It was a great morning to start off the season if you’re a fan of College Gameday, but then again what Saturday morning during college football season isn’t a great morning? While monitoring the Notre Dame/Navy game on the bottom TV, we had College Gameday in full force on the main screen here at the Gameday Blog. We kicked things off this morning live from the Death Star AKA Jerryworld AKA Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Tx. This week’s location is a neutral site for the big game of the week; Alabama vs Michigan. This week on the Richie and Greggo Extravaganza on 105.3 the FAN here in Dallas, Jerry Jones was interviewed and had an interesting note. He said this game has been the hardest event to get tickets to of any event ever hosted at Cowboys Stadium. Yes, that includes the Superbowl. Apparently rabid college football fans who traveled thousands of miles to get here are not interested in giving up their tickets no matter the price offered. Lucky for those of you still wanting to get into this game, you can get standing only-obstructed view tickets for just $89 a pop at Living Social.
To start things off, we have a couple of new faces joining the Gameday crew this year. Pictured above is Samantha Steele, who is replacing Erin Andrews. Erin left ESPN for Fox Sports after ESPN/ABC realized what THIS video declared years ago: Erin Andrews is overrated. Although Samantha seemed pretty nervous this morning (I’m not sure she knew what to expect), I think this is an upgrade for sure. I always got the feeling that Erin Andrews wished College Gameday was really the Erin Andrews Show, and there wasn’t enough room for her ego. Look, I’m not saying that women on College Gameday should know their place. I’m just saying women on College Gameday should know their place. Oh, they also added the great Scott Van Pelt to the broadcast for his segment “Bald Man on Campus”. He isn’t quite as good looking as Samantha Steele, so no picture will be provided. Van Pelt fit in great with the existing crew and I look forward to his work this season.
We must next discuss what will surely be a regular feature this season on this blog. Desmond Howard’s suit of the week. If you got up early for the 8AM Central ESPNU hour of College Gameday, you would have noticed that Desmond Howard was wearing a normal dark suit. Nothing flashy, and quite disappointing. Somehow between 8:59 and 9:00AM CST Desmond Howard managed to COMPLETELY change his suit to a BALLER pure white suit. I don’t know if he had the white suit on underneath the black suit, or if he ducked into a phone booth Superman style, but it defies explanation. What a way to celebrate the kickoff of this season, and we look forward to reviewing his threads every week.
We also learned today that David Pollack knows how to use the internet (pictured above). Just kidding David. I follow you on Twitter, and you Tweet right around 500 times a day so I know you know the internet. Nonetheless, I enjoy this picture very much. He will be back with us all season as part of their B-team on College Gameday (if Corso, Herbstreit, and Fowler are the A-team). Check back every week to see who David Pollack thinks Georgia will beat!
This week’s emotional piece of the week (EPOTW) was a segment about Urban Meyer’s return to the game, and his emotional commitment to his family. The segment highlighted Urban’s rise at Florida to two-time national champion, and his downfall that sent him to the hospital when he had a health breakdown after the SEC championship where he lost to Bama. He retired soon after to regain his health and spend time with his family like he had missed out on in recent years. When he decided to make a comeback, his daughter made him sign a contract with her including ten rules.
1. My family will always come first.
2. I will take care of myself and maintain good health.
3. I will go on a trip once a year with Nicki — MINIMUM.
4. I will not go more than nine hours a day at the office.
5. I will sleep with my cellphone on silent.
6. I will continue to communicate daily with my kids.
7. I will trust God’s plan and not be overanxious.
8. I will keep the lake house.
9. I will find a way to watch Nicki and Gigi play volleyball.
10. I will eat three meals a day.
Not knowing Urban Meyer personally, some of these seem like common sense, some of them seem like good ideas, and some of them seem like things he would have a difficult time keeping up with during the season. Even if you like to hate on Urban Meyer like I do, you have to respect the effort and wish him luck.
Also note that the Emotional Piece of the Week is also known as the Tim Tebow Memorial Piece of the Week. If you watched Gameday like I did while Tebow was at Florida, you would remember that virtually every week we had some emotional/inspirational piece about Tim Tebow ministering to at-risk-youths, preaching to prison inmates, saving abandoned kitties from the rain, volunteering at soup kitchens, rehabilitating bald eagles injured by poachers and performing circumcisions at churches in Africa. We’ll be reviewing these sometimes inspirational, sometimes cheesy, stories every week with a few highlights.
Now down to the business at hand. This week’s celebrity guest picker was Jerry Jones. Being from Dallas, I REALLY enjoyed this, because people in Dallas know Jerry Jones is surely slipping slowly into insanity. Just like expected, he talked in circles, was overly excited about everything, and went on WAY too long about some points (Fowler had to cut him off breaking down the Virginia Tech/Georgia Tech game). Just as expected, Arkansas homer Jerry Jones said Arkansas could take on Bama in a few weeks, but he picked Bama to win tonight’s big game. And for the grand finale, Lee Corso donned the Alabama headgear after taunting the crowd with the Michigan fight song.
