Who won the weekend
Well, Butch and Co., but more on that in a moment.
UTC. The Mocs flexed and flattened Furman. UTC is the class of the Southern Conference and as long as there are no significant injuries, the Mocs are loaded for a deep playoff run.
UTC wide receiver C.J. Board pulls in a pass despite the tight coverage of defensive back Trevor Wright during the Mocs' Blue-Gold intrasquad game last April. Board and Xavier Borishade are leading UTC's wideouts this season.The NFL unbeatens. The Packers, Patriots, Falcons, Cardinals, Broncos and Bengals remained perfect and moved to 5-0. Each did it with some specific traits, but the Cards and the Patriots took their foes to the shed, and the Bengals outlast the talented Seattle Seahawks.
Jim Harbaugh. Dude, how much is Harbaugh worth to Michigan, which manhandled previously unbeaten Northwestern 38-0 and could well be favored this week against Michigan State.
Charlie Strong. Yes, Butch Jones got a monster win. More on that below. But no one got a more needed jolt of success than Strong, the other UT coach who led the Longhorns over Oklahoma in the Red River Rivalry.
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Who lost the weekend
Jamaal Charles. The Kansas City Chiefs star ripped up his knee. Tough break.
Almost everyone associated with the University of Georgia. Mark Richt will get another round of "Can he win a big game" questions. Poor Nick Chubb shredded his knee on the Bulldogs first snap. The fan base is almost as depressed as the Auburn fan base. Plus, former UGA star Matt Stafford was benched for some guy named Dan Orlovsky, whose NFL lasting moment was running out of the back of the end zone.
International team player Sangmoon Bae of South Korea hits a tee shot on the fourth hole during his four ball match at the Presidents Cup golf tournament at the Jack Nicklaus Golf Club Korea, in Incheon, South Korea, Friday, Oct. 9, 2015.(AP Photo/Lee Jin-man) Sangmoon Bae. OK, picture the scene. You are the only South Korean golfer in an international match against the U.S. being played in South Korea. You are in the final match. You step to the 18th tee with all eyes on you. You chunk a chip on the final hole of the President's Cup and your team loses. Now to make matters worse, this was your last event before a two-year, mandatory military stint, so you now have 24 months to think about it.
Steve Sarkisian. Dude apparently showed up at USC practice Sunday drunk and now has been forced to take a leave of absence to get treatment. One player texted ESPN that Sarkisian "showed up lit to meeting again today."
Clayton Kershaw. Another postseason, another disappointing start for baseball's best regular-season pitcher.
Jurgen Klinsmann. He has more troubles than Ns in his name. The loss to Mexico over the weekend was a painful step back for a US side that was supposed to be improving. Now endeth the soccer updates for the quarter.
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Butch
Wow.
Saturday's 38-31 UT win over Georgia was a lot of fun to watch. And it was exceedingly telling.
What did we learn? Glad we asked.
We learned that Josh Dobbs' ceiling as a college quarterback is off the charts. He was awesome Saturday, topping the 300-yard passing and 100-yard rushing marks for the second time in his career. (By the way it's only the second time in UT history, too, and only Johnny Football and Tim Tebow have done it in the last 20 years.)
Georgia linebacker Tim Kimbrough tackles Tennessee running back Jalen Hurd during their SEC football game at Neyland Stadium on Saturday, Oct. 10, 2015, in Knoxville, Tenn. Tennessee won 38-31.We learned that tackling Dobbs and Jalen Hurd for a full afternoon may be worth the extra cost of attendance all by it self.
We learned that several of the former four- and five-star receiving prospects like Josh Malone and Von Pearson actually still are in Knoxville and still playing. Neat.
When Dobbs is throwing the way he did on Saturday on intermediate passes, the UT offense is handful.
Georgia lost arguably the second-best offensive player in the SEC on their first snap - and in a pretty gruesome way, too - and stayed in the game. There are no excuses in football, but it's hard to imagine a worse start on the road for any team.
This game was so entertaining - it was the back-and-forth fight we expected the previous week between Georgia and Alabama - that it shows that Alabama's A-game is way better than everyone else's A-game.
Tennessee head football coach Butch Jones, right, shouts to players as wide receiver Josh Malone looks on during their SEC football game against Georgia at Neyland Stadium on Saturday, Oct. 10, 2015, in Knoxville, Tenn. Tennessee won 38-31.We are reminded that coaches, like quarterbacks, get too much blame for a loss and credit for a win. But, that sometimes that is warranted. Butch Jones and Co. got much-deserved heat for a Florida loss that should not have happened. Do they deserve the credit for Saturday?
Let's expand on this. The short answer is yes, most likely.
But the deeper answer has a multitude of layers.
We think Saturday was special for Butch, the players and the fans, and especially the fans in this area, which is the crossroad battlegrounds of the UT-UGA debate.
We think Dobbs deserves national player of the year credit.
But we think that as good as Saturday's win was, it was not as meaningful as the loss to Florida. Is that too tough? Maybe. And we realize Butch may be writing our name down and putting it in his back pocket.
The decisions to go for it on fourth down twice late in the second quarter on a TD drive were inspired and deserve major credit. In fact, it could be the successful gamble that we look back on that save Jones' career.
And, as we said earlier, there are no excuses, but we're not completely ready to discount the Chubb-injury factor and what that meant.
What it means mathematically, though, is Tennessee will likely be favored to reecho the 8-4 mark this season, and that will be a noticed improvement for Jones and Co.
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This and that
- The Fab 4 (plus 2) picks was again a winner. Another weekend, another 66.7 percent run or better against the spread. We went 4-2 - with the UGA loss and Cal-Utah not going over - and are 22-12 on the season against the number and 17-7 in the last four weeks.
FILE - In this Aug. 29, 2015, file photo, Dallas Cowboys defensive end Greg Hardy (76) talks with teammates on the sideline during a preseason NFL football game against the Minnesota Vikings in Arlington, Texas. Several teams will be missing key players when the NFL season kicks off this weekend. (AP Photo/Brandon Wade, File) - Terry Bradshaw delivered a poignant and direct message about Greg Hardy's return to the NFL.
- Chase Utley was suspended for an overly aggressive slide at second base over the weekend that hurt Mets shortstop Ruben Tejada. Thoughts?
- Joey Logano won the NASCAR race this weekend and earned a pass into the next round. We dig the new NASCAR set-up, but it's hard to remember a time when NASCAR was this big of a whisper on the national stage.
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Today's question
You know what Monday means? Who won it and who lost it?
And from the thing that they did file: Has Butch Jones arrived? Is that the win that allows the mortar to dry on his brick-by-brick foundation?