Sneed Me

Reality Check of the Week: I would be the worst Starbucks employee ever. I have enough trouble remembering people’s names right after I meet them, much less trying to get a hold of some blue tooth wearing guido whose ordering a triple shot venti skim with room but no whip americana plywood style frappacino. I don’t know how they do it, especially when its busy in the morning and there are 20 people in line and there are 5 people running around behind the counter. Seriously, I was at a presidential debate party on Friday night and met 20 new people, and have retained none of their names. More props to the Bucks employees, I wouldn’t last 10 minutes.

Scooby Doo Related Item of the Week: So I have a mystery that needs all loyal Oceanliner readers help to solve. I saw a vanity license plate that I could not decipher and its driving me nuts. It was a Virginia plate and read PR8PRD. What does this mean? (L-Dub, I don’t think it has a dirty connotation, but I’m sure it will in your mind)

Sign of the Week: After Alabama’s thorough beat down of Georgia, the ESPN cameras were panning the Crimson Tide crowd and some one was holding a sign that read “BAMA beats the dogs worse than Vick”. Buuuuurn.

Quote of the Week: SI.com writer Stewart Mandel, on Steve Spurrier underachieving at South Carolina: “Remember, by this point in Lou Holtz's tenure, he'd already led South Carolina to consecutive New Year's bowls, which is fairly remarkable considering that when you watch him on TV today, he barely sounds competent enough to tie his own shoes.” Hirarious. And true.

Turrible Quote of the Week: Packers wide receiver Donald Driver, on….something: “You know the saying about having a house full of people, and if you don't get in there and eat, the food will be gone? Well, we left some food on that table last year. We have to make sure that the next time, we clean the table, wash the dishes and put everything away.” *blank stare*

Call of the Week: On Tuesday night I watched most of the Twins-White Sox one game playoff, which was actually very riveting even though it turned out to be a 1-0 game. One of the best parts was enjoying how expertly Dick Stockton delivered the play-by-play. Right after the two biggest plays in the game (Thome’s home run and the diving catch for the final out), Stockton said nothing for a solid 20 seconds so we could enjoy the sight and sound of 40,000+ fans going absolutely bonkers. It was spot on for Stockton to realize that there are no words to add to such a great scene, so he said nothing at all. Too often announcers fight against the roar of the crowd instead of waiting for it to die down and enjoy the moment (Mike Tirico, who I normally like, is a frequent abuser). Kudos to Stockton, who made the game more enjoyable for me by doing less.

Head Scrathcer of the Week: While the one game playoff was awesome, I’m part of the camp that thinks it shouldn’t have been played at all. If two teams finish tied for a division lead with the same record, the team that won the head to head season series should go to the playoffs. Even including Tuesday’s game, the Twins beat the White Sox in the season series, yet they are the ones sitting at home. The Twins didn’t even get home field for the playoff! It was a coin flip instead. Doesn’t make sense in my book.

Low Arc of the Week: Check out this logo for some so called National Beer Pong League
This dude obviously sucks at beer pong. Notice the extremely low trajectory on his shot, it’s a freakin missile. Even Yates and his Alanis Morrissette “One Hand in My Pocket” shot would roll on this dude.

College Football Thoughts of the Week

I said it before with Ohio State, and I’ll say it again with regards to USC. It annoyed me so much when talking heads on TV started to break down the “inevitable” Oklahoma-USC national title game after the Trojans beat the Buckeyes. This is a direct quote from my August 29th post about OSU, but you can apply it to USC: “Saying that a team in a power conference will “probably” sweep their remaining 9 times is ludicrous.” In the Oregon State-USC recap, ESPN.com describes how the Beavers “shook up college football with a victory over the team that was expected to roll right through its conference straight to the national championship game.” It’s so ridiculous to talk about who will play in and win the national title game after 4 games. I bet we are going to start hearing breakdowns of the Oklahoma-Alabama national title game this week. It so stupid.

There’s not much to say about the UVA-Duke game. We got destroyed. It’s time for Groh to go. I want someone young. I want someone with energy. I want…Lane Kiffin. Seriously, let’s offer him a job right now. Carolina fired John Bunting in mid season two years ago so they could start talking to Butch Davis sooner. Let’s do the same thing with Kiffin. He’s young and energetic and actually got the Raiders to perform. He’s perfect. If we wait he’s going to slip away to some one else. Unite behind me, Hoo Wants Kiffin!

This might be the most embarrassed I’ve ever been. I hate when people use “Hoos” in a group or organizational name.

Moving on to Stats class, turnover margin has never been more important than it was in college football this past week. There were 53 contests, and in only 7 did the team with more turnovers win the game. Oregon State had 0 turnovers to USC’s 2 in their tight win. Florida had 3 turnovers to Ole Miss’ 1 in their loss at the swamp. And in the most hilarious example, Hawaii had 6 turnovers to San Jose State’s 0. Final score: Hawaii lost by 3. Imagine if the had “only” had 3-4 turnovers.

Michigan State running back Javon Ringer is averaging 37 carries per game after his 44 carry, 198 yard day against Indiana. He’s in this column every week.

Indiana’s Marcus Thigpen must be related to Ontario Sneed after his day against the Spartans. He had 9 carries for 113 yards and 2 touchdowns and added 2 catches for 94 yards and a score. So not only can he do it all, but he has a sweet name too. Consider Sneed and Thigpen the initial members of my 2008 college football all name team, to be added to weekly.

Speaking of Mr. Sneed, Ontario plowed away for a solid 16 carries, 77 yards and 2 TD’s in Central Michigan’s 2 point win over Buffalo. Sneed me.

Syracuse has a wide receiver named Van Chew. Seriously, Van Chew. He only had 1 catch Saturday against Pittsburgh, but it went for a 36 yard touchdown. Van Chew, no joke.

In that same game, Pitt held the ball for 38 out of the 60 minutes. That’s ball control if I’ve ever seen it, but I guess that’s what happens when you have 241 rushing yards.

Why doesn’t Florida give carries to its running backs??? Emanuel Moody and Chris Rainey, who are good, got a combined 6 carries in their loss to Ole Miss. Direct Oceanliner quote from September 11: “Florida is going to have trouble winning the SEC without a running game.”

Carolina had 33 carries for 35 yards, but still beat Miami. Barely. I can’t think of a pass closer to being caught that turned into a pick.

Miami had 11 different people catch passes against Carolina.

Conversely, Boston College had 27 passing yards against Rhode Island, but won 42-0.

Army apparently tried the BC strategy against Texas A&M (4 total passing yards, 4!), but unfortunately came up short in a 21-17 loss.

VMI completed only 3 passes against Ohio, but 2 of them went for touchdowns

Weird game, that Wisconsin-Michigan contest. Wisconsin led 19-0 at the half, then forgot how to play football. They allowed 27 straight unanswered Wolverine points before finally scoring with 13 seconds left, but couldn’t convert the deuce.

Houston had 2 receivers go over 100 yards against sinking ECU. Funny thing is, it took Patrick Edwards 11 catches to do it, but Kierrie Johnson only 4.

West Virginia played Marshall on Saturday, which must be a headache for state officials, because no matter what the outcome of the game is, couches are going to be burning somewhere across the state after that game.

Louisiana-Lafayette rushed for 335 yards and didn’t turn the ball over, yet still lost to Kansas State.
Riley Skinner and Matt Verica apparently had a “Whose the Worst QB in the ACC” challenge over the weekend. Verica had 4 interceptions and a fumble, while Skinner added 4 picks of his own. Both teams lost. I’ll call it a draw.

Not only did Skinner have 4 picks threw the air, Wake only managed 43 yards rushing on 31 carries for the game. Those two combined will not get a win, that’s for sure.

Here’s another weird game, with many levels of intrigue. Rice put up a 77 spot on North Texas, yet didn’t score in the 4th quarter. Imagine if they had played hard the whole game. The other weird thing is that at one point the score was 28-20, and then Rice scored 49 unanswered points. North Texas forgot how to play football worse than Wisconsin.

Rice quarterback Chase Clement was a Chase Daniel-esque (is it in the name?) 22-28 for 298 yards and 5 touchdowns.

North Texas has allowed 219 points in 4 games. (They are 0-4)

Against Colorado State, Cal scored touchdowns on a blocked punt, a pick 6, and a punt return. How versatile.

Oklahoma receiver Manuel Johnson had 5 catches for 206 yards and three scores against TCU. I think the Horned Frogs will be working on their secondary this week.

Tulsa had an incredibly balanced offensive game against Central Arkansas. They scored 62 points and broken down by quarter it was 14, 14, 17 and 17.

NC State quarterback Harrison Beck completed 9 passes against South Florida for 239 yards. But because he also had 23 incompletions, he only averaged 7.5 yards an attempt. Weird.

Well, that’s it for this week folks. Austin and I are heading to God’s Garden for the Maryland game on Saturday, and even though we are terrible, I’m still looking forward to it. A 7pm game means a full day of tailgating, and not much can beat that. Give me a shout or stop by Alumni Hall if you are going to be in town. Until next time, stay safe, keep it real and go to the launch pad.