Evenly Divided

Our "Selection Monday" episode of Tailgate Overtime, wherein we laid out a Division I football playoff bracket based on a model sent to us by a faithful viewer, drew a few e-mails from the college football nation, including a couple that offered similar homegrown D-I playoff theories. Most of the models called for no more than eight spots in a D-I playoff, unlike the 16 that we laid out on the show.

Here's my problem with an 8-team bracket: there are 119 teams currently playing Division I football, from Air Force to Wyoming, with a handful of independents sprinkled in between 11 conferences. The talent level, financial commitment, and track record of teams in these 11 conferences vary widely - there's an enormous difference between Florida International in the Sun Belt and Florida in the SEC. Yet, the NCAA considers them "equals," in the sense that both are Division I football programs.



Equals? Yeah, ummm...no.





In my view, if we're going to have a true Division I national champ, we have to take every Division I program into account. That means automatic bids for every Division I conference champion -- 11 bids, right off the top. Throw in 5 at-large bids to round out the field, and there's your bracket of 16. If we separate the "power" conferences from the weaker sisters - as many of the 8-team models require - we're no better than the current BCS format, a subjective list of criteria that produces a subjective title game, with no real basis for calling itself the "national championship."

While the "all D-I teams are equal" logic is flawless, it's nine miles from reality. As any fan knows, not all Division I conferences are created equal, and neither are all Division I football programs. Though the NCAA considers them both "Division I," there's no way that Eastern Michigan can compete on a regular basis with Michigan. Then again, you would have said the same thing about Rutgers as recently as two years ago. Hold that thought.

Of those 119 Division I teams, how many have a legitimate shot at cracking the top 25 in a given year? If you take school size, football budget, ability to recruit, noteriety, and historical records into account, I can give you about 50. And of those 50, maybe half can make a serious, annual run at a national title.

Less than half, actually. I counted 22. I won't tell you which ones, but here's a hint: they're not in the MAC, Conference USA, Mountain West, Sun Belt, or WAC. What if, rather than fighting it, we simply acknowledged the fact that there's a dramatic discrepancy between the 119 Division I programs, and we quit pretending they're all on equal footing?

What if we split Division I programs into two subdivisions, one filled with teams that have the resources and commitment to compete for a national title, and one filled with schools that don't have the same assets? For the purposes of this argument, let's call them the Playoff Division and the Bowl Division.

Every D-I program plays a standard schedule, keeping current conference ties intact. However, the 50 teams in the Playoff Division (that number could change - stand by) are also playing for one of the 16 berths in the Division I bracket. If they miss the playoff, they can still accept bowl bids, which also happens to be the goal of teams in the Bowl Division.

Here's the catch: every year, based on their success or failure on the field, teams may be moved up into the Playoff Division or down into the Bowl Division. That's right, my fellow Americans - I'm talking about promotion and relegation, the model employed for years in European professional soccer leagues.



Is this wanker serious? Pour me a Guinness.





The trick would be to establish criteria by which teams move up and down. Simple win/loss record won't do it, because all 119 D-I teams obviously don't play each other every year (and everybody has hot years and cold years), but winning over an extended period of time would be rewarded. Perhaps we'll add a financial requirement to membership in the Playoff Division - schools must spend a certain amount of money on football to even be considered. Once we establish the criteria for moving up or down - and that's the tough part - the number of Playoff Division teams and Bowl Division teams would likely fluctuate from year to year.

Imagine the attention you'd bring to college football when a power program (Florida State, Miami) teeters toward demotion, while an upstart (Rutgers, Boise State) fights for promotion into the Playoff group. A two-tiered system in D-I would accomplish several goals: give us a true national champ, keep the bowl system intact, and reward teams that improve themselves on the field, while denying "power programs" the outlet of coasting on reputation. But it all keys on a universal admission that all Division I programs are not created equal.

If a playoff cannot work within the current Division I structure, maybe we change the structure. As it stands, a Division I playoff is our little Kobayashi Maru, a no-win scenario. Perhaps we should heed the example of Admiral James T. Kirk and change the conditions of the test.



Kirk out.

Division I Football Playoff, Realized

Can it work?

Logistics are no problem, as you're about to see. The real reason why a full-fledged Division I football playoff system will never come to pass lies in the root of all evil: Bread. Bank. Scratch. Shekles. Moolah. Benjamins. Net-net. Cash mo-nay. In other words, dollars, the very thing that created the BCS in the first place.

Simply put, the current bowl system is far too lucrative for local organizers, teams, stadiums, radio/TV rights-holders, hot dog vendors, etc. to blow it up in favor of a true playoff ladder. Now, if current bowls could somehow be incorporated into a playoff system - well, that's one inch closer to possible. But still unlikely.

Which brings me, again, to Tom Rados.

I've written about Tom before. He's in the Air Force, lives in Fort Walton Beach, and is currently stationed in Iraq. He's also a serious college football fan, and last year, he sent me his proposal for a D-I playoff system, which I outlined in that previous blog entry (probably worth a read, if you're still curious by this point). His model was based on 2005 results; on Monday's "Tailgate Overtime" show on Sun Sports, we applied the Rados Plan to 2006.

In case you're too lazy to jump back to the previous entry, here's the outline:

-16 team bracket, filled by 11 Division I conference champions and 5 at-large bids. The at-large teams are selected based on their BCS ranking after conference championship games are played.
-Those 16 teams are seeded based on three criteria, in this order: BCS ranking, overall record, and conference record.
-Opening-round games are played at the home field of the higher-seeded team one week after conference championship games (this year, that would be December 9th).

Notes: this system requires an 11-game regular season as opposed to 12, which is immediately a stumbling block. Bowl games that are not a part of the playoff system - the "lower-tier" bowls - go off as scheduled, but bids are not extended until the end of the opening round. Teams that lose in the first round may still go to a lower-tier, non-playoff bowl game.

Also, for this 2006 model, we're assuming that the higher-ranked teams will win out. That means, for example, that Florida beats Florida State this week, then beats (lower-ranked) Arkansas in the SEC Championship game. It's just a model, and a simple method of filling out the 16-team bracket.

Got it? Here we go:

Saturday, December 9th, 2006

1 Ohio State (Big 10 Champ)
16 Middle Tenn. State (Projected Sun Belt Champ)

8 Notre Dame (at-large)
9 Texas (Proj. Big 12 Champ)

5 West Virginia (at-large)
12 Georgia Tech (Proj. ACC Champ)

4 Florida (Proj. SEC Champ)
13 BYU (Proj. MWC Champ)

That's the top half of the bracket. Again, every game is a home game for the higher-seeded team (which gives the 8 higher seeds one more home game, which will make them happy...however, it will do nothing for the 111 remaining D-I schools that use the 12th game as a moneymaker. Mmm.)

Bottom half of the bracket, played on the same day, December 9th:

6 Wisconsin (at-large)
11 Boise State (Projected WAC Champ)

3 USC (Proj. Pac-10 Champ)
14 Ohio (Proj. MAC Champ)

7 Louisville (Proj. Big East Champ)
10 Arkansas (at-large)

2 Michigan (at-large)
15 Houston (Proj. C-USA Champ)

A note on Arkansas as the 10 seed: it could be LSU or Auburn in that spot. We're assuming chalk, so Arkansas, the (currently) lower-ranked team, loses to Florida in the SEC title game and tumbles in the BCS standings. LSU and/or Auburn might jump Arkansas if that happens, but to keep it simple for the model, Arkansas gets in as an at-large team.

Also note that under our criteria, Rutgers gets snubbed. Plus, of the Arkansas-LSU-Auburn troika, two of those teams will miss the bracket. Playoffs are cold, huh?

Okay, so let's assume, for simplicity's sake, that the higher-ranked team wins in the first round. Bowl bids are not extended until after the first-round games are complete, and those teams that lost in Round One can still accept a bid to a non-playoff bowl game. The bowl games that are used for Round Two may elect to bid on a game that features a regional draw. The BCS bowls are not yet in play - those come later.

Round Two: Saturday, December 16th, 2006

1 Ohio State
8 Notre Dame
Music City Bowl, Nashville, TN

5 West Virginia
4 Florida
Gator Bowl, Jacksonville, FL

6 Wisconsin
3 USC
Holiday Bowl, San Diego, CA

7 Louisville
2 Michigan
Motor City Bowl, Detroit, MI

See how this works? Think "pods," as in the NCAA basketball tournament. Middle-tier bowls get playoff games that double as decent regional draws - Jacksonville gets the Gators, Detroit gets Michigan, San Diego gets Southern Cal, and Nashville gets, well, a bowl game about 4 million times more attractive than Minnesota-Virginia. While these "playoff" bowls serve as Round Two, the non-playoff bowls are doing their thing with any of the other bowl-eligible teams, including the eight that lost in Round One, if they desire.

Now, the BCS bowls come into play in the national semifinals and national championship game. Just like the old BCS, the title game rotates among the four top-level bowls each year, so every four years, each BCS bowl game will host one national championship, two national semifinal games, and one "BCS game" that differs little from the current system - that fourth game will pit the two best teams that didn't make the playoff ladder, or (in this model) perhaps the two highest-seeded teams that LOST in the opening round.

Round Three: Saturday, December 23rd, 2006
National Semifinals

Florida vs. Ohio State
Orange Bowl, Miami, FL

USC vs. Michigan
Rose Bowl, Pasadena, CA

...and the "second chance" BCS bowl, which we're filling with the top-ranked losers from round one:

Texas vs. Arkansas/LSU/Auburn
Sugar Bowl, New Orleans, LA

Personally, I prefer the idea of a fourth BCS bowl each year that takes the top two teams who failed to qualify for the playoff bracket under our criteria. Using 2006 as the model, that could end up being Rutgers vs. Wake Forest, for example. The "second chance" theory of taking the top two first-round losers sorta flies in the face of a "playoff," doesn't it?

And finally:

Round Four: Monday, January 1st, 2007
National Championship

Semifinal Winner #1 vs. Semifinal Winner #2
Fiesta Bowl, Tempe, AZ

I didn't have the heart to write "Ohio State vs. Michigan" in there. Again, we went chalk through every game, with higher-seeded teams winning. We all know that won't happen, which is the beauty of a playoff.

Note that this model allows the National Championship game to be played on New Year's Day - as God intended - and actually ends the season one week earlier than the current BCS Championship Game format. Among other things, this avoids the one-month-plus layoff between a team's final game and a BCS bowl game - better for fans, with constant, meaningful game action, not so hot for coaches, who would probably prefer an extra month of practice to four straight weeks of game-planning and potential injury.

Random notes, from Tom's original model, which is now hermetically sealed in the Sun Sports vault: the middle-tier bowl games that currently serve as Round Two playoff sites can rotate from year to year. The "what about the regular season" argument is countered, at least partially, by the fact that the only SURE way to reach the lucrative playoff ladder is to win your conference - which makes Florida-Tennessee or Florida State-Miami just as compelling as they are right now. With 119 Division I programs competing for 11 guaranteed spots (and only 5 at-large bids), my view is that regular-season games wouldn't take a hit in terms of relevance.

I wrote earlier that incorporating existing bowls into a playoff structure might seem to be the best of all worlds, but I received an excellent e-mail on this point from our friend Charles Davis, who will call the BCS Championship Game in Glendale on Fox. As a former athletic administrator, Charles knows all too well the complexity of a local bowl committee, and the demands that a bowl game places on the two teams involved. As he pointed out:

"No program that's going into a playoff game is going to spend a week to 10 days in the bowl city, going to the bowl commitment events (lunches, dinners, sightseeing trips, etc.) before playing a game. And, IF you win, and you advance on to the next "bowl" game, how are you going to do that again, and possibly again? Then what about your fan base? Most people can make one bowl trip, not multiple...and which game will they choose to follow their team? It becomes a calculated gamble on the fans' part...from my point of view, if you make a playoff system, the existing bowls are dead, and they know it. Thus, their insistence on no playoff. The bowls have gone as far as they will with the BCS system. If you put a playoff in and ask them to still try to exist, they would fold up and go home before even attempting it. Then you would have a true playoff and you can call the games whatever you want to call them, but true bowl games they would not be any longer."

True dat. Which is why this model, while noble, faces serious hurdles.

Here's the big question: how desperately do you want a true national champion? Desperately enough to perhaps minimize the relevance of regular season games? Desperately enough to accept it when your team suffers the inevitable stunning upset in Round Two? Desperately enough to support your team through four weeks in December by spending three of those weeks (and your money) on the road? Desperately enough to create a playoff ladder that is completely independent of the existing bowl system, thereby removing 11 conference champions and the 5 best remaining teams in the country from consideration for existing bowls? How much does it matter to you?

On the other hand, under the current system, every regular season game is a happening, a cataclysmic event. Fans can target one bowl game - and only one bowl game - on which to spend their time and hard-earned travel dollars. Go back to the top of this lengthy entry: money talks. Financially, a D-I playoff would be an enormous challenge to support, as Charles so eloquently expresses.

But it's not impossible, which was the whole point. Just ask yourself: how bad do you want it?

Cinderella, Big Mo, and Rudy

Cinderella has left the building.

While the rest of the college football world was hanging on every play in Columbus, Ohio (did you hear that the Buckeyes played Michigan this weekend? It kinda slipped under the radar), I kept one eye on the dismantling of two of my favorite 2006 teams, Wake Forest and Rutgers. Mind you, I have no connection whatsoever to either program. I'm merely a sucker for underdogs.


Have no fear...

Neither team is completely dead, or even Mostly Dead. But both got exposed. Wake, one week after humiliating Florida State in Tallahassee (first win there since 1959, first home shutout for the 'Noles since 1973, stop me if you've heard this already), ran into the hottest team in the ACC, Virginia Tech. The schizophrenic Hokies couldn't run the ball - and in fact lost Brandon Ore to an injury early in the game - but Sean Glennon (who?) made up for it with 252 efficient passing yards and two scores. Tack on a 35-yard fumble return for a touchdown and a Hokie defense that allowed only 62 rushing yards to the one of the best running teams in the conference, and voila - a fifth straight win for Va Tech. Beamer Ball lives. And you thought it was Mostly Dead.


"You picked Wake to beat Virginia Tech? Oy, you and that idiot on Sun Sports. Go fix me a nice mutton, lettuce, and tomato sandwich."

The good news: Wake is still in the ACC Championship Game hunt, needing a road win over Maryland next week to book tickets for Jacksonville. The bad news: Jim Grobe's name is now attached to every coaching vacancy and near-vacancy in America, including South Carolina, which I'll get to in a minute.

Rutgers really broke my heart, if only because I was looking forward to somebody - anybody - becoming the fly in the BCS ointment by going unbeaten (note to Boise State: love the Smurf Turf, but you're not in this conversation yet. Something about computers. I'll get back to you). The Fighting Schianos of Exit 9 got tossed by Cincinnati, a team led by a backup senior quarterback who had never started a game. In other news, USF gets a measure of an apology from me - I guess the Bulls' road loss to the Bearcats is slightly less embarassing today.

Two games left for the Scarlet Knights: at home vs. Syracuse, the team that just got off the schneid against UConn this week, and a season-ending roadie at West Virginia, which disembowled Pittsburgh on Thursday night. Win out, Rutgers, and you too can experience the joy of reading dozens of unsubstantiated rumors about your head coach's next job. As if that hasn't happened already.

On the home front, we told you on Friday's Rec Warehouse College Kickoff show that Western Michigan would have something for the Seminoles, and they did. Bobby Bowden has been harping on turnovers all season long, and Saturday was a perfect example of why he gets so feisty about it during those press conferences on Sun Sports: the game was lost for the Broncos when Lawrence Timmons ran an INT back for a score at the end of the third quarter.

At the time, Florida State led 14-13, with Western Michigan carrying Big Mo in their saddlebags. Timmons runs a pick-6, and the score is 21-13. Next possession for the Broncos, head coach Bill Cubit - now feeling the heat, knowing that this epic road upset is about to slip away - makes the bonehead call of the day, going for it on fourth down after taking a time out to think about it. Not only did the Broncos fail to convert, they burned the TO, which killed their last-gasp drive in the fourth quarter. Next FSU possession after the failed fourth-down try, Xavier Lee finds Greg Carr in the end zone for another TD. Score: 28-13. Time off the clock, from the Timmons pick to the Carr catch: three minutes and 44 seconds. Swing: 15 points. That's why coaches hate turnovers.

More proof? The top four teams in the ACC in turnover margin are, in order, Boston College, Wake Forest, Georgia Tech, and Virginia Tech. BC and Wake are 1-2 in the Atlantic Division; Georgia Tech and Virginia Tech are 1-2 in the Coastal. The bottom four ACC teams in turnover margin - Florida State, Duke, North Carolina, and NC State - have a combined conference record of 6-24. In fact, the conference standings mirror the conference turnover rankings almost to the letter. There's no more accurate statistical barometer of success in college football than the ratio of giveaways to takeaways.

On the topic of "away," the hottest internet rumor of the moment has Steve Spurrier on top of Miami's list to replace Larry Coker. The Miami message boards are moving fast and furious on this. I'm not sure where to go with it.

On the surface, it makes perfect sense. Spurrier is notoriously impatient, and the rebuilding project at South Carolina can't possibly be moving quickly enough to suit his tastes, no matter how much money the school is pouring into the program. The plus-factors at Miami are numerous: best recruiting grounds in top recruiting state literally on the doorstep, good golf, good weather, great history, tradition of winning. Yet, for some reason, I can't convince myself this will actually happen.

One thing we do know: Larry Coker is cooked, as is Chuck Amato at NC State. Coaching changes, like the rankings, will play themselves out.

One last thing: when Urban Meyer put scout team senior Tim Higgins into the game against Western Carolina on Saturday, I wondered aloud in the studio if Higgins was Florida's version of "Rudy." Twenty minutes later, Meyer invoked Rudy's name when describing his decision to give the 5'-7'', 162-pound history major a shot at glory on Senior Day.

Damn, I thought. I should be a sportscaster on TV. Wait a minute...

An SOS For Strength Of Schedule

Okay, this one has bothered me for a while.

At Florida's official website, you can find complete football schedules for 2007 and 2008, but no further. Florida State's website lists complete ACC schedules for the Seminoles out to 2015, with sporadic one-offs and two-game series penciled in - a home-and-home with Colorado in '07 and '08, another one with BYU in '09 and '10 - but no game times, and no full 12-game slates decided beyond next season.

Point being, football schedules are fluid, rarely set in stone more than two years out. Everyone knows this. Why, then, do I routinely hear the experts tell me that Rutgers' chances of playing for a national title are weakened by their non-conference schedule?

Hear me out. The unbeaten Scarlet Knights opened their 2006 schedule with a non-conference murderer's row of North Carolina, Illinois, Ohio, Howard, and Navy. Let's agree that Rutgers set this schedule two years ago. It may have been earlier, but I'm going with the Florida/FSU model.

In 2004 - when Rutgers' 2006 schedule was most likely finalized - North Carolina was a 6-6 team, with wins over Georgia Tech and Miami(!), plus a 3-point loss to Virginia Tech. Navy had a renaissance year in '04, going 10-2 with a decisive win over New Mexico in the Emerald Bowl. For what it's worth, Howard was a winning team in 2004, albeit a winning team in I-AA. Surely you remember that the Bison had the best scoring defense and total defense in the MEAC (hey, who didn't know that?)

Illinois and Ohio were terrible in 2004, just as Rutgers placed them on the schedule for 2006. No getting around it. However, you could argue that the other three non-conference games that Rutgers scheduled for the 2006 season looked halfway decent on paper when said paper was written two years ago.

Think about it. In 2004, Rutgers was a 4-7 team, coming off five straight years of 7 losses or more, including a stellar 1-11 campaign in '02. You're Greg Schiano. You went 3-24 in conference games in your first four years on the job. Now you've got to fill out your schedule for 2006, still two years away.

After all the phone calls and exchanging of contracts, here's what you came up with for non-conference games in 2006: an ACC school (on the road), a Big 10 school, two layups against Ohio and Howard (well, layups for schools that didn't go 3-24 in their conference in the previous four years), and a road game against a service academy with a recent run of success and a bowl bid that year. Is that so embarrassing? Would you not consider that to be a decent non-conference test, remembering that your program has been utter dreck for the last ten years, and you're basing your '06 schedule at least partially on '04 performance?

In other words: why does Rutgers get punished now because the teams they scheduled two years ago happened to suck when it finally came to game time '06? It's not like Schiano was ducking anybody. To repeat: he was 3-24 in his conference by the time he set his schedule for 2006. If I were in his shoes, I'd be scheduling twelve Howards and Ohios for '06. But he didn't.

Let's be honest. Rutgers' non-conference schedule isn't the problem. The problem is still the Big East, or the perception of the Big East. Louisville and West Virginia (and, to some extent, Pittsburgh) have been lavished with love this year because they're familiar, successful programs. They play on national television on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday nights. They're fun to watch. The assumption that their success somehow lifts the entire Big East football landscape is dicey, however, and Rutgers proves it. For that matter, so does USF, a program less than ten years old with back-to-back bowl-eligible seasons and zero recognition outside of Florida.

Based solely on wins and losses, we should be talking about Rutgers as a potential national championship participant, and we should be talking about USF as the first school in Florida with a legit shot at expanding the Big Three. The fact that we're not doing so is more a testament to the Big East's image problem than any concern about non-conference scheduling. This is not an indictment of the Big East, by the way - it's an indictment of the hundreds of stupid mitigating factors that continue to exclude the great majority of the 119 Division I programs from any conversation involving the phrase "national championship." Stuff like non-conference schedules.

The solution? Play it off. Don't get me started.

But should you happen to be near a television this coming Monday at 6pm, "Tailgate Overtime" on Sun Sports may have a little something for you.

To What End?

Come on, Mike. Honestly.

In the wake of Bryan Pata's death, my man Mike Bianchi has called for the resignations of not just Larry Coker, but University of Miami athletic director Paul Dee and school president Donna Shalala. Somehow, their departures will accomplish...something.

What, exactly? From Mike: "First of all, let's state this right up front: It's absolutely unfair and inappropriate for anyone to blame the shooting death of UM defensive tackle Bryan Pata on the UM football program."

But you're about to anyway. I can feel it.

"This could have happened anywhere...But it didn't happen at Florida or Florida State or Michigan or Ohio State. It happened at Miami -- a school that has the unsavory national moniker of "Thug U.""

Only because the national media keeps dragging it back up from the bottom of the well. Did we not discuss this after the FIU brawl?

"Doesn't matter that Pata has been described by The Miami Herald as a Christian who never drank or partied. Doesn't matter that he was a team leader who switched positions before the season and played where coaches needed him most. No, what matters in the court of public opinion is that Pata played at UM, which means the school's renegade reputation will be forever linked to his death. That's why Miami must make sweeping changes in its administration."

Again - this will accomplish what, exactly?

Obviously, the death of any player casts a pall over any college athletic program. Further, I'm not naive enough to believe that Miami has completely shed the 'Thug U' image of twenty (freaking) years ago. However, I will argue that Pata's role as a Miami football player had absolutely nothing to do with his death. And because I believe that, the call for mass resignations rings hollow.

I'll save you the crime statistics - which I did look up, but would rather not harp on, because this is not intended to be an indictment of the city - but suffice it to say that Miami can be a dangerous place. However, there are many dangerous places in every major city in America. Bryan Pata happened to be in one of them, at the wrong time. That's as far as this goes. Lumping the UM football program into this tragedy - and as Miami Herald writer Greg Cote has noted, Mike B. is not the first commentator to do it - is ridiculous. And more than a little insulting. To Pata, to the Miami administration, and to the school itself.

If you want Larry Coker or Paul Dee fired, base it on wins and losses. For that matter, calling for resignations after the FIU brawl - which I did not advocate and still don't - makes more sense than linking UM to Pata's death. The "court of public opinion" means nothing to me.

In the meantime, a school is grieving, and a mother has lost a son. Call for as many heads as you like, but it won't change that fact. Let's all pray that we never have to go through it again.

NBA Update

Is it too late to change my pick in the Eastern Conference, or too early?

Fellow hoophead Matt from the Orlando Magic Blog, the same guy who shamed me into writing a serious preview piece in the first place (as opposed to the fantasy league draft review that preceded it), respectfully disagreed with my assessment of the Chicago Bulls as the most loaded team in the East. His point was that the Bulls have zero presence in the middle (offensively speaking) with Ben Wallace and P.J. Brown, and therefore are vulnerable in the rock'em - sock'em atmosphere of the NBA Playoffs.

Upon further review, he's right. But here's my quandary: by that criteria, who else will contend in the East? It's not exactly an embarassment of riches at the five-spot. Atlanta is bringing Zaza Pachulia and Lorenzen Wright. Boston's depth chart at center reads Kendrick Perkins, Theo Ratliff, and Michael Olowokandi, for pete's sake.

Among Eastern Conference teams, I like the big-man combos in Cleveland (Drew Gooden, Donyell Marshall, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, and Anderson Varejao, who I reeeeeally wish the Magic had kept), Indiana (Harrington, O'Neal, and Jeff Foster), Philadelphia (Steven Hunter and Samuel Dalembert, the latter of whom should have a breakout season - my fantasy team depends on it), and Detroit (Sheed, Naz Mohammed, Dice, and the better-than-you-think Jason Maxiell). To this mix - and again, we're only talking about bigs here - I guess you have to add Orlando, with Dwight Howard, Tony Battie, and Darko Milicic. Seriously, is that rotation any worse than any of the teams listed above?

Okay, Cleveland looks better. Plus, they've got the Lebron kid, who I think might just do something in this league. Call me crazy.

On the topic of Florida teams - it was complete coincidence, but check out this passage from Bill Simmons' NBA preview missive regarding the defending champs from Miami:

"For this team to win 50-plus games, Wade needs to play between 42-45 minutes a night... and he's coming off a 100-game NBA season, a World Championships stint and about 730 hard fouls over the past 12 months. You really think Riley will be cracking the whip here?...This team is older than Al Davis. Alonzo and GP are on their last legs. 'Toine has bad knees. Shaq has accomplished everything he ever wanted and probably spent the last few months auditioning rap artists and reading movie scripts. They have no young players other than Udonis Haslem, no young legs to carry them on back-to-backs, and if that's not bad enough, everyone will be gunning for them as the defending champs."

Now, pearls of wisdom from my semi-serious NBA preview entry, which was written without seeing Simmons' column, I swear to Chris Paul:

"I was trying to figure out why I don't think Miami will repeat as NBA champions in 2007. My instincts centered on Dwyane Wade - the Heat's version of Jordan in terms of minutes, scoring load, and overall importance to the franchise - who has now played 108 full-length professional basketball games in the last calendar year. That's 75 regular-season games, 23 additional playoff games (during which he averaged a team-high 41 minutes a night), and nine more games at the FIBA World Championships in Japan, which, last time I checked, is a hell of a flight...He must be exhausted, right? No way he can carry the Heat again, not with Shaq a year older and that much more prone to missing chunks of the season - he missed 23 games last year, and has reached 70 games in a season only once in the last five years. Wade can't do it again, can he?"

Spooky, huh? Like I said, coincidence. Now watch the Heat win 62 games, with Dorell Wright winning Most Improved Player. The lesson, as always: we might all be idiots.

As for the Magic, I've watched them with great interest over the first week of the season, and while it appears that the Kumbaya vibe of their 16-6 finish to the '05-'06 season has carried over, so too have two distressing tendencies:

First, turnovers. Through the first four games of this season, the Magic led the league in coughing it up (20.75 turnovers per game) - and then added a masterpiece performance on Wednesday night, when they politely handed the basketball to Seattle 27 times and still won. Last season, Orlando turned the ball over 1240 times in 82 games, an average of just over 15 giveaways per night. Obviously, if Orlando's playoff hopes are legit, this is a trend that must die a painful death. I'm thinking that Brian Hill might want to call Urban Meyer for some tips on no-fumble drills. Something involving duct tape and big wooden paddles.

Second, perimeter defense. Matt Guokas warned us prior to the Philadelphia game last Friday that the Magic are vulnerable to the penetration dribble. Over the next four games, teams formed a conga line to the hoop against Orlando, with Allen Iverson, Joe Johnson, Antawn Jamison, and Ray Allen combining for 120 points - and those ain't all jump shots, people.

Dwight and Darko are shot-blockers. What Orlando lacks is an enforcer-type, a Danny Fortson or Etan Thomas who will move the pile and not give a crap who gets hurt in the process. A foul-burner. That's the answer once the opponent actually gets into the lane, anyway.

In order to kill this problem at the source, the Magic need guards who can toss a blanket over a ball-handler, and they don't have many. Dooling tries. Nelson and Arroyo, in my eyes, have always been a half-step slow up top (without the ball, anyway). At the moment, there's little resistance from the Magic when a team tries to pound it down the middle, both at the beginning and the end of the attempt. That, too, has to change.

Put some shoulder pads on Battie or Outlaw. Get Nelson, Arroyo, and Dooling fitted for those parachute thingys and have them run a few sprints. Make teams pay for targeting the soft underbelly. That's how you keep the playoff buzz alive.

Strange Bedfellows

Several times last week, on Tailgate Overtime presented by Bellsouth and Rec Warehouse College Kickoff, I opined that Florida fans should root for Louisville to beat West Virginia in their Thursday night matchup - but not by much.

Reasoning: West Virginia was 3rd in the BCS standings last week, and Louisville was 5th. Florida was sandwiched in between at number 4. If Louisville were to squeak by the Mountaineers - and Florida could look reasonably dominant in beating Vanderbilt on the following Saturday - the Cardinals could move up to 4th, with Florida squeezing into 3rd, thereby moving one step closer to a potential BCS title game berth.

Naturally, none of that happened.

Strike that - Louisville, in my opinion, did indeed squeak past the Mountaineers, in a game that I viewed as an audacious display of atrocious defense. Yet, when the BCS standings were released this week, it was Louisville, not Florida, in the third spot, with the Gators holding steady at number 4, and West Virginia plummeting to 10th. The Gators didn't help themselves by looking terribly vulnerable in their 25-19 win over Vandy.

Louisville, with four games remaining, is in Position A for a BCS Championship game berth, to be played on January 8th, 2007, in a building fittingly known as Cardinals Stadium.

So this week's question: who should Gator fans be rooting for? I mean, besides their own?

Answer: South Florida. Yes, USF.

Granted, Louisville's short-term goal is to hand unbeaten Rutgers its first loss of the season - in the Scarlet Knights' home digs of Piscataway, New Jersey, no less. But note that word "unbeaten." A loss to Rutgers would elevate the Scarlet Knights more than it would decimate the Cardinals. In fact, I would argue that all the love currently being showered on Bobby Petrino's crew should be evenly handed off to Greg Schiano's bunch, should Rutgers win that game. If the BCS wishes to prove that it's not a complete old-boy-network sham, we had better damn well be discussing Rutgers' plans for Glendale by this time next week, if they manage to beat the almighty (and trendy) Cardinals.

Even if Rutgers wins, we won't be having that conversation, of course, because the BCS is a fallacy. But that's another blog.

However, the Cardinals still have to play USF, the team that just knocked off Pittsburgh this weekend. If the 'Ville ends up losing to the Bulls - a team with three losses already on the docket - that's a catastrophic loss for the Cardinals. USF has officially become the X-factor in the national championship picture, non-Ohio State/Michigan Division.

To hear Bulls fan tell it, this is precisely where USF wants to be. Our inbox at Sun Sports has been filled this season with missives from USF's small-yet-passionate fan base, demanding more coverage, better coverage, more respect. Well, fellas, here's your chance.

Beat somebody.

USF's wins this year: McNeese State, FIU, UCF, UConn, North Carolina, and Pitt. Half of those wins came against teams staggering through disastrous seasons. McNeese State is a nice win, if you're Stephen F. Austin. UConn is a nice win if you're playing basketball. You get full credit for Pitt.

USF losses this year: Kansas, Rutgers, and Cincinnati. You get full credit for Rutgers. The other two are inexcusable - if we are to take USF football as seriously as some fans have demanded.

So here it is. Beat somebody. In this case, "somebody" is Louisville. Yes, you've done it before - the biggest win in your history - but not when the stakes were this high. Derail their national championship hopes, and do it on the road at the Pizza Palace, and you are granted the keys to respectability. We in the media may even be compelled to find a reference point other than UCF, which is something that really sticks in your craw, I know.

And Gator fans? Get behind the Bulls. A Louisville loss to USF - an average team, as opposed to a highly (but not highly enough) regarded Rutgers team - will do wonders for your faint BCS title game hopes. Of course, you'll need to take care of business in the meantime, by beating South Carolina and Florida State, preferably by a million - something the Gators have not been able to do this season.

Just think: with one win - USF over Louisville - two different fan bases take a huge step closer to their goals. The Bulls' faithful will have hard evidence that they belong; the Gator Nation can make a case for Glendale with a straight face. It's all there, people. It's all in front of you.

Regardless of income, all Gators should become Bull Gators on November 18th.

Dream Big For 2007

Lord knows, I love theories. And I worked up a doozy this week.

For the 1991-92 NBA season, Michael Jordan averaged 30 points, 6 assists, and 6 rebounds over the course of 80 games. During the summer of 1992, MJ engaged in some extracurricular activity known as the Dream Team. His Olympic experience in Barcelona consisted of eight games - all starts - during which he averaged 14.9 points and a team-low (among starters) 45% field goal percentage.

Jordan's gold medal performance followed his second NBA championship, in 1992. My theory was that his numbers would drop for the '92-'93 season, after playing all those extra postseason games and traveling to Europe for even more basketball.

Ummm, no. 1992-93: 32.6 points per game, equivalent numbers for assists and rebounds. And another NBA championship. So much for the theory.

I created this theory because I was trying to figure out why I don't think Miami will repeat as NBA champions in 2007. My instincts centered on Dwyane Wade - the Heat's version of Jordan in terms of minutes, scoring load, and overall importance to the franchise - who has now played 108 full-length professional basketball games in the last calendar year. That's 75 regular-season games, 23 additional playoff games (during which he averaged a team-high 41 minutes a night), and nine more games at the FIBA World Championships in Japan, which, last time I checked, is a hell of a flight.

He must be exhausted, right? No way he can carry the Heat again, not with Shaq a year older and that much more prone to missing chunks of the season - he missed 23 games last year, and has reached 70 games in a season only once in the last five years. Wade can't do it again, can he?

Well, Jordan did.

Try another angle: MJ was 29 years old in the summer of '92, with eight good years of NBA experience already under his belt. Conversely, Wade won his first NBA title last year at the age of 24, with just three years of pro experience. Maybe Jordan, with five more years of knowledge, just knew how to pace himself back in '92. Which Dream Team member from that summer was closest to Wade in terms of age and experience? And did HIS numbers drop during the '92-'93 season?

Taking the 22-year-old Christian Laettner out of the equation - he had yet to play an NBA game when he was selected to ride the bench in Barcelona - the closest match to Wade was 27-year-old David Robinson. Scottie Pippen was closer to Wade in age that summer (26), but thanks to Robinson's Navy commitment, The Admiral had only played three NBA seasons prior to his USA Basketball call-up - just like Wade.

Robinson, before the Dream Team: 68 games, 37 minutes per game, 23 points and 12 rebounds per game in '91-'92.

Robinson, AFTER the Dream Team: 82 games, 39 minutes per game, 23 points and 11 rebounds per game in '92-'93. He didn't win a championship in '93, but the Bulls did - with Pippen.

Sometimes, you just gotta make the call. If history is any indication, the Tired Wade Theory is dead.

However, since I received an e-mail after I blogged about my NBA fantasy draft, one that gently chided me for not providing an honest league preview, I still need to make a pick. And even though Wade appears to be just fine, thank you, I'm not sold on Miami to repeat.

San Antonio. That's my pick.

For one thing, even though I have just blown the "international summer basketball" clause out of the water, I like the fact that Tim Duncan didn't do anything this summer - and still managed to show up for camp in the best shape of his life, according to his head coach. I like what I'm seeing from Tony Parker, who has been remarkably durable for a guy that throws himself into traffic - only 4 games missed over the last two seasons, even as his scoring has risen. The Spurs are long in the tooth, with veterans like Robert Horry, Brent Barry, and Bruce Bowen playing significant minutes, but that's not all that different from Miami's formula last season with Shaq, Antoine Walker, and Gary Payton.

Phoenix will win its 50-plus. Utah will bounce back as long as Boozer and Kirilenko can stay healthy. The Clippers will be better. Dallas is still Dallas. I just like San Antonio, is all.

In the east? I think Chicago is loaded. My feelings on Kirk Hinrich have already been expressed. Throw in Duhon, Gordon, Deng, and Nocioni - all approaching their third NBA season - with the veteran presence of Ben Wallace and PJ Brown, and I have a hard time imagining an Eastern Conference team that can match up. Cleveland will challenge as long as Lebron draws breath, Washington will be interesting, and we probably shouldn't ignore Detroit, but the Bulls have a perfect storm of rising talent, depth, and experience.

Big question for Sun Sports viewers in central Florida: where does Orlando fit in?

Or, put another way: are there eight teams in the East that are clearly better than the Magic?

I say no. There are three: Chicago, Miami, and Cleveland. Note that I wrote clearly better. Washington, Indiana, Detroit, and New Jersey could be better. But not "obviously" so. Those seven teams have generally been picked ahead of Orlando in the conference, with the occasional vote for a Boston or Milwaukee as a playoff team, but I don't see a vast gap in potential between Orlando and anybody on that list.

What decides it? Health is always a factor. If Dwight Howard goes down for any length of time, all bets are off. If Grant Hill plays a full season, it's pure gravy. I'd sure like to see what JJ Redick can do, one of these days.

Player development will be critical. Howard, Darko Milicic, Jameer Nelson, Trevor Ariza, Keith Bogans, Travis Diener, Redick - half the Magic roster has less than four seasons of NBA experience. Will guys like Keyon Dooling, Hedo Turkoglu, Tony Battie, Bo Outlaw, and Hill - some of the most personable and professional men in the game today - be able to coax the best from the young bucks? The Magic cornered the market on "nice guys" a long time ago, and that's not such a bad thing - you'd be hard-pressed to find any potential locker-room cancers on this roster. But now those pleasant pros need to deliver, and bring the youngsters along in the process.

I like Chicago to win the conference based on depth. I like Orlando to reach the playoffs for the same reason. As my guy Bianchi correctly states, there are no excuses anymore. If this team doesn't at least contend for home court in the 2007 NBA Playoffs, this will be a season of wasted opportunity.

So there you go. I love this game.