WEEKLY PRESSER
A monologue.
A few weeks ago, I wrote about why exactly the Bill Belichick stuff this year made me so mad. I’m not going to belabor any of those points, but the fallout from Chapel Hill this week bears mentioning.
Pat Welter at WRAL in Raleigh published a pretty thorough examination of the seemingly insurmountable cultural issues in the UNC locker room, which includes, but is not limited to:
Everyone seems to hate GM Michael Lombardi
Relatedly, nepotism: there are two Belichicks and an additional Lombardi on the staff in fairly crucial roles
Transfer players who followed Steve Belichick from Washington get preferential treatment in a number of odd ways
Parents have been asked not to talk to Bill in the program facilities
Lots of players don’t even have a phone number to reach their position coach
Maybe most damning, Bill actually does seem to be a great one on one teacher with his players, when he’s involved enough to do so
That last point sums up why this is failing, in a lot of ways. For all the faults you could find with this operation when it was announced, a lot of us at least assumed the (maybe) greatest coach in NFL history had enough pride to make this work, eventually. Bill can still coach, but by bringing in his roster of flunkies and failing to humble himself enough to at least try to understand the nuances of college football, he doomed this thing to fail from the beginning.
TAILGATE
Consumables.
LISTEN:
The new Clipse album is an absolute blast, but we’re going to feature the song that everyone in our generation learned to imitate with a pencil and school desk in Grindin’. Make sure to listen to their Tiny Desk Concert featuring all new material.
EAT:
@jujumaoo 🇬🇷 Avgolemono | Soups So Good It Can Cure Any Sickness Ep. 14 INGREDIENTS: Greek Avgolemono: - 5-8 chicken thigh bone in, (can also be 1 ... See more
Lots of child-borne coughs and colds flying around this week, make you a soup that’ll get everyone through the weekend. This is, as you might see in the comments, an extremely untraditional take on the classic Greek lemon and chicken soup, but it hits.
KICKOFF
The SEC slate for the week, previewed with exactly as many words as each game deserves.
Saturday Early
No. 8 Alabama at No. 14 Missouri
It does feel like Alabama is a much better team, but the Tide have a habit of struggling against quarterbacks who can really run. Enter Beau Pribula, a likely raucous crown in Columbia, and you have all the making for Missouri to end up like No. 6 in next week’s AP poll before doing something insane like losing to Auburn.
No. 4 Ole Miss vs Washington State
Man, what’s happened to the remaining PAC-12 teams this year is a bummer. Lane Kiffin is good for in inexplicable loss each year, but this one feels out of the realm of possibility for even that to happen.
Saturday Afternoon
No. 6 Oklahoma vs Texas (Cotton Bowl)
I don’t think Arch Manning has been quite as bad as the public narrative suggests so far this year, but he has clearly been impacted by a subpar offensive line in Austin. There’s plenty of time for him and the Longhorns offense to get right this season, but a rivalry matchup against the Dr. Frankenstein of simulated pressures and the hellish Oklahoma pass rush doesn’t feel like the moment where it will happen.
On the other side of the field, I am still laughing at the hype videos Oklahoma fans made for the hand surgeon who operated on quarterback John Mateer. He must have done fantastic work, because the Sooners are hopeful that Mateer can suit up for this game.
No. 12 Tennessee vs Arkansas
Bobby Petrino is going to draw up the best gameplan of his life as he embarks on a bid to win the permanent head job in Fayetteville. Expect fireworks in this game, something you really should be careful with around a group of people from Arkansas and Tennessee.
Saturday Evening
No. 5 Texas A&M vs Florida
It would be extremely funny to see Florida fans gnash their teeth over notching a second-straight upset of a top ten team because it means they can’t fire their coach.
No. 10 Georgia at Auburn
Time to find out if Hugh Freeze still has any of that black magic from earlier in his career, or if we’re just seeing another long, slow fade from the Tigers after a promising start. The losing fanbase is going to be insufferable on Finebaum next week, either way.
No. 11 LSU vs South Carolina
Two banged-up teams that haven’t lived up to preseason expectations meet with a get-right game against each other. There’s a great chance we leave this one feeling worse about both teams than we do now.
INTERLUDE
Halftime show.
THREADS
Interesting uniforms of the week. Inclusion does not always equal an endorsement.
Montana celebrates the 30th anniversary of its first national title with these amazing “copper, silver and gold” uniforms that originally paid tribute to the mining tradition of the state. The colors and everything are great, but what really knocks this out of the park is the helmet logo, which is somehow officially known as “Otto the slobbering bear” – maybe the best goofy animal design we’ve ever seen.
BONUS HELMET
Putting your cartoonish mascot on the helmets is a great idea. Putting your cartoonish mascot doing a unique celebration that originated at your school is a spectacular idea.
OUT OF TOWN
More to watch.
Friday Night
No. 24 USF at North Texas
A true banger of a G5 matchup, with enough fanfare that North Texas sold out its stadium for the first time in school history. Don’t sleep on the Mean Green having the best turnover celebration in the sport, either.
Saturday Early
No. 1 Ohio State at No. 17 Illinois
We still haven’t seen Ohio State play a good team this year (*looks around, ducks*) so this matchup is intriguing in the hypothetical at least.
Saturday Afternoon
No. 3 Oregon vs No. 7 Indiana
The Hoosiers, and transfer quarterback Fernando Mendoza, absolutely rock this year. But do they have enough juice to compete on the road against (maybe) the best team in the country? This is a sneaky important game for both teams as they make a push to return to the playoffs.
Saturday Late
No. 21 Arizona State at Utah
A shock loss to Mississippi State threatened to unravel the season in Tempe, but they seem to be back on track. Beating preseason conference favorite Utah would go a long way to setting up a return trip to the Big 12 title game in Dallas for the Skatteboo-less Sun Devils.
OFFERING PLATE
Praise be, we enjoyed these things, some of which require a subscription.
The phenomenal Kaleb Horton sadly passed away last month, leaving a tremendous void in the feature writing space – his review of John Prine’s The Tree of Forgiveness album has stuck with me for a long time; Brian Grubb details the Guy Fieri Tequila Heist, and phrase I will not elaborate on further until you read the article; Legendary author/poet/Minnesota Timberwolves fan Hanif Aburraqib is the guest editor of this year’s Best American Sportswriting, and talked about his process and favorite pieces with Out of Your League; The Wall Street Journal theorizes that becoming the best weightlifter in the world might be achieved by not actually lifting that many weights; Matt Levine’s Money Stuff newsletter wonderfully bemoans the intrusion of sports gambling into stock trading, and has fun with the concept of legal pump and dump schemes; Zoe Greenberg at The Philadelphia Inquirer wonders why there are so many dang Philly fans on the internet.
