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Week 2 2013: College Gameday review!

Posted on September 7, 2013 by gamedaycole

Welcome back to another great Saturday of college football folks. The afternoon games are in full swing, and that means it is time for another College Gameday review. This week the show was broadcasting from Ann Arbor, Michigan for the big matchup between Notre Dame and Michigan; THE LAST TIME THESE TWO TEAMS WILL EVER MEET*! The show opened up at 8AM central, for what is supposed to be this year’s normal schedule of a three hour show on ESPN every week. The crowd wasn’t exactly the biggest I’ve seen, and wasn’t as big as Clemson/Georgia last week either. I expected a little bit better from these two schools. Its too bad they will NEVER MEET AGAIN TO PLAY FOOTBALL.

*Last time they will meet as advertised by ESPN, unless both schools decide that they like money in which case the series will resume

The show opened with Fowler, Corso, Herbstreit, and Howard at the main desk, to be joined later by Sam Ponder and David Pollack. Fowler had an early hundred dollar question for the group: What was the trophy called that Florida and Miami(Fl) used to play for once upon a time decades ago? The confusing answer is the Seminole War Canoe, and the hundred dollar bill remained unclaimed. Early in the show we also had the return of everyone’s favorite segment, DAVID POLLACK USING THE INTERNET!!!!

He was live Tweeting from the Michigan locker room where there is apparently a shrine to Desmond Howard. He answered about two tweets live before giving up and going back to the TV set. As the guys started breaking down matchups today, Lee Corso reiterated his bold claim that Stanford would win the championship this year, and they would make quick work of SJSU today. We were then joined by Samantha Ponder who had on another nice dress today. Jennifer predicts this will be the year of the dress with the belt to define her waistline (belt not pictured below; hidden by note cards). Other notes include that she parted her hair down the middle, and her wedding ring (courtesy of Christian Ponder) is absolutely huge.

We got an interview with Brady Hoke, and the main highlight was when Hoke declared that one John “Football” Manziel would ride the bench behind Devin Gardner if he played for Michigan. Alright then. There was a very strange segment featuring noted cellar-dweller (at least in my rankings) Mike Greenberg, of Mike & Mike in the Morning fame. Being a notable Northwestern grad, he was invited on campus to be an honorary team captain for today’s game against Syracuse. Highlights included Pat Fitzgerald not having time for this nonsense, Greenberg searching in many wrong places for the team’s offense meeting, and concluded with a goofy inspirational speech from the honorary captain. I found this segment to be unsuccessful, as it included far too much of Greenberg’s sarcastic, overly-dry, self-deprecating humor. And that is coming from someone who is full of unsuccessful, sarcastic, overly-dry, self-deprecating humor. Greenberg needs to stick to his radio show talking the Jets and Tebow every week and stay away from my Gameday broadcasts.

One of the funniest moments of the show was early on when Kirk Herbstreit started an extended speech breaking down some matchup from today, the Michigan band immediately began blaring music behind him and completely drowning him out. Intentional or not, it was quite hilarious.

I happened to notice something peculiar today. Chris Fowler was suspiciously QUITE interested in what the “experts” out in “the desert” thought about how “today’s underdogs” would “perform” against how they were “expected” to. Let me remind you that College Gameday endorses gambling in no way, shape, or form. Neither does Brent Musberger. Other Fowler notes include the fact that he continues to rag on Sam Houston State (who is playing some team from College Station with some guy that won some award last year). Keep it up Fowler, the Bearkat faithful do not forget these things.

George Whitfield Jr., quarterback extraordinaire, was interviewed again this week, and said more generic things about Johnny Football. This would be a cool segment if he went in-depth about how he sees things, but when it is so generic it is quite bland.

There was a GREAT piece by Tom Rinaldi this week about Tulane’s Devon Walker, who was paralyzed last year in a game against Tulsa. I remember seeing that game last year, and it was quite intense to be seeing it live. He wasn’t breathing on the field, and they were performing chest compressions to basically resuscitate him on the field before transferring him to a hospital. He is now paralyzed from the shoulders down, confined to a wheelchair, and is in intensive rehab. He vowed to be back on the sidelines this year to cheer on the team, and he made it. He spoke to the team before their first game this year, and the best moment of the whole segment was when they presented him with his own Tulane jersey to wear. His face absolutely lit up as they put the jersey on him. Nobody likes to give Tom Rinaldi a hard time more than he for how he tries to make stories overly emotional, but this one was absolutely fantastic, and if it can be found on Youtube or elsewhere, I highly recommend it.

Moving along, that story was followed by a piece by Gene Wojciechowski about Jadaveon Clowney from South Carolina. He went to Athens to find out how he could stop Clowney in today’s game. He polled the students on campus, and they seemed incredibly educated on football (especially the ones who said he is not a threat in this game tonight). He went around the town finding out more information about how to stop Clowney, including some possibly drunk guy tackling a cardboard cutout of Clowney. Then he interviewed some local Pop Warner players about how to stop Clowney, and they probably had the best insight of anyone interviewed. The end was pretty cute when about ten of them tackled the Clowney cutout. This segment also featured a cameo by David Pollack, who had a thing or two to say when one student said linebackers were nothing to be feared.

At this point, let’s take a moment to highlight the sign of the day. It was a slow day for signs, so the following sign is presented without comment:

There was a new segment featuring Samantha Ponder interviewing Devin Gardner including her own new snazzy animated intro. Apparently Gardner likes cartoons, Brady Hoke looks like Fred Flintstone, and they talked about some other stuff. Other notes from today’s show include David Pollack shocking the world by picking AGAINST Georgia in today’s big game against South Carolina. Somewhere the REAL David Pollack is tied up in a closet and this look-alike is soiling the good name of a noted Georgia homer. Also, Michigan still hates Rich Rodriguez judging by the boos every time Arizona was mentioned today. Michigan also hates Herbie, and loves Desmond Howard.

But now, for the real reason you came here. It came time to pick the games. Today’s special guest celebrity picker (incredibly hyped on Twitter) was Mark Harmon from NCIS. His father, Tom Harmon, is a former Michigan Heisman winner from 1940, and Mark spent some time playing at UCLA himself. This sounded like a great segment in the making, and quickly turned into the most boring celebrity guest picker in the history of College Gameday. Mark Harmon picked six games, and said six words. Indiana. Florida. Georgia. Texas. Arizona. Michigan. End segment. No analysis. No jokes. No humor. End segment. Onto the headgear pick. I predicted this year Corso would have live animals on set at least four times this year, and thought this week was going to be a loser. How on earth would be bring a live animal on set today? A wolverine would be dangerous, and a drunk Irishman doesn’t count. Corso started poking the crowd with a stick hyping up Michigan, and before you knew it, he put in a leprechaun hat and proceeded to fill the desk with live chickens (in reference to Notre Dame chickening out in this series). Herbie looked terrified as usual, and it was a really funny way to end today’s episode. Enjoy the rest of your day folks.

Week 1 2012: College Gameday review

Posted on September 1, 2012 by gamedaycole

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.

pollackinternet — HA HA I’M USING THE INTERNET!!1

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.