Projected Preseason AP Top 26 (by Phil Steele)

This is garbage. After mentioning the difficult schedule, he takes this shot at LSU's schedule.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Phil Steele has always done a Preseason poll which is where he thinks the teams will end up at the end of the season. This particular "Top 26" is simply where he thinks the teams will be ranked when the polls are released before the season.

 

I think Bama and A&M also get a bye before playing us although I'm too lazy to look it up again to confirm.

 

You are correct. I knew the Gumps had a bye prior to playing LSU, but had to check the Faggie schedule and one of their byes is convenient as well.

 

The schedulers in the SEC should be arrested for crimes. How do you give the reigning champion the easiest schedule in the entire conference. If anything they should get the toughest, and Tennessee should get the easiest.

 

The "Alabama hold" is a quick grab and then let go. It disrupts the momentum of the defensive player and is really effective. Why it isn't called is beyond me.

 

I have a few guesses why it's not called.

 

In the wolrd of blatant no-call holds, Bama is the rule and everyone else is the exception. See their penalty record compared to rest of SEC. Or are we to believe this is just the "process"?

 

I don't know if I can agree with that. I can think of several instances where we were called for the most ticky-tack holding violation that you could imagine. One that stands out was in the Ole Miss game. Mettenberger completed a beautiful downfield bomb to Wright, who make a spectacular catch. But the damn thing was called back because one of our OL maybe sorta kinda curled his arm just a tad when blocking the DL. Yet Chance Warmack can be hanging from a guy's hip in the backfield & not get called. Yep, it's easy to have the best OL in the nation when you play by a different set of rules than everyone else. Very easy.