Weekend winners
Kirby Smart. Man, he's become a regular around these parts, but life is good for Smart. He motivated his bunch with a brilliant early week team meeting and asking everyone on his team who has beaten Florida to stand up. No one did. After Saturday's dominating thumping of a rival that sent them back to the drawing board for their entire program, Smart and the Bulldogs could be Numero Uno when the college football playoff committee releases their first poll Tuesday.
Baseball. Wow, just when you though Game 2 was an all-timer in World Series history, Sunday's Game 5 was a roller coaster that featured everything - including me getting started much later than normal on this column. It's hard to imagine the Dodgers coming off the deck and winning Game 6 on Tuesday after Sunday'simpossible-to-imagine 13-12 loss in 10 innings, but baseball needs to know that we'll all be watching. (Side note: L.A. ticket brokers also enjoyed the weekend. Saturday's Game 4 win that evened the World Series at 2, guaranteed a Game 6 back in LA-LA land. It also, according to ESPN's BID-ness ace Darren Rovell, that fact meant at least $12 million for those dealing in tickets in Los Angeles.)
J.T. Barrett. We rightly had some folks on social media ask - cue the Kirk Cousins - "You like THAT?" after Barrett's unbelievable day and comeback as THE Ohio State toppled previously unbeaten Penn State. Barrett finished 33-of-39 for 328 and four scores and rushed for 95 yards as the Buckeyes rallied from holes of 14 early (down 14-bagel very quickly) and 15 late (it was 35-20 in the fourth quarter). It was a Heisman-like moment against Heisman front-runner Saquon Barkley's team.
Tom Arth and the Mocs. Wow, the Mocs delivered in winning time. Down a point with the ball at their 22, the Mocs and true freshman quarterback Cole Copeland covered 56 yards in a smidge over two minutes to put Victor Ulmo in position to drill a game-winning 39-yard field goal. The big play was a fourth-and-1 call from the Mocs' 45 with 69 seconds left. Alex Trotter moved the chains and changed the fortune with a 17 yard on that play, and Copeland's 16-yard completion to Alphonso Stewart put Ulmo is place for the game winner. Nice win for a program and a coach that really needed it.
Deshaun Watson. Yes, the Texans lost to Seattle on Sunday. But in reality the Texans won in the grander scale of things. They have a quarterback for the future, and a five-year window to be a championship contender starting now. Watson has 19 TDs in his first seven games, an NFL record. He has 14 TDs in his last three games against the defensive triumphant known as Saban, Belichick and Carroll. And now consider what he did Sunday - 400-plus passing yards, 70-plus rushing yards and four TDs - amid all the turmoil within the Texans locker room. (Side note: Yes, the Browns have passed on Wentz and Watson in consecutive drafts, and while the debate could be had about whether those cats would be playing like this for Cleveland, the fact that the Browns passed on both will be mentioned fairly frequently for the next 12-15 years.) (Side note, part II: How did anyone in the Texans organization think Tom Savage was a better choice to start the season?)
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Florida football coach Jim McElwain, right, stands on the sideline during a timeout in the Gators' 42-7 loss Saturday to Georgia in Jacksonville.Weekend losers
Jim McElwain. Yes, we mentioned Kirby earlier, and normally we let one winner or loser stand from the various events of the weekend. But considering the week he had and the less-than-sure death threats and the unraveling trust between the administration and McElwain and the absolute floater the Gators put put on the field against Georgia on Saturday, Sunday's agreed parting of the ways - read $8-10 million buyout - seemed like a foregone conclusion about halftime. Now comes the story that McElwain turned down an offer of help from some cat named Steve Spurrier. Yeah, what would that ol' coot know about ball plays. (Side note: That the Gators have won the East twice under McElwain and beaten the Vols twice in three tries and Florida's administration still sent him packing has more than irked a whole lot of the Johnny Vols Fans, who want Butch gone yesterday. More on this in a moment.)
Bob McNair. The Texans owner has been mired in controversy since butchering a phrase last week. McNair, addressing other NFL owners and players union folks said, "We can't let the inmates run the prison." It caused a major rift between the owner and his players. It caused almost all of the Texans to take a knee during the National Anthem, and for the first time it turned the worm toward those protesting as the Seattle crowd cheered for them during the gesture.
The Cavs. Blown out by the Knicks? Four losses in five games? No good. Bad in fact.
Clayton Kershaw. Yes, the drama and the intrigue of Game 5 was amazing and immensely fast-paced for a the tortoise sport that is baseball. But (always a but right), if you are the best pitcher of your generation walking to the mound in the fourth inning with a 4-0 lead, you have to be better than that. Kershaw allowed six earned in four-plus innings and fell to 19-1 this year and 48-2 all-time when given a four-run cushion.
Baseball and. What, you're asking? How is baseball on the list after all that happened this weekend? Well, by now you're likely aware that Yuli Gurriel made a racial insensitive gesture to Yu Darvish after a home run in Game 3, putting his fingers on the sides of his eyes and making a very inappropriate move. MLB suspended Gurriel for five games next season. He should have been suspended Sunday. That was a half-hearted action. And for those of you who think he should have been suspended, well, we disagree, but that's your prerogative. But no punishment is better than pushing it back until next next year, which is hollow at best. It's like punishing your kid six months from now for doing something we all know was not appropriate. (Side note: Gurriel only had two hits including the three-run homer off Kershaw that tied Sunday's game at 4.)
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Butch's, man
Well, if you were going to script the unraveling of the Tennessee football program in a three-plus hour nightmare, it would have played out like Saturday's loss at Lexington.
Forget the skull-stomping that were losses to Alabama and Georgia. Those are not microcosms of Butch Jones' soon-to-be-ended tenure in K-Town. That would completely ignore the good things that Butch accomplished for Tennessee.
Nope, Saturday's 29-26 loss to Kentucky is a perfect representation on so many levels.
It was a very good and strong start in a place of total confusion for a proud Tennessee program. (UT got a turnover on UK's first play despite being almost a TD underdog against a UK team that the Vols had lost to once since the mid-1980s before Saturday. Likewise, Jones landed several big names on the recruiting trail early on - recruiting has been the one thing Jones has had UT-level success in his time in K-Town - and it was made even more impressive considering the mess he inherited from Derek Dooley.)
But UT managed only 3 yards on three plays from deep in UK territory and settled for a field goal. It was a frustrating trend that mired Jones's frustrating trend of cliches and quotes that make little to no sense in a practical manner or in the emotional charged world of SEC fandom.
In the end, UT missed a field that could have stretched its lead to eight before UK drove 72 yards for the game-winner with 33 seconds left.
Of course, because so much has been decided in Butch's time with last-second Hail Mary passes, the Vols connected on a long pass but fell 3 yards short.
Yes, 3 yards. But it feels like a mile away, and that's where it is with Butch Jones.
It appears that everyone can see this is not working other than John Currie. Florida dropped the hammer on McElwain without dillying or dallying. (Side note: The Bud Light "Dilly Dilly" commercial makes me smile.)
Currie, it's past time.
If you are waiting to know who the replacement is - the only plausible rationale at this moment - it's still past time for you to address your fan base.
The masses crave leadership, not silence. The fans are frustrated and irritated and they are about to be completely indifferent. (If Butch coaches Saturday, we'll set the over/under at 70,000, and the student section will be a ghost town.)
(Side note: Vegas now has Jon Gruden as the favorite to be the next coach at Tennessee. Take that for what you will, but Vegas is Vegas, baby.)
So where are we? If Butch is back, then the only seater hotter than his will be Currie's.
And just about the only way Currie is going to be able to satisfy the masses is to land a whale like Gruden.
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This and that
- Hey, we saw this list of the college football jobs that are already open. Did you know that Mike Price - "It's already rolling, baby" - is the interim coach at UTEP? Crazy, right?
- We have talked frequently about the dropping NFL viewership, and the accompanying reasons. There is not a specific answer, but an array of reasons. Yes, protests. But quality of play, dearth of trustworthy QBs, over-saturation of the product, and others like the changing rules dedicated to safety that people do not like (as well as the growing concerns of whether the game is too dangerous). Well add all of those up last Thursday - seriously all were present in the Ravens' 40-bagel win over Miami - and here's what you get: Last Thursday was the second-lowest rated prime time NFL game ever on broadcast TV. It's 7.0 rating was only better than the 6.3 mark the Seahawks-Bucs game drew on NBC in 2008. That legendary Bucs-Seahawks game had Jeff Garcia leading Tampa Bay to a 17-0 halftime lead over the Seneca Wallace's 1-5 Seahawks.
- Speaking of ratings, the World Series numbers are through the roof, posting non-Cubs-related highs for close to a decade in most cases. (Cue your Matthew McConaughey voice from "Time to Kill" - Now imagine the Yankees were in it.") The numbers against Sunday night football - a forgettable Steelers-Lions game - against with Kershaw pitching in a pivotal Game 5 will be interesting. We'll update with the overnights when we get them.
- Speaking of the Steelers-Lions, that was the Sunday night capper of a very, Very, VERY entertaining weekend for some picks around these parts. Let's review: Saturday we went 4-1 against the number with Penn State (+6.5), Georgia (-13.5), FAU (-7) and Washington (-17). Our loser was UT-UK under the 46.5, but in a lot of ways all of us who watched that game lost a little bit of something right? Sunday's professional action went 3-1-1, with wins on the Steelers (-3), the Cowboys (-2) and the Eagles (-12) with a loss on the Pats-Chargers (over 48.5) and a push on the Falcons (-5). Season numbers to date: Fab 4 college picks are 29-19-1 (60.4 percent) against the number; NFL picks are now 15-14-2 (51.7 percent) against the spread.
- Speaking of Falcons, man, that bunch pulled out a 25-20 win at the New York Jets. It was a water-logged win, literally. And sloppy. Atlanta is 4-3, but it's hard to know what to make of this bunch.
- On the day before Halloween, here's a story that shows that true evil does exist. Dear Lord, that woman is accused of murder of her 2-year-old and 1-year-old sons "by placing them in an oven and turning it on." Man. Heaven help us.
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Today's questions
We have a lot.
Will Butch coach Saturday's homecoming against Southern Miss, which will lead to a lot of Southerns missing homecoming?
Weekend winners and losers are always welcome on a Monday, and if you put 100 entertainment tokens on our picks from last weekend, you walked away with a very smile-worthy 470 entertainment tokens (after surcharges and such, and that's if your broker charges 10-percent on pushes).
As for this day, Oct. 30, there are a few noteworthy moments.
In 1938, Orson Wells causes a mass panic by reading "War of the Worlds" on the radio.
In 1945, Jackie Robinson signed a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers on this day and broke the color barrier.
Columbus was born on this day in 1451. Henry Winkler - aka The Fonz, aka Coach Klein from "The Waterboy" - is 72 today. Deigo Maradona is 57 today. Ivanka Trump is 36. Marcus Mariota is 24 today. (And if we may pose this question on Press Row, but at 24, is Mariota a top-half of the NFL quarterback? Considering the emergence of Watson and Wentz and some of the others in recent years like Dak and Cousins, is Mariota a top-15 guy in this league?)
Lots to digest, but if you need a Rushmore, let's go here: The Rumble in the Jungle happened on this day in 1974, as Ali toppled Foreman in round eight.
Rushmore of the most famous boxing matches ever.
Go and make the most of this Monday.