When did sports fans become so gullible?
OK, maybe gullible is too strong. Let's put it this way; when did they become so easy to please?
Here's a quote from a college football coach following a game last Saturday: "I am very pleased with the performance of our team tonight. We played an outstanding team — one of the better teams in the country — if not the best team in the country. They will be argued upon by the end of the season as one of the best teams of the decade, maybe even more than that."
That was Jay Mills, and his team had just lost, 62-3.
Mills is the coach of the Charleston Southern Fighting Lemmings. The opponent he was talking about was Florida.
That's right. Somebody got away with staging a game between The University of Florida and Charleston Southern. Over 90,000 people paid good money to see it.
Roll that around in your mind for a while. Over 90,000 people paid good money to watch Florida beat Charleston Southern, 62-3.
And you know what⢠If Florida plays Charleston Southern again next season, the same 90,000 suckers will pay good money to see it again.
Those same suckers would pay good money if Florida played Charleston Southern again next Saturday .
Is the American sporting public really that stupid?
Apparently.
Over 100,000 showed up to watch Penn State play Akron and those same 100,000 would have been there for Charleston Southern. I swear there used to be a time when a sports fan knew a bad game when he saw one on the schedule and knew when to stay away.
I know all the stupid reasons for scheduling stupid games like this. I know it's all about money and the stupid polls, but what if people stopped showing up⢠What if 10,000 people showed up in Happy Valley instead of 100,000⢠Do you think maybe Penn State would decide it would be a better idea to schedule Pitt?
Over 40,000 showed up at Heinz Field to watch Pitt play Youngstown State.
It's really pathetic that the fans have come to accept the idea that it makes sense for Penn State to be playing Akron and Pitt to be playing Youngstown State on the same day, instead of Pitt and Penn State playing each other. I get in free, and I wouldn't walk across the street to watch Penn State play Akron.
And there are people paying real money to watch this?
All you need to know is that, on a night when they could clinch a losing season and become the most pathetic professional sports franchise in the history of North America, the Pirates drew over 27,000 to PNC Park.
I can remember great Pirates teams drawing 15,000 on a Saturday night at Three Rivers Stadium. Back then, the fans were smart enough to know that Three Rivers Stadium, as a baseball park, was a dump. Bad teams were lucky to draw 10,000. The attendance last Saturday night should have been 2,700, tops.
The NFL gets away with forcing anyone who wants to buy a season ticket to also buy tickets to two exhibition games and the fans put up with it. The sad thing is that they actually show up for the games.
Think about how much excitement there would have been in this area two weeks ago if Pitt and Penn State had been scheduled to play each other last weekend. You know the world is upside down when it's a bad idea for Pitt to play Penn State, but a good idea for Penn State to play Akron, Pitt to play Youngstown State and Florida to play Charleston Southern. If you keep buying the tickets, you'll keep getting the stupidity.
· According to Greg Easterbrook of ESPN.com , Bill Cowher's asking price to return to the NFL is $10 million a year. Bill better be able to bring the Browns and the Bengals with him if he expects to pay off on that kind of a deal. He benefited quite a bit from playing in the same division as those two pathetic franchises.
· The New England Patriots seem to be the consensus pick to represent the AFC in the Super Bowl next January, and that's understandable. Tom Brady is back at quarterback. But here's something everybody who considers the Patriots the team to beat should know: Brady is not a better quarterback than Ben Roethlisberger. He plays in a more quarterback-friendly system, but he is not a better quarterback. It says here that Roethlisberger is the best quarterback in the NFL.
· Did you see what Santonio Holmes wore to work Thursday night⢠He arrived at the stadium wearing a Mick Vick No. 7 Eagles jersey. He also wore it for his live TV interview after the game. If I owned the Steelers, he'd be told that I'm paying him millions of dollars to play for the Steelers and that the only NFL jersey he's allowed to wear when he's "at the office" is a Steelers' jersey. If he didn't comply, I'd suspend him. You know who Santonio reminded me of when I saw him in that getup⢠Plaxico Burress.
