Over The Pylon

It’s Friday, it’s spring time, and finally we have a small trickle of news worth sharing. Of course, this will be short-lived for the next few weeks, until spring practices conclude across the country and the grizzly bear sized jones for football goes back into hibernation until summertime. But, like selecting your prey from Dill Street after penny pitchers, you take what you can get.

• Urban Meyer Clearly Not Taking His Chill Pills: No one can that isn’t named Urban can say with any certainty what exactly the reason was for his pseudo leave of absence at the end of last season. Florida fans are hoping that outbursts fueled by rage were not the culprit, because if so, that leave of absence did nothing. Player makes statement, player gets quoted, statement borderline not pro-Tebow enough, Urban blows gasket, Urban threatens reporter. Looks like we’re back to normal in the SEC. And that’s a relief.
• FIU’s Kendall Berry Stabbed to Death On Campus: I had hoped that we were done with this sort of thing after watching the tragedy unfold at UConn last season with Jasper Howard, but sadly, we are not. What apparently started as an argument outside a rec center leaves a young man dead. Sad on all fronts.
• Exodus From Knoxville Continues: It’s normal when a new coach comes in to have a few players jump ship or change allegiances as the depth chart shuffles, the system changes, or personalities simply don’t mesh. In this offseason, it’s not only been about the quantity of transfers from Tennessee, but also the quality. Coming on the heels of Bryce Brown inexplicably leaving the roster but staying enrolled now comes news that freshman All American offensive tackle Aaron Douglas has decided that Knoxville isn’t the place for him. Kiffin recruits ’em, leaves ’em, and Derek Dooley runs ’em off. That seems like a sure-fire way to success, Tennessee. Keep up the fantastic work.
• International Bowl… We Hardly Knew Ye: After only 4 years in the Bowl season, the International Bowl is turning out the lights and letting the bottom-dwelling Big East teams and one of the MAC’s better teams fend for themselves. Granted, the International Bowl certainly had its problems… the need for passports, expensive travel, and being, you know, outside of the US. It does cost the MAC a Bowl tie-in, though with the lack of potential quality teams in the fall, that may not be a bad thing. Interesting side note… of the four Bowl games Ball State has been to, two of them no longer exist. Watch your back, GMAC and Las Vegas Bowls.

Around the Blogosphere

• Orson at EDSBS gives the world the most sensible equation since Pythagorean.  Gus Johnson is without question the most exciting play by play man in the business and the SEC is by far the most exciting brand of football to watch on fall Saturdays. Seriously… if one of my family members was getting married at 3:30 on a Saturday, I may have to send my regrets.
• BlackHeartGoldPants raises the five questions that burn for the Iowa Hawkeyes heading into spring ball. What isn’t on that list, and is most pressing for me, is whether or not picking Iowa as my darkhorse national title contender next season and a spot at the top of our preseason poll will make me look like a bumbling idiot come January.
• Notre Dame blog-o-awesome Blue-Gray Sky is hanging it up, and another of the old guard calls it quits. Here’s to hoping those guys’ first season not religiously covering their team is considerably more successful than the last couple.
• Not football related in the least, but it is March, and basketball is ruling the day right now. As a Kentucky fan, it’s been great to see Big Blue make their rightful resurgence to the top of the pile, and Ken at A Sea of Blue sums it up nicely. Three more games and it could be quite the enjoyable Monday night for lots.

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