The Awesomeness of the ESPN-SEC Deal

Living on the East Coast, my thirst for SEC sports has been left unquenched for years. Unfortunately, I’ve been surrounded by the ACC, Big East, and other coverage of the Big 10 (11), and even Pac-10. Sure there have been options such as the ESPN Game Plan. However, jumping through hoops and having to pay money for easy access to the best conference in college sports seems a tad unjust.

In steps in the worldwide leader in sports, ESPN. Sure, the WWL has a monopolization on sports media coverage and uses that to push their own biased agenda. But there’s no getting around it, they are the best. ESPN gets the top talent, is a leader in media technology, and provides viewers with the essentials of sports analysis.

You can read the full press release from secsports.com, but here are some highlights:

Basketball

• ESPN and ESPN2 will TRIPLE their coverage. So, not just Super Tuesday, but also Thursday and Saturday games.
• More prominence for the SEC/Big East Challenge. (Remember how lame it was last year with only four games?)
• More coverage on ESPNU, ESPN360.com, ESPN Classic (vintage SEC games and instant classics!), and ABC, among the other ESPN outlets.
• SEC Tournament semifinals and finals nationally televised on ESPN/ABC.

Football

• ESPN will have the rights to every SEC home game.
• ESPN and ESPN2 will televise a minimum of 20 games during the season.
• Supplemental coverage on ESPNU, ESPN Classic, etc.

Other

• All SEC championship games except football will be aired on either ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN on ABC, ESPNU or ESPN Classic.
• ESPN and the SEC will work together to offer multi-sport packages (including football, men’s and women’s basketball, Olympic sports and conference championships).

Overall, I could not be more excited. The 15-year, $2.25 billion deal will be quite the economic boon for each member organization. Facilities will improve and recruiting against other conferences will get better, which will lead to trickle-down upgrades for academics.

The Sports Business Journal reports that the current $5.3 million doled out to each of the 12 SEC member schools from television rights could increase over 283% to $15 million per year. Just imagine what this would mean for a school such as Mississippi State, which currently operates with a $32 million athletic budget, the lowest in the conference.

So pop the cork on the champagne, it’s time for a celebration….the Southeastern Conference is coming to ESPN.

Countdown to 6:45 PM on Saturday

Why 6:45 pm (eastern)? Well, that’s when the Mississippi State Bulldogs open their 2008-2008 football season against the Louisiana Tech University Bulldogs in Ruston, Louisiana on ESPN2.

The August 30th meeting will mark the first time an SEC school has traveled to the northern Louisiana town since 1913. And as outlined in this Clarion-Ledger article, the college town of 20,000 plus is buzzing. Louisiana Tech athletic officials are hoping to break their 28,714 attendance record and have raised normal ticket prices from the range of $8-$22 to $40.

You can also check out the Clarion-Ledger for a game preview. The quick run down, La Tech’s offense will be decent (8 returning starters), but their defense will be far below par. This bodes well for a MSU Bulldog offense which has struggled in practice leading up to the season. Mississippi State’s defense should take care of business, even without all-SEC performer, Derek Pegues, who was suspended for the opener for not going to class.

Most betting sites have the Bulldogs favored by either 8 or 8.5 points with the over/under being set at 45.5.

My prediction: Mississippi State 34, Louisiana Tech 17

As far as season predictions: Rick Cleveland and Kyle Veazy, both of the Clarion-Ledger, each have Mississippi State going 7-5.  Gregg Ellis, of the NE Miss. Daily Journal, ups his outlook to 8-4.

Personally, I think 7-5 is a cake walk. I’m slightly pessimistic about eight wins…..because let’s be honest, this is Mississippi State Football….something will go wrong. Of course, I’m optimistic that Sylvester Croom has finally changed the culture. How much? Well, we will have a good read by late Saturday evening.

GO DAWGS!

MSU Bulldog Football On CBS?

Somehow CBS has accidentally leaked their SEC football broadcast schedule for this upcoming season….not sure why it must be a “leak” or an “accident” – CBS typically doesn’t announce the games they will televise until around 10 days before the match-up.

Nonetheless, Saturdays in the South seems to have stumbled onto something, and Deadspin is trying to confirm.

The Mississippi State Bulldogs only appear once on this supposedly tentative schedule….it’s the November 22nd date with Arkansas in Starkville. The caveat is that Ole Miss @ LSU and Tennessee @ Vanderbilt also appear as televised possibilities on the same date.

Right now, the Bulldogs only have three televised games on the schedule: the August 30 opener at Louisiana Tech (ESPN2) , the September 13 matchup versus Auburn in Starkville (ESPN2), and the November 28 finale against Ole Miss in Oxford (Raycom).

Let’s hope that Miss. State remains relevant up until that second to last game versus Arkansas. It’d be nice for Coach Croom and his Bulldogs to be broadcast into the living rooms of fans and potential recruits alike.

Chris Low Down and the Mississippi State Bulldogs

Chris Low, who writes ESPN.com’s SEC Blog, has been making his way around the South writing a series of features for conference member schools in anticipation of the upcoming football season.

On such feature was on DE Tim Bailey, who served an 18-month assignment with the National Guard, spending a year in Iraq, before suiting up for the Bulldogs. Hopefully Bailey’s perspective on life will rub off on his teammates.

“It was pretty rough over there,” Bailey said. “When you have bad days over here, they really don’t seem so bad.”

Bailey may be apart of an upcoming $450 million National Guard advertising campaign, the Clarion-Ledger has a piece on his photo shoot experience.

Running back Anthony Dixon left some things on the field last year, don’t expect the case to be the same this time around.

“Sometimes, I’m just out there running. I’m getting the ball and seeing the defense and looking to get bad angles or just run over people. This year, I’m reading the gaps better. It’s like Coach Croom said. I did leave some yards on the field last year by not reading the gap and seeing wide-open holes. I made 4 and 5 yards when I could have gotten 10 or 15.”

Of course, everyone knows that quarterback Wesley Carroll will be the key to potential success for the Bulldogs.

“One of the things we have to be careful about as he grows more confident is still not being a gambler,” Croom said. “We want him to get better with his throwing but also understand, as Clint Eastwood would say, that a man’s got to know his limitations.

Low also kicks it with Bulldog Coach Sylvester Croom with a two-part discussion, click the links below to check them out.

• Kicking it with Sylvester Croom, Part 1
• Kicking it with Sylvester Croom, Part 2

Mississippi State Bulldog Football Overtime

No, this post will not cover the history of Bulldog football over time, rather, the overtime history of Bulldog football.

SECFootballBlogger.com recently posted a YouTube video of the top 5 SEC overtime games of all time. Here’s the list [which looks to be compiled by SECTV, not SECFootballBlogger]:

5. Tennessee vs. LSU 2005
4. Arkansas vs. Ole Miss 2001
3. Georgia vs. Auburn 1996
2. Arkansas vs. Kentucky 2003
1. LSU vs. Kentucky 2007

Which naturally got me wondering about the Bulldogs and overtime. In case you don’t know, the OT rule for the NCAA was implemented in 1996. A list of all NCAA OT games since has been compiled by Dr. Peter A. Rosen and is posted here.

Here are the games in which Mississippi State has been involved:

• Nov. 23, 1996 – Starkville – MSU 13 – Arkansas 16
• Oct. 21, 2000 – Baton Rouge – MSU 38 – LSU 45
  (I was at this game, quite the trip.)
• Nov. 18, 2000 – Starkville – MSU 10 – Arkansas 17
• Dec. 31, 2000 – Independence Bowl – MSU 43 – Texas A&M 41
  (The Snow Bowl!)
• Sept. 23, 2006 – Birmingham – MSU 16 – UAB 10

2-3 in all OT games.
0-3 in SEC OT games.
1-3 in regular season OT games.
1- 0 in bowl OT games.

And that’s the history, over time.

On another note, Chris Low (SEC Football Blogger on ESPN.com) puts the Bulldogs at #9 in his SEC Power Rankings, he says:

The first four games are critical for the Bulldogs. They have to find a way to come out of those four at least 3-1. It remains to be seen if Mississippi State has enough offensive playmakers to match last season’s success.

I’d love to be more optimistic, but I think the Dawgs will go 2-2 during the opening four game stretch. Hopefully, Coach Croom’s team will take care of, but not underestimate, Louisiana Tech and Southeastern Louisiana in the first two games. Auburn will be a big test in game three, but at least it’s at home. The wildcard is the game at Georgia Tech on September 20th.

In the USA Today Preseason Coaches Poll, the Bulldogs get six votes among the “others” (essentially ranking MSU 41st in the nation) while Georgia Tech receives two (ranked #50). Even though the matchup is in Atlanta, I suspect the Bulldog faithful will have a strong presence in the ATL. Combine that with general lack of support for the Yellow Jackets makes me revert from my prediction, feeling that 3-1 in the first four games in highly attainable.

GO DAWGS!!

What Vegas Has To Say About MSU Bulldog Football

The over/under on win totals for 48 DI college football teams have been posted over at Vegas Watch. The o/u for Sylvester Croom’s Mississippi State Bulldog football squad has been set at seven games, and Vegas doesn’t like the odds for the Bulldogs to cover the over. Not to condone gambling, but the numbers out of Sin City always serve as an interesting predictor for upcoming seasons.

The money lines for the Bulldogs winning more than seven games is +155 and the under is -175. Of the eight other schools listed as having seven set as their o/u (Iowa, Maryland, Michigan State, Nebraska, Notre Dame, Pittsburgh, Purdue, and Texas A&M), only Mississippi State and Purdue are underdogs to achieve the over. The Boilermakers are less of a dog at +120.

The true value on MSU Bulldog wins is 6.48…..so, 6-6 gets you to a bowl game, but does it keep Bulldog fans satisfied?

Looking at the true value of other SEC schools, here’s where the Bulldogs rank:

1. Florida – 10.14
2. Georgia – 9.36
3. Auburn – 9.19
4. LSU – 8.95
5. Tennessee – 8.10
6. South Carolina – 7.74
   
7. Alabama – 7.52
   
8. Miss. State – 6.48
   
9. Arkansas – 5.74
10. Ole Miss – 5.50
11. Vanderbilt – 3.10
12. Kentucky is not listed

Personally, after glancing at the schedule, I like the chances of at least a 7-5 season. One could hope for no let downs against either Louisiana Tech, Southeastern Louisiana, or Middle Tennessee. 3 wins. The Bulldogs pull off Ws against each of the teams below them on the totem pole above, all except for Ole Miss are home games. 7 wins. And on top of that, Georgia Tech (true value of 5.81) and Alabama are both beatable, albeit, those two games are on the road.

In any case, I’m almost optimistic enough to book a flight to Vegas. Go Dawgs!