The NCAA, Chase Young, The State of the Big 10 - Baver Answers Colin's Questions: Rutgers Week

Colin: I read an article recently that stated schools that work with the NCAA get punished worse than schools that defy them. OSU though seems to have dodged a bullet with Chase Young...a quick response from the NCAA and OSU not needing Chase against Maryland and Rutgers. Your thoughts? 

Baver: A lot of angles here..... 1 – Could OSU have had this info long ago, and buried it until after the Wisconsin game, knowing that a potential 2-gm suspension against Maryland and Rutgers would be meaningless? That is possible. 2 – Is this that big of a deal anymore with the NCAA opening the door for athletes to be paid for their name, image & likeness come 2023? Athletes should have been able to profit from these things long ago. It’s not the biggest deal, but if you break rules that you know exist, you have to deal with some consequences. 3 – Your point....does working with the NCAA actually make matters worse? It can and has. Missouri worked with the NCAA recently regarding an academic scandal and got hammered. With a similar academic scandal, North Carolina fought back and got a slap on the hand.

In regards to Chase Young himself, he seems like a good kid that made a questionable decision. There is probably some more to the story than what was reported to the NCAA, but that’s just a guess. I think Ohio St has taken worse than it deserved from the NCAA multiple times in the past, so maybe this is just karma coming back around.

Colin: Rutgers is so bad let's just skip to another question. 

Baver: You don’t want a breakdown of the mighty Scarlet Knights?

Colin: No. Why was LSU playing single coverage press defense up two scores with only 1:30 left allowing Alabama to hit an easy 85-yard TD making the game look much closer than it really was? Is this an SEC conspiracy?

Baver: Mind boggling. You don’t have to be a genius to know that you have to keep everything in front of you on that play. Yeah, it added 85 yards to the box score and made for a misleading final score. At least Bama still fell out of the top 4.

Colin: Meanwhile the Gophers rowed the boat and Sparty had an epic meltdown, what is the state of the Big Ten at this point? 

Baver: The Gophers are 81 pts better than the Vegas spread over their last 6 gms, covering all 6 spreads. But they are a dog at Iowa this week, and Kinnick Stadium is not an easy place to play, as Ohio St can attest to. Minny is obviously in the Playoff if it wins out. Question becomes if Minny, PSU or Ohio St win the B10 title game, but finish with 1 loss...do they get in? I think Ohio St probably would...not sure about Minny or the Nits. This despite the fact that every conference power ranking I have seen this year has the Big Ten 2nd behind the SEC in overall strength. Is the committee going to leave the Big Ten out of the playoff for a 3rd year in a row? I know Sparty and Ohio St embarrassed the conference in the 2015 & 2016 playoffs, but you can’t keep leaving the 2nd best conference out of a 4-team playoff. 

Sparty and the Huskers have disappointed, while Michigan has been Michigan. But Ohio St has been on another planet, Indiana has their best team in decades, Minnesota is 9-0, and Illinois has made huge strides. I’d say it’s a pretty good overall year for the B10.

Colin: As far as CFB rankings, it seems Clemson is a lock but all the other teams have serious work to do. How would you rank them this week?

Baver: I’d have LSU #1, Ohio St #2, and Clemson #3, same as the committee. #4 is a tough call. Oregon has the 2nd best overall schedule strength of the top 10 teams (behind LSU), so as of today, I’d give the Ducks the benefit of the doubt for the #4 slot. With as dominant as Bama has been (in games where they didn’t face LSU), I see little choice but ranking them #5 right now. But the Tide almost can’t move into the top 4 without a truckload of upsets. I would have Penn St at #6 based on a very strong overall SOS. 

Colin: I'm going to be in Pittsburgh this weekend where sports betting is legal, what games and lines should I be paying attention to? 

Baver: I’ve got one if you can hold your nose at the betting window. I still don’t think Michigan is all that, but Sparty is getting close to rock bottom, and is decimated with injuries. They are going to get waxed in Ann Arbor Saturday. I see most books currently have that line at UM -13½.  If you can get Michigan laying less than 2 TDs, that is a steal. 

Next best play I think is Indiana getting 14½ at Penn St. Horrible situations spot for the Nits, sandwiched between Minnesota and Ohio St. 

  

--Brent Baver and Colin Gawel

Breaking News! Big $ Files Browns Story From Unnamed Bar / Tailgate on North Coast.

The North Coast Posse are considered a top five Browns follow by the actual Cleveland Browns. Follow on Twitter @northcoastposse

Browns finally got a home win versus the Bills. Did you see any signs of improvement? What is still concerning?

In a vacuum where progressive commercials and SI covers do not exist, I would say a simple eye test points to improvement from 2018-2019. Last year in Oct/Nov, teams like the Chargers, Chiefs , Steelers, and Texans were flat out curb stomping Baker and the Browns. The Browns have clearly been more competitive this year against winning teams (even if the score doesn't always reflect it.. With that said....

What is concerning is that these "moral victories" could of been actual wins if the coaching and strategy matched the jump in roster talent. Freddie continues to coach on the fly, both in terms of weekly prep and in game situations. If he doesn't commit to a heavy run first philosophy against Pittsburgh, it will be abundantly clear that his naivety + stubborn nature make him an awful fit for NFL head coach.

It’s a short week coming into a “rivalry” game with the Steelers Thursday. Is this an advantage to either team and how important is it that the Browns win this game against a Steeler team with no Big Ben, AB or Levon Bell?


Piggybacking on the last answer, having less time for Fred to install nonsense is a complete advantage to the Browns. Here is to hoping that the super short week neuters his ego so that he will be forced to rely on the teams strengths and talents (ie run first, down hill football)

If you’d like to add my prediction, I’m staying positive and hoping the Browns ride the victory wave. The CH-unt combo pays big dividends: Browns 28 Steelers 14

Did the Committee get the first ranking right? LSU at Bama? Penn St at Minny? Baver Answers Colin's questions - Terp Week

Colin: Bucks #1 in the first playoff ranking. I know your own top 4 for the playoff ended up being the same as the actual ranking.... meanwhile the AP and coaches’ polls had OSU #3 and #4. Your thoughts?

Baver: Right now, Ohio St deserves the top spot over LSU. They Buckeyes have dominated opponents more so than the other top dogs, and their 8-game schedule has been tougher than that of every other undefeated team. Bama and Clemson have similar SOS rankings, but Bama hasn’t been challenged like Clemson was against a bad UNC team. So yeah, OSU at #1, LSU at #2, and Bama at #3 makes sense. And with Penn St’s wins over Iowa and Michigan, that got them in the #4 slot ahead of Clemson...again, the right call by the committee. 

The committee has never really cared where the AP and coaches rank teams. Clemson is top 4 in both the AP and Coaches Poll, and I think the committee asked each other, “Why? Because they won the title last year?” We are two months into the 2019 season....it’s the 2019 body of work that should be evaluated, which is why the committee waits until November to release a ranking. 

Of course, the LSU-Bama winner will be #1 next week, so OSU’s #1 ranking will be short lived, and Clemson will be top 4 next week after they roll over NC State.

Colin: Seems to be lots of chatter in Columbus that as long as Ohio State wins the Big Ten Championship, they could survive a loss at Michigan and still make the playoffs. Is that wishful thinking?

Baver: That’s definitely a possibility if that’s OSU’s only loss. I think a 12-1 OSU team would still have a decent chance of trumping a 12-1 conference winner from the Big 12 or Pac 12.

Colin: This Buckeye team was on fire heading into the 2nd bye week of the season. Is there any fear that the time off followed by two inferior opponents will take the edge off how well they have been playing? 

Baver: I fear that this Buckeye team could have peaked too soon, but I don’t think the layoff or inferior competition is too much concern. And when they get supplanted from their #1 slot by the Bama-LSU winner, that should provide a bit of motivation.

Colin: Last year the turtle torched the bullets to the tune of 51 points. Do you think they studied that film on the break and what should we expect this year? 

Baver: They may have spent some time on last year’s game film, but a year ago it was Greg Schiano’s defense against Matt Canada’s offense. Those guys have moved on, and OSU’s margin of victory in this one will be much closer to Vegas’ 43½-pt spread than OSU’s 1-pt win at Maryland last November. This game has blowout written all over it; I’ve got it Ohio St 55 Maryland 7.

Colin: Around the Big Ten, is this the biggest home football game in Minnesota history? Can the Gophers get it done? Does it even matter? 

Baver: It’s the biggest game I can remember. You have to go back to 1941 to find a Gopher team that started 8-0. PJ Fleck has done an unbelievable job so far, with Minnesota’s ascent being similar to the quick rise WMU saw under Fleck in Kalamazoo. Does it matter? Minnesota’s SOS rating is somewhere around 80th best in the country, so you have to take that 8-0 record with a grain of salt. I like Penn St laying the 6½ here. Too much talent differential.

Colin: Meanwhile Joe Burrow vs Saban in Tuscaloosa this Saturday at 3:30. Thoughts on that game and playoff implications for the loser.

Baver: The average total points scored per game over the last 5 Bama-LSU games is 30.6, yet the over/under for this game is 63. LSU finally has a big-time offense, and they’ve tailored it to match Burrow’s skill set. And this Tide defense hasn’t been up to typical Bama standards with injuries taking their toll. Will Tua play, and if so, will be slowed by that ankle? Obviously, that’s key. Bama’s wide receivers are far better than any other group in the country, and I think that’s also key in this one. But I don’t think I’d lay 6½ here unless I was pretty sure Tua was close to 100%. 

I saw a prop bet a few days ago giving odds on the loser of the LSU-Bama game making the playoff. The odds basically translated to the loser of this game having a 30% chance of making the playoff. I don’t necessarily have a problem with that happening, especially if we see 2-loss teams winning power conference title games.

—Brent Baver and Colin Gawel

 

 

Movie Review: Western Stars / Bruce Springsteen - by Ricki C.

Okay, first off, it’s not exactly a state secret that Bruce Springsteen is one of my top three Rock & Roll Heroes of all time, the other two being – for those of you scoring at home – Elliott Murphy and Pete Townshend. (And Townshend has been useless to me from pretty much 1973 on, right after Quadrophenia, and all of The Who’s successive letdowns, including this year’s 5,237th Farewell Tour.)

But I digress………

Even though Bruce is my hero, there are always letdowns lurking on the winding path of rock & roll, and Springsteen’s Western Stars record is certainly one of them. I fully admit I couldn’t possibly have heard the album for the first time under worse circumstances, on the Sirius/XM radio E Street channel during a long car ride. Dave Marsh and some other Sirius stiff played the record all the way through with commentary every three songs or so, the commentary running largely to, “Oh, those songs were SO wonderful, showing the influence of Jimmy Webb while retaining Bruce’s genius for lyric writing; Oh, THAT set of songs was SO magnificent, evoking the mysteries of the landscape of the Southwest, mirrored through Bruce’s genius;” and, finally, “Oh, that closing group of songs were THE BEST songs ever written in the Sunshine Pop style of 1960’s California, only these were better because they grew from the mind & soul of Bruce’s genius.”

Truthfully, all I heard on that first car radio listen – and subsequent listening’s at home – was a fairly melodically boring record and not ONE great line of Springsteen lyrics. And don’t get me wrong, I FULLY appreciate and love that Bruce tried something different with this album – a unified set of songs, a sort of meditation on stalled stardom & The Southwest – I just think he pretty much dropped the ball on the TUNES, ya know?

Which brings us to the movie that premiered a coupla Friday’s ago: My thought was, “GREAT, I can see Bruce and some musicians with an accompanying string section play the songs LIVE, live is always the best way to experience Springsteen music.” But by halfway through the film (and believe me boys & girls, it’s a FILM, not a MOVIE; important distinction, MOVIES are oftentimes fun, films are almost uniformly boring) I found myself dozing off in my comfy Gateway Film Center seat. The songs – and, problematically, the Bruce commentary accompanying the songs – were just as boring live as they were on record. And all of those stock cinematic shots of horses running majestically through Southwest desert landscapes didn’t exactly liven things up.

Then, at the end, as a coup de grace, Bruce & the band undercut the entire premise of the Western Stars concept by essaying a cover of “Rhinestone Cowboy,” the Glen Campbell hit from 1975. THAT was when it hit me, “Damn, this lightweight Larry Weiss middle-of-the-road pap-pop tune from the mid-70’s is BETTER IN EVERY WAY than ANY of the songs from Western Stars: WAY more melodically memorable; sharper – if not exactly BETTER – lyrics; and far more FUN than anything else Bruce had trotted out in the previous 60 minutes.” And “Rhinestone Cowboy” is a TERRIBLE song that I turn off every time it comes on any of the oldie radio stations I have programmed in my car (and there are – I fully admit – a LOT of oldie radio stations programmed in my car).

One of the first – and, retrospectively, best – rock & roll lessons Willie Phoenix taught me when we met way back in 1978 was, “Never end a set of original songs with a cover, because then you’re just admitting you couldn’t come up with anything better than something that already existed.” I wish Springsteen had honored that sentiment in Western Stars.

Bruce, I’m eagerly lookin’ forward to What’s Next. – Ricki C. / November 1st, 2019.

a couple of videos to illustrate my point…….

I really believe either one of the GREAT 1960’s Jimmy Webb/Glen Campbell collaborations “Galveston” or “By The Time I Get to Phoenix” would have illustrated the “Sunshine Pop” connections to Western Stars better than this easy-listening pop song, and still would have kept the Western theme going.

Look ‘em up, cats & kittens.

Me and Bob Dylan - by Colin Gawel

Listen while you read! Spotify playlist of a recent Bob Dylan setlist


Bob Dylan is playing Mershon Auditorium, November 4th, here in Columbus.

So this Monday I am seeing Bob Dylan for the third time. Not to sound morbid, but odds are this is probably my final Dylan show. While I am a fan of the music and the man, I’m an even bigger fan of the myth. No single Bob record has impacted me the way some Springsteen records have, but Bob’s book Chronicles and the movie No Direction Home have both had a profound impact on my thinking as person and an - ahem - artist, if you will. 

In fact, as I am writing this at Colin’s Coffee between serving customers, I dug out my personal copy of Chronicles from the shelves. I used to underline parts of the book the way I suppose other folks might underline Biblical passages or whatever. The only other book I have done this with is Woody Guthrie - A Life, written by “a fella named Joe Klein” as famously plugged on Springsteen’s Live 75-85 collection. Woody begat Bob begat Bruce begat..….?

I guess the connection between those two books are that Woody and Bob are spiritual searchers. They never rest. They move forward even when - or especially when - they aren’t sure which direction is best. I guess the lesson I take away from this is in two parts: 1) Never stop trying, and 2) Trying something, even if it fails, is usually better than being scared to try anything at all. 

Or, to put it another way: 1) It would be a lot easier to NOT write this essay. 2)There is a good chance it won’t be very good anyway. But just engaging in the creative effort justifies the effort no matter what the result. That is my takeaway from Bob Dylan. 

You’ll notice I used the word “usually” two paragraphs up. This kind of mentality does open the door for some spectacular failures. As Ricki C. often says, “Bob Dylan has made more bad records than good records,” and I suppose he might be right. But still, that is what you get with Bob Dylan. He is on HIS journey and you are welcome to follow along. Or not. His live shows are the same way. Springsteen may drag you through the weeds, but eventually you end up at a shiny city on the hill. Bob might drag you through the weeds and leave you in a dark swamp. Then the house lights come on. 

Here are a  couple of passages I underlined in the Chronicles book. These are both from the 1986 tour when Dylan was backed by Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers:

Tom was at the top of his game and I was at the bottom of mine. My own songs had become strangers to me. The mirror had swung around and I could see the future - an old actor fumbling in garbage cans outside the theater of past triumphs.

A bit later on the same tour:

The shows with Petty finished up in December, and I saw that instead of being stranded somewhere at the end of the story, I was actually in the prelude to the beginning of another one.

I like that. I want to think like that. 

As for the movie No Direction Home, in my opinion the best rock documentary ever made, it gave me the historical background on why Bob Dylan means so much to people older than myself. I wasn’t around to experience the 60’s with the times a changin’ and then changin’ again when Bob went electric. The Beatles might have been the big bang for rock n roll but Bob plugging in made a loud sound too. Or so I learned watching this movie. Growing up I knew Bob Dylan was important but I didn’t really know why. The music I heard never seemed to justify the hype. When he appeared with Keef and Woody at Live Aid I was excited because it was Bob Dylan making an appearance, but the music just didn’t move the needle for me. (As a kid) I vividly remember buying my first Dylan record at Used Kids when I was 14 or 15 years old. I said to Ron House, “I should probably buy a Bob Dylan record, right?” He came out from behind the counter, fished through the bins for about 30 seconds, handed me Highway 61 Revisited and said, “This would be good for someone like you.” Not knowing what that meant I promptly bought that record along with Dokken Under Lock and Key. 

And I suppose I identify with Bob on some vague Midwestern/Great Lakes level. When he talks, I just get it. I’m paraphrasing here but at one point in the movie he talks about growing up in the North and how the weather teaches you to think abstractly. When it’s hot, it’s eventually going to be cold, and when it’s cold it will eventually get hot.  I embrace that and every once and a while I’d like to think it filters down to songs I’ve written like “Superior” and “Cold Weather.” 

Anyway, that’s the story of myself and Bob Dylan. - Colin Gawel

(By the way, the first time staff writer Ricki C. saw Bob Dylan live was before most of our Pencil Storm readers were even born; read all about it here in Growing Old With R&R: Shows I Saw in the 60’s, part one; Bob Dylan & the Hawks, 11/19/1965)