FanHouse

The Debriefing is a column that runs every weekday at 9:00 a.m. here on FanHouse. It goes deep into one issue and then bounces around to a plethora of smaller ones ... and does it all in a way that will make you feel like the prettiest girl at the cotillion. Bookmark this page, and visit daily.



My preference in sports has always been for the professionals over the amateurs. Give me the NFL over College Football, the NBA over college basketball, the Premiership over MLS, the AFC over NFC, etc. All other things being equal, I'd just assume watch the very best athletes and the very best teams.

But the events of Saturday, particularly the ones in Ann Arbor, were a beautiful, beautiful reminder that amateurs bring things to the table that professionals can't touch.

(Also at the bottom: ... Phil Mickelson shows us why the FedEx Cup could be awesome, and then shows us why it isn't ... Florida State's new offensive coordinator failed to fix everything ... and do you see what happens, Larry? Do you see what happens, Larry? Do you see what happens, Larry, when you draft a player who's already been taken?)

I wasn't able to actually watch Appalachian State's historic victory over Michigan on Saturday, as I was in a different part of the country, in a different college football stadium, watching a different Top 5 team have an afternoon way different than Michigan's.

But that far-away perspective let me to see just how mind-blowingly awesome the day in college football was. Honestly, it's hard to picture anyone outside of Ann Arbor not being as giddy as a schoolgirl about Michigan's gigantic public flop (and I don't mean to twist the knife, Wolverine fans, I really don't ... but had that happened to Ohio State or USC, imagine how happy you'd be).

I don't particularly like or dislike Michigan ... I'm fairly Switzerland about the Wolverines. But the App State Mountaineers taking them down is not only Hot, Hot, Hot, it's an underdog triumph that beats even a 16-over-a-1 in the NCAA Basketball tournament (more on that in a bit). This just isn't possible anywhere else. It's only college sports that allow a nation to come together and share that much glee about someone else's rock-bottom, suicidal misery.

I was keeping tabs on the game through intermittent updates on a stadium scoreboard ... in some ways, it's the ideal way to follow a game. The vibe in the building started out as, "Man, Michigan's really struggling with ... wait, who the hell are they playing?" and steadily progressed to "Dear God, this might actually happen" ... until about the time the game ended, and people around us were getting conflicting reports via cell phones ... someone said Michigan won with a last second field goal, someone said App State had finished the job. And then the announcement came over the PA system, "Final: Appalachian State 34, Michigan 32."

And 60,566 people went ape-dookie crazy ... people who could have cared less about that game a few hours ago roared triumphantly in unison, as if they'd just announced in the stadium that we had captured Bin Laden and were currently using his beard as a Brillo pad to scrub clean the tip of the Washington Monument.

And that reaction was mild compared to what went on in other stadiums around the nation ... in East Lansing, the announcement warranted a totally rude interruption of the marching band's postgame show. And check out this series of YouTube videos of Penn State fans in the concourse of Beaver Stadium watching the final minutes of the game (you might catch some naughty language in there, especially in clip 1).

It wasn't just Appalachian State/Michigan, either. Saturday felt a lot like -- and this might even be sacrilegious -- but it felt a little bit like the NCAA basketball tournament, the most sacred and consistently entertaining of our national sporting events.

There was one gigantic, unimaginably shocking upset ... a "mid-major" taking out a power conference teams, with Wyoming woodshedding Virginia ... Texas biting their nails against Arkansas State ... not to mention the emotional scenes at Virginia Tech and USC (that was brilliant, by the way, Pete Carroll ... an outstanding and fitting tribute that had to be positively stirring in person).

I don't know if it's the fact that upsets and near-upsets like these aren't even possible in the NFL, given the parity and high level of play throughout the league, or if it's the lack of a playoff system that makes every regular season game more important, or just that college football is more accessible to the general public and skews younger than the NFL ... but for whatever the reasons, this weekend of college football was a hell of a lot of fun.

Don't get me wrong, I'm as pscyhed for Thursday night's NFL opener as anyone, but Saturday ... Saturday brought out a brand of passion that just can't be manufactured by Roger Goodell and his boys. It's a more innocent, pure, and youthful exuberance that you're not going to find in a stadium full of people who have purchased personal seat licenses and get mad when they have to stand up.

So I thank you for your excellence, Appalachian State Mountaineers, and I'm sorry for your agony, Michigan Wolverines ... but we're all, as a sports-loving nation, indebted to both of you for ushering in the 2007 college football season in such a ridiculously awesome way.





You probably didn't notice it because you're a lecherous creep, but that's nearly perfect bump technique. Just beautiful. I would like to gently nuzzle her bump technique.






Phil Mickelson. His win doesn't surprise me ... he's been getting healthier, he's been playing to form lately, and there was no reason that Phil Mickelson shouldn't win the tournament which is named to most closely sound like the word "douchebag."

All jokes and FIGJAM dislike aside, though, he's earned this spot. He held off Tiger Woods while playing next to him on a Sunday, something he'd never done before ... he deserves a polite round of applause and a good nipple massage.

I did take note of one quote after the round, though, from Tiger Woods, who said, "Unfortunately, I just didn't make enough putts to really push him." Maybe I'm reading too much into this ... but I think that's Tiger saying, "Because if one those putts had dropped, and I put some pressure on him early ... Phil would have folded up like Lloyd Carr."



Bobby Bowden. I had originally penciled in Jimbo Fisher here, Florida State's new offensive coordinator ... but ultimately, the blame likes with Jimbo's boss.

I seriously doubt that any of Florida State's numerous offensive problems were because Fisher's actual system, but rather, Florida State was a team that just wasn't ready to play. That's on the head coach. He's the one constant here.

The old man has turned into the Norv Turner of college football ... you look at his face, and it just inspires zero confidence. Obviously, he's accomplished a lot, and he's proved that he can coach ... but at this point, I see him on the sidelines, and I can't imagine him saying anything to Drew Weatherford other than, "Hey, ya like bass fishin'? Me too. By the way, what's the score out there? We winnin'?"



Deserving Of Your Full Attention ...

9:00, VS. Movie. Rocky. Slim pickings this evening, unless you're really into tennis. But you can never go wrong with Rocky.

Other Stuff ...

7:00, USA. Tennis. U.S. Open, Men's Round of 16 & Women's Quarterfinals.
9:00, ESPN2. The Bronx Is Burning.
9:00, FOX. House.
10:00, Comedy Central. Lewis Black. Black on Broadway.