BTW, Godzilla Comes To The Swamp Saturday. Just In Case Nobody In Alabama Notices.
"I do believe maybe somebody should send those ‘Bama folks new road map and make sure they aren’t mixing up their destinations. This week’s game is not in Miami, nor against the Hurricanes. So happy motoring."
Get the women and children off the streets! Godzilla is coming to The Swamp, pillaging, and plundering everything in its path from Tuscaloosa to Gainesville. It must be Godzilla, because otherwise how could Dan Mullen’s No. 10/11 ranked team be more than a two-touchdown underdog to another SEC team in its own stadium? Have the once mighty Gators lost their advantage on their home turf and been suddenly reduced to the Washington Generals on Meadowlark Lemon’s outdoor court?
This is downright embarrassing! Especially since Florida was only a 16-point underdog in the 2020 SEC Championship Game on the neutral turf of Mercedes Benz Stadium. And the Gators lost by just six points, 52-46, in the Tide’s most tightly contested game of the year. Remember? One of Alabama’s greatest defenses was gashed for 462 yards by the Gators, 408 of it by Air Trask.
I’m trying to do the calculus. (Hey, who am I kidding? I couldn’t even do algebra.)
Even the geeks are noodling the math. One of them ran a computer model of Alabama’s 2020 team vs. Alabama’s 2021 team and he said the 2020 Tide was better than the 2021 version by 11 ½ points. So exactly how could all those numbers add up to Florida being a 15-point home underdog?
Perhaps that casts a different light on Saturday’s game between the two teams which have won more SEC titles and national titles than all the rest combined. Perhaps not. Up in Alabama, according to one media report, this is just another weekend excursion for Nick Saban. Silly me, I was thinking it was maybe one of the biggest games ever played in Ben Hill Griffin Stadium on Steve Spurrier-Florida Field.
Now I don’t intend to extrapolate that as exhibit No. 1 on how Florida can beat Alabama Saturday.
Speaking of which, I was a little surprised to hear John Talty of AL.com, one of the most respected media outlets that covers Nick Saban’s team, say last week that there was “no buzz” in his state about this game and that his readership pretty much felt like if ‘Bama rolled the footballs out on the field they could win and go home to focus on big games like Ole Miss and Texas A&M.
Sounded like Alabama Arrogance and “Rat Poison” to me. So I found myself going on Paul Finebaum’s Show to address the incredulity of such a statement. And later texting with John Talty. It was a friendly convo and I was not attempting to discredit Mr. Talty. In fact I could not even dispute his column saying Florida’s chances would be better if Anthony Richardson started and played most of the game. I just thought his readership was guilty of disrespecting what has been a worthy opponent over the years.
I do believe maybe somebody should send those ‘Bama folks new road map and make sure they aren’t mixing up their destinations. This week’s game is not in Miami, nor against the Hurricanes. So happy motoring.
It was Steve Spurrier who may or may not have said the Crimson Tide wouldn’t make it to The Swamp because “they can’t read the road signs,” and we know everything on the Internet is true. But if he didn’t say it, he should have. The Internet loves almost every one of his quotes and when I read that, it sounded very much in character for the Head Ball Coach.
Sort of like the one about Auburn on the alleged fire at the Auburn library that destroyed 20 books: “The real tragedy was that 15 hadn’t been colored yet.”
It’s tough to find anything funny about Godzilla. This will mark the 89th time that the Crimson Tide has played as the No. 1 team under Nick Saban, who is 81-8 in those games.
Alabama, you see, hasn’t been a long-time rival for Florida and vice-versa. Easy to see why Florida wouldn’t be on the Crimson Tide’s Rivalry Radar. After winning seven straight and Dan Mullen being 0-10. vs. Saban, no wonder fans might take this one for granted.
Saban is doing his best to pump up his squad, fearing Rat Poison. And his scouting report reflects concern for Mullen’s offense.
“I think both quarterbacks have played extremely well for them,” he said. “Emory Jones is a very capable guy. He’s a good runner, he’s a good passer. Both are very athletic. Anthony Richardson has made some phenomenal plays when he’s played running and passing. He’s a big, strong running back-type guy when he does carry the ball, and they’ve got some really good quarterback runs to feature that talent. But he’s also showed a lot of poise and presence in the passing game. So I think both guys are unique in their ability to play the position, and both have been very productive when they’ve had opportunities to play.”
Was that Saban’s Rat Poison for Mullen?
The guy who was 3-1 against Saban does think his Gators have a real shot.
It’s important to remember that back when Godzilla was just a gleam in his daddy’s eye, the HBC was feasting on some Tide meat. But to his point: “If you want to change, you’d better find a way to beat Alabama.” What I’m hearing out of Alabama: No chance!
“I’ll tell you what’s sort of interesting,” Spurrier said, reflecting his previous campaigns. “When I was hired here in 1990, at the press conference I was talking about how we had to try and keep up with FSU and Miami. They were in the Top Five in the country every year back then. We didn’t really talk about Alabama and Georgia at first.
“Then I got to talking about Georgia, since they were the thorn in our side – ‘We’ve got to beat Georgia if we’re ever going to win the SEC.’ As it turned out, we had to beat Alabama once they started the championship games.”
In fact, he did just that. In the first seven years Spurrier’s teams won the SEC six times. “And we had to beat Alabama five of the six times to do it.” Ironically, his first SEC game as Gator coach was at Alabama, “and somehow we eked out the win, 17-13.”
“Eked out” is a good phrase. That would be more than enough for Gator fans, who unlike the entitled, sleep-walking Alabama fans, feel fired up. They will show up and make themselves known, seen and heard Saturday in what used to be one of the SEC’s most hostile environments. Hey, even the Washington Generals beat Godzilla once.
Comments