A Chat with my Inner Dialogue | by Jay

(Following is a transcript of a conversation that recently took place inside my head)

Eight days. EIGHT DAYS!

Man, get ahold of yourself.

Who said that?

It's me, your inner dialogue.

Inner dialogue? I have an inner dialogue?

Yep, and you got to cool that shit off! And that's the double-truth, Ruth!

My inner dialogue talks like Shaft?

No, I was just quoting Mister Señor Love Daddy in Do the Right Thing. Remember when things were getting really excited, and everybody needed to just CHILL OUT? And Mookie--

Yeah, yeah, I remember. So, what the hell do you want?

I'm here to drop some reality on you.

Aha. I get it. You're going to remind me that that date with Elizabeth Hurley I've always dreamed about is probably never going to happen. I know. I'm pretty much resigned.

Nope. I'm talking about the Irish. Notre Dame. The Dome, and its new Savior, Charlie Weis. You know, the 'new era' and 'reclaiming the glory' and 'we're done f---ing around' and all that stuff.

Hey man, that's my team you're talking about. You better back the hell off!

Dude, I'm your inner dialogue, I can't back off anywhere. Listen, you really do need to calm down. I know you think that Charlie Weis is the bomb, or, the 'shizznit' if you prefer, but you've been getting way ahead of yourself. Have you read some of the stuff you've written on your little 'blog'? Pollyanna herself would blush.

What's not to be excited about? Charlie's the Man with the Plan. Have you seen his finger jewelry?

Okay, see, that's what I'm talking about. You look at the Super Bowl rings, and see reflected Glory and a return to the top for Notre Dame. I look at Charlie coming from the NFL, trying to install a pro-style offense in just over six months. Did you ever stop to think that that's pretty much an impossible task? You think our team of 19- and 20-year olds are going to be able to absorb what Charlie's been working on for twenty years? Your expectations are through the roof.

He'll break it down into bite-sized chunks for them. He's not going to give them anything they can't handle. He'll keep it simple.

Oh yeah? Have you seen the wristbands?

Wristbands?

Yeah, Minter's got the defense wearing these wristbands with all the plays listed out on them. You call that 'keeping it simple'? It's insane. It's going to be '93 Boston College all over again. Way too complex.

Dude, it's not going to be that bad. I'm sure Charlie's not trying to install everything all at once.

That's the problem. With the offense he's been running for years, this is going to be like trading in a Porsche for a Hyundai for him. And he'll get frustrated doing it, not being able to work in all the wrinkles and subtleties that he could with a professional squad, whose only focus is football. Our guys have a limited practice availability, plus on top of that they're actually college students with a full slate of classes to deal with. They don't have all the free time in the world. Can Charlie work within those constraints?

Well, he used to be a college coach. And high school. Hell, he's got a masters in education. He knows what it's like to work with student-athletes.

Glad you brought that up. When's the last time Charlie was a HEAD coach? That's right: high school. This is a whole new ball of wax for him. Sure he smiles and nods and exudes every confidence in the post-practice videos, but he's learning on the job just as much as his players are. He can't simply focus on Xs and Os and let Belichick do all the administrative dirty work; it's his bus to drive now, and the transition can't be smooth sailing.

He's from ND, he knows the drill.

Yeah, but he's got things he's got to deal with he's never even dreamed of before! Alums. Boosters. Glad-handling. Alums. ND faculty. Speeches galore. Alums. Appearances. Alums. Plus, all the mundane administrative stuff: managing the roster. Setting the schedule. And finally, keeping the pulse and the tempo of the team, and maintaining a culture of excellence, all by himself. Football teams are top-down organizations, and this organization will reflect Charlie Weis, for better or worse. The best you can say at this point is that he's unproven on all of these things.

Wait a second. It's not like he's going riding into the valley of death all by himself here. Hell, he went out and hired a great, veteran staff, full of ex-head coaches whom he can lean on.

Ever hear the phrase, "too many cooks"? What happens when there's a little controversy, and suddenly Lewis and Minter and Vaas are all telling him, "this is the way 'I' would have handled it", and Charlie disagrees, because he's got an ego the size of New Jersey. It's a recipe for disaster. The guy has a history of thinking he knows better.

Well, he IS a little cocky.

A 'little'? Yeah, and Chandra Johnson's a 'little' bald.

Look, if things go smoothly, this brain trust could be a great thing, with all that expertise bouncing off each other. It might be just what we need for a great season.

Dream on. Have you looked at the schedule? Five opponents in the top twenty-five. Three of the top four teams in the country. Let me repeat that: THREE OF THE TOP FOUR TEAMS--

Okay, I got it, I got it. Yeah, but I think we've got a chance against all of them. Even USC. Um...hello?

I'm sorry, I just passed out from an idiocy overload. Did you even bother to look at our opponents rosters? Leinart. Breaston. Palko. Bush. Jarrett. Stanton. Want me to keep going?

No, I gotcha--

Henne, Smith, White, Riggs, Rhodes, Ainge, Lee, Meachem, Watkins, Watson. I bet you don't even know who Gabe Watson is.

Yeah, he's, uh, a safety, I think, for...BYU?

Oh, man. You're in for a long season.

All right, well look. Even if we DON'T go 7-4, or 8-3 -- which I'm NOT conceding, by the way -- that doesn't mean things aren't working. Holtz was like 5-6 his first year, right? And yet, most people say that they saw discernible improvement that year. We can have a .500ish record and see the same thing.

Yeah, but look at Willingham. 10-3 was a mirage. THAT could happen, too. A good season, followed by a death spiral.

This is ridiculous. We've got a lot of experience on offense coming back, and--

Yeah, a GREAT offense -- one that ranked 81st in the nation last year. And what about that defense? How many guys in our secondary have any real game experience? We're greener than Gumby back there! I mean, look at the receivers and quarterbacks we're going to face. Palko's gonna carve us up. What'd he do last year, 400 yards and 5 touchdowns? Holy hell. What happened last time at Michigan? That's right, 38-0. USC: I shudder to think. For Leinart, picking us apart will be easier for him than picking up chicks at SkyBar. You think Tennessee won't be looking for revenge after how they stubbed their toe against us? BYU - we rushed for eleven yards against them. ELEVEN. And so on, and so on. And you know what? As brutal as the schedule is, that's not even the worst thing we're facing.

There's something worse?

Everything I've already mentioned could be ten times worse if say, Ryan Harris blows out a knee. Brady Quinn goes down. Trevor Laws gets chop-blocked by dirty Purdue linemen and we lose him for the season.

You're really bumming me out.

Look at the depth chart. Who's going to step up if we suffer an injury? We're precariously thin, and what football team goes through an entire season without injuries...

...And another thing, while we're on the topic. How about Charlie's propensity to get 'too cute' with his playcalling? Huh? How about that? That's gonna burn us at some point. And what about his health? I don't even want to think about that. Oh, and he cusses WAY too much for a Catholic school. That's not the image we want, and if he keeps it up and butts heads with the CSC, he'll get run out of here before we know it. That's if he doesn't get bored with the college game and all its petty NCAA restrictions first. And then where will we be? Back into another gawd-awful coaching search!

(Suddenly, a distant noise is heard)

chugga...chugga...chugga....

What the hell is that?

chugga...chugga...chugga...chugga...CHOO CHOOOOO!

Holy crap, it's Marco!

Marco, how'd you get in here?

Marco: I borrowed some of Charlie Weis' OMNIPOTENCE. He has plenty to spare, my friends.

Marco, I'm glad you're here! My inner dialogue was really bumming me out. Dropping reality on me and stuff. I was on the verge of tears.

Marco: Glory, my friend. Glory. Like Moses, Charlie will take us to the Promised Land. He will strike his staff upon the ground and turn it into a SERPENT that will destroy the heathen Wolverine. He will part the RED SEA of TROJANS and drown them along with their silly white horses. He will talk to a burning bush, and subsequently BURN THE TREES (Stanford). He will cast a PLAGUE on college football, and He will carve, in STONE, a new law: I am CHARLIE WEIS, who brought you out of PERSECUTION. Thou shalt not have FALSE COACHES before you. I will lead you to the PROMISED LAND!

Oh, Christ. I'm out of here (footsteps trailing; a door slams)

I love you Marco. Glory!

P6: standings | by Jay

Link to the Pick Six standings (updated with all entries) can be found here, and also throughout the season at the top of the sidebar to the right.

(Amazingly, it's still not too late to jump in on this. Click here for rules & the entry link.)

Harris Poll: spitting parts on the on-ramp | by Jay

I don't know what's more embarrassing, that the Harris folks never considered that Holtz and DiNardo wouldn't be allowed to participate by ESPN, or that "Fruit Breezer Screaming Fan of the Game" Jason Rash actually made it to the final pollster list before being found out. Per USA Today:

ESPN subsequently pulled out as a co-sponsor of the coaches' poll. "The Harris poll has a direct connection to the BCS standings," network spokesman Josh Krulewitz said. "We've said all along we wouldn't have our commentators participate in the Harris poll, and it (removal of Holtz, DiNardo and Congemi) is consistent with our decision to pull out of the coaches' poll."

Scratch, too, from Harris' panel of 114 voters: Jason Rash. He was one of 10 panelists drawn from a pool of nominees from the Sun Belt Conference but was found not to fit the requirement of being a former athletics administrator, coach or player or media member. He's the son-in-law of Troy coach Larry Blakeney and a fan.

"If this gives fans access to what we're doing ... I'm OK with that," Sun Belt Commissioner Wright Waters said before BCS officials called Wednesday to say they weren't.

Well of course you're okay about giving a random fan a vote, Wright...you don't give two craps about the BCS. And why should you? You're the Sun Belt. LA-Lafayette and Arkansas State aren't going to be contending for the title anytime soon. He knows it, so he picked his favorite coach's son-in-law to represent, probably as a goof or on a dare. And you know what? I kind of like that f--- it attitude. He doesn't care; he knows it's all a joke anyway.

The funny thing is, Rash probably has more cred than Terry Bradshaw, who's also a pollster. (Said Hollywood Henderson once, famously: "Bradshaw couldn't spell 'cat' if you spotted him the 'c' and the 't'.") At the very least, Rash has his Saturdays free to watch some football, unlike Terry. I'd trust him to fill out a more reasonable ballot than Bradshaw.

So I'm sitting here trying to figure out how Rash made it to the final cut, and I'm looking at the list, and Jason Rash is listed without any qualifying remark like "former AD" or "former player" or "media" on his one-line resume. It's just, "Jason Rash" -- blank. I guess that was a red flag for the BCS. (Maybe in Jason Rash's circle of influence, his name is all the introduction he needs. In fact, it's probably a nickname like "the Rasher". Unfortunately that's no help to those outside of the Rasher's world, but it would have been cool to see names like "the Rasher" and "Sully" and "Frank the Tank" on the list of voters.) So look out Ken Shipp and Lou St. Amant (the other two "blanks" on the list) -- you guys better fill in that resumé, and quick.

(Okay, I googled for you guys. Shipp coached the Jets for one year, and may or may not be a former head coach at Middle Tennessee State. And St. Amant was an assistant football coach at Louisiana-Monroe and now broadcasts ULM baseball games. Therefore, they look like two more Sun Belt nominees. Assist to me.)

And Kevin Donahue of Fanblogs.com tosses a few more darts at the list. Among the other question marks in the Harris Poll:

• Kevin Duhe currently is territory manager for Blue Bell Ice Cream. He played at Northeast Louisiana.
  
  
• Former SMU quarterback Lance McIlhenny was quoted in the Dallas Morning News as saying: "Any given weekend, if I'm fly-fishing, how am I going to make sure by 1 o'clock on Sunday that this Harris group will have my input?"
  
  
• Voter Kenny Roda, a radio talk show host in Cleveland, has a link to "Hotties" on his Web site. It includes (clothed) shots of Playboy Playmates and "pickup lines to bag a hottie."
  
  
• George Lapides, a Memphis-based radio host, has a link to a gambling service at the top of his personal Web site.

Since Holtz and DiNardo are out, we're going to need more Irish representation on this board. Phil Donhue's looking for a job. So is my buddy Dan (resumé: domer, good section football player). But frankly, we'd like to nominate ourselves. Surely, we're more legitimate than Jason Rash. I mean, we at least run a website, after all. Look for us on the next iteration of the Harris poll: "BGS - unbiased, unwashed Irish football recidivists. And proud Harris poll voters."

UPDATE: Pat here throwing in my two cents. Does this mean Rocket will have to drop out of the poll as well? His hip-hop album website, if that counts as a credible source, mentions that he's signed on for a second year with ESPN College GameDay. So, if ESPN is going to be the kid that took his ball and went home, won't they make Rocket excuse himself from the poll as well? He is only involved to the extent that he does pre-scripted bits before games and isn't really involved in any analysis -- not that you can call what goes on during GameDay "analysis" -- but you never know what ESPN is going to do.

And another correction. In the previous Harris poll post, we guessed former ND AD Roger Valdiserri was an Irish nominee. Valdiserri himself clears up that notion in a Chicago Tribune article.

Valdiserri, though, said Notre Dame, where he worked as an administrator for 33 years, did not nominate him for the poll.

"I'm not sure they even know I worked there," he joked.

And Valdiserri said his ties to the school would have zero impact on how he votes.

"Notre Dame will have to be awfully, awfully good for me to put them in the Top 25," he said.

That seems to confirm that the three Irish representatives were Holtz, Rocket, and former player Jim Morse.

As for the replacements? Originally ND submitted 10 names to Harris, and they picked three at random. So I suppose another random draw for the Irish will happen very soon.

Blogpollin' | by Jay

The first weekly BlogPoll is out, care of the Karl Hungus of the blogosphere, mgoblog. (And here's our ballot, for what it's worth.)

The blogpollers weren't too terribly different from the USA Today/Coaches or AP preseason polls. In fact, the BP selected the same collection of top 25 teams as did the coaches (the AP only swapped Fresno State for Alabama), and the only severe variances (relatively speaking) were Miami, Ohio State, and Alabama.

BlogPoll 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25

Team Southern Cal Texas Tennessee Michigan Louisiana State Miami (Florida) Oklahoma Virginia Tech Ohio State Iowa Florida Louisville Georgia Florida State Auburn Texas A&M Purdue Cal Boise State Arizona State Texas Tech Alabama Boston College Pittsburgh Virginia

AP 1 2 3 4 5 9 7 8 6 11 10 12 13 14 16 17 15 19 18 20 21 26 22 23 25

Coaches 1 2 3 4 6 8 5 7 9 10 11 14 13 12 15 17 16 20 19 18 21 24 22 25 23

BPVariance 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.22 1.56 0.89 0.22 2.00 0.22 0.22 0.89 0.00 0.89 0.22 0.22 0.67 0.67 0.22 0.89 0.00 2.67 0.22 0.67 0.89

I'm curious to see if the BP will do anything drastically different than the official polls as the season unfolds. For now, it looks we're all flying down the same trench, heading for the same denouement.

Ticket Montage | by Jay

Thanks to BGS reader Trace for sending this in. Click the pic for a larger version.

Threepeat Blues | by Jay

We know that if Southern Cal wins the National Championship it will be the first time in Division 1A history that a team has three-peated for the crown.

But recently, a couple of ink slingers have noted it shouldn't be the first time: an undefeated (and untied) Alabama team, the argument goes, was cruelly denied a third consecutive NC in 1966, when the dastardly AP and UPI writers mistakenly awarded it to Notre Dame.

An example of this claim, care of Scott Adamson of the Birmingham Post-Herald:

Trojans should be going after Tide's mark

Look at virtually any preseason college football magazine -- as well as the preseason polls -- and Southern California is at the top of the list.

Ranking the Trojans No. 1 and predicting they'll hold that position at the end of the season is a no-brainer. Pete Carroll's club is loaded, and the schedule is conducive to a run for the Bowl Championship Series title game at the Rose Bowl. Thus, if USC winds up the 2005 campaign with a 13-0 worksheet, it'll mark the first time in Division 1-A history a team has been awarded three consecutive national championships.

Such a feat is unprecedented, but it shouldn't be.

The honor should belong to Alabama, circa 1964-66...

Most fogies like me remember how and why Alabama was denied.

In 1966 Bryant's men had one close game -- an 11-10 victory over Tennessee in Knoxville. The Vols had a chance to win on a last-second field goal, but the short try from a tough angle sailed wide and Alabama remained unscathed.

They would remain that way the rest of the year, and absolutely steamrolled the opposition. When the regular season was completed, the Tide had outscored its foes 267-37 and recorded six shutouts. In fact, Alabama entered the Sugar Bowl against Nebraska with four consecutive goose eggs delivered by its defense.

But this was a year in which it really didn't matter who the pachyderms beat or how badly.

Notre Dame was destined for a No. 1 finish, and the Fighting Irish got it.

Ara Parseghian's club was anointed by the media as the greatest team to ever strap on the pads, and the Irish were expected to easily dispose of Michigan State in East Lansing. However, the game ended in a 10-10 draw, with Notre Dame opting to kill the clock late to preserve the tie.

Instead of Alabama vaulting to No. 1, Notre Dame and Michigan State stayed 1-2, respectively. Even though the Crimson Tide routed the Cornhuskers 34-7, when the polls were released Jan. 3 Alabama was still third.

Talk about the luck of the Irish.

Not only did Notre Dame have a blemish on its record, it still managed to finish ahead of a team that played it even for four quarters. Meanwhile, Bryant and company could only look on and seethe. It was arguably the best team in school history, yet the crimson gridders had to play third fiddle to a couple of teams with imperfect records.

As always Bryant had a classic response to the slight. When asked how he thought his team would fare against Notre Dame and Michigan State, he took a puff off his Chesterfield and never missed a beat:

"We'd like to play 'em both," Bryant said. "On the same day."

Dennis Dodd also gave his own Chatty-Cathy cord a pull, calling 1966 "one of the most heinous ripoffs in poll history."

Now, I didn't know much about the supposed screw-job of the Tide in '66. From my standpoint, and the standpoint of other Irish fans, the story sort of begins and ends with the fact that ND had a great team in '66 and was well-deserving of the crown. If any other team had a claim to the title, it was Michigan State (who actually did come out on top in a couple of polls).

For 'Bama fans, however, it's a festering sore that reopens on occasion -- like when another team is about to threepeat, for instance. If you google "1966 Alabama", you'll find all kinds of lamentations and melancholy about the title that never was.

So, was 'Bama really deserving of the 1966 National Championship, as Dodd, Adamson, and no doubt at least half the state of Alabama claim? The main arguments in favor of the elephant go like this.

• Alabama was the preseason AP #1, and won every game. What more did you want them to do?

While it's true they were ranked #1, Alabama's preseason hold on the top spot was tenuous at best and the voting was very, very close. Bama had 15 first-place votes to Michigan State's 12. In fact, that tenuousness gave way almost immediately, as they fell out of first place on September 19th, without even having played a game yet. Michigan State had just stomped NC State, and that was enough to vault them into the lead. (ND, by the way, was ranked down at #6 at the time.)

So, it's not as if Bama was ranked #1 all season, and the voters pulled out the rug at the last second. In actual fact, Bama didn't have the #1 ranking even as they kicked off for their first game. By October 10th, ND had beaten very good teams in Purdue (9-2) and Army (8-2), and the Irish were up to #2. Bama, meanwhile, had feasted on non-Division-1A Louisiana Tech, a decent team in Mississippi, and mediocre Clemson, and consequently found themselves at #3, where they would remain for the rest of the year.

• Regardless of the rankings, Alabama's team was a powerhouse -- clearly, the best team in the country.

Alabama was indeed a powerhouse. Led by the Snake, Kenny Stabler, and eleven All-Americans, the Crimson Tide racked up 267 points in 10 games (excluding the win over Nebraska in the Sugar Bowl, which was after the AP & UPI voting), and only gave up 37. Simply amazing.

However, ND put up 362 points in 10 games, almost ten points better per game, and gave up only 38.

Furthermore, ND seems to have played a tougher schedule. Alabama's opponents had a collective losing record (41-50), while ND's opponents had a collective winning record (54-46). Both teams recorded six shutouts, although one shutout for Bama was against Louisiana Tech (a non-Division-1A team, as noted above). ND played and beat more ranked teams. ND beat the #7 (Purdue) & #18 (Southern Cal) teams in the country -- both ends of the Rose Bowl, as it turned out -- and tied the #2 team (more on that later). Alabama's only quality wins at the time of the voting were against Mississippi (#12) and Tennessee (#14).

One complaint often lodged against ND is that Ara ran it up in the last game to ice the #1 ranking, and it's true that we scrubbed the floor with the Trojans to the tune of 51-0. Still, USC wasn't a terrible team, and they did go on to play in the Rose Bowl with a 7-4 record.

Weighing heavily against Bama is the fact that they almost lost the Tennessee game, squeaking out a 11-10 win in just the fourth game of the season, and the voters punished them for it. ND, of course, had only one close game, but against a very high quality opponent -- the second best team in the land, as it turned out.

• Yeah, about that tie. It's a huge black mark. It means ND didn't win every one of their games, as Alabama did. Isn't 10-0 better than 9-0-1?

We all know about the Game of the Century, in which ND, with the ball on their own 30 and 1:10 to play, elected to run out the clock instead of trying for the end zone. After the game, Ara was excoriated for his supposed complacency, and he was quick to offer his rationale.

"I wasn't going to blow the game with an interception. The decision also was made in deference to [MSU placekicker] Dick Kenney's field goal ability... Earlier in the game, we would have had time to overcome a mistake. But with a minute and a half left we couldn't gamble. Strategy dictates that you don't take a chance on losing. We weren't playing for a tie as I think the 60 minutes of football we turned in proved it."

Often overlooked in this game is the fact that ND was missing its starting quarterback, Terry Hanratty, who was injured on the second series of the game; its starting running back, Nick Eddy, who exacerbated an injury stepping off the train in East Lansing; and its starting center, George Goeddeke, who left the game with an injury. In Hanratty's place was Coley O'Brien, a diabetic who was scarfing candy bars and gulping orange juice on the sideline to ward off a bout of insulin shock.

Ranked #1, in the second-to-last game of the season, with a minute left, a good kicker on the other team, and you with a not-completely-healthy backup QB at the reins, perhaps running out the clock was a good idea. Ara thought so. So did Rocky Bleier:

I've always defended Ara's reasoning. We'd been stripped of our offensive weapons, we'd come back from a 10-point deficit, our defense had kept MSU outside our 45-yard line in the second half. Then, the critics wanted us to throw long, desperate passes into a prevent defense that was specifically designed to intercept them. And consider our quarterback. Coley O'Brien is diabetic. He drank orange juice and ate candy bars on the sideline to maintain his insulin at a safe level. In this game, he was so tense that he recalls little or nothing of the action. Ara knew he'd done a great job bringing us back. He was not about to throw it all away with frivolous play-calling in the last minute.

Voters, of course, kept ND at the #1 slot after the game.

And yet, when Bama fans talk about the Game of the Century, they throw around terms like "blemish" and "black mark", as if the tie was as lousy and damning as a loss.

Well, when you're talking about the two best teams in the country playing to a 10-10 tie, it's not a blemish, it's a measure of equality. It's value-neutral. It means you weren't any better than the other team that day, but they weren't any better than you, either. And, it says nothing about the strength of your team vis-à-vis a third party.

Let's try a little syllogism. Ned and Mike are two tall guys who are the same height. A third guy, Al, is 6'3". Therefore, Al is taller than Ned.

(If you answered "True", you might be a Tide fan.)

• Big deal. Everybody knows the press had it out for Alabama, and their anti-Southern bias clearly shone through. Moreover, Notre Dame was a media darling that unfairly capitalized on its warm relationship with the national press.

Given the climate of the South in the Civil Rights 60s, there actually might be something to this. Per the Bear Bryant Museum archives:

When it comes right down to it, many people have speculated that sports writers and the wire service polls were biased against Alabama. After all, this was the Alabama of George Wallace, “Bull” Conner’s police dogs and fire hoses, and the Montgomery bus boycotts among other things. On top of that the Crimson Tide itself was still an all-white team. By this time, both Notre Dame and Michigan State had African-American players.

Jim Murray, the Pulitzer Prize winning sports writer for the LA Times, was severely critical of Alabama. Speaking in a 1966 article, Murray suggested that Alabama “change the lyrics (of “Dixie”) ever so slightly like “do the folks keep segregatin’ – till I ca’int win no polls.” And again, in 1970 when USC traveled to Birmingham to play Alabama, Murray wrote, “they thought they only had to beat Georgia Tech. What they had to beat was 100 years of history.” He claimed “the only black guy in the place was carrying towels.”

Dodd documents a little of the flavor of the times as well.

Turns out another kind of outrage might have been working. It played itself out on TV every night on the nightly news. No one can say for sure if The Movement crossed paths with The Polls, but [Alabama historian Phillip] Shanks certainly thinks so.

"I'm awful afraid politics got involved in it," said Shanks, who is writing a history of Alabama football. "Alabama was not getting a lot of (good) publicity back then. (Former governor) George Wallace standing in the schoolhouse door. We had an all-white team.

"I was living through it here, every night on TV. It was embarrassing, we hated for that to impact our football team."

In the fall of 1966, the civil rights movement was in full flower changing a state, a nation and minds. Alabama was its stage. No one can say for sure but for one season, it seems that the noble struggle for equal rights and football intermingled.

Was Alabama the football team punished in the polls for being Alabama, the state of intolerance?

"Coach Bryant told us the fact that we didn't have any votes on the East Coast was his fault," said Jim Fuller, a defensive tackle on that '66 team. "We didn't have the integration of the other teams. He said, 'I'll never let that happen again.'"

And Notre Dame had the opposite situation...a lot of love, and maybe too much for some people. Time magazine put Hanratty and Seymour on the cover that season, only the second time in the 60s that a college football player appeared (trivia time: name the player who graced the other cover).

But you know, to prove a conspiracy, or even a complacent, insidious bias, you first have to show evidence that Alabama was clearly deserving on merit over every other team in the country. And as shown above, that just wasn't the case -- based on stats and scores, it isn't clear-cut. Both ND and Michigan state had very strong claims on #1, both in terms of statistical output and strength-of-schedule. It's perfectly reasonable to assume voters deemed ND the best team based on measurable benchmarks, and not fuzzy political agendas.

---

Here's how the final vote came down:

• 1 - Notre Dame, 41 1st-place votes, 506 points
• 2 - Michigan State, 8 1st-place votes, 471 points
• 3 - Alabama, 7 1st-place votes, 428 points

While Bama may have been undefeated, clearly most voters thought ND was just simply a better team (and Michigan State a better team than Alabama, too, for that matter). The simple truth is that Alabama lost its #1 ranking right out of the gate, and did nothing terribly outstanding the rest of the season to prove they should have had it back.

That said, I can sympathize with Tide fans who feel some claim on the '66 title, as the Irish have also been been upset in pursuit of the threepeat. In 1948, ND seesawed through the season with Michigan for the top spot and a chance at the triple-whammy, when a late-season tie against Southern Cal opened the door for Michigan to claim the crown. Historically, however, ND has played the spoiler in couple of possible threepeats (Army in '46, Oklahoma in '57).

And come to think of it...we've got a chance at another spoiler this year, too...

What's the name? | by Jay

You know.

Full Ride Surprise | by Pat

Remember when I wrote that the scholarship numbers post would be wrong in under a month? Seems I was a bit optimistic. How about 72 hours?

Today walk-ons Casey Cullen, Rob Woods, and Brandon Harris were officially awarded scholarships for the 2005 season. It's a great reward for three guys that worked hard all year, and while their names might be somewhat unfamiliar, Woods and Harris have already logged a little game time and are expected to make even more contributions this season.

Harris, in particular, is getting looks at kick and punt returner and he's running with the second team on occasion at cornerback, according to various practice reports. Granted, "walk-on cornerback running with the second team" isn't exactly Plan A, but Harris sounds like he's quick enough to handle the work. Recently he was the subject of a profile in the South Bend Tribune that detailed his studies as a music major and his late entry into the world of big time college football. And given the fact that Weis has been rather reluctant to single out individual players for praise so far, his words about Harris reveal someone who might contribute more than just mop-up duty:

"When I came here, I wouldn't say I was concerned about the overall speed," Weis said. "I just didn't know what we had. But now that they're out there and you see them all running, all of a sudden you've got some guys who have some giddyup. And he's one of them. He has top-line speed."

Woods has the most playing time of the three new scholarship players as he appeared in the Washington, Purdue, and Oregon State game last season as a wide receiver and special teams player. Wide receiver is one of the deepest positions on the team this season, so Woods not might not get many reps at that spot, but he definitely will play a lot on special teams. Practice reports from the fall mention his consistency, and at 6'2", 208 he isn't going to be undersized when he steps on the field. I'm not sure what's more impressive about Woods; walking-on and then earning a scholarship at a deep position like wide receiver, or the fact he has a 3.95 GPA as a mechanical/aerospace engineer. I'm leaning towards the latter, as it's one heck of an accomplishment and a testament to his work ethic.

Cullen might be the longest shot to see the field this year, but he does suit up at a rather thin position. A defensive lineman, Cullen is going to need to add bulk if he's truly only 235 lbs, as listed. Almost reflexively, another undersized scout team defensive end pops into your head ("235 and nuthin! And hardly a speck of athletic ability!") and you almost feel sorry for the guy.

Then you read further in the press release and find out he was an all-state player in Texas who led his team to a 12-1 record and a state championship. So while he may find playing time hard to come by, he's no Rudy-shaped human tackling dummy. Odds are you will see #60 flying down the field on special teams during the season.

And when it comes to Irish bloodlines, I don't think anyone can touch Cullen. He's a triple legacy who had both mom and dad attend ND, as well as his grandfather. And his grandfather, Christy Flanagan, did more than just attend ND. He was a two-time All-American at halfback at Notre Dame under Knute Rockne.

That's the ticket | by Pat

The tickets for Notre Dame home games have been mailed out and I must say, they look nice. They appear to form a mural of sorts when viewed together, celebrating the 75th Anniversary of Notre Dame Stadium. If people want to send in pictures of their tickets (actual tickets work too) we can try and stitch together what the tickets look like side by side.

One thing that is for certain, the current tickets look a lot better than some of the attempts at interesting tickets in the past, such as this gem from 1982.

Three Cheers for the Irish | by Pat

As has been reported before, the Harris Interactive College Football poll is replacing the AP poll as a contributor to the BCS bowl equation. Today, the identities of the 114 voters were released. Here is a description of how the voters were chosen.

Each of the 11 NCAA Division I-A conferences were asked to nominate up to 30 potential voters. Through random selection, Harris Interactive found 10 voters per conference. Notre Dame is represented by three voters and Army and Navy have a combined one vote. BCS conferences will hold a 55 percent majority, according to BCS spokesman Bob Burda.

However, with some nominees, the process was still a mystery.

"All I know is every conference must be represented, and being an ex-player from (UL-Monroe), I guess I'm representing the Sun Belt Conference," he(Duhe) said. "How they chose me, I don't know. It's like winning the lottery."

Here is a link to the names (pdf) of the voters. Have fun spotting the ex-coaches and ex-players on the list. How many connections to ND can you find?

From the looks of things, the three voters that seem to be the Irish nominees are Lou Holtz, Rocket Ismail, and Roger Valdiserri. For those that don't know who he is, Valdiserri worked in the Notre Dame administration for 33 years in a variety of roles including associate athletic director, but is best known for his longtime work as ND's Sports Information Director. He's a member of the College Information Sports Directors Hall of Fame and has received numerous awards for his work under the Dome. Remember the story about how Joe Theismann changed the pronuncation of his last name to rhyme with Heisman? That was Valdiserri's idea.

In a move that I wish the Coaches Poll and AP Poll would follow, the first Top 25 Harris poll will be released September 25th, after teams have had a chance to get a few games under their belt.

One vote for the Irish | by Pat

The pre-season AP poll came out and Notre Dame is starting the 2005 season the exact same way it started the 2004 season, with one lone AP vote. The difference being that this year the AP vote has pulled out of the BCS process and will not be used to place teams into the various BCS bowl games. It's replacement, the Harris Interactive College Football Poll, will include 114 voters -- consisting of former coaches, players, administrators, and a handful of various media members -- who will have their names released tomorrow. Here is this year's pre-season AP Top 25. Notre Dame opponents in bold.

Rank 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25	Team (first-place votes) Southern California (60) Texas (4) Tennessee (13) Michigan LSU Ohio State Oklahoma Virginia Tech Miami Florida Iowa Louisville (1) Georgia Florida State Purdue Auburn Texas A&M Boise State California Arizona State Texas Tech Boston College Pittsburgh Fresno State Virginia	Record 13-0 11-1 10-3 9-3 9-3 8-4 12-1 10-3 9-3 9-3 10-2 11-1 10-2 9-3 7-5 13-0 7-5 11-1 10-2 9-3 8-4 9-3 8-4 9-3 8-4	Points 1619 1500 1376 1329 1291 1205 1204 1184 1142 1080 1011 892 869 764 711 650 576 375 358 313 256 232 211 196 153	Final '04 rank 1 5 13 14 16 20 3 10 11 NR 8 6 7 15 NR 2 NR 12 9 19 18 21 25 22 23

Others receiving votes: Alabama (6-6) 121, Oregon (5-6) 97, Utah (12-0) 77, Georgia Tech (7-5) 62, Bowling Green (9-3) 57, North Carolina State (5-6) 57, Colorado (8-5) 38, UCLA (6-6) 19, Minnesota (7-5) 18, Iowa State (7-5) 18, Miami (Ohio) (8-5) 15, Penn State (4-7) 11, Texas El-Paso (8-4) 10, Oregon State (7-5) 8, Wisconsin (9-3) 5, Nebraska (5-6) 3, Memphis (8-4) 3, Clemson (6-5) 3, Colorado State (4-7) 1, Notre Dame (6-6) 1, Southern Mississippi (7-5) 1, Toledo (9-3) 1, Wyoming (7-5) 1, West Virginia (8-3) 1.

As mentioned previously, this will be the first time since 1963-64 that Notre Dame starts off consecutive seasons unranked. For all the recent rash of pro-Charlie Weis articles it seems that when push comes to shove, most media members don't have much faith in him to get the 2005 version of the Fighting Irish back into the Top 25.

Update:
I was trying to figure out which lone wolf cast his lot with the Irish and luckily the excellent fanblogs.com was nice enough to list out all the AP voters. Check it out.

Recruiting Rundown | by Pat

As we move into the football season we're going to try and bring some weekly features that cover a variety of topics. One of them is the recruiting rundown. Every week, we'll try and track down how the verbal commits are doing and link up any stories done about them in the local press. If we miss anything, or you happen to take in a game featuring said recruits, please feel free to shoot us an email and drop us a note in the comments field. Now then, on to the rundown. Most of the nation's high schools haven't started their seasons yet, so this week's update is rather short.

James Aldridge helped to put up a Playstation-esque 82-0 beatdown on East Chicago Central. Aldridge didn't play much as you can imagine, but still finished with 90 yards rushing and 3 touchdowns on 8 carries before he was pulled early in the 2nd quarter. And that total includes a 13 yard loss where the QB pitched the ball over Aldridge's head. Not too shabby.

Luke Schmidt's first game featured an early halftime as lightning halted the game on Friday night. At the time Schmidt was cruising with 52 yards and a touchdown on only 4 carries. They picked up where they left off on Saturday night and Schmidt finished the game with 221 yards, 3 touchdowns, and a 2pt conversion on 30 carries as he team won 29-13. I'd expect the Indiana state rushing title to be a battle between Schmidt and Aldridge this year.

Raeshon McNeil had a quiet night as the other team threw away from his side of the field during his team's 35-14 victory. McNeil missed out on getting in as a wide receiver due to cramping but did manage to finish the game with three tackles.

Upcoming Games

If there is a big game coming up for the following weekend, we'll try to list it here in case you live in the area and want to check out the game. Again, any and all feedback is appreciated.

Demetrius Jones and Morgan Park will take on Mt. Carmel in Soldier Field next Saturday, which certainly is a big stage for two high school teams. We're still undecided if we believe the rumor that Jones will be the best QB on a Chicago team to play at Soldier Field this season.

And in other Notre Dame feeder school news, Kallen Wade and the Withrow Tigers will open up their season next week on the road against former ND linebacker Bob Crable and his Moeller Crusaders.

P6 | by Jay

A slew of people still wanted to jump in on the Paterno Drink Tray sweepstakes, so we're going to open up the Pick Six for another week. Details & entry link here. Don't tarry.

Rae of light | by Jay

By now you've probably read about prep player Raeshon McNeil casting his lot with ND and becoming the 12th recruit for ND's class of '06. We apologize for being a little late with our reaction, but seeing a top cornerback announce his decision live on ESPN, and actually pick the Irish, was enough to knock us out cold for a couple of days.

Getting a high quality corner to commit to Notre Dame, especially this early in the year, is almost as tough as getting my old roommate Mike to pick up a check. But Charlie & co's hard work earlier in the year paid off as McNeil selected the school he began to heavily consider after Coach Weis visited his school in Mocksville, NC back in May.

While many recruits give lip service to the importance of academics when chosing a school, McNeil, a near-4.0 student, made it a priority. He narrowed down his choice of schools to those that included his preferred college major: architecture. I've heard of a few players who majored in engineering over the years, but this is the first guy, to my recollection, who's going to be an Archie. (This should be interesting; I wonder how he'll manage the third-year-abroad in Rome with the demands of the football program.)

Raeshon also acknowledged that the lure of early playing time was pretty enticing:

"As it stands right now, I should be the only defensive back committed, and I think if I go in there and play well I should see action on the field pretty soon."

One of the best things about getting a highly ranked cornerback recruit like McNeil is that he's actually a cornerback. Sounds a bit funny, but let me explain. Notre Dame has had success in the past getting guys capable of playing the corner to attend Notre Dame; Ambrose Wooden and Terrail Lambert come to mind as recruits who selected the Irish over a large list of top-tier programs. But neither of them actually played cornerback extensively in high school (Wooden was his team's quarterback while Lambert was a linebacker in high school.) So while they certainly have the athletic ability to play it in college, they lacked the familarity with the position coming into Notre Dame. McNeil, on the other hand, is first and foremost a cornerback, and all that game experience will come in very handy and make the learning curve slightly less steep.

McNeil selected the Irish over most of the progams on the eastern seaboard (Clemson, North Carolina, NC State, South Carolina, Virginia, Virginia Tech, etc.) and sounds pretty excited about his choice.

"It was a hard decision to make, packing up and leaving everything I have known for 17 years and going off somewhere new. But right now, I am looking forward to making some new friends and having a good time at Notre Dame."

You know, the only possible negative on McNeil's resume is the name of his high school, but I'm glad ND didn't shy away from taking a good look at the kid from Davie County High. He sounds like a perfect fit, for the team and for ND.

It was my understanding there would be no math | by Pat

Yesterday the roster and defensive line depth chart took another hit when defensive tackle Brandon Nicolas left the program. He may or may not have seen much playing time this year, but his departure does affect a team that now only has two scholarship players at defensive tackle in the freshman and sophomore class. The same numbers exist in the freshman and sophomore class at offensive line as well so robbing Peter to pay Paul isn't a likely solution to the dearth of scholarship lineman currently on the team.

Now, the defensive line will be thin this year, but should still have enough bodies to be effective. However, recruiting defensive lineman, specifically tackles physically capable of playing early in their career, is now that much more important.

Which brings me to a topic that has become more relevant with each departing football player: recruiting and scholarship numbers. Here's a quick rundown of where Notre Dame stands with regards to number of players and just exactly how many scholarship offers Weis will have in his quiver for the coming year.

I'm going to skip listing out the names for each grouping, but if are interested I highly recommend you check out the excellent scholarship breakdown on IrishEyes. It's not exactly up to date as I'm sure they are waiting until the end of fall camp to update position shifts and document the most recent attrition. Using this list and the official roster, let's take a look at what Notre Dame has in the way of scholarships. Please keep in mind however that these numbers could easily change tomorrow. Nothing here is set in stone and by and large I will be ignoring such likely occurances such as career ending injuries and additional transfers. Ok, disclaimers out of the way, let's get on to the numbers.

Currently, the 2005 Fighting Irish have:

8 - 5th year seniors
2 - Seniors with no eligibility left
14 - Seniors with 1 year of eligibility left
5 - Juniors with 2 years left
15 - Juniors with 3 years left
3 - Sophomores with 3 years left
9 - Sophomores with 4 years left
15 - Freshman with 4 years left

That's 71 scholarship players out of a maximum of 85. Once the 8 5th years and 2 seniors use up their final season of eligibility, that will leave Notre Dame with 61 awarded scholarships out of a possible 85.

That means ND will have room for 24 scholarships if all 5th year eligble players return. (Note: I tackled specific rules regarding the number of scholarships in a given class at the bottom of this post.) Odds are not all 5th year eligible players will return, but given our recent losses, especially to the O-Line, many hopefully will stay. Weis has been quoted as saying he likes to keep a scholarship or two in his pocket to award to deserving walk-ons (like Brandon Harris) so let's subtract one scholarship and leave 23 available scholarships. Currently, ND already has 12 verbal commits. That leaves room for 10 more (again, assuming all 5th years come back and one scholarship is reserved for a walk-on or Travis Leitko). Sticking with that assumption, that will leave us in 2006 with:

15 - 5th year seniors (assuming Travis Leitko is back with the team)
5 - Seniors with 0 years left
16 - Seniors with 1 year left
3 -Juniors with 2 years left
9 - Juniors with 3 years left
15 - Sophomores with either 3 or 4 years left
22 - Freshman with 4 years left.

That total is 85; the maximum number of scholarship that Notre Dame can offer. Now, for the sake of recruitniks everywhere I'll take it a step further and project for 2007. Please realize though that this is somewhat like trying to predict the weather a year from now and it is highly likely that this list will be laughably wrong within a month, if not sooner.

Ok, again assuming all 16 5th years come back for 2007--which, realistically, is very unlikely--Notre Dame will have room for 20 recruits (15 fifth years plus 5 seniors with 0 years left graduating). Now, that's the minimum number of scholarships that Weis will have to offer and any additional attrition after this season will only serve to increase that number. In the end, I'd have to imagine that due to 5th years not coming back, career-ending injuries, players leaving early for the NFL (it could happen), and even more transfers, we will have room for another 23-25 guys in 2007.

What all this means is that Coach Weis will have ample opportunity to fill the roster with his recruits and should he get Notre Dame off to a hot start and catch the eye of top shelf recruits everywhere, he will have plenty of available scholarships to dole out.

One last thing about scholarships, numbers, and the rules surrounds early entry for recruits. Each college football program is allowed a maximum of 85 scholarships. Additionally, each program may only sign 25 recruits per recruiting class. However, if there is room under the 85-limit, a school may enroll a recruit a semester early and that recruit will count towards the previous recruiting class total, but only if the previous class was under the 25 player-per-class limit. For example, the current freshman class has 15 members. If ND admits someone a semester early for the upcoming recruiting class, that player will count as the 16th member of the current freshman class and still leave a potential 25 open slots in the current recruiting class, assuming of course that total is still under the 85 scholarship limit. Confused yet? Here's where it gets even more convoluted. Say the following year another player wants to enroll early. He may do so, but must be counted as a member of his current recruiting class since the previous class, now freshman, maxed out the 25 number limit. Hopefully that clears things up somewhat. There may or may not be a quiz on this material later so I hope you were paying attention. Class dismissed.

Six Picks | by Jay

Quick update on the P6 contest.

• We have 419 entries. (A couple people doubled up; no biggie). Thanks to everyone for their entries.

• Standings are now viewable. (Hope you remembered you entry name.)

• Blogpollers will be split out into a separate standings table soon.

• Here's how the picks broke down according to the six groups:

Group A: 1-5
Southern Cal	266 (63.48%)
Texas	99 (23.63%)
Tennessee	14 (3.34%)
Michigan	10 (2.39%)
Oklahoma	30 (7.16%)

Group B: 6-10
LSU	62 (14.80%)
Virginia Tech	67 (15.99%)
Miami (Fla.)	100 (23.87%)
Ohio State	79 (18.85%)
Iowa	111 (26.49%)

Group C: 11-15
Florida	119 (28.40%)
Florida State	31 (7.40%)
Georgia	61 (14.56%)
Louisville	185 (44.15%)
Auburn	23 (5.49%)

Group D: 16-20
Purdue	88 (21.00%)
Texas A&M	85 (20.29%)
Arizona State	40 (9.55%)
Boise State	94 (22.43%)
California	112 (26.73%)

Group E: 21-25
Texas Tech	91 (21.72%)
Boston College	30 (7.16%)
Virginia	115 (27.45%)
Alabama	108 (25.78%)
Pittsburgh	75 (17.90%)

Group F: Unranked
Notre Dame	254 (60.62%)
Nebraska	19 (4.53%)
Fresno State	17 (4.06%)
Bowling Green	11 (2.63%)
Oregon	9 (2.15%)
Kansas State	7 (1.67%)
Penn State, UTEP, Wisconsin	6 (1.43%)
Georgia Tech, NC State	5 (1.19%)
Colorado, Iowa State, Minnesota, Oklahoma St, South Carolina, Utah	4 (0.95%)
Clemson, Kansas, Miami (OH), Michigan State, Wyoming	3 (0.72%)
Arizona, Maryland, Oregon State, UCLA, West Virginia	2 (0.48%)
Air Force, Arkansas, Ball St, Illinois, Memphis, Navy, Rutgers, Stanford, Toledo, UAB, UCF, Washington St	1 (0.24%)

• Best entry names:

Dr. Kenneth Noisewater
Kick It Again Bo
Mons Venus Flytrap
Elmer Bennett's Big Tooth
ShomerShabbos
Ken Dye's Little White Dogg
Take the Train, Knute

• Overheard comments (from the free-entry field):

In the words of Mystikal: f--- it, here goes nothin'!
Yeah, that's right. I said UTEP.
I should have picked Washington, OK?
I don't offer any of you clowns protection.
If your unranked choice is not ND, you have no balls.
But most the time I spend behind these county bars 'cause I drinks a bit...
If I lose, Accardo will have me clipped...
Jay still sucks, right?
I already have the Paterno collection.

What's in the Fridge? | by Michael

I rarely venture over to the ESPN website these days, but Ivan Maisel has a great look at Maryland coach Ralph Friedgen and his scouting expertise. For what it's worth, I think the Fridge's approach to studying tendencies is very similar to Charlie's. Be sure to check out the entire article, and I'll point out just a couple things that stuck out to me.

A thread yesterday on NDNation briefly touched upon one element of Friedgen's skill with scouting. In the '99 Gator Bowl, Friedgen's scouting reports showed him how one ND defensive lineman's alignment identified whether he was planning to stunt or not. These kinds of tip-offs occur all the time in football, but it's the diligent coaching staffs who discover these tendencies more often than not.

Suffice to say, this is right up Charlie's alley, especially considering how much more complex the NFL is compared to the college game. If you listened to Charlie's post-practice comments yesterday (courtesy of Irish Eyes), he briefly discussed scouting. An excerpt:

“Pittsburgh doesn’t take a brain surgeon to figure out what they’re going to do. Michigan, it doesn’t take a brain surgeon. Michigan State will have played two games by the time we’ve played them. Washington three games. Purdue has a bye in there so they also will have played three games. I’ve looked at the schedule.”

Seems to me that Charlie thinks scouting in college football is a bit of a cakewalk; it's probably a little oversimplification on his part, but you have to like his confidence. (For some more concrete examples of Charlie's ability to discover tendencies and use scouting reports to anticipate what the defense will bring, take another look at our recent piece on Charlie's playcalling.)

The ESPN article has a lot of terrific insights from Friedgen, but there's one other highlight worth mentioning. The following Friedgen quote brought about a serious case of deja vu: "If I'm them, this is what I do to stop what I do."

Charlie said essentially the same thing this past week. Check it out, courtesy of Colin Burns' piece at Irish Eyes.

“I watch all the (defensive) tape,” Weis said. “Just because I’m not over there over doesn’t mean I miss anything. We tape everything. The first thing I watch after practice is the defensive tape. I don’t watch the offensive tape. I just watch them. I go back again to see what I missed because you don’t see everything. But I know from going against the defense, they present some problems to us. Then again, there are other times where I’ll go up to those guys and I’ll go to Rick and say, ‘If you do this, this is what I’m going to do and you’re going to have a problem.’ They are doing a lot more now than in the spring.”

Still, football also depends upon talent and, as much as it pains me to say it, execution. Hate that word all you want, but all the scouting in the world didn't help Maryland overcome inexperience and talent issues at quarterback last year. The Terps had execution problems; however, the difference between a good coaching staff and a bad one is that the good one will publicly blame themselves and simplify the offense to fit the strengths of its players. A bad staff will, week after week, cite player execution as a primary reason for inconsistent play while never adapting the scheme.

In the Friedgen offense, which is similar to what Charlie ran with the Patriots and will likely run at Notre Dame, a lot falls upon the shoulders of the quarterback, and it shouldn't surprise anyone that this is really the first year that we've heard offensive coaches discuss Brady Quinn's ability to read coverages. Scouting and gameplanning are vital pieces of a winning formula, but in systems like Fridge's and Charlie's, you need a smart, decisive quarterback to efficiently run your offense. Quinn has infinitely more responsibility now than he ever did in the Diedrick offense.

Watch Maryland bounce back to have a good record this year; their quarterbacks are more experienced and talented, and the Fridge should be able to put together a solid season. Likewise, watch the Irish offense put up big numbers this fall. The cogs are in place, especially at, the most important position in this offense, quarterback. Brady Quinn will put Charlie's scouting reports to good use.