This blog has moved! Yes, already!
As of Thursday, Feb. 12, this little blog has relocated to a new home on AJC.com. It’s the same newspaper, the same Web site and the same writer (feel free to groan) — there’s just a new URL.
New features: Bigger type, more graphics, comments that load 10 times faster and a larger and more recent photo that makes me look pretty doggone old. I think you’ll like it (the blog, not the photo). But I am, as we know too well, often wrong.
Home > Mark Bradley > Archives > 2009 > January > 12
Monday, January 12, 2009
Bradley’s Buzz: Gators, Gators and more Gators
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Urban’s latest cry: “We’re set”
If you’re a Bulldog, it just gets worse and worse. The Florida Gators have won two of the past three BCS titles, and now Tim Tebow is staying while Matthew Stafford and Knowshon Moreno are leaving. Here, from Robbie Andreu of the Gainesville Sun is Urban Meyer’s not-so-humble appraisal of his program, and here Eric Sorenson of CBSsports.com quotes the Urban Legend as saying a recruit has to be nuts not to want to play for the Gators.
Even before Tebow announced he wasn’t turning pro, writers had lined up to anoint Florida No. 1 for 2009. Esteemed former colleague Mark Schlabach does it for ESPN.com — Schlabach has Georgia Tech No. 14 and Georgia No. 15, you should know — and Rivals.com offers this list, which has Tech 11th and Georgia 18th. And Stewart Mandel performs a similar service for SI.com.
One caveat: Mandel says Florida will be the most overwhelming preseason favorite “in recent memory.” But Southern Cal received 60 of 65 preseason No. 1 votes in the 2005 Associated Press poll and 60 of 62 in the coaches’ poll, and in 2007 the Trojans received 62 of 65 preseason No. 1 votes in the AP poll. Can’t get much more overwhelming than that. (You’ll also recall that in neither of those seasons did the Trojans finish No. 1.)
I mention this because, according to SI.com, a site called BetOnline.com has levied odds at winning the 2009 BCS title, and the listed favorite wasn’t Florida. It was — you guessed it — Southern Cal.
U Kno Who loves the hated Gators
A Floridian named Jones — he has since relocated to Atlanta, where he plays third base — wrote of his affection for the Gators and the guy he calls “Urban” last week for Sporting News Today. This wouldn’t be the first time Mr. Jones, who goes by the nickname Chipper, has delved into the world of online journalism. Last February he posted on an AJC.com blog under the screen name “U Kno Who.”
Fox in the doghouse
The Fox telecast of the BCS title game apparently affected many folks in the way Tim McCarver affects me. It made them want to hurl a shoe at yonder TV. Thom Brennaman drew heat from Chris Burke on AOL Fanhouse, among other bloggers, for making Tim Tebow sound like a combination of Chip Hilton and Mohandas Gandhi. The same Brennaman was taken to task by Richard Sandomir of The New York Times for mistaking third-and-goal for fourth-and-goal.
Smoltzie and Beantown
You’d think that the Sox-crazy Boston papers would be going nuts over the acquisition of John Smoltz. Uh, not exactly. The Red Sox have signed so many guys — Brad Penny, Rocco Baldelli, Takashi Saito — that the Braves’ ex-pillar has been viewed as just another in the line. Here’s Tony Massarotti of the Boston Globe on the newest Soxers and here’s Michael Silverman in the Boston Herald outlining GM Theo Epstein’s new strategy of spending less for damaged goods.
And that’s yet another different between the moneyed Sox and the beleaguered Braves. Frank Wren’s team got where it is by having so many damaged arms and can no longer afford such risks. The Red Sox have millions to burn and are concerned only about outrunning the Yankees, who’ve signed CC Sabathia, A.J. Burnett and Mark Teixeira this offseason.
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