True on both counts. If you do some close scrutiny of http://collegefootballbelt.com/Seasons.htm
you’ll probably see how it weaves in and out of the hands of the National Champion during the BCS era. So it’s not as fanciful as it might seem at first.
The fact that Oklahoma has it until somebody rips it from them (perhaps this season – perhaps within the first few weeks even) makes for some fun side bets if that sort of thing excites you.
Not long ago (I’ll try to find it after I post this) I had a survey of how The Belt figured in with the “official” National Champs.
It’s very analogous to a heavyweight championship belt (not coincidentally, of course), and you would think that if a boxing championship can pass from one to another upon defeat, why not a football championship?
That line of thought minimizes the “any given Saturday” effect – and that a single loss does not necessarily mean that a team is no longer The Best.
(Shoot, my team – University of California Golden Bears – held the belt briefly in 1993. That was a darned good team; possibly great, if they hadn’t lost their QB for a mid-season stretch. But no way are they a worthy linear descendent of the 1971 Nebraska Cornhuskers)
There’s a new, untested QB, so 70% of the game plan is going to be “give the ball to Yelden & other RBs behind a big O line”. Even Kiffen can’t screw that up.
I know and I’d rather not spread us too thin. There ain’t that many of us college football fans here on the Dope. Anybody else got thoughts? Should we have one massive 2014 college football thread? Or just discuss things in the pick em threads week by week?
I seriously doubt that we could reach a consensus on the various ways to discuss CFB so I suggest just go with what feels right on a personal level.
I plan to continue with the weekly AP Top Ten “Pick the Losers” polls and they may serve as a gathering place – or not. Or we could just keep piling on here as if it’s “never too early” and just ignore the thread title. If it gets topheavy we could start another thread.
