[Ed note: This is written by DRage in response to our (other IAI bloggers) claim that he is a midwest football hater and a UCLA apologist. He has come up with a mathmatical formula for his hate. But there is no way to defend UCLA calling its girly light blue unforms "powder keg blue". I mean come on.]
DRage writes:
Yes I am a hater. But in the name of transparency here is my hater
criteria:
Location: East of the Mississpi = minus, West of the Mississippi = plus (extra negative points if you are North of the Mason Dixon line and east of the Mississippi.
Academics: Minus points for schools with no academic cred, (i.e.
Memphis, Miami - can we talk about how stupid it is to put a U on your helmet for University?), Even more minus points for schools that brag about their academic standards as if they apply to their athletes (see Notre Dame, Duke, Stanford, etc)
Private/Public - Private is negative, public good
School Size: Super large = bad, smaller = underdogs = good.
Integrity and self righteousness - these are directly related - If you are crooked but swear you are not, very bad - see Lou Holtz and Notre Dame.
Coach Obnoxiousness: Related closely to integrity and self righteousness. Admit we love watching Spurrier and Stoops turn red on the sideline.
Wussness of Conference and Scheduling
Style of play - you have to have the forward pass in the playbook beyond third down.
Uniforms - Admit it, its hard to hate on the UM Flying Wedge. I also hate red and white - get original, sorry buckeyes but Grey andred looks like you washed your whites and darks together - hate it.
Ubiquity - Am I forced to watch them every week?
Band Wagon Factor - Why is everyone in Ohio a fan of OSU, not Ohio U - can you say bandwagon. Same for SC, Notre Dame (when they don't suck).
Based on these criteria - here ismy NCAA Hater Heirarchy from best to worst.
10) UCLA - public school, sweet unis, So Cal, coach smarminess countered by academic integrity, history of excellence. HMMM HMMMM Good!
9) Pac 10 Teams
Breakdown (best to worst)- Washington, Washington St, Oregon (Nike unis only make it worse),Arizona (really who cares - they are much higher if discussing basketball and Lute Olson), ASU (such losers and chokers hard to hate, do hate the high school reject unis with the mustard non matching helmets), Oregon St. (unbearable when they win), Stanford (BS holier than thou neo con bastards allowed to drop classes during final - everyone eligible), CAL (the sleeziest recruiters in the PAC, will take anyone, last Pac 10 school to stop taking Prop 48 atheletes, paid athletes, no relationship between football and b-ball teams and academic reputation of the school, unbearable when they win).
8) USC - the worst of the PAC, cheaters, no academic credibility, will take anyone, smug, private school bastards. At least they always suck at round ball.
7) Other small west coast schools - really who cares - the WAC is wack.
Its embarassing watching ads paid for by the conference on Fox and ESPN begging them to show Mountain West games on tv.
6) Big 12 - at least no one pretends to be academic - we'rea football factory, so what? Too much red and white in the color schemes - Texas, AM, Nebraska, OU - enough.
5) Other Mid Major schoolsEast of the Mississippi - would be lower but tired of insistent argument that they deserve more respect - that and crappy running backs who lead the nation in rushing but can't play professionally (see Garrett Wolff).
4) SEC - Pussy scheduling, no academic integrity at all (makes ASU look like Oxford on the Salt River), credit for slapping down Big 10 on regular basis.
3a) ACC - more for basketball, Duke is probably one of the three most annoying teams in any sport. Acts like any of their players could have gotten in for anything but basketball.
3) Michigan - Big 10 team, fight song calls themselves champions of the West (yeah in 1850 although I think the Sioux or Apaches could have taken them easily), but damn those uniforms are sweet.
2) Big 10 - Big 10 but 11 teams= academically suspicious; crappy, over rated teams every year; still have not discovered the passing game; Wisconsin owns UCLA in bowls (dammit); Too much red and white (Wisconsin, OSU, Indiana), too many crappy never competitive teams (Indiana, Northwestern, Illinois, Minnesota),
1a) OSU - I think we have covered this ad naseum, plus Todd is right - it's fun watching OSU fans go all apoplectic when you mention Maurice Clarret, their stolen victory over the Canes, Tressels sweater vest, hee hee hee. It's too easy.
1) Notre Dame - The standard by which all other hate is measured - they are a ten on every critera Location, Check, Check Academics - check, double check for claiming that their recruiting problems are a factor of their academic scrutiny - please didn't Randy Moss originally play at ND? Brady Quinn, yeah he's a rocket scientist private school - check school size - definitely not small or underdog integrity and self righteousness - Lou Holtz flat out paid players, atty my wife worked with who attended ND told story about football player having sex in front of audience in dorms despite "honor code", LB admitted a couple years back to dating head of the booster club and recieiving cash benefits - let's just say check coach obnoxiousness- check - fat guy tries to sue for his failed gastro by pass surgery - how about trying to by pass the buffet - extra loser points for hatable qb - Jimmy Clausen the third in the line of mediocreClausen brothers (two played at Tenn. - they are like thespecial ed Mannings) showed up at signing conference in limo wearing his threeCA statechampionship rings and promised to win more at ND - douchebag spent hisFRyear on his ass running the worst offense in the country (don't mention the UCLA game) Wussness of Conference and Scheduling - check - it is not 1950, Purdue, Navy and Army let alone Michigan State are jokes. Just join the Big 10 and shut up Uniforms - I have to admit the blue home uniforms are slick but how about a logo?; Style of play - hard to say - like what I saw last year; ubiquity - no team should have their own TV deal or guaranteed BCS slot, check; Band Wagon - theirs is the absolute worst - being a catholic apparentlymeans you haveto automatically root for ND. Luckily they have been horrible so the band wagon is limping.
But back to USC. We didn't all see this one coming? Carroll runs one of the sketchiest programs in the country despite the west coast laid back appearance. Quick run down:
Leinart's family paying for wr Jarrett's rent in a $4000 a month apartment The Ting twins leaving the school amid allegations of steroid use Two players having thousands of XTC pills in their apartment for sale. Winston Justice Mc Knight academically inelligible and Bush involved in his possible illegal recruiting Multiple players and cheerleaders taking spanish classes at a local tech school to keep their academic ratings up. This year's starting qb, Sanchez accused of rape, mysteriously dropped Three white players startingracist my space page - no punitive action by Carroll Multiple arrests by key players - no discipline by team We won't even talk about OJ I and their willingness to display his memorabilia in heritage hall.
Add on OJ II - if you have been following the story, the sleezy agent rep who brought the money was persona non grata at USC since he pulled the same crap with a player in late 90's/OO's. They knew the guy was trouble. It is a bad sign when a player is investigated for amateur violations prior to being signed. It's also a bad sign when no major program will offer a schollie to the "best" player in the nation - except for Bob Huggins who graduated all of 0 players during his tenure at Cincinnati. Just read the story of his "recruitment" facilitated by Gilloury. Also don't forget that their starting line ups average age was like 21 despite not having any seniors on the team (I think Mayo was a
21 year old freshman as was Davon Jefferson) - they will take anyone to be competitive.
SC is out of control. My guess is that they will get a slap on the wrist under the argument that the school should have known, but really this was the athletes fault. The NCAA needs a west coast power for ratings. It is also interesting to note that the first year USC won the title (the year they split with LSU), SC received the largest one year donations of any school in the country (Ivies included) - this is big business at SC just like OSU. They need to go down hard but it won't happen.
Of course the one mitigating factor for SC, is that unlike OSU, when SC cheats it pays off, two titles,4 and one in BCS bowls (and the wins weren't closeor relied on bail outs by the refs like OSU needed)includingtwo routs of the Big 10.OSU cheats and still gets steamrolled, it's one thing to sell your soul, but at least get something in return.
My hope is that SC gets busted in two years when the investigations are done which gives slick rick time to get UCLA out of the doldrums to take SC's place as the West Coast Super Duper Power. Yeah right.
DB