Running off-season CFB thread

I've always wondered if football jerseys and pads were as cumbersome as they were back in the day, players would be safer. Harder to get a head shot when your pads - and the other guy's - go up past your earhole.

 

The near-disappearance of old-style Brillo-pad artificial turf has meant the end of elbow pads.

I've heard part of the rationale for the downsizing of shoulder pads has been improvements in neck safety -- when players' heads got hit against the old bulky shoulder pads, more strain is put on the neck structure.

Same goes for the disappearance of the rhino rolls and pillow-back headrests of the 1970s and early 80s. They were supposed to protect the neck but ended up possibly causing more injuries.

 

Only good of the 1977 Hogs-Horns was watching the Little-Erxleben kicking showdown. YouTube it. Actually quite good.

 

You've reminded me of the first time (I think it was in 2000) Nick Saban talked to us at a press conference about reheating day-old coffee and grabbing a Little Debbie® Oatmeal Creme Pie or two to enjoy after fetching the newspaper from his driveway each morning. Not sure of how to spell the name, I typed in something along the lines of LilDebbie.com and landed on a page that I was certain would get me called up to HR.

 

The significance is that it was on ESPN and they don't have to pay CBS for the rights.

Like when "Baseball Tonight" does "Top 10 Catches of All-Time," it's actually "Top 10 Catches We Have Free Footage Of."

 

During Kentucky's day, they showed the regular-season win against UNC (the Malik Monk explosion game), and that was originally CBS. And South Carolina showed its tournament win over Duke.

 

Wow. I wouldn't want to be working PR for the University of Florida on this.

A Warning, a Crusade, and a Public Reckoning at the U. of Florida

 

There's something delicious in this turnabout. Huntley really was and is "the foundation of the Gator Nation."

 

Slightly off-topic, but tangential re: padding: I've noticed you never see catchers at any level wearing "knee savers" any more. I'm guessing there's research that showed they were ineffective or created some other unintended side effect?

 

PAC-12 experimenting with chopping off five minutes of halftime.

Dr. Saturday

 

In a really weird way, having a hotel owner named Patel be named as a booster providing impermissible benefits in an Ole Miss recruiting scandal gives me hope for the future of cross-cultural relations in the South.

Ole Miss releases names of boosters involved in Notice of Allegations

 

I love that Ole Miss has a tab on the front page of its athletics web site called "NCAA Case" that links to all of the Notices of Allegations and responses, and a few other informational items. Not sure I've ever seen that with a school that's under investigation.

Information about NCAA Case | Official web site for details related to The University of Mississippi's NCAA case