rcade

Seth Littrell said fewer words with each season at UNT. His last press conference was just an anguished moan like the Nazi who drank the wrong grail in Indiana Jones.

Let the Joe Walkers gloat after their school loses a game. I'd rather roll with a new coach who might not work out than accept .500 football forever while getting stomped in big games and bottom-rung bowls.

Kinne only looks like the obvious better choice because of week 1. He has less experience than Morris. Kinne had one year as co-OC at Hawaii, one year as co-OC at UCF and one year as head coach at Incarnate Word carrying on what Morris started. Morris had three years as co-OC at Texas Tech, one year as OC at Washington State and four years as head coach at Incarnate Word. Both of them are gambles. When they were hired by their schools last December, the case for Kinne over Morris would have to be about intangibles like how schools felt about their plans and their charisma. It couldn't be about experience or Morris would be in San Marcos. These two dudes have so many things in common it's weird. How did the fate of Texas State and North Texas fall into the hands of two former Saskatchewan Roughriders?

He's new and enthusiastic, so I'm willing to grant Coach O a mulligan on what he said. But he's got this receipt business all wrong. Deion said "we keep receipts" after a historic win for his program. He didn't say it after losing by 37 points at home to a 6.5-point favorite that won four games last season. Did Coach O also yell "scoreboard" as he left the field at the end of Saturday's game? That would be just as misplaced as saying "we keep receipts."

It isn't perfect because the next coach might not be able to keep the train rolling. As someone who enjoys every UTSA loss, I'd rather see them roll the dice with a Traylor replacement than watch him continue to deny me joy. The dude can coach.

It's wild that after week 1 we're now wishing we had hired the second-to-last Incarnate Word coach instead of the third-to-last Incarnate Word coach.

This isn't YMCA football and the players aren't our kids. We don't have to keep things positive and bring them orange slices and Gatorade. Everybody here has proven we support our school win or lose. Or more accurately, win or lose and lose and lose again and lose so bad winning doesn't even seem possible. The coaches and players aren't proud of that performance. I'll show pride when there's something to be proud of.

I'm not reading too much into Morris over a first game loss, but I was expecting more than to be completely blown off the field. Cal was 4-8 last season and last had a winning season in 2019. They were only a 6.5-point favorite and won by 37.

You probably shouldn't mention Texas State when counseling patience. Their new coach G.J. Kinne beat a P5 as a 27.5-point underdog in his first game.

Littrell had 88 games to show what kind of coach he was -- average. Morris has had 1 game.

The ACC is desperate to stay above 14 teams. Maybe a terrible deal wasn't the best SMU could have reached.

I don't think programs as big as FSU and Clemson could be stuck for a decade in a conference they don't want to be in. It would leave too much of their fate to the actions of others.

SMU-Clemson may be as short lived a conference matchup as SMU-UNT. I've been spending a lot of time in Tallahassee and the talk about Clemson and FSU leaving is constant.

SMU money was big in the 1980s before the death penalty. There's a lot more money in college football today. Is SMU even capable of spending so much more than the big dogs that they catch up without TV revenue? Their collective got a lot of hype for the first deal to pay all the athletes, but today they're not in the top 20.

The problem with your analogy is that before SMU, joining a P5 conference wasn't like being in debt. It was like owning a bank. Former AAC member Cincinnati will be $300 million richer from media rights revenue when SMU starts getting paid in a decade.

SMU's ACC deal is a revenue sharing death penalty. If the point of the P5 is to rake in obscene TV revenue and spend it like one of the haves while the have-nots fall further behind into irrelevancy, SMU will be earning like a have-not until 2033. By that date all the P5 schools they see as equals will have spent $200 million to $300 million SMU didn't have. SMU has a talent for falling into deep holes that take decades to escape.

If all you want is to not be G5, you've achieved that. If you want to be seen as being worthy of a place in the P5, you've taken a deal so degrading no other P5 entrant has ever taken it before. UCF, Cincinnati, BYU and Houston are getting full Big 12 shares in 2025 expected to be $30 million a year. In 2025 you're getting nothing. The best you can hope for is that other schools follow the precedent SMU has set and lock in this new idea that some P5 schools get paid and others fill a seat -- like at the Oscars when a nobody comes in because an important person needs to pee.

Even after the nine years they don't get an equal share. It rises gradually over time after that. I think SMU fans are underestimating the reputational effect of agreeing to be the least worthy member of their conference. Being in the P5 means getting fed at TV rights time and they will be stuck at the kid's table for a long time.

SMU giving up $200 million or more in media rights money to join a conference is hilarious. That has to be a record. They're like a rich kid with no friends whose dad has to give every kid who attends his birthday party a present just to convince them to attend. And hire Lil Yachty to perform.

You have too much faith in SMU's ability to not suck over time.

Is there a place any more for "sensible" in college football? Every new development is crazier than the last. Deion has 86 new players including 53 incoming transfers at CU.

I just learned there's a Conference Realignment forum.

SMU fans come here to experience a P5-level message board.

The Safeway Bowl isn't a lose-lose when we're beating them. I still want to see us go to Not That Gerald Ford Stadium and put another slobber knocker on them like 43-6 in 2014.

The Atlantic Coast Conference has added Stanford, California and SMU and now has 18 members. https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/stanford-cal-smu-join-acc-conference-membership-growing-to-18-schools-as-latest-realignment-domino-falls/ To get the invite, SMU had to give up all ACC media rights money until 2033. This expansion couldn't happen when Clemson, Florida State, North Carolina and North Carolina State were all against it, but N.C. State flipped. The ACC has a clause in its current media rights deal that if it falls below 15 schools ESPN can renegotiate. Seven ACC schools have been exploring how to get out but they have the longest-running media deal in the P5. This will be the first time SMU is in a major conference since the Southwest Conference was murdered. But since this is college football, who knows if the ACC will still be around in a year? There might just be the 32-team SEC, 32-team Big 12 and 69-team Missouri Valley Conference.