The Wizard Of Oklahoma: Bob Stoops

The above photo says it all.  Bob Stoops is looking up at the scoreboard during the 2004 BCS National Championship Game against USC.  USC won the game 55-19 and Bob doesn't look too happy about it.

Oklahoma came into the game undefeated and considered a monster of a team. 

The two announcers were talking before the game about how the Sooners had displayed total superiority over the teams they had played, while USC had "struggled" in many of their PAC-10 games.

An announcer actually said that USC quarterback Matt Leinart had no supporting players.  However, he said the Sooners were superior to the Trojans in every position.

I like a good mystery.  I enjoy a good "who done it" as well as anyone.  As a kid, I recall being shocked to find out about the "man behind the curtain" in the Wizard of Oz. 

I was shocked and a little embarrassed to find out that people can be deceived so easily.  Is it any different with the Wizard of Oklahoma?

The USA Today Coaches' Poll just came out and Oklahoma was ranked at number three.  Is that a misprint? 

Bob Stoops' record at Oklahoma screams out that his teams fail in bowl games.  When  a Bob Stoops' Sooner team plays in a bowl game, bet on the other team.

I don't care how great a Bob Stoops' Sooner team appears in the regular season, they are a dumpster fire in a bowl game.

The 55-19 USC win over Oklahoma was just a typical example of Bob Stoops being the man behind the curtain when the BCS ranks teams.

Bob Stoops' Sooners have been in 10 bowl games and lost six.  His teams have lost their last three bowl games.  He's lost bowl games to BCS and non BCS conference schools.

The year 2003 was a particular embarrassment to Bob Stoops.  The Sooners were again everyone's darling in the BCS computer system. 

The computers had Oklahoma ranked so high they could have lost a game by a million points and remained number one.  The BCS computers must have been behind the curtain, because the above theory was put to a test.

The BCS was a combination of the AP Poll, Coaches' Poll and the computers.  The AP and Coaches had USC as the number one team.  However, the computers had USC ranked so low that Oklahoma finished number one.

The story didn't end there.  It got much worse for Bob Stoops.

The Sooners had yet to play their BIG-12 Championship game.  On December 6th, Kansas State found Bob Stoops behind the curtain and destroyed the Sooners 35 -7.  

The nickname "Big Game" was promptly removed from Bob Stoops name.  He went on to lead his Sooners to a BCS Championship thrashing by LSU.

The coaches were under BCS contract to vote the winner of the BCS game as the National Champions.  Some coaches refused to do so.  That was a first in BCS history.  Some said they wouldn't be involved in a fraud and voted for USC as National Champion.

The man behind the curtain made it worse.

The AP awarded USC the National Championship.  USC received 48 votes and LSU received 17.  The AP told the BCS that they were disgusted with the BCS operations and broke away. 

USA Today advised the BCS that they would no longer have an association with the BCS system if anything like that happened again.

The man behind the curtain had struck again.

Last year was amazing.  After having lost five out of his last six bowl games, Bob Stoops was back.  Everyone from ESPN to Santa Clause thought Oklahoma was way too powerful for other college teams. 

The BCS computers were heard whirling away behind the curtain and everything appeared fine.  The trouble was, ESPN wasn't any better at picking a winner than Santa was.  Bob Stoops remained the man behind the curtain and the season was sealed.

Why do the coaches insist on jamming Bob Stoops down the nation''s throats?  Seriously, are that many coaches that dumb?  They can't be. 

USC wins too many games.  They travel across the country to play any OOC team.  Pete Carroll's Trojans have never lost to a SEC or BIG-10 team.  They continually finish the season as the AP or the Coaches' number two team.

How do you stop a team like that?  Simple.  Take the Championship game away from them.  Come up with an excuse not to place them into the game.  Bruce Feldman did just that a couple of days ago.

Bruce Feldman works at ESPN.  He made an incredibly inaccurate statement in an article.  He wrote that people really wanted to see a USC-Florida game last year, but USC made it impossible.

Mr. Feldman wrote that USC had only beaten one ranked opponent and had lost to an in-conference team which wasn't ranked.  He must have been listening to the man behind the curtain.

Mr. Feldman missed the fact that the final Coaches' Poll ranked Oregon number nine.   USC beat them 44-10.  They had Ohio State at No. 11.  USC beat them 35-3.  Mr. Feldman wasn't aware that CAL's final ranking was No. 25.  USC beat them 17-3.  That was the first game that a Tedford coached CAL team failed to score a touchdown.

However, Bruce was incorrect about USC's one loss.  USC lost at Oregon State by six points.  Oregon State finished the season ranked No. 19.  USC went on to win the PAC-10 and destroy a highly ranked Penn State team.

Mr. Feldman would say that those were the final rankings.  I don't care.  It proves my point.  In order to keep USC from winning the National Title year after year is to keep them out of the game.

Feldman and others keep saying that the PAC-10 is weak.  Penn State, Miami, Oklahoma State, Pitt and BYU all lost to PAC-10 teams in bowl games last year.  The PAC-10 went 5-0.  They were the only undefeated conference.

I might add that the current "National Champions" haven't been west of the Mississippi River to play an OOC game for over 20 years.  The current "National Champion's" continue to schedule FCS teams, but refuse to travel to play them. 

Mr. Feldman not only overlooked the above when writing his article, but didn't mention the fact that the current "National Champions" lost a home game last season to Ol'e Miss by nine points.

Could there be two men behind the curtain?  There are so many questions and no plausible answers. 

Here we go again.  The man, or men, behind the the curtain have arranged it so that there are two BIG-12 teams ahead of USC to open the season.  USC must fight through those two before they even get a chance at Florida.  Yes, Oklahoma is one of them.

Florida's FCS opponent this year is Southern Charleston or vice-versa.  Again, they will play their FCS opponent in Florida.  Why take a chance?

USC road games against ranked opponents include CAL, Oregon, Ohio State and Notre Dame.  Ohio State and Notre Dame are actually out of USC's Zip Code.  That's something not in the playbook of the current "National Champions."

Mr. Feldman wouldn't take something like that into consideration.   The BCS computers wouldn't either. 

I'm just wondering when the saying "fool me once, shame on you...etc.," comes into play.  Is it possible that there is a Civil War taking place in the United States that us westerners aren't aware of? 

In 2008, the man behind the curtain placed Alabama as the SEC king.  He carried Alabama along at number one until losing to Florida.  Then he placed Florida at the top and that was that.

The man behind the curtain insisted that the other BCS Championship game team be from the BIG-12 and no one questioned it.    That is, no one with the power to change a thing.

The season ended with Alabama being stripped of their dignity by Utah.  Excuses came in from every major sports information organization.  The most popular was that Alabama just didn't want to play in the game.  What?

If Alabama didn't want to play in the game then they should have said so and a worthy team would have replaced them.  That excuse didn't approach the level of "the dog ate my homework."

Utah went undefeated and they were the masters of the mighty SEC Alabama.  Alabama also plays FCS teams on a regular basis.  Alabama also looses to some.

Oklahoma only made it into the BCS Championship by a coin toss and help from the man behind the curtain.  It didn't matter.  Oklahoma was proven to be a loser, again.

This is my suggestion for 2009.  The BCS should eliminate the man behind the curtain from deciding on who gets to play in the final game.  Is that too difficult?

Also, I'm not asking for the voters to look at the "big picture," but only look past their eye lashes. 

It's pretty obvious that the voters rank some teams low to prevent their opponents from playing a "ranked" team.  The results of the bowl games proved that the voters ranked poorly or listened to the man behind the curtain.

The voters then give their final rankings and pat each other on the back.  However the damage is done.  The "fake" BCS Championship game is about to be played and Bob Stoops is in it again.

Mr. Feldman, is that about how you see it?  Maybe you can solve the puzzle and identify the man behind the curtain.