Showing posts with label Big 12. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Big 12. Show all posts

Wednesday, September 05, 2012

Block by block, piece by piece, some
ad agency got way overpaid for this


If an SEC version of this super dumb Big 12 ad ever got made -- which it won't -- the last shot would be of Nick Saban's lifeless body under a giant "S."

Or, as a commenter on the Saturday Down South website excellently said:
Nick Saban is too busy eating the still-beating hearts of children to care about things like commercials. He has no time for your silly human publicity.

Tuesday, September 06, 2011

Realignment, as seen on Twitter

Click on picture for higher resolution

Wow! The inside dope on college athletics you can find on the Internets!

Friday, August 12, 2011

Just another day in the Big 12 10 9


Sorry, but if you're not from around these parts, you have absolutely no idea how much we Nebraskans are enjoying the continuing implosion of the Big 12 Conference.

Uh . . . 10.

Uh . . . 9?

Anyway, let's just say we told you so.

Friday, December 03, 2010

The longest week


They say Nebraska's football coach, Bo Pelini, has issues.


Perhaps so. Then again, maybe not. But if you're asking me where you go to find the real mental cases in the Big 12 Conference, I'd say you need look no further than league headquarters in Irving, Tejas.

Like the saying goes,
everything's bigger in Tejas. That would include the whack jobs.

Who have been given the keys to an entire conference. Holy crap.


I ASSURE YOU, the Omaha World-Herald ain't making this up. If it were, I wouldn't be worrying whether they're going to be directing security efforts toward the wrong people at Saturday's Nebraska-Oklahoma championship tilt at Cowboys Stadium:
Dallas police now say they are not investigating alleged threats against Big 12 Commissioner Dan Beebe, although they are continuing to provide extra patrols by his family home.

A Dallas Police Department spokesman had said earlier this week that the agency was investigating a report of multiple harassing calls and mail to Beebe’s home. But the spokesman, Sr. Cpl. Kevin Janse, said Thursday that that was a mistake based on a misunderstanding by officers who had been flagged down by Beebe’s wife.

She told the officers that the family had received threats and was concerned, Janse said. Police initially thought the messages had gone to Beebe’s Dallas home, he said. They later determined that they had not gone to the family’s home, but instead were received at Big 12 offices in nearby Irving, Texas, outside Dallas. Irving has its own police department.

Asked for a copy of the report from Beebe’s wife, Janse said there was no written crime report.

Big 12 officials could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Earlier this week, Big 12 spokesman Bob Burda said the matter had been reported to “the authorities,” but declined to name the agency. He said he couldn’t provide copies of the alleged threats because they were under investigation.

CAN NEBRASKA just leave the Big 12 right now? I'm thinking that the farther away NU is from these batsh*t-crazy drama queens, the better.

Seriously, somebody needs to pat down the Big 12 brass before the game. If the Huskers start doing too well, you don't want any conference officials stopping a pick-6 with a 30.06.

Or pulling a Jack Ruby at the trophy presentation. Because, apparently, that's just how Tejans roll.

Just remember, Huskers. It's The Longest Yard out there, and Eddie Albert is being played by Dan Beebe.

Watch your back when you go to retrieve the game ball.

Monday, November 29, 2010

Avoid the clap. Just look at the Big 12.


Texas is like the clap. It's something you want to avoid.

Look at what happened when a perfectly fine athletic conference got all liquored up back in 1994 and hopped in the sack with a bunch of floozies from thereabouts. Not only was it not better in Texas, but the Big 8 ended up with a wicked case of SWC-philis.

And not only that, a TV network had the videotapes, and a shotgun marriage was in Big 8's future. The new union ended up being called the Big 12 -- as in,
"Come to think of it, not even a big 12-pack of beer could make this bunch look prettier at closing time."

Unfortunately, a shotgun marriage -- while it might have kept the videotapes in ABC's vault (and the Big 8 from becoming a celebrity like Paris Hilton) -- did nothing to cure that now-raging case of SWC-philis. Big 12 grew sickly as the years passed and, as the SWC-philis moved into its brain, became prone to irrational rages and sank into a quagmire of co-dependency.


"I hate this SWC-philis. How could I go on without my SWC-philis? Pass me another big 12-pack of Lone Star. (Urp.) Still uglier than s***. Kill me now, I married a f***ing cow. No, really."

ALAS, this is an ill-fated union that won't end until the fat Longhorn sings "Vaya con dios, mi sucker."

Until then, all there is left to do is endure the irrational ranting of The SWC-philitic Formerly Known as Big 8 as its appendages fall off one by one. For example, this insane rant, penned under the pseudonym of "Berry Trammel"
(God, the poor bastard can't even spell names right anymore):
Such is the fractured relationship of Nebraska and its soon-to-be ex-league, you couldn't blame Big 12 commissioner Dan Beebe for telling the Cornhuskers, don't leave, just leave mad.

Corn Country is outraged that Beebe — nor anyone from the Big 12 office — showed up in Lincoln for the Nebraska-Colorado game Friday.

Beebe was honest about why he didn't go to Nebraska. He feared for his safety.

I talked to Beebe in the Boone Pickens press box Saturday night, and he said he had received enough threats from Nebraska fans — over the 2009 title game controversy, over his suspension of NU's Eric Martin for a helmet-to-helmet hit against Oklahoma State, over the officiating in the Nebraska-Texas A&M game two weeks ago — that he was advised to steer clear of Lincoln.

Now the Huskers consider it an affront that no one bothered to conduct a trophy presentation for the Big 12's North division title.
SIGH. They say that when the mind is being eaten up by the SWC-philis, gullibility is always the last thing to go.

Poor, poor bastard. God knows that's what got him into trouble in the first place. Read on . . . if your breaking heart can bear it:
I don't think Nebraska's football standards have fallen so low that the Huskers prize a We-Beat-Mizzou piece of hardware. I just think a once-solid fan base has lost its collective mind.

Nebraskans have resorted to bloodlust over their exodus to the Big Ten. They've demonized the Longhorns. Called the rest of the league rubes for staying aligned with UT.

Hey, Huskers. The Big Ten is a great conference that offers lots of money and lots of intriguing competition. Nobody blames you for going.

We blame you for losing your class.

Last November, one calendar year, I wrote a column with a banner headline: “Why can't every place be like Lincoln?”

I applauded Nebraska's commitment to hospitality and courtesy and a stadium experience the way it ought to be.

What happened to those people? Now Nebraska seems inhabited by a bunch of kooks who frighten off Beebe, an ex-NCAA investigator, and fire off uncouth e-mails like they're from Louisiana or somewhere.
POOR BASTARD. Stockholm syndrome.

Kids, let this be a cautionary tale about what happens when you jump into the sack with just anybody. Loss of virtue is just the beginning of the end result. You, too, could end up with a raging case of SWC-philis. And that's never pretty.

Avoid the clap.

Friday, November 26, 2010

Not suffering #$@*&%! fools gladly


Last Saturday, after Nebraska's football coach left a blue cloud wafting over the scorched moonscape of the Husker sideline in the wake of a ref-assisted loss at Texas A&M, I mistakenly mentioned to my lovely and charming wife that "I get Bo Pelini."

"Really?" she asked. "You get Bo Pelini? Really?"

I am not a bright man, but neither am I Forrest Gump. I was starting to think there might be sarcasm in play here.

"You understand Bo Pelini? Really?"

Yeah, it was sarcasm, all right. You don't have to throw a yellow flag with "SARCASTIC" written on it at me and hit me right in the eye with the weighted end and scratch my cornea or anything. I'm not Nancy Pelosi, for pity's sake.

"Honeybun, you
are Bo Pelini."

The woman always goes for the kill. Every time.

And after 27 years of marriage, the woman also still doesn't understand those of us with a majority of Mediterranean blood hotly coursing through our bulging veins. I blame the Swedish blood treading cautiously, yet efficiently, through hers.


ON THE OTHER HAND, after watching this press conference this evening after Nebraska's 45-17 final beatdown of Colorado, she may have a point. If you're in a hurry, skip to the 4:55 mark.

Here's a transcript of the relevant exchange:
Reporter (who really should have known better):Do you tell the guys to just, to celebrate this? I mean, do want them to enjoy tonight, or is it something you don't even want to. . . .

Pelini: No, I want 'em to be pissed off and feel like they got their butts kicked.

I mean, come on. Yeah . . . yeah I hope they would enjoy it. They earned it. They did a lot. They've won 10 football games -- that's not easy to do, it's nothing to sneeze at, you know? I'm proud of these kids. They better enjoy it.
I WOULD HAVE said exactly the same thing. Exactly the same way.

I even may have added a gratuitous
"Are you some kind of @#$&*#! nut???" as an exclamation point. Maybe not. I don't know.

All I do know is that Coach Bo might be the brother I never had.
Now, #@!* you, you #@$%!&% #$*&!. No, really.

!@#$&!

Sunday, November 21, 2010

Texas A&M-Nebraska: Behind the scenes


Football fans, particularly of the Husker variety, were mystified at how a clean hit on the Aggie quarterback could magically turn into a late hit, and how Nebraska tight end Ben Cotton could get 30 yards of personal-foul penalties for trying to stop an A&M player from grabbing his junk.

This unfathomable mystery nearly drove Coach Bo Pelini mad with frustration on the NU sideline. Hell, I know that watching this trademark Big 12 fiasco on television in the comfort of my Omaha home had me yelling obscenities even I seldom use.

And that's saying something.

Well, I think I have the answer. I was searching the Internets up and down for some elusive enlightenment, and I came across this -- the secret behind-the-scenes Big 12 Conference video meant for its secret archives in Irving, Texas.

Now it's all so clear.

Monday, June 14, 2010

More crap from the No. 2 state


Everything's bigger in Tejas.

First of all, there's the outsized ego of its state university. And don't try to convince University of Tejas fans theirs isn't the only school in Tejas, if not the world -- they won't believe you.

And the "bigger in Tejas" list also includes, no doubt, the feedlots. They'd have to be to hold as much bulls*** as what flows out of the Land of Big Hair and Small Brains every time Jennifer Floyd Engel posts another column in the
Fort Worth Star-Telegram:
One of the best rivalries in sports will not be the same; just ask Arkansas what happened to its rivalries after leaving the SWC. Can you imagine the Aggie War Hymn with "goodbye to Louisiana State University"?

Of course, Governor Good Hair wants A&M to stay with Texas.

What he needs to be doing is trying to save the Big XII. I do not say this lightly since this league obviously had fatal flaws, starting with its clearly overmatched commissioner, Dan Beebe, and a lot of schools who did not know their role.

And I am talking to my alma mater, Mizzou. Great job being played by The Big Ten, and enjoy begging for inclusion in the Mountain West. My check is not in the mail, nor will it be until heads roll.

I am also including Nebraska, which idiotically believes going to The Big Ten will turn back the clock to 1990, when 'roided partial qualifiers ruled the college football landscape. How smart are Nebraskans? They actually buy this "more aligned with culture and academic mission" nonsense being spewed Friday.

And who hasn't heard Nebraska referred to as Harvard on the Plains?

In fact, can everybody please dispense with acting like this is about academics, or worrying about being left behind, or anything except for money and super conferences.

Yes, The Big XII is dead, killed by corn shuckers, Tigers and greedy blank-blankers. And while this wake has turned into a roast, look for everybody to be mourning its demise in hindsight.
'ROIDED partial qualifiers? Harvard on the Plains?

Well, there is this story in the
Omaha World-Herald. Maybe that's where Ms. Jennifer Floyd Engel learned about NU's reputation:
Few doubt the University of Nebraska-Lincoln can more than hold its own on the football fields of the Big Ten.

A bigger question is how it stacks up in the classroom and the lab. Nebraska's flagship university ranks lower in the U.S. News & World Report rankings and pulls in fewer research dollars than all of its new partners in the nation's most academically prestigious athletic conference.

But regardless of UNL's current standing, almost any university would envy the upward trajectory the school has been on academically over the past decade.

Its U.S. News ranking among comprehensive public universities has jumped from 57th to 43rd, a measure of its rising reputation.

Its federal research haul has more than doubled.

The school is attracting more of the state's brightest students, and more students than ever from out of state.

Were it not for the marked improvements of the past decade, Chancellor Harvey Perlman said he doubts UNL would be the newest member of the Big Ten.

Now that that new affiliation will have UNL running and collaborating with some of the most prestigious public universities in the land, Perlman and other campus leaders say they see no reason UNL can't aspire to loftier heights in the decades ahead.

“It's a new bar for academics and research,” said Ellen Weissinger, UNL's interim vice chancellor for academic affairs. “Joining the Big Ten is going to accelerate our pace.”

UNL's upward trajectory did not go unnoticed when the Big Ten's presidents and chancellors considered granting the school entry to the conference, said Lou Anna K. Simon, president of Michigan State University and head of the Big Ten's board.

While athletics and football were obviously the initial reason UNL was considered, she said, scholarship is taken too seriously in the Big Ten to add a school that was not a serious academic player.

“There was more to this than just a football game,” Simon said Saturday. “I think all of my colleagues felt very comfortable that Nebraska was an extraordinary fit.”

The recent boost in UNL's academic firepower has its roots in a period of serious introspection during the 1990s.
IT'S REALLY a shame that the best a sports columnist for an also-ran metro daily in north Tejas can muster is rank name calling. Then again, Tejas is the World's Biggest Feedlot, and the fumes from all that Chanel No. 2 must have gone to a Mizzou gal's head.

It's not like it would have taken much. As folks up here are keen enough to observe, the University of Missouri is close enough to the Ozarks to see your first cousin from there, and she/he is lookin' right purdy.

As much as anything, Engel's outpouring of bile reminds me of what became pretty much a yearly ritual for Missouri football fans after having their asses handed to them by the Huskers. Of course, they often didn't fare any better in the insult department than they did the football department.

I remember when my wife and I drove to Columbia in 1983 for the Nebraska-MU game. Of course, Nebraska won.

And naturally, some drunk-ass Mizzou student was staggering outside the stadium afterward screaming
"Nebraska sucks! Nebraska sucks!" at Husker fans (who, by the way, applaud visiting teams in Lincoln, win or lose). Of course, we responded by chanting back "Nebraska wins! Nebraska wins!"

He shut up. Really, some things are just too easy.

LIKE ENGELS succumbing to the temptation to just "phone it in" by ripping off the patented insult-column style of well-known "Colorado malcontent" Woody Paige. She imitates the Denver Post sports columnist OK; I do it better.

But
nobody approaches the real deal. And only a Tejas bulls*** artist would think she could.

That kind of baseless arrogance only can mean one thing. When UT starts up The Longhorn Network, Jennifer Floyd Engel probably will be the first hire.


Talk about your match made in Hillbilly Heaven.

Saturday, June 12, 2010

Tired of Bevo's s***, Huskers move out


If he wouldn't be embarrassed, and I wouldn't be embarrassed, I would give Tom Osborne a bear hug right now.


Harvey Perlman, too.

They have led Nebraska fans out of Egypt land. And the hypocrites of the Big 12 Conference let our people go.

Or something like that.
Like they could stop us.

I THINK Tom Shatel puts it right well this morning in the Omaha World Herald:
Goodbye, Manhattan; hello, East Lansing. Goodbye, Boulder; hello, Columbus. Goodbye, Austin; hello, Iowa City.

It was a big day, the biggest day, and nobody was bigger than Harvey Perlman and Tom Osborne.

The chancellor and athletic director/legend-at-large put on a show at the regents meeting. They laid it all out. And while they were at it, they laid out Missouri and Texas. It was powerful. It was clinical. Nebraska, eerily quiet all these weeks, finally spoke up and turned up the volume for all the Big 12 to hear.

Perlman called out Mizzou for being the one to start the expansion circus.

Osborne talked about schools in the Big 12 that were asking NU to stay and all the while selling themselves to not one, not two but three other leagues.

Perlman said the Big 12 presidents wouldn't commit to staying in the league if Colorado and Missouri both left.

And then, in a downright delicious passage, Perlman talked about calling Texas' bluff. And how he asked Texas to commit its TV rights to the Big 12 if it was serious about the league, and how Texas declined.

Brilliant, Harvey. The Steve Pederson years are now forgiven.

Then, finally, the money quote from Osborne: “One team leaving does not break up a conference. Two teams leaving does not break up a conference. Six teams leaving breaks up a conference."

Boom. They should engrave those words on a plaque, or on the side of Memorial Stadium. Maybe put them on the final Big 12 football trophy.
AND THAT, boys and girls, is how a lot of us have become something we never really considered until now -- Big Ten fans. Happy Big Ten fans.

Goodbye Big 12. And good riddance.

Wednesday, June 09, 2010

He who laughs last. . . .


. . . laughs loudest.

Bo Pelini, to put it in Facebook speak, likes this.

HERE'S an Omaha World-Herald classic from December:
Bo Pelini had played it cool walking off the field, telling Texas coaches to go win a national title.

But he heard about a conflict at the threshold of the tunnel. Seemed a Texas fan and somebody from NU had exchanged words.

Bo marched toward the scene. Who was it? Bo wanted to engage the Texas fan.

Told nothing happened, he went back toward the locker room, where he saw Marc Boehm, NU assistant athletic director.

“Marc, I want to see (Big 12 head of officiating) Walt Anderson in there right (expletive) now!” Pelini shouted.

“BCS!” Pelini said as he entered the locker room. “That's why they make that call!”

Nebraska lost another heartbreaker to Texas Saturday. You saw it. Felt it. What you didn't feel were the post-game aftershocks reverberating through the concrete tunnels of Cowboys Stadium.

It hit hardest the Pelinis, who nearly orchestrated a monumental upset.

The reason why they didn't, according to Bo's and Carl's immediate reactions, was the officials' decision to add one second to the game clock after Colt McCoy's last throw out of bounds.

Originally, the clock expired, sending a flood of Nebraska players onto the field. But a review changed that call, led to Texas' game-winning kick and sent the Pelinis into madness.

According to Dan Beebe, Big 12 commissioner, officials did the right thing.

According to Walt Anderson, officials did the right thing. Where was the clock when the ball hit something out of bounds?

“There was a second left,” Anderson said.

But nothing or nobody could convince Bo Pelini.

“I want an explanation!” Pelini yelled outside his locker room.

Standing in that tunnel quietly watching him: Harvey Perlman, Paul Meyers, Eric Crouch.

“Get Coach Osborne down here!” Pelini said. “Can you go get Coach Osborne?”

Minutes later, Athletic Director Tom Osborne walked slowly toward the locker room in black trench coat. He entered the double doors to meet Pelini.

From outside the doors, one word could be heard loudest: “Cheaters!”

Then Osborne strode back to the field, where Texas was wrapping up its trophy presentation. En route to midfield, Osborne said to a World-Herald reporter: “Where is Dan Beebe?''

Beebe was standing at the 40-yard line talking to Assistant Commissioner Ed Stewart, a former Nebraska All-America linebacker.

As Osborne reached Beebe, the commissioner extended his hand. But Osborne didn't shake it. Osborne pointed at Beebe and said, “Would you go see Bo? Right now?''

By then, Nebraska Chancellor Harvey Perlman had come on to the field. Perlman and Osborne walked with Beebe off the field and down a stadium tunnel.

The three exchanged no words on the walk. Down the tunnel, Osborne walked three steps in front of Beebe and Perlman walked to Beebe's right.
OF COURSE, you don't make a high-stakes decision like blowing up the Big 12 Conference just because you see Texas getting every benefit of the doubt because the conference's slot in the BCS championship was at stake.

(I'm not saying the call that saved Texas' hide was wrong, but I am questioning whether, if the Huskers had been in Texas' position in that game --
with the Longhorns' shot at the national title still at stake -- whether Big 12 officials don't let the clock run out and call it a night.)

But the fragrant aroma of a dish called revenge being served cold, much as a bowl of gazpacho, sure is a wonderful thing to greet you as you step into the Big Ten café.