SEC Football Year in Review with Barrett Sallee

Were you mad about anything that was said before the season, and do you demand accountability?

Did you think one of those silly preseason predictions would fail miserably and I'd never accept responsibility for steering you in the wrong direction?

Was one of those picks so awful that you laughed out loud for days, only to find out that it wasn't as crazy as it sounded?

Well, this article is for you.

As has been the case for many years, Christmas brings the gift of accountability in my favorite article to write: the "Year in Review" (aka: "end-of-the-season accountability").

The Good: Alabama's Run to the Playoff

While everybody was fawning over Ohio State, the Baylor-TCU rivalry and the possibility of Auburn stepping back into the national title picture before the season, I went with "old reliable."

The Alabama Crimson Tide.

Not only did I nail the exact seeding for the Crimson Tide (video above), but I picked them to win the national championship in our preseason preview and record predictions.

Sure, I got the team Bama lost to wrong because Texas A&M quarterback Kyle Allen decided he wanted to turn into a pick-six machine against the Crimson Tide. But head coach Nick Saban and offensive coordinator Lane Kiffin brought along quarterback Jake Coker nicely, Derrick Henry ran all the way to a Heisman Trophy and the Tide secondary became a force rather than a liability.

Yes, I will pat myself on the back because picking Alabama this summer—after two straight bowl disappointments—was going out on more of a limb than it seems right now.

The Bad: Tennessee Winning the SEC East

I'll admit it, I was a big part of the Tennessee bandwagon speeding wildly out of control last offseason. 

The love for the Vols is apparent in the video above, and I picked them to win the SEC East with a 10-2 record in our schedule prediction video.

Whoops.

In my defense, had it not been for a late-game fade against eventual Big 12 champion Oklahoma in a double-overtime loss in Week 2 and one 4th-and-14 conversion by Florida in its rivalry game with the Volunteers late in September, that record would have been spot-on and head coach Butch Jones would have taken his team to the SEC Championship Game.

But we aren't playing horseshoes, and "almost" doesn't count.

Maybe next year, Jones will remember not to coach scared for the first half of the season and the Vols will make their first conference-title game since 2007. In the SEC East, there's no reason they shouldn't be there.

The Good: Georgia's Offensive Struggles

Remember when former Georgia offensive coordinator Mike Bobo was a lightning rod for criticism and new offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer was supposed to come in from the NFL and lead Georgia to the next level?

I do, because I heard about it all offseason from an angry Bulldawg Nation that couldn't believe what was said in the video above about Schottenheimer being the wrong guy to run the offense for former head coach Mark Richt. I picked the Bulldogs to go 9-3 (ignore the part about Richt not being on the hot seat, please) rather than truly contend for the division title, and now the program is facing an offseason loaded with issues.

The team canned Richt, Georgia's offense averaged just 187.1 yards per game through the air and now 5-star prospect Jacob Eason is being counted on to be a savior from the moment he sets foot on campus.

It is OK to blame Schottenheimer, because things began unraveling from the moment Richt hired him.

The Bad: Texas A&M Deserves Respect

Jonathan Bachman/Associated Press

Texas A&M head coach Kevin Sumlin

I'll admit it, I fell into the trap.

When Texas A&M finished the first month of the season undefeated, I bought in.

After all, the defense looked solid under first-year defensive coordinator John Chavis, quarterback Kyle Allen looked like a star and the Aggies were running the ball way more effectively than they had in years past.

Then October hit.

Allen went into an October tailspin (a common occurrence under offensive coordinator Jake Spavital), the running game's success disappeared and the Aggies sputtered to a point where Allen and fellow 5-star quarterback Kyler Murray both transferred.

No more. Never again will I buy into Texas A&M until it's playing in a game in November with division-title implications.

The Good: LSU, the Paper Tiger

LSU ran the table for the first two months of the season, but nothing was different about this Tigers team than the one that was offensively challenged last year, to the point where yours truly and colleagues Adam Kramer and Michael Felder spent the majority of the three-minute, 52-second video above essentially laughing at the absence of a passing attack from head coach Les Miles' crew.

In the schedule prediction video, 8-4 was the predicted record, and that perhaps would have been a bit generous, had it not been for Auburn and Texas A&M both underachieving this year.

As we saw during the whole Miles debacle at the end of the season, the administration is fed up with the lack of a balanced passing attack. If Miles can't figure it out next season, three years of star running back Leonard Fournette will have essentially been wasted in Baton Rouge.

The Bad: Mississippi State's 'Flash in the Pan'

Consider this an apology to Mississippi State head coach Dan Mullen. 

I was wrong.

In the video above, I picked Mississippi State to go 6-6 and lose to every SEC West opponent it would face. Instead, the Bulldogs beat two divisional foes (Auburn and Arkansas), posted an 8-4 record, discovered another weapon outside in Fred Ross and produced the second-best red-zone defense in the SEC (39.53 percent of opponents' trips through the red zone resulted in touchdowns).

It's going to be a challenge again for Mullen, because star quarterback Dak Prescott won't be walking through that door for fall camp. But the floor of the Mississippi State program has been raised to a point where seven- or eight-win seasons are the expectation, regardless of personnel.

The Good: Chad Kelly's Success

Stacy Revere/Getty Images

Ole Miss QB Chad Kelly

Ole Miss quarterback Chad Kelly was a giant question mark for head coach Hugh Freeze and the Rebels entering the season.

The former Clemson and East Mississippi Community College signal-caller had a tumultuous career prior to his arrival in Oxford, but as I predicted in August, he wound up being one of the SEC's best.

He threw for 3,740 yards and 27 touchdowns, rushed for 427 yards and 10 touchdowns and helped lead the program to its second straight New Year's Six bowl berth.

How good is Kelly? He's keeping his options open after his successful junior campaign. According to Tim Graham of the Buffalo News, Kelly has put his name in the hat to be evaluated for the NFL.

That's amazing considering he was in a three-way battle for the starting job just a few months ago.

The Bad: Joshua Dobbs' Heisman Campaign

Every offseason, we write stories on dark-horse Heisman candidates in which the term "dark horse" gets completely ignored.

By definition, these picks are supposed to be shots in the dark.

My shot missed, badly.

I chose Tennessee quarterback Joshua Dobbs as my Heisman dark horse back in January, based on the video game statistics he should have put up in 2015. That simply didn't happen.

While Dobbs was solid in leading his team to an 8-4 record, his 2,125 passing yards weren't anywhere close to where I thought he'd be. Head coach Butch Jones was reluctant to trust him through the air until midway through the Georgia game, and Dobbs was more of a care-taker than a difference-maker.

The Ugly: Jeremy Johnson, the Next Cam Newton

This is a double-whammy of ugly, because not only did I whiff on Ohio State quarterback J.T. Barrett winning the 2015 Heisman Trophy (or, you know, even simply winning the job out of fall camp) in the video above, but my next guy up was Auburn quarterback Jeremy Johnson.

Yeah, Johnson was benched after Week 3 following one of the ugliest starts to the season we've seen in recent history.

Not only that, but I doubled-down on the Johnson hype right before the season in a feature on him with the headline "The next Cam Newton."

"

Auburn QB Jeremy Johnson: The Next Cam Newton? http://t.co/G9S2PtN6PF pic.twitter.com/FMfDYgibVh

— Barrett Sallee (@BarrettSallee) August 28, 2015"

My bad.

To all of you who retweet that story at opportune times, keep doing it. I deserve it.

Merry Christmas.

Quotes were obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted. Statistics are courtesy of cfbstats.com, and recruiting information is courtesy of 247Sports.

Barrett Sallee is the lead SEC college football writer and national college football video analyst for Bleacher Report as well as a host on Bleacher Report Radio on SiriusXM 83. Follow Barrett on Twitter @BarrettSallee.