Arian Foster is sorry he dropped your baby on his head. He would have held onto it, but it flew out of his hands while he was busy trying to catch the coffee he’d just dropped, which he paid for with money that slipped out of his hand while attempting to pay, which came from a wallet he also fumbled onto the pavement, which he dropped while thinking about the other cup of coffee he’d just dropped on a woman, staining her dress permanently, something he’d done while trying to hold a door for her, which he’d let slip and crash into her forehead, knocking her onto the pavement, where he’d dropped the coffee on her while simultaneously trying to catch her baby, who she had dropped because Arian Foster cannot hold onto things for longer than a second before his hands repel matter and send it crashing to the ground, because he is Arian Foster and has powers like that.

Fortunately, Dallas Baker came in, caught everything before it hit the ground, and saved the day.

Worried about the Big 10’s recent habit of face-planting in high-profile out-of-conference games? Jim Delany isn’t:

“In any particular time frame, could be three years, could be five years, could be two years, you could get your ass kicked, OK?” Delany continued. “It can happen. We’re not playing Little Sisters of the Poor. We’re playing the best football teams in their region.

“So were we 1-6 (in bowl games) last year? Yeah. Were we 0-6 in the BCS in the last (three years)? We were. Those are the facts. But take me from 2000 or 1997 to 2005; I remember when Michigan played Ohio State [in 2006]. We were the toast of the town, one versus two, game of the century.”

Jim Delany’s not too worried about it, really. He wouldn’t worry about it. Don’t worry about it. He’s not worried at all.

Sounds like a reasonably nonchalant response to the issue, even if, as Doc Saturday humbly points out, it’s a problem that isn’t likely to resolve itself this season no matter what Delany says. For all the criticism we’ve heaped on the Big 10 commissioner over the past couple years, he sounds like a guy who takes a level-headed, matter-of-fact approach to problems instead of panicking, which is the kind of trait you’d want in not only a conference commish but also . . . an advice columnist:

Dear Big 10 Commish,
My husband and I have three children: a son who is in college and two daughters, a 16-year-old and a 10-year-old. My older daughter was an A student all through elementary and middle school, but her grades have deteriorated markedly since she started high school. She has a boyfriend now and has been spending a lot more time with him and his clique of friends, and a lot less time studying or helping out around the house; she hasn’t been particularly combative toward me or my husband, but that’s mainly because we hardly ever see her at all. A couple weeks ago I found what looked like the remnants of a marijuana cigarette on our back patio; I asked her if she knew anything about it and she said she didn’t, and that she had never tried marijuana or any other drugs. Can I trust her? Is it time for me to put my foot down and make her stop spending as much time with her boyfriend, or will that only drive her further away?
Concerned Mother in Battle Creek

(more…)

During one of our post-SEC-media-days evening wind-downs, I overheard our fearless leader Orson, in a telephone trash-talk exchange with one of our illustrious Big XII partisans, describe Big XII Media Days as “the second guy in a DP scene” compared to the SEC. If that’s the case, then Pac-10 Media Day must be the guy holding the boom mike, as evidenced by this mob scene (courtesy of Scott Wolf from Inside USC) from new Pac-10 commissioner Larry Scott’s podium appearance last Thursday:

PRESEEZUN BUZZ: UR DOIN IT WRONG. Seriously, Pac-10, that is bush. In the interest of a more literary comparison, if SEC Media Days is “Animal House” — a lot of shenanigans go on, nobody really learns anything, but nobody gets hurt — then Pac-10 Media Day (yup, that’s Day, singular) is the equivalent of a Tom Stoppard play: very low-key and dignified, a lot of people talk for what seems like a very long time, but in the end nothing happens.

As further evidence of just how much Scott’s appearance fizzled, Oregon coach Chip Kelly brought the house down, comparatively speaking, with his explanation of how his spread offense relates to the Pythagorean theorem. (As someone who counts finagling his way out of AP Calculus in high school as one of his life’s greatest victories, I find this inconceivable: Math?!? In college football? Too complicated! FIRE BAD!) Even Dennis Erickson’s interview with Fanster.com was positively vanilla (not to mention barely audible), with Erickson offering up nary a story about golf carts, volcanoes, drunken sexual shenanigans in the Far East, or any of the other things for which you’d bother to listen to such an interview in the first place.

Meanwhile, even Big XII Media Days gave fans more excitement in a single tattoo on Brandon Carter’s skull than the Pac-10 had in an entire day. Clearly, Pac-10, you guys need an adrenaline shot, but we, the SEC, are willing to provide it. How ’bout we loan Clay Travis out to you for future Media Days, just to liven things up a bit? Once you’ve watched Aaron Corp field the question of whether he’s saving himself for marriage, your eyes will be opened to a whole new world of possibilities.

Hey, kids. If you’re reading this, it’s because we were in the emergency room all night getting a pesky couple of broken transverse processes of the L1 and L2 lumbar vertebrae taken care of by the fine medical professionals at Emory Hospital. You ever had Dilaudid? It’s like morphine, but with robot arms, a trust fund, and a horrendous gambling problem. We met last night.

Play me off for 6-8 weeks, Keyboard Cat.

No permanent or lasting damage, as the piece of angry, disunited bones in my back aren’t load bearing. They do hurt like I swallowed a plugged-in soldering gun, which is why I’m waking up in a few hours to dust off some more delicious, nutritious Percocet.

Thanks to all the well-wishers on Twitter and Facebook. (Our phone doesn’t work, as the iPhone battery died last night, too.) It’s pill and sleep time, and we’ll see what “we” feel like tomorrow.

“’Tis the maddest trick a man can ever play in his whole life, to let his breath sneak out of his body without any more ado, and without so much as a rap o’er the pate, or a kick of the guts; to go out like the snuff of a farthing candle, and die merely of the mulligrubs, or the sullens.”

Via Dawg Sports, of course, comes the side-splittingest breaking tale of the entire offseason: UGA mutant star Knowshon Moreno being forced to write a two-page essay last year on noise pollution following a writeup for loud music in the dorms. I cannot encourage you strongly enough to click through to the documentation itself. Before we even get to what he wrote, there’s the hyperreaction of the Boss Queen of the Conduct Review Board (naturally named “Brad”), who announced—go on, say this out loud without sneering: “…that Knowshon had not fulfilled the original conditions of the sanction regarding formatting of the research paper”. It gets better (emphasis added for spite):

On October 31, 2006, Knowshon responded to Brad but resubmitted the same incorrect sanction. Brad once again informed Knowshon that he needed to format the paper correctly and resubmit the sanction. In addition, he warned Knowshon about the possibility of having his record flagged…

And then there’s the essay itself. From the conclusion:

To show the responsibility that I have gained over this situation I was recently asked in my room one night after quiet hours if I could do a back flip. My answer to this was yes because I can, but I kindly stated that I would not be able to perform this act at the time because I did not want to disturb my fellow neighbors below and around me.

He goes on to state that he will resolve this issue by living off-campus next year. The document further informs us that Knowshon’s record “remains flagged.” Knowshon himself….does not.

Clearly, the wrath of Brad has had devastating and far-reaching consequences.

By the EDSBS staff.

We care, just like a tiger does: with their claws and teeth first.

Tennessee has a minor, eeny-tiny-bit of a discipline problem, and not the sort that professional paste-eater and push-door puller Mike Freeman suggests should end up in the firing of Phil Fulmer. (Mike: Tyler Durden IS the narrator!) Fire him for being only good to excellent, sure; we’ve seen that in the SEC before. Fire him for blackmailing Trace Adkins with incriminating gay sex photos into performing at his daughter’s birthday party. (Unsee that, dear reader, and you have achieved enlightenment. We just typed it, and will not eat for several days.) Fire him for picking up field mice and bopping them on the head, and then dipping them in panko crumbs, deep frying them, and eating them during film sessions.

Fire him for any of these, but not the juvenile aborted Liverventures™* most Vol players get arrested for these days. The Vols just need a special blend of caring, discipline, and caring discipline outlined below. Because we care. We really do. In that kind of foster kid kind of care, the one where you don’t buy them fresh produce, turn on the heat for them in the winter, or buy them clothes that fit.

Actin’ Straight with EDSBS: Vol-arity Edition.

1: Pat Summitt. This doesn’t even have to take longer than 15 minutes. Simply invite Pat over, have the winningest coach at Tennessee ever come to a Vol team meeting and then allow her to rip each of the Vols’ gridiron types a new, perfectly torn second asshole. Summitt is the kind of thin-lipped, wiry, kerosene-eyed women who drove schoolbuses in my childhood: very, very quiet schoolbuses. There were rumors one kid, once, had spoken, and that only a red mark the birds liked to pick at on the school driveway stood as testament to her wrath. The team would be a lot like that schoolbus for the next year, at least.

2. Hedge mazes outside dorm entrances. Bull your way through fifteen rows of thorny hedge without bleeding to death? Do I smell starting defense?

3. The ChastiT belt. Fierce, made of stainless steel. Adorned with picture of John Chavis on codpiece for extra contraceptive power. (more…)

A crowded singles bar in an urban setting. Bobby sits at a bar in a red tube dress, drinking a cosmo and swirling the straw around in his hand.

Another! Now!

Bobby: BARTENDER! Another Screaming Orgasm over here.

Bartender: You’re really pouring it on.

Bobby: Fuck it, I’m drunk. And put another one on that old guy’s tab over there. He’s not even paying attention.

Mr. Blank, at the opposite end of the bar watching tv: Love ya, babe!

Bobby: Kiss my ass, limpdick. See? He didn’t even hear it. Limpdick!

Mr. Blank: (Blows kiss, winks.)

Bobby: Fuck. (downs shot)

(A stiff, tweedy middle aged man fiddling with his cell phone approaches the bar and the empty seat next to Bobby.)

Bill Martin, Michigan AD: Good evening, madam. Mind if i sit…

Bobby: Go right fucking ahead. ANOTHER! (taps empty shot glass)

Martin: Bartender, a Latour ‘64, if you’ve got it?

Bartender: (Stares, pauses, continues.) We have wine coolers.

Martin: Ooh! That sounds quite refreshing. I’ll try one.

(Turns to Bobby)

The weather has been delightful this year. Perfect for some late fall sailing, don’t you think?

Bobby: Sailing? Who the hell are you, Captain Ron? (more…)

Updates, updates, updates! This is a grand time of year for coach-related rumor mongering and, yes, even the occasional real bit of news.

Clemson Keeps Bowden
Fan 1: How do you know the 2007 season was fucked up?

Fan 2: Appy State over Michigan!

Fan 1: No, jackass.

Fan 2: Stanford over USC?

Fan 1: Bah – no, not that. Dude, there were multiple teams competing with one another for Tommy Bowden’s services.

Charlie Weis Wants You To Judge Him
Next year, that is.

Asked how quickly he can get things righted, Weis responded: “Not fast enough. That’s probably as fair an answer as I can say,” Weis said Monday at a news conference. “I think that the arrow is definitely pointing up. You already know what my goal is every time we play, and every time we play my expectation is to win that game. But we can’t get good enough fast enough as far as I’m concerned.”

I have to agree here: things are looking up. I honestly thought they’d lose to Duke and Stanford.

UCLA Needs To Hire Coach With Swagger
So says a crusty looking old dude at the LA Times, anyway: “Those who lead the teams that get the attention in Los Angeles have a common thread. They are people who conduct their business with a style and a swagger. They either came with name recognition or quickly acquired it here. The style and swagger aren’t always the same, but all have some form of it… So, for at least a couple of weeks, Guerrero has our spotlight. We don’t ask much, just a coach with style, swagger and success.”

If you’re having trouble imagining Pete Carroll reading the LA Times this morning, allow me to assist you…

Les Miles Still In Play At Michigan
Or wait, no, maybe it’s Ferentz. Wasn’t I talking about Brady Hoke this morning? Am I a candidate for this job?

If you’re having trouble imagining Ohio State fans reading Michigan blogs this morning, allow me to assist you…

University of Louisiana-Monroe coach Charlie Weatherbie is celebrating for a few reasons. Sure, he’s got reason to pop the bubbly because his team beat the Alabama Crimson Tide 21-14 on Saturday. But Weatherbie has 4 million other reasons to celebrate–namely, that he’s going to be paid a salary commensurate to his record after beating the 4 million dollar man himself, Nick Saban.

Give the man a monkey. And his 4 million dollars.

“According to the win, I’m undervalued by 97 percent of what I should be paid,” said Weatherbie, who earns a mere $130,000 as the coach of the Warhawks. “I’m looking forward to being paid what I’m truly owed and living out one of my lifelong dreams: buying a monkey, and then training it to smoke and drink beer.”

ULM had no formal statement in response to Weatherbie’s demands, but off-the-record sources were quoted as saying that “there was no fucking way” they could pay Weatherbie’s new salary, citing the fact that “paying almost one-tenth of our total budget to a 5-6 football coach would be completely fucking insane.”

Weatherbie, though, is confident something could be worked out. “Perhaps they could sell some land or something. I don’t know. Have a bake sale. Charlie wants his monkey, and it’s time to give him some bananas for all his hard work. Tell the sob stories to my agent, pencilnecks. Bananas, motherfuckers.”

Weatherbie’s not the only one making cash from the hash of the Crimson Tide’s loss. (more…)