Sorry for the no pregame, during and after updates yesterday. I’ll be kind in describing the idiotic layout for Lincoln Financial Field, BUT, I will complain about this little nugget….
If journalists use sites like WordPress, which I do to blog from their events, the Linc blocks access via their wireless or ethernet to those sites because of the NFL policy on blogging live during games.
The feeling is, and there is a lot of this starting in college football and basketball, if the league, team, whatever, is paying for the rites to broadcast a certain game, they don’t want people getting their information from anything other than the national television outlet.
That, and in the NFL’s case, it blocks fanboys from gaining access to blog from a game.
So, thus we have no live blog from the Linc yesterday, and it’s probably just as good since I would have done nothing but bitch and moan about how horrid the Philadelphia expressway/highway/parkway system is.
I sat over the Schuylkill River for nearly 90 minutes just waiting to pass a broken down car only to be told by a cop that we couldn’t take the exit we needed for media parking.
Getting to Lot K was a different ballgame, the cops in Philly cannot direct traffic to save their lives. They are AWFUL. The people in and around the Linc are used to 20,000 people for Temple, they got (supposedly) 69K yesterday, (note, there was FAR less than 69K….some probably missed the game entirely because they were stuck on 11th street).
I will never again complain for how PSU handles gameday traffic because the people at the Linc are the worst I’ve ever seen. Plan and simple. They suck.
BOWLING FOR DOLLARS
It’s pretty simple for Penn State. They have to win Saturday at Michigan State, or even the Motor City Bowl comes back into play.
The deal with New Years Day Bowls is this….a lot of us need the 26th as a travel date, so quietly inside, we’re pulling for the Outback Bowl.
BUT, there are SEC tie ins to the Outback and Cotton. The SEC West goes to the Cotton while the East goes to Tampa, meaning it’s likely Florida will land in the Outback Bowl, promising a sellout, but not the draw that an out-of-state team will bring. Most Florida fans may travel the day before or even day of the game to go, but Florida in the Outback is a total win-win for the bowl itself.
In regards to PSU, the deal is this, if Michigan loses (which I feel they will now, based on how focused tOSU will be), that puts them at four losses overall and sticks the Outback Bowl into a sticky situation, especially if PSU wins.
Will the Outback want a four-loss Michigan team, assuming that Illinois lands in the Capital One Bowl?? Will they take a four-loss Michigan team whose fans will be discouraged by a fifth straight loss to Ohio State, Lloyd Carr on his way out, the disappointment of a four loss season when they had dreams of a title?
The other problem, if Wisconsin and PSU both win, do they take PSU which they just had last year (and the outside chance that Tennessee lands there again in a rematch?)??
Wisconsin, despite record seems out of the mix if it comes down to PSU and the Badgers because PSU smashed them weeks ago.
It’s complicated, it’s hazy and it’s rather annoying to think of all the possibilities. The simplest plan? Hope a Michigan team wins, and that Ohio State doesn’t fall too far after the Illinois loss yesterday, AND, they don’t fall past No. 12 with a loss to Michigan, meaning the Big Ten could still sneak two into the BCS with a Wolverines win, and everyone bumps up a notch, all but assuring PSU they got to the Outback Bowl with Illinois in the Capital One.
Gotta wonder if the Cap One will throw dollars to get Florida, in Orlando, against former coach Ron Zook.
What a friggin mess.
