Amid continued discussions on the hill for bailouts of additional U.S. corporations and various levels of taxpayer stimulus, Nancy Pelosi pushed her chips all in and unveiled what is being hailed as “the mother of all stimulus packages”.

Pelosi’s plan calls for $1 million stimulus checks to be delivered sometime in the 1st quarter to each household currently earning less than $1 million per year. “We feel it is important to proactively engage the bulk of America with proper stimuli rather than allowing each business and population group to gradually come forward for help” Pelosi said, adding “we simply don’t have time in the Senate for any more hearings”. Barney Frank added “harumph, harumph, gargle, gargle, George Bush can kiss my ass”.

With approximately 96 million households under the $1 million income mark, the pricetag for the plan is roughly $96 trillion. “A small price to pay for America’s future” said Pelosi.

When asked how the plan would be paid for, Pelosi indicated reductions on future appropriations would offset a portion, plus seizures of banks accounts held by those in the $1 million+ household category would occur “here and there”.

Economists who have studied the plan encouraged stimuli recipients to quickly exchange the funds to Canadian dollars or Yen, depending on “whomever takes us over”.

The lame duck session of Congress is expected to vote on the plan Thursday or Friday.

You’re welcome.

How bad have things gotten at Syracuse? Not only was your coach fired but you’re a 19.5 point dog at Notre Dame. Probably going to get worse though- like losing to Notre Dame worse.

Where Vegas oddsmakers really earned their money this week was setting a line for 0-10 Washington at 1-10 Washington State. The good news for the Washington Board of Tourism is one of these teams is going to get a win. Whoopeeee!

Despite being 10-0, coming off a dominating performance of Oklahoma State, and a #2 BCS ranking, Texas Tech is still a 7 point underdog at Oklahoma. Still no respect for the Red Raiders I guess. I’m picking OU but wouldn’t risk a cent on this one. Except of course the over/under- the line is set at 76 points. My guess is this thing makes it to at least 80.

The game to decide the Big Ten (at least partially) has Penn State a 14-point favorite over visiting Michigan State. The line hasn’t budged but right now 91% of the money is going to Michigan State. Take from that what you will.

Finally, here’s an interesting link at trojanwire.com. Not surprisingly USC would be favored in any national championship match up, this according to the Wynn sportsbook. The worst game would be USC vs. Alabama, where USC is currently an 11-point favorite. The best game would be against Florida where USC is currently only a 1.5 point favorite.

You’re welcome.

1.) I wrote that South Carolina would cover the 21-point spread against Florida. I couldn’t have been wronger about that. Any questions from anyone about the dominance of Florida right now was soundly answered. The statistics provide the evidence for the beating that South Carolina took:

Florida Offense
519 total yards
346 rushing yards
173 passing yards
46% conversion on 3rd downs

South Carolina Offense
173 total yards
53 rushing yards
120 passing yards
6% conversion on 3rd downs
-2 turnover margin

It all resulted in a 56-6 Florida victory. South Carolina couldn’t get out of its’ own way, making mistake after mistake. The game was ostensibly over toward the end of the 1st quarter. Florida had just gone up 14-0 and South Carolina tried a little trickery on the kickoff return. They fumbled the ball and Florida recovered on the 1/2 yard line, the humor of it all brilliantly pointed out on EDSBS.com.

The game also provided further proof that without quality quarterback play, you can’t compete in big games. South Carolina has gotten 17 touchdowns against 20 interceptions from their three quarterbacks this year. No matter how good your defense is, that QB ratio isn’t going to get it done.

Everything that could go wrong for SC did and everything that could go right for UF did. It was the type of perfect storm game that resulted in an unusually lopsided result, where the losing team isn’t quite as bad as the result, nor is the winning team quite as good. But Florida is very, very good, and is peaking at the perfect time. And in a karma sense, how fascinating it was to watch Spurrier struggle through the very type of beating he used to administer on a frequent basis when he was at Florida.

2.) I was only part right on Ohio State -v- Illinois. Ohio State did win as I predicted and Juice was normal Juice and not Super Juice like he was last year. Statistically speaking, Juice had his best completion percentage game of the season and his 4th best QB rating game, but too many untimely mistakes on both sides of the ball did the Illini in.

Despite not having a consistent running game this season, Illinois was able to rush for 214 yards against the 26th ranked rush D nationally. Unfortunately for Illinois, Ohio State was able to rush for 305 with Beanie doing what Beanie does and Terrelle Pryor going over 100 yards for the first time.

Unfortunately for Ohio State fans, the Buckeyes got the win despite TP only passing the ball 10 times (49 yards total). I’ll take the win but I don’t like the reinforcement of Tressel-ball principles so late in the season. That lack of production, whether pre-meditated or accidental equals a loss to a 2nd or 3rd place SEC/Big XII team in the bowl game. And another long winter in Columbus.

If you missed any of the play-by-play, here’s a fantastic game summary including “the hurdle” over at elevenwarriors.com.

3.) As I predicted, Kansas could not keep it close with Texas, losing by a final score of 35-3. Game summary over at burntorangenation.com. Kansas now stands two games behind Missouri in the Big XII North and with one game left to play, is out of the race. Texas’ path to the Big XII championship involves blowing out Texas A&M this weekend and a close win by Oklahoma over Texas Tech. That’s probably the only way they’ll remain ahead of both OU and TT in the BCS and thus get the tiebreaker in the Big XII South.

4.) Stanford could not make lightning strike twice losing to USC 45-23, though the game was tied 17-17 at the half. The USC defense was vulnerable once again to the run giving up 202 yards but the offense came through with 282 rushing yards and five total touchdowns.

5.) I predicted a close win for Alabama over Mississippi State, and it was on track for that until the MSU special teams went in the toilet. The score was 12-7 Alabama at the half and Mississippi State was hanging tough with the nation’s # 1 team. Until the 3rd quarter that is. Following MSU’s first possession of the second half punter Blake McAdams punted the ball to Javier Arena which he proceeded to run back 80 yards for a touchdown. Score 19-7 Alabama. That was the spark that Alabama needed and they controlled the rest of the game winning by a final score of 32-7.

I still don’t buy into Alabama as the # 1 team but they’re doing what they need to win all their games. And in our current flawed system, that’s all it takes to be champion.

6.) I mistakenly predicted a Troy upset over LSU, one that almost materialized. I also detailed in a previous post how the Troy collapse happened. As I wrote on Friday, Troy needed some turnovers to get the win. They finished the game -2 so clearly that didn’t happen. The turnover problem plus the 4th quarter collapse spelled doom for the little engine that couldn’t.

You’re welcome.

At that exact moment, the light went on for the LSU offense with Jarrett Lee going 5-8 for 47 yards and Freshman QB Jordan Jefferson rushing for his first college touchdown.

Score: 31-10 Troy

Troy gets the ball back with 1:26 left and proceeds to rip off a 1-yard run and two incomplete passes. They punt the ball and, after taking only 78 seconds off the clock, LSU gets the ball with :18 seconds to go in 3Q.

Jarrett Lee again on fire (how little those words have been uttered this year). 4 of 4 for 80 yards with a touchdown pass to Brandon LaFell.

Score: 31-17 Troy

At this point, despite only about a quarter of LSU fans remaining, the momentum had so clearly swung in favor of the Tigers, and yet Troy didn’t want to acknowledge any of that. At least they had some sense to run the fricking ball on the next drive to run some clock down. Sort of.

14:00 minute mark- Troy passes incomplete on 1st down, rushes for 9 yards on 2nd down and 0 yards on 3rd and 1. 4th & 1 from the LSU 40 and Troy decides to go for it. Gutsy attempt to swing momentum back in your favor for Coach Larry Blakeney. Try and “out LesMiles” Les Miles. Unfortunately, the universe simply can’t handle that type of quantum computation and the risk backfired. Troy went incomplete on a 4th down pass giving LSU decent field position and 12:54 left on the clock.

Score: 31-17 Troy

Jarrett Lee on fire again (still, strange to type). 4-4 for 36 yards passing, with Charles Scott and Quinn Johnson getting the rest on the ground. It’s slipping away Troy fans- can you feel it?

Score: 31-24 Troy

Next possession Troy gets a poor kick return and takes over at their own 18 with 10:33 left in the game- an eternity based on how the last ten minutes had elapsed. Time to run the ball and take some time off the clock, right? Wrong.

1st down- pass incomplete. 2nd down- pass complete for 4 yards. 3rd down- pass (of course) intercepted by LSU returned to the Troy 13 yard line. Total elapsed drive time- 62 seconds.

Fortunately, LSU returned to their first half self and their drive stalled out. Field goal attempt good.

Score: 31-27 Troy

Another poor kickoff return and Troy starts their drive at their own 16. After the previous drive, lesson learned right? Run to burn time off the clock or if you’re going to pass, make sure they’re complete. Yeahhhhh….not so much.

1st down- pass incomplete. 2nd down- pass incomplete. 3rd down- and stop me if you’ve already heard this- pass incomplete. Total elapsed time: 35 seconds. Now it’s time for second-guessing:

It’s 4th down, you’re at your own 16 yard line and you’re getting your ass beat in by the defending national champs after dominating them for almost three quarters. Do you a.) punt the ball giving LSU fantastic field position with plenty of time to score the game-winning touchdown, or do you b.) run the ball through the back of the end zone for a safety and take a kick off? Granted, the kick off only gains you about 20 yards and with so much time remaining, probably doesn’t matter.

Troy elected to punt giving the ball back to LSU at the 50 with 7:16 left to play. Seven plays later, Charles Scott goes in for a touchdown.

Score: 34-31 LSU

4:50 left to play- Troy with plenty of time left to salvage the game with a late field goal. One rush and three incomplete passes later, Troy turns the ball over on downs on their own 34. LSU scores again to put the game on ice and finish off 30 straight points for Les Miles’ crew.

When the dust settled, Troy had blown a 28-point lead and managed only four rushes during that 21 minutes or so. An egregious lack of game management by Coach Blakeney, who afterward said:

“If you do what we do, you have to do it all the time. You can’t do it for a half and then lock down with a wishbone in the second half.”

Wishbone certainly would have been extreme, but a few more rushes and LSU may have run out of time for their miraculous comeback. Instead, Troy goes home a loser and the SEC remains as dominant as ever, even if they aren’t really.

You’re welcome.