Football is back! And so is my little blog...

Let's take a quick look back at week 1 in college football and a quick look ahead to week 2.

-I'll start with Texas A&M since they represent all that is good and holy in this world. The Aggies first game was postponed due to the hurricane, which was a giant let down for everyone (the cancellation, not the hurricane... the hurricane was just ok... I've had better). So... that's about it for looking back to week 1 for the Ags. I'll revisit them in a bit as I look to week 2.

-How about a little more SEC talk? South Carolina and Vanderbilt went about exactly the way I picture all SEC games going. Poor offense, good defense, low scoring, with the better team eventually winning. People always rave about the SEC defenses and use that a reason why A&M will supposedly get crushed, but I think a large part of the equation is just bad offense. Last year Alabama only played one team all season (Arkansas) that had a top 50 offense. ONE! Meanwhile, A&M played against 5 of the top 13. Some might say it's a chicken and egg scenario (Does the Big 12 have good offenses or bad defenses?) and maybe some  chicken and some egg in it (huh?), but the fact is, the SEC does NOT have dynamic offenses, outside of Arkansas and now, hopefully, A&M. 

-Alabama! SEC! SEC! It's just not fair. I'll just leave it at that. And if you don't know what I'm talking about, just go look at the first half play by play from their game against Michigan. They are this year's national champions, in my opinion.

-Florida, who I did watch closely since they are playing A&M this week, looked... ok. They were just ok as a team last year, and there's not much to suggest they'll improve this year. Which isn't to say they're bad, they just aren't on the level they used to be, and they are beatable. They do have athletes though. They also have what the French call a certain... I don't know what, but whatever it is, it comes from being a program that has been really good for a long time. They don't have much at quarterback though and that will cost them a few games this year. And their defense didn't play nearly as well as I thought it would.

Now, on to some non-SEC stuff.

-The Longhorns, who naturally represent all that is evil and dirty in this world, had an easy win against Wyoming. I didn't see it so I can't comment on much, but my opinion all summer on the Horns' prospects has been this: a very good defense, and an offense that will be better than last year, both running and passing, though still not explosive, which will lead to 9 (most likely) or 10 wins. I felt like this game somewhat went with my predictions. The running game does look better, and t.u. has a few good backs that are each different in style. Two running backs rushed for 100+, which I'm assuming hasn't happened in a very long time for them. The passing game led by Davis Ash still doesn't produce big plays, but at least he protected the ball. That right there is a big reason I see t.u. winning more games this year. I could certainly talk more about them but I feel very dirty right now so let's move on.

-OU looked pretty bad for three quarters against a bad team. Very interesting development. They are still a highly regarded team but I get the sense that they're just teetering on the edge of falling back down to normalcy. I think Bob Stoops is one of the best, so I'll be interested to see how they handle this season. The good news for them is that the Big 12 only has one other school that recruits as well as they do, so they still have as much talent as anyone, although West Virginia's offense appears to be in a league of its own.

-West Virginia came within one missed extra point of scoring 70 points in back to back games, dating back to last year's bowl game. I spent all summer rolling my eyes at how people were overrating WVU. People seemed to only look at the bowl game and assume that WVU scored 70 every week, when in reality they did have a few struggles here and there. Seeing them come right out of the gate this year has changed my opinion on them somewhat, and I now have them winning the Big 12. The only two teams that I think have a chance to slow them down are OU and Texas, and both of those teams have issues of their own. So I have WVU winning the conference with an 11-1 record. Full prediction below.

-Baylor looked great. I know, I know, it was just SMU that they played, but the fact is, they racked up over 600 yards of offense despite losing the Heisman Trophy winner, a wide receiver that went in the first round of the NFL draft, and a running back that set the all-time single season rushing record for their school last year. You'd expect a drop-off, but there was none. I've been high on Baylor this off-season. I have still had them as an 8 or 9 win team even without RG3, because they are still with Art Briles. Briles is an evil genius, and I think we're really going to see that this year as their offense is almost as good as it was last year. Baylor has done a great job of re-inventing themselves, branding themselves as a "cool" football team, wearing flashy uniforms (their basketball team does as well), and having a superstar to help the image. Even with an atrocious defense last year, Baylor won 10 games. This year, they lose a little on offense but their defense should slightly improve, and I have them going 9-3. 

-I can't go without a quick mention of the Houston game against Texas State. WOW. So Houston goes 12-1 last year, loses their coach to Texas A&M, and promptly loses their first game, in which they were favored by about 35 points to a team that just started playing FBS football. All I know is that after seeing that score pop up, I immediately felt even better about the fact that Kevin Sumlin is A&M's coach, because for them to crumble like that in the first game without Sumlin tells me that Sumlin was the key ingredient in Houston's success. Another interesting note from that game is that in the days following, Houston's offensive coordinator Mike Nesbitt resigned. After one game. It's somewhat reminiscent of how Kevin Sumlin, who coached at A&M in 2002, got his first opportunity to be an offensive coordinator. A&M's offense was struggling badly under Dino Babers, and in the middle of the season, R.C. Slocum demoted Babers and promoted Sumlin, and just like that, A&M's offense improved. Scoring went up by 50%, and A&M ended up beating #1 ranked Oklahoma in one of the most memorable games ever at Kyle Field. 10 years later, Sumlin has now ascended to one of the highest levels you can reach, and back at the school he just left, the same thing is essentially happening ... something something circle of life.

Looking ahead to Week 2, from the viewpoint of a degenerate gambler:

-A&M (-2) vs. Florida: I can't really say too much that hasn't already been said about this game. Being the featured game of the week on ESPN, having College Gameday there, it's been talked about plenty. A&M new quarterback, A&M no depth at defensive line, Florida two quarterbacks, A&M home field advantage, blah blah blah. So I'll just go for the old journalistic trick of attempting to make connections to similar situations in the past. Here goes.

In 1989, R.C. Slocum took over and in his very first game, he hosted a top 10 SEC opponent. A&M was coming off of a 7 win season. And in an "I'm here to be reckoned with" statement game, he led his Ags to a 28-16 victory and went on to have a hall of fame coaching career.

Now, Sumlin inherits a team coming off of a 7 win season, and opens the year with a traditional SEC powerhouse at Kyle Field.

The fact is, even with the fact that A&M hasn't played a game yet and Florida has, Sumlin can still come in and make a big, fat statement to the SEC and all of college football and win this first game.

I was a student when A&M's offense was sputtering so badly in 2002 that R.C. demoted Babers mid-season and promoted Sumlin, and Sumlin, with the exact same players and playbook, increased our scoring average by over 50% and led us to an upset of the #1 team in the nation. He's a badass and he has been for a LONG time. He's not going to let the fact that this is the first game affect anything. He's going to go out and lead the team and have them ready. We may win, we may not, but we'll be ready.

In that LSU game in 1989, A&M's Larry Horton returned the opening kickoff of the game for a touchdown. How sweet would it be if Trey Williams did the exact same thing this Saturday...

I believe Sumlin is THE man for our program, and he will announce as much by leading us to a win over Florida. My official pick: A&M- 27, Florida, 24. (It's not one I'd bet on though)

Other gambling picks for the week:

I really like Georgia (-2.5) over Mizzou. 

I like Michigan (-21) over Air Force (assuming Air Force still isn't allowed to use planes).

I like Ohio State (-18) over Central Florida.

I like Miami (+7) over Kansas State, and would probably also throw a bet down on the moneyline for Miami, because I think there's a great shot they'll win the game.

I like Iowa State (+5) over Iowa and again, would consider a moneyline bet on ISU.

I like New Mexico (+38) against t.u. I think t.u. will easily win, of course, but they don't have the type of offense to cover very many 38 point spreads.

I like Louisiana Tech (-3.5) over Houston. 

I like Nebraska (-6) over UCLA. 

That's it. I may add some over/unders but haven't really looked at them yet. Last week, I didn't post picks here but I went 5-2 on picks against the spread posted on another website. They were:

Baylor (-9)- win
Baylor (OVER)- win
Michigan (+14)- loss
Boise (UNDER)- win
Stanford (-24)- loss
Texas State (+36)- win
Wyoming (+31.5)- win

Oh, and I almost forgot. I was going to make a couple predictions. Official prediction for A&M is 8-4 and has been all along for me. Bama wins the SEC and the whole country and maybe even plays an all-star football team from the USSR and beats them too to win the world. In the Big 12, which I still feel most knowledgeable about, I'm going with WVU at 1 loss, OU, t.u., and Baylor with 3 losses, TCU, KSU, and OSU right behind them, and ISU, KU, and Tech all struggling with only 1 or 2 conference wins. I haven't added all that up to make sure the math works, but something in that general vicinity is my prediction.

Thoughts on college football, last week, this week, etc

Last week I briefly spoke about 3 games of interested, and wouldn't you know it, I nailed all 3. I said OU would beat FSU, Texas would easily win against UCLA, and that A&M would destroy Idaho. The A&M prediction was easy to make, but I feel smart nailing the OU and Texas picks. Lots of people had talked about OU's recent road struggles, but they managed to get over that, while Texas was only favored by a few points at UCLA, but just like I predicted (I'm really hurting my arm, patting myself on the back...), Texas finally decided to use their better players, dropping the odd strategy they had been employing (using their worst players), and sure enough, running away with an easy victory over an AWFUL UCLA team.

The true test start for Texas next week, so I'll talk more about them then. This week, the true test starts for Texas A&M and Oklahoma State. Here's a summary of a lot of the common thoughts from Aggie fans:

Last year, even with 5 turnovers and playing on the road, A&M statistically dominated the game only to lose on a last second field goal. Avoid the turnovers and A&M wins easily (so the thinking goes).

Last year, OSU had evil the evil genius Dana Holgerson calling plays, and they were really, really good offensively. This year, stud QB Brandon Weeden and uber-stud WR Justin Blackmon are both back, but without Holgerson calling the plays, their offense loses something (there may be something to this based on Blackmon's statistical drop-off this year and Weeden's increased interception total this year, but still too early to say conclusively, since they are average over 600 yards per game so far in 2011.). Meanwhile, in year two of the Tim DeRuyter era for A&M, the defense now knows the entire playbook and is free to run around at full speed without having to think so much, while also being free to run all sorts of crazy schemes, which will confuse OSU and A&M will slow them down and win easily (so the thinking goes).

This year, A&M's offense is one of the best there is and has no weaknesses, so whatever the defense for OSU (which has not been good so far) tries, we can counter with something and will be able to score at will. So then we will just need a few stops on defense, and should be able to win easily (so the thinking goes).

Here are my thoughts, which somewhat overlap with aspects of the above, but don't necessarily align all the way through. A&M does indeed have the best offense the history of Aggie football. We have one of the best quarterbacks we've ever had, we have the best running back tandem since Greg Hill and Rodney Thomas were running on bright green artificial turf with maroon numbers, and we have either the best or second best group of wide receivers we've ever had (the Bethel Johnson/Terrence Murphy/Jamaar Taylor/Greg Porter group was equally amazing). Put these skill players, along with a solid offensive line, up against a defense for OSU that is not spectacular, and we really should have no trouble scoring points.

A&M has already proven that we can move the ball and score points quickly, and we haven't even used big plays to do it. Amazingly, A&M only has 2 plays this season of over 30 yards (a 37 yard run by Cyrus Gray and a 32 yard pass from Tannehill to tight end Hutson Prioleau), yet the Aggies have still put up huge numbers in less than 3 quarters in each of their first two games. That means A&M is doing it bit by bit, 6, 8, 14 yards at a time, content to march down the field like that. It also means that there are big plays coming. A game like this, with so much at stake (Did I mention that this is the first matchup of two top-10 teams at Kyle Field since I've been alive? Yeah...), teams start taking chances. OSU will take chances. A&M should have a couple big (40+ yards) plays. Defenses get lulled to sleep by boring, rhythmic offenses, which is what A&M has sort of pretended to be this year. But that's the great part about this Aggie offense. They are able to be the boring, efficient offense, but rest assured, they can hit you with the big plays. Cyrus Gray and Christine Michael are both capable of making the 80 yard run at any time. The receivers for A&M are as well. So what's my point? It is this: A&M will be able to move the ball, both methodically and with big plays, all game long, in my opinion.

The game then comes down to A&M stopping OSU. I don't personally subscribe to the notion that the loss of Holgerson will hurt OSU that much. They are still, in my opinion, one of the best 10 offenses in the country, if not top 5. So can A&M stop them? I honestly think the Aggies will struggle to. OSU has scored 30 or more in 15 of their last 16 games. I think it will be very difficult for A&M to hold them under 30. The defense for A&M has shown signs of being very good, but the loss of Von Miller still hurts A&M. To win this game, the Aggies HAVE to do three things:

-Stop the run. A&M must force OSU into predictable passing situations. If they keep us off balance, they'll score 50.

-Bring pressure when we do know they're passing. We have to force Weeden to throw before he's ready. If he has time, he WILL pick us apart.

-Catch the ball if and when he throws an interceptable pass. A dropped interception cost A&M the game two years ago against this same opponent. Everyone knows how important turnovers are. The assumption is that Weeden will throw a couple bad balls. A&M must catch those.

Can A&M do those things? I really, honestly think we can, but stopping the run is the toughest of the three, and the most important. The other two follow from the first one.

I'm gonna cheat and do two official predictions. If A&M accomplishes what I believe they need to, A&M wins 45-31.

If A&M fails to stop the run and/or struggles to pressure Weeden and catch one or two bad passes from him, A&M loses 48-45.

Ok, no cheating. My OFFICIAL official prediction is the first one. I do think A&M wins. I think this is a special group of guys that A&M has right now, and I think Kyle Field is still Kyle Field, which means that as long as the talent is close between the two teams, A&M wins at Kyle.

Gonna be a great day.

A short look ahead to some week 3 college football action

It's been a fun start to 2011 college football. There are some great games coming up this weekend. I'm particularly excited for the Oklahoma vs. Florida State matchup, though I won't be able to watch it since I'll be at Kyle Field watching the Aggies destroy Idaho. But I think this is a good chance for OU to show that they are legit, and I think they will do so. They are favored by about a field goal, but I think they'll cover and win by seven or more. There are lots of reports out of Tallahassee about the amount of young talent they have, and I don't doubt it, but it's still young. Give them another year or two and we might see them contending for a championship. For now, OU wins.

Many people will be interested in the Texas - UCLA matchup. I think Texas wins this one pretty easily, actually. Benching Garrett Gilbert was one of the easiest paths to improvement for the Horns, and now that they have finally done that, they can at least move forward as an offense. They'll still have to be creative to find ways to hide Ash and McCoy's inexperience, but Harsin is a creative guy. Throw in the fact that it seems that Malcom Brown is ready to take over as the lead running back (which is the obvious choice- he's far superior to any of their other running backs), and they will now have a new pep in their step. Oh, and UCLA is an awful, awful team. Texas wins easily.

Other big name games include Ohio State and Miami (come on, no one has a clue what will happen there), Tennessee and Florida (two teams looking to get back to past glory), Notre Dame and Michigan State (can Notre Dame finally win one of these crazy games?), and of course the always heated Buffalo versus Ball State matchup (just kidding, those are completely made up teams).

As for A&M, they are favored by 5 touchdowns against Idaho in what should be an easy tune up. Obviously you still have to take every opponent seriously, but Idaho shouldn't offer much resistance to the efficient Aggie offense. A&M kept things admittedly conservative against SMU, but with Oklahoma State looming, I'd hope the Aggies open things up just a bit more to work out any kinks that need working out. Official prediction: I'll go with A&M winning 51-14.

Watty's Week 2 computer picks

My super secret formula at work again... And again, early in the season, some of these are pretty worthless, though some are pretty good. For now, I'm using all of 2010 plus 2011, so for teams without much turnover, I have a pretty good model, but obviously for teams like Auburn and TCU, it's pretty worthless until we have a few more weeks of real data. That being said, here's what I have for this week. In theory obviously, if you were using this to make picks, you'd look for ones with huge differences between my model and the actual lines and pick accordingly. But based on my admission that these are mostly last year's numbers and that I pretty much just made this model up myself, you'd be pretty stupid to use this for real money betting (though I think I actually have a pretty good model... did I say that already?)

p.s. Sorry about the weird formatting. I suck at computers and internets.

        Prediction Vegas Line
BYU          19
Texas          28         -7/48

Missouri         28
Arizona State 22 -10/51

Oregon State 17
Wisconsin   34 -20.5/57.5

Iowa                 25      -6.5/44.5
Iowa State 15

Toledo        9
Ohio State 38 -17.5/52.5

Mississippi State 32 -5.5/57
Auburn                35

Northern Illinois 35 -4.5/62
Kansas                17

UTEP        18
SMU        26 -19.5/54

Cincinnati         25
Tennessee         31 -4.5/56

Virginia Tech 53 -17.5/63.5
East Carolina 24

Nevada        25
Oregon        46 -26.5/63

California         28 -6.5/47
Colorado         22

Alabama         32 -9.5/42
Penn State 13

TCU                 25
Air Force    21 -1/49.5

South Carolina 25 -3/51.5
Georgia        29

UAB        18
Florida        39 -23.5/53.5

Utah                 25
USC                 27 -8.5/51.5

Notre Dame 34 -3/55
Michigan         29

Houston        39 -21.5/64.5
North Texas 27