Mid Week Update

Wednesday Mail-Blog

 

       It's time for the mid-week update and your questions. With the regular season and conference championships long gone, what's on the radar to talk about? The Heisman Trophy has been awarded. Coaching positions have been filled; or at least the important head coaching jobs have been. Then there are the rumors of more schools deciding to change conferences, but isn't that getting old now? And besides, who really cares if small schools are making the moves? We are only interested in the bigger schools moving now. So, what do we have to talk about? It's a little early to starting making predictions for bowl games and we are all tired of hearing about how Louisville, Wisconsin, and Northern Illinois shouldn't be in the BCS.

 

          I leave Wednesday's pretty wide open to answer your questions, react to your comments, and give you my thoughts on your predictions, etc. But I also want to at least find someting interesting to post. I could speculate on who Florida State and Jimbo Fisher are looking at for the defensive coordinator job, but again, it's speculation at this point. Then there is the mess at the 'U'. Miami is still waiting for the NCAA to finish its investigation and pass down their punishment. What about Bobby Petrino to Western Kentucky? What a hire that was, right?

 

      Oh well, this segment is on you anyway. I only received one question this week.....so lets see what one of you came up with.

 

 

Timothy writes: Enjoying the blog. I have emailed you a question or two before. One thing that I have been thinking about the last couple of weeks, The playoff system is coming, TV contracts are being ironed out, and teams are still thinking about moving to other conferences.... Where does the ACC fit in all this mess? It seems that at the rate they are going, the conference will be kicked to the curb and FSU, Clemson, Miami, and Virginia Tech will be forced to go elsewhere if they want to be relevant again.

 

       Thanks, Timothy. This is a very complicated and hard to predict situation. Yes, at the current rate, the ACC seems to be becoming less and less relevant in the big picture. However, the playoff system could salvage the ACC (or at least give it the boost it needs). The trouble with the ACC the last 8-9 seasons has been the traditional powers. Florida State, Miami, and Virginia Tech have been down. It was expected that adding Miami and Virginia Tech would help the conference's image because both those schools were performing at a high level. Miami played for a couple National Championships in 2001 and 2002. Virginia Tech had been a very consistent 'up and coming' team after their 1999 Sugar Bowl game for the National Championship (they lost to FSU).

     Anyways, I don't need to give you an entire history lesson..... At this point, Florida State seems to be headed back in the right direction and that will help the ACC. Clemson has finally started to be consistent, and they deserve some attention as well. I think the ACC will be fine. I'd say the biggest way they can help themselves is to make sure they get a team in the first playoff. If Florida State, Clemson, or Virginia Tech can claim one of those spots and COMPETE in the first season of the playoffs then the ACC won't be the punchline for many of the weak conference jokes.

    Outside of FSU, Clemson, Virginia Tech, and Miami, the rest of the conference needs to step up. North Carolina seems to be right on the edge of being a solid program. The addition of Louisville will help as long as they keep winning, of course. Surprisingly, Pitt could develope into a pretty good team as well. Pitt and Syracuse should be joining the conference as early as next season, if I'm not mistaken. The ACC may look rough right now, but there is light at the end of the tunnel. Notre Dame is the other wild-card in all of this. Notre Dame will be partial members to the ACC here real soon, and I share the same theory that many others have. Notre Dame's football will join a conference within the next 5 seasons. And one thing is for sure, the ACC won't allow Notre Dame to be a member of another conference in football and still hold their partial membership to the ACC. It's not too far fetched.....Really it's not. The Academics line up with what the ACC stands for and the sports fit really well.

      So in the near future, the ACC needs Virginia Tech and Clemson to be in the top 15 consistently, Florida State and Notre Dame need to perform at a high level and be in the top 10 consistently, and Louisville needs to stay in the top 25. Will this solve all of their problems? No, but it will certainly help. The rest of the conference needs to start pulling their weight. Thanks again, Timothy, for your question.

 

       Don't forget you can send me your comments/questions to jeremy.cf2d@yahoo.com. Check us out on Facebook and give us a 'LIKE'. Check back later this week for more updates.