bukie

Belichick tried to tell everyone, but we wouldn't listen.

Nice article to prep you for the USMNT at the World Cup next month: https://sports.yahoo.com/usmnt-world-cup-preview-22-questions-about-the-us-at-qatar-2022-answered-153005805.html

And to think under the prior postseason format tge Phillies would have missed the playoffs entirely, effectively eliminated by the Cubs.

Your season is on the line. There is no time limit, no batter limit, the only limitation you have on you is the number of outs you are allowed. You have two remaining, after getting two consecutive walks. Why give away half your season freely?

An Illini win at Nebraska, followed by a win at home vs Purdue, would clinch the Big Ten West for Illinois with 2 games to play.

And I had such high hopes for RealNBAQuotez.

I'm not trying to relitigate the actual decision to keep Schwarber or claim his 2020 was absolute proof of his level at the time, but in the context of being surprised at the claim that Washington 'fixed' him, it definitely matters that he was near replacement level in 2020. Here is his fWAR the last 5 seasons: 2.5 2.0 0.3 2.8 2.7 It looks like 2020 is a clear outlier and that his performance only improved marginally since leaving the Cubs. Or I guess you could argue he was on a clear decline with the Cubs and then Washington saved him lol. I mean, 2020 is a clear outlier because fWAR is an accumulative stat and there were about 1/3 of the games that season.

Undefeated Ohio State, undefeated UCLA, undefeated Clemson, Bama struggles to barely win the rest of their schedule, beats a previously undefeated Georgia in the SEC championship, but Georgia was without their best two players, who would be back for the postseason. Could squint and see Bama missing out in that scenario.

Current NCAA playoff odds, according to 538 (combination of FPI and ELO): https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2022-college-football-predictions/ Here are the teams that still have a real chance of making the playoff if they win out (more than 50% chance: 1- Georgia (100% if they win out) 2- Ohio State (100%) 3- Clemson (100%) 4- Michigan (100%) 5- Tennessee (100%) 6- TCU (100%) 7- Ole Miss (100%) 8- Alabama (99%) 9- Illinois (98%) 10- Syracuse (97%) 11- Kansas State (97%) 12- UCLA (95%) 13- Ok State (94%) 14- LSU (84%) 15- Texas (70%) 16- Oregon (69%) 17- UNC (69%) 18- Purdue (63%) 19- USC (58%) 20- Mississippi State (53%) So that makes effectively 20 teams at the halfway point that control their own destiny to win the national championship. Of course, some paths are more realistic than others to go undefeated (nearly 70% of all playoff outcomes are some assortment of Georgia-Ohio State-Clemson-Michigan-Tennessee-Alabama). In addition to these 20, Utah, PSU and Wake Forest have realistic paths to the playoffs but need help at this point.

What about 9-3, losses to Purdue and @Michigan, and don't end up winning the BTW because they laid an egg at IU?

Based on 2nd order winning percentage (taken from Bill Connoly's post-game win expectancy : here ), here are the top 10 most dominant teams (not adjusted for schedule): Team Games SO Wins SO Pct 1. Ohio State 6 6.0 100% 2. Georgia 7 6.9 99% 3. Michigan 7 6.8 97% 4. UCLA 6 5.7 95% 5. Tennessee 6 5.6 93% 6. James Madison 6 5.5 92% 7. TCU 6 5.4 90% 8. Illinois 7 6.3 90% 9. Ole Miss 7 6.3 90% 10. Texas 7 6.2 89% Looks like Ohio State/Georgia are clearly a step above, and Michigan/UCLA are there just ahead of Tennessee (Alabama is 14th here). Granted, not all schedules are created equal (see: James Madison, dominant but against minnows). If we normalize it by schedule strength (calculated using Sagarin's numbers), we get a top 10 that looks like this: Team SO% +SOS 1. Ohio State 0.899 2. Tennessee 0.869 3. Georgia 0.857 4. Texas 0.845 5. Michigan 0.811 6. TCU 0.809 7. Illinois 0.789 8. Alabama 0.777 9. Oregon 0.765 10. UCLA 0.760 Which to me, looks a lot closer to a realistic measure of how dominant each team has been this season. OSU has looked dominant across the board this season, Tennessee and Georgia have looked dominant except on rare occasion, Texas has looked great but lost a couple close tossups that they'd win more often than not, Michigan had effectively a 15 minute chunk against Iowa that was suspect, but against a weaker overall schedule than the other top 5 teams, TCU won a couple of toss up games the past two weeks, Illinois won what was effectively a 60/40 game against Iowa and lost what was effectively an 80/20 game against Indiana, and Alabama has looked sketchy effectively 3 out of 7 weeks against what has been a tough overall schedule. (In this exercise, Clemson came up 14th, Ole Miss 11th)

Alabama will be 6th. If they win out they will still make the playoffs. I think what may be interesting is the Georgia/Tennessee loser v the Michigan/OSU loser as the 4th team in the CFB rankings Realistic-ish scenario: Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama all win out with Georgia beating Tennessee and Alabama beating Georgia in the SEC title game. I'd think Alabama would get in since they'd be the SEC champs and then the committee probably goes Georgia over Tennessee due to H2H if they take two SEC teams but boy that seems harsh on Tennessee. I suppose it would depend on how the games play out. Like if Georgia beats Tennessee convincingly than you take Georgia for sure. But if Georgia beats Tennessee like Tennessee beat Alabama today, then it's tougher. Plus, you'll need to factor in a likely 11-1 Illinois team that would have victories over Michigan and Ohio State.

Halfway through the conference season, Illinois leads the Big Ten West, and Wisconsin is in last place. What year is this?

I mean, there are probably less than a handful of teams I'd confidently say the Bears are better than right now, but the Commies are one of those teams. EDIT: It might be Houston, Washington, and Detroit. So, convenient for this year's schedule.

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I don't really see the value in signing Montgomery to a sizable deal this offseason. I'd much rather have a longer term deal for a 25yo WR than a 25yo RB, particularly as the value of a single RB getting lesser and lesser with each passing season given the evolving scope of the NFL offense these days. Just because the Bears are rushing more than average doesn't mean much in terms of NFL offensive capability. They need 2-3 capable WRs and a solid OL/TE to really be able to run a NFL-caliber offense with Fields. They're currently about 2-3 WR short and 2-3 OL short, and possibly a TE short. I get trying to develop inexpensive talent via the draft, but you can't expect the team to hit on all that in the draft, so at that point it becomes about what's worth spending FA/trade value on, and I'd love Moore as a piece if the price is at all reasonable. I don't see much in the offseason FA WR market that would match that.

I think the Blackhawks have finally accomplished assembling the worst team in the NHL. This team is going to be unwatchable aside from Kane this season, and hopefully they can trade him for some future value before FA next year.

I have 0 desire to trade for another WR this year. I don't see the point. DJ Moore will likely go for a Day 2 pick, if not a 1st. He's not going to put the Bears over the hump this year. And the GM just stockpiled 11 picks when he started with 5. I don't think he's willing to go down to 4-5 picks in Year 2 for a WR in a rebuilding year. It's not really for this year as it would be to get a younger quality WR set for the next 3 years without relying solely on the draft and making use of the cap space they'll have. There's no way Moore would require a first. I'd do a 3rd for him, though.

The Bears desperately need a WR. The Panthers desperately need salary relief. Sounds good to me. [tweet] [/tweet]

That's rather shocking. I'm happy to see the team winning games, and the defense is really good, but it still doesn't feel like there's any way they are one of the best 25 teams. But let's win a few more games and go to a semi-respectable bowl game for a change!It appears Vegas agrees, as the #24 Illini are 4 point home dogs to unranked Minnesota next week (and I agree with this assessment, I think Minnesota is the one legit team in the BTW this season).

Illinois has now allowed 48 points this season. MSU allowed 49 points today.

Illinois plays Minnesota next week after hopefully beating Iowa 6-4. I mean, I was close.

At least the backup FG kicker came to play.

Just direct snap it to Chase Brown from here on out.

At this point, that last play is the only change of pace Sitkowski should do...hand off to someone other than Chase Brown for a play.