my last column before the Patriots-Broncos contest, but saw New England lose fumbles on its first three possessions and fall behind 24-0 at half. Went to bed like I’ve heard many of you did (us Eastern time zone folks), and was then shocked with the rest to wake up and see the Pats had won 34-31 in overtime. Tom Brady threw three touchdown passes as New England scored on its first five possessions of the second half, while Peyton Manning had a very poor game, passing for just 150 yards with an interception, though Knowshon Moreno rushed for a career high 224 yards on 37 carries. Denver lost three fumbles as well, including the critical one in OT when a New England punt bounced off the leg of Denver backup cornerback Tony Carter and was recovered by the Pats at the Denver 13. Three plays later a Stephen Gostkowski field goal won it.
So in their 14 meetings between the two quarterbacks, Brady is 10-4.
New England, 8-3 and with an easy remaining schedule, not only is in line for a first-round bye, but conceivably could get the overall home field advantage as both Denver and Kansas City sit at 9-2, though play each other this weekend.
—San Francisco held the reeling Washington Redskins (3-8) to just 190 yards of total offense on Monday night, running their record to 7-4, as the 49ers won 27-6. Washington coach Mike Shanahan, on the hot seat, said, “we haven’t got dominated like that since I’ve been here.”
Of course the story is Robert Griffin III, who has been a shell of his rookie performance last season, completing only 17-of-27 for 127 yards while throwing an interception.
“After the way the Washington football team played on national TV on Monday night, they may have to change their nickname to the Thicksins.
“After this 27-6 loss….you can baste Coach Mike Shanahan; roast Jim Haslett, who hasn’t fielded a good defense since the 20th century; stick offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan and his goofy fourth-down call on a spit to rotate; and definitely leave Robert Griffin III in the oven a whole lot longer because he’s clearly not a fully cooked NFL quarterback yet.”
“As either a defensive coordinator or NFL head coach, his last 12 defenses since 2001 have had these gruesome rankings in points allowed: 31st this season, 22, 21, 21, 31, 31, 28, 28, 27, 14, 26 and 27. One mediocre defense, three poor and the rest lousy out of his last 12. Even if his players are bad, wow.”
Back to RG III, he is the 26th-rated passer out of 34 in the league with a quarterback rating of 81.9 compared with 102.4 last season. [14 TDs – 11 INTs vs. 20 and 5 in 2012.]
As for Shanahan, he is now 24-35 in his fourth season at the helm. Does he survive, assuming, say, they finish 5-11? Can he get the most out of Griffin and ensure RG III’s development? Probably.
–Meanwhile, Jets QB Geno Smith is the worst-rated signal-caller in football, 62.1, 8 TDs, league high 18 INTs and five lost fumbles, while the Giants’ Eli Manning isn’t much better at 72.5 and 17 picks.
But if Jets fans thought maybe coach Rex Ryan would switch to Matt Simms at quarterback for this Sunday’s Dolphins game, Rex has committed to Smith, saying Geno gives the team the best chance to win.
[By the way, Mark Sanchez was interviewed by the Star-Ledger and its now been 8 weeks since his shoulder surgery. Sanchez said he’ll be stronger than ever on his return and wants to play for the Jets next season. It will be interesting to see if the Jets will now entertain the thought in the offseason of bringing him back even though it has long been felt he’d be released.]
—Seattle Seahawks starting cornerback Walter Thurmond was suspended for four games for violating the league’s substance abuse policy. The other corner, Brandon Browner, may face a one-year ban. Not good.
–Regarding all the losing clubs that still have a shot at the playoffs, at this stage of the season, since 1970, just three teams with losing records went on to make serious playoff noise, as Michael Salfino of the Wall Street Journal points out. The 2009 Jets and 1996 Jaguars advanced all the way to the AFC Championship game and the 1979 Rams went from 5-6 to the Super Bowl, where they lost to Pittsburgh 31-19.
–I suspect as all of you are gathered with family, watching football, that talk will turn to the concussion issue. As noted by ESPN and the Star-Ledger’s Dave D’Alessandro the other day, participation in Pop Warner has declined 9.5% over the past two years. Some say the drop is due to a decline in youth sports in general (with the exception being lacrosse), but it’s obviously something more serious when it comes to youth football. Like I said a few weeks ago, the big winner down the road will be baseball.
College Basketball
AP Poll
1. Michigan State
2. Kansas…next up Wake Forest, Thurs.! (I’ll be focused on turkey and family)
3. Kentucky
4. Arizona
5. Oklahoma State
6. Duke
7. Ohio State
8. Syracuse
9. Louisville
10. Wisconsin
11. Gonzaga…then lost to Dayton
13. UConn
14. Oregon…Duckwear in probation sports drawer due to football team
16. UNC
24. UMass
VCU is out of the top 25 after two losses. No, I am not abandoning them.
NBA Fever
–Chicago Bulls fans can’t believe Derrick Rose is officially lost for another season after undergoing surgery on his right knee. As the New York Times’ Ben Strauss writes:
“The blow – to Rose, to his team and to a city in which he is without question the most popular current athlete – is a devastating one and leaves the future of one of the NBA’s youngest superstars in doubt.”
Plus the Bulls not only owe Rose $17.6 million this season (minus reimbursement from an insurance policy), but he has another three years and $60 million remaining after 2014.
—Kobe Bryant signed a two-year contract extension for $48.5 million that virtually guarantees he’ll retire as a Laker, while the team can pursue one top free agent next summer; a class that could include LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony.
Anthony is interesting. He has vowed to stay with the Knicks but with the team going the way it has, would you? Especially if he has a chance to go to L.A.
Then again, Bryant, who is making $30.4 million this season, still hasn’t played after suffering his torn Achilles tendon injury in April.
–With the Knicks and Nets shockingly off to 3-10 starts, George Willis of the New York Post comments on the Nets and their coach.
“You wonder if (coach Jason) Kidd can fix this mess. It would be one thing if he were a young coach with a young team that could grow together. But the Nets are built to win now, not next season when (Kevin) Garnett and Paul Pierce are a year older. This was supposed to be a magical season. Instead, it’s turning into a nightmare. Boos filled Barclays Center as the final seconds of Sunday’s dismal performance (a loss to the Pistons) ticked off the clock. They’ll only get louder if the Nets continue to play the way they have.
“Kidd built a Hall of Fame career as a player by controlling the game with the basketball in his hands. But he looks almost helpless on the sidelines as his team turns lifeless after halftime. He started mostly bench players in the fourth quarter, but even that had little impact. Kidd is searching. Just like his players are searching.
“ ‘The ball’s just bouncing the opponent’s way right now,’ he said. ‘We’ve just got to stay together.’
“Problem is, the Nets aren’t together – certainly, not on the court, probably not in the locker room.”
But what’s this? The Nets won on Tuesday in Toronto, 102-100, which I actually watched a lot of; curious to see how awful Brooklyn was. And boy, they almost didn’t disappoint. Granted, they were without Williams, Lopez and Kirilenko again, but the Nets were up 101-86 with about 3:20 left when Toronto took advantage of some unbelievable sloppy play to go on a 14-0 run before the Nets finally nailed it down to improve to 4-10.
Ball Bits
–So Mets fans are wondering just who, aside from outfielder Chris Young, the team is going to add in the offseason after shortstop Jhonny Peralta signed with the Cardinals, the Mets having expressed interest in the Biogenesis client.
But it’s the Cardinals who have had to defend their decision to sign Peralta to a four-year, $53 million contract, with General Manager John Mozeliak saying the Cards weren’t about to appoint themselves “morality police.”
“Character and makeup are something we weigh into our decision-making,” Mozeliak said. “In his case, he admitted what he did, he took responsibility for it. I feel like he has paid for his mistakes, and obviously if he were to make another one, then it would be a huge disappointment.”
Mozeliak did concede the penalty, in Peralta’s case 50 games, wasn’t severe enough.
–The Dodgers signed pitcher Dan Haren to a one-year, $10 million deal. Haren, with ERAs his last two seasons of 4.33 and 4.67, figures to be the fifth starter. Your eyes just glaze over at the money for mediocre talent these days.
–The Hall of Fame ballot is out, highlighted by first-timers Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine, as well as Frank Thomas. The first two are locks, Thomas might fall a few ballots short.
Of bigger interest is Craig Biggio (68% last year) and Jeff Bagwell (60%) and whether they get up to the required 75%. Plus Jack Morris (68%) and in his final time on the ballot.
And of course it will be interesting to see what happens to the steroids boys like Barry Bonds (36%) and Roger Clemens (38%).
In early December 1944, Brissie was with the Eighty-eighth Infantry Division in Italy when an artillery shell exploded just yards from him, ripping open his left leg. As noted in Gary Bloomfield’s ‘Duty, Honor, Victory: America’s Athletes in World War II,’ the “leg was shattered between the knee and the ankle, his ankle mangled, both feet broken, and both hands injured. It was seven hours before anyone searched for the squad, and Brissie was the only survivor [out of a platoon of 12.]”
Field doctors told him the leg had to be amputated, but he pleaded with them, “Send me to somebody who may be able to help me, because I want to play baseball.” He was transferred to another hospital and surgeons performed the first of twenty-three operations he would undergo to salvage his leg.
[I read another account that said he lost a leg and was fitted with an artificial one. I’m going with the above.]
By 1947, Brissie had rehabbed to the point where he went 23-5 for Savannah in the South Atlantic League, and made his major league debut by season’s end with the Philadelphia Athletics. Then on Opening Day 1948, Ted Williams smashed a line drive off Brissie’s mangled leg and the ball caromed almost to the right field wall, but Brissie stayed in the contest. He went on to go 14-10 in 1948 and 16-11 in 1949, making the All-Star team that season, though this would prove to be the high water mark as he finished 44-48 for his career.
–I forgot to mention last time that Sebastian Vettel won again, his ninth consecutive Formula One event, the season ender in Sao Paulo. Vettel thus equaled the all-time record of consecutive victories, which Alberto Ascari set in 1952-53 over two seasons, and Vettel equaled the record set by Michael Schumacher in 2004 for most wins in a season, 13. It’s just not supposed to be that easy, folks.
–We note the passing of Brian Griffin, the white Labrador on “Family Guy.” One of my regrets is not watching this show enough. Suffice it to say, Brian’s fans are rather upset he was killed off.
–There are an estimated 300 cougars in South Dakota’s Black Hills, according to a piece in National Geographic, but a hunt has been authorized to take out 100 because sportsmen say the cougars are killing off the elk population. Cougars are also becoming established in western Nebraska. In Yellowstone National Park, however, there have been instances where reintroduced wolf packs killed cougars and drove them off carcasses.
Of course cougars are also continuing to head east, most famously the one killed by an SUV on a highway exit in Milford, Conn., 2011, that genetic tests proved came from the Black Hills…2,000 miles away.
There have been 145 recorded cougar attacks on humans since 1890. 20+ proved fatal.
And you’ve seen all the stories of cougars proliferating in the mountains surrounding Los Angeles. California does not have a cougar hunt.
First one was Nov. 27, 1924, also known then as the Macy’s Christmas Parade, and the early ones consisted of 300 Macy’s employees marching with two dozen animals borrowed from the Central Park Zoo, including camels and elephants. But as the New York Post reports, “The live beasts frightened children and after three years they were replaced by balloon animals.” Plus I’m assuming the animals made a break for it, running over the kids in the process, and after three years there weren’t any animals left.
The Post notes, “In the parade’s early years, the balloons were released into the air at the parade’s conclusion. Each had a return address stitched into it, and the idea was, the balloon would float off, slowly deflate, then drop to earth, where someone would find it and return it to Macy’s for a $50 or $100 reward.
“In 1931, aviator Clarence Chamberlain had just left Bennett Field when he spotted Felix the Cat hovering over Jamaica Bay. In a feat of mid-air heroics, he snagged the balloon with the wing and returned it safely to the field.”
In 1962, Donald Duck’s rain filled brim caused the balloon to tip and dump 50 gallons of water on chilly spectators.
In 1997, winds blew the Cat in the Hat into a light-post, a piece of which broke off and almost killed a girl, who was in a coma for a month. That near-tragedy ushered in the wind rules that will be in play Thursday.
But concerning a different Thanksgiving tradition, the pardoning of a turkey by the president, as reported by the Post’s Candice M. Giove, Harry Truman supposedly spared the first turkey in 1947, but the Truman Library has never been able to verify this. Days before he was assassinated in 1963, JFK unofficially spared a gobbler. “He looked at the turkey and said maybe we should let this one grow a little more,” said turkey-pardon historian Ira Brill.
But it was really George H.W. Bush who was the first to establish the precedent of an official pardon in 1989.
Dwight Eisenhower liked to carve the White House bird himself. During World War II, Ike made sure turkeys were served to the troops on Thanksgiving.
William Howard Taft, all 450 or so pounds of him, gobbled up a turkey weighing in at 50 lbs., or so legend has it.
And Benjamin Franklin wanted the “respectable” turkey to become the national bird instead of the bald eagle. He derided the eagle’s “bad moral character.”
Top 3 songs for the week 11/27/76: #1 “Tonight’s The Night (Gonna Be Alright)” (Rod Stewart) #2 “The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald” (Gordon Lightfoot) #3 “Love So Right” (Bee Gees)…and…#4 “Muskrat Love” (Captain & Tennille) #5 “The Rubberband Man” (Spinners…not their best…) #6 “Disco Duck” (Rick Dees & His Cast of Idiots) #7 “Just To Be Close To You” (Commodores… easily one of their top three) #8 “Beth” (Kiss) #9 “More Than A Feeling” (Boston) #10 “Nadia’s Theme (The Young and the Restless)” (Barry DeVorzon & Perry Botkin, Jr.)
College Football Quiz Answers: 1) Fresno State’s Derek Carr has 39 TDs and just four interceptions. Oregon State’s Sean Mannion is second with 34. 2) Wisconsin’s Ron Dayne remains the leading rusher in Division I history with 6,397 yards (1996-99).
Happy Thanksgiving!
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