The Auburn/Alabama rivalry is a bitter one that I love being a part of, but at times think becomes a little ridiculous. Things that have been done over the past couple of years have simply taken the enoyment and sportsmanship away from the rivalry. For instance, before the 2010 Iron Bowl in Tuscaloosa, Auburn fans taped a Cam Newton jersey on the statue of Paul "BEAR" Bryant outside their stadium.
I found this quite humorous myself, but Alabama fans, of course, went ballistic and one of their redneck, back woods fans decided to poison the Toomer's Corner trees that have been there for hundreds of years and serve as an icon of sorts at Auburn. Traditionally, Auburn fans roll the Toomer's trees with toilet paper after a win. I was at Auburn for four years and have been going to games with my father all of my life, but I had never rolled the trees until this year after the Florida game. I threw one roll up into the tree and was terrified even the feather weight of the toilet paper was going to snap the tree in two. I know it sounds like a silly tradition, but it's our tradition and that's all that matters.
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| Toomer's Corner after the 2011 BCS National Championship |
Moving on to the game. So, what a crap show that was. The LSU players looked as though they weren't even there. You could see in their faces that they had no clue what was going on around them. They are a talented team so there's no one to blame but the coaches in my opinion. I don't care for Nick Saban (aka, the robot), but he prepared the Alabama team and it showed. Les, on the other hand, did no such thing.
He really is. If you watch his interviews he will take some of the worst situations and talk around them in such a way that they don't seem so bad. Magic. There are, of course, things that could have been done before this game to more readily prepare for Alabama. I don't know what was going on back in Baton Rouge over the break because they were severely unequipped to handle what the Bams brought to the table. Alabama finished the game with 21 first downs to LSU's measly 5, they had 150 rushing and 234 passing yards compared to LSU's 39 and 53 yards respectively. Insanity! I mean, I had a bad feeling that Alabama was going to pull out a win, but I definitely didn't think that it would be the first shut-out in BCS history. So freakin' lucky.
Gross, AJ. Just gross. How did you go to St. Paul's? Speaking of quarterbacks, that's another mistake Leslie made in the beginning of the game. Once he saw that Jefferson wasn't getting the job done, he should have replaced him with Jarrett Lee, in my opinion. Instead, he waited until it was too far gone and Jefferson was in such a twitt that he actually threw a shovel pass that landed softly in the hands of an Alabama linebacker. When asked why he didn't put Lee in for at least a part of the second half, Leslie replied, "I felt like it would be unfair to him with the pass rush he would sustain late in the game." In other words, it wouldn't have made a difference. < Conversational wizard. The Alabama coaches knew exactly what to do to take advantage of LSU's strong secondary. They threw on the first down as much as they could to keep the Honeybadger and their other defensive back on the outside where they were less of a threat.
With Marquis Maze out of the game with a leg injury and crying on the sideline, AJ had to play the game sans his best receiver. Of course there's a very lengthy article on ESPN's website that is totally dedicated to praising him. Maybe I'm wrong, but I feel like most of the media attention Cam got even after being acquitted by the NCAA for all infractions and winning the title was laced with negative statements putting him down, especially on ESPN. AJ only completed three more passes than Cam during our game last year, but Cam threw for more yards AND got two touchdowns. He did only run for 64 yards in our game, which was well below his average. It doesn't matter. Alabama can have those idiot brown nosers over at ESPN.
The Alabama kickers should feel a little better about not losing their lives seeing as how they scored all but six of the points on the board. I seriously throught they were going to have to be kept on suicide watch after the regular season game against LSU. Bams don't play. In this game, they still managed to miss two though. I'm no football player, but I just don't get how you can miss that many field goals in one game. You're the kicker. That's all you do. There are even rules that state that no one is allowed to touch you on the field. I feel the same way about guards shooting free throws in a basketball game. Besides layups, all you do is shoot from the outside. A free throw shouldn't be a problem unless you're this man...
Did anyone else see the SNL skit last Saturday when Charles Barkley was hosting where Keenan Thompson played Sir Charles and Sir Charles played Shaq? Hilarious.
So yeah, to sum up, I'm really bummed about having to listen to a bunch of Bams talk about how their team could beat a team of angels with Jesus as the quarterback for the next 364 days. They are ridiculous and delusional. And if you're thinking of asking me why I wouldn't pull for another team from my home state, don't. Alabama fans ask me this all the time knowing good and well they feel the same way when Auburn is playing. I was raised to hate Alabama and never pull for them. Ever. I don't feel bad about it and frankly, I like it that way.
Cam says Happy Hump Day and War Eagle!
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