Tiger40

Free king cake tasting in NOLA Thursday at 7pm. Details via NOLA.com: LINK

This: LINK Looks like the perfect recipe for Saturday

I have high confidence that the Pope is a Tiger fan.

I'll be in Rome during the Auburn game. I'm well aware of the rule against scheduling exotic foreign trips during Tiger games, but what's done is done. Anyone aware of any expat Tigers in Rome and any place where the game might be available for viewing? I'm hoping I can catch the game while my wife does some sightseeing crap. She said something about some Coloseum or whatever. I told her we were at Auburn that week, and we don't even play USC. Jesus, I wish she'd pay more attention...

Ok here's a reason why your proposition is not neccessary: it solves a problem that doesn't exist. I'm presuming we really don't care about who's number one in week 3, or 5, or 7, but just who has the opportunity to be play for the title. So, am I right that you'd like the prior champion to begin in the 1 spot to ensure they play to defend their title if they're unbeaten? Consider this: in the BCS era, Auburn is the only unbeaten BCS team that failed to gain the opportunity to play for the title. So, for every other year, your proposition addresses a problem that simply does not exist. Whether ranked #2 or #22 at the beginning of the season, no unbeaten BCS team other than Auburn has missed that opportunity. I will go out on a limb here and say, had Auburn been the previous years champion, they'd have had enough juice in the polls to pass OU and play for the title. Just my opinion FWIW

When the coaches' poll comes out doesn't matter at all. Why? 2 reasons: First, we the consuming public demand polls and we would still gobble up the Athlon, Lindy's, SI Power Rankings, etc, week by week (and even if you could somehow eliminate those polls, they'd be replaced in the blogosphere). Second, a delayed coaches poll would do exactly what the Harris poll does right now: piggyback on the non-offical polls out there which represent the national consensus. In fact, the polls actually come out about ten seconds after the end of each season as each columnist and outlet posts their "way-early" rankings for the next season. Throughout the spring and summer, those rankings are modified based on perceptions of recruiting, early-entry, injuries, etc. Georgia (and I am no Dawg fan) survived this process to emerge as number 1 in the first "official" rankings. Whether one agrees with the choice or not (and I don't), the manic interest in and information about college football produces more national dialogue about the rankings than ever before. Also, regarding number one not dropping without a loss: I don't know if I agree with this. More and more we see CFN, Mandell, Dodd, et. al. posting weekly power rankings that go into detail explaining why teams are ranked the way they are. I think this moe fluid approach is slowly leaking into the official polls, and I think we saw abundant evidence last season in the final poll, when voters decided that LSU and tOSU were the right two teams to play for the title. Wether you agree with that decision or not, you can't argue that it was the simple result of moving teams up one slot automatically. I think the Auburn experience has provoked some of these changes, and that's a good thing. It's funny how we put our P&G glasses on and say that an undefeated '08 LSU team would deserve the title game over an undefeated OU or USC because the SEC is so strong. Isn't that a version of the same thing we criticize? Deciding how good the teams are before a game is played?

Interesting stat: Schools that played for the BCS title:

Top 10 recruiting schools: 80%

Second 10 recruiting schools: 20% (UThug and Nebraska)

Schools 21-30: 10% (VA Tech)

31-119: 0%

Of course this validates the star system. Beyond that, it's intuitive that better recruits=better results, but the separation between the top 10 and anyone else is eye-opening. Also, Fla State fans should be livid; no one does less with more.