THURSDAY

SEC DOMINATES COLLEGE WORLD SERIES

The SEC has left little doubt where the best baseball is played at the collegiate level. Florida and Kentucky made it to the finals and the championship game is now set with Tennessee playing Texas A&M. The SEC started a run in 2017 when Florida won the championship and were followed by LSU and Arkansas who were runner-up. Oregon State won the title in 2018, 2020 was not played due to COVID, but in 2019, 2021, 2022, and 2023 the titles were won by Vanderbilt, Miss. State, Ole Miss, and LSU. The SEC also had runner-up the last two years with Oklahoma and Florida.

The championship two of three series start Saturday night at 6pm and will continue at 1pm on Sunday. If a third game is needed, it will be played Monday at 6pm.

It did not take long for former TCU coach Jim Schlossnagle to turn Texas A&M into a national power. I will be pulling for him to complete the deal, but Tennessee appears to be the best team.

COLLEGE FOOTBALL TABLOIDS ARE HITTING THE STANDS

Lindy’s and Athlon Sports have made it to the stores as has Texas Football. Phil Steele’s football bible should be hitting the stores this week if they have not already in some markets.

 Athlon Sports released its 2024 preseason Top 25 rankings and have LSU at No. 11. Seven other SEC teams made their poll, including Georgia (1), Texas (4), Ole Miss (5), Alabama (6), Missouri (10), Tennessee (13) and Texas A&M (18).

Phil Steele digital is now available. The most accurate mag you can buy.

MCNEESE SOFTBALL ADDS FORMER BARBE STAR

#24 Nyjah Fontenot

OF | R-Fr. | 5-6 | L/R | Lake Charles, La. | Barbe HS

Nyjah was a softball All-American in 2021 when she led Barbe High School to the 5A state title. She signed with Arkansas, but redshirted due to injury.

WHO IS THE BEST PLAYCALLER IN THE SEC?

I am filling my column with national news because the news on FCS and the Southland Conference is not as available as the power houses. There are tons of SEC podcast on YouTube for the fanatical fan to follow so I have been watching as much as I can to be informed and to get a diverse range of opinions. I catch a lot of flak from LSU fans who disagree with these assessments, but they are aligned with only LSU homers such as Dandy Don, Matt Moscona, T-Bob Hebert, Jacob Hester, Shea Dixon, Jordy Cullotta, Sonny Shipp, Brody Miller, and Mike Scarborough; so, the news is slanted. I still have not learned that honey attracts more flies than poop, but it is in my DNA to see the forest even with trees.

There are some national podcasts that are more neutral like Greg McElroy and Josh Pate. In recent days, Josh and others in the Southeast USA have been giving their opinions on who are the best play callers in the SEC. Unfortunately, some are ranking coordinators by position without understanding that they are OC in name only. I am not buying that Nick Sheridan will be calling all of the Bama plays, Derrick Nix at Auburn, Charlie Weis at Ole Miss, or Kyle Flood at Texas. There are several podcasters who rank their SEC coordinators by position, but I have collected several opinions of neutral broadcasters and came up with a different list.

The SEC is two tiered when it comes to big name coordinators and in some ways it is unfair. The bottom three have been repeatedly listed as Tim Beck at Vanderbilt, Rob Sale at Florida, and the combo of Joe Sloan and Cortez Hankton at LSU. Bush Hamdan is in his first year at Kentucky and getting few votes as well, but we know Stoops is in charge. Rob gets a lot of criticism because offensive line coaches are not known for their creativity of the passing game, etc, but more in line with line them up and control the line of scrimmage football.

The LSU duo is in a bad spot because they follow the guy(Mike Denbrock) who was voted #1 OC last year and put the Tigers #1 in total offense and points per game in the nation. He put up huge numbers at Cincinnati before moving to Baton Rouge. Of course, he had the #1 quarterback in the country and the NFL’s #2 and #4 rated WR’s in all of college football. One of the reasons Notre Dame is in everyone’s Top 5 is them signing Mike Denbrock.

I know LSU fans are not worried and most podcasters are throwing around superlatives for Joe Sloan to be equal to Denbrock. Did I say that clicks to the podcasters site gets more money from sponsors, etc? Joe Sloan has been a play caller only once in his career and that was at Louisiana Tech. Sloan has been at LSU only two years and was at Tech for eight years with the final four being OC. He is 38 years old. Hankton has even less experience due to having a couple of years at Georgia as a WR coach and then at LSU the past two years as WR coach. Of course, Sloan is the QB coach and gets some credit for Daniels improvement and working with Nussmeier.

Oklahoma’s offense will be run by former UNT coach Seth Lattrell which is not exactly Lincoln Riley. However, OU put its money on the defensive staff and hiring Clemson DC Brent Venables.

Let’s cut to the chase. I have my “Tier One” play callers and it is a collection of what Rick Neuheisel says is the best in the country. At least three podcasters say that Texas has the best coaching staff in the country. Steve Sarkesian has the reputation as an excellent play caller and developer of quarterbacks. He is a top-notch recruiter as well. When the Manning family sets out to find the best landing spot for Arch, you have to figure they have done their homework. I have a lot of respect for Josh Heupel at Tennessee and so does several big-name DC’s in the SEC. The offense he put together at Central Florida is unheard of for that level of program.

It gets tricky after the top two because the podcasters rank OC’s instead of who is calling the plays. Give me Lane Kiffin to call my plays anytime of the week. I don’t care who the OC is, Lane is going to be calling the plays. Derrick Nix maybe the OC at Auburn, but Hugh Freeze can mix it up with the best of them. Freeze stayed one year at Arkansas State and went 8-0 in the Sun Belt and led the conference in offense. He turned Ole Miss around with his great offenses, and then got fired. He turned Liberty around and will turn Auburn around. The guy had a terrific game plan against Bama last year and had the game won before a brain fart by the safeties cost them the game.

Bobby Patrino has the reputation as a great play caller. Arkansas better turn it over to him or Sam Pittman and his staff will be out of work. The new guy at Texas A&M(Mike Elko) is a defensive minded coach, so he is not a top tier OC, but he hired Kansas State’s OC Collin Klien who does have a great reputation as a play caller.

In my opinion, this is your top tier play callers in the SEC. Not a bad list and they are all getting paid a ton of money to move the football.