East Coast storm brewing for Heisman
We almost made it to November before East Coast bias reared its ugly head in the Heisman Trophy race.
Boston College quarterback Matt Ryan played terrific for five whole minutes last Thursday night at Virginia Tech, which evidently was more than enough to propel him as the Heisman’s head man in the eyes of many back east.
That’s a complete overreaction.
Far as I’m concerned, the race remains wide open with my new leader being Oregon quarterback Dennis Dixon.
Yes, Ryan is on my list. So are Florida quarterback Tim Tebow, Ohio State quarterback Todd Boeckman, Michigan running back Mike Hart, Oregon running back Jonathan Stewart, West Virginia quarterback Patrick White, Kentucky quarterback Andre Woodson, Louisville quarterback Brian Brohm and Texas Tech wide receiver Michael Crabtree.
With an impressive month, Oklahoma freshman quarterback Sam Bradford and Missouri quarterback Chase Daniel might hit my radar, too.
If Ryan remains steadily unspectacular, look for a continued push from some influential easterners.
But the farther east they lean, the farther west I’m tempted to look.
Bulldog stunt a bunch of bull
Careful what you wish for, Mark Richt.
There was nothing wrong with Georgia football coach wanting to celebrate against Florida. But when he wanted the celebration was a bush-league move.
“When we score that first touchdown against Florida we are going to celebrate,” Richt told his team during a bye week. What he got was roughly 60 of his 70 players running onto the field after taking a 7-0 lead in the first quarter.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xj_yqJtmE2w
Richt admitted he was caught off-guard with how the celebration unfolded. “I was envisioning the guys on the field that were on offense to go celebrate until the official threw the flag,” Richt said. “I didn’t tell the whole team run off the sideline and go celebrate. I said I wanted it to be a team celebration. I didn’t really expect the whole mass to run off the sideline but when they started running I was like, ‘I guess that is what they heard me say.’ The entire team they took off and I was like, ‘Oh boy.’ ”
Florida tied the score 81 seconds later, but the Bulldogs went on to a convincing 42-30 victory. Georgia’s triumph would have been even more impressive had it behaved more appropriately. This is the SEC, not Little League. More disgusting than the stunt was the endorsement it received from fans (82.2 percent approval rating in an Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll).
And if the celebration had backfired and Georgia had lost?
“That’s OK,” Richt told the AJC. “I was willing to take that risk. I have been through too many games where there is not enough emotion. We had to make sure we created it. If it cost us, it cost us. At least we were going to play with a lot of heart and a lot of energy.
“That thing, it became a bigger mess than I expected it to be. I can see now in hindsight where if somehow tempers flare, it could have been bad.”
Florida coach Urban Meyer tap-danced around the issue. “We’ve got to keep them out of the end zone so they can’t do that,” Meyer said. “That’s none of my business.”
