College Football's Identity Crisis

I know you are but what am I? So begins the riddle of children who deflect criticism by tossing it upon the accuser.

Some college football programs have done the same thing over the years. For example, take the following three questions to mind.

1) Simple Multi-Part

What major college has the most wins of any school in history? What was the record of that school in 2008? How about that conference finish of next to last in an 11-team league?

2) Where Is The Defense?

What school, famous for its great defenses over the decades, played for the BCS title last season despite giving up 343 points, an average of 25 points a game.

One only has to trace back to the 1970–2000 era to find this team has won its most recent four National Championships by giving up an average of 11 points a game. Here is the most astonishing fact—the current coach is generally agreed to be a defensive genius!

3) Who Is Running The Asylum?

It was announced that the San Antonio Extension of Texas University has hired Larry Coker as head coach for a base salary of $200,000 a year. Certainly a nice sum for any ordinary business person.

A year ago South Florida's Jim Leavitt, an announced and accepted genius by all media and coaches alike, signed a contract running through 2014 for $12.6 million.

Larry Coker has been a head coach for six years. In those six seasons he won 60 and lost 15, won the National Championship, finished in the top five of the polls on two other occasions, and had only one year with more than three losses. That is an average of 10 wins and two losses a year.

Leavitt's past six seasons at South Florida, his most glorious era, reveals a record of 43-30, an average of seven wins and five losses a season. He has won no conference titles, no national titles, never been ranked in the final AP Poll but, does has a notation for "receiving notoriety due to the lack of discipline in his program."

In summary, followers of the game are being victimized by half-truths, teams that have completely changed their style of play, and by living upon accomplishments earned long ago that don't apply to the current era.

Someone has to sound the alarm.