Today, we have a not-bad slate of games, and again we have a slate of interesting games that we have to choose between in the evening. This time though, two of them are conference games and none of them involve LSU, so it's not such a big deal to me personally.
Being a husband and also the father of a toddler, my day will of course start with various errands and doing things of interest to a toddler. For example, I will be going to Story Time at the local Barnes & Noble this morning, and returning books to the library. Unlike most of you drunken late-night revelers, I have experienced a good part of my day before football ever starts, which is why I don't mind morning football. By the time the Jefferson-Pilot game comes (and I think I will call it that, at least today), I have been up for 6 hours.
But then football starts. At 11:21, we have Alabama @ Kentucky, a game that on first blush is of only minimal interest. However, it is certainly true that bigger upsets than a Kentucky win over Bama have happened. I would say that Washington's win over USC was a bigger upset than this would be, though perhaps not in retrospect. I fully expect a Bama win here, of course, but I don't think it's so inevitable as to make the game uninteresting.
After that, the main event comes. LSU @ Georgia airs on CBS at 2:30. I don't recall a game between two SEC teams sitting at a combined 7-1 overall and 4-0 in the conference that has lost as much luster from pre-season as this one has. It's a shame really, and I do not recall easily a time when the SEC was popularly conceived as being so top-heavy. While LSU is ranked #4, almost everyone seems to think this ranking is inflated (then how did we get this ranking, one may ask?), and with Ole Miss's bad loss and Georgia's similar lack of popular respect, people seem ready to hand Alabama and Florida the West and East divisions, respectively. But it seems every year one or two teams get a lot better from the early season to the end of the season. Why not LSU? And why not Georgia for that matter? Whichever of these two teams wins today will protect themselves while they get an opportunity to get better. The Patrick Peterson vs. A. J. Green matchup has gotten a lot of press, but equally important will be the matchup between LSU's beleaguered offensive line and Georgia's talented but underachieving defensive line.
Then the evening games give us a manageable number of interesting contests. At 6:00pm, Ole Miss @ Vandy will kickoff. While I think Ole Miss will win this one, I think this is an interesting matchup, and Vandy could pull an upset. It will take an emerging passing game to give them a chance, however. Then at 6:45pm, Auburn @ Tennessee starts. This game has gotten a lot of attention locally, as the Auburn fans are considering this their proving ground. Personally, I don't think so. I think Auburn is a lot better than Tennessee is, and they should win this one by multiple touchdowns. Tennessee's offense just cannot keep up, and a lack of quarterback play will likely doom them here. Then again, games aren't played on paper.
Other games are going on at the time, including South Carolina State @ South Carolina, which is on television for some reason, and which means that South Carolina Gamecocks fans have the same complaint that I have been having for a while about too many interesting games being scheduled against each other. Georgia Tech @ Mississippi State and Texas A&M @ Arkansas also go off, which are kind of interesting OOC games.
Anyway, a game thread will open at 1:30pm. Until then, try to do something non-football related for a while.