We’re near the end of October, which means rankings are going to become even more a part of our college football lives.
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We’re dismissive by nature. We see something that looks a bit off, we don’t give it a chance. We assume things, because taking time to figure it out would be an awful lot of work.
Take breakfast at Taco Bell. At first thought, a place named after tacos serving breakfast sounds like eating asphalt patch. Then, you try a waffle taco with sausage and holy heck, your world is changed.
Other times, you’re justified. You see a movie with Kevin James in it, and you know it’s a must-skip. Folks skipping have yet to be punished for making that assumption.
Last year, a little team named Ohio State lost its Heisman-contending quarterback before the season started. The Buckeyes started a redshirt freshman, went through the growing pains, and eventually saw him grow into his own version of a Heisman contender in only two months.
Then, at the witching hour of the regular season, he got hurt. Enter the third-stringer, some guy named Cardale Jones, and the rest is history. The CFB Playoff committee didn’t pay mind to the injuries when Ohio State came down to the cutting board along with probably (reasonably) five other teams hoping to play for all the marbles.
Baylor lost quarterback Seth Russell, as we (relative to those with their noses in college football) all know this past Saturday. He’s done for the season, and the Bears will turn to Jarrett Stidham, a true freshman, and back him up somehow with a wide receiver.
Absent the fact that Baylor is insane to use a receiver as a backup signal caller — considering its extensive selling points to potential quarterback recruits — one would hope those voting in the polls can look past the assumption of pure doom because Russell is gone.
Often times, injuries are the death knell we think they are. Georgia hasn’t recovered from Nick Chubb this year, for instance. Byron Marshall at Oregon comes immediately to mind as well.
Baylor has the mean streets of the schedule ahead. TCU looms. So does Oklahoma State. Both are unbeaten and prepping the bedroom for a visit from the Bears. Oklahoma is still around as well, for the most part, looking like a contender other than when Texas rises from the dead to pull the Sooners down in the grave.
Come to think of it, across the board, the Big 12 has a lot of title lurkers still hanging around like a fart in an enclosed space.
The committee has shown the ability to make good decisions regarding plastic things like injuries, where we project before we know rather than know and then project. Only in sports are we allowed to do those things.
The reality is that Stidham could be the second coming of Ken Dorsey and will find ways to never lose football games as a quarterback. The point is, we don’t know. Granted, we don’t know about Baylor to this point as it is. The Bears have tested themselves about as much as a lawnmower going over artificial turf.
That’s on Baylor, but eventually, water will find its level, and we’ll figure out who is wearing masks on Halloween, and who is just flat terrifying.
Situations like Ohio State last year are the exception for the most part, not the norm, especially so late in the season and in such big moments. Jones was and remains a special talent with an equally special mindset.
The point is, though, Stidham could be as well. Hell, anyone replacing anyone else could be. When Drew Bledsoe went down to a Mo Lewis hit and some unknown clean-shaven young fellow named Tom Brady stepped in, the Patriots were dead to rights.
The rest … well … you know the rest. Good thing the CFB Playoff committee seems to know, too.
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