Welcome to February 2016...and as such, welcome to another blog post. We're in Super Bowl week and there's a lot of ground to cover elsewhere so let's hit the ground running.
One of the biggest sports stories of last weekend isn't the Super Bowl, or isn't even the Pro Bowl. It has to do with the Detroit Lions, and wide receiver (for the moment) Calvin Johnson. Yesterday, the news broke on several outlets (most notably ESPN via Adam Schefter) who reports that Johnson has been planning this retirement for a long time. You can read ESPN's writeup here: Calvin Johnson
One thing that Schefter writes that immediately comes to mind is that Johnson's body has been beaten down and he's 30 years old. Imagine how much worse it's going to get if he keeps on playing, not to mention all the stuff that's been coming out about concussions in football over the last several years.
Even in the lead up to Super Bowl week and what I hope will be a great game, this is a really black day and could signal a really alarming future for the NFL and football in general. Seriously, Johnson has been/still is one of the top receivers in this league and he's calling it good at 30, 31 years old when many of his predecessors would still be playing into their late 30s (and Jerry Rice played well past 40)?
Don't get me wrong, I think this is quite possibly the safe and very possibly the right thing for Johnson to do. It might well be better for him that he retire and take the money now rather than having to wake up with memory loss or other terrible concussion symptoms 20 to 30 years down the road.
That said, on to college football. And in the world of college football, arguably the biggest story over the weekend is the rise...and potentially the fall...of a recent up-and-coming SEC power, Ole Miss.
According to Pat Forde of Yahoo! Sports, Ole Miss "has received a Notice of Allegations from the NCAA Enforcement Staff alleging roughly 30 violations in football, women's basketball and track and field, sources told Yahoo." You can read the article here: Ole Miss Violations?
My reaction to this is: Least shocking bit of news I've seen in quite some time.
With the exception of when Eli Manning was there and made them relevant, this football program was a perennial SEC doormat year after year. Then they hire Hugh Freeze and suddenly they are getting top 10 recruiting classes? And beat Alabama twice in a row and won at Bryant-Denny Stadium for the first time since the late 80s and twice in a row for the first time ever? Yeah, nothing to see here. Not.
On a related note, as much as I hate to say it, score one for Bo Pelini; Pelini called them out in summer 2014 after some shady stuff went down when Nebraska was trying to land Damore'ea Stringfellow, who is now at Ole Miss. His quote then was, "Read between the lines. I think we all know what happened in that situation." No mincing words there, and as much as I hate to give Bo credit for anything he was dead on the money with this one. Sad thing is, NCAA will probably give them a slap on the wrist, because SEC.
While we're on the topic of the SEC, as great as they are in football, that conference is absolutely putrid in college basketball; the Big 12 wiped the floor with them this past weekend in the Big 12/SEC challenge to the tune of 7 wins in 10 games. Kentucky will probably be good in March, Texas A&M has a good team, and LSU is OK but other than that a whole bunch of whatever. The other four power 5 conferences (Big 12, Big 10, ACC and Pac-12) blow them away completely and there are even some mid-majors who can claim they're better than the SEC in basketball this year.
Oh and if you haven't seen the Oklahoma/LSU and UK/Kansas games from this past weekend, do it. Neither was as good as the triple OT classic between OU and KU but both were still good games. I don't like anything about OU but Buddy Hield is going to make some NBA team very happy.
Quick NBA topic; as much as I love Tyronn Lue (Nebraska, yo!) getting the head coaching job in Cleveland and as talented as they are, everyone proclaiming the Cavs are showing what they can be in the wake of that win over the Spurs Saturday night needs to slow down just a second. First of all, that win over the Spurs really can only be claimed a half-win because Tim Duncan didn't even play and it's a mid-season game. The Spurs don't care about games in January, they care about the playoffs. Lue is 4-1 since taking over in Cleveland, but let's see what he does over the course of the rest of the year.
And finally, here we are at Super Bowl week. The big one is six days away, Broncos vs Panthers. I'm not going to make a prediction right now but here's a key to the game, and it's not Peyton Manning.
Wade Phillips. In fact, the former Texans defensive coordinator and the son of Bum Phillips may well be the X-factor for Super Bowl 50.
Let's face it, for as much as people love Peyton Manning, man for man the Carolina Panthers are the better team. The last thing Denver can afford to do is get in a shootout with Carolina because Cam Newton and the Panthers will run them off the field if that's the case.
Denver's best bet is the same formula that they used to beat the Patriots; that is, namely, win this one with defense, special teams and just enough offense.
The problem for Wade, as highly as I think of him, and his defense is Cam Newton is an entirely different type of monster than Tom Brady. He's built like a linebacker, he's got a cannon for an arm and he'll run you over if he has to. But somehow, the Broncos have to find a way to come up with takeaways because if this game is even or + for Carolina in the take/give ratio the Panthers will win this game.
Until next time....
