Upon Further Review - The Predictions
The talking season is nearly over. The real season, which has already begun for a couple teams, starts in earnest this weekend. Last year, in my pre-season look across the country, I hit on some and totally missed on others. Kind of like everyone else in the country that made an attempt to predict what would or wouldn’t happen before the real hitting started. The good news, I hit on 50% of the teams that made the CFB Playoffs. Clemson and Alabama were repeats in the Championship game. I had Alabama repeating. That didn’t go too well for the Tide. The two I missed?
I homered up and picked Iowa to represent the Big Ten and had TCU coming out of the Big 12. Neither of those came to fruition as Washington and Ohio State made up the other two participants. They both showed up, but neither put up much of a fight.
All my picks were based on what I felt were factors that would allow those four teams a road to the playoffs. Who could have foreseen the rise of Penn State, which propelled OSU into the playoffs, or, for that matter, that the Huskies would run with the big dogs and make their own path to the playoffs.
So this year, I’ll just run through the Power 5’s alphabetically and I will incorporate this into a portion of each weekly article.
The ACC Atlantic features a trio of pretty darn good teams, including the defending national champion Clemson Tigers. When you look at this group, you have to think that they will be in the mix. Their head man, Dabo Swinney, is in the conversation as one of the best in college football right now. Six straight double digit win seasons also tells me something about the team, as a whole. FSU is another perennial favorite among college football experts. Nothing has changed there. Jimbo Fisher leads the Seminoles, who themselves, have won double digit times 6 of the last 7 seasons. Louisville is the black sheep in this group. I touted them hard last year, and they faded down the stretch. They return the Heisman Trophy winner in quarterback Lamar Jackson, who, isn’t the favorite for the Heisman this season. Sam Darnold from USC and Saquon Barkley are the favorites heading into 2017. Don’t count out the talented Jackson to repeat and make history of sorts. Heck, he’s only a sophomore, he definitely has a chance to win it twice, maybe thrice! The way his O-line treated him in the latter stages of the season last year is probably why he isn’t favored this year. And that is the same reason I’m not as confident they can rise above either Clemson or FSU to win the Atlantic. That means the decision on who represents the Atlantic will likely come down to the game played between those two. I’m going with the experience over the younger talent this year and calling for FSU to be back on top in the Atlantic once again.
The ACC Coastal could really go a variety of different directions. However, I’ve narrowed it down to Virginia Tech and Miami. Virginia Tech opens with W Virginia in what is a renewal of a rivalry that had to be shelved for a few years from a fan tension standpoint. Sad, cause that is probably one of those rivalry games that should occur every year. After that, they have a trio of warm-ups prior to leading off league play against Clemson. We will know a lot about the Hokies by that time. Miami is led by Mark Richt. He seems to be very comfortable at his alma mater, and is also back in those fertile recruiting grounds of South Florida. Will that help? Sure. Has that helped? You bet it has. I really think Miami is on the cusp of coming back and being noteworthy again. Will they fight for National Championships? It’s possible, however, they need to win a division title and a conference title first. So, not to get the cart ahead of the horse at all, but…………..Miami is my pick to win the Coastal .
ACC Champion: I’m going to go with FSU. They have Deondre Francois and Jimbo Fisher and will have a better offensive line than they had last year that should be able to protect Francois better than last season when he was basically running for his life.
Big Ten East, like the ACC Atlantic, has three very good teams that one could make a case for. I’m going to go with Michigan first. They’ve lost too much to graduation and the draft and are ranked too high to start the year. Harbaugh and Company will have to prove to me that they are still a force, which could happen, but they have a tough row to hoe. They open right here in DFW against Florida. I think they will be sent home with their tail between their legs. They will have a chance to regroup though, but they won’t have enough to make it happen in 2017. That means it likely comes down to Penn State and Ohio State. Penn State returns everyone it seems. Ohio State does return everyone from the youngest team in college football last season. Penn State was a surprise to everyone outside of Happy Valley. Ohio State got the nod to the playoffs when they possibly shouldn’t have. This is a tough call, but I’m going to go with another year of experience for the kids and say that Ohio State retakes the Eastern crown.
The Big Ten West is always going to be a four horse race. The names change from time to time, but honestly, not that often. Wisconsin is the favorite, followed by Northwestern, Iowa and Nebraska. Most experts would have you believe that Wisconsin isn’t going to be challenged all that much. Big Oline, strong D, backs that can carry them through the worst of times. This year, however, Northwestern might be the team that could unseat the Badgers. They bring back all the key parts that made them decent a year ago on offense. Their defense will always remind us of their head coach, as it should. Nebraska, with Mike Riley, have yet to prove they are anything more than a pedestrian group of players with upside. Iowa, well, I’d like to tell everyone that the quiet confidence oozing out of Iowa City reminds me of some years gone by that turned out pretty darn well for the Hawks. However, there are a couple areas of concern that need to be addressed and answered before I go anointing them as potential West winners. I’d love to fall in line and make it easy on myself, but I just can’t when it comes to the West division. That said, I’m going with Northwestern to represent the West. I think they might have something special on the offensive side of the ball this year and surprise a few folks.
Big Ten Champion: Experience means a lot. Experience means you’ve been there before. Experience tells me that Ohio State will end up being the team that emerges from the Big Ten this season.
The Big 12 is an anomaly among the Power 5 conferences, in that they do not have two divisions and have only just this year decided they needed that 13th data point by having a conference championship. There was a big surprise this summer with the retirement of Bob Stoops. Believe it or not, there are a number of NFL fans in Dallas. Many who know nothing about college football. I was talking to a guy the other day that said, “Stoops will have the Sooners ready to play and get them to the playoffs again this year”. I said I doubt it. He asked why I thought that. I told him because Stoops retired and that Lincoln Riley was the new head coach at Oklahoma. He didn’t believe me. I just said okay, it really didn’t happen. My point with all that, Oklahoma lost a ton of talent, yet still has a ton of talent. The coaching change may not affect them as much as some think, but it will affect them. Oklahoma State is a team that seems loaded and ready to take on the spot light. TCU, led by the second longest tenured coach in college football, Gary Patterson, will have some talent and be ready when the time comes. I was listening to College Sports Today, hosted by Mark Packer, the other day and one of his questions was who could get to the 10 win mark this year and why. An Iowa State fan called in and threw his reasons into the ring. I wondered what medication he was on that would create that type of delusional behavior. I sent a tweet to Pack asking where the “not gonna happen” button was located. West Virginia, Texas and Kansas State will all have a say in who the final champion will ultimately be, but I don’t think it will be any of those three.
Big 12 Champion: I’m always torn on this one. I know the fan favorite is always Oklahoma. I’m not here to pick the fan favorite. I’m truly trying to figure out who the actual winner will be. Based on that, and based on the fact that the Big 12 will finally have a true conference champion, my pick this year goes to Oklahoma State. I think Mike Gundy and his boys will win the inaugural event.
The Pac 12 North will be a three headed monster this season as well. Seems to be a trend. Oregon makes a bit of a comeback under first year coach Willie Taggart. He’s a coach that demands perfection and dedication. I think Oregon needs a shot of that. Washington, who was the Pac 12 CFB Playoff representative last year, will be back. That defense reminds me of some of those Boise State defenses in those years they were really strong. They proved to me that they could run with the big dogs last year and may have learned a little something along the way that could propel them back into the playoff picture. The final team from the North, may be Stanford. The Cardinal seem to have some players in place to pick up where some recent draft picks left off. It’s reload in Palo Alto, not rebuild. All that said, I’m going with Washington to win the North.
The Pac 12 South will come down to two teams. I believe one of them will be Utah. The Utes are a tough out and have been for a while. Kyle Whittingham has proven to be a solid replacement for Urban Meyer, winning an average of 8.5 games per year. No reason to think they can’t do that again this year. Matter of fact, if they gel early, and can gain a bit of confidence for their young quarterback Tyler Huntly, I think they could make a run at USC. Which is my other team in the southern division. USC, led by Clay Helton, who I had on the early coaches “Hot Seat” last season (Seems ridiculous now), will be loaded. They have the early favorite for Heisman at Quarterback in Sam Darnold. The decision Helton made to burn his redshirt and throw him in the fire was a good one in hind-sight. From the moment Darnold took his first snap, through the end of the USC season, you could tell he was an inspiration. He might have saved Helton from being unemployed as well. Darnold isn’t the only player USC has, it is, after all, USC. They will be loaded along both fronts. The offensive line did not play that well last year, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t talented. The Defensive front could be one of the best in the Pac 12, and will need to be in order to propel the Trojans into the CFP conversation. Because of all those things, I’m picking USC as the winner of the Pac 12 South.
Pac 12 Champion: I believe that Washington will ultimately win the Pac 12 title again this season. It will be full of strife, changing tides and probably disappointment. The Pac 12 winner might have multiple losses this year.
Last, but certainly not least, on to the conference that Paul Finebaum would have us believe is as strong as the man of steel, can leap tall buildings in a single bound and is by far the best in college football. The SEC.
I’m not inclined to agree with Mr. Finebaum. The SEC East, or SEC Least as it’s been known by recently, is going to be won by one of two teams. Either Florida or Georgia. I think both will represent their division well, starting with Florida. They open, as I mentioned earlier, against the fighting Jim Harbaughs, right here at Jerry’s World. Their off season, in particular the last couple weeks, has been filled with player suspensions and possession charges. Now, all the players (save one) that have found trouble were down the depth chart and shouldn’t really hurt that much (except one). That one is the very talented and starting WR Antonio Calloway. This last bone head move might have been the one that broke the camel’s proverbial back. Guess we’ll see as the season progress. The biggest problem the Gators have is who will start at QB. When Malik Zaire transferred from Notre Dame to Florida as a graduate transfer, it was assumed by many that he would be their starting quarterback. You know what they say about assuming………don’t do it. 4th year junior Luke Del Rio, son of Oakland Raiders coach Jack Del Rio, may have the upper hand. Coach McElwain hasn’t named a starter. Has actually said all three might play that first game. Seriously? Come on man! He’s just playin with us. That won’t really happen, will it? Either way, the Iowa Hawkeyes made the Florida gators inept offense look like world beaters last year in the bowl game. If they can somehow duplicate that offense this season, they will be tough to beat. The Georgia Bulldogs aren’t going to be a push over by any stretch. Matter of fact, I really think they will be a double digit win team this year. They are talented. They have one of the best RB’s in college football in Nick Chubb. Yes, I know, it seems like Chubb is in his eighth season, but reality is what it is, and Georgia, despite not having QB questions like Florida, the question is has Jacob Eason developed? The other question, can Georgia’s offensive line (yeah, you know how I am about those big uglies) give him enough time to get it to his receivers. It was a problem last year. Of these two teams, I’m going to go with Florida winning the East for the third straight year.
The SEC West is owned by a guy by the name of Nick Saban who happens to coach the Alabama Crimson Tide. Who’s that you say? Maybe Darth Vader is the only name more recognized. Not sure who would win in fight with light sabers, but I would probably put my money on Saban. Now I do sound like Finebaum! Okay, lets make this short and sweet. In fishing, we have a saying. Don’t leave fish to go find fish. In this case, there’s no reason to pick against the team that has owned college football, no matter how badly I want to. There are, for arguments sake, teams that could present an issue for Alabama. Those teams are Auburn and LSU in the West. Well, there are more, that is why they play the game, so lets explore. Auburn has the best kept secret at quarterback of any team in the country. He is flying so below the radar, that he is barely mentioned in conversations about best QB’s and Heisman Candidates. Guys, this is the same 4-star kid that Art Briles talked into going to Baylor after originally committing to Texas Tech! He transferred to Auburn, after a year at a community college and not playing and will be a major force the next couple years. Jarrett Stidham will be one of the best QB’s that no one is talking about. Auburn has a tough schedule, but what team in college football doesn’t? If Stidham can perform at the level I believe he’s capable of performing, Auburn is going to be a formidable foe. If not, they will just be another casualty of Alabama on their way to the CFP once again. The other team, who I really seem to like, is LSU. Ed Orgeron is excited about his team. I’ve listen to him describe how he has changed as a coach and as a person since his days at Ole Miss. I’ve listened to him describe how his players have bought in, how he is a players coach. How he gets out of their way and lets them do what they are good at doing. He’s talking the talk, now it’s time to see if his team can walk the walk. They open with BYU, a team that has a game under their belts already. They will be tested immediately. If they can get through that one, and get on any kind of roll, I really think they could become a West Division player. But, as I said, my pick to win the West, until proven otherwise, is Bama.
SEC Champion: Again, going with the Tide on this one. Don’t leave fish to find fish……
I haven’t talked about the independents yet, so now is as good a time as any. Notre Dame isn’t getting in. Either is BYU.
Now to the real meat of the article………who makes the playoffs. Honestly, I’d be happy if I hit on 50% again this year. Let’s take those same conferences in order again.
ACC: FSU
Big Ten: Ohio State
Big 12: Oklahoma State
SEC: Alabama
I believe the Pac 12 is on the outside looking in this year. I thought the same thing last year, didn’t happen. There may be a little too much cannibalism in conference play this season to make it back. Bottom line, two new teams, two teams that have been there consistently in the past. Won’t be a repeat matchup in the title game this year. What do you think?
