K-State Slate: 10.27.11

I have yet to find a smoking gun between KSU and Malone/Bell/Smith in this case.

Sports by Brooks is trying to connect us to it by Huggins hiring Hill to get Beasley to come to KSU. Well…duh. That’s how the game worked. We used a legal practice (unseemly or not is not part of this debate) to steer a kid here. What happened after that, as long as we didn’t participate in it and there’s no evidence we knew anything about it, means the worst that can happen is that we invalidate our wins from that year.

It kind of sucks because there’s an NCAA tournament appearance that we have to scratch off of the books, but whatever. That’s the price of playing poker in today’s college basketball.

Also, on the Malone thing, I think the rift probably started once Frank and Co. found out how Malone and Co. were using Mike. No one will ever be able to convince me that Mike wanted to go pro after one year. He genuinely loved it here. It was the first home he probably ever really knew. But all of those promises from Malone to Bell to Smith probably forced him to go, so he never really had any say in the matter. After that I’m sure a lot of the bad blood with Assault had a lot to do with Wally. I don’t know whether or not Malone had some sort of side gig going on with someone over Judge, but it would explain his anger over a lack of PT for Wally. It would also explain why Gary Williams was enraged when Wally came to Maryland with a “handler”, and he ended up retiring as a result of hating to be a part of the recruiting business any longer.

I’m going to yell at you for being wrong. :)

If we win this week, yes, the invalidation of OU will be a theme, and frankly it’s a valid one. You’ve seen me harping on the softness of their receiving corps and Landry’s panic mode, I’m sure. But I think it’s just as likely that we’ll start getting seriously fellated, and the “OU wasn’t any good” crowd will be the vocal minority.

As for Oklahoma State, I’m sorry, but if we’re both unbeaten and we win that game, nobody’s going to be talking about how we won a weak conference unless everyone shits the bed down the pike.

But say we go 10-2 (which is what I’m expecting, wish I could be more confident) this year. We have Klein, Hubert, Pease, Wilson, Harper, Thompson, our TEs, some of the line, etc, etc. While we lose a lot on the D line, if Brown comes back he has a good host around him with Zim, Walker, Malone, Seau, Williams, Latui, Blackman, and I’m sorry but I’ve seen Tate Snyder hit so I’m going to include him. Plus the new guys on both sides of the ball.

So the question is: What will the national expectations be with most of a top 15/20 team back? Do we start out high or will we have to prove it again?

How Snyder has to be king of the “well that team just isn’t as good as we thought” comment following a victory over a favorite. I think he’s right.

How many times do we beat a team like an OU, who despite only having 1 loss, most perceive as being very talented (which I believe to be true), and then when the clock hits 00:00, and the other team has 2 losses (or whatever), and the story instantly becomes about how the losing team was a fraud, if lowly ole KSU was able to beat them?

Wouldn’t that give them a chance to pimp the SEC? I would have to think that stands a good chance of leaping Stanford-Oregon (which, to be fair, is a much better game than Stanford-USC).

I will revise my initial belief that aTm could afford a loss. They probably have to win their next two games as well. However, I think there is enough of the “story” component there to make it more compelling than Stanford-Oregon, especially since we will be in the National Title conversation, even if most people don’t think we will make it in.

Of course, with TV execs making these decisions, you can never know. If it was Fox in charge of this decision they would just cancel GameDay and replace it with Heisman Contender: The Search for a Legend.