On the first day of football …

Sporting News, The, August 23, 2004 by Steve Greenberg

Only a few shopping days left before college football season is here. What to get the fan who knows everything?

Two tickets to paradise. That would be Miami, the site of this year's national title game. Unfortunately, your fan is going to need both tickets: one for the kind, responsible person you love and the other for the double-talking B.S. artist who swears she had this Orange Bowl matchup pegged from the first day of fall camp.

It never has been this hard to size up the season. Who picked LSU last season? Or Ohio State the year before? Nobody I know.

It used to be that your fan could feel pretty good about one of the Florida schools getting to the big game, but then the Gators got Zooked, the 'Noles lost their mojo and the Canes joined a real conference.

The SEC has a different champ every year. The Big Ten still fancies itself the king of conferences, but no one else does. Maybe the rest of the Big 12 has yet to catch up to Oklahoma--or maybe Kansas State's and LSU's eviscerations of the Sooners last December and January left permanent scars.

The safest pick out there? Probably USC. And that's a team with nearly an all-new offensive line and a bunch of receivers not named Mike Williams.

Notre Dame? Come on, I kid.

A subscription to the Bizarro World Sporting News. Your fan could hitch his wagon to the real TSN pick for No. 1, Georgia. He could throw a dart at a map of the U.S., too. The postscript to last week's college football preview issue: Star running back Kregg Lumpkin shredded his knee on the first day of practice--the very day the Bulldogs announced their best linebacker, Odell Thurman, had been suspended for the first three games of the season. Oh, joy.

The masses are rumbling about a SPORTING NEWS jinx. Seems we've made some lame predictions of late, such as the Cubs to win it all, just before they started falling all over themselves to get on the disabled list. Hey, we do what we can.

A punching bag. Your fan wants a playoff, needs a playoff, knows down deep it was meant to be. He has no idea.

Your fan isn't going to see a playoff for the next decade. Those aren't my words; they're Big Ten commish Jim Delany's. He's a mighty powerful guy, and he wouldn't say it if he wasn't convinced it was true.

Your fan's going to have some aggression to burn 'round about the big MPC Computers Bowl-Motor City Bowl doubleheader December 27 on ESPN.

A fire extinguisher. Every home should have one, especially now that the whole family is calling dibs on the Barcalounger on gameday. 2Studies show pro football has become the preferred sport among women, who also have taken to the college game as never before.

"Honey?"

"Can't talk. Watching the game."

"But I think the kitchen's on fire."

"Not now, Frank!"

Some love for the little guys. When was the last time your fan stopped and smelled the roses that grow outside of the BCS conferences?

Does he truly appreciate the garden of splendid quarterbacks 2(Akron's Charlie Frye, Toledo's Bruce Gradkowski, Northern Illinois' Josh Haldi, Marshall's Stan Hill) that is the MAC?

Or the magnificent offenses (Louisville, Memphis, Houston, TCU) that have bloomed in Conference USA?

Stop me before I continue with this strange and disturbing botanical metaphor.

Some love for the really little guys. We don't often dip beneath the Division I-A level at TSN. Nor, I'm guessing, does your tan. What are we missing?

Maybe the next Walter Payton/Jerry Rice/Steve McNair. There's no telling when the next kid from Southwest Podunk A&T will take the NFL by storm.

Here's a name your fan likely doesn't know: Jamaal Branch. He's a running back at Colgate, a 225-pound senior who rushed for 2,326 yards and 29 touchdowns in 2003. Small-college expert Don Hansen says Branch is the best pro prospect outside of I-A ball.

Hansen's top teams: Delaware in I-AA, Saginaw Valley State in D-II and St. John's (Minn.) in D-III.

So there.

A great big box of upset specials. OK, enough already about the little guys. Thrill your fan with these possibilities:

Miami loses at home to Florida State on September 6. The Canes are bound to be slow starters without all of those first-round picks who flooded the NFL. Besides, FSU plays better in Miami than it does in Tallahassee.

Michigan goes down at Notre Dame on September 11. There won't be an uglier big game all year.

LSU gets knocked off of its high horse at Auburn on September 18. Why? Because Aubie still owes us a big win (see: TSN jinx, 2003).

The 'Noles gel slapped all over their home field by Clemson on September 25. Tommy Bowden turned the tables on his old man last year.

Ohio State shames itself at Northwestern on October 2. The Buckeyes almost lost there two years ago during their national title run. They aren't as good as they were then, and the Mildcats have gotten a lot better.

Oklahoma forgets all it stands for against Texas in Dallas on October 9. Texas' players are every bit as good as OU's. The Longhorns finally are going to act like it.