Point taken.

But Florida-Oklahoma was a good game and a compelling matchup (2 heismans, proud traditions, great fan bases etc.). I hate the way college football chooses its champion too but it is what it is.

The NFL matchups yesterday were weak and so were the games (what little I watched anyway). Thats the price of parity in the NFL. Today's are a little better. Looking forward to Philly-NYG. Still I'm pulling for AZ-SD so we can have 2 8-8 teams square off in the most overhyped event of all of sports. Talk about a joke. Parity=mediocrity

That bunch from Tallahassee was using some stuff on offense that looked an awful lot like parts of the "Houston Veer." Fla. could probably take half the NFL teams today. And I'd take the points against half of the rest. I'm glas the coaching "gene pool" has a chance to be expanded at this point; too many coaches have become too comfortable with the same old same-oh. And just try to bend the players to a set of time-worn tactics, or find the player who fits the round hole exactly. Exhibit A: Mike Shanahan. The rest of the league won't admit it, of course, but they've known every running play the Bronocs use for so long it's silly. The keys haven't changed; so talk about seein' 'em comin'. Shanahan last outcoached somebody in 2002. Student body right, anyone?

"If we don't live in one of these areas, who cares?"

Like, for example, Oklahoma and Florida?

watching CFB this year when Utah beat Alabama and won the National Championship. Everything that follows that is just meaningless exhibition.

As to the NFL, I am taking Sand Diego over Stinksburgh (Big Ben is really Little Ben), Spew York over Spewadelphia (McFlabb gets sacked more than lunch), Crapazona over Crapolina (Delhommey or Warner? Give me Warner) and TennASSsee (Flacco will be flatulent).

EVEN MORE THANKFUL FOR HOCKEY!!

The Florida - Oklahoma game was a great football game. You make it sound like a turkey just because it wasn't a shootout. This wasn't Big 12 touch football, it was the real deal on both sides of the ball. Good match up, well-played, and tight to the end. What else do you want. Besides a gag order on the Fox announcers. Those guys were bad, very bad.

I've lost interest in the NFL playoffs, Baltimore-Tennessee, Arizona-Carolina. This is the best we get? Really, if don't live in one of those areas, who cares?

Hopefully this year's disaster of a pointless, empty bowl game series has cemented in the popular consciousness how silly the system has become. Teams' records and head-to-head matchups disregarded? Coaches forced to "vote" a specific way by an outside entity? An undefeated team who beat a former #1 team not even in the running for a national title? Good grief, how can anyone actually take a college football seriously anymore?

It shows how badly college-level ball has become a bloated, twisted, money-poisoned charade. Pay the players? Sure, why not further enable all the worst tendencies already on display. Instead, maybe we should take the money out of college football and have enough of a collective moral compass to realize how screwed-up our educational system has gotten if it produces this.

Speaking of screwed-up and money-poisoned, on to the NFL. This sure looks like a good set of matchups this weekend--it almost couldn't have been scripted better (ahem). Though, as was the case throughout this season, a lot of the anticipation and drama comes from not really knowing what to expect out of most of these teams. Here we have the elites of the NFL, and we really don't know how well any of them will play on any given day. It was like that all season, and though some of it was just "that's why they play the game", a lot of it was just maddening inconsistency (with which, as a Cowboys fan, I am closely acquainted).

The Giants still look great in theory, but I can't shake a worry about them losing 3 of their last 4--that's getting way too familiar with not winning, and is the opposite of their last season. Losing streak + key offensive player missing + the Eagles on a mission = lots to worry about. I'd like to see the Giants go all the way again, but the Eagles and (presumably) Carolina will be a test probably as great as the Patriots were last year.

I'm looking forward to the two AFC games mainly to see if it clears up exactly who these teams really are.

That's one of the great things about the NFL--we get to see teams go from ambiguous parity to clarity by actually playing one another. If we used the college football model, the Chargers and Eagles and Cardinals wouldn't be given a shot at a title, while "favored" teams like Oklahom--er, excuse me, New England--would be grandfathered in, because they're objectively better, in some complicated way that no one ever really explains very well.

So, it's fitting that the NFL is now picking up right where the laughable BCS leaves off--with a batch of good teams that don't have any indisputable case for being called "champion". In a few weeks, we'll have a result that gets much more satisfyingly close to that ideal. Same thing happens in hockey, tennis, baseball, soccer, and pro and college basketball. Which, in my mind, leaves college football as the county-fair livestock show of sports.

I am the 'king' of nitpicking. All bow before me (has to be a 45 degree bow, I'll be measuring)!

Hope everyone has a fine weekend.

" ...the team that can force more turnovers will probably win it.

Since picking that team is nothing more than a guess and I don't want to pick all four home teams, I'll take the Ravens."

Why do you not want to pick all four home teams? And if not, isn't there another home team you think is just as likely a guess to lose? Are all home team wins in a given round of playoffs unprecedented? Eh, to heck with the statistics.

As a Titans fan I am rather disappointed in your guess. As an old Oiler fan, and an NFL follower I think I understand.