Sunday, October 14, 2007
Merge!!! (and some sports, too)
Before I get into the sporting portion of this blog, I’ve got to get something off of my chest. It’s bothered me for years, and now that the problem is impacting us here at home, I’ve got to say something. On my way to the Northside-Jordan game at Kinnett Stadium on Saturday night, I decided to take I-185 up to the J.R. Allen Bypass for the sake of speed. Big mistake. It turns out that traffic is being compressed to one lane just south of the by-pass. I saw the electronic signs advising drivers to “MERGE LEFT” because things would be shut down in three miles. Keep in mind that there was almost no traffic around me. I went ahead and moved left… and about a mile and a half later, I was dismayed to see two lanes of traffic at a dead stop in front of me. Why? People ignoring the signs, racing up to the front of the line, and then trying to squeeze in. This just seems a little rude to me. Yes, you may have to slow down when you get behind the line of cars moving through the construction zone. But, you won’t have to stop dead and wait for an opening if you just move over..... and you won’t inconvenience every other motorist on the road, either!! I’m convinced that half of the trouble in Atlanta construction traffic can be blamed on people putting themselves first and racing to the front, and then holding everyone else up by merging in. So, please… just move over when you see the signs. It might make things move a lot more smoothly (and it might help me be around for kickoff for the next high school football game I try to get to!)
Moving on…
Does it get any better than college football this year? After all of the upsets so far this year, last weekend we saw #1 LSU and #2 Cal both go down in flames, both against teams that you wouldn’t expect to be on top when the clock hit zero. While shooting that Northside-Jordan game I mentioned, I had my cellphone in my hands the entire time, keeping up with the LSU-Kentucky gametracker on ESPN MVP. Watching for one-line play-by-play text to pop up on a screen isn’t the best way to keep up with a game, which makes it that much more remarkable that I was so excited walking up and down the Kinnett Stadium sideline. By the time UK put the game into overtime, I was really fired up, passing along updates to anyone and everyone around me not trying to coach the game. At the half, I headed back to the station, and made it inside just in time to watch the Wildcats stuff a 4th-and-2 run by LSU to seal the win. Nobody in the WRBL newsroom has any ties to Kentucky (besides our good friend Dan Edward, a former WRBL sports anchor who graduated from UK). Nobody here has anything against LSU. But the thrill of the upset had us cheering and high-fiving. I have always been a fan of the big-time college programs, but now that anybody can go down on any given Saturday, it just makes things seem more fun.
The really cool thing about Saturday’s upsets is that the door to the SEC West title is now officially wide open. Both Auburn and Alabama already controlled their own destiny heading into the weekend. Both had just one SEC loss. Neither had to worry about other teams losing to open the door to a championship (Mississippi State holds the tie-breaker over Auburn, but MSU already has three conference losses). Now, though, that LSU also has a conference loss, Auburn, LSU, and Alabama are all tied on top of the SEC West. Each has a chance of winning the division. LSU still looks like the favorite to me. Auburn’s offense has been shaky at times, although the Tiger defense is suddenly playing lights-out. Alabama has had well-documented trouble finishing games, which could hurt them down the stretch. Then again, the Tide did a great job of finishing Saturday against Mississippi, rallying for 10 unanswered points in a 27-24 win. LSU isn’t bullet-proof, though… we knew that after watching them struggle early in the easy games like Tulane, and then throughout their win over Florida. It’s going to be a LOT of fun to watch this all play out over the next five or six weeks.
On a somewhat related note, I’m really starting to change my opinion of the two-quarterback system. Before now, I’ve never really been a fan of playing two quarterbacks. In David Greene’s sophomore year at Georgia, it always seemed to me that bringing in DJ Shockley would throw off Greene’s rhythm somehow. Eventually, the system started to work much better at Georgia with the Bulldogs bulldozing their way to a couple of SEC Championship Games, and winning one. That experience, combined with watching Florida run the two-quarterback plan to near-perfection last year with Chris Leak and Tim Tebow started to change my view. Now LSU and Auburn (among others) are having success with the same plan. I don’t think it will work for every quarterback out there. Some players need to know that they’re “the guy”. But, if you’ve got some players who are true team-first kind of players, who are secure with their position on a team despite not taking every snap, I say go for it. You’ve only got four years of eligibility and five years total to keep a player around. If you’ve got a potential star like Auburn’s Kodi Burns on the roster who can help you win games, get him in there.
