CBS Sports: Noles May Live Up To Hype

Don't know how many of you saw this on Saturday, but Bruce Feldman had some pretty high praise for FSU QB EJ Manuel. In this article for CBS sports says why FSU may live up to preseason hype. All FSU fans, including myself would love it if Manuel came through and led FSU back to the promised land. I highly recommend reading the article and will pull some highlights out here.

Apparently, EJ Manuel has improved in how he has transferred his weight and even Manuel noticed the difference. EJ also thinks he can complete 70% of his passes. He hit on 65% of passes last year. Feldman called Manuel "one of the most impressive college players you'd ever meet. He has a presence about him where you come away convinced that he'd be a success at whatever he attempted." That is pretty high praise from Feldman. Nice to know that the Seminoles possess players like this.

Manuel thinks he will be much improved and has put in a lot of hard work this offseason. He says that we will be impressed with Kelvin Benjamin. Finally, he says that the D-Line is "gonna be Kuh-RAZY!"

Get excited Noles fans! It's gonna be a good year, I can feel it!

-Noland

My Pick for the Heisman

I promised myself I wouldn't write about anything negative today. No more Penn State, no more Greg Reid and apparently no Baltimore Orioles. However, I will say that I am psyched to have Nick Markakis back and he had an awesome game. I will also say that I sure hope Jason Hammel is ok, because the Orioles need him.

Therefore, I wanted to bring your attention to the next great NFL QB. Matt Barkley of the USC Trojans is a blog favorite. He could very well be leading USC to a national title. Barkley also is a good Christian man. Cbssports talked about Barkley last night in an article that I highly recommend.

The article talked about the similarities between Barkley, Peyton Manning, and Andrew Luck. It talks about how he passed up the draft an why. One of the reasons he passed up the draft was to get a Heisman trophy. My early prediction is that Barkley will in fact win the Heisman. I think it is pretty likely that he pulls it off. If USC does go undefeated, then he will certainly pull off the Heisman.

I won't give away too much more, I just wanted to say that you should check out the article. You should also check out Barkley's I Am Second video. The guy is a class act and as I said earlier the next Heisman winner.

-Noland

Barron Statement On Possible Big 12 Move

Since I have been talking about the possible move of FSU to the Big 12, I thought it would be good to include Eric Barron's statement on the issue. The statement is below and Barron provides very good reasons against the move. I like that it will be a well thought out move. There is also an article out that says they should take the Hokies with if they move.

"I want to assure you that any decision made about FSU athletics will be reasoned and thoughtful and based on athletics, finances and academics. Allow me to provide you with some of the issues we are facing:

In support of a move are four basic factors argued by many alumni:

1. The ACC is more basketball than it is football, and many of our alumni view us as more football oriented than the ACC
2. The ACC is too North Carolina centric and the contract advantages basketball and hence advantages the North Carolina schools
3. The Big 12 has some big football schools that match up with FSU
4. The Big 12 contract (which actually isn't signed yet) is rumored to be $2.9M more per year than the ACC contract. We need this money to be competitive.

But, in contrast:

1. The information presented about the ACC contract that initiated the blogosphere discussion was not correct. The ACC is an equal share conference and this applies to football and to basketball ­ there is no preferential treatment of any university with the exception of 3rd tier rights for women's basketball and Olympic sports. FSU is advantaged by that aspect of the contract over the majority of other ACC schools.
2. Colorado, Missouri, Nebraska and Texas A&M left the Big 12, at least in part because the Big 12 is not an equal share conference. Texas has considerably more resource avenues and gains a larger share (and I say this as a former dean of the University of Texas at Austin - I watched the Big 12 disintegration with interest). So, when fans realize that Texas would get more dollars than FSU, always having a competitive advantage, it would be interesting to see the fan reaction.
3. Much is being made of the extra $2.9M that the Big 12 contract (which hasn't been inked yet) gets over the ACC contract. Given that the Texas schools are expected to play each other (the Big 12 is at least as Texas centered than the ACC is North Carolina centered), the most likely scenario has FSU playing Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa State, and West Virginia on a recurring basis and the other teams sporadically (and one more unnamed team has to join to allow the Big 12 to regain a championship game), we realize that our sports teams can no longer travel by bus to most games ­ the estimate is that the travel by plane required by FSU to be in the Big 12 appears to exceed the $2.9M difference in the contract ­actually giving us fewer dollars than we have now to be competitive with the Big 12 teams, who obviously do not have to travel as far. Any renegotiated amount depends not just on FSU but the caliber of any other new team to the Big 12.
4. Few believe that the above teams will fill our stadium with fans of these teams and so our lack of sales and ticket revenue would continue.
5. We would lose the rivalry with University of Miami that does fill our stadium
6. It will cost between $20M and $25M to leave the ACC ­ we have no idea where that money would come from. It would have to come from the Boosters which currently are unable to support our current University athletic budget, hence the 2% cut in that budget.
7. The faculty are adamantly opposed to joining a league that is academically weaker ­ and in fact, many of them resent the fact that a 2% ($2.4M) deficit in the athletics budget receives so much attention from concerned Seminoles, but the loss of 25% of the academic budget (105M) gets none when it is the most critical concern of this University in terms
of its successful future.

I present these issues to you so that you realize that this is not so simple (not to mention that negotiations aren't even taking place). One of the few wise comments made in the blogosphere is that no one negotiates their future in the media. We can't afford to have conference affiliation be governed by emotion ­ it has to be based on a careful assessment of
athletics, finances and academics. I assure you that every aspect of conference affiliation will be looked at by this institution, but it must be a reasoned decision.

Eric Barron
President"