Ole Miss is headed to the Allstate Sugar Bowl in New Orleans, the Rebels’ first trip to the classic since 1970 (a fine year, if I may say so) and the program’s second straight access bowl. Some of the top players in Mississippi were in Oxford over the weekend for state championship games and are now headed to Hattiesburg to face Team Alabama. SEC Media Days will have some new faces in July, and the Rebels picked up a big win in Springfield, Mass. My thoughts on those topics and more follow here, thanks to Oxford-based RE/MAX agent Harry Alexander.
Note: I spent most of the weekend at Vaught-Hemingway and I’m leaving for Hattiesburg in the morning, so this will likely be an abbreviated version of 10 Weekend Thoughts.
1. Baylor won’t be the opponent, but as I said up top, Ole Miss is headed to the Allstate Sugar Bowl to face Oklahoma State on Jan. 1 at 7:30 p.m. The Cowboys won their first 10 games this season before losing to Baylor and then to Oklahoma to fall out of the national championship hunt. Mike Gundy’s team has a 20-point win over TCU and a 17-point win over Texas Tech. The Cowboys also have a three-point victory at Texas and a two-point win over Kansas State.
Oklahoma State can score points in bunches, but the Cowboys’ defense won’t be mistaken for Michigan State’s or Alabama’s anytime soon. ESPN will be happy, I suspect. The night after the national semifinals, Ole Miss and Oklahoma State should sling it all over the Mercedes Superdome on New Year’s night.
For Ole Miss, it’s a major accomplishment. Sure, as has been said and will be said, this team will always be remembered for what it could have been, but a second straight access bowl just four years removed from the debacle that was 2011 is nothing short of remarkable.
2. Alabama and Michigan State will meet in one semifinal on New Year’s Eve. Clemson and Oklahoma will meet in the other. I’d say the committee got it right, though I think Ohio State has one hell of an argument. The Buckeyes lost just once – to Michigan State. Oklahoma is also 11-1, and the Sooners’ one loss was to Texas (5-7). Alabama’s one loss was to Ole Miss (9-3). Clemson is unbeaten.
Conference championships mean a ton, obviously. I love chaos, and as you know, I favor an eight-team playoff. Don’t you wish Ole Miss had beaten Arkansas and advanced to the SEC Championship Game instead of Alabama? At 11-2, I don’t think Ole Miss would have garnered one of the top four spots. However, would the Rebels have knocked Alabama out of the top spots? How would, for example, the committee differentiate between an 11-1 Alabama and an 11-1 Ohio State with neither the Tide nor the Buckeyes having a conference title on their resumes?
My guess is they couldn’t. So add that to the list of landscape shifts that occurred on fourth-and-25 in Vaught-Hemingway on Nov. 7.
Crazy.
3. If we had an eight-team playoff, by the way, the debate would still be intense. The top four would make it, obviously. Ohio State would be fifth. Iowa, at 12-1 after a narrow loss to Michigan State in Indianapolis, would be in the field. That leaves two spots, with Stanford and Notre Dame likely rounding out the field.
North Carolina and Florida State would have compelling arguments, but both would likely be left out and have no one but themselves to blame. Houston, Northwestern, TCU and Oklahoma State would all get some time at the discussion table.
I guess Ole Miss fans should be glad there’s no eight-team playoff. If there were one, that fourth-and-25 disaster would have kept the Rebels out of the tournament. An 11-2 Ole Miss, especially with an SEC championship in tow, would have been seeded no lower than seventh.
It’s coming, though. There’s simply too much money to be made.
4. Here are my final SEC power rankings, with the future very much a part of my thought process:
1. Alabama – The Tide’s not sexy, but it wins.
2. Ole Miss – Oh, what could have been.
3. Florida – When Jim McElwain gets a quarterback, look out.
4. Tennessee – The Vols would plummet if they were in the West, but they’re not.
5. Arkansas – The Hogs haven’t accomplished much (they did drastically impact the playoff landscape), but they’re stable.
6. LSU – Les Miles beat the boosters. The last SEC coach to do that, Tommy Tuberville, went unbeaten the next season.
7. Texas A&M – Kevin Sumlin needs at least nine wins next season.
8. Georgia – Mark Richt did such a crappy job at Georgia that he had four job offers within 24 hours of his firing in Athens.
9. Auburn – Gus Malzahn really needs Nick Saban to go away.
10. Mississippi State – The Bulldogs did not win the first week of the offseason. Dan Mullen looks like a coach who can’t get out.
11. Missouri – The Tigers promoted from within, meaning the transition from Gary Pinkel to Barry Odom should be fairly seamless.
12. South Carolina – Will Muschamp acts like a maniac on the sideline, but he’s one hell of a recruiter. He will assemble a staff full of good recruiters. The Gamecocks will become more talented, but can Muschamp turn that into wins?
13. Vanderbilt – Derek Mason did a decent job at times in 2014, but he is probably coaching for his job in 2015.
14. Kentucky – The Wildcats should have made a change now.
5. If Eric Edholm is right, Hugh Freeze better get his suit game on point in time for the NFL draft.
http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nfl-s...-bosa-top-two-round-projection-201609583.html
Freeze is missing two things from his Ole Miss resume – a strong first-round NFL draft presence and a trip to the SEC Championship Game. Late April is going to be good for Freeze, and that should make future Februarys better. That, in turn, should eventually get Freeze to the ATL.
6. Freeze is wrapping up his fourth year in Oxford. Few coaches are more stable than he is at this point. Kirby Smart is the new coach at Georgia. Muschamp is back, this time at South Carolina. Odom is at Missouri. Mullen wanted out but is stuck for now (he’d have had a shot at Arizona if Rich Rodriguez had said yes to Ray Tanner). Malzahn, Sumlin, Stoops and Mason are likely on the hot seat entering 2015.
The tumult might not yet be finished. If Alabama wins two games in the next month-plus, will Nick Saban explore his myriad of options? Many believe he will. There will be NFL openings (Indianapolis? New York Giants? Tennessee?) that could be attractive. ESPN has openly coveted Saban.
Saban will have to replace Smart, possibly Lane Kiffin (NFL rumors abound), possibly strength coach Scott Cochran (to Georgia), the likely Heisman winner (Derrick Henry), his quarterback (Jacob Coker) and the majority of his immensely talented front seven on defense.
If there were even a time to leave and try something new, it would be next month, especially if Saban has yet another national title in tow.
7. I saw four of the top prospects from Mississippi compete this weekend in the state championships at Vaught-Hemingway. I’m not a football expert, and I won’t pretend to be one here. Here are some quick thoughts though:
A. A.J. Brown reminded me so much of Laquon Treadwell it was incredible. He’s physical downfield, is a big target for his quarterback, runs gracefully with the football and even has some of Treadwell’s off-field mannerisms. It will be difficult to pull him away from the Starkville pressure, but my goodness, the guy’s ceiling is high.
B. No one could block Noxubee County’s Jeffery Simmons. He’s a freak and he’s going to get bigger in a college weight program. He looked like a guy who could be three and gone to the NFL, much like the player he wants to emulate, Robert Nkemdiche.
C. Wayne County’s Benito Jones would be a national top-five prospect if he were two or three inches taller. He’s very disruptive in the middle of the line and extremely athletic.
D. D.K. Metcalf showed that extra gear Rivals analysts have wanted to see. If he shows out in Hattiesburg and Orlando over the next few weeks, he’s going to gain that elusive fifth star.
E. Kobe Jones didn’t jump off the proverbial page Friday night during Starkville’s win, but I could see him being a multi-year starter at offensive guard at the next level.
8. Ole Miss picked up a big win over UMass in Springfield, Mass., Saturday. The Rebels, now 6-2, have apparently found themselves a bit since moving Stefan Moody to point guard following a rough weekend in Charleston, S.C., last month.
Sebastian Saiz played well against the Minutemen, who had just one loss previously. At some point, the Rebels likely need contributions from a point guard not named Moody, but for now, Ole Miss is compiling nice wins.
The Rebels travel to Southeast Missouri on Saturday before returning home to face Louisiana Tech on Dec. 15.
9. The Major League Baseball winter meetings begin Monday in Nashville, less than week after Zack Greinke (Arizona) and David Price (Boston) broke the proverbial bank. Yoenis Cespedes, Jason Heyward, Alex Gordon and others will get paid big this week, in all likelihood, in Nashville, proving that baseball is as financially solvent as ever.
I’m a capitalist. I subscribe to the theory that one should get what one can when one can. So kudos to Price and Greinke and the others in advance of their huge deals. If that’s the new normal, then bully for MLB.
However, I can’t help but wonder if Boston is going to regret paying Price $31 million in a few years when he’s torn his elbow up and he’s missing a season or if Arizona is going to feel like it was a good expenditure when Greinke’s 96 mile per hour fastball is down to 88 and he’s getting hit hard every fifth day.
10. Here are some articles of interest for you to enjoy at your leisure this week, if you’re interested. Have a great week.
Meet the NFL’s best method actor.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/meet-the-nfls-best-method-actor-1449002579
I’ve known Jimmy Sexton for years. He’s a great guy. Mark Schlabach captures that extremely well in this profile.
http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/14239090
We in the sports media don’t get the access we used to, especially at the college level.
http://www.poynter.org/news/mediawi...e-dwindling-media-access-to-college-athletes/
Mother of top hoops prospect wants to change the recruiting process.
http://www.kentucky.com/sports/college/kentucky-sports/uk-basketball-men/article47741045.html
Steph Curry is changing the way we watch basketball.
http://www.sbnation.com/nba/2015/12/3/9674388/warriors-stephen-curry-ruins-everything-for-everybody
I love the NBA all-star uniforms, ads and all.
http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nba-b...they-re-clean-and-ad-supported-165659690.html
How demographics will change the 2016 presidential election.
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-demographics-will-shape-the-2016-election/
King Hezekiah’s seal was discovered in Jerusalem.
http://www.cnn.com/2015/12/03/middleeast/king-hezekiah-royal-seal/
The Phillies could shop locally with the first pick in June’s MLB draft.
http://www.csnphilly.com/baseball-p...aplezone-possible-mlb-draft-1st-pick-phillies
Pirates GM Neal Huntington blamed himself when he cut Pedro Alvarez.
http://triblive.com/mobile/9560643-96/alvarez-pirates-huntington
How Marshawn Lynch saved a life with a modicum of words.
http://www.seattletimes.com/sports/...-my-life-how-a-380-pound-man-went-beast-mode/
The man who inspired The Wire died. He was 73. (Yes, Ben Garrett, I know, I need to watch.)
http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat...iams_the_wire_inspiration_and_actor_dies.html
There is uncertainty this offseason in Cincinnati.
http://www.cincinnati.com/story/spo...i-reds-at-redsfest-face-uncertainty/76822380/
Is it too late for Tim Tebow to be saved?
http://www.esquire.com/sports/a39826/tim-tebow-interview/
The Saints might be willing to trade Sean Payton, but they won’t let him walk for free.
http://www.nola.com/saints/index.ss...al&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
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