Big week and I can’t imagine there being more going on…

Blackout, Munson’s retirement, ESPN Gameday in town for the 1st time in 10 years…oh, and a classic SEC battle between two top 10 teams, jus the 9th top 10 showdown in Sanford history.  I fully expect a really, really raucous crowd for this one.  I can’t imagine the emotion in that place when Munson’s voice comes over the speakers in pre-game…goosebumps I say.

I haven’t heard yet where Gameday is going to set up and my guess would be Reid quad just because it’s close to the stadium and I’m pretty sure it’s a family friendly zone, meaning no one uses it.  Given the inability to use Tate due to construciton, my personal choice would be to put the stage just south of the intersection of Sanford and Baldwin.  You could still have the stadium in the background and the crowd couls spill down Baldwin as well as go up the hill towards North Campus.  The only problem with that spot is it couldn’t be set up prior to Friday afternoon due to bus traffic.  The nice thing is it wouldn’t limit traffic on game day as Baldwin is mostly closed already and there are still ways around that intersection on foot.  It would present some really cool aerial shots as well.  Anyway, just my thoughts.

• Yes, Bama’s coach did say that we were wearing black because we were going to a funeral.  He just doesn’t know who’s it is.  To his credit, it was said at practice and I’m sure our guys say stuff like that all the time.  Probably the reason we close practices.
• AJ Harmon’s move to OL was probably eventual, but it would’ve been nice if it had happened as soon as he arrived.  If he had started out there, he would likely have been in the playing rotation by now.  Excellent move for down the road.
• You knew it was coming eventually but Munson’s announcement still hits hard.  The way he phased himself out makes this easier but I wish his last called game had been something more significant than Central Michigan.  Somehow just doesn’t seem right.

Just sharing some thoughts…random, as always.

First off, I suppose I’ll stay away from offhand nicknames for a while. Yesterday I referred to AJ Green as Shaft due to his apparent general bad-assedness (shut yo mouth). Well, then Isaac Hayes dies. I wield incredible powers apparently. I’ll be more careful in the future.

I tried watching part of the Falcons preseason game against the Jaguars Saturday but was derailed by a few things. 1) preseason NFL is near the bottom of the barrel when it comes to watchable sporting events. 2) I knew I wasn’t in the right frame of mind when I realized I was surprised to hear that our coach’s name was Mike Smith…quite possibly the lowest profile NFL hiring ever. 3) I’ve seen public access TV shows with better production quality…not only was it non-HD, it was grainy, rabbit ears style bad…not to mention the screen said NBC but it was on Fox (sign of the apocalypse?). In the end I tried to watch but just couldn’t and ended up watching some of the Olympics. I will admit I was a bit intrigued to watch Matt Ryan.

Speaking of the Olympics, I got sucked in this weekend. First off, I spent a lot more time actually in the house this weekend (trying to finish a bathroom remodel) so I kept catching different snipits here and there. At different times I watched water polo, synchronized diving, rowing, beach volleyball and swimming among other barely watchable events. With the complete atrocity that is the Braves’ season it’s obvious I’ve got a gaping hole in my sports watching life right now. I need football in a bad way (and not preseason NFL…that’s like going to a football game and leaving after warm-ups).

Great weather this weekend. It did nothing for my football jones though. My dad pointed out that there was absolutely zero chance of it being this nice in Sanford for the opener. He’s right. It’s a near certainty that it will be a scorcher. Especially with a 12:30 kickoff.

Urban Meyer versus Nick Saban. Who has the bigger ego? If you need to kill time between now and football, this is a great way to pass it with your friends. It’s like the chicken/egg thing because I don’t think there’s an answer.

I guess since I’ve started this thing, I’ll go ahead and use it to start compiling my preseason writeup. I’ll go ahead and (purely speculating here) do a position group each day starting on Monday evening and go through the middle of next week or so. Then I’ll compile the individual breakdowns into one document which will be the kickoff writeup. Probably a good way to tune up for the season.