Alabama Faces Five Opponents Coming Off of Bye Weeks

by Nico2.0 on Jul 24, 2007 10:06 AM CDT in Football

About a month ago, I posted an article critiquing Rivals.com strength of schedule rankings. The main thrust of my argument was that their standards appeared to be applied haphazardly given how similar Florida's and Alabama's schedules are this season. Florida's schedule is ranked 7th nationally and Alabama's is unranked.

Paul Westerdawg of the Georgia Sports Blog linked to my post about this in a post discussing AJC's Tony Barnhart's ranking of the five best out of conference games involving SEC teams. I'm glad Paul linked to it because it prompted a reader of that site, DW, to send us an email with a fact that I was unaware of:

...I believe you left something out that I believe is just as critical as home/away....teams coming off of bye
weeks. Bama is playing 5 teams that will be coming off of bye weeks this year (Arkansas, FSU, LSU, MSU, Auburn). No other SEC team is playing more than 1 team off of a bye except LSU which will play 2 such teams.

We have a bye week the same as LSU, so we will come into that one on equal footing, but it is interesting that nearly half of the teams we face will play us with two weeks' worth of preparation, which could be significant.

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ARGH!!

That makes me wanna pass out.

by gorjus on Jul 24, 2007 10:38 AM CDT reply actions

Yeah...

...I was less than thrilled about the news when I got the email.

Roll Tide!

by Nico2.0 on Jul 24, 2007 10:42 AM CDT up reply actions

that is fine with me...

we are still going to ROLL this year. lsu and the TIDE have off weeks at the same time before the game. The boogs have an off week before us but, we are playing la monroe that week, so no biggie there either. We will be fine, it is 2000SABAN, clubshula is over, the days of watching an out of shape unprepared team are over.

tubs sucks!!!!!!!!!!!!

by BAMA PHREAK on Jul 24, 2007 11:30 AM CDT reply actions

I laugh out loud every time...

...you write "clubshula." I don't know why I find that so funny, but I do.

Roll Tide!

by Nico2.0 on Jul 24, 2007 11:46 AM CDT up reply actions

CLUBSHULA.....hahaha

I can not claim that I made this one up. I saw someone else use it in describing shula's time at the Capstone. I think that the term is completely accurate in describing BAMA under shula's direction. I am glad you like it. You can incorporate it into your vocabulary easily. For example, "Clubshula's teams lacked discipline and focus. 2000SABAN's teams seem to be prepared and in shape." I am just happy to have a coach that truly knows what he is doing. ROLL TIDE ROLL, we are getting closer...

tubs sucks!!!!!!!!!!!!

by BAMA PHREAK on Jul 24, 2007 2:22 PM CDT up reply actions

HA HA HA

2000Saban
Clubshula
PartyPrice
Frannochio
Dumbose

Can't bust on Stallings - he is my BOY!!

"FAILURE" - When your best just isn't good enough

by BamaReturns07 on Jul 24, 2007 6:24 PM CDT up reply actions

those afe some....

good ones. Stallings was the last guy that really knew how to handle this poisiton up to now with 2000SABAN. I like the partyprice one, sums it up pretty well. RTR, we are getting closer...

tubs sucks!!!!!!!!!!!!

by BAMA PHREAK on Jul 25, 2007 11:41 AM CDT up reply actions

it sucks but....

good teams win big games....period. those are 4 (out of 5) tough games no matter what the situation. so i don't think that will cause any of those games to go one way or the other.

by gerry dorsey on Jul 24, 2007 12:52 PM CDT reply actions

Week Off

Would be interesting to see if this is actually an advantage or not, statistically. IT makes sense on the surface that 2 > 1, therefore, 2 weeks to prepare is an advantage. But in the thrust of a season, I'm not so certain it's that cut and dry. That's up to someone else to decipher i guess.

Whatever the case, it is obviously horribly unbalanced, and difficult to believe the folks in charge of conference scheduling allowed it.

by crbama on Jul 24, 2007 1:32 PM CDT reply actions