A Not-So-Formal Introduction: Hello, Bleacher Report

Editor's note: Today marks a transition for the Your Best 11 blog. Our first college football lead writer Dan Rubenstein has decided that he wants his handsome mug to be seen more on camera and is pursuing more direct TV work. Those of you who saw him on "Who's Still Standing?" know that he might just have a future in this TV thing. Dan was an integral part of our first Lead Writer group and we wish him nothing but the best moving forward.

We're excited to present you the debut of our new CFB guru, Adam Kramer, and thrilled to welcome him to the Bleacher Report family.

The first college football column I ever wrote wasn’t so much a column, but instead a few sentences on Lou Holtz’s magnificent broadcasting skills. It was an uphill climb, and the maiden jokes included in this maiden voyage were never discovered because no one read it. And while Lou Holtz’s broadcasting skills haven’t changed much since then, I like to think I have. Well, in some ways.

I first began writing about college football because I couldn’t get enough of the game. I constructed a blog, Kegs ‘n Eggs, with very little idea of what I was doing and an appearance early on that rivaled most 6th grade dioramas. For a while I wrote for myself, which was fine. I enjoyed the dozen or so page views a day because it was at least a dozen more than I was getting before. Plus, I really just loved writing about college football.

Over time, it got more serious. I wrote more, and this passion developed into a website packed with college football content, sarcasm, serious pieces, gambling tidbits (one of my favorite things), drinking games (I like these, too) and more. I enjoy writing a wide range of pieces because it keeps readers on their toes, and after a while the “OMG LOOK AT THE MARYLAND UNIFORMS” posts become tiresome.

When Bleacher Report reached out to me, I was honored. The talented writers they’ve brought in over the last year need no introduction, but they’ll get one anyway. The likes of Dan Rubenstein (good luck to you, good sir), Bethlehem Shoals, Dan Levy, as well as other fantastic wordsmiths garnered a lot of attention and deservedly so. Being able to include myself in this discussion—at least in title—was simply too wonderful of an opportunity to pass up.

And now, well, here I am.

As for a little bit about me, I’m a simple man with very simple tastes. I’m a Big Ten guy at heart. I live just outside of Chicago, and I’ve enjoyed my fair share of B1G field goal thrillers. You call it ugly football, I like to think that Purdue is choosing not to be wasteful with their scoring. I’ll bet you hate recycling, too.

As much as I enjoy the occasional 4.7 forty, there are far too many wonderful teams, players and conferences to simply focus on one part of the country. Watching Hawaii beat up on a team at two in the morning is a college football tradition like no other. And then there’s MACtion, beautiful, beautiful MACtion. For those of you unfamiliar with this term, MACtion is the magic that takes place when two MAC football teams play one another. Typically this happens midweek and they outscore most Big Ten basketball teams. There are no guarantees in this game, but MACtion is close.

Last, but certainly not least, are FAT GUY TOUCHDOWNS. No further explanation needed; we should all get a day off of work to celebrate when a man pushing 300 bills or more rumbles himself into the foreign territory that is the end zone. These, of course, are just a handful of glorious examples of why I love college football. Listing this out in one document would require a coffee IV and a few days of feverish thought.

There will be no MACtion or FAT GUY TOUCHDOWNS, however, for nearly seven months. You can simulate that FAT GUY TOUCHDOWN in the nearest open field—a fine exercise and indeed, highly recommended—but the box score will remain closed until further notice. Yes, we’re in the middle of that thing that gets invited to no one’s birthday party called “the offseason.”

This time of the year, however, no longer carries the same protocol as it once did. Army has already embarked on their spring (using this term rather loosely these days) practice and there will be plenty to discuss before we hit media days in the summer. Recruiting has peaked for the time being, but there really is no stop to this either. In fact, college football’s calendar can no longer be restricted between September and early January, which is good news for college football junkies like us.

It gives us much to discuss in the coming months leading up to actual pigskin, and I’m thrilled to be able to do just that. Trust me when I say that this is only the beginning of something special here, and there is plenty more exciting news to come, especially if you’re into this whole college football thing. In the marketing world they call that “a tease,” which typically irritates folks more than a Dr. Pepper Ten commercial. I don’t want to start off on the wrong foot or get fired, so I bid you all farewell, for now, on that note.

We’re going to have fun here—perhaps too much of it at times—and I encourage you all pull up a chair frequently. I hear the atmosphere is wonderful, and rumor has it that they have the freshest beer on tap in all the Internet land. That is, if you can endure a bad Lou Holtz joke every now and then.