Top ranked teams disappointing

I’m in a slump.

In the last couple of weeks I have hit the proverbial wall.Anything that could go wrong has gone wrong.

The only thing more painful than watching Purdue fumble away avictory in the last two minutes two weeks in a row would be ifNelly made back to back singles with Christina Aguilera and TimMcGraw [damn, that happened too].

I saw USC, Florida State and Texas play its best games of theseason against Arizona St, Virginia and Texas Tech teams thatweren’t ready for primetime. I watched Louisville play asgood as I have ever seen anyone play against Miami for threequarters only to lose because they continued to kick to Devin”Human Highlight” Hester.

Seriously, what possesses a coach to punt to a guy that ran backa kick and a punt for a touchdown already in the game.

In two weekends I went from 9-5 to 10-11 and the criticismhurts, but incase you were checking I am not the complete idiotthat the record would say.

Most of the so called experts online guarantee a 60 percentsuccess rate, but their picks are over any game on the schedule. Asdifficult as picking Oklahoma over Kansas sounds I think a blindmonkey could handle that.

Every week I pick only games between Top 25 teams and games Ithink will be upsets of Top 25 teams. It gets a little tougher tokeep a quality win percentage when you have the Michigan-Purduegames of the world to deal with, or when picking a weekly hunch— and lets say Texas Tech decides that tackling reallyisn’t an important facet of being a successful footballteam.

Also, don’t get me started on that five-yard punt. Itspretty easy to score when you start drives inside the Red Zone.

So this week I am responding to the critics. I am picking everygame featuring a ranked team. So what if I have correctly predictedLSU and Ohio State being out of Top 10 despite the rest of theworld having them pre season Top 10.

So what If I have correctly picked six underdogs to be outrightwinners. We’re padding the stats this week. Here goes:

Upset Specials

No. 22 Virginia Tech at Georgia Tech, 6:30 p.m.Thursday

Quarterback Bryan Randell leads a 5-2 Hokie squad down toAtlanta to battle the Yellow Jackets [4-2] in primetime. The fouryear starter has done a solid job in carrying a young team to a 5-2record and an upset victory over ranked West Virginia.

Georgia Tech has Reggie Ball, the sophomore who has moreinterceptions than touchdowns while being sacked 11 times on theyear despite being a running quarterback.

Both defenses are stout and should make life troubling for theoffenses, but something about this game screams Georgia Tech.

It could be that Ball seems to play his best while the camerasare rolling [see 251 yards and four touchdowns against a rankedClemson team on ABC], it could be that Virginia Tech has troublescoring, or it could just be that Chan Gailey needs a big home winto keep the boosters off his back.

The Pick: Georgia Tech 19-17

No. 10 Georgia vs. Florida in Jacksonville, 2:30 p.m.Saturday

The pick for this game has two major themes that will determinethe outcome:

1) Always pick an extremely talented team coming off anunderachieving performance, and

2) Its probably not a good idea to pick a team whose coach issuddenly out of work.

Florida qualifies for both rules due to the embarrassing loss atMississippi State.

Florida became the first conference victory for Sylvester Croomas the Gators lost to a Bulldog team that had not won since theopener — and that stretch included a loss to Maine.

The pitiful loss allows www.hireurbanmeyer.com to gathersteam with Coach Ron Zook’s firing on Monday. Utah’sMeyer and Steve Spurrier are frontrunners for the Gator job thatZook somehow coached to a 20-13 record despite never finishingoutside the Top 10 in recruiting in his tenure.

Georgia is coming off a strong performance last week inFayetteville as the Bulldogs rolled up over 500 yards of offenseagainst the Razorbacks in a 20-14 win.

The question is, which Georgia team will show up: the team thatrolled against LSU and Arkansas, or the underachieving bunch thatlost to Tennessee.

And that leads us to a third axiom concerning the World’sLargest Cocktail Party:

3) Always pick Florida to beat Georgia [First team I have everpicked a team without a coach].

The Pick: Florida 31-24

Big Games:

No. 21 Arizona St. at No. 7 California, 2:30 p.m.Saturday

Andrew Walter is going to end his career at Arizona State withevery major passing record in Pac-10 history.

This season alone he has thrown for over 1800 yards and 21touchdowns against only six interceptions. He has resurrected thefaithful in Tempe [63,985 at Sun Devil Stadium on Saturday] and hasled Arizona St. to a 6-1 record. Despite these accolades there islittle doubt that Walter is the second best quarterback inSaturday’s game.

Taking snaps for Cal is Aaron Rodgers the junior superstar whois completing an astounding 75 percent of his passes for 14touchdowns against only four interceptions.

Yes, Rodgers has more help with running back J.J. Arringtonrushing for over 100 yards in six straight games, but it’sRodgers ability to step up in big games that truly separates himfrom Walter.

Against USC, Rodgers went 29-34 for 267 yards and a touchdownwhile completing an NCAA record 23 straight passes at onepoint.

Walter against those same Trojans, failed to validate his gaudystats by throwing two interceptions on 19 of 34 passes for 184yards. Rodgers’ play is stellar and his superior supportingcast and raucous home crowd should carry him to victory.

The Pick: Cal 38-28

No. 2 Oklahoma at No. 20 Oklahoma State, 11:00 a.m.Saturday

I really can go either way on this one. The Cowboys reallyshowed me something on Saturday as they came from 17 points down atMissouri.

Seeing Vernand Morency carry for 173 yards has ceased to be asurprise, but the play of Donovan Woods opened my eyes.

Woods looked confident showing touch and precision that I quitefrankly didn’t think he had.

He only went 7-13 for 110 yards, but he also ran for 71 yardsand a 36-yard touchdown. His connection to his brother D’Juanfor a 12-yard touchdown was the best sibling hook-up since thatpicture of the Hiltons kissing found its way into my e-mailbox.

If The Cowboys were playing another Top 10 team I would feelcomfortable picking them, but this is the Sooners and they knowwhat can happen in Stillwater.

Twice now Bob Stoops has had perfect seasons ended by theCowboys and he will be determined to make sure that doesn’thappen again.

Oklahoma is the best team I have seen in person this season,with Mark Clayton and Adrian Peterson being the two best players Ihave seen first hand.

The combination of the Sooner’s focus and talent will betoo much for the valiant Cowboys to handle.

The Pick: Oklahoma 35-20

The Rest

Listed in Order of Rankings [if you want to know who they areplaying look it up yourself]:

USC, Auburn, Miami, Florida State, Texas, Utah, Michigan, WestVirginia, Texas A&M, Purdue, Boise State, LSU, Iowa, Minnesota[Wisky, Virginia, Louisville and Southern Miss have byes].

Other Upset: No. 11 Tennessee goes down to Columbia,SC.

Just for fun: Intramural Locks of theWeek

Men’s: Lambda Chi over Beta

Women’s: Chi-O over Theta,

Co-Rec: Incidental Contact over Fluffy Bunnies.