Much has been said about Les Miles’ comments on other conferences. The further the commentor is from LSU and the SEC, the more out-of-context and more scathing the comments become. Double the hate if it’s a USC fan that is commenting.
First of all, what Miles did say:
1) I can tell you this, that they have a much easier road to travel…..They’re going to play real knockdown drag-outs with UCLA and Washington, Cal-Berk[e]ley, Stanford — some real juggernauts — and they’re going to end up, it would be my guess, in some position so if they win a game or two, that they’ll end up in the title (game). I would like that path for us.
2) I think the SEC provides much stiffer competition.
3) The Big 12 is a conference that might have two really pretty good teams, maybe four.
4) I think the Pac-10 may have one or two really good ones.
5) The ACC certainly, arguably, has some quality teams.
6) I don’t think there’s any conference out there that has as many quality teams as ours.
Ok, because of all the dickwads out there (I’m looking at you, Jim Rome) here’s what Miles did not say:
1) Miles did not say that USC is a bad football team.
2) Miles did not say that Texas, Oklahoma, Ohio State, Michigan, Cal, Notre Dame, or [insert your favorite team here] are bad football teams.
I’ll admit, his sarcastic comments were a little over the line, but he does have a point. If you look at last year’s conference winners, which tough teams did they have to play all year?
Florida: Tennessee, LSU, Auburn, Florida State, Arkansas.
Wake Forest: Florida State
Louisville: West Virginia, Rutgers*
USC: Arkansas, Cal, Notre Dame*
Ohio State: Michigan, Texas
* Not that tough
Inferences from Miles:
1) If you look at the way he says it, he’s really calling out the media, not the schools involved. Ok, so he sarcastically calls UCLA a juggernaut, which is kind of like calling Brent Shaffuh a heisman candidate, but that aside, what’s really at stake is the national championship, which is why you get coaches lobbying all the time for their causes. A fair system would have all of the conference champions play in a “playoff” which would result in a “no-bitching, no-lobbying, genuine-national-championship” instead of the beauty contest we have in place today.
The teams that play in the national championship. decided by the national press corps, which pretty much follows ESPN’s lead. Last year Florida didn’t deserve to be on the field with Ohio State, and the year before that, Texas couldn’t touch THE BEST FUCKING TEAM EVARRRRRR USC USC USC USC USC! Guess what ESPN, you suck at predicting and ranking things. I can’t believe we entrust the media to choose our champions. ESPN’s #2 team, Michigan, got shelled by USC. Again — I don’t know how to emphasise enough how much the media sucks at evaluation of similary talented teams.
Miles is really taking a swipe at the way on-field talent and teams are evaluated by the media, a swipe which they richly deserve.
2) It was pretty immature of Les to do so — but isn’t that why we love him? I mean at halftime at the Tennessee game when he almost rips the sideline reporter’s throat out stating “we’re gonna play our asses off”, isn’t that what you want to see — a little fire out of your coach? For fucks sake people, we’re not entrusting Les Miles to write peace treaties, he’s supposed to instruct a bunch of kids how to hit and run and pass and catch.
By the way, all you Les haters, this is the exact thing you criticised him for in his first year — lack of passion for the game. Make up your mind, Les hater nation.
So on to the point, counterpoint, counterpoint to the counterpoint
Stewart Mandel (USC homer, back-up USC fluffer when GameDay crew, Will Farrell not available):
“Forget for a moment the numerous, logical flaws in Miles’ diatribe (i.e., the fact the team he’s bashing beat SEC West champion Arkansas 50-14 last season). Forget for a moment the seemingly arbitrary shots at innocent bystanders Washington and Stanford. (Is Pete Carroll out there dissing Vanderbilt and Mississippi State at his booster functions?)”
Counterpoint: Miles’ argument was against strength of schedule, Mandel attacks one of LSU’s weakest foes, and an SEC opponent not on the LSU schedule. Dick.
”Yet if you know anything about LSU fans, you know the only way Miles could have played to his audience any better is if he’d broken out a baseball bat and started busting open a Nick Saban piñata.”
Counterpoint: Actually the message boards have been on fire with Miles hate on this one. Good idea on the Nick Saban Pinata though. By the way this argument has nothing to do with SOS.
”This isn’t college football’s poll era and it probably won’t be the last. Just like with Michigan and Nebraska in 1997, or Miami and Washington six years before that, the Tigers and Trojans were both officially recognized as champions.
But apparently, one trophy was not enough for LSU fans. Instead of basking in the glory of their school’s first such championship since 1958, many Tigers zealots immediately began assuaging media outlets like this one, furious that USC was stealing their thunder. Theirs — as any LSU fan will tell you in excruciating detail — was the only trophy worthy of official recognition because it was earned through the agreed upon BCS structure.”
Counterpoint: Isn’t that why we have the BCS? Stewart, you’re a homer and an asshole.
”But like a bad Roadrunner cartoon, the Trojans keep finding ways to stick it to their wanna-be tormentors, most recently stealing coveted running back recruit Joe McKnight out of the Tigers’ own New Orleans backyard (and allegedly doing so with some illicit help from former USC-turned-Saints star Reggie Bush).”
Counterpoint: We all know USC got away with cheating on this one here. Maybe he would have gone to LSU, maybe he would have gone with Alabama or Ole Miss. There’s no gaurantee in recruiting, and we needed WR’s this year more than an RB. We kept Keiland Williams last year, so it’s a mute point. Good luck to McKnight, as stated earlier on this blog, the only way he sees meaningful playing time this year is if he learns how to punt. I hope his mom likes the new house one of the boosters is going to buy her in San Diego….well, not really new, previously lived in by Reggie’s parents. Wait a minute! This dig also has nothing to do with USC’s SOS.
“We’ve heard it. We get it. We’ve put it in bold type across the cover of Sports Illustrated: The SEC is the toughest conference. Florida proved that in the title game. But it’s not like the league is indisputably head and shoulders above everyone else. Perhaps Miles needs a reminder that two of his league’s best teams last year, Arkansas and Tennessee, lost to the third- (Wisconsin) and fourth-place (Penn State) teams from the Big Ten in their bowl games. Or that the year before that, the SEC’s champion (Georgia) lost its bowl game to the Big East’s champion (West Virginia).”
Counterpoint: Miles is referring to last year and this year’s perceived schedules. Georgia / West Virginia was two years ago. Fuck off Mandel.
“Such has become a common refrain since the Trojans’ rise to dominance under Carroll: If USC played in a “real” conference, they’d lose xxx number of games. Regardless of how you feel about the Pac-10, this is a pretty idiotic sentiment seeing as the Trojans have continually beaten upper-echelon foes from those conferences under Carroll (including a 4-0 record against the SEC).”
Counterpoint: Yeah…beat Arkansas twice in a row — and then remind me who else they’ve beaten from the SEC to make it 4-0?
Mandel totally misses the point by obscuring the argument, and comparing oranges to matchsticks. LSU is 9-0 against it’s last 9 PAC-10 opponents. The only way we will solve this is by a playoff. That being said, Mandel is pompous fat ass clown, however.
Jim Rome (USC homer, part time douchebag): “Shouldn’t you win a conference title first before opening your mouth? USC is 4-0 against SEC opponents in their last four meetings”.
Counterpoint: Les was in a conference champoinship in 2004 but lost because Jamarcus Russell was injured. He didn’t make it in 2005 because Ref-gate at Auburn. LSU is 9-0 against Pac-10 opponents since 1979. Suck it, Rome. LSU would certainly have won the Pac-10 in 2006 if USC and LSU swapped places. Judging from USC’s year last year, they would have lost more than 2 games with LSU’s schedule. I think that’s a fair statement.
T Kyle King of Dawgsports(Miles hater) (note: Kyle is a blogger I admire very much and NOT a dickwad): “Stop it. Stop that nonsense right now. If you want to say the S.E.C. is the toughest conference in college football, fine; if you want to say that, this year, the league is tougher at the top than any other, there’s a pretty good case to be made for that proposition, although these things change more rapidly than one might expect.
1) This business about there being one or two or four good teams in other B.C.S. conferences, though, is just dumb…. From 2000 to 2006, six different teams won or shared the Pac-10 title in a seven-year span.Meanwhile, six of the last seven Southeastern Conference championships have been won by the league’s three dominant teams: Georgia (2002 and 2005), Florida (2000 and 2006), and L.S.U. (2001 and 2003).”
Counterpoint: Actually Kyle, the PAC-10 has no conference championship game, and if they did it would be a safe bet that USC would win. In 5 of the last 7 years, USC has shared or won in that title, the other 2 years it was Oregon. In the SEC example you gave, there was 4 different teams, equaling the ACC for diversity.
King then goes on with an ad-hominem attack against Miles: Coach Miles, who played in the Big Ten and coached in the Big 12, did neither himself nor his newfound conference affiliation any favors by running his mouth and he needs to keep his trap shut until he learns how to sound more intelligent in an interview than he looks in a baseball cap.
Counterpoint: Isn’t this what makes the offseason interesting? Yes, Miles ran his mouth — but all coaches do — it’s called lobbying. Mack Brown did it in 2005, he won the MNC. LLoyd Carr, Pete Carroll, Tommy Tubberville and Urban Meyer all lobbied for their causes last year at different points during the season, and they do it because even if you win a difficult conference, you are likely to be shut out of the championship game because you have 1 or 2 losses.
I agree with those readers that say he should win the conference before running his mouth — absolutely, but he is highlighting a problem with the system. There is no consistent and strong methodology for ranking conferences — arguably the way the MNC is set up right now, you should have the top team from the top 2 conferences play each other. That isn’t necessarily the case — look at how Auburn got shut out in 2004.
This is what Miles is shouting out against. Can you blame him?
