Cotton Bowl - Florida vs Oklahoma

The NY6 games are the ones suffering the most. They get the players and teams that were almost in the CFP and they have players opt and the rest half ass it. I said it in another post, the game needs a major overhaul.

I’m not sure whether to be proud of Florida for not pulling an FSU and just canceling the damn game, or to be pissed that Florida didn’t just cancel the game. This is how absurd this was; Florida had to rush to medically clear a converted 4th string TE to have him play DT, so that UF would have enough DT’s to meet the mandated minimum for the position group. That’s why we saw #81 messing around at DT looking totally lost and confused (Dante Lang).

To your broader point, the system does need an overhaul. The opt outs were already getting bad but this year was exacerbated by COVID. I think the answer is to expand the playoffs to at least 12 teams and to compensate players for playing.
 
😂

Florida led 41-14 and 55-28 in that game and won comfortably. But okay. Lane is great, that 4-5 was so impressive and his 70-55 career record is magical.

Alabama led UF:

28-10 in the 2nd quarter
35-17 at halftime
45-31 with 7 minutes left &
52-38 with 2 minutes left

That didn't stop you from crowing about how close that was with your little window dressing touchdown at the end.

The bottom line is UF had 642 yards of offense and Ole Miss had 613. You two were pretty evenly matched in Year 1 for Lane vs. Year 3 for Mullen.
 
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Not only that....Did the Independence Bowl ever mean anything? Did the Outback Bowl ever mean anything?

In the old, old system....the Orange Bowl, Sugar Bowl, and Rose Bowl may have all mattered on the same day because #1 Nebraska was in the Orange Bowl, #2 Georgia in the Sugar Bowl and #3 USC in the Rose Bowl. And if #1 and #2 lost, #3 could win the national title.

But, even in that system, what the hell did the Sun Bowl or Gator Bowl mean?

There is a lot of revisionist history here. The difference today is there are players who are saying....hey, wait a minute. I'm risking my draft spot (which is worth more money now than 30 years ago) to win the damn Gator Bowl? No, thanks. I'm going to sit this one out.

The only way they meant anything was because there were fewer bowls, so making a bowl meant more. But other than that....it was just another game.

In 1987 Tennessee went 9-2-1 and was ranked #16 and got a Peach Bowl invite to play Indiana. That game wasn't even broadcast on a network or ESPN, it was on the Mizziou Network and in Nashville was on one of the weird off network channels.
 
Not only that....Did the Independence Bowl ever mean anything? Did the Outback Bowl ever mean anything?

In the old, old system....the Orange Bowl, Sugar Bowl, and Rose Bowl may have all mattered on the same day because #1 Nebraska was in the Orange Bowl, #2 Georgia in the Sugar Bowl and #3 USC in the Rose Bowl. And if #1 and #2 lost, #3 could win the national title.

But, even in that system, what the hell did the Sun Bowl or Gator Bowl mean?

There is a lot of revisionist history here. The difference today is there are players who are saying....hey, wait a minute. I'm risking my draft spot (which is worth more money now than 30 years ago) to win the damn Gator Bowl? No, thanks. I'm going to sit this one out.
I remember the first year Miami won the national championship, 83' I think. Miami was #5 and they played and beat #1 Nebraska in a classic in the Orange Bowl and jumped all the way to #1 because Georgia beat #2 Texas in the Cotton Bowl, the Big 10 champ I think was #3 maybe Illinois and they got upset by UCLA in the Rose and #4 Auburn won the Sugar Bowl in a sloppy fashion. Miami's only loss that year was getting the brakes beat off them by Florida on the opening weekend.
 
I remember the first year Miami won the national championship, 83' I think. Miami was #5 and they played and beat #1 Nebraska in a classic in the Orange Bowl and jumped all the way to #1 because Georgia beat #2 Texas in the Cotton Bowl, the Big 10 champ I think was #3 maybe Illinois and they got upset by UCLA in the Rose and #4 Auburn won the Sugar Bowl in a sloppy fashion. Miami's only loss that year was getting the brakes beat off them by Florida on the opening weekend.

Right. And even with all those bowl games mattering.....

There were still 15+ bowl games that didn't matter.
 
Alabama led UF:

28-10 in the 2nd quarter
35-17 at halftime
45-31 with 7 minutes left &
52-38 with 2 minutes left

That didn't stop you from crowing about how close that was with your little window dressing touchdown at the end.

The bottom line is UF had 642 yards of offense and Ole Miss had 613. You two were pretty evenly matched in Year 1 for Lane vs. Year 3 for Mullen.

It really bothers you that UF was 6 points and one more minute on the clock from beating Alabama doesn’t it? “Window dressing” TD? It’s the SEC Championship game. UF was down two TD’s with over two minutes left, Bama couldn’t stop them, did you want them to take a knee?

Lane Kiffin is a loser. He had a losing season. He got smoked by Florida despite putting up 35 points. He gets beat by any team with a pulse. The only reason he has a career winning % above .500 as a head coach is because he racked up two 11-win seasons at FAU, where he also managed to have a season where he only won 4 games. He got fired from Oakland and USC, he bolted after a 6-loss season at UT, and he’ll eventually get fired at Ole Miss after they get tired of losing 5-6 exciting games a year. Maybe UT will bring him back at that point since he’s your guy. Your judgment is clouded by his flashy offenses, his charisma, fun personality and his quotable quotes. But when you strip away all the bling, there he stands with his 5 losses per year.
 
It really bothers you that UF was 6 points and one more minute on the clock from beating Alabama doesn’t it? “Window dressing” TD? It’s the SEC Championship game. UF was down two TD’s with over two minutes left, Bama couldn’t stop them, did you want them to take a knee?

Lane Kiffin is a loser. He had a losing season. He got smoked by Florida despite putting up 35 points. He gets beat by any team with a pulse. The only reason he has a career winning % above .500 as a head coach is because he racked up two 11-win seasons at FAU, where he also managed to have a season where he only won 4 games. He got fired from Oakland and USC, he bolted after a 6-loss season at UT, and he’ll eventually get fired at Ole Miss after they get tired of losing 5-6 exciting games a year. Maybe UT will bring him back at that point since he’s your guy. Your judgment is clouded by his flashy offenses, his charisma, fun personality and his quotable quotes. But when you strip away all the bling, there he stands with his 5 losses per year.
Lane just had a better SEC record in year 1 at Ole Miss than Dan did in Year 1 at Miss State. In fact, Dan had only 1 winning season in SEC play out of 9 at Miss State and that came in year 6, so I guess he's a loser too. Heck, Florida only went 2-3 this year against West, so like I said Ole Miss and Florida are roughly equivalent teams, Ole Miss just played in the tougher division.
 
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I’m not sure whether to be proud of Florida for not pulling an FSU and just canceling the damn game, or to be pissed that Florida didn’t just cancel the game. This is how absurd this was; Florida had to rush to medically clear a converted 4th string TE to have him play DT, so that UF would have enough DT’s to meet the mandated minimum for the position group. That’s why we saw #81 messing around at DT looking totally lost and confused (Dante Lang).

To your broader point, the system does need an overhaul. The opt outs were already getting bad but this year was exacerbated by COVID. I think the answer is to expand the playoffs to at least 12 teams and to compensate players for playing.
The real problem is the bowl setup itself is a holdover from a dead model, and the expansions of the bowls watered down the achievement to where you have to be a really bad team to not make a bowl. I'm old enough to remember when there were less than 20 bowls. There were years where 8-3 teams had a very real possibility of not making a bowl, and now that's not really even a possiblity in a normal year.

Then you add to that how the landscape of professional football has changed. The NFL is bigger and more profitable and salaries are sky high. Add to that how much more we know about how football effects the body long term and now you have guys who are thinking they have a relatively small window to make as much money as possible and may suffer some long term damage and they are thinking what's best for them. When you take off the nostalgic glasses and start thinking of it from THAT standpoint, it's hard to argue with their approach.

I agree with both of you here, and also @05_never_again pointing out that there is a cultural difference now as well. For example, and I know I really go out of my way to bang on UNC, but I find this absurd. UNC is playing aTm in the Orange Bowl, they haven’t sniffed a bowl game of that prestige in forever. Hell they haven’t even won a conference title in 40 years, but they have their 4 best players (outside of Sam Howell) opting out for the biggest game in program history. I would be irate if I were a Carolina fan. You aren’t Florida or Oklahoma where you are at least in NY6 game every year, you’re a team that has the opportunity for an achievement that hasn’t been done ever or in forever. It’s sad that there isn’t some sort of school pride or loyalty associated with it. I understand it’s a business decision and maybe it’s time to explore further compensation, but the college game is beginning to suffer. Games like last night are the worst thing that could happen because when a Florida vs OU Cotton Bowl game is an afterthought then your model is broken and Viewership will plummet.
 
I love the fact that Florida fans all think they’re back bla bla...and yet they just finish the year with a record of 8-4. Looks pretty average on paper. Of course we know they beat uga and played Bama tough. But the record will show the same as auburn who just fired their coach.

0-12
 
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How many were Covid?

I heard that some just opted not to play but never heard which ones.

The key players missing were opt outs (Pitts, Toney, Grimes, Davis, Wilson).

Pitts should have opted out after the Ole Miss game, worst case after taking that concussion shot against UGA.

Copeland was the most notable Covid issue, because he went on social media to let the world know about it, which is his MO on just about everything. LB Ventrell Miller and DT Kyree Campbell were late scratches, not sure if they were Covid related.

There were also some guys injured like DE Jeremiah Moon and LB David Reese, who tends to stay injured.

Here’s the full list:
3 Marco Wilson (opt out, addition by subtraction)
4 David Reese (injury)
6 Shawn Davis (opt out)
7 Jeremiah Moon (injury)
8 Trevon Grimes (opt out)
15 Jacob Copeland (COVID)
17 Kahleil Jackson ???
21 Ethan Pouncey ???
22 Rashad Torrence II (injury or COVID)
51 Ventrell Miller (possibly COVID)
54 Lamar Goods ???
55 Hayden Knighton ???
66 Jaelin Humphries (injury or COVID)
84 Kyle Pitts (opt out)
91 Marlon Dunlap (injury or COVID)
95 Lucas Alonso ???
 
The key players missing were opt outs (Pitts, Toney, Grimes, Davis, Wilson).

Pitts should have opted out after the Ole Miss game, worst case after taking that concussion shot against UGA.

Copeland was the most notable Covid issue, because he went on social media to let the world know about it, which is his MO on just about everything. LB Ventrell Miller and DT Kyree Campbell were late scratches, not sure if they were Covid related.

There were also some guys injured like DE Jeremiah Moon and LB David Reese, who tends to stay injured.

Here’s the full list:
3 Marco Wilson (opt out, addition by subtraction)
4 David Reese (injury)
6 Shawn Davis (opt out)
7 Jeremiah Moon (injury)
8 Trevon Grimes (opt out)
15 Jacob Copeland (COVID)
17 Kahleil Jackson ???
21 Ethan Pouncey ???
22 Rashad Torrence II (injury or COVID)
51 Ventrell Miller (possibly COVID)
54 Lamar Goods ???
55 Hayden Knighton ???
66 Jaelin Humphries (injury or COVID)
84 Kyle Pitts (opt out)
91 Marlon Dunlap (injury or COVID)
95 Lucas Alonso ???

Yeah, thats a bunch.

The young QB looks the part.
 
Yeah, thats a bunch.

The young QB looks the part.

The question marks are kids who didn’t play much at all, so they may have gotten caught up in contact tracing.

As far as our next QB goes, Emory is not a sure thing. Anthony Richardson is a monster.

Hopefully Mullen can pull a couple kids out of the transfer portal to catch passes. What we saw last night won’t get it done in 2021.

Oh, and Grantham has to go like yesterday.
 
I’m all for wishing bad things on you guys but I’d like to be honest about it.
Edit: you know more than anybody my thoughts on CDM but this clearly Isn’t on him.

Yep, and I appreciate your honesty.

The LSU game validated your Mullen theory, but last night was an entirely different animal.
 
The question marks are kids who didn’t play much at all, so they may have gotten caught up in contact tracing.

As far as our next QB goes, Emory is not a sure thing. Anthony Richardson is a monster.

Hopefully Mullen can pull a couple kids out of the transfer portal to catch passes. What we saw last night won’t get it done in 2021.

Oh, and Grantham has to go like yesterday.

Yeah. The defense doesnt have to hold teams under 20 any more but if Florida is going up to the next level it has to be better than it is.

That Qb was impressive (mop up or not). Has a Cam Newton look to him.
 
It’s basically the opposite of college basketball. College football needs to be fixed, and soon. I think there needs to be some major changes made to help the long term growth of the game.
I agree. I think one thing they need to do is to expand the playoff to at least 8 teams. Currently, you can count on 3 of the 4 teams in the playoff being the same every year. It’s getting very boring.
 
Is it me or does Mullen come off as a guy that blames everything else except himself whenever things don’t go his way? Is it so hard for a guy to say “we got out coached and out played today but we will use this season as a stepping stone going into spring practice”? I understand everyone hates losing but he is the king of excuses. Sometimes you have just take it on the chin and move on. Maybe he should actually win his big games in the spotlight and he wouldn’t have to complain about anything.
 
I agree. I think one thing they need to do is to expand the playoff to at least 8 teams. Currently, you can count on 3 of the 4 teams in the playoff being the same every year. It’s getting very boring.
Right now Bama and Clemson are a combined 28 point favorite tomorrow. There’s gonna be some serious Bama vs Clemson fatigue going on. Isn’t that like 4 of the past 5 years? Plus Clemson gets a cakewalk every year so they’re always rested and healthy for the CFP. It needs to change.
 

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