Southern Inferiority Complex: 2008 Edition

This college football season is not yet three weeks old, and already we see the Southern Inferiority Complex emerging from yet another highly-ranked SEC team. I guess the whining and crying, while beating up on 1-AA programs, isn’t exclusive to Tommy Tuberville and Les Miles. Mark Richt is getting into the act, as well.

Again, we’ve been away a while, so let’s review:

The Southern Inferiority Complex is a second cousin to the Domer Hype Machine, which is of course closely related to the east coast bias. Together these three subversive movements make up the larger Axis of East Coast Bias. But, I digress …

Apparently stunned and feeling under-appreciated in the wake of Georgia’s fall to No. 2 – following its home field 45-21 practice game versus Georgia Southern, and in comparison to USC’s road win at Virginia – Richt began monitoring SportCenter highlights looking for reasons to blame others, in case the Bulldogs do not fulfill their “destiny.”

Andrew Dasher of UGASports.com gives us the scoop:

Running back Knowshon Moreno was a hot topic of conversation during this week's teleconference with Georgia coach Mark Richt.

Moreno's 18 carry, 168-yard, three-touchdown effort in Saturday's 56-17 win over Central Michigan obviously wowed the sellout crowd at Sanford Stadium, but it was his hurdle of Chippewa safety Vince Agnew to complete a 29-yard run that dropped jaws.

OK. Let’s stop it right here. Who the hell is Knowshon Moreno? And, more importantly, who are the Central Michigan Chippewas? Oh, that’s right. They’re another no-name school against which Craig Sheppard could complete a “three-touchdown effort.” Who is Craig Sheppard? Exactly. But, I digress …

It was a play that Georgia fans will no doubt be talking about for quite a while, but it was one that many in the country watching ESPN did not get to see except for a brief glance during a quick preview of the Bulldogs highlights to come following a commercial break. Knowshon Moreno's hop over Vince Agnew wasn't the highlight fans thought it should be.

When the network did its Top 10 plays, Moreno's highlight was not included. Richt was asked about the omission.

"I think they missed the boat or didn't do their homework or something," Richt said. "Normally they do a good job with that, so it looks like somebody would have noticed that. It didn't make their highlights, but it's going to make ours for a long time."

A representative from ESPN's local online affiliate claimed that FOX did not put the highlight in its highlight package to other networks.

"You're kidding me," Richt said. "OK, so you're throwing FOX under the bus. I threw you under the bus now you're throwing FOX under the bus. That's the way it works."

If anybody should be thrown under any bus (figuratively, of course), it’s Richt. Who does he think he is … Roone Arledge? Perhaps if he did his “homework or something” he’d knowshon that much of the sports media knowshons that hurdling a Chippewa is hardly a challenge. Try hurdling this … or this … or this … then we’ll talk about highlights.

And while you’re at it, try doing it more than once, in a big game, against a rival program, on national primetime television. Then maybe we’ll all see Georgia’s highlights on ESPN, and we’ll knowshon who Knowshon is.

Until then, Richt should concentrate on the task at hand, rather than trying to make a mountain out of a Chippewa. Trust us, we know.

Beat the Buckeyes!

USC Football: Better Than It's Ever Been Done?

A funny thing occurred to me last night as I posted a take (on Conquest Chronicles) about the latest in a string of “controversies” to threaten the reputation of USC Football …

I’m getting tired of this crap.

Certainly, I understand it all comes with the territory. I know that unprecedented success on the field and on the recruiting trail, in a major metropolitan market with no NFL team, has created a “perfect storm” of heightened media attention and acute scrutiny of USC.

No doubt, I understand the fact that high-profile athletes and successful college sports programs are primary targets for muckraking journalists, jealous rivals and other gold-digging elements.

But this supposed residue of USC’s college football greatness is starting to wear the Teflon of success a little too thin for my taste.

I know that Hershel Dennis and Mark Sanchez were exonerated of sexual assault. I know Rey Maualuga has taken anger management courses and did community service to pay for his outbursts during a tough time in his life. I know Dwayne Jarrett catching a break on rent from Matt Leinart’s father was really a small issue in the overall scheme of things.

But after a while, this crap starts to become a burden.

Really, I understand that the NCAA won’t come close to proving that USC knew or should have known anything about Reggie Bush and his idiotic family’s dealings with crooked sports agents. I know that phone records will prove that Pete Carroll never set up a conference call between Bush and No. 1 recruit Joe McKnight.

But I have to ask … when is this crap going to stop? However alleged, non-factual, inaccurate, unwarranted, and flat-out-stupid it might be … is all of this completely out of our control?

Even if we can explain it all away with common sense scenarios, absence of fact, and third-party validation, we still have to acknowledge this crap and deal with it.

No doubt, I know that USC Football will emerge unscathed from all of this, and our national championship trophies are safe in Heritage Hall. I know there is every reason to believe that we will be adding more hardware to our historic collection.

But how many measured statements out of Tim Tessalone’s crisis communications handbook do we have to hear on our way to another BCS bowl game? How much fuel do we have to give the “nation” of hate and the inferiority-complexed south, while we defend another No. 1 ranking?

Don’t get me wrong. I believe in our man Carroll. I believe in his unique approach and his player's-coach style and the evolved philosophy that has brought unprecedented success to USC Football. I believe in the Magic Tennis Book!

But, I also know that Carroll's stated mission is to "do things better than it's ever been done before." I know it’s difficult, maybe even unrealistic. As Caroll has also said, “That stuff, it is kind of nasty. You just don't know where it's coming from and people are out to get you. It can get kind of hard.”

But if USC Football is to get there, if we really do believe as true Trojans that we will do this better than it’s ever been done before, we should acknowledge that perhaps we are falling short of that mission today.

It’s a noble thing for Carroll to aim higher than mere mortals. And we embrace the opportunity and added responsibility to transcend the common pattern of other highly successful programs like Miami … or Notre Dame … or U.C.L.A. Really, no disrespect to other college programs -- again, it’s tough -- but we think we can do better.

After all … We Are SC! Now, more than ever, this should mean something to us.

So, rather than explain away these minor issues with our common sense and the reassurances of non-haters, perhaps it’s time to ask our man Carroll -- however unfair it may be -- when will we stop having to deal with all this stuff in the first place?

Maybe it’s time to tell him we’re getting tired of this crap.

Fight On!

NOTE: There is a very slightly "cleaner," guest-blogger version of this post on CC.
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USC Vote: Let's Try This Again

So, maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to assume (i.e., ass u me) that Nebraska fans had anything better to do than vote for their three teams in ESPN’s "All-Time Greatest College Football Playoff."

Apparently, we weren’t alone in thinking that perhaps the voting smelled like rotten corn, as Kirk Herbstreit made abundantly clear while the College GameDay crew revealed the results. “This is ridiculous,” he said.

Herbstreit’s take was that the final should have matched USC 2004 versus Miami 2001, and he wasn’t alone. Todd Blackledge tapped the ’04 Trojans for the final, as well as the Lispy One, who said: “The [2004] Southern Cal team […] I thought was maybe the best team of all time.” No kidding ... Holtz actually said that.

But it was Herbstreit who was most adamant:

Rece Davis: So, you’re calling into question the entire process.

Herbsreit: I am. … My goal is for next year to try to make sure that South Florida somehow gets ESPN Classic, and that Southern California gets ESPN Classic … because the ’04 ‘SC team and the ’01 Miami team are the two best teams in this.

So, now we know better, and maybe ESPN’s College GameDay crew does, as well.

Still, this doesn’t mean we should give up on other pre-bowl-season, dead-zone-filling voting things. Sure, we know now that these greatest team or playoff scenario brackets are “ridiculous.” But perhaps we can stack the deck in another type of contest … maybe in a category in which even an east coast biased idiot like Beano Cook could lend his support.

As luck would have it, we found just the ticket over at CBS Sportsline, which is in the midst of its Cheerleader of the Week Playoffs. As we join the fray, our beloved USC Song Girls (don’t call them cheerleaders) have already survived a first-round match-up as the No. 9 seed versus Michigan’s eighth-ranked cheering squad.

How our lovely Song Girls could possibly be ranked ninth, let alone one spot behind Michigan, I’m not sure. But, one look at the top seeds tells us that the bracket has the look of southern inferiority complex all over it. Our No. 9 seeding means we’re up against No. 1 LSU this week.

No matter, though … at the time of this writing, our pristine Song Girls lead those sweaty Bayou babes by six percentage points with 10,491 votes counted.

For sure, there is a long way to go (voting is open until Friday), but clearly, we can do this! So, let’s stuff some ballot boxes, and spread the word throughout the Trojan Family, again.

This time we may get some help from non-Trojans, too. Even though it’s not Thursday, we know Beano is good for at least 500 votes.

Fight On! Beat the Tigers!
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