bald man on campus – Cole's Gameday Blog

Week 10 2014: College Gameday review! #saturdayselections #cfb #getup4gameday

Posted on November 1, 2014 by gamedaycole

Good afternoon football world, and welcome to your week 10 College Gameday review. This morning we had some technical difficulties this morning involving our DVR, and due to this reason we missed approximately the first 8 minutes of Gameday this morning. I would imagine that Big & Rich, along with Cowboy Troy, offered us a little zing in our zang zang while Lzzy Hale shredded on a guitar for us, but if we missed anything incredibly important please send us a letter.

The show today was broadcasting from Morgantown, West Virginia, where we would see the Big 12 matchup between #7 TCU and #20 West Virginia. I truly think Morgantown is my favorite setting, with the show setting up right at the bottom of the sorority/fraternity hill.

Early on, we were hammered with a Gene W. piece on the coaching situation down there in Florida. The viewer was treated to a montage of clips from the Will Muschamp hiring press conference, where Florida AD Jeremy Foley told us how excited he was to have Muschamp here for a long time, and Muschamp told us that he was sure Foley had made the right decision to hire himself. Fast forward to 2014, and things sure have changed. Remember when Will Muschamp was the coach-in-waiting at Texas, but had to bolt for Florida because he was too hot of a commodity to wait around another decade or two for Mack Brown to retire? I guess neither of those things panned out too well. I just hope Florida wins today against Georgia so that we can get at least one more week of the Florida coaching soap opera before Muschamp is run out of town like a common pygmy.

Carrying on with this theme of chaos at a traditional power, the Gameday boys (with Pollack replacing Corso) decided to discuss the “resignation” of Michigan AD Dave Brandon. I was impressed with how well Desmond was composed during this segment, because he normally squirms around when Michigan controversy is brought up. The main fun fact from this segment was Kirk Herbstreit saying he was the biggest Michigan fan out there (which Desmond had to quickly correct).

A highlight segment featuring TCU quarterback Trevone Boykin was followed up with a breakdown by noted quarterback guru and questionable wearer of men’s clothing, George Whitfield. This brings us to this week’s FABULOUS FASHION REVIEWS WITH @GAMEDAYJEN!!! Whitfield has scaled back his fashion statements in recent weeks, but this week Jennifer’s big takeaways were that he is still rocking the Jesse Palmer too-tight jacket, and won’t give up the damn brown shoes. He was also wearing the world’s tiniest rosette on his lapel.

We also can’t have fashion reviews without the Sam Ponder outfit of the week. This week Jennifer has declared that it is officially SAM PONDER FALL WEATHER WEAR SEASON!!! Jennifer said that she loves her boots and scarves, and that the lipstick was a nice accent this morning. As always, if Sam Ponder is reading this, your future best friend @gamedayjen is still waiting on a shoutout.

What would normally have been the strangest segment of an episode of Gameday was the Tom Rinaldi interview with Marshall quarterback Rakeem Cato; an interview which was performed from within the College Gameday bus. I guess West Virginia fans hate Rakeem Cato that much (for what reason, I am not sure) that he could not be interviewed out in the open air. Weird interview setup, but he still seems like such a good kid. In this reporter’s opinion, Marshall deserves to be ranked at least 25, and you can take that all the way to the bank.

I say that the bus interview would normally be the strangest segment of the day because this was quickly trumped by the return of the Gameday boys dressing up as coaches (complete with creepy masks) with each of them defending their representative schools. This segment basically devolves each year into too much giggling behind the masks while the props start falling apart, but for some reason I hope they continue this each year.

This bizarre fake coaching segment also leads us into this week’s best signs. There were a good selection of signs today including “Gary Patterson gives out apples on Halloween”, the return of one of the true greats known as the “SPORTS” sign, a couple of signs from the SEC network reading “KENTUCKY HAS A FOOTBALL TEAM!” and “TIM TEBOW USES CHRISTIAN MINGLE”, and the tremendous work of the young man holding the sign reading “I’m wearing adult diapers so I don’t lose my spot!”. However, this week’s two best signs were unrivaled. This week’s first entry was the following:

Our second entry this week was a sign seen very briefly, and it may be hard to make out, but it reads “TREVONE ENJOYS BOYKIN DUDES”. This is classy work good sir.

This week’s Tom Rinaldi tear jerker centered on the Auburn wide receiver Sammy Coates, and his friendship with an 11 year old fan named Kenzie Ray. Kenzie has been a fan of Auburn since she was a toddler running through the house yelling “WAR EAGLE”, but is currently in the middle of a battle with AML (a type of leukemia). She has survived hospital stays, rounds of chemo, and a bone marrow transplant, and made friends with Coates on a trip to Auburn as a guest of the Auburn drill team. Coates vowed to never take off the wristband she gave him reading “Praying for Kenzie”, and he never has. He even drove 3 hours on a particularly rough night where she may not have survived to be with her. They now share a friendship which they hope to last a lifetime as she continues her battle. Touching stuff.

Another touching segment was the honoring of Lee Corso’s 250th headgear pick today, which saw a segment highlighting his career of picking games. He sat in silence, overwhelmed by the montage, for a minute or two while the crowd chanted his name. This touching moment was broken up by Fowler’s comedic relief, noting that “the crowd here in Morgantown loves you… at least for the moment”. See the following for more details: http://goo.gl/wOYlmi

Bald Man on Campus featuring Scott Van Pelt was back this week, and he was hanging in an overly casual manner with WVU head coach Dana Holgorsen. The segment mostly centered around Holgorsen’s unique hair style, and much was made of comparisons to McCracken from the movie Kingpin.

Other quick notes include Desmond Howard revealing he is a Taurus, and Auburn DB claiming that they call the SEC West “the baby NFL” (which is an absurd claim). Another interesting note is that I’m not sure the phrase “Florida State” was said once during the entire show. No coverage of the exciting Thursday night finish against Louisville, no mention of Jameis Winston and his shenanigans, and no mention of Karlos Williams and his own recent controversy. Just interesting in my opinion. Also, David Pollack apparently sat around playing Mario Kart against WVU students yesterday. For fans of the now-defunct feature known as “DAVID POLLACK USING THE INTERNET”, we now bring you what will hopefully continue on into the future: “DAVID POLLACK PLAYING N64!”

When it came time to get down to the real business of picking the games, this week’s special guest celebrity was revealed to be none other than West Virginia native Braid Paisley. He seemed really knowledgeable about college football, even revealing that his first WVU game was as a kid watching Lee Corso’s Indiana team come into Morgantown to play in their “crappy little stadium” at the time. As the picks continued, the crew got to the random matchup of Pitt-Duke, to which Brad Paisley said he CERTAINLY WAS NOT GOING TO SUGGEST THE CROWD START A CHANT REGARDING PITT. The crowd immediately broke out into an “EAT SHIT PITT” chant, which was very quickly talked over by the rest of the crew so as to not offend women, young children, and the FCC. When it came time to pick the big game of the day, David Pollack had previously picked WVU. Desmond upset the home crowd by going with TCU, while Paisley picked WVU to nobody’s surprise. Kirk gave us generic keys to the game since he is calling the game as we speak. Corso talked up the West Virginia crowd big time and got them into a complete frenzy before apologizing to Brad, the WVU fans, and John Denver, while popping on the TCU Hornfrog headgear….backwards! Charley the Cat and Jennifer both went with WVU as well, this could end up being a close one. Enjoy the rest of your football day!

Corso with the backwards TCU headgear! Photo courtesy of Gameday Twitter

Update: Today’s “Desmond Howard Michigan Pick of the Week” saw a dejected and depressed Desmond Howard pick Indiana to beat his Michigan Wolverines. Wait, what? You read that right; Indiana over Michigan. THIS IS NOT A DRILL! SOMEONE ALERT MICHIGAN INTERIM ATHLETIC DIRECTOR JIM HACKETT! This marks the first Desmond Howard pick against Michigan since week 11/27/2010, when he picked Ohio State to beat Michigan in week 13. Remember this day os that someday you can tell your grandchildren about the last time Desmond picked against Michigan.

Week 3 2014: College Gameday review! #getup4gameday

Posted on September 13, 2014 by gamedaycole

Ladies and gentlemen; boys and girls; children of all ages: Welcome back to our weekly College Gameday review! The show was broadcasting to you live from Fargo, North Dakota, where today we will see the matchup between 3-time FCS defending national champions North Dakota State and something called the University of the Incarnate Word! This was the same location as their FCS visit last year, which was one of the best Gameday editions ever, and this year was no slouch either. The crowd was HUGE again just like last year.

It looked like a chilly edition (if you’re not from North Dakota), and Chris Fowler reminded us that the AVERAGE temperature in Fargo last winter was 4 degrees. In order to make sure that Coach Corso did not freeze to death, he donned a bison-fur coat which was a thing of beauty.

After opening the show in such fashion, Coach Corso went back to the bus and we were joined by David Pollack and Samantha Ponder. She interviewed new NDSU head coach Chris Klieman and they discussed how he can continue the legacy after winning 3 national championships before taking over. This brings us to this week’s SAMANTHA PONDER OUTFIT OF THE WEEK FEATURING OUTFIT REVIEW BY @GAMEDAYJEN!!! Jennifer said she likes this week’s outfit. She said “I like the boots, the jacket has unique details, and I like the pop of the blue with the scarf”.

While we are on the topic of outfits, since we are giving this week’s style award to Sam Ponder, we need to discuss a significant setback in men’s fashion this week. No no, it wasn’t Desmond Howard and Chris Fowler wearing matching suits again this week. This week we need to discuss QB guru George Whitfield’s outfit. Now I may have absolutely terrible fashion sense, and have worn some questionable outfits during my day, I am not a television personality or guru of any kind. I asked Jennifer for an opinion, and all she could say was “There is such a thing as too many patterns, and George Whitfield has exceeded that limit”. We saw brown shoes with grey pants on a plaid navy jacket with powder blue plaid shirt and a heavily patterned orange tie. You may be a guru of quarterbacking but you are not a guru of men’s fashion I’m afraid.

And since we’re on the topic of questionable looks, let’s see this sign featuring vintage Kirk Herbstreit! I’m sure I never looked like this in the 90s.

Other signs featured this week included “Who is FICA and why are they taking my money?”, “Chicken fries are back!”, and “Big 10: Bad Math, Bad Football”. Another great sign was the following:

This week’s sign winner had to be this gentlemen who was incredibly proud of his mullet, and equally proud to have Sam Ponder touch it

But let’s not forget last year’s top sign from Fargo, and one of the greatest moments in Gameday history!

Other quick topics include the fact that deer archery season opens Monday in North Dakota, the panel debated whether NDSU should make the jump to FBS (consensus was no), the Washington State flag made its 150th straight appearance today, and someone or something called “Babi Mac” made a second appearance on Gameday this season. I’m sure I am not down with today’s pop culture, but I have no idea who Babi Mac is.

George Whitfield broke down Everett Golson’s improvement as one of his paying clients (yes he thinks Golson improved greatly under his tutelage). We then reached two segments in which we saw Desmond Howard get FIRED UP big time. Gene W. had a nice piece on Everett Golson’s fall and triumphant return to Notre Dame and how he spent 14 weeks working with George Whitfield to improve his pocket presence. Golson said he was motivated to do do this because it finally hit him when he was watching Notre Dame play Michigan last year without him that the world does not stop because he was kicked off the team. Now back to Desmond’s opinion. He had the opinion that spending 14 weeks in San Diego working on your craft with the world’s best QB guru is hardly punishment for the offenses committed. They finally had to cut him off because the conversation was going nowhere.

Desmond also got FIRED UP when discussing the Penn State sanctions being lifted. He said he is tired of seeing sanctions against schools for financial or academic reasons, but then turning around and lifting the sanctions for the Sandusky scandal. Kirk disagreed strongly, citing the fact that everyone involved in the program is now gone from Penn State. I thought this would come to blows.

If you don’t mind, I’d like to stop down for an editorial here (as opposed to whatever the rest of this nonsense is). Our panel of Gameday hosts got into a discussion about LSU’s Leonard Fournette doing the Heisman pose after scoring a touchdown against Sam Houston State University last week. Comparisons were made to Desmond Howard’s legendary pose, and they felt the need to kick SHSU in the crotch for about three minutes. I like to think of myself as the Paul Finebaum of the Southland Conference (is that weird?), so that hurt. However, my beef here is with Leonard Fournette’s Heisman pose. Is there nobody who can do the Heisman pose properly in this world? Has anyone actually looked at the statue before? The Heisman trophy has two feet on the ground.

THIS

IS NOT THIS

Whatever. Now that I’ve wasted 45 seconds more of your life, let’s get back to Gameday. Today’s chef of the day was Dr. David Newman. Doctor of meat I guess? He was making kabobs of some sort with yellow squash and green peppers for a NDSU colored meal.

This week’s overly casual roundtable segment where they leave the desk and go sit in chairs ten feet away was pretty much a segment to kick the Big 10 in the crotch for last week’s performance. Desmond was suspiciously silent. They looked at Big 10 point spreads this week, and it became clear that Herbie and Des don’t really know how point spreads work. Has anyone else noticed how much ESPN has pushed gambling lines this year? They have an entire ESPNU show on Fridays dedicated to it, and highlight the spread when breaking down all the matchups this year. Weird.

Tom Rinaldi had a lovely piece on Marshall QB Rakeem Cato. He came from the Liberty City neighborhood of Miami, and lived in public housing with 9 other children under the same roof. His mother died when he was 13, and he lived through high school staying at football teammate’s houses. He was determined to make it out of such a setting, and was able to be the first in his family to go to college by attending Marshall and leading the Thundering Herd to a bowl win last year. His coach, Doc Holliday, said that he is an example for any kid who thinks there is no hope. Inspiring stuff.

Bald Man on Campus was back, and SVP chilled with Todd Gurly. They discussed his comparisons to Herschel Walker and other greats. Really hip and casual segment.

The Gameday crew discussed Steve Spurrier’s comments about how he has a rule for his teams: if you hit a girl then you’re gone. The consensus was that they all agree. #hotsportsopinions

Chris Fowler didn’t have a hundred dollar question this week, but did have the guys pick the Secretary’s Cup game. In case you are one of the few who didn’t know, that is the game between the Coast Guard Academy and the Merchant Marine Academy. Coast Guard was the consensus pick.

But let’s get down to the business at hand. This week’s special guest picker was former NDSU QB and three time national champion Brock Jensen. He had his championship rings on, and all I can say is BLING BLING. Apparently the only Gameday guest picker with more rings is Magic Johnson. File that fun fact away!

Brock had some good picks, and to nobody’s surprise picked NDSU to win big today. In fact, everyone including Charley the Cat picked NDSU to win today. Lee Corso jumped in a trailer containing Corso the Bison and put on the headgear to match for his headgear pick this week. I think we were near a disaster, with a combination of Lee Corso hanging onto the back of a trailer, a mask I’m sure he couldn’t see through, a live bison in with him, and the trailer taking off down the street. However, everyone survived and we will live to see you next week!

Week 10 2012: Gameday review #saturdayselections

Posted on November 3, 2012 by gamedaycole

Its about noon here and we are in the middle of the morning slate of games, and that means we’ve put another edition of College Gameday in the record books. Today the show was broadcasting live from Baton Rouge, Louisiana for the huge matchup between #1 Alabama and #5 LSU. While LSU has a ridiculous winning record at home (something like 36-1 in their last 37, forgive me if I’m wrong), it is the Alabama Crimson Tide who are about an 8 point favorite going on the road. We opened this morning with Chris Fowler welcoming us to the show and doing some quick clerical duty running down the day’s schedule before handing off the hosting duties to Samantha Steele. Samantha Steele tweeted this morning that she went to Chik-fil-a and witnessed a toddler fight in the playplace as well as a girl fight in the bathroom regarding Alabama. Sounds about right for Baton Rouge. Today her outfit was another FABULOUS one according to Jennifer. She said she would like to have this shirt. However, one must bring up the question: WHY ARE YOU WEARING WHITE AFTER LABOR DAY? I MEAN COME ON, IS THIS AMATEUR HOUR?

samsteelewk102 — Week 10: Samantha Steele

This morning we got a good bit of BCS Guru Brad Edwards breaking down potential scenarios based on future wins and losses. He did a segment on both the early hour on ESPNU as well as the main show on ESPN later on. He seemed to think that aside from Alabama, Kansas State is in the drivers’ seat as far as making the championship game (should everyone in the running win out). The Big 12 is #1 in the computer rankings, so the KState strength of schedule is giving them the edge. Notre Dame may have a pretty good resume on paper, but most of their tough games are behind them. Oregon’s strength of schedule is peaking at the right time, but with Oregon State and USC losing, the Ducks winning out might not be enough to jump an undefeated Kansas State. We are assuming a lot here. Can’t wait to see how it ends up.

We got a replay of the De’anthony Thomas/Black Mamba/Snoop Dogg/Snoop Lion piece from about a month ago as filler material this morning. Snoop discovered Thomas at one of his football league games and gave him a nickname: The Black Mamba. The best morning segment today for me was when David Pollack and Samantha Steele were joined by GIGANTIC HUMAN BEING TREVOR MATICH. They were breaking down matchups between the defensive line and offensive line in todays’ games. David Pollack looked terrified pretending to go up against someone the size of Trevor Matich. Keep in mind that in the picture below David Pollack is 6’2”.

trevormatich2 — Trevor Matich: Large human being

Coming back from commercial we got some great video of local Louisiana residents doing whatever boat things they do in the swamp. You can tell I know what I’m talking about here. The highlight of this quick segment was footage of someone who they said was a former Louisiana Tech quarterback from a while back. Seems about right.

To close out the first hour on ESPNU, we got some picks from Desmond Howard and David Pollack. They both went with Bama over LSU to some nice booing from the crowd. You can generally tell how live the crowd is each week based on how much they boo these two. As the main show kicked off on ESPN, Fowler and the crew sent Samantha Steele to the bus and David Pollack to use the internet and tweet at the rubes. This week Pollack arrived to the internet in the Batmobile. I wish it had been the 1960s Batmobile.

pollacinternetwk102 — Pollack likes Batman, likes internet

Early on in the show we got a breakdown of the big game today: the Battle for Myron Claxton’s shoes. They just couldn’t wait til the end of the show to break down the Occidental/Whittier matchup, and neither could I. The predictions were unanimous with Corso, Herbie and Des all picking Whitter over Occidental. I think that’s a solid pick. Before we get to the signs of the day, I do have to ask the question: Where were the Alabama fans? Every time they showed the crowd it seemed like a sea of yellow and purple. Maybe I wasn’t paying attention, but I wonder what the crowd will look like for the game tonight. Anyways, the highlights of the signage today include the LSU “If we lose do we get a re-do?” sign, the “Miles eats grass taller than Saban” sign, and the “Saban is a Keebler elf” sign. Today’s runner up was the “Alabama claims Lance Armstrong’s Titles” sign. This might have won, except that it was too late. Texas A&M already claimed those titles.

signofthedaywk10b2 — Sorry, A&M already claimed the titles

Today’s official sign of the day has to be the following, presented without comment once again.

We got another piece of beatnik poetry from Tom Rinaldi quiet-talking about the deeper meanings of a loss. He asked coaches about how they handle losses and how they eulogize them in the locker room after the game. They said lots of things about not taking it out on the players, about moving forward, appreciating the wins, and how it can be like a death. Tom Rinaldi summed it up by saying losing is worse than death because it happens more than once. Alright then.

rinaldi-beatnik — Beatnik Tom Rinaldi performing live

We also got a piece by Gene W. about Oregon’s Marcus Mariota. Apparently he grew up wanting to go to USC, but that didn’t work out. Instead, Chip Kelly offered him a scholarship to Oregon before Mariota ever even started a game. His response to Chip’s offer was “are you sure?” I’m not sure that is the response I would give to such an offer. We also got a Bald Man on Campus with Scott Van Pelt featuring AJ McCarron. Apparently when he was young he made a list of things he wanted to be as a grown up, including football player, fireman, and car man (whatever that is). The highlight of this segment was that McCarron said that when Nick Saban comes down on you hard “you feel as small as him”. Lol.

samlolo — Sam Steele & Lolo Jones just because

But let’s get serious. Its time to get down to the business at hand. It is time for picks. The experts are leaning 20 to 3 in favor of Alabama over LSU as of mid-day today. The full slate of picks can be found HERE for your reference. Today’s special guest celebrity is former LSU track star Lolo Jones who was brought in to see if she could top Ryan Lochte’s performance. She had some delightful insight including saying she could beat Denard Robinson in a foot race. Since Denard Robinson is out with an injury today, that’ll go nicely with the rest of her sprinting challenges to injured football players. I mean, she already knows she could easily beat Eric Legrand. Anyways, she had little to contribute to the football discussion other than picking Kansas State over Oklahoma State because they wear purple like LSU. Des and Dave both went with Alabama, and Herbie joined them riding the Crimson Tide. Would coach Corso go with the home crowd favorite in LSU, or the actual favorite Alabama? He had Sweet Home Alabama pumped through the speakers as he went back and forth egging on the crowd. He finally chose Alabama over LSU to an overwhelming boo. As he donned the headgear, Herbie wasn’t quite as scared as he was of live animals, but he continues to be awkward each week leaning away from Corso. Another great Gameday. Enjoy your Saturday.