See FanBlogs and EDSBS.

Like you, I've been touched by the devastating cyclone in Myanmar, the tornadoes in Oklahoma, Missouri and the Midwest, storms in the Southeast, wildfires in California & Florida, and earthquakes in China, not to mention the everyday needs in our own communities.

Orson from EDSBS and I are asking you to show your school spirit and help those in need today by making a donation to the American Red Cross, CARE, or the International Rescue Committee.

In turn, we'll rank the total donation by school and display it this week at Fanblogs and Every Day Should Be Saturday. The winning school will have its colors displayed at EDSBS and logo/mascot shown on every page at Fanblogs.

The particulars:

1) Make a donation online to the American Red Cross, CARE, or the International Rescue Committee.

2) Email the donation confirmation to kevin@fanblogs.com and state your team affiliation by 8pm EDT on Wednesday, May 14th.

3) Results will be displayed at Every Day Should Be Saturday and Fanblogs throughout the week, with the final results shown by Thursday, May 15th.

4) The winning school will have its colors displayed at EDSBS and logo/mascot shown on every page at Fanblogs.

I'm not sure if he'll ever agree with me about the "means" of my anti-playoff argument, but after the occasional protestation, EDSBS' Orson Swindle has come to the same conclusion about the ends: to hell with a playoff for college football.

Glad to have you aboard. 

In its entirety (emphasis mine):

The net result for us in experiencing the NCAA tourney from the vantage point of deep inside the smoky anus of Vegas is this: college football must never, ever have a playoff. Nevah. That’s our gut instinct right now after having watched the weird dénouement of the tourney’s first weekend in Vegas and realizing that the NCAA cannot effectively coordinate the mating of two donkeys, much less a major football tournament.

Because we’re typing this off our phone while waiting in line to be told that we’re not making our connecting flight in Phoenix, we’ll be succinct: the season remains everything in college football, and a playoff would tangibly devalue the regular season’s value. Man on moon, yes; but seeing the dispassion of turning the game into a neatly compressed lump of productmeat suitable for easy heat ‘n bake consumption made us irrationally sad.

As it stands, every team with a decent body of work gets their one moment in the sun, unless they get the Motor City Bowl, in which case they at least get a moment of glory in the rain of fiery ashes and locusts that has been pelting Detroit for 40 years or so. A playoff kills that dead.

Onto the plane. It’s strictly working on the lizard brain level right now, but the image of a season easily ended in tidy fashion on four screens in Vegas makes us want to split the rails of a playoff train’s tracks and watch the wreck ensue.

It’s just this weekend’s Colbert gut instinct, but it’s there.

I wonder if this is playoff proponents' Cronkite moment.  If they've lost Swindle, they've lost middle America ... or something.

Anyway, welcome to The Coalition, Every Day Should Be Saturday.

* * *
For more of my thoughts on this issue, see my "Playoffs = Bad Idea" category here, and read my entry Le Playoffs.  If you're of like mind, send an email my way with your name or the name of your blog/website to be added to The Coalition (you're not alone!) of people against a playoff in college football on the menu at left.

I love it.  No other sport has this kind of dialogue and passion.

The great Wizard of Odds has published a study this morning analyzing average game length by the various broadcasters.  Memo to SEC fans unhappy about never-ending games: exclusive SEC broadcaster CBS is the runaway favorite when it comes to long games.  We all know the reason why: commercials.

I'm not here to complain about commercials - they pay the bills.  However, looking at Wiz's data its obvious that long games aren't universal.  Not every network carries a nearly four hour broadcast.  Game time continues to be a function of the run/pass nature of competing teams, the efficiency of the game officials, overtime, replay review and ... commercials!

It's a little unfair of the networks to demand changes in the game without determining new ways to reduce their own burden.  Maybe the solution is to encourage the game to be even longer and more compelling.  That creates even more opportunities to sell ads and commercials and pushes college broadcasts further into the day and night.

I don't know about you, but on some of the smaller networks when the game ends they go right into 90 minutes of infomercials or other dead weight Saturday programming.  If I'm a network, I'd be trying to figure out ways to prolong games and the more serious ad revenue they bring in rather than cut them short to rush into worthless programming.

Onward ...

Another towering giant of the college football blog community MGoBlog's Brian Cook says at FanHouse that maybe we need to hold our fire.

Here's the claim from the NCAA rules committee:

NFL studies showed that adding the 25-40 clock will actually add 4 to 5 plays per game based on consistent pace of play. BCS Football and officials themselves were for this change. With the ready for play, live ball out of bounds rules, (This happens about 12 times per game, with on average 3 of those in last 2 minutes) we should get the same amount of plays in a time span that is a few minutes shorter. For the record it is BCS football, TV, Conference Commissioners with lengthy seasons and television that leads the push for faster games. The Committee's stance is that the game has given about all it can give back without a negative influence on product. Next move will have to be from Administrators or Television themselves. It is still a great game. MC.

 Sunday Morning Quarterback then replied with: "again, I disagree"

Any guess that the 40/25 clock will somehow increase plays is based on teams moving to the line quickly - "on consistent pace of play," in the words of the NCAA rep who responded to Orson's readers - but there is no incentive for offenses to take any less time than the rules afford. There's no way to predict the future with certainty, but the data from our "control group" (the NFL) indicates the number of plays will go down.

And Cook continues to assert that this might all work out.  After some math, the following:

The main reason the NFL features far fewer plays than the college game is not the length of the playclock but the running clock after a first down. That difference is not up for review, and the assertions made by the rules committee are therefore well within the realm of the plausible. Any difference wrought by the 40-second playclock will be small.

Where do I stand on this?  Hell if I know, but someone backed up by serious math is wrong.  Regardless, scrutiny of this rule change *proposal* absolutely must be intense.  There's little folly in raising alarm.

The Rules Committee screwed up big time with 3-2-5-e, and the motives behind that change are still guiding the current proposal.  If not for intense public scrutiny, extensive documentation of 3-2-5-e's failures and massive carping from coaches, we'd still have that rule on the books.  The college football public must continue to have its guard up when potentially hazardous rules come up for review.

I will continue to stand against anything that reduces the actual number of plays and possessions in college football games.  For the sake of the Rules Committee they better be right about it. 

Yay alliteration.

Amazingly, this little bit of data may not have been discovered by Florida's SID's, but instead some guy commenting on Heisman Pundit's Live Blog last weekend.

my first question/comment was going to be about tebow becoming the first 20/20 college player EVER (20 rush TDs, 20 pass TDs)...

 

1:24 Do you guys know what Tebow was for Halloween?

1:24 [Comment From J.R. Deluxe]
doesn't this make tebow the first 20-20 player ever?
1:24 Clark Kent

1:25 Good question Deluxe

1:25 I think so

1:25 Amazing

okay, this guy is the "foremost authority" on the Heisman and i had to inform HIM of this fact? i detected a strong urge from "the establishment" to hurry up and find a frontrunner to replace the injured Dennis Dixon QUICK, with someone besides SuperTim...i wasn't having it.

so, i'm not going to take credit if Tebow eventually wins this thing, but i will say that i might have influenced an "influential player" in the game...

UPDATE--i don't mean to brag, but i think my pointing out the 20/20 angle seems to have become the talking point nationally. i think i re-framed this debate...

 

This guy has a future in politics.  Great find, and more than anything I'm shocked Heisman Pundit wasn't on it first, he has a tremendous knack for putting together information/stats/storylines like that.

Be sure to catch my brief assessment of this weekend's Kentucky - Florida game posted over at the amazing Wizard of Odds site.

It is indeed a college football site for winners. 

Be sure and check out my Q&A with the prolific "Saturday Sound Offs".

We're talkin' about playoffs.  Playoffs.

The Baseball Savant is starting to sound like my friend Kevin with the bold proclamations. 

Check out the banner sub headline:

The official Vernon Gholston fansite! Gholston is the most devastating DE in the nation!

He rocks the house!

*More* 

It's always nice to get a friendly link from blogs outside the normal CFB circle.

Here's one that called my Le Playoffs entry "very well reasoned".  You're in the minority, my friend, but welcome to the family of... I don't know... "hold the line-ers"?  We'll work on that nickname.  In the meantime, I must say his blog is awesomely named:

Tempin' Ain't Easy

Heh.

Because you know, people would be more than one.

At least one person nominated me (thank you kindly!) in two categories for some newfangled College Football Bloggers Awards.  That person is Tennessee blogger The 8th Maxim, who I've shared a few friendly arguments with.  Obviously he's a classy dude in spite of the tussles to have nominated me.

I'm going to make like Pete Carroll and feign ignorance on how the whole thing works although I honestly haven't paid a moment's attention to it beyond this entry.  Here's T8M's ballot mentioning CFR.

The Brady Quinn Award: Best layout/looking blog.
College Football Resource
Nice banner. Everything is organized and easy to find. Also has a massive archive of many college football blogs and websites.

And...

The LOL, MSM Award: Explore the most controversial issues.
College Football Resource
He's about the only person I've read that takes an anti-playoff stance on the whole BCS and best #1 loss team mess. Even though I don't agree and want a playoff you can't talk down on his passion for his argument.

So uh, cheer me on?  Thanks again to The 8th Maxim, you get my cool dude of the day award.

Here is today's list of new blogs to be listed on College Football Resource.  Be sure and click on them to make their owners feel important and special.  Maybe they'll even link back to me.  Because that would be cool.

As always, you can find these and many other college football blogs neatly categorized for your perusal here at College Football Resource.

Simply go to the menu at left and click College Football Blogs under the heading Sections.

• Stand up and Yell
• Greg Cote, Miami Herald (CFB)
• Greg Cote, Miami Herald (Hurricanes)
• The Baseball Savant
• Dallas News - CFB

• Dallas News - Baylor
• Dallas News - North Texas
• Dallas News - Oklahoma
• Dallas News - Oklahoma State
• Dallas News - SMU

• Dallas News - Texas
• Dallas News - Texas A&M
• Dallas News - TCU
• Dallas News - Texas Tech
• Clemson Sports and Recruiting

• MVictors.com
• RedRaiders.com Blog
• Houston Chronicle - UH
• Dennis Dodd - Dodds and Ends
• Boiled Sports

• Rumors and Rants
• Seattlest
• What Thou The Odds
• AggieSports.com Podcast
• The Band Is Out On the Field

• Jay Heater's Cal Football Blog
• College Hotline with Jon Wilner
• Kansas State Football
• Dick Weiss
• The National Championship Issue

• Ivan Maisel
• The Scarlet Knights of Rutgers
• Jeff Metcalfe, The Arizona Republic
• The Rock Report
• The Woodshed Network

• Kenny Smith Podcast
• Get the Picture
• Sports Bastards - CFB
• Dan's Take
• Sports on my Mind

• Saurian Sagacity
• Rattler Gator
• Double T Nation
• Raider Red Nation

 
If you have a college football blog and would like for it to be linked on here and featured in a future blog roundup, please send me an email with a link and I will happily oblige.

Here is today's list of new blogs to be listed on College Football Resource.  Be sure and click on them to make their owners feel important and special.  Maybe they'll even link back to me.  Because that would be cool.

As always, you can find these and many other college football blogs neatly categorized for your perusal here at College Football Resource.

Simply go to the menu at left and click College Football Blogs under the heading Sections.

•  Fumbled.org
• The Wisdom of the Matty
• Tar Heel Fan Duplicate
  
• Irish Blue and Gold
• Monday Morning Quarterback

• Her Loyal Sons
• Tightwad Hill
• Troy Nunes is an Absolute Magician
• Orange Insider
• Wasted Shabbos

• BfloBlog
• LSU Football Analysis
• Kate on Sports
• Campus Pigskin
• Longhorns Illustrated Duplicate
  

• With Leather-CFB
• College-Football-News.de

 
If you have a college football blog and would like for it to be linked on here and featured in a future blog roundup, please send me an email with a link and I will happily oblige.

Here is today's list of new blogs to be listed on College Football Resource.  Be sure and click on them to make their owners feel important and special.  Maybe they'll even link back to me.  Because that would be cool.

As always, you can find these and many other college football blogs neatly categorized for your perusal here at College Football Resource.

Simply go to the menu at left and click College Football Blogs under the heading 'Sections'.

• Tiger Tracker
• Eye on the Illini
• Stephen McGee
• The Buckeye Expat
• The BBC (Buckeye Battle Cry)

• Eleven Warriors
• The Penalty Kill
• The POJO Dodo
• Double Deuce: Second Rate News
• Go Bucks Duplicate
  

• The Buckeye Blog
• Tigernet Talk Podcast
• Clashmore Mike
• Jones Top Ten
• Out of Kilter

• AllCanes Blog
• Inside UM
• Tech Football
• Badger State Homer
• Kansas State Football

• Nebraska Sports Blog
• Work Hangover

These will be added to the links shortly.

If you have a college football blog and would like for it to be linked on here and featured in a future blog roundup, please send me an email with a link and I will happily oblige.

The NCAA Football FanHouse is quite informative and entertaining.  Best be sure and check it out sometime, ya hear?

• Marshawn Lynch's injury cart joyride
• Michigan State's improbable comeback
• Losing to Rutgers sucks
• C.J. Spiller is kind of a big deal
• San Jose State/Nevada live blog.  Take THAT, ABC!

• Brady Quinn wakes up Echoes of Leinart to beat UCLA
• Karl Dorrell keeps his playsheet in... his happy place?  No wonder UCLA had so many near delay of games, coach was just too reluctant to whip it out.  That sure explains UCLA's conservative offensive strategy on their last possession, however.
  
• Oregon's Jeremiah Johnson has no dress socks.  Seriously.
• Wisconsin's P.J. Hill is a Bubble Butt
• Crazy Weekend, Man
  

MANY new blogs.  Be sure and click on them to make their owners feel important and special.

Maybe they'll even link back to me.  Because that would be cool.

As always, you can find these and many other college football blogs neatly categorized for your perusal here at College Football Resource.

Simply go to the menu at left and click College Football Blogs under the heading 'Sections'.

• FalconBlog
• The Extra Point
• Mickey Plyler's Blog
• I Can't Complain
• Georgia Football Blog

• SEC Fanatic
• Josh Booty Football
• Football Saturdays in the South Duplicate
  
• According to Jim
• Owls/Rice Athletics

• Year 2
• The Pac-10 Apostle Duplicate
  
• Lightning Strikes
• The Longhorn Mafia
• SI's The Vent

• The Dar Speaketh
• Wildcat Sports
• Church of Gridiron
• Solomon's Wisdom
• Bulldog Banter

• The Joe Cribbs Car Wash
• Hoosiers Insider
• Turner Loose
• Awful Announcing
• Card Chronicle

• Bear Territory
• John Walters Blog
• College Football Musings
• The Angry Bulldog
• Yahoo! Sports Blog

• Dan Shanoff
• Blog Net Sports-NCAA Football
• I Bleed Red and Black
• Random Thoughts
• Addicted to Quack

• Stanford Tree
• Rose Bowl Before I Die
• Tedford is God
• Eye On The U
• College Footblog Duplicate
  

These will be added to the links shortly.

If you have a college football blog and would like for it to be linked on here and featured in a future blog roundup, please send me an email with a link and I will happily oblige.

Here's a new NCAA football blog aggregator which may of some use to you in your travels around the internet:

Blog Net News-NCAA Football

Their pitch:

BlogNetSports jumps a generation ahead of other aggregators out there that just reprint posts and tell you which ones get clicked on the most.

Our current version offers these features:

1. The day's top news - based solely on what news stories College Football bloggers are linking to - no matter what mainstream news source they're in.
2. A NCAA Football blogs search engine.
3. A quick guide to the hottest blog comment sections in the College Football blogosphere.
4. A quick index of the day's most active NCAA Football blogs
5. A guide to the College Football blog posts most linked to by other College Football bloggers.

In one place, in one minute, you'll get an update on what's going on across the blogosphere.

Take a look, let me know if it's useful or not.  I have yet to meander over there, but will certainly add it to the links. 

If you haven't already made it a regular stop, please do consider AOL's NCAA Football FanHouse blog.

There's plenty of interesting items to read in the team and conference pages with around 40 schools represented and all the major conferences.

The highlights include Iowa's statewide OMG Look at Meeeee fest in anticipation of No. 1 Ohio State rolling into town, the Pope endorses the Buckeyes, Michigan State coach John L. Smith's official count of choked games (he's up to eight now!), the Florida blogger comparing Alabama last year to the Ewoks from Return of the Jedi, the Notre Dame blogger Live Blogging a high school football game (Clausenmania!) and an account of Kirk Herbstreit calling reporter Erin Andrews 'Poopsie'.  And that's just from last night and this morning.

Being a part of that blog has been fun and I have great admiration for the efforts of my peers in putting together a fantastic product that is entertaining and informative.

I'm still at work here, obviously, but am also devoting a segment of my time to AOL's blog as well. 

Listen to this... sad? hilarious? unhinged? rant.

Fast forward until about eight minutes in and then just keep listening.  The guy loses it.

Things are not going well in East Lansing.  For whatever reason hot tempers are a part of the situation, whether it's the coach chewing out his assistants on national TV for screwing up, or calling Charlie Weis a liar or the fans screaming about the bad coaching job on Saturday.

Eeeeeeeeeveryone's wound a little tight in that corner of the world, no?  Somewhere, a shrink is packing his bags and grabbing the prescription sheets and seeking his or her fortune advising and medicating distraught Spartan fans.

I Don't Know What We're Yelling About! Louuuuud Noises!

As always, you can find these and many other college football blogs neatly categorized for your perusal here at College Football Resource.

Simply go to the menu at left and click College Football Blogs under the heading 'Sections'.

• Sports Media Review by Jonathan Weiler
• The Stunner
• College Football Podcast
• Blacksburg Beacon
• Turkey Talk (old)

• Cap'n Ken's Homespun Wisdom
• LSUnpredictable
• Pass Right
• The Wade
• From the Bleachers

• Sideline Warning
• Behind Enemy Lines
• Husker Mike's Blasphemy
• The Displaced Trojan
• We Are SC

• Wahoo Nation Presents: Ben G's Random Rants
• D.C. Sports Bog
• Danny Ford is God

These will be added to the links shortly.

If you have a college football blog and would like for it to be linked on here and featured in a future blog roundup, please send me an email with a link and I will happily oblige.

Alright, I'm back from a fairly lengthy bit of travel.

My email inbox is quite bloated, so to offer it some relief I'll spill some of its contents onto this here post.  Sound good?

---Check out this new South Carolina blog ~ Cock & Fire

---Also, be sure and swing by the NCAA's official CFB blog, Every Game Counts

---You knew it was coming: another fire Chuck Amato website ~ Chuck Chuck.  For those keeping score at home that's at least two fire Chuck Amato websites, of which one is now the combined project of two formerly disparate websites with the same goal.

---Clemson blog The Sporting Gnomes has moved to a new URL: sportinggnomes.com

---A new Tennessee blog is hitting the mean streets of the CFB blogs scene: loser with socks

---And, a more general CFB blog ~ The 323 

---Finally, just some general notes.  Everything will be back to normal this week here at CFR: Top Teams rankings list, the Saturday LiveBlog (although it might be at a new location), etc.  Just have to get back to the swing of things.  My deepest appreciation for sticking around with the recent slowdown of entries.

FanIQ's keeping the score.

Pundit Picks Tracker

BTW ESPN's Bruce Feldman went an amazing 15-0.  Nice job, Bruce! 

Kind of cool.  Be sure and visit that site, it's a fun interactive community of fans, and they could use a few more college football nuts.