samantha ponder – Page 3 – Cole's Gameday Blog

Week 4 2015: College Gameday review! #cfb

Posted on September 26, 2015 by gamedaycole

Welcome to the way-too-late Week 4 edition of the College Gameday review. This week’s edition of College Gameday was broadcasting to your television set live in color from Tuscon, Arizona for the big matchup between Arizona and UCLA. Whenever Gameday is on the west coast for a Pac-12 game, it is always an early start at the show location, and this brings out the best (or worst) of the fans on most occasions. Maybe it is because only the crazies would get up that early to go claim a spot for Gameday, or maybe it is because they can basically go straight from the bar to the Gameday site, but comedy is always present for the 6AM local start.

Before the show even started this morning, there was urgent business which almost postponed the entire show. The Washington State flag, which has appeared at 166 consecutive College Gameday shows dating back to 2003, was lost in transit sometime late Thursday or early Friday. The show was almost cancelled by producer Lee Fitting as you can see below:

We have seized all activity on the @CollegeGameDay set until Ol' Crimson makes it to Tucson. We will not proceed without. #FreeOlCrimson

— Lee Fitting (@leefitting) September 25, 2015

Let’s dive right into the sign game this week. Strong contenders this week included “I LIKE SPORTS” and “I’m still drunk”. I was surprised at the lack of Lane Kiffin signs after the rumor mill started buzzing this week, but perhaps they were just confiscated before being allowed to enter the Gameday site. There was a massive amount of signs picking at the alleged minutiae of everyday life for our student athletes and their coaches. Lots of Jim Mora tributes including “Jim Mora waters his lawn” and “Jim Mora is gluten free”. However, the target of more signs than anyone else was UCLA QB Josh Rosen. “Josh Rosen hangs out with his RA”, “Josh Rosen wears socks to bed”, and “Josh Rosen doesn’t even fast on Yom Kippur” were among the many featured. However this week’s co-signs of the week are a little bit edgier that we usually see on Gameday.

For some unknown reason, there was a point early in the show where the crew was discussing the Rutgers/Kansas game. I only point this out because none of the Gameday hosts knew who the head coach of Kansas was except Rece Davis. Poor Clint Bowen.

The Sam Ponder outfit of the week was a hit in our household this week. Jennifer gave it big props, so let us know what you think.

Tom Rinaldi presented us this week’s touching piece about teams surprising some of their walk-ons with scholarships in different ways. This was pretty much a recycled segment from last season on the same subject, but I would be perfectly fine if they did one of these segments every year. Those of you who may have read my reviews before know I love to bag on Tom Rinaldi for sensationalizing certain pieces (see last week’s Lawrence Phillips piece) but seeing walk-ons get scholarships certainly gives me the warm fuzzies.

Speaking of Tom Rinaldi, he and Gene W. did a quick piece on football players and their use of the ice bath. I point this out because not only did we get both of them shirtless, they went into an ice bath and then Tom Rinaldi disappeared as the crowd around him jumped in. We may never see him again judging by the full video.

Today we got to revisit the inspiring story of USC deep snapper Jake Olsen. In case you’re new to the show, he had been featured in Gameday as a 12 year old USC fan who was going to lose his eyes to cancer. He had appeared as a special guest picker posting a 6-4 record picking with Corso and the boys. He had appeared as the only blind high school deep snapper I’ve ever heard of. And today he appeared as the newest addition to the USC roster as a deep snapper. He hasn’t gotten play time yet, but it is a pretty darn cool story with how much he has accomplished. He is playing major college football without the sense of sight. I am laying on a couch eating ice cream while blogging. It is pretty much the same thing I guess.

Gameday did a feature on LSU running back and Heisman hopeful Leonard Fournette. You probably remember his most famous moment when he performed a Heisman pose while squeaking out a win against Sam Houston State last year 56-0.

This piece on him from today featured his story of surviving Hurricane Katrina and a tough upbringing in New Orleans. The most shocking moment was when he casually told us about football practice one day as a youngster in New Orleans. “That spot over there with the swings, that’s where one of the coaches got shot in the head at.” All I could think is:

Still a great segment, so check it out here.

As the show started to wind down, it was once again time for everyone’s favorite segment, #YOUHADONEJOB!!!! Just watch the video because words do not do it justice.

When it came time to get down to the business of picking games, this week’s special guest celebrity initially left me scratching my head. He is famous(?) Arizona alumnus Bob Baffert. I didn’t know who that was until Jennifer told me he was the trainer of Triple Crown winner American Pharoah. He arrived on a private jet, so he must be doing well in life. He seemed to have little idea of what is going on in football, and mostly picked games based on a friend or relative who went to a school. To nobody’s surprise he picked Arizona to win today. David Pollack had gone with Arizona earlier in the show, and Desmond Howard agreed. When it came time for Coach Corso to make his pick, he cut to a shot of American Pharoah picking the game and taking UCLA. To my knowledge that is the first time a horse has picked games on Gameday, but I will follow up on that research later. Animals must stick together because Charley the Cat went with UCLA as well, while Jennifer and Coach Corso both took Arizona in today’s featured game. This was the first time Corso has ever picked Arizona as his headgear selection, so this is quite a historical day.

Enjoy your night and have a happy football!

Corso picks Arizona! Courtesy @CollegeGameday

Week 3 2015: College Gameday review! #cfb

Posted on September 19, 2015 by gamedaycole

After a hiatus last week due to some extracurricular activities last Saturday, the Officially Unofficial College Gameday Review is back for week 3! Today’s College Gameday was broadcasting to your television live in color from Tuscaloosa, Alabama for the big matchup between Alabama and Ole Miss.

Let’s dive right into this week’s sign game. The SEC has historically been a strong conference for Gameday signage, and today was no letdown. Highlights this week include “WE WANT JACKSONVILLE STATE”, “Chad Kelly shaves his arms”, and “Make sure you’re on the potty before you go hotty toddy”. My favorites this week were the following:

FullSizeRender (1) — This guy has it going on

The Sam Ponder outfit of the week was a unique one for sure. She said she was already reconsidering her choice about fifteen minutes into the show today because a fan yelled out “NICE SCRUBS SAM!” Jennifer said its a good color on her, but not her favorite.

George Whitfield was back this week to break down some QBs for us. The only takeaways I had from this were his dedication to wearing tiny rosettes on his suits, and not understanding why every one of these segments is now done while walking the Gameday site. I guess they just want you to know how casual they are during this segment. NOTICE THE CASUALNESS!

Kirk, David and Desmond in particular engaged in a somewhat controversial discussion about Florida head coach Jim McElwain’s sideline behavior last week with Kelvin Taylor. While all agreed that it was excessive, David was the the reasonable voice saying that he was yelled at plenty during his career and didn’t think it was deserving of suspension or discipline. Desmond Howard was highly criticized on the internets for seemingly trying to work up a situation where both himself and ESPN can take a strong moral stand against this type of behavior. I may have not played a down of football past the 8th grade, but I find it hard to believe that Desmond never took a tongue lashing from a coach. While most of the heat was targeted at Desmond in particular, I have a bone to pick with Kirk Herbstreit over his comments on the topic. During his own lecture, he said that coaches like Bear Bryant, Bo Schembechler and Woody Hayes would never have gone as far as Jim McElwain did last week. I’m no expert on Woody Hayes (or any other subject for that matter), but I would think if you are trying to contrast Jim McElwain with a legendary level-headed coach, you might not choose one that ended his own career by punching a student athlete during a game.

.There was a segment highlighting the quick rise of BYU quarterback Tanner Mangum. This is a 22 year old true freshman who was the MVP of the Elite 11 QB camp (over one Jameis Winston), but went on his Mormon Mission spending two years away from his family, friends, and game of football before returning to pull out two miracles this year at the end of games. Will he make it three in a row? We certainly hope so.

Tom Rinaldi did a Tom Rinaldi piece on former Nebraska running back and current Kern Valley State Prison inmate Lawrence Phillips. I know Rinaldi loves putting together stories to touch your heart, whether it is a tragic fall from grace or a story of overcoming adversity. I felt this one fell a little flat, considering it was pretty much the story of a truly great athlete who had a hobbies including domestic violence, assault, vandalism, and most recently being charged with murder while incarcerated. Normally Rinaldi’s stories of falls from grace have a redeeming quality at the end, but I wasn’t feeling it for this one. Sorry Tom.

On the other hand, we had a more inspiring story of Laquon Treadwell’s return after disaster last season. You may remember him as the Ole Miss wide receiver who seemingly scored the winning touchdown in a showdown between #3 Ole Miss and #4 Auburn last season. Upon further review, it couldn’t have been farther from the truth. It was ruled he fumbled at the 1-yard-line while being taken down into the endzone, while simultaneously dislocating his ankle and breaking his leg, which also brought an end to a magical Ole Miss undefeated season. He is back after a tough rehab regimen. Check out the full piece here.

Our new favorite segment on Gameday is called #YOUHADONEJOB and it features Sam Ponder and David Pollack playing the most ridiculous clips from the football week along with said hashtag. Really funny stuff, so just watch the video here.

Nick Saban visited the set for an interview at the Gameday desk. He talked about generic coaching things in vague terms, so the highlight was his response to which coach he would want to team up with during a tag team brawl. He said Urban Meyer due to his success in coaching, but Kirk said Charlie Strong would be his leading contender. Anyways…

When it came time to get down to business and start picking some games, this week’s “Bear’s Bank” picks were Purdue+6.5, UCLA-16.5 and Ole Miss+7. Go call your bookie and then come back to finish this. This week’s special celebrity guest picker was country music bro Eric Church. While I have no knowledge of his music or talent, he was one of the most well-informed guest pickers we’ve ever seen on Gameday. He was dropping so much knowledge on the Gameday boys that Corso eventually had to quit explaining his picks and just give us the winner. As they went into a no-huddle-offense to finish on time, Herbie broke down the game since he is calling it and can’t pick the game, while Desmond and Eric both took Alabama. Corso asked if he could borrow Church’s acoustic guitar, which Church handed over, and he started “playing” Sweet Home Alabama before donning the Alabama headgear once again. Charley the Cat took Ole Miss in an upset, so this is quite a showdown we will see between Coach Corso and our cat tonight. Enjoy your day folks.

Week 1 2015: College Gameday review! #cfb #getup4gameday

Posted on September 5, 2015 by gamedaycole

I know this is coming out a little bit late, but welcome back to our weekly College Gameday review! Week 1 was broadcasting to your living room in full color from Sundance Square in Ft. Worth, Texas, where the Gameday boys were preparing for tonight’s big game between Alabama and Wisconsin. The intro song continues to be revamped each season, sliding into more and more mediocrity, but I’ll be damned if it still doesn’t get me jacked up every Saturday morning.

Right out of the gate you may have noticed that Rece Davis is now piloting the show in place of Chris Fowler, who has been called in for play-by-play duties full time on Saturday nights. Many of you may not have noticed the difference, as many claim Davis and Fowler are actually one and the same. Come to think of it, have you ever seen the two of them in the same place at the same time?

Anyways, upon opening the show, a few kind words were said by Rece Davis about Chris Fowler. Not enough can be said about Chris Fowler’s impact on College Gameday, but there is nobody better to fill those shoes than Rece Davis. The kind words extended by Davis were agreed upon by all of the Gameday crew, but this took an awkward left turn as Kirk Herbstreit boldly proclaimed that there is NOBODY better in the business than Chris Fowler. He then backtracked and let us know there there is ALSO nobody better than Rece Davis.

As the show got under way, it has become apparent that ESPN is fully embracing the gambling on college football games this year. Two years ago you never heard anything about point spreads, totals, or covering except vague references to “the experts” predictions from “out in the desert”. Last year they started at least acknowledging the spreads, but this year they are all but making and taking bets on the show. Those of you watching the weeknight games this week may have seen the birth of the “Cover Alert” to go along with the Upset Alert. Gameday has now introduced a new feature called “Bear’s Bank” in which Chris ‘The Bear’ Fallica provides three of his best bets for you with his patended “Bear Bucks”. This week he took the Alabama/Wisconsin under, Texas A&M minus the points, and Arkansas St to cover against USC. This segment was also stopped down by Herbie who pointed out that Fallica was breaking Gameday dress code by wearing shorts. The biggest takeaway here is that Fallica has HUGE calves.

As we get into the sign game this week, the competition wasn’t as strong as some weeks in the past, but we still had a few highlights. We had the return of the always-beloved “I’m Asian” sign, the “Kendal Briles was adopted” sign, “Saban pays for Tinder”, and “Gus Malzahn’s name was on Ashley Madison”. Here’s some of those signs. However this week’s co-signs of the week are the following:

and…

Early in the show there was a short piece on the move made by Mike Riley from Oregon State to Nebraska. He is very mild mannered in case you forgot that from similar segments of years past. In fact, he is basically the antithesis of Bo Pelini in every way possible. Even though Nebraska is off to a rough start losing to BYU today, let’s all root for Mike Riley for being such a nice guy.

Without a doubt the best segment of the day was a highlight video of extreme offseason workouts. Kids are dressing up like superheros and comic book characters to get an extra bit jacked up for weight lifting and practices. The kids are also big into viral videos one-upping each other with ridiculous feats of football skill. There is really no way to properly describe this, so just watch THIS VIDEO and ejoy it.

Samantha Ponder had a hilarious segment teaching College Football 101 to some children including her own little bundle of joy Scout Ponder. Without a doubt the highlight of this video is the kid from Alabama yelling “WE’RE NUMBER THREE! WE’RE NUMBER THREE!”

This brings us to this week’s edition of the SAM PONDER OUTFIT OF THE WEEK! This week she was sporting a white skirt and pink blouse, but this was hardly noticed due to the presence of QB guru George Whitfield and his purple suit and lavender rosette. The best line of this week comes courtesy of Reddit user Extra21stChromosome who asked “Why is Sam Ponder talking to Grimace?”

Now back to regularly scheduled programming. After watching the earlier extreme workout video, Rece Davis wasted no time challenging David Pollack to see if he can still do a 52 inch vertical leap. The result was impressive (at least to someone like myself with a solid 28 inch vertical leap).

https://vine.co/v/eTQEvx5q7wA/embed

A touching tribute piece to Chris Fowler followed the David Pollack acrobatics show, and it was a great look back at the last 25 years he has been on Gameday. There is nothing I love more than vintage Gameday videos. After this video, the entire Gameday crew was joined by Fowler, which finally places Fowler and Rece Davis in the same place at the same time proving them to be different.

During this segment, Rece Davis vowed to continue the famed ‘Hundred Dollar Bill Question’ popularized by Fowler. This week’s obscure piece of trivia was questioning what team in ALL of college football has the longest losing streak. Those of you playing at home obviously know it is D2 school Cheyney University of Pennsylvania with a 32 game losing streak. The hundred dollar bill remained unclaimed by the Gameday crew.

Gene W. had a great piece on Alabama kicker Adam Griffith, who is actually from Poland and has quite an amazing story. I guess Gene W. never really does stories on your average middle-class player who got a scholarship to Colorado or Pitt and lived a normal life, so I don’t need to tell you this kicker has an amazing story. From growing up in extremely hard conditions, bouncing around from parents to orphanages to the streets (and taking up smoking at the age of SIX!!!) he was adopted by an American couple and brought here to dominate the kicking game (except for his appearance in the Kick Six). On top of that, he has a pretty funny Polish-SEC accent, so check it out.

As the show neared the grand finale of game picks, out of nowhere a Brad Paisley concert broke out. He sang about college football and stuff. It was weird. I guess since he was this week’s guest picker he demanded a musical appearance. Babi Mac made a brief appearance earlier (which I still don’t understand), but the jury is still out on College Gameday musical pieces (at least to me).

Speaking of picks, this week’s grand finale featured both Brad Paisley and one of the Kirk Herbstreit clones named Chase. Brad Paisley brings a lifetime record of 6-3 picking games in his previous appearance, so we will see if he can top that. This week’s picks started off picking a few cupcakes against the spread for entertainment purposes only before diving into the day’s bigger games. As the time arrived for headgear, Corso said he had arranged a live elephant on set for today at the price of $6,000, but the elephant stood him up. He picked up the Alabama headgear and did a double fake-out before finally placing it on his head. Those of you paying close attention might have noticed he let this pick slip earlier in the show when he said he would take both “Alabama and the under”, but who cares? Its Lee freaking Corso.