All NFL Combine Snub Team 2012: Offensive Skill

In case you missed it, the official NFL Scouting Combine invitation list came out earlier this week. Considered the premier event for draft-ready prospects to showcase their skills prior to the April’s big day, the combine is far from the end all, be all of determining whether a player will boom or bust on the next level. The inevitable Wes Welker example has been echoed a thousand times over, and just as Welker went on to NFL stardom after not receiving a combine invite, we can bet this year’s list of combine “snubs” holds several future Pro Bowlers. Here are some notable offensive skill position players from around the country who didn’t get an invitation.

QB: Zach Collaros, Cincinnati- To a certain extent I can understand how Collaros gets overlooked. The Big East has been mediocre for most of his career, and his senior year was broken up due to injury. Still, it’s worth pointing out that Collaros was once the poster-boy for a dual-threat Big East quarterback, electrifying the nation as a sophomore in 2009 when he led the Bearcats to five consecutive Big East wins. A key part in helping Brian Kelley’s team get to the Sugar Bowl that season, his size (6-foot-ish) might not be ideal, but when healthy he has the kind of leadership ability and versatile athleticism to make you wonder why an NFL team wouldn’t consider him.

QB- Dan Persa, Northwestern- Wait a second. Is it just me, or were we talking about this guy as a potential Heisman darkhorse a year ago? It’s no secret Persa’ brilliant junior season was spoiled by an Achilles injury which left him in a limbo-like relationship with starting status in 2011, but he still managed to hit over 74% of his passes, and actually became the NCAA’s career leader in completion percentage. While his mobility was extremely limited last season, he’s shown proved adept at moving in the pocket, and despite standing only slightly over 6-foot, he’s got the kind of pinpoint accuracy that make playing at the next level entirely possible.

RB: Bobby Rainey, Western Kentucky- This is the guy already making his name out to be “Mr Overlooked” for the 2012 draft. Passed up by the Senior Bowl selection committee as well, Rainey was the most instrumental player in the Hilltoppers’ unprecedented rise from the ranks of college football’s worst teams in 2011. His 5-foot-7 frame obviously hurts him, but he’s rumored to have sub 4.4 speed. Toughness? The guy only led the country in rushing attempts each of the last two years, and despite playing through coaching changes, poor offensive lines, and sometime nonexistent quarterback play, Rainey still managed 4,542 yards in his college career.

RB: Lance Dunbar, North Texas- Call it the curse of playing for not just a non-BCS school, but a bad non-BCS school.Dunbar was a three time First Team All Sunbelt pick and is just one of six FBS players in history with over 4000 career rushing yards and 1000 receiving yards. True, his 5-foot-8 size is far from ideal, but last I checked plenty of NFL backs weren’t built in the Adrian Peterson mold. Not sure he gets drafted, but he’s a guy who can definitely become a contributor on the right NFL team.  

WR: Cole Beasley, SMU- People are going to compare this guy to Wes Welker because of his size, skin color, and the kind of offense he played in, but the simple fact is that Beasley is a receiver in every sense of the word. He’s got great footwork and feel for the dimensions of the field, and once more, he displays a level of toughness and concentration in traffic that are needed on the next level. Despite missing time due to injury as a senior, he stepped up for 79 catches in 2011, and should make a great slot NFL receiver.

WR: Jeremy Ebert, Northwestern- How a guy who caught 137 balls for over 200 yards and scored 19 touchdowns over the last two years gets left off the combine invite list is beyond me. Like Beasley, it probably doesn’t help that he’s a moderately sized white guy in the slot mold, but to say Ebert lacks ideal speed down the field is to blatantly ignore his highlight film. His numbers would have been even better had Dan Persa been injury free in 2011, but as it stands now he’s going to make one team (the Patriots, perhaps?) happy with a steal in the draft.

TE: Brian Linthicum, Michigan State- Forget for a second that at 6-foot-5, 245-pounds he has ideal size for coming off the line, but Linthicum is coming off a season in which he caught 31 balls for 364 yards. He has averaged over 10 yards a reception in a pro-style, run heavy Big Ten offense each of the past three years, and is a guy who could immediately step in and play as a second tight end on the NFL level.

TE: George Bryan, NC State- Bryan is not going to win any awards for his speed, but at 6-foot-5, 265 he has the perfect size of an NFL tight end, and the resume to boot. As a rare four-year contributor who managed to catch 126 passes in his career, he begs an invitation to the NFL combine if simply to see whether or not his much harped on “lack of athleticism” is enough to detract from his toughness as a receiver and soft hands.

The Rise of the Academics: My Take

If you’re anything like me, you’re probably in Thanksgiving food coma mode over your inability to process the various day-after columns and recruiting rankings coming in from around the college football world. I hate to add-on to your day-after Signing Day indigestion, but I did want to offer my take on a dynamic some have brought up with regards to the “Rise of the Academic Schools.”

If you don’t read Ivan Maisel’s 3-Point Stance on a daily basis, start. It’s short, concise, and written by one a guy who’ll take the time to get back to you if you send him an email. This I can respect amongst a horde or twitter-going college football crazies, of which I may or may not be a part of (+1 if you found your way here via twitter, by the way.)

I want to address a point Ivan made the morning after Signing Day when it comes to the success of the Stanford’s and Vanderbilt’s of the world on the recruiting trail. Here’s what Ivan he had to say:

1. Stanford coach David Shaw told me last April that he and his staff had a shot at nationally prominent recruits who would be the school’s most highly-regarded class ever. Stanford signed seven players Wednesday out of the ESPNU 150 and is 12th in the recruiting rakings. Shaw also said this: “Nobody wants us to be successful. There’s no way. With our academic standards? There’s no way that other schools want to see us have continued success … because if we’re going to be in the top 10 in football perennially, why wouldn’t you come here? How could you say no?”

2. And Stanford isn’t the only one. Vanderbilt, where James Franklin has refused to accept the Commodores perennial role as league doormat, at one point on Signing Day made the ESPNU top 25. Northwestern and Virginia both signed players in the ESPNU 150. Is something afoot here? Are better players getting smarter? Are they more willing to consider their education when deciding where to play?

While I hate putting any stock in recruiting rankings, the two classes Maisel references were ranked (by Rivals.com) fifth and twenty ninth, respectively. Another “academic school” which regularly recruits well — Notre Dame — came in #22 overall, while another well-to-do bastion of higher learning — Virginia — was #29.

Just for yukes I decided to take a look back at the Rivals ranking from 2007 (hey, five year intervals are all the rage, right?) and noticed only two of those teams — Notre Dame and Virginia — cracked the Top 30. Going back ten years also reveals just two of those teams — again, ND and UVA — make the Top 30. So we can all agree that even a quick, elementary survey hints that Maisel is onto the proverbial something. The question is, “what?”

Stanford got a "big" get in OT Kyle Murphy

I think you look at a few factors. One, I think you look at the economy. It’s already established that the slow recovery has helped the service academies in recruiting (see my 2009 story here) and it stands to reason that as jobs continue to be tough to come by after college (just ask this unemployed 2011 college grad), that recruits are going to want all the help they can get. Whether that means they’re convinced a Stanford degree holds more weight than an Oklahoma degree — or if they just recognize the networking opportunities at a Stanford — I’m not sure, but I think it factors into some of the recruits’ decisions.

I also think you look at the proliferation and identification of top talent. Long story short: the scope of covering recruiting has grown past where it was in 2007 and definitely from where it was in 2002, and because of that, we’re seeing more recruits in the total supply, and more attention given to refining rankings. The coverage has evolved, so comparing 2007 to 2012 might not be apples to oranges, but it is sort of like apples to pears. Get my drift?

Likewise, success in getting to the BCS bowls – in Stanford’s case, for sure — has helped, as have the NFL-bound careers of top Stanford and Notre Dame players who also happened to be great student athletes. But how does that explain UVA? And what does that say about Vanderbilt, which is just trying to tread water for a bowl birth?

My completely unprofessional ”gut” feeling tells me it has to do with what I like the call the magnet theory. As a young person myself, I get that people want to be around other people that are like them and share their values. They want to be amidst “like-minded” kids, so to speak. I mean, who among us felt out of place being the all AP student stuck in the below grade level math class (wait, only me?) When programs like Stanford have success — or when programs like UVA and Vanderbilt have dynamic, energetic coaches who can latch on to one of two high-profile recruits who also happen to fit the model of the perfect student athlete — it acts as a magnet for others. Let’s face it, there are always going to be the ‘perfect’ kids who excel in football, baseball, class, and yes, LIFE. They date the prom queen, volunteer for their church, and still have time to whip your butt in Call of Duty. Basically, they drive us crazy, but no matter what they do, they’re going to do it well. Thing is, usually these guys are few and far between, and where they go is about as varied as the states they come from. Some, like Russell Wilson, end up at Wisconsin by way of North Carolina State. But others, like Andrew Luck or Toby Gerhart, go to Stanford.

What we’re seeing now, I believe, is a concentration of said “perfect” kids at schools that have shown they can either make the BCS or have coaches who can convince them they can make the BCS. But that concentration is augmented by a magnet effect of recruits, and a decision of young men to follow others “like them” to schools that expose the havs of higher education and top football. As we see the juxtaposition of these young men against a back drop of, lets be honest, increasingly ridiculous notions of ‘student athletes’ that have worked their way into many of the nation’s top schools, it’s a trend we’re likely to see continue. I was reminded of that again on Signing Day, as stuttering recruits made commitments all over ESPNU while listing anything but academic or life pursuits as reasons for their choice.

Are complex factors at work in the rise of the academics? You bet. But when push comes to shove we all gravitate towards the people we have things in common with, which is exactly why the Stanfords ad Vandy’s of the world have such a positive attraction for the ‘perfect’ young men making their college decisions.

Short White Guys, the Senior Bowl, and Being World Champs

One was second in the league in receiving yards during the regular season. Another averages over 5 yards a carry through just four years in the league. The third only plays offense, defense, and special teams after spending  his college career as a quarterback.

None get out of the 5-foot-something range. All seem to be ”deceptively quick” in the eyes of television color analysts. And all will be playing essential — if not altogether expected and familiar roles — for  a team amidst arguably the greatest dynastic run in NFL history.

Wes Welker. Danny Woodhead. Julian Edelman.

One more thing; none of them were invited to the NFL combine.

The week between the Conference Championship games and the Super Bowl tends to see the curious intersection of interests between the college and pro football fans. Not much of an NFL fan myself, I’m nevertheless drawn to this weekend and its implications to the greater trends in the game at large thanks to the Senior Bowl. With our favorite Saturday heroes still wearing colors from our alma maters, we nevertheless view them through the spectrum of the hypnotizing scroll of NFL Network’s ticker and the harsh tones of Mike Maylock. Players — like Wisconsin’s Russell Wilson — are lauded for their character yet mourned for their lack of “ideal” size. Some — like Kellen Moore — will fall victim to the old “funky throwing motion” debate, while more than a few will stumble in interviews and arouse whispers and suspicions of not being the proverbial  ‘sharpest tool in the shed.’

All things considered, one could do worse than to be pegged as short, having a funky motion, or not having the football IQ of Vince Lombardi. One could, I think it’s safe to say on this not quite political correct of blogs, be a short white dude.

Funny though how we make jokes about short white guys not being the poster boys for athletic success when these three have been quite the opposite. In a day and age where the rumor of a less-than-ideal 40-time can cast you off to a MAC School or worse (yikes, Chadron State? Good luck with the Don Beebe route there, Danny) the thought that unheralded and overlooked can go to key role player or, dare I say in Welker’s case, veritable superstar, smacks of the kind of egalitarian made-for-tv movie you’d think the sports world would embrace.

So why aren’t they?

In a media environment Jordy Nelson ends up creating controversy in by musing on the popular stereotypes of caucasian skill position players, I suppose it’s almost a risk to even venture a guess. But as measuring tapes and electronic timers begin rolling out of the pockets of NFL scouts once again, it’s perhaps best to keep the cases of short white guys, the Senior Bowl, and the quest to be world champions in mind. Every team, every scout, every fan who scours the internet during a company’s other 4 hours of his/her time — they’re all looking for the next superstar to lead their team to the bigtime. But just ask the Philadelphia Eagles if it’s a guarantee of postseason glory, and you’ll likely get an awkward gulp.

Maybe they’ve all be looking in the wrong place. Maybe, just maybe, championships are won and loss not by the superstars at the Senior Bowl, but the short white (and black and asian and latino and ok, are there any arab?) guys standing to the side.

Laying it on the line, again

Lest this blog suddenly become a spiritual reflection blog with a side of breakfast cereal, I’ve been attempting to come up with something insightful to say this week in regards to another great passion in life: college football.

It’s been a challenge so far, and judging by the carry-over audience from other web projects (and I’m not complaining, I appreciate you all immensely) and it goes without saying that this aspect of the lens through which I’ve seen the world has been underrepresented. Well, Monday turned to Tuesday and now it’s Friday, and the best I’ve been able to surmise are several narrow Navy football recruiting stories for the GoMids.com.

It’s interesting, because those stories I write are all stories for which I’ll be paid for. No, not much, but enough to warrant me taking the time to craft them. And yet here, where I have freedom of thought and direction but a complete lack of monetary incentive, I struggle to offer insight. As uncomfortable as it is to admit, I don’t offer insight into the X’s and O’s of the blackboard because, well, I want something for doing that.

Clearly I could take a lesson from the players  in the host of All-Star games going on right now, including Saturday’s East-West Shrine Game.

You’d think after four years of distinguishing themselves on the college gridiron that guys like Boise State’s Tyler Shoemaker or Western Kentucky’s Bobby Rainey would have earned the benefit from scouts looking to bring them onto NFL teams. For Rainey especially — a guy who ran for over 4000 yards and 39 touchdowns in three season — you’d think people would say, “ok son, clearly you’re very good at what you do, no need to show us again at your own expense.” You’d think that, and so would I. But that’s not the world we live in.

Instead Rainey, at all of 5-foot-8 and coming from the Sun Belt, and Shoomaker, the proverbial “great route runner” who lacks “big-play ability” (read: white dude) will have to go out on the field one more time and audition in an All-Star game. They’ll be scrutinized, analyzed, and looked at from every angle short of a full dissection by scouts and media members, just in the pursuit that they’ll leave open the possibility of being drafted. And once if that happens, there is still no guarantee their years of investing themselves in the sport will land them NFL success or a lucrative contracts. Who knows, maybe either will be cut in year one or year two, maybe, just maybe, making a practice squad roster. Perhaps one of their fellow players — former Northwestern quarterback Dan Persa, for example — will defy stereotypes of his height for a few preseason games before being dealt a crippling injury that’ll take that NFL future away. No, I don’t wish to see it, but it happens. And isn’t the thought that laying in on the line, again, enough to make him stand up and say, “dammit, this isn’t fair I was going to be a Heisman trophy contender!”

There are some days where I feel the same about my freelance writing career. I can remember what people used to say to me. Whether in middle school or high school, college and even now. “We’ll be reading you in Sports Illustrated one day,” offers one memory, or “Try to smile on Sportcenter,” recalls another. So what has happened?

Nothing, really. Like the college stars taking to All-Star games trying to prove themselves after having already done so time and time again, I’m still young. I have some imperfections in my craft (a comma obsession, perhaps, the writing equivalent of a 4.7 40-yard dash time) but I’m dynamic and witty, confident in my resume and what I can.

I don’t need money to drive me to do that, just as the players in the East-West game don’t need money to lure them into playing one more high-stakes game of audition. They do it for two reasons. One, because they like to play football. And two, because they understand, in whatever way they phrase it to themselves, the poetic line I’ve come to repeat time and time again. The hope is in the waiting.

Perhaps a lot of things, including perhaps Bobby Rainey will impress someone during the Eat-West Shrine game, and perhaps he’ll become an unlikely hero on a playoff bound team in 2013. Perhaps my time to shine, like Rainey’s, is still in front of me.  

I write, and I hope. They play, and they hope. Together we have no promises that we’ll ever make the big-time or see the dreams we’ve long-held materialize, but together we lay it all on the line, again.

Why I love writing about recruiting

I’m enough of a realist to know there is a growing backlash against the coverage of college football recruiting right now. I get that more and more rational human beings who just happen to be college football fans are finding the minute-to-minute, hypercompetitive “analysis” of those at ESPN Scout Inc. and Rivals.com to be off-putting and frankly kind of creepy. And I certainly sympathize with those who wish we could all just “leave the kids alone” and establish some kind of definitive separation in the fan-recruit dynamic when it comes to social media.

I guess, to a certain extent, some people might even hold people like me to blame. And if you want to blame me for the sensationalism invested into the talents of 17 and 18 year olds — and you want to affix the growing power and influence yielded by said 17 and 18 year olds over entire fan communities to me — then I can’t stop you. But before you go ahead and ascribe the clear and present problems of the coverage college football recruiting gets to every writer who covers this kind of thing, let me tell you why I love writing about recruiting.

It’s not about ranking the classes. It’s not about the perverted dreams of what a high school athlete might represent in terms of future wins and losses. And it’s definitely not projecting unthinkable expectations in a high school senior to take my favorite team to the proverbial “next level.”

What it is is the moment a recruit calls you up and tells you he has just been offered his first Division I football scholarship. Or the air of certainty and fulfillment in his voice when he tells you he has committed to a university. It’s the sharing in that moment — the dynamic, off-the-cuff expression not seen in the overhyped coverage on ESPNU’s signing day broadcast — that makes any popular and misplaced conception of what I do as a recruiting writer easy to ignore.

I get reminded of this every year while covering service academy recruiting for GoMids.com. It’s kind of a thankless task to tell you the truth, but I’m o.k. with that. The stories — often published as premium articles for paying members — are not read by many, and when they are, questions about my “expertise” inevitably come up. But I’m not a talent evaluator and have never tried to be. I’m a storyteller, and when I can share in the stories of the 17 and 18 year olds who’ve toiled in high school weight rooms and battled through injury all just to achieve a dream of playing FBS football, it’s definitely worth it.

I was reminded of that this past week on two separate occasions. The first was when a recruit called me to tell me he had committed to the Naval Academy. With his clear but excited “yes sir, no sirs,” he talked about the connection he made with all he encountered in Annapolis, and how he felt at home. This is a young man who’ll never get a lick of press from any service outside his hometown paper, so for me to have the chance to bring his story to at least a few people outside that hometown…well, that is tremendously gratifying. The other occasion was much the same, but also different. A young man from Nevada who holds a few high-level FCS and low-level FBS offers (including Navy) called me to talk about his visit to Navy. Hearing the excitement in his voice about the possibility about not just playing for, but attending the Naval Academy, was refreshing, but equally refreshing was hearing about the player currently on Navy’s roster who showed him around on his visit. The player was Navy slotback John Howell, a 5-foot-8 speedster who was  experiencing the same “oh, wow” moment three years ago as a high school senior. And I, a dropped-out-of-college but recently accepted transfer student to Utah State University, remember interviewing John that winter and sharing in that moment when he committed to Navy.

I guess it’s easy to overlook moments like this when the most common and enduring images of recruiting season we see on TV are those of stuttering prep stars already forecasting the impact they’re going to have as freshmen or the millions they’ll make after college. But for me – a soul-searching 23-year old who worked my butt off for three semesters at a college I didn’t care for before earning a scholarship to a university community that actually wanted and accepted me?  I mean, I just can’t help but feel a certain kinship with the young men I cover in recruiting. It’s as if through every revelation they have that all their hard work has paid off, and every awe-struck moment they experience at that “this is it” feeling they get when they visit a campus, resonates and reminds me of that own moment in my life.

So before you assume that recruiting is all about sensationalism and catering to the perverted interests of fans, take a moment to ask yourself if you remember that feeling of getting accepted into college, and if you recall being introduced to the idea of joining a special fraternity. And maybe, just maybe, the answer to that question will allow you to understand why someone could love writing about recruiting.

A Damn Good Football Game

I won’t venture to guess the percentage of American sports fans tuned into ESPN 2 between the hours of three and four in the afternoon on Saturday. Assuming that the ”2:30 feeling” doesn’t actually lead people to take shots of the 4-calorie magical energy bottle (well, at least not on weekends) I’m going to assume it wasn’t a lot. Besides, with two evening NFL playoffs games and a busy night of collegiate hoops on tap, the scene from Frisco, Texas probably wasn’t something many people would get excited over.

Many people, I am reminded, are thankfully not me.

 It wasn’t just that North Dakota State played a good-old fashioned, hard-hitting, defense and special teams rule the day 17-6 game against previously unbeaten Sam Houston State to win the FCS National Title. It was that they held arguably the most dynamic offense in the division formerly known as I-AA to just six points. Not bad for a team of stereotypical “farm boys” from the sometimes most forgotten state in these here lower 48.  I’m reminded, on days like today, if it hadn’t been for several Bison upsets over Minnesota in the last five decade, our enduring audio/visual representation of the home of the Bison would be a 1996 dark-comedy bearing the same name.

One versus two. It’s exactly what you want for a championship, and it’s exactly what we got Saturday. But instead of an almost dreaded rematch in which defense, and only defense, is expected to be the star, we as fans were given a glimpse of the made-for-Holleywood matchup between a high-flying offense and the stone wall defense. And at the end of the day, the old saying held true; defense wins championships.

To put it in perspective, Sam Houston State’s top ranked scoring offense was averaging 39 points coming into this game, led my a dynamic and multifaceted option attack which ranked fourth in the country. North Dakota State, on the other hand, came into the game ranked first in scoring defense in the country. What could have happened was any one’s guess. Any one, you could say, who doubted the familiar maxim. And as the NFL postseason was getting revved up to the tune of the “year of the quarterback,” I’m willing to bet a few among us had forgotten that maxim.

It’s wasn’t just a dominating — if not historic – defensive effort which made this year’s FCS Championship so fascinating. It was the stories found amidst those fourth down stops and passes broken up which made it worth watching and savoring. It was a program playing deep in enemy territory and looking for a championship in a Division it had only joined in 2004. It was the senior punter — a former backup running back — swinging momentum decidedly in the Bison favor with a gutsy 27-yard fake on fourth and four, and the native Texan who took the next play (a screen pass) downfield for a signature touchdown. It was a freshman linebacker making the play of the game with a clinching interception in the fourth quarter, and the looks of disappointment on a team that was as close to perfect as one could be — through 14 games, that is.

It was everything a fan could want. And by the time early January rolls around, and the controversy of the BCS decision and coach firings and hiring is finally winding down, a damn good football game — played at whatever level, by whatever teams — is all a football fan could ask for.

Being Jared Abbrederis

I woke up this morning wondering what it must feel like to be Jared Abbrederis. My thoughts scattered after a restless night, my body still running on adrenaline. With sore eyes I sit up in my bed, images sporadically flashing through my mind. It comes back to be slowly, piecing its way together like a puzzle.  

The lights of the Rose Bowl brighten the Pasadena sky before a frenzied mirage of green and red. We’re down by a touchdown, but we’re still o.k. Russell’s led us back before and I know he will — we will — do it again.  On a 2nd and 6 I’m off with a dash, exploding off the line and into the second level. Somewhere, high above the field in the broadcast booth, Kirk Herbstreit is probably making a comment about how “surprising” my speed is. Figures they’d say that about a white guy from Wisconsin. Figures, but it doesn’t bother me.

In no time at all I’m behind the linebackers. The zone is soft, just as you’d expect. Russell’s ball is tight and on the money as always. As if guided by a GPS it falls into my hands, leading me on a half-turn up the field. Now the fun starts.

They’re all around me now, the Oregon defenders. My God those uniforms are ugly says some kid watching thousands of miles away. I could care less, there’s an endzone in front of me somewhere, and I’m getting there. I’m getting there.

I don’t know what happens next. Sure, I remember, but I don’t know what happens. The ball loose, my shoulder pads slamming to the ground. The unlikely and untimely physics of a football dying in the grass, its enticing shape welcoming Michael Clay like an Easter egg enticing a child after church. How it happened I don’t know. But it happened. It’s over now.

I shake my head and stand up slowly. Maybe they’ll say I should have went out-of-bounds. Maybe they’ll say that an extra yard wasn’t worth the risk of trying to plow through two defenders. They’ll say these things, I’m sure. They’ve always said them.

Just like they always said I could never play Big Ten football. Just like they said I’d never earn the scholarship — the one that finally comes next semester — or that I’d lead a nationally-ranked team in receiving yards and average. But I did, and I’ll do it again. Just like I told the media after the game. “I Can’t dwell on this. I have to move forward and look towards next year. We’re all human. This will make me better.”

I shake my head again and step away from the thought. It’s not mine, because I’m not Jared Abbrederis. As I, Adam Nettina, walk to the bathroom to get ready for just another day, the thought hits me that almost nobody in their right mind would want to be Jared Abbrederis on a day like today. And before letting the thought slip away completely, it hits me that that’s a damn shame, because if we could all have the kind of attitude he has, being Jared Abbrederis would do a lot of us a lot of good.

New Year’s Day Bowl Games…on January 2nd

New Year’s Day Bowl games have always enjoyed a special connotation in my mind. While the advent season and the week before Christmas usually find my desire to connect with God and my desire to be plugged into the early bowl game action at odds, New Year’s Day — the most worthless of secular holidays, if you’re asking me — has always afforded be the great pleasure of sitting on a couch and zoning out to America’s greatest game. Call it one final hurrah before the bleakness of hot stove baseball or the pop-culture ramifications of the NFL, NBA, and NHL playoffs, but I’ve always felt that college football fans of all sorts are entitled to this day.

The Federal Government would seem to agree with me, seeing as though there’s no mail today and apparently it is a national holiday. So why the hell did I drive past a middle schooler freezing his ass off waiting for the bus this morning?

We seem to have hit a curious intersection in the calender year. Said New Year’s Day television watching, falling on a Sunday, apparently was reserved for the NFL this year. Week 17, however, provided me with absolutely nothing in the way of enjoyment, and only made me more uncomfortable at the growing disparity between football as a sport and what the National Football League has become. There was no Rose Bowl parade, of course, and there were no little guys and underdogs to root for after a late night of watching celebrities make a fool of themselves from Times Square.

Instead, all of that has been reserved for today. A Monday. A school day.

Having earned my college degree last May you’d think I wouldn’t have a problem with that. But being the perennial “kid at heart,” gets the better of me on days like today. After all, sports play an essential role in the wholesome interests of our country’s youth. I can remember often thinking that the ultimate injustice to the the coming of age teenager – whether in the middle or high school level — was starting the NCAA basketball tournament during school hours. And heck, I wasn’t even much of a basketball fan growing up! If that was injustice, this — starting the “biggest” day in bowl season during school hours and ending it well within prime homework-time — is clearly a crime against fandom.

I’ll be watching the games today, but a part of me won’t be. It’s the part of me that is still 15 years old, a freshman in high school and altogether lazy teenager. I’ve just woken up from a night of watching an Arrested Development marathon and flirting with one of my sister’s friends, and as I chill out on the sofa in the basement, Iowa is playing Florida in the Capital One Bowl. There’s no impeding issues of permanent job security, nor things I need to do to get ahead in the world. I’m a kid again, and the New Year’s Day bowl games are all that’s on my mind.

If only life could be so simple, and bowl games could always fall on January 1st.

Riley and Me

I can distinctly remember the first time I saw Riley Nelson play football. It was 2006, and if my below-grade-level match skills serve me right, I was a senior in high school (this, by the way, is the point where you whistle and say, ‘damn son, you’re old.’) Spending a productive afternoon in the living room of my parents’ house in Ellicott City, Maryland, I ran across a MASN-2 feed from some God-forsaken location of a university even I had never really heard of. Utah State was playing some school that day — the exact WAC opponent, I can’t recall — and stopping briefly between the anxious move to the next station and game, I caught a glimpse of a dynamic athlete.

Riley Nelson spun out of a tackle, hit the ground (but didn’t) and sprinted to the endzone. The subsequent touchdown which wasn’t (he was ruled down by contact) was the kind of thing an impressionable college football fan and teenager keeps in the back of his mind. Call it a “player cognition theory” if you will, and even extend it to the university. A few minutes later I turned the channel, but the name “Riley Nelson” and “Utah State” suddenly had meaning.

Flash forward five years later. I’m a half decade removed from that floor, yet I’m sitting here all the same. An out-of-work college graduate – ironically enough, from Utah State — I’m watching the same exact player, who, as if laughing in the face of all conception of four-year eligibility, is still playing college football. Riley Nelson and me (yes, and me, because those are how the words form in my mind) now find each other in a curious position. He’s no longer at Utah State and has seemingly burned bridges with many in Logan, yet he’s moved on. I was no longer in Ellicott City, burned some bridges, went to Logan and loved it, but also had to move on. But now I’m back here sitting on my butt, and he’s leading the school he felt compelled to transfer to for reasons all his own.

Riley wouldn’t remember the one conversation we had in our lives. It was on the phone in 2008, and the last thing he was going to do was to open up for some college paper writer looking for a sensational quote about betraying a university and community. I remember the conversation though, and I remember how stalwart he was in defending the course he’d taken in life. He really felt God had led him away from Logan, just as — oh, the irony again — I had felt God led me to Logan. I walked away from that conversation with a respect for him, a respect, I want to add, that continued even as his once-bright career looked to have passed him by with the triumphant arrival and sensational play of Jake Heaps at the close of the 2010 season.

Considering this, perhaps my fellow Utah State graduates will forgive me when I admit I was rooting Nelson while he was leading the Cougars on their game-winning drive in yesterday’s 24-21 Armed Forces Bowl win. I won’t deny a burst of sudden emotion when he brilliantly faked a spike at the goal-line only to connect with Cody Hoffman for a touchdown, and I won’t pretend like the victory didn’t mean something to me as both an individual and a fan.

You can talk all you want about loyalty. You can talk all you want about throwing away the love shown to you by an entire community, or wasting your potential on a circuitous route to only minor glory. But there’s another way to look at it, and that’s through the eyes of the person making the decisions that other label as such.Riley and me, me and Riley, we’re not so different, I think. And yesterday, sitting on my parents’ floor watching him on a football field all these years later from when I first saw him, I can’t help but think that while I’m really in the same place, I too, have found a hint of redemption.

And that’s a story worth writing about.