ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: THE JOHN VAUGHN. Painful things will happen this season. Terrors will befall your team. Perhaps your defensive coordinator will develop an unfortunate fixation with loose zone coverages late in games; perhaps your offensive coordinator will ask "What would Gary Crowton do?" and then proceed to do just that. If this last one befalls you, we have no prescriptions or cures. Embrace death, and be brave for those still living.
The John Vaughn, however, is one you might just want to ride out, because failure as spectacular as his is almost an art form in itself.
In 2005 Vaughn missed five field goals in the game against LSU, including the fifth and final in a situation to tie it in overtime. Vaughn somehow managed to avoid assassination, perhaps because rival fans were foiling Auburn fans' plots to keep Vaughn alive for their upcoming games against the Tigerplainsmen. Don't wish this fate on your worst enemy okay go right ahead because LOL SOUL-CRACKING FAILURE.
(Vaughn did actually recover and kick a game winner against Georgia that season, and then in the NFL for a bit before getting cut by the Titans. He's from Brentwood, TN, so we imagine he's now selling [something], wearing some sweet pressed khakis, and going down to the Corner Pub where he hangs out with that skinny blonde girl. You know, that one.)
WE DON'T GO OVERBOARD ON BONUS POINTS IN THE FULMER CUP. The mugshot of the former Oklahoma State football player hit by current OSU Cowboy Jamie Blatnik does tempt, though. He looks like he ran into an anvil.
JOE PATERNO SEEMS OLD. VERY, VERY OLD. The common thread in those gently tiptoeing around Paterno's appearance at Big Ten Media Days yesterday: Joe Paterno is old, and actually looked old yesterday, slurring some of his words, speaking in a half-whisper, and generally functioning at a slower, less snappier rate than he has in previous appearances as "Joe Paterno, old guy who acts old-but-not-decrepit."
Meanwhile, Tim Brewster in the full bloom of middle age put on the kind of rhetorical fireworks show you might expect of an expert orator skilled in the Bobert Zook school of excited competition dialogue victory win talking speak. We join Black Heart Gold Pants in suspecting that Brewster and [NAME REDACTED] are the same guy done with elaborate fleshmasks and body doubles. ACTUAL BIG TENNISH NEWS: they will have a championship game by next year, according to Jim Delany, who spoke slowly for all the SEC graduates in the room. (Joke's on him! We were in the parking lot keying the word "FARTEATER" into his car.)
ANOTHER TIME GREG MCELROY IS SLIGHTED AND WEEPS QUIETLY WITH A TUB OF BEN AND JERRY'S WHILE WATCHING THE VIEW. The lack of respect for McElroy at this point is now a form of entertainment. Embrace it, Alabama fans. Cut him in line at the Golden Corral; ask for the kicker's autograph and walk past him without acknowledging him. Better still: ask him when Mark Ingram is coming out to say hello, and then say "Thanks, coach." It only makes him stronger, you know.
WOOOO BIG EAST MEDIA DAY. It is the day when the Big East allows their coaches to insist "WE'RE STILL HERE DAMMIT," and the proper warmup for this is the Octonion joking about mascot sexual practices. Memphis will fit in just fine, thank you.
FLORIDA'S PRACTICE WILL AGAIN BE CLOSED TO THE MEDIA. That only means one thing: the wishbone returns, and you will have to deal with it.
HE'S ALL THAT AND THEN SOME/ SHORT DARK AND HANDSOME. Great moments in hip-hop college football fashion, Georgia Tech edition. You cannot go wrong with lacy cursive, i.e the font of ironic asskickings.
DR. TOM COULD ROCK A BELLBOTTOM. Dr. Tom is the clear stunner here, though Don Coryell is clearly down to fuck in an outfit with that much checker to it.