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Last time I checked, the Big 10 doesn't have to do that-they just love tradition, and that's what they choose to do. They could play next week just like all the other conferences are if they choose to-blame the Big 10, not the NCAA.

I do not foresee a scenario other than the voters don't want a repeat in the title game that ND jumps Michigan. I can see that scenario playing out because we have seen it play out over and over again in college football. Every time we have a situation like this plays out, a late loss hurts worse than a head to head loss early in the season does. It may not be right, but it almost always happens that way-so I wouldn't be surprised if it happened again. I think it's viable because it is precedent. Two quick examples: 1993-ND/Florida State-each with 1 loss, FSU's loss was to ND-FSU wins this matchup. 2000-FSU/Miami/Washington. All finished with 1 loss. Washington beat Miami, and Miami beat FSU, but FSU goes to the title game. If ND jumps Michigan, it will simply be following the same principle that college football has always followed. At the same time, I wouldn't be unhappy with the breaking of that principle either, so I can see it going either way.

I would agree with that. If USC wins out, I think it should be Ohio State-USC. If Florida, ND, or Arkansas do-then it could be them, or it could be Michigan-both ways are reasonable.

Not exactly. If WVU wins out, their only loss will be to Louisville on the road. They'll have a legitimate case. As would Louisville for that matter. A legitimate case for what? :-k The National Title game. WVU over a school like Michigan, USC, or ND for the national title game? They wouldn't even be in the discussion. They lost a close game, on the road, to another very good opponent in Louisville. They should most definitely be in the discussion. I know Cuse has said it but I'm going to repeat it: the complete underestimation and disrespect for the Big East by some people is insane. The only problem is WV's lack of big wins. All the other teams will have at least 2 big wins over marquee teams if they win out (Michigan over ND, Wisconsin) (USC over Arkansas, Cal, ND, and a good win against Nebraska), ND (GT, USC). WV has a good win against Maryland, and a good win over Rutgers, but those caliber of wins simply doesn't stack up with the others, especially when you consider that WV only has a couple wins against the next tier of teams (teams like Pitt for WV, or Penn State and Purdue for ND, etc) that the others have a few more wins aginst.

It should be a good game. I hope ND can stay in it. Good luck to USC next week.

There's a tendency to try and quantify all of this with stats and whatever. I just think the Heisman is won and lost based on those few big pressure games where the player plays----unless he simply blows it against lesser opponents. Troy has had 2 this year and shined in both. Quinn had 1 and didn't look all that great, for whatever reason. Even if he plays lights-out against USC, they aren't #2 and it won't be that huge mega-game that the Texas and Michigan games were for Troy Smith. Oh, that's a perfectly logical argument-but ND has played the better defenses and a better schedule, and I'm just responding to the statement that Ohio State had better in each of those. BTW, Quinn wasn't all that bad for a player running for his life the entire Michigan game (2 INT's weren't his fault, only 1 was a bad decision or bad throw). I do understand though that his game was not nearly as good as Smith's games-but I do think Soccers argument that ND has had no offensive line pretty much all year and yet Quinn has done this has credence also. Remember that year when Woodson won the Heisman over Peyton? Peyton was the favorite to win it, but then Woodson was having this great year-----and in the biggest regular season game, he comes up big again. I think Peyton takes it if not for that final big game (I think it was OSU too). For better or for worse, that's the Heisman in a nutshell. Tennessee fans still burn up over that one. I know-I heard the complaining about that one just today from a Tennessee fan :D

There's a tendency to try and quantify all of this with stats and whatever. I just think the Heisman is won and lost based on those few big pressure games where the player plays----unless he simply blows it against lesser opponents. Troy has had 2 this year and shined in both. Quinn had 1 and didn't look all that great, for whatever reason. Even if he plays lights-out against USC, they aren't #2 and it won't be that huge mega-game that the Texas and Michigan games were for Troy Smith. Oh, that's a perfectly logical argument-but ND has played the better defenses and a better schedule, and I'm just responding to the statement that Ohio State had better in each of those. BTW, Quinn wasn't all that bad for a player running for his life the entire Michigan game (2 INT's weren't his fault, only 1 was a bad decision or bad throw). I do understand though that his game was not nearly as good as Smith's games-but I do think Soccers argument that ND has had no offensive line pretty much all year and yet Quinn has done this has credence also.

Before the OSU/UM game I agreed with you. Quinn's stats are still better. More yards, more TD's, same # of INT's and Smith doesn't have the benefit of a bunch of rushing yards and TD's like he did last year. Quinn's been the better QB this year. And I'm not exactly one to hand out compliments to ND or their players very often. It's not a stats race---never has been. Quinn had a prime shot to show he was the Heisman favorite against Michigan in his own building, and they got slaughtered. Quinn looked overmatched at times. Smith has faced down two #2 challengers and looked real good against both of them. Smith is the clear Heisman winner IMO. I doubt the voting will be particularly close. Smith had 2 good games and a bunch of eh/crap games. Quinn had one bad game and a bunch of solid/good games. Do you know how many games Smith has been held under 200 yards passing? 6. Quinn? 0. Want to talk about who is more important to his team? It's Quinn and it's not even close. Quinn has to play well because ND's defense isn't that good. OSU has one of the top defenses in the nation. Coming into today, Notre Dame's defense has allowed 67.5 more ypg than OSU. Offensively, OSU has a far better running game than ND and is averaging 65.5 more rushing ypg than ND. Ohio State has a better team than ND and Smith doesn't have to do as much to keep his team in the game. Quinn is a better player, has better stats, and is more important to his team than Quinn is. To me, that means the Heisman winner should be from South Bend. And, as with many of my Brady Quinn posts, and to annoy ndistops, I have one more thing to say. Quinn is going to look good in Silver and Black next year. Strength. of. Schedule. Which in every SOS ranking (in all the computers for example) favors Notre Dame-so your point is what? Then replace "schedule" with "defenses faced". What good defenses did Ohio State play that ND didn't? Remember that ND played Penn State, Michigan, and Michigan State. Here's the rest of Ohio State's opponents: Northern Illinois, Texas, Cincy, Iowa, Bowling Green, Indiana, Minnesota, Illinois, Northwestern. Who of those opponents are better defenses then teams like Georgia Tech, UCLA, or upcoming USC? I can only see 2 or 3 of those teams that even have decent to good defenses.

Before the OSU/UM game I agreed with you. Quinn's stats are still better. More yards, more TD's, same # of INT's and Smith doesn't have the benefit of a bunch of rushing yards and TD's like he did last year. Quinn's been the better QB this year. And I'm not exactly one to hand out compliments to ND or their players very often. It's not a stats race---never has been. Quinn had a prime shot to show he was the Heisman favorite against Michigan in his own building, and they got slaughtered. Quinn looked overmatched at times. Smith has faced down two #2 challengers and looked real good against both of them. Smith is the clear Heisman winner IMO. I doubt the voting will be particularly close. Smith had 2 good games and a bunch of eh/crap games. Quinn had one bad game and a bunch of solid/good games. Do you know how many games Smith has been held under 200 yards passing? 6. Quinn? 0. Want to talk about who is more important to his team? It's Quinn and it's not even close. Quinn has to play well because ND's defense isn't that good. OSU has one of the top defenses in the nation. Coming into today, Notre Dame's defense has allowed 67.5 more ypg than OSU. Offensively, OSU has a far better running game than ND and is averaging 65.5 more rushing ypg than ND. Ohio State has a better team than ND and Smith doesn't have to do as much to keep his team in the game. Quinn is a better player, has better stats, and is more important to his team than Quinn is. To me, that means the Heisman winner should be from South Bend. And, as with many of my Brady Quinn posts, and to annoy ndistops, I have one more thing to say. Quinn is going to look good in Silver and Black next year. We'll see when the voting comes down. I'm telling you it's not going to be close soccer. I would agree with that. No matter what the debate about what should happen ends up deciding, what will happen is that Troy will win easily.

Before the OSU/UM game I agreed with you. Quinn's stats are still better. More yards, more TD's, same # of INT's and Smith doesn't have the benefit of a bunch of rushing yards and TD's like he did last year. Quinn's been the better QB this year. And I'm not exactly one to hand out compliments to ND or their players very often. It's not a stats race---never has been. Quinn had a prime shot to show he was the Heisman favorite against Michigan in his own building, and they got slaughtered. Quinn looked overmatched at times. Smith has faced down two #2 challengers and looked real good against both of them. Smith is the clear Heisman winner IMO. I doubt the voting will be particularly close. Smith had 2 good games and a bunch of eh/crap games. Quinn had one bad game and a bunch of solid/good games. Do you know how many games Smith has been held under 200 yards passing? 6. Quinn? 0. Want to talk about who is more important to his team? It's Quinn and it's not even close. Quinn has to play well because ND's defense isn't that good. OSU has one of the top defenses in the nation. Coming into today, Notre Dame's defense has allowed 67.5 more ypg than OSU. Offensively, OSU has a far better running game than ND and is averaging 65.5 more rushing ypg than ND. Ohio State has a better team than ND and Smith doesn't have to do as much to keep his team in the game. Quinn is a better player, has better stats, and is more important to his team than Quinn is. To me, that means the Heisman winner should be from South Bend. And, as with many of my Brady Quinn posts, and to annoy ndistops, I have one more thing to say. Quinn is going to look good in Silver and Black next year. Strength. of. Schedule. Which in every SOS ranking (in all the computers for example) favors Notre Dame-so your point is what?

I think that was an incomplete pass because by the time he caught the ball he was already being driven back by the Cal guy and never made a "football move". Because of that, he had to hold the ball all the way to the ground in order for it to be a complete pass, and he didn't.

It's 10-0 Cincinnati over Rutgers right now-early 2nd quarter.

This season: Wells: .303/.357/.542/.899 Barrett: .307/.368/.517/.885 Three year splits: Wells: .282/.338/.493/.831 Barrett: .289/.349/.494/.843 How much of an improvement would Wells over Barrett be? I understand that Wells would play more games than Bare, but Blanco/Soto would not provide comparable production to Pierre. Blanco is just bad offensively and Soto is unproven without much of an upside. Plus, Wells would only be under this team's control for a year unless he gets an extension. Wells has age on his side and his three year stats skewed by an injury in 2005. more than likely his star is rising while Barrett's is fading. and the fact that Barrett is a catcher is a huge factor in determining who has more impact on the offense. who would you rather have, Wells for 160 or Barrett for 120 and Blanco for 42. 120 games per year the offense would be comparable, but it's not hard to see that the Cubs offense would be significantly better in those 40 games per year with Wells instead of Hank. I personally think it reasonable that Blanco and Soto combine for a .315/.410 line. Blanco is bad, but so is Pierre. their OPS has been virtually identical the past two years. Soto has put up a .350ish OBP in every level of minor league play and his ability to draw a walk won't go away. he also has more pop than Pierre. Plus they won't be up at the top of the lineup making outs, they will be at the bottom of the lineup making outs. I don't see your point about control of Wells because the Cubs only have control of Barrett for one more year too. The one thing I disagree with is that Soto has more pop than Pierre-Pierre has a very slight edge over their last 4 years SLG percentage (but they are close). The rest of your post I agree with (other than maybe being a little optimistic on the Blanco/Soto platoon). If the Cubs are not ready to give Barrett an extension after this season, then maybe they should trade him for a player who they are ready to sign to an extension.

good. i would much rather have 4 years of drew than 5-6 of soriano. I dont see why everyone thinks we can only have one or the other. With a $115 Million payroll, there is no reason we cant have both. We can, but that would leave us only about 5 million for pitching to try to fill 2 spots.

But if contact is made and the defender has their back to the play, they are going to call it every time. There was contact? It looked like they brushed hands at best. He prevented Manningham from coming to the ball. That's interference. not if the Manningham doesn't come back for the ball and there is contact, unless he fact guards, which he didn't do. He didn't face guard him? What he did pretty much defines face guarding, he wasn't looking for the ball and making a play on the receiver. The ball hit him in the shoulder to boot. faceguarding has to do with the hands, ie. putting your hands up trying obstruct the view of the receiver without turning around and looking for the ball. the DB never got his hands up. in fact, the ball hit the DB in the hand down by the waste. I'm looking at it on Tivo, and that's exactly how it happened. Faceguarding has to do with looking at the receiver and never looking at the ball. You aren't looking to make a play on the ball you are looking to prevent the wide receiver from making a play on the ball. He never looked back. Agreed, you can't look at the receiver only and touch him with the ball in the air. It was a good call. Great game by OSU, and Michigan also. Not sure how the title game picture will shape up, but I question whether USC/Ark/ND/Rutgers would be able to deliver as good a game as Michigan would. So I wouldn't mind seeing a rematch---though alot depends on these other big games coming up. The title game will likely come down to the voters-Michigan will almost certainly still be the top 1 loss team in the computers (with the possible exception of USC by the end of the season). Unless the voters push them too far down, they will probably have a re-match. My guess is that USC and possibly Florida have a chance to go, but it all depends on how far some people want to drop them in the polls.

This Purdue-Indiana game is hilarious. It's 7-3 Purdue, and each team has 4 turnovers so far. That is not a misprint, there have been 8 turnovers in the first half with just over 3 minutes to go in the half. That doesn't even count the Indiana blocked punt that set up Purdue's only TD. I wonder what the record is for combined turnovers in a game is.

I have bitter feelings towards the Big 10-Rose Bowl tie in. Cost PSU a shot at the NC in 1994 Does the sting of that year make you happier that the BCS is in place, and at least you'd get your shot now?

On 6/21 he gave up 4 runs in the 1st (36.00 ERA), 9 runs in the first 2 innings (40.50 ERA), and a total of 13 in 5 innings (23.40 ERA) -- keeping him in did him a favor in the ERA department. On 7/19, his ERA after each inning was 18.00, 22.50, 18.00, 18.00, 18.00, and it jumped to 21.60 by pitching into the 6th. An exception is not warranted. You may as well take out his best 2 starts. When you suck, you suck. EDIT: You almost got me -- that 2nd game was actually on 7/18. He posted an ERA of 0.00 on 7/19 It may have done him a favor in his ERA for that day-but normally he probably would have been taken out after 6 runs or so-and 7 more in 4 innings does not help out his entire years ERA at all. Actually, yes it does. How did the extra 7 runs in 4 innings help out his year's ERA? Because it was inflated by giving up 6 runs in 1 inning. Say it starts at 4, goes up to 5.5 after getting shelled in the first inning or so. Instead of being taken out, he stays in 4 more innings giving up a run or two an inning, and his season's ERA ends up at around 5. No-the 6 runs would take it from 4 to 5.5, and then the 7 runs in the next 4 innings would take it up to around 6. It wouldn't rise as fast, but the total year's ERA would still continue rising. 7 runs in 4 innings is never going to drop a 5.50 ERA for the season, no matter what the person did the inning before.

On 6/21 he gave up 4 runs in the 1st (36.00 ERA), 9 runs in the first 2 innings (40.50 ERA), and a total of 13 in 5 innings (23.40 ERA) -- keeping him in did him a favor in the ERA department. On 7/19, his ERA after each inning was 18.00, 22.50, 18.00, 18.00, 18.00, and it jumped to 21.60 by pitching into the 6th. An exception is not warranted. You may as well take out his best 2 starts. When you suck, you suck. EDIT: You almost got me -- that 2nd game was actually on 7/18. He posted an ERA of 0.00 on 7/19 It may have done him a favor in his ERA for that day-but normally he probably would have been taken out after 6 runs or so-and 7 more in 4 innings does not help out his entire years ERA at all. Actually, yes it does. How did the extra 7 runs in 4 innings help out his year's ERA?

Westbrook's profile is much more groundball and anti-HR than Marquis'. Given 100 chances to choose between the two, I would choose Westbrook 100 times. That said, I wouldn't trade Murton for him. But, if we're talking about some subset of Wuertz, Ohman, Novoa, Cedeno, Marshall, Guzman, Mateo, Moore, Patterson, Gallagher, then I'm all for it. I would trade some of the bullpen arms for Westbrook and probably somebody like Marshall or Mateo-then again, I wouldn't be upset though if we signed Marquis if we got him for somewhat cheap either (or if we did both). It all depends what the market is, and it's sometimes hard to tell how teams value these types of players. I think Westbrook is the better bet to put up a solid year, but I'm not sure exactly how much better of a bet that is.

On 6/21 he gave up 4 runs in the 1st (36.00 ERA), 9 runs in the first 2 innings (40.50 ERA), and a total of 13 in 5 innings (23.40 ERA) -- keeping him in did him a favor in the ERA department. On 7/19, his ERA after each inning was 18.00, 22.50, 18.00, 18.00, 18.00, and it jumped to 21.60 by pitching into the 6th. An exception is not warranted. You may as well take out his best 2 starts. When you suck, you suck. EDIT: You almost got me -- that 2nd game was actually on 7/18. He posted an ERA of 0.00 on 7/19 It may have done him a favor in his ERA for that day-but normally he probably would have been taken out after 6 runs or so-and 7 more in 4 innings does not help out his entire years ERA at all. The probably better comparison to make it fair for Marquis is to take out his two worst starts and his two best starts and to see what his average was then. I bet it's still better than his total ERA, but still pretty bad. As people were saying last night though, Marquis is simply Westbrook who had one awful year.

I think Leftwich got a raw deal in Jacksonville, and I think if he does end up not playing another game in a Jaguars uniform, he'll have the opportunity to start elsewhere. He's no Joey Harrington, come on. You know, some people I was watching the Giants game with started complaining about Grossman...all I could think about was how much more confident I feel with Grossman at the helm than a Kyle Orton, Chad Hutchinson, Jonathon Quinn, etc. Some [expletive] media type person said something like: "Kyle Orton did what he was supposed to do, not lose games. Grossman can lose you games" God, I wish there was some emoticon to express my reaction to that. I'd probably take Joey Harrington over Leftwich. I think Leftwich still has a chance to resurrect his career, but it's going to be hard. Colts fans are hoping Garrard struggles big-time the next two weeks so they'll put Leftwich back in to face us. The thing with Leftwich is he's pretty immobile, and he's not very accurate with his throws. That makes it so he makes some good plays down the field, but he gives up many big plays to the defense in the form of sacks and turnovers. He doesn't make enough good plays to make up for the bad plays on a week to week basis.

Same for me: as much as it hurts, let's go Michigan and let's go USC tomorrow! I think Ohio State and USC will probably win, but the difference between the teams is so slight that the games could really turn out in just about every different way possible.

The only thing that scares me about those years? In some years, his home/away splits are decently even. In 2004 and 2006 (as you said, his 2 pretty good years), here they are 2004 Home: 7-2, 2.37 ERA Away: 7-7, 4.13 ERA 2006 Home-7-4, 2.88 ERA Away-8-6, 5.40 ERA That scares me a little bit about him.

I'd be fine with this, but it better get a true #2 starter in return if they do trade him. If they are looking at trading him now though, he must not be in their long-term plans, so I'd rather trade him this offseason if we can get good value for him rather then simply lose him next off-season.