2007-2008 NCAA Football
 

its about damn time! starts tonight with the majority of the games on saturday. who is your pick to win the bcs?

Brother;
I had started a thread a few weeks ago (here: http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums/sh...78#post1497078 )

But since this is newer we can go with this.
If there is a Mod lurking around, please merge them

Matt Flynn is one of my very good friends from back home.

......took LSU tonight at -18.

The Knights won tonight.
Now lets go BLUE!!!

I'm a little pissed. Apparently a few of the games, including the one on Saturday for Michigan, are going to be broadcast on this Big 10 network. WTF. Pretty much NO ONE has this network.

My Golden Hurricane Rolled :cool:

This is a great read, if you have some spare time (long):

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/etick...t&lid=tab2pos1

As for the BCS - BOOMER SOONER !

i really thought the LSU game was going to be close for a while

LSU defense looks good as always. Offense wasn't fantastic, but it'll get better.

I feel bad for MSU's D because they really had to take the loss created by the offense.

I think LSU will be good and be right in the SEC championship mix, but I think they'll have a tough time making it into the BCS championship game (same goes for all the SEC teams this year).

LSU's defense is so good it's scary.

I knew the list of people who have this network was exclusive when the sideline reporter said my name during a report.

Seriously though, F'ing Michigan, way to go, blowing the season on the first day. :(

I agree, sort of, with you.
Was at the Blood bank where there are no TV's so missed the game.
I read this:
http://www.mgoblue.com/document_disp...ument_id=25213
and still do not understand what happened.

All one can say is "On any giving day..........."

Like you said.... any given day.

The sad part of it is.... most of us here in Michigan didn't get to see the game. And I really feel sorry for the Appalachian State fans who had their biggest win ever yet didn't have a chance to see it live. $$$$ the big ten network. My alma mater has won four of the last five national titles in D-II football..... does that mean they could beat Michigan too?:confused:

W.T.F.

BTN a jinx? Lol maybe. The game was stupid. Oh I loved the play they missed because the fucking camera was showing the crowd. Nice job assholes.

They said your name? Lol!

Well, I know the producer and his daughter goes to Michigan. Maybe that's who you were seeing. His son goes to Penn State, so maybe you can miss a play there, too.

Kidding.

He's actually a great producer. I used to do NBC NFL football with him. He was Executive Producer of CBS Sports and ran TV production for the Atlanta Olympic games. I don't know who is directing the games, but it was more likely his fault if a play was missed.

Now,

The Big Ten Network is the second of many of its type (they act like the first, but it ain't true) that will be springing up -- I work for the first which covers the Mountain West Conference. We just passed our first anniversary yesterday.

The SEC will probably be next, followed by a lot of others.

The conferences want to control their own destiny in terms of how many games are televised, and what time they're played.

In terms of carriage, we have the same problem as BTN, but in reverse. We are on cable in all of our markets, but don't have a national satellite deal. BTN has the satellite carriage, but very few cable deals.

The truth is that you (global you) probably have more power in this than we do. Call your cable company or satellite provider and request (OK, demand) that they carry our networks instead of 58 alpha numeric channels or shopping services.

Also, just in case you were too young or have very short memories, remember that ESPN and the FSN regionals all had the same problems when they launched. Cable and Satellite systems deal with supply and demand. You demand, and sooner or later they'll supply.

Finally, my youngest sister-in-law in Detroit and her son in Texas are undoubtedly in mourning tonight after the Michigan debacle.

I hope Ann Arbor survives the night without being burned to the ground.

Well, you know what I say:

Let's go FLORIDA GATORS!!!!

Thank you Michigan for helping everyone to forget about OU-Boise State.

As a former OU Dad, I can agree with that, but at least everyone around here felt like Boise State was "for real" and had a legitimate chance last year.

Appalachian State certainly wasn't on my radar scope to upset Michigan, even with their impressive lower division national championships.

What I hope is that this kind of game will get some attention in the big conference schools who schedule these teams that they think will be sacrificial lambs in the non-conference season just to generate big stats and impressive numbers early.

Wishful thinking on my part, I know.

It'll still be Nebraska 221 -- Mississippi School for the Blind and Deaf -7.

Of course, you can fill in a lot of names in place of Nebraska, but the Husker Nation (again, fill in the blank in place of Husker) will still go crazy as if the game was for the National Championship.

Who do we hate?

Boise State

I was pretty shocked that the Vandals even scored against USC, wtf was going on in Southern California that the Vandals scored, let alone against USC (sorry amycat).

Screw the BTN, I'd rather listen to it on the radio and follow along online then watch some low budget public access channel. I always watch the big games in a social setting but games against teams like Ap state, EMU, and CMU arent worth it. Even if Michigan loses.

However, I'd imagine that more local cable companies will pick the channel up next season after the Big Ten keeps some marquee games for themselves.

I'd like to say LSU of course! :D But, way to early to tell. I really think this will be a great year for LSU. As for the fans predicting a NC year, only time will tell. We will see how things come together with Matt Flynn, the new Offensive Coordinator, and the offense in general.

We looked good on defense against Miss St. Offense struggled and was out of sync most of the first half. I'm not too worried about that though. I'm confident that things will improve.

I'm so ready for the home game against Virginia Tech!!!!! :)

I can't speak for the Big Ten Network, but we're certainly not a low budget public access channel. We are well funded and our people and production are top notch. We use exactly the same freelance people and equipment (production trucks) as the major networks. I'll say again that the lead game producer for BTN is a former Executive Producer for CBS and a producer I worked with when I was directing football for NBC Sports, so I would be amazed to hear that they don't do an outstanding telecast.

Looking at their executive team on their website, most of them come from big jobs at major networks.

Did you see the game? I'm wondering why you use the "low budget public access" phrase.

Is it because they're only on cable or DBS? Remember, so is ESPN and so are all of the FSN locals.

GO (CSUF) Bulldogs.
We are 1 for 1. OK, it was Sac State, but it was a win. After last year, please, a winning season. Next week, College Station:eek:

And the rankings are:
http://msn.foxsports.com/cfb/polls

http://www.sportsline.com/collegefootball/polls

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/rankingsindex

http://www.scoreboard.msnbc.com/msnb...caafb1a&cat=ST

I saw some of it from a friend who taped the game. Naturally, I didn't watch the whole game but it looked a little rough around the edges. I'll cut them some slack though, it was the first weekend. I worked in production for a few years but I'm not an expert by any means. However, my eye might be a tad better than the average viewer.

A lot of people here in the mid west are frustrated that we can't get this channel but don't really want to pay extra for it either.

Two questions:

Do you think there will ever be a day where tv viewers can pick their channels "ala carte"? I've heard that the BTN would cost around $1.10 a month in the eight state big ten region and .10 cents for those outside of it. I would love to have a hand picked 25-30 channel block that I would pay those fees for. Some would be pretty expensive such as espn but I'd pay for it as I know I would watch it a lot. One problem I would see is that a lot of channels wouldn't get picked up and could go under.

And the second one, do you think the big ten or anyone else might try to keep a few marquee games for themselves on their channel as incentive to be put on regular cable everywhere in the midwest? Would the ad dollars be worth it to do this?

A first game can be a little rough, especially for a new crew in a new truck. I heard that the Big Ten Network commissioned two brand new high definition trucks of their own since their contract is twenty years between the conference and the Chicago FSN local. That's a pretty big committment, and new trucks take a few games to iron out all of the little kinks sometimes.

I wish we had our own trucks, but that's a huge expense. We rent like pretty much everyone else.

It was also probably the first time the entire crew had worked together as well. That's tricky. I know, because the NBC games I directed in the past were not the national game of the week and I never had the same truck or the same crew (except producer and announcers which were constant) at all. Ever. It takes a little while to get into a rhythm.

Taking a shot at your questions, the chairman of the FCC has suggested that ALL cable be ala carte. If that's even possible with today's technology, my guess is that it would be pretty hard to track and the extra work in billing and the additional computer technology needed would probably drive up the costs of all of the services, and, as you point out, some of the weaker ones would probably not survive. That being said, there's a ton of stuff on my cable package that I could do without, so the bottom line result might be comparable. Of course my network is 50% owned by Comcast (and 50% by CSTV/CBS) so I get my cable free. Sorry.

That, by the way, is a difference between us and the BTN which is 51% owned by the Big Ten Conference. The conference has no direct financial interest in our network. One upside in that for us is that they can't really intrude into the content side of our sports/news type of shows.

Now, for everyone's information, all (or all I'm aware of) commercial driven cable and satellite networks make money in two ways. First is by advertising revenue and second is by a per subscriber fee that the network charges the cable company or Direct Broadcast Satellite (DBS) service. It's no surprize that the most expensive is ESPN. The figures you mention ($1.10 and $0.10) sound more like subscriber fees per month than Pay Per View (PPV) fees which are generally considerably higher (comparable probably to a PPV movie for instance, which in our area is probably $5-7 per movie -- um, or game). It's probably not in the BTN's best interest, though, to do a PPV thing and dilute the impact of the network itself.

Finally, as for the marquee games, those currently go to the "major" networks for over the air broadcast. The networks pay the conference big bucks for those games and I would be shocked if that changes.

OK, so the above wasn't really "finally."

Remember that the driving force behind this movement is NOT the networks themselves, but rather the conferences who want more control over their own destiny in terms of dollars and scheduling -- and also want more exposure for the weaker teams in the conference. The Ohio State/Michigan game will probably never be on BTN (except as a rerun) because it's too lucrative in terms of dollars from the major networks.

I understand that BTN is doing what we've done here recently and that is a media campaign to try to get viewers to put pressure on the cable systems to carry the network. We're doing it to pressure the DBS services.

So, while that doesn't get pictures and sound of your team into your living room, I hope it gives you a little bit of insight into what's going on.

As I said above, speculation is that the SEC will be next, followed by conferences like the Pac 10, Big 12, ACC etc. as their contracts with the major networks expire.

Thanks for the explanation. The one thing that I will miss until I get the BTN is the non revenue sports that are still fun to watch like softball, track, and other sports of that nature.

Are these really right? How can Michigan still be ranked #5?

I admit that I'm now a VA Tech fan. All the stories they did before the VT vs. ECU game made me really want to pull for them. The game against LSU should be really good! I'm excited (although, I doubt I'll be able to stay awake for the whole game)!

Go Hokies!

I was wondering that as well; even as I posted them.
Seems as if the long weekend caused some delays.
Look at them again; Michigan fell a long way:(:eek:
Rutgers is still top 20.

We have caller ID, and when my sister-in-law from Detroit (a huge Michigan fan) called yesterday, I answered the phone, "Appallachian State University Athletic Department."

Poor baby.

:eek::p:D

I got to see the K-State vs Auburn game in person. I know we've got a lot of Auburn folks on here, so just let me say that if Freeman had actually been in shape and gotten himself off the PUP more than three weeks before the game, y'all might have had some serious problems.

Now, I just can't wait to see what my Huskers can do against a real opponent.

Nebraska in the National Championship game?
http://msn.foxsports.com/cfb/story/7159172

From what I saw.....Freeman looked fine.

If KState doesn't have that monumental screw up on special teams in the fourth quarter (roughing the kicker), Auburn would have been in a very, very bad spot.

Agreed, though I've always thought that 90% of roughing the kicker calls are BS anyway, that one included. If a roughing the kicker needs to exist, it needs to be exactly the same application as "roughing the passer." Something blatantly unnecessary after the ball is away. Being in mid-air trying to block a kick and not changing course (see Newton's laws of motion) shouldn't cut it.

BTW, trust me on this, Freeman was still not in top shape for that one. Spent all spring semester (at least) partying at Teke.

ASU Alum
 

We were at the ASU-Michigan game on Saturday and I am proud to be a Mountaineer!!! We went to Michigan from NC on Thurs. and came back Sunday. The Michigan fans were classy and most congratulated us on the win. Ann Arbor is a pretty town, it reminds me of Chapel Hill, that other school in NC!

It feels amazing to have witnessed history being made and being in the largest sport gathering in the world that day.:)

Yeah, I agree.....I think the rule is pretty asinine......it's football. Should be self explanatory.

K-State did have Auburn in a pretty tight spot. However, thankfully the offense clicked into another gear and the defense finished them off.

Defense played fine, but the offense needs a boost. Hopefully that happens when Lester and Fannin get back in the lineup.

Hey!

We yell that in Halawa as well!

My other favorites are:

F-U BSU

and

Buck the Froncos

I also love the term "Boise Junior College"

If you decide to jet over here for the game, you're welcome to crash on my futon and tail gate with us. I'll even buy you lunch at the plate lunch joint, Loco Grindz. Anyone who hates BSU is my friend (even if you weren't my sister ;)) It is even Ag Days that weekend, so if you're lucky we can see some cloned mule action.

Who do we hate?

BOISE STATE!

Who do we love?

U DUB!

Even though the Vandals won against Cal Poly, we could have lost and I'd still be thrilled that Donkeys fell to the Huskies 24-10. I can't believe I'm happier when Boise Junior College loses, than when the Vandals win, but that's how it happens.

How 'bout them Wolverines?

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