We’ve had a slight change of plans at Red Renee World Headquarters. A spot opened up at a friends’ timeshare in Disney this week so we’re loading up the family truckster and heading to Orlando. That means the liveblog for the Georgia-Hawaii game is still on but will be done remotely using satellites, my Blackberry, and some duct tape. The liveblog we had previously announced for the Orange Bowl is out unfortunately, we’ll make it up to you though during the Super Bowl.

Management

More upcoming games…

The Sun Bowl (aka the “Sun Bowl”)
Oregon vs. South Florida / El Paso / December 31st, 2:00pm / CBS

Two more cases of fallen glory on display in this game. South Florida was on top of the Big East and talking National Championship until they lost three games in a row. Oregon was looking for the same when Dennis Dixon got injured and the Ducks ripped off three losses in a row. I’m going with the South Florida Bulls in this one- I think the injuries Oregon sustained throughout the season are still too much to get past.

The Suspension Bowl, Part II (aka the “Gaylord Hotels Music City Bowl”)
Florida State vs. Kentucky / Nashville / December 31st, 4:00pm / ESPN

I’ve already detailed this one in depth- Florida State is playing their JV squad, and let’s be honest, their Varsity squad was JV by most standards to start with. Kentucky will continue to ride Andre Woodson and his NFL-arm to a win over the beaten Seminoles.

The Manly Bowl (aka the “Insight Bowl”)
Oklahoma State vs. Indiana / Tempe / December 31st, 5:30pm / NFL Network

In case you didn’t know, Oklahoma State’s Head Coach Mike Gundy is a man. He reminded us of that during the season while lambasting a reporter. On the other side of the class spectrum, Indiana will be playing in memory of another man- former Head Coach Terry Hoeppner. Oklahoma State is favored in this by 4.5 by I like Indiana to pull out an emotional win for their fallen leader.

The Chick Fil-A and Peaches Bowl (aka the “Chick-Fil-A Bowl”)
Clemson vs. Auburn / Atlanta / December 31st, 7:30pm / ESPN

This used to the be the Peach Bowl, but I like Chick-Fil-A way too much to rename them out of the title sponsorship. And I also like peaches. Plus, I’ve got to make dinner for ten people in about an hour so I really need to wrap this up. This should (emphasis on should) be one hell of a game. The line is Clemson by 2.5 so it’s basically a pick ‘em. The battle to watch will be the Clemson offense vs. the Auburn defense- both squads respectable. It’s always memorable when the Tuberville’s and the Bowden’s get together to break bread, and hopefully this one won’t be any different.

To be continued…

Apparently I missed Alabama’s 6-point win over Colorado yesterday- Buffs and Bama-lama-ding-dongs, please forgive me. Congratulations to Nick Saban on finishing a splendidly mediocre season and getting paid $4 million to do so. You are worth every dollar you swindled Alabama out of.

I’m pressed for time today so, recapping previous action…

Wake Forest won the Demon Huskie Bowl by 14. Mississippi State won the Barry Sanders Bowl by 7 over UCF and Barry Sanders’ record was not broken. And Penn State won the Alamo Bowl by 7 covering the spread and leaving a sobbing Jorvorskie Lane. Even in Coach Fran’s departure, the Aggies still didn’t use Jorvorskie Lane properly, and he was visibly upset on the sideline. Way to go making a 270 pound running back cry- punks.

On to the next round of games…

The Fallen Bear Bowl (aka the “Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Bowl”)
California vs. Air Force / Fort Worth / December 31st, 12:30pm / ESPN

Ahhh….mid-October. I remember it vividly. So much promise, so much talent, a # 2 ranking. That was the Cal Bears. And then they proceeded to rip off six losses in their last seven games. Cal plays Air Force today in a game that Air Force has no business really being competitive in. Cal has talent advantages at every position, but talent doesn’t always matter in college football. Air Force has losses to BYU (by 25), Navy (by 11) and New Mexico (by 3), all bowl teams, but none with the talent that Cal has. No matter, Air Force will keep the game close and probably will win.

The Blue Turf Bowl (aka the “Roady’s Humanitarian Bowl”)
Georgia Tech vs. Fresno State / Boise / December 31st, 2:00pm / ESPN2

This game would be memorably unmemorable if it not for the blue turf. And when you see it blinding all your house guests this afternoon, you’ll say “Hey, that’s the Blue Turf Bowl that Red told me about”. On a more serious note, I don’t know what “Roady’s” is. I suppose that’s why they’re sponsoring this magnificence- so I can learn about them via carefully placed television commercials and field logos. I bet it’ll work too.

To be continued…

This edition of mythbusting will be short and sweet. One of the frequently repeated stats when discussing the National Championship is that Ohio State is 0-8 historically against the SEC in bowl games. That might be a useful piece of information if the National Championship game were to be played by the best players in Ohio State history vs. the best players in SEC history. Obviously, that’s not the case.

We find this kind of random, one-sided reporting at a minimum lazy, but mostly irresponsible. Historical records are just that- history. Different players, different coaches, different eras.

If you find Ohio State’s 0-8 record vs. the SEC particularly relevant than consider this: overall including bowl games, Ohio State is 7-9-2 against the SEC. Hardly convincing. Also consider this- in games against teams ranked # 1, LSU is 1-7-1. That’s right- one win, seven losses, and one tie.

So the next time you hear somebody spouting off the 0-8 stat, set ‘em straight.

You’re welcome.

ESPN has something called the “Bowl Challenge” where they award a title to whichever conference finishes with the best bowl record. Considering that bowl matchups are rarely even with bizarre tie-ins and lots of coaching fluctuation, we think this is a little too simple of a way to determine which conference had the best bowl season. Instead, we’ve come up with a points system that much more accurately assesses how each conference performs.

Rather than just look at wins and losses, we’re using the vegas line to draw a finer point. It goes a lil’ something like this:

* Lose as the favorite or lose and not cover the spread - 0 points
* Lose but cover the spread - 1 point
* Win but don’t cover the spread - 2 points
* Win and cover the spread - 3 points

Once we’ve tallied the above points, we’re going to divide each conferences point total by the total number of games they played in. The highest final score wins the challenge. We’ll report back with the final standings and provide a comparison to the ESPN figures as well.

You’re welcome.

Recapping previous action…

Purdue won the I Went to Detroit and All I Got Was This Bowl Bowl with a field goal as time expired. On the arm of Curtis Painter and his 546 yards passing, Purdue mounted 21-point leads three different times in the game. Central Michigan rallied in the 3rd quarter with 28 points but Chris Summers hit a 40-yard field goal as time expired to win the game for the Boilermakers. Central Michigan performed admirably, especially considering the distractions of their 1st year head coach Butch Jones interviewing for the vacated West Virginia job.

Texas won the Holiday Bowl in dominating fashion, despite the efforts of Mack Brown’s stepson:

Boston College held off Michigan State to win the Suspension Bowl, Part I by a final of 24-21. The game was a battle of two delightfully flawed teams- Boston College who couldn’t scrape together any semblance of a running game all season long, and Michigan State, who despite only committing 13 turnovers all season long, managed to give the ball up 5 times to BC. MSU outgained Boston College, and also managed 171 yards rushing against the nation’s # 1 rush defense. The Spartans also covered the spread in the loss, but moral victories don’t get any press in East Lansing anymore.

A team from Texas won the Inbred Bowl- eggggsselent. Just as they planned it. TCU won by 7- yippee.

Oregon State held off Maryland in The Hey! That’s the Name of our Nuts Bowl on a chilly night in San Francisco. Maryland got gashed for 275 rushing, including 177 to Yvenson Bernard. The Orange Bowl birth six years ago for Friedgen and the Terps is looking pretty distant with losing seasons in three of the last four years now.

On to the next round of games…

The Demon Huskie Bowl (aka the “Meineke Car Care Bowl”)
Uconn vs. Wake Forest / Charlotte / December 29th, 1pm / ESPN

The line is Wake by 2.5 here so expect a close game. Uconn is the Big East version of the little engine that…couldn’t. We’ll call them “Uconn’t” (trademarked). Wake Forest won the ACC BCS bid last year (and then lost to Louisville). I like Uconn and that East Coast speed to win. If Wake wins though, I like them too.

The Barry Sanders Bowl (aka the “AutoZone Liberty Bowl”)
Central Florida vs. Mississippi State / Memphis / December 29th, 4:30pm / ESPN

The main story line here is Central Florida’s Kevin Smith and his chase of Barry Sanders’ single season rushing record. Smith needs 181 yards to break Sanders record of 1,878 yards set back in 1988. Of course, Smith has had more games to get the record, averaged fewer yards per rush (5.9 vs. Sanders’ 7.64), and averaged fewer yards per game (188 vs. Sanders’ 200), but don’t let that affect your opinion of this game? After all, marketers run sports, not statisticians. What are you, a purist?

Secondary story lines here include the SEC vs. Conference-USA and Sylvester Croom vs. George O’Leary. The Vegas line here is Central Florida by 3.5.

The Alamo Bowl (aka the “Valero Alamo Bowl”)
Penn State vs. Texas A&M / San Antonio / December 29th, 8pm / ESPN

The biggest story here is one of the A&M yell leaders making some comments about JoePa needing a casket, etc. Here’s the video:

Texas A&M officials made an apology and allegedly sent the kid home for the remarks, but in classic Paterno style, JoePa remarked “Some young guy went up there, trying to be funny. Maybe he’s accurate, I don’t know.” Note to bowl organizers: poking fun at Senior Citizens always draws big publicity.

Here’s our interpretation of the pep rally:

And a memo to any Aggies out there (Mark O. I’m talking to you), can someone please explain to me what all the bicep fondling is in the youtube clip above? Seriously, I don’t get it.

To be continued…

Courtesy of The Onion, and in hopes of getting you ready for the 2008 Presidential election, the most important election issue for 2008…

Poll: Bullshit Is Most Important Issue For 2008 Voters

You’re welcome.

Two bits for you on a Thursday night. First, sorry we’ve been silent for a little while. We had a few technical glitches with the geo-synchronous orbit of our errrr, one of the crystals was loose on the flux capacitor errrr….well, let’s just say we had some technical difficulties. Anyways, we’re back and large and in charge. We’ll have a Christmas report for you in a few days but as a sneak preview, we got a few new games for the Wii, one of them being “Playground”. One of the Playground games is Dodgeball which is the single greatest video game of all time. All Time.

The second bit is the announcement we promised a couple days ago- mark your calendars for two liveblogging events in the next few days.

# 1: The night cap on New Year’s Day (8:30pm) featuring Hawaii and Georgia will be the first liveblog. We’ll be checking in throughout New Year’s Day with several quick kicks but we’ll be right beside you on the couch double-dipping our chips for Bulldogs -v- Warriors.

# 2 will be on Thursday, January 3rd for Kansas -v- Virginia Tech. That’ll kick off at 8:00pm Eastern and once again- keep your computer by your side, preferably connected to your second big screen tv, and we’ll tell what you’re actually watching while you’re watching it. You can thank us later.

We’d like to bring you a liveblog event for the National Championship, but we’re going to have a couple dozen people over at Red Renee world headquarters and so will be otherwise engaged. Plus, our friends are a little shady and might convince us to post long streams of profanity depending on how the game goes. We’ll obviously have reams of reports the next day and probably the day after that. In fact, because we care about each of you so much, Red’s taking a vacation day on the 8th to bring you post-National Championship game coverage and possibly to repair the hole in my TV, again depending on how the game goes.

You’re welcome.

The entire staff at Red Renee (all three and a half of us) wish you a happy, safe, and Merry Christmas. We’re going to lay low for about 36 hours what with the presents and egg nog and what not. We’ll be back sometime on the 26th with a special announcement about some live-blogging we’re going to do in the next two weeks.

First, catching you up on what’s happened so far…

Fear the Mountain West. Through the first six games, the Mountain West is 3-0 boasting wins over the WAC, the Pac-Ten and Navy. Of course, they were favored in all three games and covered in only one of them, but don’t let that dampen your Mountain West spirit.

Utah won the Cash and Flowers Bowl 35-32, fighting off several runs by Navy on the way to a seventh bowl win in a row.

FAU won the Schnellenbowl in fancy fashion marking the first bowl win for the young FAU football program. Afterwards, FAU Head Coach Howard Schnelleberger said “we have a strong squad. I think we can compete with America.” Uhhh… easy there Pappy. Beating a 7-6 Conference USA team isn’t exactly the type of accomplishment that’s akin to “competing with America”. We do love your spirit though, now go have some frozen yogurt.

The home team (New Mexico) won The Screw it, We’re Naming a Bowl After Ourselves and Playing it Here Bowl, Part I shutting out my pick (Nevada), 23-0. As I suspected, Colin Kaepernick was spectacularly unspectacular going 13-31 for 137 yards with zero touchdowns and zero interceptions. Somebody please remind to use the phrase “you’ve been Kaepernicked” next year.

BYU won the Anybody? Does Anybody Want this Job Bowl by a final score of 17-16 over UCLA. It took a blocked field goal as time expired to preserve the win for BYU, who looked very un-Mountain West-like for much of the game.

East Carolina pulled out a victory with a dramatic last second game-winning field goal in The Naming Rights Are For Sale Bowl. Boise State rallied hard with 14 points in the 4th quarter but couldn’t find any of the magic they used to beat Oklahoma last year. What a difference a year makes- knock off Oklahoma one year, lose to East Carolina the next. The field goal was all ECU could manage in the 4th quarter and all they needed to get the win.

And looking ahead to games coming up on the schedule…

The I Went to Detroit and All I Got Was This Bowl Bowl (aka the “Motor City Bowl”)
Purdue vs. Central Michigan / Detroit / December 26th, 7:30pm / ESPN

The anatomy of a mid-major conference is that your champion gets to play a team tied for 7th in the Big Ten, and in Detroit no less- the very place where the MAC Championship game took place, and the same state where Central Michigan is from. If you can motivate your team for that game- you deserve Coach of the Year honors, I don’t care who you are. Purdue is favored by 8 so that should help the Chippewas find a little extra in the tank. Ahhhhh, Christmastime in Detroit.

The Holiday Bowl (aka the “Pacific Life Holiday Bowl”)
Arizona State vs. Texas / San Diego / December 27th, 8pm / ESPN

Nearly always one of the best bowl games of the year, and the first meaty bowl to really make it feel like the bowl season is upon us. Arizona State comes into the game on the heels of a rivalry win over Arizona and a 20-point ass-kicking at the hands of USC. Texas comes into the game being a Bridesmaid (again) to Oklahoma in the Big XII South and on the heals of an 8-point loss at Texas A&M. Colt McCoy officially hit his Sophomore slump this year throwing 21 touchdowns against 18 interceptions. Not to be outdone, the Longhorn pass defense is ranked 109th in the country giving up an average of 276 yards per game. Texas is favored by 2.5 but if the Pac-10 wants any love from this website, they better win this game.

The Suspension Bowl, Part I (aka the “Champs Sports Bowl”)
Boston College vs. Michigan State / Orlando / December 28th, 5pm / ESPN

According to an AP report this evening, Michigan State is suspending five of its’ players for the bowl game, including Senior Jonal Saint-Dic who leads the team in sacks (10) and is second in tackles for a loss (16). Also suspended is Senior starting linebacker SirDarean Adams, who has 47 tackles on the year. All of this would have been splendid information to know before I made my picks in ESPN’s college Bowl Mania. Thanks a lot Spartie. I like BC to win (now).

The Inbred Bowl (aka the “Texas Bowl”)
TCU vs. Houston / Houston / December 28th, 8pm / NFL Network

No offense to Texans, but this bowl was just too easy to name- two teams from Texas playing in Texas. That’s like taking candy from a baby (a baby Texan no less). Houston is favored by 4, and I have to be honest- I don’t really know why, nor do I care. Neither should you. Unless of course, you live in Texas. In which case- Cowboy up pardner.

The Hey! That’s the Name of our Nuts Bowl (aka the “The Emerald Bowl”)
Maryland vs. Oregon State / San Francisco / December 28th, 8:30pm / ESPN

6-6 ACC team? Check. Third place Pac-10 team? Check. All the nut metaphors you can shake your….fist at? Check. Strap yourselves in for this doozie of a game. Or not, whatever. We don’t really care what you do.

You’re welcome.

Over the next two weeks we’re going to bring you all the BCS Championship breakdown you need and then some. We’re going to give you the ins, the outs, and the curl routes. Tonight we’re bringing you something that isn’t quite a Mythbusting post, but damn near. We thought it would be interesting to look at the Rivals.com player power rankings and compare Ohio State vs. LSU based on where their players are ranked. The data, as always, is revealing.

Once again, despite popular opinion LSU is not the more talented team, at least not according to Rivals.com. In fact, each team placed players in the top 25 at each position grouping. Most notable for LSU is Glenn Dorsey at # 1 for Defensive Line players and Craig Steltz at # 3 for Defensive Backs.

Most notable for Ohio State is James Laurinaitis at # 2 for Linebackers, Kirk Barton at # 3 for Offensive Linemen, Malcolm Jenkins at # 4 for Defensive Backs, and Chris Wells at # 4 for Running Backs.

If fact, as the table above indicates, if you average the player rankings for each team, Ohio State has a better average ranking at # 9 vs. # 13 for LSU. So at the very least, this indicates LSU does not have a significant talent advantage vs. the Buckeyes. And at least according to Rivals.com, Ohio State is actually more talented than LSU.

You’re welcome.

In keeping with our continued quest to disseminate facts instead of reckless opinion, we bring you more data about whether or not the SEC really is better than the rest of college football. If the Pro Bowl represents the best of the NFL (or at least the most popular players), than what better way to get a glimpse at how the conferences have matriculated to the rosters. We broke the Pro Bowl rosters down