Time for Another What-If Post

I honestly can’t remember how many I have done in the past but I don’t think I have dedicated an entire post to something like this.  This is what happens during the off-season…the mind starts to wander.

First, before I begin, I will say that I have been sick all week and noticed the Cleveland-Philly trade the day after it happened.  Doesn’t change my mock draft as all that would have to be done is the Eagles are slotted in at #2 and the Browns are now at #8.  Somehow we have gone back to my first mock which had Joey Bosa going to the Browns.  Poor Joey.

Alright, time for the What-If portion of our show.  The question this time around is What if Penn State was granted entry into the Big East back in 1982?

I know this has been done several times by others but I figured I would take a crack at it.  If you don’t know, Penn State applied to become part of the old Big East in 1982.  They needed six votes to be accepted out of the eight schools and got five.  Georgetown, St. John’s, and Villanova voted against it.  All three had powerhouse basketball programs and did not want to go away from the conference’s basketball roots.  The Big East didn’t sponsor football until 1991 so until then, basketball was king.  This decision was possibly understandable at the time but boy did it ever affect college football in the future, especially with the eventual demise of the Big East itself.

So let’s take a look at what would have happened if Penn State had been accepted to the Big East.

Penn State would have never accepted an invitation to the Big Ten if they had already been in the Big East.  Penn State was an independent until 1990 when they joined the B1G.

The Big East probably would have started sponsoring football at least one or two seasons earlier than it did.  The Big East had a football conference for the first time in 1991.  Chances are this would have started earlier, even if it had been one season.

There is a good chance with Penn State in there, Notre Dame would have joined before talks became serious with NBC.  This means, when the conference probably would have started sponsoring football in, say, 1990, this is what the football lineup would have been:

Boston College, Syracuse, Pittsburgh – all original members

Penn State, Notre Dame – invited in the 80s

Miami, Rutgers, Temple, West Virginia, Virginia Tech – invited when Big East started football conference

That would be some kind of ten-team conference.  Only issues in the 90s would have been Rutgers and Temple being doormats most of the decade.

Does this mean Florida State joins the Big East?  Probably not but I think the decision becomes a little less simple with Miami, Penn State, and Notre Dame all in one conference.

Up until 1995, most of this would have meant very little.  That all changed in 1996 when the Southwest Conference ceased to exist.  This made the Big 8 expand to the Big 12, Conference USA being formed, and the WAC going with some extreme expansion.  Remember, if all above had happened, the Big Ten would have still been at ten teams.

I think the big 1996 realignment, the first of its kind, would have gone on exactly as it looked, at the time.  At this point, college football is big, but not as big as it has become now.  And it certainly didn’t have the money flowing towards it back in 1996 that it does now, 20 years later.

All this time, I am sure Joe Paterno would have reminded everyone of his vision of a Northeastern-type conference of college football.  The one team that he had mentioned that wasn’t in the Big East was Maryland.

This brings us to 2004.  The great ACC heist of three teams from the Big East (well, Miami and Virginia Tech that year and Boston College the next).  We can safely say now that this probably never happens.  However, Miami had complained about the Big East as far back as 1999.  The northern nature of the conference may have created the scenario that Miami would have felt like an outsider.  At the time, Miami did feel like an outsider because they were more focused on football than basketball.  Again, this isn’t the issue here.  My guess is Virginia Tech and Boston College stay.  And on top of that, the Big East adds the aforementioned Maryland to the conference to complete Joe Paterno’s dream (kind of).  Also Connecticut is added to the Big East as well.  Finally, Temple remains and isn’t dropped as was originally what happened.

The ACC is almost desperate for expansion so they would take Miami, especially since this means more games for Miami against archrival Florida State.  The ACC wanted enough teams (twelve) to hold a conference championship game though.  This meant they would have still needed three teams.  My best guess is they go to twelve immediately with the invitations to Louisville, Cincinnati, and USF, the three football programs who ended up going to the Big East that same year.

I believe this would also be what behooved the Big Ten to expand.  In 2011, they added Nebraska from the Big XII.  I think they would go all in and also add Kansas and Missouri as well.  This would put them at an awkward 13.  Rutgers now wouldn’t make sense as the Big Ten really didn’t have a bridge to the NY/NJ area.  My guess is they are semi-forced to take Kansas State as they may be anchored to Kansas (although that might not be true).

So now the Big XII is down to nine.  Do they stay that way?  I doubt it.  But now, instead of Colorado and Utah, the (then) Pac-10 has an easier time of convincing the Texahoma 4 (Texas, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, and Oklahoma State) to move west and join to become the Pac-14.

The SEC would get Texas A&M but now Missouri is in the Big Ten (where they probably should have been all along).  Knowing there’s few schools out there that fit the SEC footprint they may just take UCF as they are a huge school from a big area.  It would also match the number of Florida teams in the ACC with two.

Finally, with all this talk of conference championships being important, the Big East would have to move to add a team to get to twelve.  My best guess is that it would come down to three schools at the time: East Carolina, Massachusetts, and Buffalo.  East Carolina wouldn’t fit the geographic footprint and Buffalo isn’t a power in neither football nor basketball.  So in the end, the Big East gets UMass.

All this would leave the following setup (I have left divisions out as it doesn’t really matter here):

Big East	SEC	Pac-14	Big Ten	ACC
Boston College	Alabama	Arizona	Illinois	Cincinnati
Connecticut	Arkansas	Arizona St.	Indiana	Clemson
Maryland	Auburn	California	Iowa	Duke
Massachusetts	Florida	Oklahoma	Kansas	Florida St.
Notre Dame	Georgia	Oklahoma St.	Kansas St.	Georgia Tech
Penn State	Kentucky	Oregon	Michigan	Louisville
Pittsburgh	LSU	Oregon St.	Michigan St.	Miami
Rutgers	Mississippi St.	Stanford	Minnesota	NC State
Syracuse	Ole Miss	Texas	Missouri	North Carolina
Temple	South Carolina	Texas Tech	Nebraska	USF
Virginia Tech	Tennessee	UCLA	Northwestern	Virginia
West Virginia	Texas A&M	USC	Ohio St.	Wake Forest
	UCF	Washington	Purdue
	Vanderbilt	Washington St.	Wisconsin

There’s probably a few things that could change there obviously as some schools could be considered more “deserving” to be in there than others.  Some schools, like Baylor and TCU, now thrive on the football field and it may affect things in the future.  Obviously this means the Big XII would die off (not surprisingly) and the aforementioned Baylor and TCU would be joined by Iowa State and Colorado as schools without a conference.  Either the Mountain West or Conference USA would become their home.  Either that or, in the case of Baylor and TCU, a new Southwest Conference is formed with some of the bigger/more successful schools like Houston, North Texas, UTSA, UL-Lafayette, etc.  Utah would be still stuck in the Mountain West.  This, however, might mean that BYU might be inclined to want back in, especially if they also had Baylor and TCU.

This whole exercise also includes the breakup of the Big East as well.  The basketball schools would leave and create their own conference like they have now.  However, the Big East name might not be theirs so the conference with Georgetown, Villanova, Butler, et al might be called The American Conference instead.

Anyways, no matter how you figure the dominoes would fall, it is a certainty that that one vote not going Penn State’s way changed college football’s landscape forever.

Mock Draft Five…FIVE? Yeah Five. Thanks a bunch Titans.

I wasn’t planning this I swear.  I was prepared to ride my draft prediction horse into the NFL Draft at the end of the month.  Then Tennessee decides to fuck things up TWO WEEKS before the draft.  Jerks.  It was a massive trade for sure and it’s obvious the Rams have decided that since they moved to Los Angeles they better do something good…unlike what they did in St. Louis since the early part of the century.

So I had to re-do my mock draft V 4.  I figured I could change a few picks and all would be well.  Nope.  Not even close.  That one trade had a pretty catastrophic effect on my entire mock draft, especially round one where many picks changed.

Here’s my brand-spankin’ new mock draft followed by a fun non-Buzzfeed-like list (you won’t believe bullet point number one!):

1	Los Angeles	Carson Wentz, QB, North Dakota State
2	Cleveland	Jared Goff, QB, California
3	San Diego	Laremy Tunsil, T, Ole Miss
4	Dallas	Jalen Ramsey, DB, Florida State
5	Jacksonville	Vernon Hargreaves, CB, Florida
6	Baltimore	Jack Conklin, T, Michigan State
7	San Francisco	Myles Jack, LB, UCLA
8	Philadelphia	Joey Bosa, DE, Ohio State
9	Tampa Bay	DeForest Buckner, DE, Oregon
10	NY Giants	Shaq Lawson, DE, Clemson
11	Chicago	Ronnie Stanley, T, Notre Dame
12	New Orleans	Noah Spence, DE, Eastern Kentucky
13	Miami	Darron Lee, LB, Ohio State
14	Oakland	Taylor Decker, T, Ohio State
15	Tennessee	Ezekiel Elliott, RB, Ohio State
16	Detroit	William Jackson, CB, Houston
17	Atlanta	Leonard Floyd, LB, Georgia
18	Indianapolis	Reggie Ragland, LB, Alabama
19	Buffalo	Sheldon Rankins, DE, Louisville
20	NY Jets	Paxton Lynch, QB, Memphis
21	Washington	A’Shawn Robinson, DT, Alabama
22	Houston	Derrick Henry, RB, Alabama
23	Minnesota	Laquon Treadwell, WR, Ole Miss
24	Cincinnati	Josh Doctson, WR, TCU
25	Pittsburgh	Mackensie Alexander, CB, Clemson
26	Seattle	Eli Apple, CB, Ohio State
27	Green Bay	Germain Ifedi, T, Texas A&M
28	Cleveland	Jarran Reed, DT, Alabama
29	Arizona	Kendall Fuller, CB, Virginia Tech
30	Carolina	Kevin Dodd, DE, Clemson
31	Denver	Connor Cook, QB, Michigan State
32	Kansas City	Corey Coleman, WR, Baylor
33	Tennessee	Tavon Young, CB, Temple
34	Dallas	Vernon Butler, DT, Louisiana Tech
35	San Diego	Andrew Billings, DT, Baylor
36	Baltimore	Will Fuller, WR, Notre Dame
37	San Francisco	Jaylon Smith, LB, Notre Dame
38	Jacksonville	Su’a Cravens, LB, USC
39	Tampa Bay	Maurice Canady, CB, Virginia
40	NY Giants	Robert Nkemdiche, DE, Ole Miss
41	Chicago	Christian Hackenberg, QB, Penn State
42	Miami	Jason Spriggs, T, Indiana
43	Tennessee	Le’Raven Clark, T, Texas Tech
44	Oakland	Keanu Neal, S, Florida
45	Tennessee	Justin Simmons, S, Boston College
46	Detroit	Michael Thomas, WR, Ohio State
47	New Orleans	Joshua Garnett, G, Stanford
48	Indianapolis	Cody Whitehair, G, Kansas State
49	Buffalo	Braxton Miller, WR, Ohio State
50	Atlanta	Chris Jones, DT, Mississippi State
51	NY Jets	Nick Martin, C, Notre Dame
52	Houston	Dak Prescott, QB, Mississippi State
53	Washington	Sterling Shepard, WR, Oklahoma
54	Minnesota	Vonn Bell, S, Ohio State
55	Cincinnati	Kenny Clark, DT, UCLA
56	Seattle	Javon Hargrave, DT, South Carolina State
57	Green Bay	Charles Tapper, OLB, Oklahoma
58	Pittsburgh	Yannick Ngokoue, LB, Maryland
59	Kansas City	Shilique Calhoun, DE, Michigan State
60	New England	Artie Burns, CB, Miami
61	Arizona	Darian Thompson, S, Boise State
62	Carolina	Shon Coleman, T, Auburn
63	Denver	Hunter Henry, TE, Arkansas

List (now with less Buzzfeed)

• Let me start with saying I do enjoy Buzzfeed sometimes. They have some cool lists at times.  It’s just the clickbait titles have gotten out of hand.  Soon I am sure they will have a link that says “NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS ORGY AT THE STADIUM!  YOU WON’T BELIEVE WHO SOME OF THE WOMEN ARE!” and it’s a list of pictures of Tom and Gisele holding hands in various parts of the stadium.
• The domino effect of that trade was insane. First of all, you almost HAVE to go all-in with quarterbacks at the top two spots now.  The Rams desperately want a quarterback and it is looking like Carson Wentz will be their guy.  At the two spot, the Browns aren’t picking Laremy Tunsil.  Not that their offensive line is awesome (apologies to Joe Thomas) but they also really want a QB.  So (Don’t Hassle the) Goff will probably go #2 to the Browns.
• What this means is that the guy who was the easy consensus first overall pick probably has no chance of being #1 now and that’s Laremy Tunsil. The Chargers would not pass a guy like that up so the domino effect continues.
• If you compared my previous mock draft that I did LAST WEEK with this one, it’s like I almost put every name in a hat and picked them out one-by-one. Here are just a few of the rather large changes (especially when we are considering this is a week’s difference):
  • DeForest Buckner dropped 5 spots (from 4 to 9)
  • Vernon Hargreaves moved up 7 spots (from 12 to 5)
  • Jack Conklin moved up 10 spots (from 16 to 6)
  • Noah Spence moved up 6 spots (from 18 to 12)
  • Darron Lee dropped 7 spots (from 6 to 13)
  • Ezekiel Elliott moved up 7 spots (from 22 to 15)
  • And that’s just for the current top 15!
• And now I hear rumblings that the Browns may do the unthinkable and trade out of the #2 spot. This could end up being one of the wildest draft days (well, as wild as a draft can get) in a long time.  I, for one, kind of hope the Browns do trade out just to see the added chaos it causes.  Just don’t do it until closer to the draft.  I don’t want to have to do a version 6.
• And finally, my apologies to Sheldon Rankins for excluding him from the previous mock draft. Don’t know how that happened.  I will blame it on global warming because why the hell not.

  The schedule is getting pretty close to completed.  The games are slotted in the proper weeks so by the end of May I will be starting the series of posts on the most important games of the upcoming season.  A little over four months away!  I hope it goes quick!!!

 

Mock Draft V 4 – Yeah I’m all in now

All in with quarterbacks that is.  I’ve taken the bait.  Who knows if I will be right (Spoiler Alert: probably not) but it’s kind of fun to just go with the trend and move quarterbacks up into the first round.  Fuck it, like it matters in the end.

Alright here are the first two rounds of mock draft number four with some fun-time notes afterwards:

1	Tennessee	Laremy Tunsil, T, Ole Miss
2	Cleveland	Carson Wentz, QB, North Dakota State
3	San Diego	Jalen Ramsey, DB, Florida State
4	Dallas	DeForest Buckner, DE, Oregon
5	Jacksonville	Myles Jack, LB, UCLA
6	Baltimore	Darron Lee, LB, Ohio State
7	San Francisco	Paxton Lynch, QB, Memphis
8	Philadelphia	Jared Goff, QB, California
9	Tampa Bay	Joey Bosa, DE, Ohio State
10	NY Giants	Shaq Lawson, DE, Clemson
11	Chicago	Ronnie Stanley, T, Notre Dame
12	New Orleans	Vernon Hargreaves, CB, Florida
13	Miami	Mackensie Alexander, CB, Clemson
14	Oakland	A’Shawn Robinson, DT, Alabama
15	Los Angeles	Eli Apple, CB, Ohio State
16	Detroit	Jack Conklin, T, Michigan State
17	Atlanta	Noah Spence, DE, Eastern Kentucky
18	Indianapolis	Taylor Decker, T, Ohio State
19	Buffalo	Laquon Treadwell, WR, Ole Miss
20	NY Jets	Reggie Ragland, LB, Alabama
21	Washington	Josh Doctson, WR, TCU
22	Houston	Ezekiel Elliott, RB, Ohio State
23	Minnesota	Corey Coleman, WR, Baylor
24	Cincinnati	Jarran Reed, DT, Alabama
25	Pittsburgh	William Jackson, CB, Houston
26	Seattle	Vernon Butler, DT, Louisiana Tech
27	Green Bay	Leonard Floyd, LB, Georgia
28	Cleveland	Kevin Dodd, DE, Clemson
29	Arizona	Kendall Fuller, CB, Virginia Tech
30	Carolina	Derrick Henry, RB, Alabama
31	Denver	Connor Cook, QB, Michigan State
32	Kansas City	Germain Ifedi, T, Texas A&M
33	Tennessee	Tavon Young, CB, Temple
34	Dallas	Andrew Billings, DT, Baylor
35	San Diego	Robert Nkemdiche, DE, Ole Miss
36	Baltimore	Joshua Garnett, G, Stanford
37	San Francisco	Jaylon Smith, LB, Notre Dame
38	Jacksonville	Su’a Cravens, LB, USC
39	Tampa Bay	Cody Whitehair, G, Kansas State
40	NY Giants	Michael Thomas, WR, Ohio State
41	Chicago	Christian Hackenberg, QB, Penn State
42	Miami	Le’Raven Clark, T, Texas Tech
43	Los Angeles	Nick Martin, C, Notre Dame
44	Oakland	Justin Simmons, S, Boston College
45	Los Angeles	Braxton Miller, WR, Ohio State
46	Detroit	Will Fuller, WR, Notre Dame
47	New Orleans	Chris Jones, DT, Mississippi State
48	Indianapolis	Vonn Bell, S, Ohio State
49	Buffalo	Jason Spriggs, T, Indiana
50	Atlanta	Kenny Clark, DT, UCLA
51	NY Jets	Dak Prescott, QB, Mississippi State
52	Houston	Cardale Jones, QB, Ohio State
53	Washington	Shilique Calhoun, DE, Michigan State
54	Minnesota	Keanu Neal, S, Florida
55	Cincinnati	Charles Tapper, OLB, Oklahoma
56	Seattle	Javon Hargrave, DT, South Carolina State
57	Green Bay	Yannick Ngokoue, LB, Maryland
58	Pittsburgh	Darian Thompson, S, Boise State
59	Kansas City	Adolphus Washington, DT, Ohio State
60	New England	Sterling Shepard, WR, Oklahoma
61	Arizona	Maurice Canady, CB, Virginia
62	Carolina	Emmanuel Ogbah, DE, Oklahoma State
63	Denver	Hunter Henry, TE, Arkansas

Fun-Time Notes

• We are now up to seven quarterbacks in the first two rounds. It seems more and more like Philadelphia and San Francisco are going to draft quarterbacks (and that they might trade up to get the one they want COUGH*Carson Wentz*COUGH).  Welcome Dak Prescott and Cardale Jones to the draft board everyone.  Two supremely talented college quarterbacks that could be, at the very least, decent backups in the NFL.  Plus they both like to run and have little regard for the safety of their own bodies.
• Will Tennessee trade the number one pick? It wouldn’t surprise me.  Saying that, I still believe Laremy Tunsil is a lock for the #1 pick unless the Eagles trade up into that spot.  That’s the only way someone who is pretty much Bizarro Tunsil (Wentz) could be drafted number one.
• I’ve dropped Joey Bosa to 9, Vernon Hargreaves to 12, and Noah Spence all the way to 17. This is more of other guys stepping up through their respective Pro Days rather than these three falling for any conceivable reason (although Spence didn’t exactly light it up at the Combine).

This has become very interesting.  I could see upwards of four trades involving the first ten picks which is unheard of.  Even more than one trade that early on makes the heads of the experts at ESPN and the NFL Network explode.  Mel Kiper might do laps.  Mike Mayock may chug an entire bottle of Jack Daniels.  It could get insane.  Or at least more so than it usually is.

You have just witnessed my last mock draft for the 2016 NFL Draft brought to you by Verizon (or some other massive corporation).  We are 17 days away now so unless something crazy happens, I am sticking with what I’ve got.  This year, I plan to switch it up and will watch the ESPN draft feed instead of the NFL Network broadcast.  Only fair since the last two drafts I watched mostly the NFL Network.  I’m assume it will be equal parts introspective, entertaining, and shitshow-like.

This will probably be my last post until after the draft.  I may throw down something great….who am I kidding, I know I won’t.  Working on the college schedule right now and am gearing up for the annual Most Important Games list which will come out possibly in late May if everything works out.