Disclaimer: Bandwagoning is not a ranking of the best or worst teams, the biggest wins or worst losses. It's instead an inexact assessment of the emotions experienced by various fan bases following their most recent game. There is nothing scientific about this. Nothing.
JUMPING OFF: Is it flopping or faking? It doesn't matter.
The latter occurs in soccer; that being when a player is bumped or rubbed or breathed upon by an opponent, so he goes dramatically flying to the ground. His hope: to draw a penalty.
In the game of American football, it's merely taking a dive. The goal: to stop any momentum for the opposing team.
Pesky cramps are typically the culprit. They're tough to diagnose and inclined to quick recoveries. A player hits the deck, goes out for a bit, then suddenly returns a play or so later no worse for wear.
It's as if he grabbed a bottle and took a deep swig of French water from the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes. It's a miracle!
But it frustrates coaches, particularly those tasked with playing Ole Miss.
The Rebels (5-1, 1-1 SEC), ranked 12th at the time, had a player go down because of injury 11 times during their 27-3 win Oct. 5 at South Carolina. J.J. Peques, a 325-pound defensive lineman, went down four times. Yet, he still had two tackles (one for a loss) on defense and scored two rushing touchdowns on offense.
Afterward, South Carolina coach Shane Beamer repeatedly said he hoped Ole Miss' players were OK. However, he couldn't help but to connect some dots.
He pointed out how it was part of trend that was visible while reviewing video from when Ole Miss played Wake Forest and Kentucky. And it's usually after the opposing offense made a first down or had a big play.
What he saw unfold at Williams-Brice stadium featured an identical rhythm. And, as in the case of Peques against the Gamecocks (3-2, 1-2 SEC), sometimes the same player.
USC Gamecocks Sports Gamecock takeaways from a puzzling loss to Ole Miss: What was that? By David Cloninger [email protected]
"I've got my own problems on our own team right now," Beamer said. "But the timing of some of the injuries, it's a really bad look for college football. And it's not what this game's about, if what it looks like is accurate."
One issue is that there isn't an easy way to police the practice. After all, how can a referee determine if an injury is real or not? The only option is for schools to forward video to be evaluated by the NCAA and conference officials (a course of action Beamer suggested South Carolina would take).
"The SEC has a policy regarding it," LSU coach Brian Kelly said Oct. 7. The 13th-ranked Tigers (4-1, 1-0 SEC) play Ole Miss on Oct. 12. "So there is a policy in place that was implemented by the commissioner relative to sportsmanship. If there was any faking of injuries in a deliberate fashion that the SEC would take action on that. I can leave that up to the SEC and let them evaluate that."
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JUMPING ON: How can the wheels on this bandwagon not be bowing?
Army and Navy won convincingly over the weekend. They're a combined 10-0 for the first time since 1945, just a few months after the end of World War II. And if there were an Associated Press Top 30 instead of only 25 teams, then the Midshipmen (5-0, 3-0 AAC) and Black Knights (5-0, 4-0 AAC) would be ranked 28th and 29th, respectively.
Clemson Tigers Sports Clemson plays 'OK' and 'B-plus' at Florida State: 5 takeaways from the Tigers' win By Jon Blau [email protected]
But here's what's truly exceptional: Each has a legit chance to make the College Football Playoff. That would be by continuing this current run and winning the AAC championship; possibly positioning it for the automatic berth as the Group of Five's highest-ranked team.
What's wacky, however, is the Dec. 14 Army-Navy game won't factor into the CFP race. The final field will have already been set six days earlier.
So, in theory, the loser of the Army-Navy game (a non-conference contest) could still make the playoff even coming off a loss. And that makes the whole proposition even more intriguing.
PLENTY OF ROOM LEFT: A large majority of folks who swore up and down that continuity is reigning in Alabama are now pivoting big time.
After the then-No. 1 Crimson Tide lost at Vanderbilt 40-35, the entire system is being questioned. And we're talking everything from Kalen DeBoer's ability to coach to speculation that Nick Saban didn't just retire -- but that he was shown the door.
Honest to goodness, there's a lunatic fringe element that's thrown that out there. Don't buy it.
No, the blunt truth is that Alabama (4-1, 1-1 SEC) isn't the machine we saw jump out to a 30-7 halftime lead against Georgia in Week 5. It's probably more like the team that gave up 27 second-half points to the Bulldogs and had to scramble to secure a 41-34 victory.
Citadel The Citadel can't hang on to 4th-quarter lead against Furman By Andrew Miller [email protected]
The point being, the Crimson Tide still got a rare regular-season win over Georgia -- it just had to really work for it. And they remain a CFP contender, even if they did suffer their first loss to Vanderbilt since 1984. So all should continue to be well in Tuscaloosa, Ala.
Just don't bother telling that to Crimson Tide fans.
HOT TICKETS: Vanderbilt QB Diego Pavia ... Iowa State ... The Calgorythm ... SEC parity ... Players shutting down their seasons ... Arkansas coach Sam Pittman ... Florida International's Miami Vice uniforms ... TCU's offense ... Indiana offensive coordinator Mike Shanahan ... Dunking goalposts into the river.
COLD TICKETS: Arizona QB Noah Fifita ... Missouri ... 10 p.m. ET kickoffs ... SEC cannibalizing itself ... UNLV's CFP hopes ... UAB coach Trent Dilfer ... Ohio State's all-gray uniforms ... TCU's defense ... Alabama defensive coordinator Kane Wommack ... Fines for storming the field.