Playin' At My Crib With My Ball!

"Ya'll gotta come play on our street now!"

Remember when you were a kid playing pick up games in the backyard or at someone else’s home court? Man, those were the days. You would play all over the neighborhood going from house to house. Why, because there was a basic concept that even kids understood. If I play you at your house you then have to come to my house to play! That’s only fair, right?

When your boy was playing on his court he knew of all of the soft spots or just felt more comfortable running up and down the field in his backyard. Typically, the guys playing at home would win and when that would happen the first thing the visiting kid would say was, “let’s go to my crib and this time we’re gonna play with my ball.”

If children can understand that simple concept why is it so difficult for Kirk Hersbstreit and the Boise State Broncos to understand it? Every year the Bronco’s, who are now in the Mountain West Conference, play two big games. One on their home field “ The Blue Turf” and the other on a neutral field with Kirk riding their jock all season long. I can hear him singing his infamous song, “I’ll take Boise State on a neutral field against anybody in the country. What?

Kirk, the last time I checked big time programs always play home and away schedules against big time non-conference opponents. For example, Texas/Ohio State, Florida State/Oklahoma, Miami/Ohio State, USC/Arkansas, Michigan/Notre Dame etc.

I’m not even going to get into the conference schedules that the BCS schools have to play week end and week out. Last year #1 Alabama went on the road to South Carolina and got beat. The following week #1 Ohio State went to Wisconsin and lost. Then #1 Oklahoma traveled to Mizzou only to get upset. They didn’t play in neighboring cities or states. They played those games on the other guys campus in hostile environments.

Last year Boise State played Va. Tech in Baltimore, Maryland not in Blacksburg, Va. That‘s a neutral site and it doesn’t matter how you look at it. I don’t care if the majority of people there were Hokie fans. Playing at a different venue is a road game to the players. If you’ve got to get on a plane, stay in a different hotel, eat at a different restaurant and take a different route to a stadium that isn’t yours, it’s a road game regardless if 70 to 80% of the folks there are cheering for you. It’s called breaking routine! Whether you realize it or not it makes a difference to the players!

So don’t sell me the spoiled bag of apples that Boise State should be in the national title conversation when they go to Atlanta and beat the routinely under performing Georgia Bulldogs next week, who by the way, are ranked #33 in the pre-season depending on which poll you look at! When you get that far down it doesn't matter. You get my point! So they're already not playing a very good team in Georgia but they wanna play them down the street at their cousin's crib and not between the always hostile hedges in Athens.

 Then they’ll do what they usually do, take the week off before they travel to lowly #75 Toledo just like they did last year after the Va. Tech game. Why, do you ask if that’s significant, because it gives the injured players an opportunity to heal before the next game. Smart huh! Yeah, that’s the smoke and mirrors I’ve been telling you about for several years.

You can’t contend for a national title when you won’t play true road games against top ranked programs especially if you play in a “roody poot” conference where the highest ranked opponent #19 TCU gets carjacked by the powers that be back in February. The Mountain West screwed the Horned Frogs out of their home game this year against the Broncos when they decided to move it to the “Blue Turf” in Boise because the conference felt like it was better for the Conference because TCU is going to the Big East after this year!

While we’re at it let’s take a look at the rest of the upcoming Boise State conference schedule. They’ve got #50 Air Force, #82 Colorado State, #38 San Diego State, #111 UNLV, #88 Wyoming and #103 New Mexico! Now tell me after they beat the brakes off of that schedule they deserve to play for the national title when there are 8 teams from the SEC, 5 teams from the Big 10, 3 teams from the Big 12, 3 teams from the PAC 12 and 2 teams from the ACC in the top 25! Not to mention the non-conference match ups that are scheduled like #1 Oklahoma traveling to #6 Florida State on September 17th!

If you think that Boise State should be even in the discussion, you’re way past the point of recreational use and needed to be in rehab yesterday with your shoe strings taken away from you.

Holla At Ya Boy!
Jay Graves
Twitter: @jaygravesreport