A clever hit song in 1975 talked about a guy who received some direct advice on how to move along from a failing relationship.   According to the Paul Simon song, there were “Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover”.

In 2021, disgruntled college football players around the country are reviving that hit song and hiring moving vans in record numbers as they transfer from one school in hopes of achieving greater personal success on the football field next year.

A few years ago, the NCAA began allowing student-athletes (in any sport) the right to transfer to any other school they desired (just like traditional students can).  Prior to 2018, there was an assortment of rules which may have prevented players from transferring to other schools within their conference or making them sit-out for a full year prior to becoming eligible to play sports again.

That isn’t the case anymore as the NCAA’s transfer portal has become quite popular this season with a surprising number of well-known successful college football players jumping into the transfer availability pool as they search for a new college to play football next season.

With so many players waiving their hands to other schools saying, “Pick me! Pick me!”, the moving business should be quite healthy for college athletes over the offseason.  Though the numbers of college football players wanting to transfer changes daily, I am estimating that there over 200 players who are looking for a new school to play football (and, study, of course!).

Some of the high profile players have already cut a deal with another school.  Most of these transfer players are hoping to leave what they perceive to be a bad situation and find a better one.  Though many of these players will get their wish for another chance, others will not.

In the SEC’s Western Division alone, the starting quarterbacks this season for LSU (Max Johnson), Auburn (Bo Nix), and Texas A&M (Zach Calzada) have thrown their hat into the NCAA’s transfer portal in hopes that they can find another place to play college football which better suits their personal needs.

The obvious question is, “Why would they want to do that?”

Though there is an ever-so-slight chance that the college student-athlete may be seeking an expanded academic program to better fit his future vocational needs, the big reason is that the football player has become concerned that his playing time is going to be diminishing next season.  The next “new and exciting” young high school recruit has been signed and/or a new coach has come to town promising some big changes.

LSU’s Max Johnson had earned the starting quarterback near the end of the 2020 season and then kept the job for most of 2021.  The left-hander (son of former NFL quarterback Brad Johnson) did an admirable job this year despite LSU’s mediocre 6-6 final record.  An inexperienced and porous offensive line along with a rapidly depleting wide receiver group contributed to LSU’s offensive struggles.  Meanwhile, head coach Ed Orgeron was axed in favor of former Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly recently.

Max Johnson still has two seasons of college football eligibility remaining.  His highly-recruited younger brother, Jake, plays tight end and was expected to sign a scholarship at LSU to join his brother.  That isn’t happening now.  Apparently, the two brothers are trying to sign as a package deal with another school.

Why not stay at LSU?  Is Max Johnson unhappy about the firing of his former coach or is he now concerned that LSU freshman Garrett Nussmeier (or another incoming high school fres...

If you are a football fan of the Houston Texans or the Jacksonville Jaguars at this point of the 2021 NFL season, the best thing your team must accomplish is not winning another football game.

That’s right!

Both the Texans and Jaguars are tied at 2-10 and running neck and neck for having the worst record in the NFL this season.   Yes, I am aware that the Detroit Lions are 1-10-1 and have a one-half game lead in the race for the first pick in next year’s NFL draft.

In defense of the Detroit Lions, they are on a definite upswing and competing hard against their opponents.  Last week, Detroit won their first game (on the game’s last play against Minnesota).  In their prior three games, the Lions lost by two points to Chicago (16-14), three points to Cleveland (13-10) and tied the Pittsburgh Steelers (16-16).   They may not score a lot of points, but Detroit is giving it their best shot late in the season.

For AFC South division rivals Houston and Jacksonville, the equally inept 2-10 teams are putting on a clinic on how to implode a football franchise.   By being division rivals, the Texans and Jags must play each other twice every season.  Houston took Game #1 at home with a 37-21 win.

A week from now, a very important rematch will be held in Jacksonville.  The ramifications of winning or losing this one game could be significant.  The only thing that fans of these two moribund franchises have to root for is receiving a higher first round choice in the NFL draft next spring.

It is imperative that each team must focus on doing what they do best – losing.

For Houston, the team continues to write checks to pay their $40 million/year All-Pro quarterback, Deshaun Watson, as he remains inactive this season following a busload of sexual assault or harassment charges made by 22 different women.  According to a report this week, prosecutors are expected to bring this case before a Grand Jury by January, 2022.

That hasn’t stopped the Texans from trying to trade their talented quarterback to other teams over the past several months.  Rumors persisted that either Carolina or Miami were going to make a deal with the Texans for Deshaun Watson.  With so much legal baggage hovering over Watson’s future (on the field or in jail), it appears that neither of those teams wants to make a move without seeing what the justice system will do.

The Houston Texans brought in veteran back-up quarterback Tyrod Taylor in an attempt to give the club a chance, but Taylor has been injured frequently behind Houston’s porous offensive line.  Rookie third string quarterback Davis Mills (from Stanford) was advised this week that he will be the team’s starting quarterback for the remainder of the regular season.  With so many holes to fill on the Texans’ roster, it appears that the team will give Mills a chance to prove his worth as he is the team’s youngest body still capable of running for his life every game (at least for now) .

The Texans are wrapping up an impressively bad three game home stand Sunday after losing to the 3-9 New York Jets 21-14 two weeks ago and being skunked 31-0 at home by 7-6 Indianapolis one week ago.

The Texans’ are losing due to a dearth of talent on the field caused by years of poor decisions by the team’s executive management.

Meanwhile, the Jacksonville Jaguars are losing with (on the surface) a little better talent on the field but years of poor decisions by the team’s executive management.

I believe that we are noticing a trend!

Just four years ago, Jacksonville was playing in New England for the AFC Championship aga...

Millions of college football fans watched the SEC Championship game played Saturday between the previously-unbeaten Georgia Bulldogs and the defending national champions, 11-1 Alabama.

What is terrific about college football is that the regular season games are played on a weekly basis.  Fans have a week to get fired-up for the game and a few days afterwards to either delight in victory or wallow in defeat.

With Georgia coming into the game undefeated and sporting college football’s best defensive unit in recent memory, fans of the Bulldogs were licking their paws with the chance to finally take down Alabama, win the SEC Championship, and, most likely, eliminate their crimson-clad conference opponents right out the door of the upcoming College Football Playoffs.

Georgia, you see, has not won a national championship since Herschel Walker ran roughshod over America’s college football landscape in 1980.  Since that time, Alabama has won seven national championships.

One of my favorite humorists and writers, the late Lewis Grizzard (a Great American – whose columns were syndicated in over 450 newspapers) was a University of Georgia alumnus and a fanatical Dawgs football fan.  He was at the 1980 Georgia championship game at the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans and considered it the highlight of his too-short life.  He died in 1994 at age 47 and, according to his wishes, had some of his ashes scattered near the 50-yard line of Georgia’s Sanford Stadium.

After Alabama ran roughshod over Georgia 41-24 on Saturday, I was thinking about the title of one of Lewis Grizzard’s first books.

“They Tore Out My Heart and Stomped That Sucker Flat” was written by Grizzard in 1983.  The book’s title (which was actually about his first open heart surgery) sums-up the feelings of millions of Georgia fans this week after Saturday’s butt-kicking administered by coach Nick Saban’s Alabama Crimson Tide.

Georgia was favored by nearly a touchdown coming into the SEC Championship game.  No team had scored more than 17 points against their vaunted senior-led defense.  The offense had been able ran the ball with ease and with a former walk-on quarterback in Stetson Bennett who looked more like a young Drew Brees as he smoothly operated the Georgia offense.

Yes, Georgia seemed to have everything going  for them and looked poised for their biggest win since 1980’s national championship title game.

Like the Peanuts cartoon strip in which Lucy always pulls the football away from Charlie Brown right before he tries to place-kick it, Georgia’s football team, coaches, and fans just whiffed once again and will need some better luck to get one more try for success again in early January.

What’s worse is that Bama Nation (which isn’t used to being the underdog in any football game since Nick Saban arrived in Tuscaloosa in 2007) is loudly proclaiming “We told you so!” after their win.

So, what happened to Georgia last Saturday to make their fans so gloomy this week?

Georgia actually took a 10-0 lead early in the second quarter.  From that point on, Alabama’s offense was literally unstoppable.  The Crimson Tide scored 41 points over the final the rest of the game in less than three quarters.

Alabama’s sudden offensive onslaught against Georgia’s top-rated defense was quite impressive.  After falling behind 10-0, here is how Alabama responded in the second quarter:

Alabama’s first score – Touchdown – 3 plays, 75 yards in 44 seconds

Second score – Touchdown – 6 plays, 80 yards in 2 minutes, 57 seconds

Third score – Field goal – 12 plays, 79 yards in 5 minutes, 13 seconds

Fourth score – Touchdown – 9 plays, 75 yards in 1 minute, 40 seconds.

Bama led 24-17 at the half.

In the first drive of the second half – Touchdown – 5 plays, 75 yards in 1 minute, 50 seconds.

It is once again time to unveil your SwampSwami.com Ultimate College Football Bowl Guide for the upcoming holiday season.

Not counting the National Championship Game (Monday, January 10, 2022 at 7PM Central ), a new record of an incredible 42 bowl games will be played in the coming weeks.

In fact, Santa ESPN has brought Christmas joy for the two unfortunate teams (6-6 North Texas and 6-6 Miami of Ohio) who were eligible (with six wins) to play in a bowl game but were passed over by the other 41 bowl games.

No one wanted to hurt the feelings of fans of the Mean Green (North Texas) or those of the Redhawks of Miami, Ohio, right?   How can you leave two football programs which feature our favorite holiday colors of green and red out in the cold for Christmas?

Ol’ Santa ESPN quickly created the “Frisco Football Classic” to be played in the Dallas suburb of Frisco on Thursday, December 23 at 2:30PM central time.  Make sure to buy your souvenirs now, because this game might become a “one and done” classic bowl event.

At first glance, Santa ESPN might appear to be a benevolent old soul, but he is also smart enough to know how many last-minute Christmas television ads can be sold during a three and one-half hour college football telecast.

Where else can you virtually assure advertisers that one million eyeballs (mostly male) will be watching so that they may peddle their products just ahead of Christmas?  No matter what ESPN agreed to pay these two participating teams will more than be covered by selling more than 90 minutes of commercials on this incremental bowl telecast.

Let’s give credit to ESPN for some timely goodwill and marketing prowess.   Instead of putting a couple of lumps of coal in the stockings of North Texas and Miami (Ohio), their football fans are now happy to have a chance to play in a bowl game in 2021.

Why not?  After all of the other six-win teams had been selected, this is a very smart public relations gesture by ESPN.  It will also be a profitable one, too!

Here’s my holiday question to you.  How many of these games will you watch?  I will probably watch at least ten of them, but there’s no way that I will want to sit through all 42 games.

“Dear Santa – Please bring me ample supplies of my favorite caffeinated beverage and a case of Visine!”

Before I present the complete college football bowl list (including my SwampSwami.com rankings so you can see how well my rankings fare in these match-ups), here are a few interesting bowls that I am planning to watch:

Tuesday, December 21 at 6:30PM on ESPN – Frisco Bowl

12-1 UTSA vs. 11-2 San Diego State – This game (where about 95% fans will come up from San Antonio) features UTSA’s potent offense against tough defensive team in San Diego State. Let’s see if UTSA is able to step-up and handle the pressure.

Thursday, December 23 at 6PM on ESPN – Gasparilla Bowl

8-4 UCF vs. 6-6 Florida – This intrastate game features one team (University of Central Florida) which has waited for years to get a chance to play the state’s flagship university up the road in Gainesville.  Florida’s new head football coach, Billy Napier, will take the reins and try to turn around the Gators’ fortunes.  This should be quite entertaining!

Tuesday, December 28 at 5:45PM on ESPN – Liberty Bowl

7-5 Mississippi State vs. 6-6 Texas Tech – If you like offense, this is your game!  Perhaps they should rename this year’s game as “The Mike Leach Bowl” as current Mississippi State head coach Mike Leach previously coached at Texas Tech from 2000-2009.  Both teams will pass at least 80% of the time.  Don’t be surprised if this game will take over four hours to play.  ESPN will be thrilled to be able to sell even more commercials!

Thursday, December 30 at 10:30AM on ESPN – Duke’s Mayo Bowl

6-6 North Carolina vs. 6-6 South Carolina – It’s a border war game!

After completing a twelve game regular season and playing in the American Conference Championship game, the Cincinnati Bearcats were able to accomplish something that no other major college football team in America was able to do.

They ran the table to finish with a perfect 13-0 record in 2021.

Georgia came close, but they couldn’t finish it off.  Neither could one-loss Alabama, Michigan, Notre Dame, Louisiana-Lafayette, or UT-San Antonio.  Each of those teams played a terrific season of football but stumbled one time in thirteen games.

The University of Cincinnati was the only FBS college football team to win every single game this season.  As a result, the Bearcats are a deserving #1 in the final SwampSwami.com College Football Top 25 rankings to close this 2021 regular season.

In Saturday’s American Athletic Conference championship game against 11-2 Houston, Cincy was clinging to one-point lead (14-13) heading into halftime.  After adding 21 more points in the third quarter, the sold-out rowdy home crowd in Cincinnati was more than happy to count down the minutes in order to run onto the field and celebrate a championship season with their beloved football team.

Congratulations, Cincinnati!  You earned the #1 spot in my final regular season rankings.

Conference championship Saturday also brought us a highly entertaining nail-biter (Baylor vs. Oklahoma State), a stunner (Alabama vs. Georgia), and a downright stinker, too (Michigan vs. Iowa).  Let’s review Saturday’s games:

Big 12 Championship – Baylor 21, Oklahoma State 16  (TV viewing rating: A+)

In Saturday’s early game, Oklahoma State rallied from an 18-point deficit and should have won this game.  Two different times in the fourth quarter, the Cowboys had first and goal near the Baylor goal line.  After settling for a field goal on the first time, Okie State would get a final chance culminating an impressive 90-yard drive on Pokes’ last possession.  A fourth down mad dash around the left end toward the Baylor goal line was stopped inches short of becoming the winning touchdown.  As jubilant as Baylor (11-2) and their fans were afterwards, this was an absolutely crushing loss for 11-2 Oklahoma State.

MAC Championship Game – Northern Illinois 41, Kent State 23  (D)

The Huskies (now 9-4) bolted to an early lead and never trailed in this snoozer.  Kent State (which was where Nick Saban played college football) finished the regular season at 7-6.

Sunbelt Championship – Louisiana-Lafayette 24, Appalachian State 16 (B)

The Ragin’ Cajuns (now 12-1) were seeking their first outright Sunbelt Championship with a coach (Billy Napier) who was just hired by the University of Florida who wanted to stick around for this week to lead his team to victory.  Mission accomplished!   A former track star in high school in Baton Rouge, Cajuns’ senior starting quarterback Levi Lewis has been one of the most underappreciated team leaders in all of college football.

 SEC Championship – Alabama 41, Georgia 24 (A)

It is rare to see a Nick Saban-coached Alabama team come into a game as the legitimate underdog, but previously unbeaten Georgia had steamrolled opponents without giving up over 17 points in a single game this year – before Saturday.  Bama limped into this contest after surviving a four-overtime game against rival (but just 6-6) Auburn last week where the Tide was fortunate to tie the game and force OT.  On the speedy artificial turf, Alabama quarterback Bryce Young carved his name onto the Heisman Trophy with a record-setting passing performance against Georgia.  Both teams finished the regular season 12-1 and now head into the College Football Playoffs.

AAC Championship – Cincinnati 35, Houston 20 (B)

The first half of this game looked like both teams were capable of scoring a lot of points.  As discussed earlier, the Bearcats came back out after halftime and scored 21 unanswe...

In my favorite Christmas movie, “Miracle on 34th Street”, a local judge facing re-election must decide whether or not a kindly gentleman named Kris Kringle is actually the real Santa Claus.  Without giving away the end (in case you haven’t seen it), the judge is provided with a last-minute Christmas miracle of his own to justify a favorable ruling.

In the back of the courtroom, the judge’s campaign manager (played perfectly by William Frawley) nods his head in agreement knowing that his candidate has ruled wisely.

Upon hearing the news that LSU will hire football coach Brian Kelly away from Notre Dame to become the Tigers’ new head man, I am mentally picturing LSU Athletics Director Scott Woodward in the William Frawley role today.  He must be very pleased with this decision, too.

Before we get to the hiring issues of Brian Kelly coming to LSU, it is important to take a look at the exit of former coach Ed Orgeron, too.

Football fans never doubted that Ed Orgeron was a dedicated LSU man at heart.  You can’t fake it by simply growling “Geaux Tigers” in his signature thick Cajun accent at the end of every interview for years.  That is what endeared him so much to the Tiger faithful.

This is the same man who guided LSU to an incredible 15-0 perfect season in 2019 (less than two years ago).  After such a rousing season, LSU rewarded Coach O with a new contract.

Ed Orgeron was literally King of Louisiana at that point.

If he could have maintained a high level of success (winning nine or ten games a year and keeping the Tigers a national contender), he could have retired into the bayous of South Louisiana at any time he liked.

That’s when the wheels fell off.  Ed Orgeron (the man) simply isn’t the same kind of obsessed football coach that Nick Saban is.  He loves life outside of football (perhaps too much) and may not have focused on his job enough at times.  The fact that his LSU teams over the past two years have finished with records of 5-5 and 6-6 (only after winning the final two games in both seasons) confirms that Coach Orgeron wasn’t the right man to keep the winning going in Baton Rouge.

It was fun while it lasted.

When new Athletics Director Scott Woodward took the reins, Ed Orgeron’s time at LSU was hanging by a thread.  Woodward (a graduate of LSU) had a reputation at Texas A&M for making splashy hires (Jimbo Fisher in football and Buzz Williams in men’s basketball).

Since football at LSU represents about $80 million per year in revenue to the school and funds all other sports other than baseball and men’s basketball, ticket sales to football games was going to help support or sink Ed Orgeron as the football coach.

In 2021, LSU did not have one sellout game (102,321) in their seven home games.

The final game against Texas A&M (a spectacular win for LSU in the final minute) featured nearly 11,000 unsold seats.  If you assume an average LSU SEC home game ticket price of $150, that’s a loss of $1.65 million in unsold tickets alone.  The actual attendance for the Texas A&M game was much smaller (let’s say 75,000-ish).   If you factor an average of $20 per person in unsold concessions, merchandise, and parking for that game, the “other” revenue loss would be in excess of $540,000.

Because LSU’s final home game against a strong Texas A&M should have been a sell-out, the school theoretically lost over $2.1 million in potential revenue by having a struggling team in 2021.

Scott Woodward’s job at LSU is to keep the school’s athletics facilities filled with happy fans spending lots of money.

Despite a 51-20 record as LSU’s head coach, the recent hemorrhage of cash flow meant that Coach O had to geaux.

Personally,

I hope that you enjoyed your Thanksgiving week as much as we did!  In addition to a little traveling, a lot of eating, and some family fun, last weekend’s college football didn’t let us down, either!

Just when you thought that Ohio State was finally going to prove to the world that it was ready to be the top contender to Georgia, the Michigan Wolverines took the Buckeyes to the proverbial woodshed 42-27 with the help of 106,000 fans in the Big House Saturday.  Ohio State lost its second game of the season and (let’s hope) is finally gone from the College Football Playoff chatter.

As for 11-1 Michigan, Coach Jim Harbaugh finally seized his first win over arch-rival Ohio State and moves into the Big Ten Conference championship game against surprising 10-2 Iowa.  The Hawkeyes were the beneficiary of yet another surprise game as the 8-4 Golden Gophers of Minnesota shot down Wisconsin’s championship hopes by methodically downing the Badgers 23-13 Saturday.

It’s all in front of Michigan this Saturday (7PM Central on Fox).   Before anyone hands the Big Ten crown to Michigan just yet, the “experts” were saying last week to expect an Ohio State vs. Wisconsin Big Ten championship game.  Will the Iowa Hawkeyes play spoiler and burst Michigan’s bubble at the worst possible time?

Then there’s Alabama.  Though the oddsmakers figured that one-loss Bama should make mince meat pie of arch-rival 6-5 Auburn, the three-touchdown favorites from Tuscaloosa had to fight for their proverbial lives on Saturday against this year’s home team in the Iron Bowl.

Auburn was the aggressor for about 58 minutes of the sixty minutes of regulation time on Saturday on the Plains.  Unfortunately for Auburn fans, Alabama (like wrestling’s Undertaker) found a way to climb-up off the mat, tie the game in the final two minutes of play with a 97-yard drive and eventually pinned Auburn in quadruple overtime 24-22.  The finish of this game even had Alabama head coach Nick Saban smiling (yes, I said smiling) as nearly everyone in the stadium and watching at home had thought his team was about to lose their second game of the season and drop out of playoff contention.

The Crimson Tide’s next task is now right in front of them.  By winning the tough SEC West, Alabama has earned the chance to play SEC East champion #1 Georgia.  With a win, Bama will earn a spot in the four-team college football semifinal rounds.  12-0 Georgia breezed through its regular season schedule and is licking its chops for a chance to take down last year’s national champs.  Bama and Georgia will kick-off at 3PM Saturday on CBS.

They call the annual sports battles between the University of Oklahoma and Oklahoma State University the “Bedlam” series.  Like Auburn and Alabama, games between these two intrastate public schools are quite highly charged for bragging rights within the state.  Recent football games between OU and OSU have produced some high scoring photo-finish thrillers.

Last Saturday night in Stillwater, both teams entered Boone Pickens Stadium at Oklahoma State with identical 10-1 records and seeking to work their way into the four-team College Football Playoffs.  Oklahoma grabbed the lead early in the second half, but Oklahoma State’s defense clamped down enough to preserve a 37-33 victory.  Okie State (11-1) will now play 10-2 Baylor for the Big 12 Championship (11AM Saturday on ABC).  With a win, there’s a decent chance that the Cowboys might sneak into the playoffs, but Baylor will be seeking to extract a little revenge from an earlier loss to OSU.

Don’t forget about that certain 12-0 “underdog” team named Cincinnati which is trying to claw its way into college football’s final four.  The Bearcats have earned the right to host the University of Houston on Saturday afternoon in the American Athletic Conference championship gam...

Happy Thanksgiving to all!  Me and my lovely wife (SwampMommy, as she laments yet another bad pun) will take to the roads and spend the holiday week doing a little R&R and visiting with family.

As we enter late November, the contenders and pretenders of this year’s college football championship chase have finally begun to separate.  The SwampSwami.com College Football Top 25 rankings this week continue to show the national bias against some teams who continue to win their games but are discounted by the national media as cheap imitations as they continue to fawn over the same dozen teams every year.

These final few weeks mark the time when long time college football rivalries such as Michigan vs. Ohio State, Oklahoma vs. Oklahoma State, and Alabama at Auburn still lay ahead and promise to have a big impact as we whittle down to arrive at the College Football Playoffs final four teams.

This week, I thought it might be interesting to take back at Associated Press College football rankings after 2021’s Week # 1 and show their current records:

* Alabama

* Georgia

* Ohio State

* Oklahoma

* Texas A&M

* Clemson

* Cincinnati

* Notre Dame

* Iowa State

* Iowa

* Penn State

* Oregon

* Florida

* USC

* Texas

* UCLA

* Coastal Carolina

* Wisconsin

* Virginia Tech

* Ole Miss

* Utah

* Miami (FL)

* Arizona State

* North Carolina

* Auburn

Several of these early-season ranked teams have played up to their lofty rankings, while a few others have fizzled as this season has progressed.  It’s time to determine which one is the most deserving team of this year’s Thanksgiving Turkey Award:

Silver Medal – Texas (4-7) – Worst loss 57-57 (OT) vs. 2-9 Kansas.  Texas has hired and fired two head football coaches in the previous six years.  Texas exes Tom Herman and Charlie Strong were paid millions of dollars to leave Austin earlier than scheduled.  New head coach Steve Sarkesian isn’t faring any better and now sports a six-game losing streak.  Heading into the SEC won’t make matters easier for the Horns over the next few years.

Gold Medal – Florida (4-7) – Worst losses at 5-6 LSU (49-42) and at 6-5 South Carolina (40-17).  Though Florida embarrassingly trailed (42-35) at the half to FBS Samford, the Gators rallied to outscore the Bulldogs (the ones from Birmingham, Alabama) 70-52.  This weekend, Florida went to Missouri (6-5) and lost in overtime as Mizzou won on a two-point conversion.  The hot seat for Florida Coach Dan Mullen is a raging inferno.  Florida has been a giant mess in 2021 and doesn’t play hard enough on offense or defense to warrant a better record.

Before we get to this week’s SwampSwami.com College Football Top 25, Ohio State finally got a signature win by overwhelming Michigan State by a score of 100-0.  OK, it was only 56-7.  But wait, Ohio State just scored again!  To the fans of the Buckeyes, your win over a formidable foe has boosted your ranking all the way up to #4 this week.  Congratulations on the convincing win.  It should be a little tougher next week at Michigan.

Here are my rankings for the week ending November 20, 2021:

 

 

With just two games left in the regular season for college football teams, you would think that most teams would be finishing the season with a few of their biggest games of the year rather than feasting on cupcakes on Saturdays during November.

For the Big Ten Conference, November represents the time when we finally get to see Ohio State, Michigan, Michigan State, and the other contenders duke it out for a spot in the College Football Playoffs next month.

In the Big 12 Conference, 10-1 Oklahoma went down last week at Baylor and now faces a wild three-team slugfest with rival Oklahoma State with Baylor nipping on their heels heading toward the conference championship.

Out west, the Pac 12’s 9-1 Oregon Ducks visit closest rival Utah this weekend with a chance to solidify a spot in the College Football Playoffs.

Meanwhile, the rough and tumble Southeastern Conference will showcase six of the league’s  fourteen teams this Saturday in what might be better described as the “SEC November Cupcake and Bake Sale”.

Home team fans of Georgia, Kentucky, Texas A&M, Mississippi State, Tennessee, and LSU will witness Saturday games against teams whose primarily mission will be to play a competitive football game, collect a large paycheck, and quietly leave town hoping that their team’s players are not injured during the contest.

Georgia (10-0) starts the Saturday bake sale by hosting FBS team Charleston Southern (4-5).

Kentucky (7-3) will take on 1-9 New Mexico State

Texas A&M (7-3) plays nearby FBS opponent Prairie View A&M (7-2)

Mississippi State (6-4) will play host to FBS member Tennessee State (5-5)

Tennessee (5-5) plays against Sunbelt foe South Alabama (5-5)

LSU concludes Cupcake Saturday with an 8PM contest on ESPN2 versus UL-Monroe (4-6).

This is not a knock on the six teams hitting the road on Saturday.  Nobody knows whether or not one or more of these teams might spring an upset this week, too.

The Florida Gators certainly learned a hard lesson last weekend after FBS member Samford (Birmingham, Alabama) came to Gainesville and scored a record 42 points in the first half despite losing the game 70-52.

It’s safe to say that last week’s game at Florida will serve as a wake-up call for all of the host teams in this week’s slate of SEC cupcake games.

Each of the visiting college football teams has an athletics department which benefits greatly from the extra revenue of these road games to help keep their programs afloat.  In most cases, these teams will receive somewhere in the ballpark of $1 million for their trouble Saturday.

The players on these teams also get a chance to play a football game against a “big name” football opponent in a larger football stadium and crowd which is much larger than they will draw at home.  Once the games end, they will head back home with the largest paycheck of the season for their trouble.

I think we should award a special “What were you thinking?” commendation to New Mexico State.  The Aggies scheduled back-to-back road games versus SEC powers Alabama last week (a 59-3 loss) and Kentucky on Saturday.  New Mexico State is now considered an independent and had to go on the road for seven of their twelve games on the road in 2021.  That’s really rough on their players.

Georgia’s overpowering defense has spearheaded a record season in which the Bulldogs clinched their SEC divisional title earlier than any team since Auburn (2004) and Alabama (1993).   The biggest interest in Georgia games this year has been to see if any opponent will finally score twenty points in a game against them (we’re still waiting!).

The 10-0 Georgia Bulldogs have blasted their SEC East rivals and will now rounds out the regular season with...

Hidden away with the other sports headlines of the day, I ran across a story which indicated that the NFL’s Green Bay Packers were offering 300,000 shares of stock to the public at a price of $300 per share.  That’s a cool $90 million that the Packers are going to raise from fans worldwide.

According to the Green Bay Packers’ website, the team will utilize the $90 million for continued improvements to their beloved home football stadium, Lambeau Field.  Things such as new video boards, concourse-level improvements, and other modern features will help keep this iconic football stadium fresh for years to come.

Don’t you think dear ol’ Dad might like a $300 share of Green Bay Packer stock for the holidays?  Here is the link on how to do just that!

Unfortunately for the legions of Packer fans who might buy one or two hundred shares (that’s the limit) of this limited amount of green and gold stock, you won’t really be able to do much with it except put the stock certificate inside of a frame and keep it on your wall at home or at the office.

Since 1923, the Green Bay Packers have been a publicly-owned non-profit corporation.  With just over 5 million shares owned by 361,000 people, they are the only major professional sports franchise in the United States which is owned by the team’s fans.  Despite Green Bay being the smallest market franchise (by far) in professional sports, Wisconsin fans have flocked to Green Bay to watch professional football games since the beginning of the National Football League.

In 1919, Indian Packing of Green Bay, Wisconsin sponsored this fledgling professional football franchise.  In 1922, the club’s debts had begun to pile up, so a local attorney spearheaded a group intent on selling the shares of stock in the Green Bay Football Corporation to the general public.

In 1925, the Green Bay Packers beat the Chicago Bears in front of a record crowd of 5,389 at City Stadium.  By 1929, Titletown USA had its first NFL championship after going 12-0-1.

During the early 1930’s, the bleachers at City Stadium collapsed and a lawsuit put the Green Bay Football Corporation into receivership to protect the team from going under.

In 1935, the corporation was reorganized into the Green Bay Packers, Inc. (the team’s current ownership).  By 1949, though, the team was struggling financially once again and staged a local intrasquad game to raise $50,000 in cash to stay afloat.   The following year (1950), the Packers staged another stock sale to raise an additional $100,000 and keep the team “in the green”.

Since that time, the Green Bay Packers’ financial woes have (for the most part) been put into the rear view mirror.  Once television arrived to give the NFL a huge financial boost over the ensuing decades, the Packers’ popularity with fans soared nationwide as did the team’s ability to raise additional funds with future stock sales.

The NFL would later require that each franchise must have at least one principal team owner in control 30% or more of the franchise.   Fortunately for Green Bay, the league grandfathered the team’s unique community ownership model but prohibited any future franchises from doing the same thing.

For fans of the Green Bay Packers, their broad-based public stock ownership virtually assures that their beloved team will never move away from the frozen tundra of northeastern Wisconsin for as long as the NFL exists.

In researching this story, I learned that three Canadian Football League franchises (Edmonton, Saskatchewan, and Winnipeg) are considered to be publicly-owned.  However, only the Roughriders of Saskatchewan currently f...