I Can't Believe I Cheered For Ohio State

Since this isn't technically a sports blog I don't typically write about sports, but here goes.  I can't believe I'm posting a picture of Ohio State's mascot on my blog.  Truthfully I am only doing it to amuse Sarah as she's a fan.  Obviously their win in the national championship game last night is fueling this post and here is why.

College football is my least favorite sport when ranking the nation's most popular sports.  I think it represents a lot of what is wrong with athletics, especially college athletics, and therefore I choose not to participate.  I did watch the college football playoffs, however, with rooting interest in Ohio State.  Being from the Midwest and Big 10 country (or is it the Big 14 now? I can't keep track anymore.  This is one of many reasons why I don't like college football.), I tend to root for Big 10 schools in national tournaments.  I must say, I have found most OSU fans that I have met to be loathsome and generally unlikeable because of their obnoxious rooting habits (The Ohio State University?  Give me a break.).  They may be a-holes, but they're our a-holes, and in situations like this I will support them. 

With that being said, I would rank SEC-worshiping as even more obnoxious.  I'm not even sure it is the SEC's fault.  I blame ESPN (I could write an entire seperate blog about things that ESPN does that annoy me.  I think I've said that before.)  So I was quite happy when one team after another from the SEC lost in their bowl games while the "mediocre" Big 10 schools continued to win.  Then came OSU's first playoff game against mighty Alabama (Nick Saban = generally unlikeable), where OSU won with their third string quarterback.  Third string!  It is unthinkable that a school from the mediocre Big 10 could beat mighty SEC Alabama with not their backup quarterback, but their backup's backup.

Which set the stage for the title game against Oregon, a team from the Pac 12 that I know nothing about and thus have nothing against.  Presumably they're good - they have the Heisman trophy winner and are in the title game.  And OSU steam-rolled them.  The Buckeyes absolutely trampled them.  The only reason the game was even as close as it was is because Ohio State coughed up the ball four times.  The only thing that looked good about Oregon was their uniforms (Which interestingly enough did not contain green or yellow, which I believe to be the school's colors.  Regardless they were sharp.) and their cheerleaders.  Otherwise this game wasn't even close.

And to think that this new playoff format conjured this much emotion and interest from me for a sport that I don't even care about.  Hopefully this will quite the SEC talk and we can hear about some other teams and conferences for a change.  Then again what do I care?  I won't be paying attention anyway.