What the Orange Bowl tells us about conferences’ automatic BCS bids

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We’ve followed the Clemson Tigers this season, from their 8-0 start, through their late-season slippage, their return to their winning ways in the ACC championship, and now their embarrassing defeat last night in the Orange Bowl at the hands of West Virginia. The Tigers’ victories have come almost exclusively on the back of their high-flying offense. Like Grinnell “system” basketball, Clemson doesn’t much care how many points you score because they’re just going to score more. It’s a great approach as long as it lasts, and it definitely is thrilling to watch, but when it unravels, things can get ugly in a hurry. Keep reading…

The steel-silver lining in Rashard Mendenhall’s season-ending injury

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In Tuesday morning’s weekly update, I wrote that Pittsburgh Steelers running back Rashard Mendenhall’s season-ending ACL tear was “a literally crippling blow to Pittsburgh’s Super Bowl chances.” Observant Grantland writer Bill Barnwell offered a contrary view:

Will [Mendenhall’s absence] really affect the Steelers heading into the playoffs, though? It’s debatable. Mendenhall certainly has the biggest name of any Steelers running back, but his production is positively ordinary. He’s only averaged 4.1 yards per carry on his 228 rushing attempts this year. Meanwhile, primary backup Isaac Redman has averaged 4.4 yards a pop on 110 attempts, while third-stringers Mewelde Moore and Jonathan Dwyer have combined for 280 yards on just 38 carries, for a rushing average in excess of seven yards.

It’s not totally uncommon for a backup to produce a rushing average superior to the starter, but that usually happens because the starter is accruing a large quantity of touches, including many in less-than-ideal situations for gaining consistent yardage. It’s hard to fathom that Mendenhall is such a back, since he’s only carried the ball about 15 times a game and had just one game this season with more than 19 carries. The DVOA statistic, which adjusts for quality of opposition and game situation, says that Redman and Mendenhall are virtually identical; Mendenhall’s DVOA is at 3.8 percent, while Redman’s is at 3.5 percent.

It would be one thing if Mendenhall had a history of success, but he now has 813 NFL attempts and a rushing average at those same 4.1 yards per carry. His case for being a star basically amounts to his status as a first-rounder and two big games in 2009 against the Chargers and Broncos, in which he combined for 320 yards against two below-average run defenses. He’s never developed into a reliable receiver, catching just 68 passes in four seasons. We hoped and expected that he would take a step forward this season after a somewhat disappointing 2010, but if anything, he had taken a step backward before the torn ACL.

If the Steelers can get Moore back from a sprained MCL to serve in his customary role as the third-down back, chances are that they won’t miss Mendenhall whatsoever.

My only rejoinders are a) Barnwell’s analysis fails to consider a durability notion (the effect on Mendenhall’s replacements of having to shoulder a heavier load), and b) the combination of Mendenhall’s absence and Ben Roethlisberger’s limitations due to his own injuries, which I mentioned on Tuesday. Still, given Barnwell’s recently proven successful playing of the NFL numbers this season, I’m inclined to yield to him on this sort of thing.

Philip Jackson’s legacy

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Now that we have a few generations of organized sport under our collective belt, we have more options for assessing the greatness of its participants contextually. While many of the major sports, especially hockey and baseball, have become internationalized through broad player entry, coaching pools remain markedly small. Moreover, many of the coaches are (professionally, and occasionally familially) related to each other. Trace a current head coach’s resume backwards and you’re likely to find that he worked as a coordinator or assistant alongside other current head coaches underneath a prominent head coach of the past generation. Looking prospectively, these relationships often are described as “coaching trees” (click here for a detailed look at some of the NFL’s coaching trees), and, beyond any championships won, seasonal records set, or individual players developed, these coaching trees can represent a coach’s most lasting impact on the game. Some of the most extensive coaching trees read like the first chapter of Matthew (the begattitudes), and these relationships are important not just because a handful of people used to work together and now are running their own teams, but because they represent shared philosophies of coaching– strategy, tactics, personnel management, etc. Sort of like long-gone U.S. presidents can continue to affect public policy through their lasting legacy of federal judicial appointments, athletic strategists can find their schemes in play long after they’re gone, directed by their coaching legacies and operated by modern stars they may never have met. Having a large, relevant coaching tree is a major indicator of coaching success.

Which is why it’s surprising to realize that professional basketball’s greatest coach, Phil Jackson, essentially has no coaching tree whatsoever.

Last month, Grantland’s Chuck Klosterman wrote a piece on Jackson and the Triangle offense that offered little insight on Jackson or the Triangle. It did conclude with the following, however, and while the last sentence frames this partial paragraph as a preemptive obituary for the Triangle, the substance of the quoted portion functions to conscribe the legacy of Jackson himself:

Jackson is widely viewed as arrogant. He engenders jealousy among his rivals (and seems to enjoy doing so). His acolytes are few and far between. Unlike most coaches who’ve had major success, he hasn’t spawned a significant coaching tree of former assistants — his only real tentacles into the league have been recently fired Timberwolves coach Kurt Rambis and ex-Mavs coach Jim Cleamons (currently working in China). Neither ran the Triangle in totality. Jackson’s NBA impact has been massive, but his ongoing influence will be muted. It appears that he will not be remembered as the NBA coach who ran the Triangle best; in all likelihood, he will be remembered as the only NBA coach who ran it at all. If the Triangle truly dies, it dies with him.

The man and the scheme are inextricably connected, of course, and we’re far too close to Jackson to estimate or predict his total legacy and future perception, but at a time when the many of the best coaches are seen either as the grand culmination of an existent coaching tree or, especially, the roots of a new one, Jackson appears rather isolated, which is sort of how we’ve always thought about him anyway.

Tuesday morning special

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We normally do this on Mondays, but with the breakdown of this fall’s orderly football schedule, together with adverse outcomes in the two games I attended over the weekend and the opportunity to post the song below, I figured it was ok to wait until Tuesday this time.

On Friday, the Red Wings lost by a goal on the road to Chicago, and on Saturday, Vanderbilt lost by a touchdown to Cincinnati in the Liberty Bowl. Recaps of both of those games will come later.

There wasn’t much of special note in the NFL’s final week of regular season play on Sunday, except that Steelers’ RB Rashard Mendenhall tore his ACL and is done for the season, a literally crippling blow to Pittsburgh’s Super Bowl chances, especially considering Ben Roethlisberger’s lingering leg injury.

The traditional New Year’s Day bowls were played on January 2 this year, and Michigan State came back to win a triple-overtime game against Georgia in the Outback Bowl, much to the chagrin of commodawg and bpbrady. By the second half, it appeared that nobody wanted to win the game. The officials insisted that there had to be a winner, though, and two missed field goals by Georgia, including one the Spartans blocked in the third overtime, sealed the game.

The BCS games played yesterday were exciting as well. Oregon topped Wisconsin for the Ducks’ first Rose Bowl victory in over ninety years, and Oklahoma State beat Stanford in overtime for all the Tostitos in the Fiesta Bowl.

Tonight, the once-proud Sugar Bowl stakes its claim to irrelevancy when Michigan takes on Virginia Tech. Our bpbrady is there. Watch for him on tv, assuming he makes it into the stadium after a week in the French Quarter.

New Years Rulin’s

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I’m not much for new year’s resolutions as rituals go, but if I need some suggestions for self improvement in 2012, I’m going to be turning to Woody Guthrie’s New Years Rulin’s from 1941 (click image to zoom):

For a modern analogue:

Liberty Bowl preview

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After a couple weeks of silly bowl games and lamenting the defunctedness of the Baccardi Bowl, it’s come time to get into college football’s more serious postseason games. With the BCS bowls getting going on January 2 (there are no New Year’s Day bowls this year), New Year’s Eve provides a suitable appetizer, including Cincinnati and Vanderbilt in the Liberty Bowl, 2:30 pm Central time on ABC. Watch for me on the TV.

Rather than try to duplicate the good work already done by dedicated Vanderbilt bloggers and create my own full game preview, I’ll yield to more experienced voices below, after offering my own thoughts, in bullet-point format (it’s Memphis, after all):

  • While Vanderbilt was three plays away from a 9-3 record in the regular season, they finished 6-6, which still triples their win total from last year with essentially the same roster and bests their win total from the past two seasons combined. That said, a win on Saturday would give the Commodores a winning record on the season; a loss, of course, would give them a losing record. Coach James Franklin has hit this point in his preparation this week and I think it’s an important one. A season this good, comparatively speaking, cannot end with a losing record.
  • This is just the fifth bowl appearance for Vanderbilt, but this year’s senior class is the school’s first to play in two bowl games. At a school where nobody leaves early for the NFL (not even Jay Cutler), the seniors represent a strong, experienced group of leaders. They also have played for three different coaches (Bobby Johnson, Robbie Caldwell, and Franklin) in three years, so they have been through a lot together. After a win in the Music City Bowl three years ago, followed by two down years, the seniors seem to play for themselves as much as they do for Franklin and the future of the program. I think this bodes well for their performance in their final game.
  • As much as 2008’s Music City Bowl was a coming out party for quarterback Larry Smith, the 2011 season has been a coming out party for his replacement, Jordan Rodgers. The junior starter with a famous brother has been an offensive force this year, both as a rusher and a passer. Rodgers need not have a perfect total game for Vandy to win– other offensive options and tools are available– but he needs to avoid making the kinds of mistakes he did in the overtime loss to Tennessee.
  • Cincinnati is a relative unknown to me, and probably to you, something the information below should remedy. The two things that come to my mind are 1) they aren’t that far removed from Brian Kelly, so there probably is a talent residue there; and 2) their basketball team is made up of some hard brawlers, which may or may not carry over onto the football field. I just looked up their regular season record: 9-3. But they play in the Big East.
  • I’ve been to one other bowl game, the 2007 Rose Bowl. USC embarrassed Michigan that afternoon, and I was embarrassed to be associated with the state in which the losing team was located. I very much am hoping for a different result on Saturday.

History: Sensibly, the Liberty Bowl started in Philadelphia in 1959, but by 1965, it had moved to Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium in Memphis to host larger crowds and establish itself as one of the oldest non-BCS bowls. The People’s history of the Liberty Bowl is here.

Continue reading →

Friday Delta Jam

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Today’s Friday Jam comes to you from the road, where I’m beginning my reverse reinactment of the second third of the great blues migration. I will be in Chicago tonight for the Red Wings and Blackhawks, and I’ll be in Memphis tomorrow afternoon for the Liberty Bowl, where Vanderbilt will face Cincinnati. Given the recent spate of hockey head injuries, the most recent victim of which is Nashville’s Shea Weber, featuring Warren Zevon and Mitch Albom’s “Hit Somebody! (The Hockey Song)” in this spot didn’t seem quite right. The other selection never was in question, however, and I was happy to find this particular clip because it was the first time I’d ever heard the tune:

I hope that happens to me exactly, minus the rain and the catfish. I’ve caught catfish. I’ve eaten catfish. Various preparations. I’ve tried. I can’t do it anymore. And the pouring rain. It always seems to rain for the Liberty Bowl, but this year is shaping up just fine.

AD’s year in review

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Thanks for dropping by this week and checking out our year-in-review posts, interspersed with our usual coverage, and thanks to Brendan for a great idea.

Top Sports Moments of 2011

The scoreboard in left field.

If you’re looking for an official or objective list of the top stories of the year, I suggest you go elsewhere. What I like about our year-in-review features is that we’ve written about the stories, albums, and events that were most interesting or important to us, and, as will be immediately obvious, I’m going to follow suit.

1. Detroit Tigers playoff push

The Tigers obviously didn’t make it as far as they did in 2006, but this year was like that year in that Detroit beat the Yankees along the way. What was different about 2011, for me, was that I was a) living in Michigan, and b) writing and tweeting for a sports blog during much of the season. Both of these things measurably enhanced my experience of and connection to this year’s team, its successes, personalities, and volatility. It also was the first time in a few years that I was able to attend a game. I spilled much digital ink on this team in these virtual pages, and the posts are easy enough to find so I’ll spare you any detailed recap, except to say that, a few months later, I am able to appreciate the way the wheels came off as a suitable ending to a dramatic (by Detroit standards) season.

2. Vanderbilt’s football season

I didn’t put the Lions’ season on my list under the rationale that it still is ongoing, so this selection is cheating a little bit, but the college football regular season is over, so I’m running with it. I’ll hit on some of the high points in my Liberty Bowl preview that will go up later today, but first-year head coach James Franklin appears to have changed the culture at Vandy even faster than Jim Schwartz has in Detroit, tripling the win total with essentially the same players. As successful as he was on the field (I’ll always maintain that they were three plays away from a 9-3 record), Franklin may be even more successful on the recruiting trail. He already nabbed a Virginia quarterback recruit away from Virginia Tech, and he took a five-star QB recruit to the wire against LSU and Notre Dame. Next year looks even more promising, when Warren Norman is scheduled to return to the backfield alongside 2011 success stories Zac Stacy and starting QB Jordan Rodgers. 2012 will look even better if the Commodores can win the Liberty Bowl and finish this year 7-6.

3. Misbehaving College Coaches

This was a great year for teams I like– Spartans, Commodores, Tigers, Lions, and Red Wings– and it was a great year for sports writing, with the launch of Grantland, OutKick the Coverage, and The Classical, but like Magalan felt compelled to remark upon the marathon record-setter, I feel compelled to mention the names Jerry Sandusky, Jim Tressel, and Bruce Pearl. Sandusky is in a terrible league of his own, and I already have written here about Tressel and Pearl. Sparing the hand-wringing, defending, and analyzing, what I’ll say in the context of the posture of this post is that it is a welcome development that the NCAA is punishing coaches individually for the violations they commit or otherwise oversee. I hope the days of slippery escape artists like John Calipari, Pete Carroll, and Lane Kiffin are over.

Top Albums of 2011

Creating this list was a bit more difficult, not because I don’t like or know about music, but because I’m not quite as hip-to-the-modern-scene as many of my co-writers here. (See, for example, my punt on Amy Winehouse earlier.) Resort to a list of 2011 releases from a trusted source, something I suspect a lot of people writing bits like this do, was unavailing. That list jogged my memory on one album, Gregg Allman’s Low Country Blues, that Bdoyk actually tipped me off to initially. It didn’t make my list though, even though I had to cheat a little as you’ll see, because I didn’t think it was anything special. I liked it, but I don’t think it deserves to be one of the three best albums of 2011, even if I can’t come up with three.

1. Revelator – Tedeschi Trucks Band

This was an easy number one choice for me. I wrote a full review of the album back in September, and I don’t feel the need to supplement it now, except to add that it was the first record I played on my turntable after recently setting up my new stereo system.

2. June 3, 2011, Pine Knob – Phish

This is a concert, not an album, but I was in attendance, and it was a perfect concert night. Put attendance together with recording (free sample streaming), and I’m calling it an album. I went with a good friend, with whom I’ve seen the band once before, and everything went as smoothly as could be. The weather was perfect, the band was playing at a level they hadn’t reached in years. and it was my first visit to this historic outdoor Michigan venue. It definitely was the best I had ever seen them, and we had the feeling during the show that something special was going on, which made it all the more neat and enjoyable. Because amateur blogging about a Phish show registers somewhere between talking to another person about your fantasy minor league baseball team and a rambling monologue at a loud bar about that “drug trip” you had “back in high school,” I’ll close this by quoting bona fide Phish blogger Mr. Miner (the second Mr. Miner— I held that username as a prior legal nonconforming use on phishows.com), who wrote shortly afterwards that:

Sometimes a show—just one set—can launch thousands of dreams, taking the audience on a voyage so cosmic and coherent; so spectacular and superb that people will look back on it for years to come. Odysseys like the second set of Detroit’s Friday night exclamation reach the very core essence of Phish—four musicians pushing the boundaries of musical possibilities while taking 15,000 fans with them into the depths of the universe. With playing so together and inspirational, Phish opened yet another door last night, inviting us further into the future. And more than ever, the future is now.

…You get the idea.

3. Fall – Root Glen

As I suggested above, I didn’t hear a lot of 2011’s new releases, but I definitely heard this one. One of two releases by this relatively new band from New Jersey, I also wrote a full review of this EP last month. What I’ll add in this retrospective is that it is cool to listen to something for the first time and immediately recognize that it represents an important step up for a band you already liked. Before Fall, Root Glen had been successful at capturing their live sound in the studio, and this was great. After all, it was their live performances that gave them a following in the first place. But a lot of bands play live and just noodle and jam without much focus or commitment, and Fall is evidence of a group redoubling its effort to put forth an even higher quality of music they always had in them.

Thanks for reading us in 2011, and be sure to stick around for much more in the New Year.

Related
Magalan’s year in review
Bdoyk’s year in review
Exexpatriate’s year in review
Bpbrady’s year in review
ALDLAND’s year in review

Magalan’s year in review

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Top 3 Sports Moments/Things of the Year:

1. Makau breaks the Marathon World Record in Berlin.

Don’t worry, we’ll talk SEC Football soon enough. But records in the Marathon don’t happen every year, and it’s getting much harder to break. So when Patrick Makau runs 26.2 miles in 2:03:38, it’s a big deal. Breaking the previous record by only 21 seconds in a race that is so long might not seem significant, but, umm, it is. I find it helpful to note that the time listed above means Makau ran the race with an average pace of 4:42.9 per mile. If you were a track star in high school, it is possible that you could run a mile in under 5 minutes. Once, maybe twice. To do it 26.2 times is truly difficult for me to comprehend.

2. The ALL SEC National Championship Game.

Since it is a moment that will actually occur in 2012, we’ll say the selection of two SEC teams for the title game. I’ll start by saying the whole situation stinks for Oklahoma State. They were certainly deserving of a shot against LSU. But so is Alabama. I didn’t agree with any of the talk about the LSU-Bama meeting on November 5 – I didn’t think it was terribly boring, and really enjoyed watching it.

Aside from SEC homerism, the moment is significant in that it might have finally tipped the scales for a move to some kind of playoff. It has, at the very least, put the structure of the BCS in doubt going forward. The run up to the national championship may look very different five years from now.

3. The Atlantic publishes Tyler Branch’s piece, The Shame of College Sports, in October 2011.

As should be clear by now, I love watching college football. But its hard to read that article and not feel unsettled by the current state of affairs. As revenues for college football continue to increase, I expect that we’ll eventually see some sort of real payment for players. Which is probably for the best.

Top 3 Albums of the year:

1. Here We Rest – Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit.

He was my favorite part of the Drive-By Truckers when we was with them, and I’ve loved each of the three albums he’s made since he moved on in 2007. This last one is yet another good addition to his body of work. He’s a heck of a songwriter, and you can rock out or relax at various points on the album.

2. The King of Limbs – Radiohead.

I liked it, sorry. Maybe it’s not as groundbreaking as stuff in the past, but I’ve caught myself listening through the album over and over again. I take that as a sign.

3. Barton Hollow – The Civil Wars.

These guys put out an incredible album this year, and then got a ton of publicity when Taylor Swift tweeted about their concert at the Belcourt Theater. The whole album is beautiful, and the title track is all sorts of acoustic kick-ass.

Related
Bdoyk’s year in review
Exexpatriate’s year in review
Bpbrady’s year in review
ALDLAND’s year in review

Bdoyk’s year in review

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My favorite time of year is when my go to blogs begin to slowly unveil what they thought was the best of the previous 11-12 months. I tend to nod my head in visible agreement or audibly exclaim a Gob Bluth-esque “C’mon!” as certain selections grace their lists. I anticipate that you, fair readers, will do precisely the same. Thus, without further ado…here goes nothing.

Muzac

1. Bon Iver, Bon Iver

It’s no secret that I adore Bon Iver. I have had their first album and any live material I could get my hands on in frequent rotation for the last 3 years. I’ve even changed the way I say their name multiple times (specifically after being scoffed at when say both Bahn Eye-ver and Bone Ee-vehr, now I just sort of mumble it and tend to swoon over Justin Vernon instead). Anyways, this album was highly anticipated by me and many others, and did not disappoint. In fact, it also produced the best song of the year. And to cap it off, it was the best concert of the year. [note to fans: Bon Iver + Ryman + Acoustic = Unreal]

2. Adele, 21

Similar to Bon Iver, I’ve been waiting for Adele’s sophomore release for a long time. As the days led up to its release, she began her media tour and I fell in love with her all over again. When I lived in New York, I had the chance to see her twice. Both times I was struck that her live performance was better than her first album, a feat I previously thought impossible, and, to top it all off, she was just so damn likeable, chatting with the audience, giggling like an excited school girl. Fortunately/unfortunately she performed a ton in support of this album, so much so she found herself under the knife, and isn’t expecting to make another album for another 2-3 years. In the meantime, I’ll be watching this and definitely not not getting teary eyed.

3. The Head and the Heart, The Head and the Heart

I’m not sure how/when this band popped on my radar, but boy am I glad they did. Their album is simple, but fabulous. Like the previous two on this list, I can listen to it beginning to end, never skipping a song. I’ve probably listened to Down in the Valley close to 2,398,509,259 times since May, and still haven’t gotten sick of it.

4. Kanye West, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy

Ok, so this is sooo 2010, but I’m going to go ahead and include it. Hopefully ‘Ye will feel better about not getting an Album of the Year nod with this honor. Perhaps even more interesting than the album is the story behind how it came to be. Kanye’s a nut, that’s for sure. He also has a lot of feelings. He also is a pretty brilliant producer and each of these combine for some serious hotness. Throw on the full album next time you’re at the gym and tell me you didn’t do some fist pumping. Also, Nicki Minaj’s verse on Monster is one of the best rap verses maybe ever, and makes me want to get in a fight.

Well I don’t have a 5th so I’m going to throw out my Honorable Mentions and miscellaneous awards here:

Black Keys, El Camino. Haven’t listened quite enough to put it on the list, but I can tell you there are some gems on here. My personal favorite, Mind Eraser, is like a song version of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and I’m super into it. Sister and Lonely Boy are also pretty epic.

Jay Z & Kanye West, Watch the Throne. Seems too easy to have on there. However, it’s really, really good. Some of the lyrics are absurd slash offensive, but the beats are undeniably super hot and may inspire an instant party no matter where you are (don’t ask me how I know this).

Best Cover:  TIE! Both are too good for me not to include them

Take Care (Drake), Florence + the Machine

Dirty Diana (Michael Jackson), The Weeknd

Best Jam: Girl I Want You to Know, Lupe Fiasco

Best Love Song: A Million Years, Alexander

Sports Moments

1. The end of the NFL lockout

Sundays from February to August feel empty enough to me as is; thus, the prospect of not having a season was a little bit much for me to realistically consider. There were some desperate points in there. However, as the end came, just days after the passing of the Pats’ owner’s beloved wife, and Bob Kraft played an instrumental role in the negotiations, it felt doubly sweet.

2. The epic collapse of the Red Sox/Eva(n) Longoria’s extra innings walk-off

I am still  not in a place where I can talk about this. But, boy, was it memorable.

3. Brees surpassing Marino for single season yardage

See? Sometimes procrastinating has its perks. The inclusion of this moment comes less than 24 hours after it happened. Sure, the talking heads will all point to how the game has changed sufficiently, making the comparison of Marino and Brees’ accomplishments laughable. However, Brees seems like a great guy. His post-game speech in the locker room was as genuine as they come. All in all, excellent work for an excellent dude.

Related
Exexpatriate’s year in review
Bpbrady’s year in review
ALDLAND’s year in review