Week 7: MotSaG B1G Pick ‘em and Tidbits

By: Phil Schoch, Twitter me @osuphil95

Each week in this spot, we look at college football’s point spreads and match-ups and predict each B1G game as well as a few national spotlight games.

WOW! What a week! Not my humdrum picks or the uneventful action Saturday, but the drunkenness, firings, failings, voodoo PED use, retirement and the absurdity of Bert that unfolded Monday in the aftermath of the Week 6 action.

As more and more details of deposed Southern Cal coach Steve Sarkisian’s alcohol fueled antics have come to light, a few things have become quite obvious. First, USC athletic director Pat Hayden and his hiring crew did a shabby job of looking into Sarkisian’s past escapades at Washington. Second, Coach Sark couldn’t coach his way out of the bottle. Drunk at a game!? Drunk in team meetings? Too drunk to conduct practice? This guy needs serious help.

BIG GAME BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! (Imagine that Texas is the tiger)

Gainesville residents thought they had been freed. New Gator football coach, Jim McElwain, had the antidote to reverse the voodoo curse Urban Meyer had turned loose on the Gator program five years ago. But Lo! Gator fans! You shan’t underestimate the mystic powers of Urban Frank Meyer! Meyer shape-shifted into a spandex-clad, Gold’s Gym bench press ultra-grunting, parking lot pharmacist. He lured  Gator QB, Will Grier, into his 1983 IROC-Z and filled him with PED-tainted candy. Gator officials are working to re-name the Meyer Era at Florida as “The Time between Zook and Muschamp.” The curse continues.

Steve Spurrier never met a one-liner he wouldn’t use to zing a rival. When a fire in an Auburn football dorm destroyed property, including twenty books, Spurrier needled, “But the real tragedy was that 15 hadn’t been colored yet.” Over the past few years, Spurrier also never met a golf cart he couldn’t coach from. Apparently the floodwaters in South Carolina were too deep for effective golf cart coaching and instant retirement became a necessity. College football folks will miss the Head Ball Coach’s one-liners, but his on-field product at South Carolina never measured up to his great Florida teams. He thought he had a shot a few years back, but couldn’t get past the big boys.  Lee Corso was right when he predicted in 2005 that Spurrier would never win an SEC title (even if he coached there for 400 years).

Bret Bielema is the drunken lout hitting on your recently widowed aunt at your family reunion. He’s the balls-to-the-wall jerk in full uniform at the office co-rec softball game who takes out Marge from Accounting as she pivots at second base trying to turn-two. He’s the red-faced, foul-mouthed, know-it-all blowhard at every sports bar and tailgate. He has tickets right next to you at every game you will ever attend. His scent is crotch-sweat, mildewed clothes, Axe and stink bug extract. In real life, Bert is a meathead football coach who baits opponents, flops like a Uraguayan footballer to draw a penalty, then dances a celebratory Pig Sooie jig. He is the worst! And that is why we need/want him back as the B1G villain. #bertforillini

Oh yeah, there were some games last week.

Week 6 saw Pick ‘em & Tidbits level-out with a 5-5 mark versus the spread and 7-3 straight up. For the first time this season, my PM Stukenborg Fearless Prediction (Northwestern over M) did not cover as the Wildcats got boot-stomped by Michigan. After six weeks, I am 39-44 (47%) against the spread and 63-20 (76%) straight up. Not too bad.

Disclaimer: Warning! Do not try this at home! Your spouse might find out.

Around the B1G… (My word count is up, so short and sweet)

Saturday, October 17

Who is undefeated and who got shellacked by Michigan?

Pick ’em says… Iowa, 18-13.

Why was Purdue grad and first man to walk on the moon, Neil Armstrong, so quiet and out of the spotlight after his astronaut career? Because he knew the truth about extraterrestrials and the government made him keep silent.

Pick ’em says… Pick Wisconsinbly, 27-13.

The Boss vs Tito Jackson.

Pick ’em says… Same as last week for Indiana, if Sudfeld and Howard can effectively play, Indiana wins. If not, Rutgers wins.

Prediction: Lot’s of glowering. 

Pick ’em says… Too many injuries for Sparty. Cook HAS to make big plays. Is there such-a-thing as “program momentum?” We’ll see. Michigan, 23-17.

Oh Nebraska. I bet you wish you still had Old Bo to kick around. At least then you’d be kicking around a coach who won 71% of his games when he was ranting and raving up and down your sidelines.

Pick ’em says… It’s Dilly Bar Dan time! Gophers, 20-16.

I hate matte helmets. The helmet shouldn’t be black too. Get off my lawn! Bah!

Pick ’em says… Impostor uniforms, 45-13.

I wish they both could lose. I remember the good ol’ days when I could watch this game and root for a tie. Bah!

Pick ’em says… Eggplant Head, 24-17.

From 1966 – 2012, legendary Minster (Ohio) resident, Paul ‘P.M.’ Stukenborg (pictured above) posted his weekly sports predictions in the hometown paper, The Community Post. Each week, Pick ’em will make a P.M. Stukenborg Fearless Prediction and call for an underdog to to knock off the favorite.

Pick ’em says… Wishful thinking perhaps, but I would love to watch the 12th Man celebrate to the Aggie War Hymn while Nick Saban sulks. Gig ’em! 34-31.

COME ON JACKETS! 0-3? OUTWORKED BY THE SABRES? BAH!