Isn't it ironic, don't ya think?

Warning: The following sentence may make your head explode from irony...

Shiny-headed blowhard Paul Finebaum calls out a columnist for writing a ridiculous column full of hyperbole. The Orlando Sentinel's Mike Bianchi wrote a column spawned from SEC Media Days with one-liners such as

You see, Alabama football, with its legions of fanatical fans and its horde of frenetic media, is scared.

Very scared.

and...

Meyer has the demeanor. He has the domination. He has everything the Bear had except the houndstooth hat.

and...

This is Alabama's worst nightmare.

The Bear has finally risen again.

But he's coaching at Florida under the alias of Urban Meyer.

I'll grant you that Bianchi's column in question is a ridiculous comparison to make given Meyer's brief (so far) tenure in the SEC, but Finebaum calling him out is laughable at best. The good news for Auburn fans though is that Finebaum's next column should be all about them. The defense of The Bear should appease the Alabama fans for a few days.

Last thoughts about finebaum's column

Cocknfire over at the always great Team Speed Kills linked back to my response to Finebaum's recent pot-stirring column and makes some of the points I wish I had made, but was too flabbergasted by the gall it took to pen such meaningless crap.

If you don't believe that Ole Miss is going to win the SEC West this year, that's one thing. There's plenty of people out there who believe the Rebels will not win it and offer legitimate reasons they won't. Then you have Finebaum who somehow pieces together 827 words of inflammatory muck without offering a single intelligent statement or snippet of research as to why the Rebels will fail this year. I'd be impressed by the sheer ineptitude if I weren't so bothered that his editor ran with the story.

As Cocknfire points out, most of (Finebaum's) shots are "playground-level taunts, but that's Finebaum's usual fare." It's the sort of inane banter expected on the free access areas of message boards, but not from a professional paid "journalist". He could have worked in "Ole Piss" and "webels" and not compromised the integrity of the column, as there was none left to lose by the fourth paragraph.

Catching up with the pundits

I've been away for awhile, but I'm back.

* The more I read and hear Paul Finebaum, the more I wonder who the shiny-headed blowhard has nekkid pictures of. He's a pot-stirrer at best who rarely - if ever - writes anything non-inflammatory. The latest bandwagon he's jumped on is the anti-Rebel Bandwagon bandwagon.

This piece may be pointless and empty of any real substance, but at least it's clouded by ridiculous hyperbole, metaphors, and Caesarian references. I'm not even going to justify it by quoting it on this site. It's bad even by Finebaumian standards.

I will say one thing though. Mr. Finebaum, please allow me to speak for the Rebel Nation when I assure you that we don't need your pity. Whether or not the Rebels win the SEC West this year remains to be seen, but win or lose, I'll still be a Rebel and you'll still be a washed-up never-was that panders shamelessly to anyone that will actually read or listen to you, the overwhelming majority of which recognize you for the fraud you are. So please, spare me your faux-pity.

* Then there's Tommy Tuberville, whose opinion I actually do respect. He offers a pretty fair assessment of the the three-team race atop the SEC West, though he gives the edge to LSU. Personally, I think he's putting too much stock in Jordan Jefferson, but that's just me.

Tuberville's thoughts are after the good article about the Louisiana players on the Ole Miss roster.

* Wally Hall is typically as big a homer as Finebaum is pointlessly inflammatory, so I was surprised he listed Mallett behind Snead in his rundown of the SEC QBs. If the Hogs OL can gel and hold up, I can see Mallett flourishing in Petrino's offense. That's not the issue I have with this list. It's the ranking outisde the top 3 that leave me scratching my head.

Let me be the first to say that if there are 7 worse quarterbacks in the league than Tyson Lee, the SEC is in for a long, miserable season. He's a shoo-in for highest interception/attempts ratio in the conference. What exactly has Wally Hall seen from Lee that makes him think Lee can even be a serviceable QB in the SEC?

And ranking Joe Cox last? In this mediocre crop of SEC QBs, give me a fifth-year senior with UGA's OL with AJ Green lined up wide any day of the week over the majority of QBs ranked ahead of him. Cox would very well be 4th in the league in passing yards behind Tebow, Snead, and Mallett.

The same can also be said about Greg McElroy ranking 11th. Bama has some questions on the OL, but as long as Julio Jones is running around, McElroy will have one of the top bail-out options in the country.

As long as Garcia's antics are a thing of the past, I think, almost by default, that a Spurrier-coached QB (even a down-trodden, disinterested Spurrier) is going to be better than anyone Vanderbilt, Kentucky, Auburn, or mittippi tate run out there this year.

I'll grant you these lists are always subjective, but I can say unequivocably that Mr. Hall is dead wrong on many accounts in his list. I'm not sure what his criteria were, but if you're basing strictly on the productivity expected for the 2009 season, I think the list should be:
1) Tebow
2) Snead
3) Mallett
4) Cox
5) Garcia
6) Jefferson
7) McElroy
8) Burns
9) Hartline
10) Smith/Adams
11) Crompton
12) Tyson Lee/whoever replaces him when Mullen realizes he's not an SEC-caliber QB

Tuesday Tidbits

* It’s as though we’ve landed in some kind of bizarro world: College Football News offers the following Sugar Bowl projection: West Virginia vs Ole Miss. I’m just waiting for Kevin, Gene, Feldman, and Vargas to show up.

Assuming the SEC champion is No. 1 and off to the national championship, the Sugar Bowl will get the first choice of teams and it'll most certainly take the second best SEC team. Ole Miss, Alabama, LSU, Georgia or even Florida; throw a dart and you might have the right SEC representative. Boise State might be the call if the Fiesta doesn't have an interest, but geographically is makes more sense for the Broncos to go to Glendale and the Big East champion, possibly West Virginia, to go to New Orleans. The Mountaineers stunned Georgia the last time they were in the Sugar, played in Atlanta in 2006.

* Shiny-headed blowhard Paul Finebaum has high praise for Gene Chizik’s "Tiger Prowl". While Finebaum admits it was a gimmick, it seems he’s putting way too much stock in it.

There was another important aspect to Tiger Prowl as well -- stoking the home fires. In politics, you garner votes by exciting your base. You toss them red meat and hear them roar. The Auburn fan base was spitting fire last week. However, I think the most important message of the week was that Auburn is going to make Alabama fight for every acre of real estate in the state.

To me, this is exactly like John McCain choosing Sarah Palin as his running mate last year. Sure it got the fan base rowdy for a while, but once the novelty wore off, it was a gimmick with little to no substance. I somehow doubt Nick Saban is overly concerned about Chizik and his limo rides.

* Chris Low has his SEC Spring Wrap up on his blog and the Rebels are featured prominently. His Ole Miss wrap up is pretty good too.

* Jermey Parnell has signed a free agent deal with the Saints. Yes, that Jermey Parnell. While there's very little chance he makes the team, you can't teach the size, strength, and athleticism that JP's got. Who knows? Maybe he'll be the next Antonio Gates, just as a DL. I certainly wish him the best. If he doesn't go down against UT in the SEC opener last year, we probably win that game and a handful more of games we lost in the early conference season last year.

* The Quad, the New York Times college sports blog, has started its annual countdown of the best teams in America #120 - #1. Western Kentucky brings up the rear for a 2nd straight year. While it’ll be early July before any of our SEC brethren show up, it’ll be fairly quickly when UAB and Memphis show up. And then there’s the other half of the non-conference schedule – Northern Arizona and SELA – which won’t show up at all, as they’re both 1AA. So we’ve got that going for us.