Monday’s profile of Alabama athletic director Mal Moore listed online roleplaying games among his many hobbies and described him as a “tenth level Elf-Dragon”. Mr. Moore is actually an extremely accomplished paladin, and there is also no such thing as an Elf-Dragon. We regret the error.

Roll Tide!

On Tuesday, we reported that the University of Tennessee had, following the firing of Johnny Majors, considered attempting to hire Florida coach Steve Spurrier to replace the longtime Vol coach. This was inaccurate; Tennessee made no such attempt, a point clarified to us at great length in a phone call from Tennessee officials earlier this week. The candidate Tennessee wanted most to replace Johnny Majors was not Spurrier, but rather country music legend David Allen Coe. We regret the error.

Monday’s continuing series on the struggle to rebuild Columbus following last year’s Ohio State-Michigan victory celebrations misidentified an image as a neighborhood just south of campus. The photo in question is actually of a Beirut bomb crater. We regret the error.

O-H!

Monday’s “Where Are They Now?” segment featured a collection of inaccuracies we would like to address here. Purdue is located in West Lafayette, Indiana, not Louisiana. The Heisman Trophy was, until 2001, awarded annually not at Radio City Music Hall, but at the Downtown Athletic Club. And finally, Eric Crouch played at Nebraska, not at Iowa State, and at no point in his adult life fought a crippling addiction to drinking window cleaner he consumed to quiet the voices of relentless murder in his head. We regret the error.

He does, however, have unusually silky dark brown hair and particularly delicate, almost feminine eyelashes his female friends just can’t stop gushing over. His secret pride in this forces him to question his understanding of his own masculinity.

The Tuesday Grid-Iron Crossword had an ambiguous clue under “14 letter word for former coach at Texas A&M and Mississippi State.” Both the words “Jackie Sherrill” and “Piglickingcheat” fit the slot in the puzzle, causing some consternation among our readers, especially as “piglickingcheat” contains more letters than “Jackie Sherrill.” We regret the error, and clearly have no place assembling crossword puzzles in the first place.

A Wednesday evening news flash reported that former Kentucky coach Hal Mumme was among a band of notorious pirates captured by peacekeeping troops in April off the coast of Mozambique. Mr. Mumme has since been located, and apparently serves as the head football coach at “New Mexico State University”. We regret the error.

The lead story “Sean McDonough: Announcer at Large” on Monday inaccurately described McDonough as being “three apples high.” This refers to the apocryphal height of smurfs, not McDonough. The announcer himself is easily five apples high, and will kick a fucking Smurf in the teeth without hesitation, especially if shirtless white-pant wearing punk suckas walk up on him and take him seven-on-one again like they did after the Continental Tire Bowl BECAUSE THAT’S JUST THE KIND OF PUNK SHIT YOU FRENCH SURRENDER MIDGETS PULL, DON’T YOU SMURFS? WHAT? HUH? YEAH! GARGAMEL AIN’T GOT SHIT ON THIS! BRANG YO BEST, LAWYA!

We regret the error.

Our lead post on Thursday stated that an EDSBS staffer was critically injured after being lured into an open rain gutter with promises of a shiny balloon. The report further named the assailant as Ole Miss head coach Houston Nutt. The perpetrator has since been correctly identified as Pennywise the Dancing Clown. The Turtle cannot help us, and we regret the error.

The Montana Meth Project represents a landmark of anti-drug advertising: it makes meth look awful while still managing to make the whole thing look somewhat flyover country-heroin-chic fabulous, a real accomplishment if we’ve ever seen one.

The evil mind lurking somewhere in the otherwise benign person of the Great Barstoolio saw this and did what innovators do: they innovatatatatate. We may or may not have chipped in with a few of these, but let us just say they represent some of the most disturbing and funny football/meth-themed farkery we’ve ever seen. You might be saying: isn’t that a very small subset of work?

And we’d answer that we’ve been awake for 32 days, and have no idea what you just said.

Enjoy. Because if you can’t laugh at meth, what can you laugh at, we ask? Besides genocide, that is. We’ve included four of them below: click over to Barstoolio’s House of Romantic But Inevitably Fatal Tropical Evil for the rest.

(more…)

In light of recent events, we proudly present our line of Colorado-themed student section wear. In the case of The Majestic Buffalo vs. Man, there can be no neutrality. Who ya got?

(more…)

We rarely pre-empt the Curious Index. Today, there is a reason. Read on, because Holly found something majestic.

Raise ya glasses, shake ya asses, Vol Nation: For unto us is given this day that greatest of football blogosphere treasures—a Catlab masterpiece of our very own. It’s like staring into the sun, but it’ll get you drunk. Behold:

Have you ever seen anything ring so true? I’m about 85% sure the guy holding the pennant is my cousin Maxie. Had this wondrous creation hatched just a scant few days earlier, we would’ve been hard-pressed not to scrap the Tennessee list entirely—because this is, perfectly encapsulated, what Orange And White People Like.

By Holly, who reminds you that when the zombie war comes, machetes do NOT need reloading.

Their names were shouted in exultation or bellowed in impotent rage across the SEC in 2007. You know their stats by heart, lived and died with their triumphs and tears. But in this age of bioweapons and nuclear experiments gone horribly awry, there are more important matters to ponder; namely, how each of these college football notables will aid your survival when the wrong red button is pressed and the zombie hordes rise to enslave us all. You’ll need the best of the best (SEC speed = fast zombies). The essential personnel:

Rich Brooks thinks the undead hordes are bullshit. This will not save him.

The Buffoon Who Got You Into This Mess: Michael Henig, QB, Mississippi State
How He’ll Save The Day: When jumping from rooftop to rooftop to reach the river/gun store/barricades, will carry the season to its logical conclusion by mistiming the flinging of his own form and being intercepted, so to speak, by a less than sturdy awning. As he is tugged with agonizing slowness from the canvas, the undead hordes will fall upon his flesh, allowing you to escape.

The Decoy: Blake Mitchell, QB, South Carolina
How He’ll Save The Day: Will be assigned as lookout while the rest of the party stocks up on ammunition/canned goods/fuel, and upon seeing an approaching zombie attack party, will inexplicably fancy himself a hero and run outside, waving his arms and capering about to distract them long enough for our heroes to lock and load and hop into an appropriately sized truck. The undead hordes are not amused by dancing, and will fall upon his flesh, allowing you to escape.

The Cloyingly Self-Effacing Hero: Erik Ainge, QB, Tennessee
How He’ll Save The Day: Sneaking past the gibbering masses in the dead of night, will slip on a discarded shotgun shell and break both legs in the fall. Will implacably insist on not being carried because He’ll Only Slow You Down, and will accept no comfort—but does gather all remaining grenades. After the explosion, the hordes will fall upon his flesh and the flesh of their shredded comrades, allowing you to escape.

The Hothead: Knowshon Moreno, RB, Georgia
How He’ll Save The Day: With tears in his eyes and an unearthly battle howl in his throat, by completely losing his shit and barreling into the penultimate wave of zombies at full force, ripping and tearing their limbs with his bare hands. A valiant effort, but the thing about zombies is there’s always Just Too Many. The undead hordes will fall upon his flesh, allowing you to escape.

The Shrewish Love Interest: Colt David, K, LSU
How He’ll Save The Day: After spending the entire ordeal displaying gradually more obvious signs of crumbling and generally slowing everyone down, will drop to his knees shortly into the sprint over open ground to safety, wailing that It’s Hopeless and We’ll Never Make It. The undead hordes will fall upon his flesh, allowing you to escape.

The Cheap Shot You Don’t See Coming: Kyle Jackson, S, Florida
How He’ll Save The Day: As you stagger over the final hill between your sleepy little borough and the haven of the convenient nearby military base/open sea/arms of Orgeron, will burst inexplicably into flames and fall in a shrieking, ineffectual heap at the crest of the ridge. Cold and raw or sizzling in the skull—brains is brains is brains to a zombie. The undead hordes will fall upon his flesh, allowing you to escape. Fade to black.

T-Tubb, if he can get his boys to aim those chop blocks at the neck, might stand a chance.

Remember: life’s not out to get you . Life will get you, and by “get” we mean “turn into a pile of dessicated bones buried beneath the crushing weight of the earth.” The top ten moments of malicious fate striking for 2007 await you, even if you happened to win the national title.

9. Glenn Dorsey gets chop-blocked.

Oh, sure. Be an optimist. Say it all ended well. Fine–just because fate misses with a bullet doesn’t mean it doesn’t do any damage. All the bitching about having a two-loss BCS winner would be moot if Dorsey hadn’t nearly been maimed by Auburn’s offensive line, who executed chop blocks on tape in both the LSU game and in the Peach Bowl. Without Dorsey and Ricky Jean-Francois (out for season with sprained cerebrum,) LSU had to rely more and more on blitzing for pressure, leaving holes open in the pass D for Kentucky’s endless screens and taking the functional permanent double team out of the middle for the Arkansas game.

Sure, call it a happy ending if you want Pollyanna. We’ll be waiting here with the bucket of tears and bouquet of black flowers for when it all goes sour somehow eventually.

To be continued. Watch your back in the meantime: we don’t think it’s a tumor, we know it is…

Remember: life’s not out to get you . Life will get you, and by “get” we mean “turn into a pile of dessicated bones buried beneath the crushing weight of the earth.” The top ten moments of malicious fate striking for 2007 await you.

10. Shaun Carney’s knee bends sideways.

Air Force 24, Cal 21. After some comebacking by Cal, Air Force drives down to the one in an attempt to make it a two score lead again in the Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Things What Fly Und Kick Ass Bowl.. Positive vibes! Inspirational lighting! Cue the Jerry Goldsmith soundtrack! Carney had over a hundred yards rushing, a TD on the ground, and had passed for another as Air Force ran the modded-up flexbone all over Cal. Slo-mo camera, tension, Bruckheimer’s all over this and…

Air Force loses their flux capacitor when Carney exits, the defense gets shredded by Kevin Riley, and the upset ends with a Cal victory, 42-36. Life ain’t fair.

To be continued. Watch your back in the meantime…the wolf is always at the door…

Name: The Champs Sports Bowl. That place in the mall where you can buy tight fitteds, son, and 150 dollar athletic shoes you can’t run in, son. OOO-WEEE! And them brushed/gold pom-poms, son! Prospicacious street goods, son!

Motto: “Real eroticism begins with the introduction of a third party.” The quote from the end of Emanuelle is the best explanation why Orlando needed a third second bowl game: because they’ve got a stadium, little to do with it, a zillion hotel rooms, a nice airport, good weather, and have watched and learned from the lessons of Emanuelle by adding a third partner into the mix with the city and the Capital One Bowl.

Fake Bowl? No, as in backed by deep-pocketed mall retailer that sells the streetest pom-poms evah.

Intrusive Corporate Sponsor: Champs Sports, “where sports lives.” We thought sport lived in our glowing green sweat and in Gatorade, so this could be the subject of some direly needed academic research.

Tradition rating: Around since 1990, back when we were glued to Dial MTV and learned that life will rip even the most tender and vulnerable things from your grasp and squash them to blood pudding in a hydraulic vise. Like Jim Henson, dammit.

Just go to the fucking doctor next time! Sobbing…

Setup: A Bangalore casting call: anyone who’s around and available, evidently. The Big 10, Big 12, ACC, and Big East, and ACC have all made appearances in the history of the bowl, meaning they just want someone to hold them and love them and just show up, okay? A woman has low standards at this point in life. And Boston College, you’re not showing up, only selling 6,000 or so of their 12,000 ticket allotment, meaning you’ll be Boise-bound and out of this woman’s arms, you emotionally unavailable bastards!

Why you should watch despite this being the Champs Sports Bowl and 5:00 on a Friday: For Matt Ryan, who being from New England and white instantly had horrific nicknames like “Matty Ice” thrown on him along with Tom Brady/Ted Williams/Sports Messiah aura. Luckily no one in New England cares enough about college football to destroy his young psyche with an intolerable level of celebrity, so he’s doing fine and alternately saving his team’s collective ass (as in the last second TD in the Virginia Tech game) and throwing them into the fire. Boston will start off throwing heavily and then throw even more if they feel threatened, either by a Michigan State lead or a particularly threatening security guard. The fewest attempts for BC this year passing has been 32; Ryan’s gone over 40 ten times.

Michigan State has Jehuu Caulcrick, Javon Ringer, and guy who throws the ball. That’s all you need to know: Ringer’s the speed guy, Caulcrick is a bus-big back for the power downs, and sometimes they let Brian Hoyer throw the ball. If he’s approaching 30 attempts, that ain’t good for Michigan State. Their game plan will be squat-ball all the way, holding the ball forever and keeping it out of the hands of Matt Ryan. Boston College’s run defense was the best in the nation. This may not be a good idea.

On defense, it would have been great fun watching Jonal Saint-Dic try to disrupt Ryan because Ryan’s taken a good beating this year despite his productivity and glossy numbers. Unfortunately, Michigan State will be Saint-Dic-less due to Saint-Dic’s sprained cerebrum and academic ineligibilty. We imagine BC wins this one in as sluggish a fashion as a team that throws the ball 40 times a game can, and then begins the fun of trying to replace someone who took every snap under center. Matty Ice! It’s better than Matty Light! Or Matty Chill. That stuff tastes like iguana piss in a bottle.

Minimal football noise today, so let’s access that spleen and talk about how much another corrupt, shitty sport blows. No particular reason.

Full of shit, but will get you laid: Baudrillard.

We’re big Jean Baudrillard fans, and not because we’re some organic tea-sipping grad student getting wood to the concept of actually writing crap bollocks about art, meaning, and dissecting meaning without having to actually come up with any ourselves. You’re out there, we know who you are, and we will refrain from making the Starbucks serve-us-our-latte professor joke, because many of you do indeed go on to do terrible things like teach Lacan and Derrida to smartstruck private school kids cowed by your ability to string together three sentences together and use the phrase “late-stage capitalism” without shitting yourself from shame.

Plus, when you can quote shit like this pants just fly off smart ladies not quite smart enough to realize just how full of shit you really are:

Like dreams, statistics are a form of wish fulfillment.

That’s Baudrillard, who rules like Motorhead because he’s totally quotable, completely full of shit, and sold tons of books in France despite the fact that he, himself, would remind anyone he was brimming with intellectual fecal matter. He insisted, in fact, on most everything being fake and shitty–simulacra–mere imitations of things that once existed, and that most culture was just growing like the fingernails and hair on a corpse.

Drop that at a cocktail party, and someone will probably either pose thoughtfully or call you a homosexual. Either way you’re going for the bullshit gold, since it’s English major bongwater primo stuff. However, it may rightfully describe the EDSBS official Most Despised Game, not a sport, but a game, the hypertrophied croquet match that is baseball, and the fact that old incontinent people care enough about it to waste an ex-Senator’s time on whether or nor its players are taking illegal supplements. (more…)

This year’s BCS game will feature local man Ted Warburton versus eight live dingoes, according to SEC commisioner Mike Slive in a press conference last night announcing the participants for this year’s BCS title game.

“At no point in the history of the BCS have we had more interest in the BCS, and I can safely and confidently say that at no point in the history of the game have we put together a more compelling matchup than Mr. Warburton versus this fine team of mad, crazed dingoes.”

Warburton, a copywriter for a large local utility company, seemed as surprised as the rest of the country that the college football season would come down to this. That it would involve him at all was doubly surprising for the the 34 year-old University of North Carolina graduate.

“I mean, it should have come down to a one-loss Kansas team, or even a two-loss Georgia team. There’s no rule that you have to win your conference championship, right? Mark Richt said as much in his press conference yesterday. Or even, if you’re so fascinated with the difference between no, one, and two losses, well…you could have had Hawaii in there, man.”

“Plus, I don’t know how putting me on a field with eight dingoes proves anything. I don’t have a wife and kids, but I do have a cat, and she’ll need to be fed if anything happens to me. The money’s nice, but it’s a lot of risk to take. Plus, it’s not really a football game, is it?”

Big East commish and BCS tycoon Mike Tranghese downplayed the clamor of complaints and criticisms surrounding the choice of Warburton versus dingo for the game.

“What we put on is a heckuva show, people, and that’s what we’re going to give the viewing public who tune in to this game. It’s been a topsy-turvy year in college football, and what better way to end it than with a good, old-fashioned classic: a two-loss Ted Warburton versus an undefeated pack of eight highly athletic dingoes.”

The matchup, per ESPN writer Ivan Maisel, does have its upside.

“Dingoes are opportunistic carnivores, and unafraid of most of what you’ll throw at them, defensively speaking. They try to limit their mistakes and work the numbers, most of the time, and that’s precisely what they’ll do against Ted here. He’ll have his hands full…of dingo fur, mostly.”

Warburton’s two losses this year were widely regarded by AP voters as “quality losses:” one, losing a girlfriend to his “lack of commitment,” and breaking his leg in a cycling accident. While there were others in the pack with fewer losses, Warburton’s strong performance throughout the year tilted the scales in his favor.

“Really, he was hampered by injury and a tough foe, a girlfriend wanting to settle down,” said Sporting News writer Matt Hayes. “Those two have taken down plenty of great teams in season. But when you look at his resume this year, there’s a lot of strengths: scoring not twice, but three times with that hot divorcee in the Bahamas, mowing his yard four weeks in a row, and flossing regularly throughout the year, including the hectic holidays.”

“In a year of almost-rans, he’s the closest we’ve got to a championship contender.”

The dingoes, for their part, are excited.

“rrrttggghhhRROOOAOAAAHHHHRRRR snrragggrrlglh ROOAOOOROOOOAAARRRGH YOUUUWWWL Ssnrarrgglhhhf, GrrrgghhhgHghhhgllll groarrggar gnsicnorhf grrrrswgghhHHHhh,” they said following the press conference, a noise widely interpreted to mean somehing between “we’re honored to be facing such a great opponent in a great venue,” or “BLOOD! BLOOD! BLOOD BLOOD BLOOD BLOOD!!!”

The fact we have to wait for a selection show doesn’t seem half as unusual this year as a college football fan. As strange as it’s been, Barry Alvarez could come on the screen in a Cat-in-the-Hat raver cap, technicolor-striped pants, and twirling two glow sticks while screaming “SOMEONE GAVE ME BAAAAAAD DRUGS!!!” and it would feel apropos. It’s been bad trippy time for football fans everywhere this entire season–why change now? Just put Thom Brennaman in the fat pants, dose him on some cut-rate MDMA, turn on the camera, and let the fun begin. WHO LOVES YOU? AND WHO DO YOU LOVE THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP

It feels so good when you touch my head…where’s my gum?

So while we all wait for the BCS selection show, please note that EDSBS Live, America’s Most Outstandingly Mediocre College Football Show, has been moved for one week only to Monday night on account of Peter Bean, our co-host, being exceedingly occupied this week for reasons unknown. (He’s secretly negotiating for the job of defensive coordinator of the Texas Longhorns. Let it be known that we think he’d be just as good as their current management.) It will be broadcast live tomorrow night when we’ve got BCS selections to discuss and a bit more time on our hands as a duo.

Regular programming continues apace tomorrow. For the record, we think placing the entire undefeated 2004 Auburn squad and the 12-0 1994 Penn State Nittany Lions would make as much sense as any other arrangement you choose, since the BCS is made to hand pick a pair of lions from the pride for their title game, not pull a pair a pair of random feral cats from a sack.

Swindle reports from the SEC Championship press box that Stewart Mandel is a Dapper Dan man. Best of luck to him in his fisticuffs, and to all of you in your end of season drankin’ and gallivantin’.

Swindle: Much thanks to Holly for the open thread opening. We were busy watching Les Miles nutslap ESPN two hours before the biggest game of the year. What happened in that press conference, and what’s allegedly happening in a fitting love triangle to end the Time of Troubles that this season’s been:

–First, the number we’ve gotten on LSU’s counter-offer to Miles is $3.45 million. Michigan’s not even in the same fairway as that offer at ~2.5 million a year.

–The media’s busy parsing the hell out of Miles’ verbiage like he’s a diplomat making a speech at the WTO. They shouldn’t–Miles came out with the body posture of a wrestler addressing the crowd and said ESPN was full of shit. That’s it. Tightly wound, school-of-Woody-Hayes tempermental PR posturing, pure and simple. He could have been brained with a folding chair by Lloyd Carr in the middle of it and it wouldn’t have seemed out of place.

–Sean O’Keefe, chancellor of LSU, looks like a man who bathes in Domaine du Puys and craps solid bars of platinum. Being nicknamed “Pappy” or “Red” and owning several islands devoted solely to his pleasure would NOT surprise us.

UPDATE: CBS and EDSBS, together again for the first time:

Your entire lives have been building to this moment; you just didn’t know it.

Swindle: Verne’s the nicest man you’ll ever meet. Danielson, on the other hand, stabbed us with the sharpened end of a broom handle on the way out. We kid! He was down ton the field doing his job when we were chatting with Verne.

Oh, and stop by and read the liveblog from the Championship Game over at the SN. It’s fact-tastic!

Update: we’re going to do a story on Erik Ainge maturing as a quarterback for tomorrow. We think it’ll happen any day now, and when it does, whoo-whee, look out!

`I’m not looking to go anywhere.”

–Matt Turner, NWA.com, Thursday.

Tommy Tuberville may have just completed the long-delayed departure he began back in 2003 when he survived Bobby Lawder’s attempt to depose him and bring in Bobby Petrino behind his back: Arkansas media types are reporting that Tuberville has agreed to be the next head coach at Arkansas, a story we’re not really sure we believe at this point.

Thanks to Kevin for encoding the video for the public football interest. He’s cool like that.

The early signs came with the story that Tuberville was not present at a scheduled meeting with Auburn AD Jay Jacobs earlier this week; then the additive snowballing of rumors and continued radio silence on the part of both Tuberville and Auburn officialdom made things even more suspicious for the paranoid types who, being broken clocks twice a day, really thought this might happen.

The quick, hastily scanned impact of this IF TRUE ALL SHAKY RUMOR AT THIS POINT HOLD OFF ON FACTINESS:

–Tuberville inherits a roster full of manageable talent to work with at Arkansas. Being a CEO kind of guy, the staff Tuberville assembles will matter immensely, and with his current DC Will Muschamp being considered for head jobs, he’s gonna need a bright young defensive mind at the least if offensive coordinator Al Borges follows him.

–Auburn, like the guy who never deletes a single lady’s phone number from his cell phone, will likely booty call the coach they got caught engaging in a backdoor case of coitus interruptus with in 2003: Bobby Petrino. Alabama may soon have two extremely overpaid coaches, especially given the increasingly hopeless situation at qb in Atlanta. Hopeless, in case you didn’t know, is spelled H-A-R-R-I-N-G-T-O-N. Or L-E-F-T-W-I-C-H. Or you could just say “It’s a Somalia, man,” and watch everyone nod knowingly. The effect is the same all around.

–If Petrino is as unbudgeable (and with the demonstrated tolerance of being mediocre as a college coach after being a superb college HC being a two years, see Spurrier and Saban) as we suspect he might be, then Auburn’s stuck in the nasty position of hunting retreads in a job market with Michigan and Nebraska still prowling. That’s an ugly proposition, though Auburn could certainly outbid almost any other program around. The only issue is how many bananas are left on the shelf when they get around to actually shopping for replacement.

–We’ll say it again: LEACH. LEACH. LEACH. Just because we want him in the SEC so, sooooooooo bad. Hire Orgeron as your line coach and head of recruiting and you’ll hear us purring for miles.

–Paul was right, Paul was right, Paul was right. Never underestimate the power of Wal-Mart. The Chinese People’s Liberation Army bought Tuberville through the wallet of the Walton family if Tuberville did come through, and Paul Westerdawg was righter than Ron Paul on this.

–In state, this gives Nick Saban a bit of breathing room in terms of competitive advantage. He’ll have a running head start on recruiting that will be impossible to make up this year, especially with Tuberville raiding south the instant he hits the door in Fayetteville.

–More later, because this is the SEC, where we’ve figured out what to do with the other eight months of the year not involving actual football games: a little exercise we like to call Scandalicise! Feel the burn, Auburn fans!

With Orson out running moonshine through the hills of North Carolina, the guest columnist of the day is The Kid from Fire Mark May. He’s here to talk about Notre Dame 2007. It should be fun.

Hey, remember: Van Damme kicks himself off the cross in this scene. There’s always hope.

There’s no reason to spread the scourge of the Trev to Orson’s corner of the interwebs, despite his benevolent Trevness. This is between me and you, Notre Dame, and this season that has stabbed my heart with a flaming chainsaw. I hereby declare it basketball season. Forever. These are the lengths I go to in this the winter of my discontent. Sure, I have thought that Michigan losing to Appalachian State would sustain me through this down season, but that wonderful dose of schaudenfreude can’t get me out of this crippling withdrawal from Notre Dame glory. I need my fix, man, and I don’t see any way to get it anytime soon. Its not the money, I’ll break into your freaking houses to get me some glory, but its just…well….I don’t freaking know!

What is it? How did all of these players forget how to play effing football? (more…)

It’s the last call for Da U at the Orange Bowl this Saturday night when Miami hosts Virginia under the lights. I’m not a ‘Canes fan but I’m a football fan and if I had to name my most vivid college football memories, half of them would be housed at the OB.

The ‘84 National Championship Game: Greatest game I ever saw. The call Osborne made to go for 2 at the end was like a perfect storm of stones, musk, and arrogance [for the young pups, see: Miles, Les]. This is the game that hooked me on college football and it’s an addiction I’m still battling today.

The ‘87 Orange Bowl: Brian Bosworth stalked the sidelines while on suspension from the team sporting a wicked haircut and wearing a t-shirt that spelled out N.C.A.A. with the words National Communists Against Athletes. On the field, the Sooners laid the wood to Arkansas 42-8 but all I remember is the Boz and his stance against the man, trying to hold a brother down.

The Brawl and The Call: Not one word needs to be said.

It’s not just about the games, it’s about the fear, loathing, and feral atmosphere that permeates the old joint. When they come out of the tunnel, I used to wonder if it wasn’t fog at all, but rather a blizzard of crack smoke. The electricity in the air isn’t something synthetic (unless you count the fans, players, coaches, and broadcasters fueled on Charlie and Cris) either. There appears to be something very real that turns people into maniacs with a riot mentality when they enter the hallowed walls of that place. It may look like it’s on death’s door, with the crumbling walls, dilapidated toilets, and mysterious yellow fluid that leaks from its bowels, but if you look her in the eye, there’s still a fire raging in there that will take all you got, all night long, and laugh in your face when you’re done. Kind of like Peter O’Toole.

But thanks to criminal city management, fiscal nightmares, and $2 whore, Donna Shalalalalala, the OB is shutting her doors. What’s worse, the ‘Canes’ new home will be Dolphins Stadium. The thought of the ‘Canes playing in that synthetic place makes me sick. The concessions serve tater salad and tapioca; it’s like a goddamned nursing home. Look what it’s done to the Dolphins! But alas, this isn’t about the future, it’s about the past, so this weekend, when you’re tailgating, whether you’re at a game or on the couch, do a rail of blow and pour a little out for a fallen homey. You don’t have to love her, but you gotta respect her.

Recognize.