40 Acres Sports

The preseason magazines don’t have a perfect track record for predicting much of anything, but it’s wonderfully interesting to see what they’re smoking. Fortunately the AAS aggregated the data from all the polls so we can see all this info in one place.

Most overrated? Easily Notre Dame and Oklahoma. The Irish defense was slow and average last year and should be pretty much the same this year, and their schedule is absolutely brutal. Heck, they could be pretty darn good and still lose two of their first five games. And as for the Sooners, their main weakness last year was their offensive line and I’m not sure how losing two top draft picks will help that. If they’re going to be a top team they’ll need a healthy Adrian Peterson and a much improved Rhett Bomar, I wouldn’t count on both of those happening.

With several teams with an equal shot of a national title, proven teams with holes to fill like Texas and USC seem to deserve more credit than teams who had lesser seasons and have just as many issues.

If Rocky was at Texas, we’d probably be unanimous preseason #1.

Auburn football players had one of the highest academic progress rates, now we know why.

Ex-Longhorn fullback and Marine joins VY in Tennessee.

Interesting body changes since getting to USC. The dude needs a bro. (Manssiere!)

High praise for the future Longhorn, whether he ends up a QB or a WR.

Vince needs to get in camp on time, but he also needs to get his guaranteed money. Let’s hope they work it out.

Joe Schad interviews with the new Rice offensive coordinator and former Longhorn legend [tag]Major Applewhite[/tag] on his Insider blog. Seems to have his head on straight about expectations for the Owls, but still has his goals and a plan to achieve them. He also talks about Vince Young and text messaging recruits. He also covers the Longhorns’ two-headed (or maybe three?) quarterback situation, a subject he may know something about:

As a coach now, my opinion is that when you have two quarterbacks, it’s because you haven’t found one. In Texas’ situation, it’s because of inexperience. Make no mistake, Texas has one, it’s just a question of them not knowing which one because neither has taken a snap. My whole deal is, if you’re asking your quarterback to be a leader of the team, it’s difficult with two guys doing that. With 18-, 19-, and 20-year-old kids, the maturity level just isn’t there. You lose sight of the big picture and agendas and selfish ideas get in the way. You have to have one guy. You have to make him earn it and you have to trust him. Then, if he struggles, you can always try the other guy. The problem at a place like Texas is, you’d better find the right guy fast. You’d really like to come out of spring ball and say, hey, you have one starter. That’s not easy, though.

Read link. (ESPN Insiders only!)

[tag]Oklahoma[/tag] Sooners fans were furious with the officiating at the end of their matchup with [tag]Texas Tech[/tag] back in November. Several questionable calls in the final minute went against the Sooners, including the final play where Tech’s Taurean Henderson barely did/didn’t cross the goal line.

Well the Red Raiders aren’t going to let the opportunity to rub it in the Sooners’ faces one more time pass them by, and they’ll happily sell a few extra season tickets in the process. They’ve put a great billboard up in Lubbock with a photo of Henderson stretching the football across the goal line that says, “He’s in. Are you?” Of course they used a photo from his second effort that came after he was down, but it’s still amusing.

That billboard sure would look good here in Dallas or maybe smack in the middle of Norman.

I likely will spend time this weekend reading all of them for free at Barnes and Noble. (via)