Wonderlic Results Season

Half the fun of the NFL Draft is when the player’s Wonderlic scores get leaked out to the media because you get gems like this.

David Irons, he of the undying Irons brothers and their genre-defining interview, may want to bring his own shoes to the NFL Draft. More specifically, the ones labeled ‘L’ and ‘R’ that denote which foot to put them on.

Irons tied with Weber State safety Bo Reed for the lowest score on this year’s Wonderlic: a four.

Here’s the Wonderlic sample test for you to flex your mental power.

Florida and Ohio State in Another Championship Game

The Florida Gators beat the Ohio State Buckeyes for this year’s (mythical) college football championship. Now, those two teams meet in the real NCAA basketball finals.

Now we’ll see who’s really No. 1.

Florida, the top overall seed in the NCAA tournament, and Ohio State, which finished the regular season as the top-ranked team, rolled into Monday night’s championship game.

After a tournament filled with nail-biters, Saturday night’s games were downright pedestrian. Ohio State (35-3) beat Georgetown 67-60 despite more foul trouble from Greg Oden. Florida (34-5) romped to a 76-66 victory over UCLA in a rematch of last year’s title game that wasn’t any closer than the original.

It will be a title game rematch of sorts. The Buckeyes and Gators met for a title in January — only it was on grass, not hardwood. The gridiron Gators won that one in an upset, beating Ohio State 41-14 and making Florida the first school to hold titles in football and men’s basketball at the same time. Now Florida is looking to add to its title collection. But the Buckeyes might want a little revenge for their football brethren. Yes, that was Ohio State football coach Jim Tressel sitting in the front row Saturday night with his Florida counterpart Urban Meyer across the way.

Florida is trying to become the first team since Duke in 1992 to repeat, and the first ever to do it with the same starting lineup.

Winning the big two college titles in the same year would be unprecedented and quite amazing, indeed.

How about them Dolphins?

Forgive me for having a Robin Williams moment. The Miami Dolphins have been very busy over the last few days. Here is the good news.

The Dolphins have agreed to terms with former Pittsburgh linebacker Joey Porter on a five-year, $32 million contract, a source said today.

The deal is pending Porter passing a physical examination, which he is expected to take tonight or tomorrow.

The deal includes a $12 million signing bonus and another $8 million in guaranteed salary, a source said.

Porter, who was released by the Steelers last Thursday in a salary cap-related move, logged 60 sacks in his eight seasons with the Steelers while emerging as one of the AFC’s top outside linebackers in Pittsburgh’s 3-4 defense. The Dolphins deploy the same kind of defensive system and are in need of an outside linebacker with Donnie Spragan now an unrestricted free agent.

No question, Porter is a great addition to the team. Now for the bad Dolphin news.

The Miami Dolphins’ busiest day of the free-agency period ended with the team better positioned for April’s draft and picking up more space under the salary cap.

It could be just the beginning of a roster overhaul that might signal a youth movement under first-year coach Cam Cameron and General Manager Randy Mueller.

Miami traded popular wide receiver Wes Welker on Monday for second- and seventh-round draft picks, giving the Dolphins nine picks – and possibly more to come.

Tight end Randy McMichael and his $4 million salary and quarterback Joey Harrington, who was due a $1 million roster bonus this week, were released.

Harrington was no great loss. Welker is an overacheiver who gets little respect because of his size but his stats were good last year his first season playing mostly full-time. Welker also livened up Miami’s kick returns that have been pathetic for years.

Then the team dumps McMichael. Couldn’t the team find room for his bonus? They’ve got enough over priced overrated players dump them. So what will Miami do at tight end now. Here is one possible answer.

The Dolphins have made their first free-agent acquisition of 2007 by signing Green Bay tight end David Martin to a contract, a source said Sunday.

*****

Martin played in 11 games for the Packers in 2006 with four starts, catching 21 passes for 198 yards with two touchdowns. The 6-foot-4, 265-pound Martin is regarded as a quality receiver who has battled injuries throughout his first six NFL seasons in Green Bay.

Here are the stats on the piece of junk player Miami will replace Randy McMichael with. I’m so overwhelmed by those 87 career pass receptions. NOT!

Oh and if anyone cares, The Dolphins’s 3rd string QB at the end of last season, Shane Matthews, has retired.

Quarterback Shane Matthews, a 14-year NFL veteran, said Friday he plans to retire permanently.

Matthews, a former Florida Gators star, came out of retirement in December to sign with Miami after the team placed Daunte Culpepper on injured reserve to rehabilitate his knee. He did not appear in any games.

In his NFL career, Matthews played for six teams and threw for 4,756 yards and 24 touchdowns.

Here are Matthews career stats. Note that he threw 31 career touchdowns not 24. Back to remedial sportswriting school with you Palm Beach Post reporter Edgar Thompson.

Shane Matthews won’t be missed by Dolphin fans, I wish the same could be said for the rest of the team’s transactions.

NCAA Demos New Basketball Uniforms

It looks as if the NCAA may be moving away from the baggy shorts and oversized jerseys to a skin tight top and what appears to be a skirt or some kind of kilt. Of course the uniform is supposedly built like the “tattoo culture” where everyone has the same uniform but you can customize it to be unique.

Starting tomorrow night, four top schools—Arizona, Florida, Ohio State, and Syracuse—will don Nike’s System of Dress, a radical new look that brings Raf Simons–style proportion-play to the hard court. Complementing the aforementioned shorts are formfitting jerseys ten inches smaller in the torso, resulting in a second-skin look that’s more Bode Miller than Ben Wallace. Players will also be able to customize their uniforms by adding options like padded shorts (to protect against the errant knee or elbow) and Dwyane Wade–style leg wraps.

As for me, well I won’t be rushing out to buy my own version with my own personal pieces of flair. The idea that you want every player to be able to make themselves different from their teammates strikes me as counter to the idea of a team all together.

Florida Gators fire Carolyn Peck

The Lady Gators Basketball program is not as sucessful as the men’s. From the Gainesville Sun.

Carolyn Peck, who coached Florida’s women to a 69-74 record in five seasons, was relieved of her duties on Monday effective at the end of the year.

Peck will receive a buyout of approximately $300,000 because she had a year remaining on her contract.

“I love the University of Florida,” Peck said at a news conference. “The reason the University of Florida athletics ranks with the best in the nation is that Jeremy Foley has the guts to make the tough decisions.”

Florida is 6-20, 0-11 in the SEC.

If Ms. Peck was sincere in her statement at the press conference, she is a classy lady. I wish her well in whatever her future endeavors are. Hopefully it will include coaching basketball.

If you read the 82 word Gainesville Sun article written by Pat Dooley, you’ll find one word missing. It is the sport Ms. Peck coached, it is called basketball. Back to Sports Journalism 101 with you Mr. Dooley.

See I don’t only pick on golf writers.

Streaking Gator Hit By Car

This is not the way to end the night after your team wins:

GAINESVILLE, Fla. A Gainesville college student who was streaking last night is in the hospital.

Police say the student was out celebrating after the Gators won the B-C-S championship against Ohio State and was hit by a car.

The student suffered a serious head injury and was rushed to the hospital. His condition and name has not been released.

What is it about a fan’s team winning a championship that causes rational brain function to cease?

SEC Too Good For Ohio State?

AP sportswriter Ben Walker penned this lede to his piece on last night’s BCS Championship game in which the Florida Gators whooped the Ohio State Buckeyes:

Turns out Florida was too good to be on the same field as Ohio State, and that Heisman Trophy winner Troy Smith and the Buckeyes were the ones who weren’t worthy after all.

Coach Urban Meyer’s once-beaten Gators dominated the undefeated No. 1 Buckeyes and streaked to college football’s national championship, 41-14 on Monday night.

“Honestly, we’ve played a lot better teams than them,” Florida defensive end Jarvis Moss said. “I could name four or five teams in the SEC that could probably compete with them and play the same type of game we did against them.”

Honestly, I think that’s right. That’s why the simple counting of wins and losses is a silly way to pick national title contenders in Division I. The idea that Boise State, which played a schedule filled with teams that probably couldn’t beat Florida’s high school championship team, is better than teams with even three or four losses in the SEC or ACC, is a joke. LSU, Auburn, Georgia, Arkansas, and Tennessee probably all could have beaten Ohio State last night.

Of course, that’s why we need a playoff system rather than a beauty contest.

John McCain at BCS Coin Toss

Hotline On Call observes that “no amount of cash today can match the exposure John McCain received tonight during the coin toss of the BCS nat’l title game between the two biggest schools in the two most important states in presidential campaign lore. The referee made a point to make sure that the players from swing states Florida and Ohio State were personally introduced to McCain.”

Doug Haller, Jason P. Skoda, Jeff Metcalfe, Richard Obert of the Arizona Republic have a different view: “The potential 2008 presidential candidate flipped the coin. Florida won the toss. And McCain lost Ohio in the future election. Yes, it happened that fast.”

OTB

Boise State and the BCS

Heralded by many, in Idaho, as the true National Champions, the Boise State Broncos closed the 2006 College Football season as the only undefeated team. Florida, by virtue of their thrashing of Ohio State, is the National Champion. And the Broncos? Fifth in the AP. Sixth in the USA Today Coaches poll. Not exactly the treatment befitting an undefeated team, who will be remembered best for their thrilling victory in the Fiesta Bowl – a game already declared an instant classic.

Boise State however will not be accorded any more respect than they won on the gridiron. They are the other – an interloper at the big BCS bash. And in spite of their undefeated record, the exciting style of football they play and the prominence their situation has received, they are not welcome to clamor that they were denied their rightful place atop the College Football heap. Their National Title hopes denied not because they lost, but because they play in a smaller conference, in a smaller market and They are not a glamour team like USC, Texas, Ohio State or Florida.

Lots of folks will be writing and scribbling in the coming weeks what needs to be done to fix the BCS. Many of those folks perpetuate the ridiculous system for picking a Champion. And pay careful attention to that word. Championships are not won on the field, they are picked by voters, whether ink-stained scribes or clipboard cr5acking coaches, and then parsed by a computer.

The writers and coaches both pay more fealty to the polls than they ought. Much was made about the clash between Texas and Ohio State earlier this season. Texas finished the year with three losses, one of them against Ohio State. It was a very different team from the one that stunned USC in previous year’s Rose Bowl. But Texas was highly ranked. Because people who hadn’t seen them play thought they were a good team. One honest writer cast a protest vote for Boise State as the top ranked team. Whoever that writer is, he or she has earned the right to pen the by now obvious column declaring that what college football needs is a playoff.

The solution is obvious, but money stands in the way. The Bowls, the major conferences and Notre Dame profit far too much from the BCS to allow the lesser conferences like the Western Athletic or the Mid-American or the Mountain West to join the party in an actual eight or sixteen game playoff that would actually allow the teams to compete to crown a Champion.

Commentator Norman Chad once declared that true sports don’t determine the winner by voting. This was why athletic competitions with subjective styles of selecting winners could not be called true sports. Your fate was not in your hands. You couldn’t win and therefore prove your mettle. College Football’s postseason sadly has long been an athletic competition and not a sport.

So in Gainesville celebrate your Champs. Urban Meyer did a great job game planning. And that made a huge difference. Make no mistake, though. This Championship belongs in part to Meyer’s predecessor Ron Zook, who recruited many of the players who went out and whupped Ohio State. They toppled Goliath and won the big game. But the matchup was picked, not entirely earned. And until the Championship Game is truly the clash of the last two teams standing after a playoff tournament, the conclusion of every College Football season will carry some baggage.