Blog

The "offseason" is here

ShoelessCU — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 06:40:00 +0000

So, it’s been awhile since I posted anything so I guess I’ll break the streak. There’s really nothing new to touch on. Everything else has been beaten to death by every source.

We’re a decent basketball team and we’ll probably make the tourney (hopefully).

The Confederate flag still flies on the State house grounds and people have mixed opinions of this issue.

Recruiting is going terribly and then it’s going great! Rankings were changed and they don’t matter then they were changed again and they matter!

What’s my take on all of this?

Let’s start with basketball. Everyone is on the bandwagon… and it’s still rolling strong. Now I don’t think anyone expects us to win it all or even an ACC title but making the Tournament really is an accomplishment for our guys and really gives us all some hope for the future. Maybe one day we’ll be where we want to be consistently and it seems like we are on the right path towards this with Coach P as our leader. For now we’ll just keep chugging along.

The Confederate flag issue. I never get into this argument so I’ll just let everyone else complain or give history lessons for me. How’s that sound?

Recruiting… I don’t really care to follow recruiting and hopefully I never will but I think people need to chill out when it comes to recruits. I mean… if someone comes or doesn’t it’s not the end of the world or a reason to celebrate. And rankings mean jack! Gaines Adams, Ko Simpson, Charlie Whitehurst, Roscoe Crosby and Demetrius Summers can tell you all about those rankings. 3 are in the NFL and were 3 stars or lower 2 aren’t and were 5 star guys. The ratings might be a slight barometer for some, but for God’s sake let them play a little before you crown them the next coming or crucify them as crap.

Ok, I’ve offered enough opinions for one day… now down to the bizness!

Videos in the off-season… Today I am releasing another Basketball Highlight video and there should still be 2 more coming. Along with that… I have a year-in-review video from the 2006 football season to be released on Feb 7th and then there should be 1 video every two weeks until the middle of July. Then, I’ll start a top 50-play count down to begin the new season.

The videos that I have planned to make right now are 2 more bballs, 1 year-in-review, tributes to Gaines, Chansi, Reggie M, (and probably more tributes as well) another random football video, and hopefully a baseball video.

One last thing… check out www.clemsonfootballdvd.com and get your self a DVD of last season! The more they sell the better chance that you’ll get more in the future!!! If we sell enough next season will be one of the coolest things you could ask for! I’m telling you, we’ll be able to show you stuff that no one else in the country can offer! PERIOD! Everything that we are doing is for the greater good. Clemson will be on the forefront of progress, I’ll have a job, and all the proceeds will go to The Boy’s Home of the South and you’ll get to see all sorts of cool stuff everyday!! But we won’t be able to get it done unless you help us out! Please buy a copy, I don’t want to have to beg :-) You can get a copy online or at any Spinx location.

Shoeless takes a trip to Raliegh for the Basketball game

ShoelessCU — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 05:36:00 +0000

I had a good time at the game. The team looks impressive and if teams will stop hitting threes to keep it close late, we could run away with a few games... Until then we're gonna have to learn to hit free throws (lol yea right).

Anyway, I took my grandfather (who lives in Raliegh) to the game and he had a good time; so, regardless of the outcome it was a fun trip and winning just added to it.

The stadium is nice and about twice the capacity of Littlejohn. It reminded me a lot of the new Bobcat arena in Charlotte except the fans seem to care more even though the game was decided early. One thing I will comment on is the fact that if you went to the RBC center when there wasn't a game being played, you'd think it was only a hockey arena. All the hockey banners are near the score board while the NCSU bball banners are tucked away into the corners. Also, one of the loudest cheers of the night came when they showed the Carolina Huricane's score on the board. One more thing I noticed was that there were surprisingly few students there. This is probably b/c of how far the stadium is from campus but it was disappointing none-the-less.

The fans around me were nice until late in the game when one group turned into sore losers telling me "only fruits wear orange", I just smiled and laughed. Besides that one group everyone else was friendly and not like the norm for State.

Sorry I wasn't around to post videos from the game but if we can get a win on Saturday I'll try and have a full video before the UNC game next week :-)

Here is a link to all my pictures from my perspective all the way up in the nose bleed section. There are 34 pictures in all and one panoramic shot.

Click for all the pictures

You'll notice in a few pics around about the 4 min mark in the 2nd half the stadium was emptying out. Also, with about 2 mins left... the place was nearly empty.

Shoeless Bowl Recap (long), 95 Pictures, & 3 Videos

ShoelessCU — Wed, 03 Jan 2007 13:22:00 +0000

This was supposed to be a different blog but I guess I’ll make do with what I’ve got…

If you don’t want to read it all just click HERE to see all of the 95 pictures and there are 3 videos on this post… the main one is at the bottom.

This post was actually supposed to be posted Monday… and it was supposed to be a post that included a recap and pictures from my trip to Nashville… Then Tuesday was supposed to be a 3 min long video from the bowl. Then the day after that was supposed to be a Shoeless Highlight video from the Bowl victory. Then the next day was supposed to be a video from inside the locker-room of the post game victory speech, then finally the last day was supposed to be a final video of some extras of the post game interviews etc. You see all that? That’s what I was going to give everyone this week if we had won… *sigh*

Instead I’ll just bring you a recap of the bowl, the pictures and one video today.

Recap: First of all let me inform you guys of something… For the bowl game I got a sideline pass to film the game. This was the first time I’ve ever done anything like this and I wasn’t going to tell anyone about it b/c I figured it would be a much better surprise when I got to share with everyone all the things I got to experience first hand. This didn’t exactly work out but you at least know where all these clips and pictures are coming from…

I drove to Nashville on Thursday before the Bowl. I got there around 2 PM (Nashville time) and checked into the hotel. I stayed at the Alexis Inn and Suites about 5 miles from the stadium. Besides the fact that my room was right in front of the elevator and that you could hear every intimate detail of everything within 3 rooms our or paper thin walls… it wasn’t a bad place. It seemed to have more Clemson people than Kentucky people there as well. I met a handful of Clemson people and, as always, that was a treat!

I proceeded to downtown around 6PM and headed to the “strip” which was PACKED full of Clemson and Kentucky fans. In the downtown area it was tough to tell how many fans each school brought but you could sense that Kentucky had a few more (we found out later how many more). After making a couple of rounds I made my way to Buffalo Billiards where I watched the Clemson UGA basketball game on every TV in the joint. That place was solid Orange except for the 10 or so Kentucky band members who walked through near the end of the game. C-L-E-M in cadence count was performed every 2 mins or so and it was a neat experience to watch Clemson basketball with so many fans so far away from Clemson.

I was hungry so I left downtown soon after the game b/c there were 2-3 hour waits everywhere! I also had to get up early the next day to get my sideline pass and didn’t want to be hung-over or tired in the process. So I got myself a bite to eat and called it a night. It was pretty difficult sleeping in general with all the things going on in my mind but I managed to get about 3-4 hours.

I left the hotel after breakfast around 9AM and I shared a cab to the stadium. When I got there I crossed the pedestrian bridge and snapped a few shots of the stadium and downtown.

The place was already buzzing and I needed to find the media will-call window. After doing a complete circle of the stadium thanks to bad directions by a police officer and the “information window”… I made it around to the media will-call window and got my sideline passes. I didn’t really want to wait around so I headed into the stadium and after a thorough investigation of my camera bag and prostate exam (j/k) I headed down into the stadium. There wasn’t really much to see and nothing photo worthy but if you want to know what it looked like… imagine cement walls, no decorations and open pipes in a hallway with doors every 20-50 feet labeled with computer paper. The only thing really separating the teams was distance. There was however a small carpeted and roped off section that guided the teams from their locker rooms towards the field.

I immediately headed to the Clemson sideline…

Now, I don’t know if you have ever walked out onto a field from the tunnel without visiting the stadium before, but I can say that I have now. Having never played college or professional football (stupid sports agent screwed me)… this was my first time. It was quite a different experience and I hope I get to experience it again. I proceeded to get my camera set up and take some snap shots of the field etc.

Soon thereafter the players started coming out onto the field in groups… I got videos of all of this but here are some pictures.

Time almost seemed to fly by as we counted down to kickoff. I got a little bit of flyover and the best view of the team running out of the tunnel. We made our way to the sidelines and got a good spot next to the team and I got to meet Crump :-) Then I moved over to the endzone and filmed the game from there as I had a better view with less people getting in the way.

The game went along as it did and I got some great angles of plays that came right to me… (including the INT Proctor threw in the endzone) check out my perception of that play... Not too shabby for a first timer huh?

At halftime I turned my focus to more important things like the Tennessee Titan Cheerleaders and Stacey Dale Shuman on the sideline. I made sure to try and get as many pictures as I could for you guys cause I know how perverted and proud we all are :-) .

The 3rd qt started up and the game... well, you know how that went. I will say one thing though; being on the field, you can hear the fans differently. I will say that Kentucky easily had us out numbered 4-1 but when we were being loud we sounded about the same. That says a lot about our fans. Another observation I will make about Kentucky fans is that they were more concerned with basketball than Football. I talked to about 10-15 different groups of Kentucky people in the 2.5 days I was there and EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM asked about our basketball team or who we had playing in the NBA etc… It was quite surprising to them when I wanted to talk football.

But I digress… the game ended and this is where I'd like to express some things that I witnessed. I followed the team into the tunnel and towards the locker room (I wasn’t allowed in after the loss but if we had won I would have probably gotten in). The coaches, players and staff were silent. Heads were down and it seemed like a beaten team. There was no bickering or fussing or blaming just disappointment. If you could have seen the way they looked when they entered that locker room maybe you’d understand how stupid you sound when you post negatives about the players or coaches.

Will Proctor was holding back tears as he answered the press’ questions. If anyone doubts his emotion towards the team and program they are morons. He might not have been the best QB we’ve ever had but save your opinions of him personally until you are face-to-face with him. Have you ever read nothing but negative things about yourself everywhere you look? He has… and maybe that’s why he’s defensive and standoffish at times.

Another thing I wish the boards could do that the players do is leave it on the field. For the first time in my life after a loss I left the stadium without wanting to just explode. Those players give it their all but once the game is over they can’t really do anything about it anymore so they move forward. Maybe it was being around them after the game or maybe it was actually being on the field for the game… I don’t know what it was but when I left the stadium I had a different perspective. I’ve never been one to vent on a message board; but, right now, the only thing I want to complain about is all the jackasses on the board who think they know everything. Seriously… Shut the #### up! If you have a problem write a letter or even better… make a phone call (864) 656-2115. That’s IPTAY’s number, give them a ring, they’ll connect you to the party of your choosing otherwise shut up.

I got to experience one of the coolest things of my life. Something that, even if I never get another chance to, I’ll never forget. I wanted to share everything I saw, I wanted to show you these pictures and give you multiple long videos but instead I will just show you the few that are on this post.

Here is a video of the Rally cats, cheerleaders, band and fans at the bowl game performing Tiger Rag.

Video is approx 27 mb and 2 mins 47 secs long.

One last thing we need help with the Clemson football DVD! If you want Clemson to take another step forward, buy this DVD! Next season you might get as many as 5 videos a week, EVERY week, if we can sell enough of these DVDs!! But we have to prove to Clemson that it is worth it! And I’m not talking about 5 stupid videos either, I’m talking behind the scenes stuff that you would NEVER see otherwise. Remember the all-access show they did on ESPN a couple years ago before the NCSU game? Imagine getting that everyday!! Plus, ALL proceeds go to the Boys home of the South so you are doing a good thing in the process! I hope you’ll help out or there might not be videos like this for a while.

Get behind your Tigers!

Shoeless looks at the BCS vs a Playoff System in D1 Footbal

ShoelessCU — Tue, 05 Dec 2006 14:54:00 +0000

Let me breakdown one of the most highly discussed topics in all of sports, especially during this time of year-- The BCS vs. the playoff system in College Div 1-A football.

First of all, College D-1 football is the ONLY level of sports that doesn’t have a playoff. Pee-wee league up to Pro football does it, pee-wee basketball all the way up to the highest level, volleyball, softball, soccer, baseball, … get my point yet? EVERY OTHER SPORT DOES IT! Even football, it’s only College and it’s ONLY Div-1… and guess what? It’s the only one people argue about needing to be changed.

Now a lot of people want a playoff system and if you don’t please keep reading b/c I’ll show you how it should be done to please EVERYONE.

Let’s start with the negatives… pretty much the main two reasons why people don’t want a playoff system or pretty much think it won’t happen are: 1. The bowls and 2. It’ll lead to too many games a year.

Here’s a simple yet perfect way to fix this without really changing or adding anything.

1st thing they need to do is eliminate the 12th game. Now, before you start running your mouth about all money that it brings in etc, hear me out. About half the teams playing in D-1 make a bowl thanks to the only needing 6 wins rule so most teams will get the extra game anyway. With a playoff system they’ll need that extra game just incase they make the playoffs.

2nd thing… why does everyone think that adding a playoff system would mean scraping the bowls? I don’t get it. You keep the bowls… all of them!

3rd thing… add a 12-team playoff. Why 12 teams? Do it just like the NFL playoff system minus the home field. 4 teams get bye weeks and for the most part that would only mean 4 games (at the most) to decide a winner. Why 12 teams? Well, you’ll need to take these 6 as automatic bids and 10 won’t be enough and 16 will be too much… esp when you look at the amount of bye weeks teams get and championship games some conferences have.

So the 1st 6 teams are decided the same as the BCS…The ACC, SEC, Big 10, Big 12, Big East and Pac-10 Champions get and automatic bid… there’s half your teams right there.

So your 1st 6 teams (but not necessarily your bye teams) would be:

Ohio St (Big 10)
So Cal (Pac 10)
Florida (SEC)
Louisville (Big East)
Oklahoma (Big 12)
Wake Forest (ACC)

With Florida, Wake Forest, Oklahoma getting and automatic bye for playing (and winning) in the Conference title game and Ohio St earning the final bye bid. Note: The reason for the bye is for consistency of length of schedule with the conference championship adding an extra game for the 3 teams.

The 2nd 6 teams will be at large bids, using this year as an example… the next six teams would be:

Michigan
LSU
Notre Dame
Boise St.
with Wisconsin & Virginia Tech claiming the last bids (VT gets the final bid over Auburn and Arkansas bc of the way they finished the season).

Now here’s how the bracket will look with the bowl games included so that people will get the best of both worlds.

These bowls would stay the same with no changes what so ever…

Credit Union Poinsettia
Las Vegas
New Orleans Bowl
Papajohns.com Bowl
New Mexico
Armed Forces
Hawaii
Motor City
Emerald
Independence
Holiday
Texas
Music City
Brut Sun
AutoZone Liberty
Insight
Champs Sports
MPC Computers
International
GMAC

These bowls would make up the playoff system and in what order…

2 weeks after the conference Championships:
Alamo
Peach
Outback
Cotton

1 week later:
Gator
Capitol One
Rose
Fiesta

1 week later:
Sugar
Orange

1 week later (the same date as this year’s National Title game): The National title game would be played in one of the alternating “BCS bowls”… This year it would be played in Glendale, Arizona

This year’s bracket would look like this:

If you think about it… if you drop the 12th game you really aren’t adding anything-special… just 1 game.

Ex: Ohio St will play 13 games this year. In this system they would play 14. That’s only one extra game to decide the “true” champion.

WF, Florida and Oklahoma play 14 games this year (including bowls) they would play 15 if they made to the title game in this system.

The ONLY speculation anyone would say about having a playoff would be who is the 12th team every year. Wisconsin and Virginia Tech were picked in my system but Auburn and Arkansas also would be considered this season. But isn’t having to pick between three or four 2-3 loss teams that a much better of a problem than having to pick between three and four 1 loss teams for one game? I think so.

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week is:

Clemson basketball will start to make some noise!

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

I went 10-6 this past week picking the other games, making my overall record 308-110.

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8
Week 4: 25-3
Week 5: 23-5
Week 6: 18-9
Week 7: 22-9
Week 8: 22-5
Week 9: 19-7
Week 10: 18-8
Week 11: 16-6
Week 12: 36-19
Week 13: 27-17
Week 14: 10-6

Overall: 308-110 Clemson: 9-4

No football games to predict this week so I’ll take a break.

One play NEVER decides the outcome

ShoelessCU — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 15:18:00 +0000

I hate being right. I really do. I said FGs and not TDs would lose us the game and was pretty much dead on. I was referring to all FGs in a defensive struggle but what it boiled down to was attempting 1 FG to try and tie a game instead of scoring 1 TD to win it late.

Oh well, I was right about another thing too… the blind squirrel! HA!

Gotta give credit to USC though. They played a good game. They got the “W” and it was one for the ages even if the wrong team (to me at least) won.

This next segment is brought to you buy the makers of “get-over-it deodorant” reminding you: “Bitterness smells bad no matter how you wear it”…

This segment is for any of the Clemson fans blaming Jad Dean, USC fans still complaining about the “Push-off” or any other school’s fans that have ever complained about “one play costing us the game” in any sport-- EVER!

Football is a team sport played over (most of the time) 80+ plays. NO ONE PLAY EVER WINS OR LOSES A GAME PERIOD!! EVER!!

You can always look at one play before or after that play and place just as much blame on it if you do that way even if it seemed meaningless at the time. You are always ONE PLAY away from turning a game. That’s why they call football a game of inches. Same with baseball or soccer or basketball or tennis or golf or any other sport… You make your own destiny with hard work and effort. Sometimes you work hard enough to get that extra push on the line, or extra inch vertical jump or the extra first down or the free throw or base hit, and sometimes you don’t. You play until it’s over and you try your best. If you don’t succeed you work harder and get them next time. If there isn’t a next time you just have to move on. You don’t complain and moan about officials or one player “screwing it up”.

Bill Buckner lived a pretty shitty life thanks to fans like these along with 100s of other scapegoats in the past. Unfortunately, there are idiots still out there making scapegoats of new people after every close game.

If you want to play a game the requires one play to win or lose… play Russian Roulette.

That’s one where you win or lose with one play. Not football. Not one kick or one bad call or one missed onside kick call or one “no call”. There is no conspiracy and if you saw the way certain refs and players were treated b/c of the “one plays” you’d probably stop complaining, but maybe I’m giving you too much credit. If you believe otherwise you are a moron and I hope you’ll play Russian Roulette before you start breeding.

Now, before you bring up my posting videos of the bad-calls from the BC game or the Ron Cherry punt spot from the NCSU game those didn’t cost us the game and I NEVER said or implied they did. Of course they didn’t cost us the NCSU game b/c we WON that one. Yes, the calls were bad, but we had plenty of other chances to win the BC game even with those calls and I, in now way, think that any poor officiating ALONE cost us any games… Hell, have you ever seen any of my posts or videos before? I’m always taking a satirical look at things and those videos were merely to humor others and until I see a ref, on the first play of a game, call…

“Holding on Clemson. Penalty results in change of possession and automatic Touchdown, game over, wins”

I’ll continue to believe that the refs didn’t cost us (or anyone) a game.

The same holds true for any one football or baseball player who doesn’t pull a Bugs Bunny and play all 11 positions at once for football and 9 for baseball, 5 for basketball etc etc etc.

Please stop blaming “one person” or “one play” for outcomes of games and maybe I’ll be able to enjoy my tall glass of STFU and stop complaining!

I’m done.

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week is:

No game to predict for Clemson but I predict the meltdown will continue unless Clemson basketball stays undefeated! Please prove me wrong people and stop the complaining!

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

As I predicted Clemson lost. That makes my final Clemson predicition record… 9-4.
Note: I noticed that I was a game off after including my “bye week victory” and checked to see that I forgot to add the GT prediction to my record so I end the regular season at 9-4 almost the same record as our Tigers but with better coaching.

I also went 27-17 this past week picking the other games, making my overall record 298-104. Finally cracking 100 losses but almost surpassing 300 wins not too shabby.

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8
Week 4: 25-3
Week 5: 23-5
Week 6: 18-9
Week 7: 22-9
Week 8: 22-5
Week 9: 19-7
Week 10: 18-8
Week 11: 16-6
Week 12: 36-19
Week 13: 27-17

Overall: 298-104 Clemson: 9-4

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games and I’m picking them all is I did last week:

Central Michigan 21 Ohio 17
Southern Miss 10 Houston 17
UConn 0 Louisville 30
Wake Forest 34 GT 23
Army 10 Navy 3
Stanford 10 California 34
La Tech 10 New Mexico St 32
Air Force 10 TCU 24
Frenso St 29 San Jose St 20
USC 50 UCLA 32
LA Monroe 10 LA Lafayette 17
Arkansas 35 Florida 10
Troy 30 Florida Intl. 0
Rutgers 30 WVU 28
Nebraska 15 Oklahoma 24
Colorado St 0 San Diego St 14
Oregon St 55 Hawaii 63

Shoeless Fearless prediction for USC game

ShoelessCU — Wed, 22 Nov 2006 18:59:00 +0000

Alrighty. Another week another Shoeless blog that nobody will read!! Woo!!

Well, maybe not this week b/c this is the big week you know.

This is the week that everyone within the borders of NC, GA and the Atlantic has waited for.

This is the week where one of either Clemson or USC prophetically announces “wait until next year”.

This is the week!

So let’s see. A couple of weeks ago Clemson looked like a team that couldn’t be beaten, a team that would not only contend for the ACC title but maybe even the National-- well… we blew that opportunity but there’s still a lot to gain in this season.

I had the privilege of helping interview some players and coaches on Tuesday, for the www.clemsonfootballdvd.com project (shameless plug), and one thing that stuck out to me was a Gaines Adams comment. When asked about the success of this season, he said that we are still only two games away from being 8-5.

That really hit me hard knowing how we started and what this means to these kids. 10-3 would be acceptable and the “new goal”; but 8-5 would not be a successful season and these guys know it.

You could also tell that the week off was much needed. I’m not really sure if it’ll help us enough to get back to our old ways (pre VT) but you never know. Hopefully the rest will get Davis, the OL and our Def back to 100% and ready.

If I had to pick the winner of this game and put $1,000 on it, I’d put the money on USC. I hate to say it, I don’t want them to win but here’s the way I look at it, if Clemson did lose… hey, at least I won $1,000 right?

Now to the prediction… I am not confident in a Tiger win. I would dare to say I think we are going to lose. Bye week or not, I don’t know if Spence will change his play calling enough to get it done this time. I don’t think we can expect to win if we have to rely on a big play from our defense every game. They are ranked in the top 10 nationally in 5 categories defensively and ranked in the top 20 in 1 one other. The only category on defense we are not in the top 20 or better in is Turnover margin... and that’s b/c the defense doesn’t really have complete control over that one.

Need a reminder of before the season turned… vs. FSU, GT and WF we had bad predictable play calling.. .we won but you can thank James Davis, Gaines Adams, CJ Spiller, and even Proctor (FSU) for those games not masterful play calling. However over the last 3 weeks the big plays have disappeared right.. oh yea except for the one CJ Spiller run vs. NCSU. Hmmm noticing a trend. As the big play goes, so do we.

Here’s the breakdown.

Our Defense is stout! Probably the best Clemson has had in 15+ years top to bottom and this is with 2 decimating injuries before the 2nd game. If you want to blame any game all year on the Defense you Sir/Ma’am, are a moron.

What’s that mean? It’ll come down to offense and the way we are coached it’ll probably mean more stress and gray hairs for most fans. If we get the big plays on offense and maybe one on defense we could very easily win in a romp. If we don’t it’ll be another 13-9 type of battle.

Will the week off help?

Will a “set” of Christmas “balls” be hung on a certain coach after Thanksgiving giving us a different offense?

It is completely up in the air this year. Nobody knows nothing. I ain’t got a clue and hopefully I will be wrong with my pessimism and the Tigers will make like the War Eagles and get the one for the thumb… but I just don’t see it happening.

Hey you know what they say about blind squirrels.

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week is:

Clemson 9 South Carolina 10 much like the Maryland game, FGS not TDs do us in.

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

As I predicted Clemson dominated the Bye week. I went 36-19 this past week making my overall record 271-87. I picked a few less games this week but still stayed close to my average on the year.

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8
Week 4: 25-3
Week 5: 23-5
Week 6: 18-9
Week 7: 22-9
Week 8: 22-5
Week 9: 19-7
Week 10: 18-8
Week 11: 16-6
Week 12: 36-19

Overall: 271-87 Clemson: 7-4 (yes I’m included a win over the bye week b/c this is my blog!!)

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games and I’m picking them all is I did last week:

BC 20 Miami 10
Northern Ill 40 East Mich 17
Kent St 20 Ball St 7
Ohio 45 Miami (OH) 10
Texas A&M 24 Texas 30
Cent. Mich. 12 Buffalo 0
LSU 10 Arkansas 42
Tulane 17 Tulsa 34
Oregon 30 Oregon St 32
W. Mich 10 Akron 12
Colorado 0 Nebraska 24
Air Force 45 UNLV 3
Fresno St 17 La Tech 10
Kansas 17 Missouri 21
Virginia 0 VT 23
Florida 31 FSU 32
North Carolina 3 Duke 0
South Florida 0 WVU 34
Syracuse 0 Rutgers 40
Cincy 12 UConn 3
UAB 13 UCF 17
Kentucky 0 Tennessee 22
Miss St 0 Miss 34
Oklahoma 34 Ok St 13
San Diego St 11 New Mexico 13
SMU 21 Rice 24
New Mexico St 0 Utah St 7
Louisville 43 Pitts 23
BYU 30 Utah 31
GT 32 UGA 23
Troy 18 MTSU 30
Boise St 40 Nevada 32
Ark St 14 LA Lafayette 13
San Jose St 15 Idaho 31
Arizona St 0 Arizona 17
TCU 34 Colorado St 31
North Texas 13 LA Monroe 3
Fl Intl 0 FAU 33
East Carolina 17 NCSU 13
Marshall 30 Southern Miss 44
Wake Forest 13 Maryland 12
Notre Dame 10 USC 23
Memphis 34 Utep 45
Purdue 50 Hawaii 65

A new week a new complaint

ShoelessCU — Wed, 15 Nov 2006 11:45:00 +0000

The “Blame Game”, will not be seen this week as-- we won. This doesn’t mean life is grand and all the problems are fixed though. I (like the Def Lineman of NCSU) telegraphed the screen pass to the left the led to a pick 6 as well as over 50 other offensive plays from the game. Very few did I miss but I’ll put that on the back burner b/c CJ Spiller and Chansi Stuckey are beasts!!

In other news… we got another #### ##### ######## ## ### # ###### ######### ###### NOON GAME! I am not pleased. I will be there, as always, but that doesn’t change the fact that I hate Noon games!! Want to know why? Well, I’m gonna tell you anyway.

1st of all, I live in Charlotte. It takes me about 2 to 2 and a half hours to get to Clemson depending on traffic weather etc. Not too long right? Well, for noon games I have to leave at 6:30AM to beat traffic. Now some of you might say “so what, I leave at 5” well let me give you a cookie b/c I don’t!! and I don’t want to!!!

The funny thing is, 6:30 is only about an hour difference from any other time I would leave. I am usually on the road no later than 8AM for any game whether it be 3:30PM or 7:45PM.

The reason why I’m upset is that I love seeing people and Clemson and tailgating and all the great things that make Clemson on game-day… well…. Great!

Now you might say, “why not just do it after the game”. Well let me remind you of what I do… I make videos. That means if we win, I have work to do. If we lose I don’t have to get home immediately, but who the hell wants to be social and polite after we lose? Certainly not me… it’s a lose/lose situation for me with noon games. For 3:30, and later, games I don’t have to worry about the video b/c I won’t be getting home until late anyway so that becomes a non-factor and guess what… I get 3 and a half hours MORE time to socialize and enjoy a town that I (among 10 of thousands others) miss and don’t get to see that often.

Another reason is obvious…

I give you exhibit A: The Maryland Game 2006: The crowd was flat, the crowd was weak the crowd was STILL ASLEEP!! Its funny how everyone seems to say “the crowd was decent… for a noon game” do we ever say this about night games? Nope, don’t need to b/c they don’t suck!

Exhibit B: GT Game 2006: One of the best atmospheres I’ve ever seen before a game. Sure you can say it was ESPN’s Gameday that brought out the people but the stadium was 95% full 25 mins before the game started! We didn’t even get 95% full for the whole game vs Maryland! If you need proof, just take a look at my pictures from both games on photobucket.

Exhibit C: UGA 2003: Sorry to bring this up, but can you remember a worse game you have ever attended at the valley? Played when? Oh yea… NOON!!

Exhibit D: FSU 2003: You think we would have won the game if it was played at noon? How would we have known there was a lunar eclipse and the planets had aligned? Do you think Radio would have run down the hill at noon? I doubt it! Radio told me himself that he hates noon games and would have refused… ok I made that last part up I don’t know Radio.

Exhibit E: USC 2004: I love how people like to pretend this is the exception for noon games. Well let me ask you what was so great about this game? The score? Maybe but it was a boring game, the crowd (minus the opening kickoff) was bored… at least until the fight!! Oh yea, remember that? Think there would have been a fight had we played at night? Heck no!! Lou would have been asleep before the start of the 4th quarter and both teams would have been ready to kick back and relax instead of putting up fists!!

Exhibit F: USC 2000: Probably the greatest Clemson USC game played in the valley. The whole game was tight and came down to a handful of controversial calls and a game winning FG. What time was the game played? NOT AT NOON!

If you need more I can spout out game after game for hours! But I don’t need to. The students don’t like noon games, the players don’t like noon games, most of the fans don’t like noon games but TDP doesn’t care about these people, he cares about $$ and a few old farts who think the noon games are “better”. Kiss my non-loving noon games rump.

Ok I’m vented. You can say what you want and I don’t really care. I will be there and will cheer like I ALWAYS do. Hopefully, other people will get there early and do the same unlike they seem to do at EVERY OTHER NOON GAME!!

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week is:

Clemson will absolutely murder the bye week! Have you looked at the stats? The Bye week ranks last in every category!!

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

I went 16-6 this past week making my overall record 235-68. I picked a few less games this week but still stayed close to my average on the year.

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8
Week 4: 25-3
Week 5: 23-5
Week 6: 18-9
Week 7: 22-9
Week 8: 22-5
Week 9: 19-7
Week 10: 18-8
Week 11: 16-6

Overall: 235-68 Clemson: 6-4

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games and I’m picking them all this time!:

Miami (OH) 20 Bowling Green 14
Akron 20 Ohio 10
West Virginia 45 Pittsburg 20
Eastern Mich 10 Kent St. 7
Cent Mich 10 Northern Illinois 34
Miami 24 Virginia 10
NCSU 25 UNC 10
Maryland 17 Boston College 21
Buffalo 0 Wisconsin 31
UConn 10 Syracuse 21
Western Carolina 3 Florida 35
Michigan St 13 Penn St 22
Iowa 10 Minnesota 26
Indiana 10 Purdue 28
Oklahoma 34 Baylor 10
Middle Tenn St 10 South Carolina 38
Temple 10 Navy 39
Tennessee 42 Vandy 17
La Monroe 10 Kentucky 39
Illinois 10 Northwestern 34
Duke 10 Georgia Tech 30
Oklahoma St 40 Texas Tech 45
W Michigan 10 Florida St 30
UCF 30 Tulane 28
Houston 20 Memphis 10
Missouri 10 Iowa St 24
Arkansas 45 Mississippi St 10
Army 0 Notre Dame 31
Utah St 0 Boise St 32
Tulsa 10 SMU 13
East Carolina 10 Rice 0
Oregon St 25 Stanford 20
Arizona 21 Oregon 20
Kansas St 34 Kansas 0
Auburn 24 Alabama 21
Michigan 20 Ohio St 19
Wyoming 10 UNLV 12
San Diego St 10 TCU 23
New Mexico 10 BYU 45
UTEP 10 Marshall 14
Idaho 10 Fresno St 33
LA Lafayette 10 Florida Intl 17
Washington 10 Washington St 13
Florida Atlantic 9 North Texas 14
Virginia Tech 19 Wake Forest 20
Arkansas St 10 Troy 24
South Florida 10 Louisville 42
Utah 10 Air Force 33
Rutgers 50 Cincy 10
California 24 USC 21
Nevada 10 La Tech 30
UAB 10 Southern Miss 39
Mississippi 10 LSU 40
UCLA 10 Arizona St 30
San Jose St 30 Hawaii 45

Welcome to Week 2 of the blame game!!

ShoelessCU — Wed, 08 Nov 2006 02:57:00 +0000

Welcome to Week 2 of the blame game!! (cheesy music plays)

Let’s meet our contestants…

Will Proctor, 6’2” 205 lbs Quarterback of the Clemson Offense who’s got the looks and the charm to sweep every lady off her feet this side of Miami but can he throw a pass?

Rob Spence, Clemson’s offensive coordinator. This second year coach from Toledo is commonly referred to as the Rush Limbaugh of play calling!

Poor Tackling, this herpes of a nuisance reared its ugly head again and seems to be making a come back bigger than JayZ!

And finally…

Last week’s winner, Shoeless

So, just incase you missed last week… here’s how the game works… everyone gets a chance to explain why they were to blame for the loss, and the winner takes the blame.

But before we start let’s hear a word from our Sponsor…

Alcoholics anonymous… who remind us that insanity is defined as repeating the same actions over and over, yet expect a different result.

We’ll check back with them later in the program.

Back to the show…

Proctor, we’ll let you go first…

“Thanks John! Well let me be the first to point out that this week I completed 18 of 25 passes on Saturday for 251 yards and no interceptions! I also made big plays of 25, 60 and 71 yards to Stuckey and TE Hunter. Can’t blame me this week… nope… just can’t do it… nuh uh.”

Thanks Will! How about your take Coach Spence!

“Well, first off I’d like to give credit to Jesus for being our lord and savior through him all things are possible!”

(silence)

and what about your take on the game?

“Well, this week we had more success throwing the football but still can’t figure out why we aren’t getting the ball in the end zone. Oh wait I’ve got an idea! I’ll put Reggie in the game and people will start chanting his name and then they’ll think we are running it, but I’ll pass instead! That’s brilliant! Oh and another wrinkle might be… I’ll put in the 4th string white guy and when the defense is thinking… who’s that? What’s the scouting report… BOOM! I’ll run it up the middle! Genius!! (evil laugh)”

Thanks coach! Glad to see you were willing to go out on a limb and try something different! Now let’s check in with Poor tackling…

“Can’t blame me this week John. We did our job”

You’re right got me there you can be excused!

and finally let’s check in with Shoeless…

“Well, something isn’t right. I came to the game this week. I started a new streak. I wore my lucky shirt, shoes, hat… everything! I washed my truck and got to the stadium early. I cheered my ass off until I was hoarse, I clapped until my hands hurt. I didn’t boo our players or team… I did everything I possibly could! I don’t know if I can take the blame for this one.”

Thanks Shoeless, now let’s go to the judges to see who are winner is…

Wait a min… Shoeless we have good news for you… as it turned out our judges reviewed the tape and decided to take away your blame from last week! You weren’t at fault and you can give back your shame.

“Wow! Thanks! That’s a huge relief!”

(cheesy suspenseful music plays)…

And our winner is…

Coach Spence!

Why blame coach Spence? Well it’s easy. I don’t like to blame players EVER! Coaches get paid (too much) to make the plays and also take the blame. Why blame it on a kid who’s playing for tuition instead of a guy who gets paid to play a game? But, I digress… why blame Spence? It’s easy. I’m not expert, or coach or film-surgeon... nope, just a fan. a guy who watches football, A LOT! Now if I can pick up on tendencies... chances are, an expert, a guy who gets paid to notice things, a coach will too.

This is the problem right now…

And before you get your panties in a wad let me say that I’m not jumping ship or going to be selling my season tickets or any of that non-sense. I’m just venting and guess what … its Tuesday! Not Saturday afternoon or Sunday. I’ve had 3 FULL NIGHTS to sleep on this and I STILL feel this way.

Let’s take a trip back down memory lane… I’ll skip the Woody years b/c that’s too easy… but in 2002 I noticed it a little and in early 2003 was the true beginning of it.

There I was.. a dude sitting in the stands, noticing a trend. I could call our plays on offense before the ball was snapped 80-90% of the time. Every formation I'd call a run or pass and to whom it would go. It was like a game inside the game… I win!

The peak was vs WF in 03… God that was painful. But then…the next week we changed. Everything changed! Play calling changed, they lined up the 1st drive vs. FSU and I thought to myself "Dear Lord, here we go again!" and I called what I saw and they DIDN’T do it. I watched for a good quarter and didn't get one call right!! I fell back to earth and became a fan. The next 4 games were a whirlwind! I was a fan living it up on top of the world. My expectations for the off-season were sky high...

2004: WF. THE FIRST GAME OF THE SEASON!! We had a whole off-season to prepare. We changed offensive coordinators and we were sitting pretty with a top 15 ranking. The first game of the season was an afternoon game in the valley poised for greatness... What happened? They did it again. They came out and ran the offense that I had seen before. When they lined up, I said... "please don't do what I think you are going to do…" and they did. We won the game but I had a bad feeling about it. After the season I was right back to where I was in the middle of the ‘03 season.

Sure, we had some bright spots, won some games, and I tried to stay optimistic, but it didn’t feel right. I didn’t feel like just a fan. Then we made some changes!! I was ecstatic!

2005: New offensive coordinator. This guy is different. This guy is a "genius". This guy will get it done. With this guy, I won't know what’s coming. They were right for 2 games. A&M & Maryland we did enough to win and we actually made adjustments where I didn't really know what was going to happen. Even on the TD pass vs. MD to Baham I said, crap another bubble... YEESSS!! Great wrinkle in a play we had run for 2 weeks without change.

As the season pressed on... the play calling stayed the same, by the SC game I knew 80-90% of the plays before the ball was snapped, thankfully we now had James Davis and some leadership at QB and WR that made it less noticeable.

Sometimes you don't have to be fancy to win, but sometimes you do.

So here we are, 10 games into the 2006 season. What has changed? not much. I would like to say that I didn't know what was coming until the last 2 games, I would like to say that these have been a fluke, I would like to say that we are just flat… but I can't.

Since the first game of the season, I've had a feeling about every play we've run. If we put Reggie in the game with 2 of our starting 3 WRs, it's a pass. If JD is in the game in a bunch formation and they put Hunter in motion, it's a run up the gut. If there are 2 backs, 2 WRs to one side and they shift one back to the WRs, it's a bubble screen. (Note: this is just a generalization but I could do this to 90% of the plays this year... and I have.)

After the VT game, I even got a call from my mom, yes my mom! Not Lee Corso or Bear Bryant! My mom!!! She told me she knows what's coming most of the time. Hmmmm... something ain't right. Nothing against my mom, but if she knows what's coming there’s a good chance the other team does!

Now some of you will say, what about WF what about FSU, GT and even the good about BC and ALL the other games we dominated and won? I’m not saying that the plays didn’t work and they should scrap the whole system b/c sometimes they do work… but that’s mostly b/c of athletes like Davis, Stuckey, and Spiller not “genius” play calling!!

Like I said, I am no expert. I do watch some film of our games b/c I make videos, but I probably watch 10% of what the coaches who get paid to do this do. Maybe I only watch Clemson, so that's why I know what we do more but something’s missing. Personnel needs to be swapped around, I don't care if Stuckey and Kelly don't block as good as Harris and the 4th string white guy... but when they are in the game I KNOW WE ARE GONNA RUN IT! There’s something about camouflaging your scheme that tends to work more than just doing the SAME DAMN THING ALL THE TIME!!

Now, I have lots AND LOTS of plays on film that do exactly what I'm talking about; but, I don't really have the time or the patience to go through and get them all to prove my point. The point is... when we don't add any new wrinkles all year; we are going to get shut down eventually. I'm not talking new formations or gadget plays that are hard to implement in a week's time but I’m talking about... misdirection on plays that we already run, dragging a TE back across the field when rolling everyone one way... a toss sweep instead of a stretch play. Little things... little things make a world of difference.

Did you see the Arkansas game on Saturday? 3rd and goal from about the 17… what did they do? Ran a draw for a TD… have we run a draw all year? What about a shovel pass? toss sweep? Or even just an all out go send everyone long?

I'm actually surprised we made it as long as we did... but then again we did play UNC, Temple, FAU and La Tech during that stretch.

Now, like I said... I am no expert. Do I think I could do a better job of coaching? Probably not, even though I'd like to think I could; b/c at this point, it's not too hard to imagine. Do I want to coach? No. But I do want to be a fan again and when I know what is going to happen before it happens... I'm not a fan but a critic.

Now back to our sponsor… Insanity… doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result… sounds pretty familiar doesn’t it. And it’s also kind of ironic that Alcoholics anonymous is the definer in this case b/c they are getting a lot of new clients from the tri-county area lately.

Keep in mind that most of what I wrote is an exaggeration, but it is what I believe. Something has got to change. I’m not happy with 7-3 after starting 7-1. That doesn’t make me a bad fan or any of that crap but this was supposed to be OUR year. The team that got us over the hump, the team that we were waiting on for 7 years. And here we are… going insane.

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week is:

Clemson 9 NCSU 7

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

I went 18-8 this past week making my overall record 219-62. This was only my 3rd week below 20 wins this season and I’m hoping to bounce back this weekend but 2nd in a row. I’m doing just as badly as the team it seems lol!

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8
Week 4: 25-3
Week 5: 23-5
Week 6: 18-9
Week 7: 22-9
Week 8: 22-5
Week 9: 19-7
Week 10: 18-8

Overall: 219-62 Clemson: 5-4

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games:

Lousiville 25 Rutgers 10
Wyoming 10 BYU 30
GT 50 UNC 9
Cincy 10 West Virginia 50
Wisconsin 35 Iowa 30
Georgia 10 Auburn 28
California 17 Arizona 21
Kent St 3 Virginia Tech 37
Miami 10 Maryland 13
Michigan 30 Indiana 3
South Carolina 30 Florida 28
Nebraska 20 Texas A&M 21
Ohio St 31 Northwestern 6
Notre Dame 20 Air Force 21
Texas Tech 30 Oklahoma 56
Duke 0 Boston College 34
Tennessee 10 Arkansas 9
Alabama 3 LSU 30
Wake Forest 34 FSU 10
Texas 30 Kansas St 3
Oregon 0 USC 20
Boise St 60 San Jose St 23

Let's play "the Blame Game!!" and prediction

ShoelessCU — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 14:21:00 +0000

Let’s play the blame game!! (cheesy music plays)

Let’s meet our contestants…

Will Proctor, 6’2” 205 lbs Quarterback of the Clemson Offense who’s got the looks and the charm to sweep every lady off her feet this side of Miami but can he throw a pass?

Rob Spence, Clemson’s offensive coordinator. This second year coach from Toledo is commonly referred to as the Rush Limbaugh of play calling!

Poor Tackling, this herpes of a nuisance reared its ugly head again and seems to be making a come back bigger than JayZ!

And finally…

Shoeless, this supposed “die-hard fan” didn’t attend the game on Thursday thus dooming the entire existence of man permanently!

So, here’s how the game works… everyone gets a chance to explain why they were to blame for the loss Thursday night, and the winner takes the blame.

Proctor, we’ll let you go first…

“Thanks John! Well let me be the first to explain that I can throw the ball, I just don’t feel like it! Also, I like to put zip on the ball but the coaches told me that I lose accuracy and so I just lob them now. Also, my WRs told me that it’s more fun to catch less accurate passes than ones right on the money so I do this also...”

Thanks Will! How about your take Coach Spence!

“Well, first off I’d like to give credit to Jesus for being our lord and savior through him all things are possible!”

(silence)

and what about your take on the game?

“I think we just needed more plays to establish the run, I bet if we have 10 or 20 more possessions we could have worn them down and got something going.”

Thanks coach! Glad to see you were willing to go out on a limb and try something different! Now let’s check in with Poor tackling…

“I think I dropped my mic, it can’t seem to hold on to it. Where’d my nametag go? It was just here?”

and finally let’s check in with Shoeless…

“Well, I’m sorry for our loss on Thurs, everyone can blame it on me! I missed the game on Thurs and it was my first game I’ve missed in 2 years and only the 3rd game I’ve missed in 5 years. If I had been at the game something different would have happened.”

Thanks Shoeless, now let’s go to the judges to see who are winner is…

(cheesy suspenseful music plays)…

And our winner is…

Shoeless!

Shoeless took the blame and the rest of the team can breathe easy for another week!

Your prize Shoeless? You will be fired as a fan and all hope is lost for your soul! You clearly are a terrible human being for missing the game and any ill fate coming your way is deserved.

That’s pretty much what it felt like to me on Thursday. I felt like everything went wrong. I felt as though Will Proctor didn’t have a clue what he was doing throwing the ball and Coach Spence needed to grow a set… I mean what’s the point of having a 50,000 page play book if you can’t turn past page 4. The Defense did as poor of a job of tackling as I’ve ever seen and really all I could think about was not being there and how I let them down.

I don’t really know how some of you people do it but I promise you that I won’t miss another game this year…

But to my prediction this week... Maryland is a decent team. They are bowl eligible and they’ve got nothing to lose and this scares me. Not b/c I think they’ll win but b/c I think Maryland is playing better than most are giving them credit for. They’ve won. Period! They might have been ugly doing it but they’ve done it. They’re giving up a lot of yards but so did BC when we played them… do I think they are the better team? No, but they won.

If I were a coach, this wouldn’t have been a fun week for Clemson. They would have gotten an extra day off considering the long week but I would have made the rest of the week hell! I hope the players learned from Saturday and the rest of the season is played differently… but we deserved to have our asses handed to us after the way we played on Thursday and I frankly hope we never see it again.

We are a better team than Maryland and we’d better come out ready to play on Saturday. I don’t want to see another let down. I want to see problems fixed (or at least improved) and I want to see this team play again like we’d seen for 8 weeks. If we don’t do it, I’ll be as shocked as anyone.

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week is:

Clemson 45 Maryland 10

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

I went 19-7 this past week making my overall record 201-54. This was only my 2nd week below 20 wins this season and I’m hoping to bounce back this weekend.

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8
Week 4: 25-3
Week 5: 23-5
Week 6: 18-9
Week 7: 22-9
Week 8: 22-5
Week 9: 19-7

Overall: 201-54 Clemson: 5-3

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games:

West Virginia 34 Louisville 35
Army 14 Air Force 10
Virginia 20 Florida St. 21
Ball St 0 Michigan 20
Penn St 10 Wisconsin 23
Missouri 10 Nebraska 30
Mississippi St 10 Alabama 34
Florida 25 Vandy 3
Kansas 32 Iowa St 10
Navy 6 Duke 3
Georgia 35 Kentucky 10
Arkansas St 10 Auburn 34
Northwestern St 10 Mississippi 33
North Carolina 0 Notre Dame 32
Washington 20 Oregon 21
LSU 10 Tennessee 12
Ohio St 40 Illinois 9
Arizona 0 Washington St 10
Georgia Tech 34 NCSU 13
Boston College 30 Wake Forest 29
Oklahoma St 10 Texas 40
So Cal 54 Stanford 10
Arkansas 10 South Carolina 24
UCLA 10 California 36
Oklahoma 17 Texas A&M 21
Virginia Tech 40 Miami 10

Shoeless Fearless prediction for VT

ShoelessCU — Wed, 25 Oct 2006 11:15:00 +0000

So we did it! We did it in convincing fashion! We put a whopping on them boys from Tech and now we are back! Right? To take a line from our new bestest friend Lee Corso… “not so fast my friend”.

As a reward for our hard work and dominating performance on Saturday our beloved Tigers get the pleasure of a short week, little rest and the daunting task of traveling to Blacksburg to face the Hookies of Virginia Tech. Yay! (cough cough)… now most of the Tiger faithful might be riding high and predicting a blowout but I have a few doubts. Not really against our offense or defense but instead our special teams…. Remember those? The thorn in our side that cost us BC and almost cost us WF and FSU? Yeah, that. Well, we’d better shape up or we could be in for a rude awakening when we travel north this Thurs night.

VT and Frank Beamer are known for their special teams dominance. In Beamer's 233 games as head coach, Tech has blocked 112 kicks (57 punts, 34 field goals, 21 extra points). Fifteen of the blocked punts were converted directly into touchdowns.

Tech has blocked three punts and a field goal this year. And we’ve have 3 fg’s blocked and also allowed 1 kickoff for a TD, another for over 90yards and 5 of 40 or longer to teams like FAU and Temple!

Yeah, this won’t be a gimmie by any stretch. We’ll have to play solid on ALL sides of the ball to get this victory in, what’s looking to be, a nasty game played in sub 40 degree temperatures.

The rest of the stats from the Hookies don’t really scare me all that much. Their rush defense is currently 22nd in the country… and their total defense is 6th. However, FSU’s rush defense was in the top 3 BEFORE we faced them, BC in the top 5 BEFORE we played them, WF in the top 15, BEFORE we played them, and GT was 6th… BEFORE we played them… now they are—13th, 17th, 27th and 32nd respectively. If James Davis is 100% this game might be another laugher. I really don’t know if there’s a defense in the country that could stop our ground game when they are on.

However, I’m not at all thinking that this will be a wash. If temperatures are lowered, and the ground is wet that’ll slow down our faster players and turn this into a grudge match that might come down to who wants it more.

On the defensive side of the ball we should be able to contain their offense for the most part. I don’t really see how they could put up more than 10 points on us with their offense which makes special teams that much more important! Any big turnover, or blocked kick or long return might be just what VT will need to stay in the game.

To say the least, I’m a little nervous about this game. Maybe even more so than I was the GT game… but that might also be b/c on Thurs, I’ll be missing my first Clemson game (home or away) since the 2004 Miami game. By the end of this season (in the last 4 years) I’ll have missed only 3 games total and we lost 2 of those 3… (NCSU on the road on a Thurs night and Maryland on the road in ‘03).

So, here’s to another Tiger romping and further proof that I get myself all nervous for nothing and our Tigers really are “back”.

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week is:

Clemson 34 Virginia Tech 28

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

I went 22-5 this past week making my overall record 182-47. Yet again… sometimes I think I get what I want to happen confused with what I think is going to happen lol. I wanted Florida State to beat Boston College (as did every Clemson fan) but yet again… FSU looks terrible and BC does enough to get the win and keeps on making our lives miserable lol. Well, I say forget about them and just win our own damn games from now on. If they lose “woo” if not we need to just worry about us.

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8
Week 4: 25-3
Week 5: 23-5
Week 6: 18-9
Week 7: 22-9
Week 8: 22-5

Overall: 182-47 Clemson: 5-2

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games:

NC State 30 Virginia 14
Michigan 54 Northwestern 13
Illinois 10 Wisconsin 38
Oklahoma 10 Missouri 12
Notre Dame 14 Navy 13
Penn St 10 Purdue 11
Auburn 40 Mississippi 10
Bowling Green 23 Temple 3
Vandy 10 Duke 9
Buffalo 10 Boston College 43
Colorado 10 Kansas 37
Kentucky 10 Miss St. 3
Georgia 10 Flordia 35
Southern Cal 40 Oregon St 17
Wake Forest 50 UNC 10
Miami 14 Georgia Tech 39
Nebraska 46 Oklahoma St 16
Minnesota 20 Ohio St 45
Arkansas St 13 Florida Atlantic 7
Portland St 10 Oregon 36
Florida St 20 Maryland 31
LA Monroe 10 Arkansas 29
Texas 42 Texas Tech 31
Texas A&M 56 Baylor 10
Tennessee 15 South Carolina 14
UConn 10 Rutgers 11

So we are here. We have the National stage set.

ShoelessCU — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 08:55:00 +0000

So we are here. We have the National Stage set. We have College Gameday in town. We have a top 15 ranking. Our opponent has a top 15 ranking. We will be under the lights in the greatest atmosphere you can imagine. We’ll have 90,000 strong trying to weasel their way into the game. We have arguably the biggest game at Death Valley that we’ve had in 20 years… and to top it all off… its homecoming.

Clemson will be jacked up! Georgia Tech will be jacked up! The fans will be jacked up! If you don’t like football even you will be jacked up on Saturday! There’s not a reason in the world that I would miss this game and not a reason in the world why I don’t think we’ll cherish every minute of it.

Clemson will swagger into Death Valley boasting of the nation’s leading scoring offense, #6 total offense, #4 rushing offense, #6 rushing defense, #6 passing efficiency defense, #4 in total defense, #11 in scoring defense, #7 in kickoff returns, #5 in sacks, #10 in tackles for loss, #2 in sacks allowed and 119 in kickoff return yards… oh wait… that’s terrible… worst in the country.

Well, now that you’ve slightly come back down to earth, let me tell you a couple things you might not have known. In the last 5 years following a bye or long week, GT is 8-8. GT also has only scored over 30 points on the road 2 times in the last 4 years (at Duke and Connecticut) before traveling to VT this season and winning 38-27. This game this weekend will also make only the 2nd road game for GT this season.

GT also boasts some good numbers statistically this season as well. Currently the Jackets are ranked 22nd in rushing offense, 7th in rushing defense, 9th in pass efficiency defense, 10th in net punting, 17th in total defense, 24th in scoring defense, T-24th in sacks allowed, T-18th in turnover margin, and 31st in scoring offense. These numbers (like Clemson’s) might be a little skewed in a positive direction thanks to Samford, Troy and UVA but also might be a good indicator when you look at Maryland, VT, and Notre Dame.

However, in the Notre Dame game, they only held the ball for 24:35 in time of possession, while allowing 138 net yards rushing and 246 passing. Also, vs VT, they gave up 339 yards through the air and also lost the time of possession battle but still won the game.

Stats really don’t mean a whole lot when you look at wins and loses but it seems as though GT hasn’t really seen an offensive juggernaut like they will vs. our Tigers on Saturday. They haven’t seen the likes of 4, 5th year SRs and a 4th year JR on an offensive line that is rushing for a (soon to be) team record in rushing. They haven’t seen a healthy James Davis who is arguably the best back in college football but doesn’t have the padded stats of full games like some of the “Heisman” candidates. They haven’t seen the 2 fastest college football players on the planet in CJ Spiller and Jacoby Ford. They haven’t seen a QB who has stepped up to the plate as a proven leader in his Senior year.

This is a Tiger Team that is hungry! This is a defense that has only played 3 full games and dominated when needed and is ready for a full test! This is an offense that can put up huge numbers on the 26th, 22nd, and 11th ranked rushing defenses in the country and is hungry for another test. All 3 of those previous rush defense were in the top 15 or higher before the Tigers ran through them. Oh and guess what… Reggie Merriweather will be healthy again for this one too…

So what do I think? A sure fire blow-out? Hardly. This is a Georgia Tech team that I personally have not seen a victory in person against since 2002 in a monsoon. I have proudly attended all home games since I was a little Shoeless but I haven’t had all that luck vs. the Bees. My record (in person) vs. GT is… 6-6 lifetime with a 1-4 record in the last 5… If I wasn’t so damned stubborn I might purposely miss this game for luck… but I don’t believe in luck. You make your own damned luck! I’m gonna be there screaming my ass off like I did last week in Charlotte, the week before at Wake and every other game this year!

There’s no reason why we shouldn’t win and even cover the spread this weekend but knowing our past history with the Jackets we’ll be in for another classic. If we get a few breaks and can make the right corrections on special teams we should be ok… but we’ll just have to see.

Get there early folks! It’s gonna be a fun one! Clemson will come out fired up and get an early lead, they’ll slow down in the 2nd and 3rd quarter then fall behind then… in the 4th quarter with about 5 mins to go the defense will make a huge stop (and the fans break the ear drums of upstate SC)… the offense will ride the shoulders of James Davis, CJ Spiller, Reggie Merriweather and the best offensive line in the country… and drive down the field to take lead with less than a minute to go to win the game on a 2 yard TD run… and… Shoeless passes out…

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week is:

Clemson 31 Georgia Tech 27

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

I went 22-9 this past week making my overall record 160-42. Sometimes I think I get what I want to happen confused with what I think is going to happen lol. I wanted Florida to beat Auburn, I wanted Michigan to lose, I wanted BC to lose but none of those did and I probably would have guessed right on at least one of those had I not let my “wants” get in the way. Such is life… anyway…

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8
Week 4: 25-3
Week 5: 23-5
Week 6: 18-9
Week 7: 22-9

Overall: 160-42 Clemson: 4-2

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games:

LA Lafayette 10 Florida Atlantic 24
North Carolina 10 Virginia 20
West Virginia 40 Connecticut 35
NC State 35 Maryland 32
Illinois 10 Penn St 17
Louisville 35 Syracuse 10
Rutgers 28 Pittsburg 35
Texas 10 Nebraska 7
Wisconsin 23 Purdue 10
Indiana 10 Ohio St. 48
Mississippi 10 Arkansas 30
Miami (Fl) 17 Duke 14
Miss St. 10 Georgia 39
Kansas St. 10 Missouri 34
Tulane 0 Auburn 55
UCLA 10 Notre Dame 14
South Carolina 10 Vandy 13
Washington 21 California 43
Alabama 10 Tennessee 27
Boston College 10 Florida State 20
Iowa 10 Michigan 20
Oregon 32 Washington St. 3
Boise St. 40 Idaho 9
Texas A&M 37 Oklahoma St. 6
Southern Miss 0 Virginia Tech 30
Colorado 10 Oklahoma 14
Fresno St. 10 LSU 50

Shoeless Fearless Prediction for Temple

ShoelessCU — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 11:24:00 +0000

Well, Wake almost made me eat my words last weekend but it was more about our team not coming out firing more so than it was Wake pushing us around. Even if we had played for 2 quarters instead of one we might have scored closer to 50 and thus my 56-10 whopping wasn’t that far off if you look at it that way… and that’s better than looking at it in a different way. Just think of how bad it would have been if we played the whole game? Wow! That’s scary!!

Let’s move on… we’ve had a rough go of it recently with the injuries piling up and to make matters worse… we don’t get a bye week for another few weeks!! So what’s the good news? We are playing Temple on Thurs night in Charlotte… my city!!

No need to get cute or try and force some stupid joke on you this week people… this is an easy one. Temple won’t have a chance. Look for Proctor, Davis, Adams and the rest of the 1st teamers to be sitting after halftime and for another fun game of big plays and 300+ yards on the ground. Temple might be the “home team” but they won’t feel like it when 30,000-40,0000+ tiger fans (most of which will be drunk) enter the lavish confines of Bank of America Stadium. Charlotte will welcome the Tigers as a small thank you for allowing their team (the Panthers) to play in Death Valley 10 years ago and the team will return the favor setting the tone early and often with a nice solid butt whopping.

Nothing against Temple but they just don’t have the team to compete. Clemson might even play down and still win by 20+. Hopefully, this will be the game special teams get on track and it serves as a walkthrough for the rest of the squads.

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week is:

Clemson 49 Temple 3

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

I went 18-9 this past week by far my worst week to date and making my overall record 138-33. I correctly picked Tenn of UGA, Florida over LSU but failed miserably with my Oregon and Oklahoma picks… oh well, I hope no one lost the farm thanks to me.

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8
Week 4: 25-3
Week 5: 23-5
Week 6: 18-9

Overall: 138-33 Clemson: 4-2

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games:

Virginia Tech 30 Boston College 28
Nebraska 31 Kansas St. 10
Wake Forest 33 NC State 32
South Florida 23 North Carolina 24
Syracuse 10 West Virginia 39
Minnesota 10 Wisconsin 30
Iowa 35 Indiana 10
Purdue 21 Northwestern 10
Iowa St. 10 Oklahoma 35
Vandy 25 Georgia 50
Florida St. 56 Duke 3
Rutgers 30 Navy 3
Oklahoma St. 14 Kansas 23
SE Miss St. 0 Arkansas 45
UCLA 10 Oregon 39
Maryland 26 Virginia 3
Cincinnati 0 Louisville 44
Mississippi 17 Alabama 24
Missouri 10 Texas A&M 33
Texas Tech 34 Colorado 3
Ohio St. 43 Michigan St. 9
California 40 Washington St. 20
Arizona 30 Stanford 24
Baylor 6 Texas 45
Florida Intl. 0 Miami 35
Idaho 7 La Tech 20
Florida 30 Auburn 10
Arizona St. 0 So Cal 33
Michigan 40 Penn State 42
Kentucky 17 LSU 35
Boise St. 45 New Mexico St. 3

Let me be the first to congratulate Wake Forest...

ShoelessCU — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 12:14:00 +0000

Let me be the first to Congratulate Wake Forest on another dominating performance and Victory vs. my Tigers. Congratulations for beating us 2 straight and 3 out of 4. You did it again, I made the drive up to Winston-Salem for the 3rd time in 4 years expecting a win and you took my hopes and dreams and ran off with them faster than that laptop I left in Columbia.

Your offense proved once again that we have no answer for it and kept our defense guessing all afternoon. You proved 2004 was a fluke and I’m glad Coach Bowden has opened a petition to forfeit all of our previous wins over your Deacs.

Thank you for showing us that we shouldn’t have believed our own hype.

Thanks for pointing out that your players will win every time when they focus instead of brag, study film instead of sleep and get dirty instead of dance.

Your fans and students once again treated me with respect and dignity as we humbly retreated back to our cars and we salute you and your amazing one of a kind game-day atmosphere.

Pre-Shoeless Prediction: This will not be what I am writing on Saturday night after the game.

Now get your pads on boys let me tell you what IS going to happen on Saturday!

Wake Forest is going to meet a different team than before… Not the same team that traveled in 2003 unprepared and lazy, bored and lackadaisical, tired and uninterested. Nope, this is a Tiger team that (I can personally attest) that is focused and ready. This is a team that remembers the past and will not allow it to repeat.

This offensive team is hungry to prove 50 points is not just a feast we consume vs. the weak and easy. This is a defense ready to let loose with a flurry of blitzes and aggression is has been held back from the past 2 weeks. This is a special teams hungry for a block and ready to make up for previous lack of execution. This is a hungry bunch of Tigers.

Wake Forest can spin it anyway they want and they have all the right in the world to think highly of their team this year. Hell, it’s been a long time since they started 5-0 you know… 1987 when they played equally as fearsome a schedule in the likes of Richmond, NC State, Appalachian St., Army and UNC.

Yup they’ve got me shaking. Ohhh please don’t run up the score on us please! You only beat, Syracuse, Duke, UCONN, Ole Miss and Liberty by a combined 66… yup that’s same amount as our 1st teams have put up in the 1st halves of our last 2 games. Excuse me a second, I’ve got to change my pants.

Now let’s break it down by position why don’t we… Offensive line… yep we’re bigger, stronger, better and out weigh your def front by about 60lbs… no biggie considering you chop/cut block every play which is fine b/c you’ll need to do whatever it takes Saturday.

Offensive skill players… hmmm can’t think of anyone off the top of my head. Let’s check online… QB Riley Skinner, RBs De’Angelo Bryant & Micah Andrews and WR Willie Idlette… Hey wait a minute!! I know them! They are the Fresh Toe-Tapping Trio!! You know, that kick@$$ bluegrass/techno/hiphop group that the internet is buzzing about!?! No wait I’m thinking of someone else…

Still looking, still looking… yup I’ve got nothing. Not one person on your whole roster that even the name sounds familiar. Now go ahead a give me the “well, you’ll know them after Saturday” bs you’ve got in the holster… b/c I don’t really care.

We’ve got 4 RBs you would KILL for in your system and a 5th that would still start for you too. We have 8 WRs that would own your campus if they played for you and could take their pick from all 11 of your hot co-eds. That doesn’t even include our 45 on the defensive side of the ball that would do the same; but—hey, that’s fine, you beat us last year-- and 2 out of 3-- and now 3 out of 4 when you win Saturday right? I forgot.

But the team didn’t…

You ain’t seen the Orange heck-fire that will travel your way this weekend.

Statistically Clemson Wake Forest

Rushing Off 7th Nationally 37th Nationally
240.6 yards/game 167.4 yards/game
Passing Off 54th 98th
204.6 yards/game 149.6 yards/game
Total Off 11th 75th
445.2 yards/game 317 yards/game
Scoring off 2nd 63rd
43.4 pts/game 23.8 pts/game
Rushing Def 11th 16th
69.2 yards/game 78.2 yards/game
Pass Def 30th 63rd
170.4 yards/game 194.28 yards/game
Pass Eff Def 2nd 40th
85.78 avg. rating 139.28 avg. rating
Total Def 9th 24th
239.6 yards/game 273 yards/game
Scoring Def 15th 9th
13.4 pts/game 10.6 pts/game
Sacks T-22nd T-12th
3.0 per game 3.4 per game
Sacks Allowed 10th T-61st
.8 per game 2.0 per game
Turnover Margin 14th T-52nd
+1 +.2

Looks about even… but take into account our 1st team (and 2nd for that matter) has seen less time on the field, we have played some tougher teams and we still lead in almost all categories… we’re good.

Rev coined the term “Gee-Hawed” for this weekend, and I think I like it.

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week is:

Clemson 56 (yes, I said 56) Wake Forest 10

See you at your “Fair” Saturday night! GEE-HAWED!!

Note: anyone who actually gets mad at my posts please grow up and get a life I do this for fun not to intentionally piss people off. So save your emails for someone who gets paid.

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

I went 23-5 this past week improving me to a 120-24 overall record. Another solid week of picking and I had 3 pretty big upsets in that group as well… I only got one right (GT over VT) but hey it’s better than an 0-fer.

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8
Week 4: 25-3
Week 5: 23-5

Overall: 120-24 Clemson: 3-2

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games:

Florida State 35 NCSU 28
TCU 28 Utah 21
Louisville 35 Middle Tenn St. 10
Indiana 10 Illinois 21
Arkansas 10 Auburn 34
Northwestern 10 Wisconsin 23
Purdue 14 Iowa 21
Kent St. 3 Temple 0 (game of the week)
Texas A&M 10 Kansas 21
Vandy 10 Mississippi 14
West Virginia 50 Miss St. 3
Stanford 10 Notre Dame 35
Washington 24 So Cal 31
Maryland 10 Georgia Tech 30
Bowling Green 0 Ohio State 45
LSU 10 Florida 21
Texas 14 Oklahoma 21
Baylor 10 Colorado 13
Michigan St. 10 Michigan 30
Virginia 10 East Carolina 20
South Carolina 23 Kentucky 21
Missouri 24 Texas Tech 30
Duke 0 Alabama 30
Tennessee 10 Georgia 7
Oregon 33 California 32
La Tech 20 Boise St. 35
Nebraska 38 Iowa St. 13

Shoeless Fearless Prediction for La Tech

ShoelessCU — Wed, 27 Sep 2006 12:18:00 +0000

So we manhandled UNC… I had us at 45-10 and I’ll take a 52-7 final in our favor any day!! Living in Charlotte seems a little easier this week. I’ve worn my orange in public everyday and haven’t even managed a 2nd glance much less any ribbing; but then again I always wear orange so that’s nothing new.

Now let’s take a look at what we’ve got in store for us this week… La Tech huh? Well, at least it’s not another noon game.

No need to really break anything down. We should roll, maybe we won’t be as impressive as vs. UNC but I think La Tech would probably beat UNC this year.

James Davis will probably get 2 TDs instead of 4 and 80 yards instead of 90. Spiller will have another 2 and will get close to 100 on the day assuming Reggie will probably sit this one out to rest his ankle. Chancellor will get some more carries and maybe even have a career day. Add in a couple of better passes by Proctor and a big play or two and we’re looking at another close to 50-point performance.

Now that being said… let’s take a look at the USC game instead. Auburn huh? Wow… ummm yea… this is going to be ugly. -13.5? Holy crap!! I need to make a phone call… brb….

So yea… let’s get to the point you’ve got stuff to do and I’ve got videos to get ready to make.

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week is:

Clemson 48 La Tech 13 (defensive plays more 3rd teamers early for reps and allows La Tech to score a little more than you’d expect)

USC 7 Auburn 38 (yea it’s gonna be ugly)

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

I went 25-3 this past week improving me to a 97-19 overall record. I know a lot of you have been complaining that I don’t pick against the spread however I am 4th in the donor board pick’em so far with a 63-37 record with the spreads. One reason I don’t pick against the spreads is that I don’t have a way to judge the spread by the time I make my picks and I don’t want you fools to get mad at me when you bet on my picks :-)

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8
Week 4: 25-3

Overall: 97-19 Clemson: 2-2

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games:

BYU 10 TCU 35
Auburn 38 South Carolina 7
Rutgers 24 South Florida 17
Virginia 10 Duke 9
Tennessee 35 Memphis 20
Wisconsin 20 Indiana 0
Illinois 10 Michigan St. 30
Colorado 14 Missouri 30
Sam Houston St. 7 Texas 45
Maine 10 Boston College 34
Miss St 0 LSU 39
Alabama 10 Florida 24
Purdue 16 Notre Dame 14
California 34 Oregon St. 17
Boise St. 43 Utah 6
Texas Tech 28 Texas A&M 31
Oregon 30 Arizona St. 15
Liberty 0 Wake Forest 33
Georgia Tech 24 Virginia Tech 20
Northwestern 10 Penn St. 30
Miami (OH) 30 Cincinnati 42
Houston 0 Miami 32
Temple 0 Vandy 23
So Cal 42 Washington St. 23
Kansas 10 Nebraska 28
Michigan 39 Minnesota 20
Ohio St. 14 Iowa 17
Georgia 23 Mississippi 10

Shoeless breakdown and Fearless prediction for UNC

ShoelessCU — Wed, 20 Sep 2006 12:41:00 +0000

Alright, alright, alright! No one is happier than I am that my prediction came up wrong from last week! I traveled to Tally, dominated their town and improved my record at their house to 2-2 :-). I’m extremely proud of our team for rising to the occasion and getting a tough road win overcoming a lot of adversary from the previous week up in Boston and in Florida as well.

Now let’s take a look at what we’ve got in store for us this week… oh God… North Carolina. Man, I really hate those guys. Most of you have to deal with a different brand of Carolina fans where you live; well I get this brand. Having lived in Charlotte for a couple of years now, I’ve encountered my fair share of Tarholes and for the most part they weren’t too bad to deal with, esp when talking about football. However if you ever watch the news around here or ready the paper you’d see why we really hate UNC.

Now that being said… please Jesus let’s beat the living heck out of them this weekend! I have a couple “friends” here that I know will be blowing my phone up for the next couple of weeks if we don’t!

Ok, now that I’ve got that out of my system… let’s take a look at the breakdown. UNC is not terrible team but then again they aren’t really a good team… I’d probably rank them as below average. They are ranked at the bottom of most defensive categories and that’s all that needs to be said really. However, if you recall… Clemson still owes UNC some long needed revenge from 2 games from years ago… 2001’s 38-3 shellacking thanks to one freak named Julius Peppers and 1996’s 45-0 beat down. I haven’t forgotten either of those games and attended both in person… and though we did get a little bit of revenge in 2002 with a 42-12 victory… I think we still owe them plenty more!

If we do what we are SUPPOSED to do in this game, it will be a nice relaxing noon game for most fans making the journey to Tiger Town. I don’t really see it being any other way. I think this game will not be a let down game and we won’t let a bad team to come rob us of this one. The sellout crowd will amp up the team and they’ll come out busting heads, they’ll get on them early and we won’t need to kick FGs this week (wink wink).

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week (and I really hope I’m wrong) is:

Clemson 45 UNC 10

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

Thankfully, I was wrong about the FSU game but not by much… I had the final at 21-20 FSU, and would have taken any score where I was wrong and Clemson won hehe.

I went 20-8 this past week falling behind on my previous pace of the first 2 weeks however I’m still trucking along with a solid 72-16 overall record.

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4
Week 3: 20-8

Overall: 72-16 Clemson: 1-2

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games:

Virginia 10 at Georgia Tech 42
Cincinnati 3 at Virginia Tech 35
Wisconsin 17 at Michigan 42
Iowa 21 at Illinios 10
Louisville 55 at Kansas St. 3
Colorado 3 at UGA 45
Howard 3 at Rutgers 35
Buffalo 0 at Auburn 45
Iowa St. 17 at Texas 34
Arizona St 31 at California 35
Rice 0 at Florida State 38
Alabama 17 at Arkansas 14
PSU 10 at Ohio St. 24
Marshall 0 at Tennessee 37
West Virginia 35 at East Carolina 10
Wake Forest 24 at Mississippi 10
Florida Intl. 0 at Maryland 30
Tennessee St. 3 at Vandy 19
Middle Tenn St. 3 at Oklahoma 50
Florida Atlantic 10 at South Carolina 28
Mississippi St. 14 at UAB 17
Troy 10 at Nebraska 48
Kentucky 10 at Florida 45
Southern Cal 24 at Arizona 21
Boston College 20 at NCSU 17
Tulane 0 at LSU 65
Hawaii 20 at Boise St. 45
Notre Dame 35 at Michigan St. 29

My trip to Tally by Numbers…(links to pics included also)

ShoelessCU — Mon, 18 Sep 2006 18:01:00 +0000

82,300 people in Doak on Saturday night
Seeing 74,000+ people doing the Tomahawk Chop is a cool site
74,000+ people were sent home upset
8,000+ Clemson folks dominated the stadium before, during and after the game
7,000: Clemson fans can out cheer 25,000 of any other teams fans in the nation
900: the amount of minutes I spent on the road driving from Charlotte to Tally and back
565: the amount of beer (in cans/bottles) that was purchased and consumed by members of my party from Thurs night until early Sunday AM
$300: the amount of money I spent the whole trip (we had a free place to stay that’s why it’s so low)
250:1 the ratio of friendly FSU fans to jackass FSU fans we encountered before, during and after the game
200:1 the ratio of extremely hot FSU girls to non-skanky looking hot FSU girls
100: the heat index at kickoff (Gawd it was hot)
‘89: the year of the last time Clemson beat FSU in Tally (another game I attended)
87: the amount of yards James Davis had on Saturday night
75: the amount of seconds it took for FSU scoreboard operators to pull the plug after the game went final
63: 17 (sorry had to throw that in there)
12 hours the amount of sleep I got over 3 nights
10 mins, how long it took to drive thru Atlanta going mach 10
9 points we GAVE FSU when we should have scored
8 coolers full of food and beverages we took to the tailgate
7 hours after the game ended until we feel asleep
6 layers of atmosphere we had to cross before reaching our seats in the stadium lol
5 stupid screen passes that went for 2 yards or less lol
4 great days of partying, seeing old friends, and how many times I’ve been to Tally to see Clemson play.
3 out of 4
2 in a row
1 hell-of-a weekend!
0 voice left!

Go Tigers!!

Here are all the pics from before, during and after the game

Pictures

a lot of the game photos didn’t come out as the lights affected my view so much.

Here are the two panoramic shots that came out also

I'm going down to Tally

ShoelessCU — Wed, 13 Sep 2006 13:05:00 +0000

Well, there’s not much more to say about the Boston trip now so I’ll just dive right in to the FSU prediction.

Let’s see, FSU beat Miami and Troy even though both were nail biters, a win is a win. In the 2nd game they rushed for a season high 45 yards vs. Troy and were held to negative yards vs. Miami.

This bodes well for Clemson having lost 1 or 10134324 key defensive players on defense it seems. FSU, however, has balanced out its lack of a rushing game by shutting down opponents rushing game in return… boasting the nation’s #1 rushing defense that only is allowing 13 yards per game. Granted we are only 2 weeks into the season but on the flip side Clemson is already averaging 167.5 yards per game on the ground… something’s got to give.

Who do you think will show up this week? The in your face, no guts no glory bad-ass stomp your face in Clemson team? Or the let’s play not to lose, don’t take any chances, conservative Clemson team? Well, either way... I'll be there to support the team I love most and I hope you'll be there to join me.

I personally think we have the ability to go down to Tallahassee and put a whooping on them, but I also know we have the same ability to go down there and lay and egg. This might be the year we win at Doak for the first time since ‘89 (a game that I also attended) but it also might be the year we return disappointed and start pointing fingers again complaining of another lackluster start.

I personally think the game will come down the running game. Conservative or not, if we can get 150+ yards on the ground Saturday, we should be able to win the game in convincing fashion, otherwise we could be in for a long evening.

I’m not a betting man, and if I were I would never put money down for or against the Tigers because of how inconsistent we are week to week so that being the case you can almost expect us to do something different. That might be a good thing that might be a bad thing.

What do I think about the game though? Well, mistakes on special teams can’t happen or we’ll lose again. If we don’t get any pressure on Weatherford we’ll lose. If we get the ball 1st and goal from the 3 and have to settle for a FG we’ll lose. If we get a turnover we’ll have to make sure it’s legit and take advantage of every opportunity we get esp if Ron Cherry is in town or we’ll lose.

That’s a whole lot of things we’ve got to do better in order to win and I know this team can get it done but they have to prove it first. I don’t like to pick against Clemson because it never seems to jinx the other team but this time it might not matter. FSU already has a huge win on the road vs. a top 15 team, and that little bit of confidence might be the difference between a win and a loss.

Personally, I think it will be a great show on Saturday night seeing our powerful offense vs. their shutdown defense that will most likely lead to an exciting game for the public; but as it seems with most of these exciting games for us… we tend to fall just a little bit short at the end.

There’ll be no circle the wagons posts this year and even if there were, it wouldn’t mean as much as before. We didn’t just get our asses handed too us by a weak team, we aren’t about to fire Bowden. We are a better team now filled with great athletes at every position. We are a team capable of beating anyone in the country but we just can’t seem to get it done sometimes. With that being said…

Write it down, take a picture, call your momma, eat at Joe’s… The Shoeless Fearless Prediction for this week (and I really hope I’m wrong) is:

Clemson 20 FSU 21

Now let’s recap last weeks games predictions:

I was wrong about the BC game but not by much… I had the final at 31-17… if they hadn’t gotten an early Christmas present from Santa Cherry Claus they probably wouldn’t have scored to tie the game at 24.. and let’s say we break off another big one or just drive down the field slowly and get a late one… what’s the final then? 31-17… anyway-- nobody’s handing out if’s or but’s right now so “Fack it” (in my best Boston accent).

My record this week was just about spot on from week 1 though. I went 24-4 this week and making my overall record 52-8. I should have known not to take SC but whatever that’s a win-win situation either way :-)

Weekly Records:
Week 1: 28-4
Week 2: 24-4

Overall: 52-8 Clemson: 1-1

Let’s take a look at this weekend’s games:

Maryland 17 vs. West Virginia 24
Duke 0 vs. Virginia Tech 38
BYU 21 vs. Boston College 24
Wake Forest 14 vs. Connecticut 17
Cincinnati 10 vs. Ohio St. 45
Iowa St. 10 vs. Iowa 14
Arkansas 7 vs. Vandy 10
UAB 10 vs. Georgia 40
Troy 10 vs. Georgia Tech 24
Temple 10 vs. Minnesota 34
Oklahoma 35 vs. Oregon 31
LSU 14 vs. Auburn 17
W. Michigan 17 vs. Virginia 18
Youngstown St. 14 vs. Penn St. 35
Miami 35 vs. Louisville 38
Michigan 28 vs. Notre Dame 29
Texas Tech 16 vs. TCU 17
Mississippi 10 vs. Kentucky 13
Texas 45 vs. Rice 0
Portland St. 10 vs. California 55
Wofford 3 vs. South Carolina 35
Tulane 17 vs. Miss St 24
Furman 17 vs. North Carolina 20
Nicholls St. 10 vs. La Tech 24
NC State 10 vs. Southern Miss 7
Arizona St. 42 vs Colorado 28
Florida 10 vs. Tennessee 17
Nebraska 28 vs. So Cal 31

Trip to Boston

ShoelessCU — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 16:11:00 +0000

First off are my random Shots from Boston.

Random pics of Boston

Mostly tourist stuff from downtown Thurs night, our sunset tour of the Bay, etc etc...

Thurs was fun day, we hit the town with a bang and those yanks didn't have a clue! Lots of laughs everywhere we went esp when those rat bassers got Chick all pissy lol

Celtic drank Boston dry and they ran us out of 13234 bars. The only place that didn't want to get rid of us was the Union Oyster Crap-face restaurant! We sat in JFK's favorite booth, but we figured that they just said that b/c he sat there so damn long waiting on his food! Worst service I've ever experienced but the laughs were plentiful.

We called it a night pretty early Thurs b/c of the early flights and were up bright and early Friday heading out for our tour of Fenway. Those Bostonians must have seen us coming b/c they promptly shut down the T-Trains going to town so we had to catch a cab to Fenway and thankfully our cab didn’t have a break pedal so we made fantastic time! (Note: there are no speed limits, traffic laws, or cautious drivers when it comes to Boston Taxi Drivers.)

We arrived early to Fenway and had a cozy group of about 25 or so touring Fenway with us (20 of the 25 were Clemson fans) but before that this old man gave us the comedy routine of the century repeatedly throwing out gems and keep the crowd rolling before the tour began. My side is still hurting (Note: this was sarcasm, Fireball’s witty comebacks to this poor, hopefully, mentally challenged man were funnier than “the jokes”).

I did learn a lot about the history of Fenway and the Red Sox on this tour and got a lot of good shots.

Pictures from Fenway and the game that night

The game that evening was a gem too. The Sox lost but the people around me were mostly season ticket holders and the conversations with them were fantastic! They all commented on all our fans and all the orange in Fenway that night and I made sure to invite them down to see us next season even though none of them cared much for BC.

After the game I took it upon myself to dominate the downtown scene alone as Fireball had drank Boston Beer Works dry and Celtic and Chick had dipped out early. It didn’t take long to meet up with some people I knew and we were off like Paul Revere except with more orange.

They call Boston a “walking town” and they weren’t kidding… 6+ miles, 30+ bars, multiple free drinks, 13 females, 2 butt whippings, and 4 hours later… I finally called it a night and headed back to the hotel. I don’t remember much of the ride home but Boston looks really cool at Mach 12.

I did get to meet a new doctor at the hotel as we both arrived at the hotel at the same time. They said they remembered seeing and hearing me from earlier in the night and wanted to get a picture so I obliged and then I retired to my room (but not before a visit to their personal chambers only to get coot-blocked by Momma). Here’s that pic and yes my hair is orange

If I remember correctly, the 32 secs of sleep I got that night were the best I ever had!!

It wasn’t too long after waking that we headed down to the JFK Library and Museum. This was such a great time (rolls eyes). I’m so glad we decided to embark on this 3 week trek across the land to this wonderful place filled with unbiased opinions and free from political opinions (cough cough). Actually, it was an interesting visit but the 90 mile walk was a little too much for the skin on my inner thighs that rubs while walking, which was now severely bleeding lol.

After we made it back to the Hotel, that we headed to BC. Unfortunately we had lost most members of our party on the trail crossing the Mississippi and to Malaria.

Those Bostonians didn’t have a clue to what was about to hit their bar area. We were there well before 11 and there were already 100s of Clemson folks everywhere. We took over and I think even the BC fans were doing C-L-E-M in Cadence count before it was all over.

After getting a bite to eat and a drink or 12, I headed over to campus to snap a few shots.

Thankfully, I left the bar 12 hours before kickoff otherwise I might have been late getting to the stadium considering it was only about 12 miles from where we were “tailgating”.

For the most part their fans were nice. There were a few assholes who decided to be rude, but everyone has a few of those types so I let it slide.

I got to the game early and the Clemson fans poured in. I think we probably had close to 8,000 total spread out and we made just as much noise as they did. A few of their fans commented that they had never seen a school travel so well and they are right.

Pics from the BC game and campus

Now… sigh…to the game.

If there was one thing I would change about the weekend, it would be the scoreboard… that’s it. Nothing else (as most would agree).

Everyone has hit on every point on why we lost and how we could have won so I won’t go into it but I will say one thing… it’s a lot easier to blame the officials than it is to blame the team I love, so that’s what I’ll do. Ron Cherry can eat a pile of shit—and wasn’t just one play but… “indisputable”??? my ASS!! I’m not saying anymore or I might get upset again.

I haven’t re-watched the game to get clips yet but I know when I do I’ll get that same sick feeling I always get after a loss.

After the game I didn’t feel like doing anything else so we headed back to the hotel and crashed. The group sex with the 15 foreign bikini teams staying at the hotel wasn’t the same after a loss either.

All in all it was a fun trip. I would love to do it again on someone else’s dollar next time but it is something I’ll never forget.

I’m heading down to Tally this weekend so I hope to see you there with me. If you’ve never traveled to an away game before, you need to… Clemson fans are the greatest and have more fun than anyone!

Here’s to turning the panhandle Orange!

Here are the panoramic shots I got from BC and Fenway