The big news, of course, came late last night: Chase Daniel's going to New York this weekend. Now, the surprise would have been if he didn't get invited, but this is exciting nonetheless. Dave Matter goes into detail about his Heisman ballot (and introduces "Cut to the 'Zo") here.
It's Dave Matter's turn to write the "Big 12 coaches want to fix BCS" story, but more interesting is the blurb at the bottom: Dave Christensen is a candidate to replace Art Briles at Houston.
For some reason, the Post-Dispatch posted a link to search for salaries of Mizzou coaches, and for some reason I'm passing it along to you.
I couldn't let a day go by without a "stupid Orange Bowl" link. Or two. Actually, the second link there is Blair Kerkhoff asking if conferences should protect their teams from getting screwed.
Could the Big 12 have protected Missouri in the BCS selection process, mandating that a major bowl take the second-highest-rated league team if there was to be an at-large selection?
That way, the Tigers, who finished sixth in the final BCS standings, would have been automatically in a BCS bowl ahead of Orange Bowl-bound Kansas, which finished eighth.
Can’t happen, Big 12 commissioner Dan Beebe said.
"The bowls pay a lot of money to have flexibility," Beebe said.
It was that flexibility that allowed the Rose Bowl, which selected ahead of the Orange, to pass over several teams and take Illinois. The Illini are No. 13 in the BCS standings.
The BCS bowls pay each participant’s conference $14 million to $17 million with a cap of $21 million if a conference gets a second, or at-large team, in the BCS.
"And it would be something that could put us at a disadvantage," Beebe said. "If a bowl game wanted our Team Y and we’re telling them they had to take our Team X, that bowl could just pass on our conference altogether."
Again, the problem isn't the BCS--it's the bowls. I mentioned that the best solution for the BCS bowls would just be for the BCS standings to dictate who gets the at-large bids and allow the bowls to fight it out for those teams. But the Rose Bowl would throw a fit, so that wouldn't happen. Can't wait for Dallas to finish building that new stadium and move the Cotton Bowl there--that way they can (in my dreams) make the Cotton a BCS bowl and just phase the Rose Bowl out of the process altogether. Uh huh. (I forgot to link to Big Head's take on the situation yesterday.)
I didn't see this yesterday, but on Monday Bernie Miklasz posted his reasons for why Mizzou should be happy with Cotton.
As I've mentioned before, we couldn't have timed our big season better, what with Nebraska and Texas A&M having to replace their coaches. However, we're now getting news of a visit from an Arkansas commit as well. Oh, and NU soft-commit Josh Williams canceled his Texas visit to come here instead. And he's from Texas. Weird, huh?
The Trib's Steve Walentik shares his thoughts on the Big 12-Pac 10 Hardwood Series.
I have long been a fan of these early season events pitting major-conference teams against each other. The Great Eight used to be a highlight of every December in the 1990s. The ACC-Big Ten Challenge has also been something I've looked forward to since its inception in 1999, despite the fact that the ACC predictably whips the Big Ten every single year. So I was happy to see the Big 12 and Pac-10 get together to form their own duel, and not just because it meant I'd get to spend a weekend in the Bay Area on the company dime.
Maybe the best thing about this series is all the matchups its produced that wouldn't have happened on their own. Sure, traditional powers like Kansas and Arizona find a way to schedule each other at least once a decade. But Missouri hadn't visited Cal in 21 years and had only played the Golden Bears four other times. Oregon hadn't visited Kansas State since 1966, and Washington State hadn't ever faced off against Baylor in Waco, Texas.
...
The 12-game interconference battle isn't over with yet. The Pac-10 currently holds a 6-5 edge -- Kansas' win at USC on Sunday didn't count in the standings -- but Texas Tech has a chance to even things up when it tips off against Stanford in the final game on Dec. 22 in Dallas.
Time to give the Mizzou Racing Team some love!
This is in no way Mizzou related, but that was a monster trade the Tigers and Marlins pulled off yesterday. Holy crap. Detroit has officially mortgaged the future for another World Series bid, which I sort of admire as a Pirates fan (considering my team mortgaged the future to trade for Matt Morris), but...yeah, they have no prospects left in their system now, and they probably still won't beat the Red Sox if Johan Santana moves to Beantown. But you know why I love this trade the most? Because the Marlins suddenly have an insane amount of fun, under-25 talent. It takes balls to trade away the two faces of your franchise at once, but you know what? It's worked for the team before, and besides that, what other options do they have playing in front of 800 fans a night in Miami? They weren't going to win with Willis and Cabrera, and in terms of sheer talent Maybin and Miller might be just as good in a couple years. Anyway, I just admire the chances they're taking considering my team hasn't taken a chance in 20 years.