July 29, 2011 — If you follow Alabama or Auburn football with any degree of interest, you’ve by now heard of T-Town Menswear and its gregarious owner Tom, who’s been “dressing players for the Alabama football team for years.”
continue...
Saturday, July 30, 2011
Monday, July 25, 2011
From the Bench
What Has Been Good About Summer 2011?
Robert Shields
It’s summertime and you can tell people are looking for things to talk about when on sports-talk radio they entertain a guy who talked about playing college football on his Playstation 2 (not even a PS3) and how the Hogs are going to win it all according to how he played the video game.
In the absence of no good controversies coming out of SEC media days, I was tempted to write another listing of the best cheerleader schools (#11-20), but you get this column instead.
The theme is, what has been good about this summer?
I’ve enjoyed the KARZ replays of great Razorback football games on Wednesday night. The Miracle on Markham was fun to watch all these years later. It was amazing to look back and wonder how the Hogs won that game with only 50 yards of offense deep into the third quarter and Matt Jones only completing four passes for the game with two of those coming on the game-winning drive. I got mad again seeing the refs flag the Hogs for celebration after the Decori Birmingham game-winning catch. I was so mad I actually attempted to call the Big Red Fifth Quarter Show.
The Tour de France was spectacular this year. I think most of them must be off the juice as nobody was dominant. Yet at the same time, it was one of the greatest tours in a long time. Cadel Evans and Andy Schleck put on a show. Schleck attacking the Col du Galibier 60 km out was one for the history books on Stage 18. Also, what is up in every stage that it never fails someone is dressed up as the devil with a pitch fork?
It just keeps getting uglier and uglier for Ohio State even after having to vacate the Sugar Bowl. The summer started with their coach resigning, and the NCAA will drop the big hammer soon enough. Some Razorback fans probably think vacating is the same as forfeit, and that is fine because in reality it is.
Auburn stays in the news over the recruitment of Cam Newton and mostly due to its own coach not keeping his mouth shut. It was the underlying talk for SEC media days. Wally Hall even wrote his Sunday column about it. It’s hard to explain how Newton’s dad wanted $180,000 from Mississippi State for Cam to play for them, yet he ended up at Auburn. Auburn fans contend he arrived for nothing. This doesn’t jive in the economic reality for some people. An Auburn fan would probably explain it away by saying Newton’s dad must have had a change of heart about wanting money.
Summer always brings some old topics back up, and this summer it’s been conference realignment. Two teams on the list to join the SEC according to callers on radio shows have been Texas A&M and Oklahoma since they were the favorites last year before the Texas Longhorns roped them back into the Big Whatever conference after Colorado and Nebraska bolted. If by chance these two schools ever come to the SEC, I propose they are in the SEC West and Alabama and Auburn are shipped to the SEC East, and then Vanderbilt slips over to the SEC West to balance it at seven teams on each side.
It was fun doing the cheerleading list. It was also one of my most popular columns.
The lack of rain has made it very sunny allowing all of us to enjoy most of your nights to do whatever you want. If you are a big-time high-school recruit, that still means just hanging out at the Gas ‘N Sip.
The preseason magazines make pontificating and arguing with opposing fans fun thanks to their predictions. It helps most of us get through the summer while waiting for football, and the magazines have been good this year. I love the Arkansas Sports 360 preseason magazine since it’s free and it’s done extremely well.
So what has been bad about this summer?
Anthony Oden getting kicked off the team. This will cause some musical chairs now on the offensive line hurting unity as the line has to get reacquainted. There is no other area that requires teamwork like the offensive line. I have a feeling fans are going to be uttering his name well into the season whenever something goes wrong. He is the new Peanut Adams.
Women’s soccer disappointed many people in the end. Soccer is disappointing anyway.
The lack of rain has made the heat sometimes unbearable.
You can fill out the rest of what has been bad. I’m a positive kind of guy.
Send your negatives from the summer to fromthebench@yahoo.com and follow me @rsfromthebench on Twitter to win a chance at a pancake breakfast cooked by me or one dollar determined by me.
end
Robert Shields
It’s summertime and you can tell people are looking for things to talk about when on sports-talk radio they entertain a guy who talked about playing college football on his Playstation 2 (not even a PS3) and how the Hogs are going to win it all according to how he played the video game.
In the absence of no good controversies coming out of SEC media days, I was tempted to write another listing of the best cheerleader schools (#11-20), but you get this column instead.
The theme is, what has been good about this summer?
It just keeps getting uglier and uglier for Ohio State even after having to vacate the Sugar Bowl. The summer started with their coach resigning, and the NCAA will drop the big hammer soon enough. Some Razorback fans probably think vacating is the same as forfeit, and that is fine because in reality it is.
Auburn stays in the news over the recruitment of Cam Newton and mostly due to its own coach not keeping his mouth shut. It was the underlying talk for SEC media days. Wally Hall even wrote his Sunday column about it. It’s hard to explain how Newton’s dad wanted $180,000 from Mississippi State for Cam to play for them, yet he ended up at Auburn. Auburn fans contend he arrived for nothing. This doesn’t jive in the economic reality for some people. An Auburn fan would probably explain it away by saying Newton’s dad must have had a change of heart about wanting money.
Summer always brings some old topics back up, and this summer it’s been conference realignment. Two teams on the list to join the SEC according to callers on radio shows have been Texas A&M and Oklahoma since they were the favorites last year before the Texas Longhorns roped them back into the Big Whatever conference after Colorado and Nebraska bolted. If by chance these two schools ever come to the SEC, I propose they are in the SEC West and Alabama and Auburn are shipped to the SEC East, and then Vanderbilt slips over to the SEC West to balance it at seven teams on each side.
It was fun doing the cheerleading list. It was also one of my most popular columns.
The lack of rain has made it very sunny allowing all of us to enjoy most of your nights to do whatever you want. If you are a big-time high-school recruit, that still means just hanging out at the Gas ‘N Sip.
The preseason magazines make pontificating and arguing with opposing fans fun thanks to their predictions. It helps most of us get through the summer while waiting for football, and the magazines have been good this year. I love the Arkansas Sports 360 preseason magazine since it’s free and it’s done extremely well.
So what has been bad about this summer?
Anthony Oden getting kicked off the team. This will cause some musical chairs now on the offensive line hurting unity as the line has to get reacquainted. There is no other area that requires teamwork like the offensive line. I have a feeling fans are going to be uttering his name well into the season whenever something goes wrong. He is the new Peanut Adams.
Women’s soccer disappointed many people in the end. Soccer is disappointing anyway.
The lack of rain has made the heat sometimes unbearable.
You can fill out the rest of what has been bad. I’m a positive kind of guy.
Send your negatives from the summer to fromthebench@yahoo.com and follow me @rsfromthebench on Twitter to win a chance at a pancake breakfast cooked by me or one dollar determined by me.
end
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Monday, July 18, 2011
From the Bench
Cheaters Prosper in College Football
Trying to Meet Fan Expectations
Robert Shields
In spite anxiously awaiting for the college football season and reading all the preseason publications as they are released, I am always shocked that there is actually a market to publish where some punk attends high school, what team he plays for, and where he might go to college. For starters, there seems to be a fair chance that these kids’ continued enrollment in college and graduation with a degree is less than certain.
Fans, particularly Razorback fans as they really are the dominant fan base in the state, really care about where Johnny “My Head Is Too Big” Smith might enroll because he can run 40 yards in 4.3 seconds. I could get all the excitement if somehow that really mattered in the grand scheme of things.
I could get really excited if their bench-press numbers actually meant something to me and had a real impact on my life or that the 50 touchdowns the hot recruit scored while dating the head cheerleader in high school led to employing more people.
Instead, all these numbers mean is that the kid might be able to score or tackle above average as compared to his fellow high-school punks, and it is still far from certain he will do that at the major college level. Yet there is so much excitement over the athletic accolades of these high school children that it is a year-round industry.
I personally get a much more excited feeling when a friend tells me that his son or daughter has joined the military. This actually does have an impact on my life and improves the lives of others. This person is about to risk his or her life to protect mine. That matters. This person is about to risk life and limb so “Big Head” Smith can still run a football down the field.
Yet there is still no magazine or paper that covers this child’s commitment to you and me. Now that would be a recruiting publication.
Our society seems lost prioritizing a child’s game over other important facts of life. I am a capitalist so I get it’s what the market demands, but somehow I think there is some need to refocus on what is really important. My alma mater winning the national championship should be way down the list.
Most, though, don’t want to roll back the clock 40 or so years and are quite happy with the current product of big football at all levels, and this desire to win it all has introduced corruption in the game never really imagined decades ago. The Ohio State fiasco that ended in their coach’s embarrassed departure is the sign of the times.
There is no doubt this level of desire to win in this child’s game has started to trickle down to the high-school level and the corruption, if it has not already started, will follow soon enough. Some already point the finger at certain schools in Arkansas for blatantly recruiting.
This past week, the New York Times ran a story saying that Auburn, the defending national champion, is still under NCAA investigation. The case is apparently not closed on the Cam Newton pay-for-play scandal.
The kid was cleared because he said that he did not know that his father was shopping him to schools. This huge loophole in the rules allows an out for any player to deny that he knew when things went wrong and maintain his eligibility. Newton’s father was reportedly shopping his son to Mississippi State, yet Cam ended up at Auburn. This left a lot of people wondering how he ended up at Auburn at the end of the recruiting process.
How do we know Auburn is still under investigation? Because its football coach asked an NCAA representative at an SEC coaches meeting when Auburn will know when the NCAA investigation is over. The NCAA rep apparently at first deflected the question, but the Auburn coach continued to push for an answer.
She finally replied that “You’ll know when we’re finished” to the Auburn coach. Then she dropped the bombshell statement, “and we’re not finished.”
If Auburn is found guilty of cheating, the past year will go down as the most corrupt in college football history. USC has had to vacate its 2004 BCS title, Ohio State has voluntarily vacated its 2010 season including the Sugar Bowl, Oregon is under investigation and it looks bad -- and they were the team Auburn faced in the BCS title game.
And now for Auburn, we get the word that the investigation continues.
One thing everyone has seen over time is that if the NCAA is investigating, they hate to spend the resources to come up empty handed. Rarely, if ever, have I heard of an investigation result in nothing.
I leave with this thought, what does it mean as we watch a game that later gets vacated. It’s as if the sport never really exists. So I beg the question again, why do you care so much what these athletes do that it causes men to lie, cheat, and steal in order to meet your expectations?
Send your answer to fromthebench@yahoo.com or @rsfromthebench on Twitter.
end
Trying to Meet Fan Expectations
Robert Shields
I spent part of the non-football interim giving my Razorback preseason prediction for football, my popular ranking of cheerleader squads, and somewhat off-topic listings. Without the constant drama of the past coming from UA athletics and waiting for the arrival of SEC media days, it is so boring this time of year that I actually watch the Tour de France because otherwise I am forced to watch women’s soccer.
In spite anxiously awaiting for the college football season and reading all the preseason publications as they are released, I am always shocked that there is actually a market to publish where some punk attends high school, what team he plays for, and where he might go to college. For starters, there seems to be a fair chance that these kids’ continued enrollment in college and graduation with a degree is less than certain.
I could get really excited if their bench-press numbers actually meant something to me and had a real impact on my life or that the 50 touchdowns the hot recruit scored while dating the head cheerleader in high school led to employing more people.
Instead, all these numbers mean is that the kid might be able to score or tackle above average as compared to his fellow high-school punks, and it is still far from certain he will do that at the major college level. Yet there is so much excitement over the athletic accolades of these high school children that it is a year-round industry.
I personally get a much more excited feeling when a friend tells me that his son or daughter has joined the military. This actually does have an impact on my life and improves the lives of others. This person is about to risk his or her life to protect mine. That matters. This person is about to risk life and limb so “Big Head” Smith can still run a football down the field.
Yet there is still no magazine or paper that covers this child’s commitment to you and me. Now that would be a recruiting publication.
Our society seems lost prioritizing a child’s game over other important facts of life. I am a capitalist so I get it’s what the market demands, but somehow I think there is some need to refocus on what is really important. My alma mater winning the national championship should be way down the list.
Most, though, don’t want to roll back the clock 40 or so years and are quite happy with the current product of big football at all levels, and this desire to win it all has introduced corruption in the game never really imagined decades ago. The Ohio State fiasco that ended in their coach’s embarrassed departure is the sign of the times.
There is no doubt this level of desire to win in this child’s game has started to trickle down to the high-school level and the corruption, if it has not already started, will follow soon enough. Some already point the finger at certain schools in Arkansas for blatantly recruiting.
This past week, the New York Times ran a story saying that Auburn, the defending national champion, is still under NCAA investigation. The case is apparently not closed on the Cam Newton pay-for-play scandal.
The kid was cleared because he said that he did not know that his father was shopping him to schools. This huge loophole in the rules allows an out for any player to deny that he knew when things went wrong and maintain his eligibility. Newton’s father was reportedly shopping his son to Mississippi State, yet Cam ended up at Auburn. This left a lot of people wondering how he ended up at Auburn at the end of the recruiting process.
How do we know Auburn is still under investigation? Because its football coach asked an NCAA representative at an SEC coaches meeting when Auburn will know when the NCAA investigation is over. The NCAA rep apparently at first deflected the question, but the Auburn coach continued to push for an answer.
She finally replied that “You’ll know when we’re finished” to the Auburn coach. Then she dropped the bombshell statement, “and we’re not finished.”
If Auburn is found guilty of cheating, the past year will go down as the most corrupt in college football history. USC has had to vacate its 2004 BCS title, Ohio State has voluntarily vacated its 2010 season including the Sugar Bowl, Oregon is under investigation and it looks bad -- and they were the team Auburn faced in the BCS title game.
And now for Auburn, we get the word that the investigation continues.
One thing everyone has seen over time is that if the NCAA is investigating, they hate to spend the resources to come up empty handed. Rarely, if ever, have I heard of an investigation result in nothing.
I leave with this thought, what does it mean as we watch a game that later gets vacated. It’s as if the sport never really exists. So I beg the question again, why do you care so much what these athletes do that it causes men to lie, cheat, and steal in order to meet your expectations?
Send your answer to fromthebench@yahoo.com or @rsfromthebench on Twitter.
end
Monday, July 11, 2011
From the Bench
Alabama Game Critical
But Shouldn’t Be Overhyped
Robert Shields
A few weeks ago in my column, I made the bold preseason prediction that Arkansas would go 12-0 in the upcoming football season, which includes a win over Alabama, and drew a comparison to the Alabama game being similar to last year’s Georgia game.
The Georgia game was pivotal last year to the great season that ended with a win over Ohio State in the Allstate Sugar Bowl. Everyone knew going into the Georgia game how important it would be. It was going to be tough to win on the road in Athens against a traditional SEC powerhouse.
The Hogs were up to the task as Greg Childs juked a defender and raced the rest of the way to the end zone for the go-ahead touchdown. It was a tight game with a true freshman, Zach Hocker, kicking an important field goal before the half from a very long distance. If the Hogs would have lost that game, last season looks much different.
The same can be said looking into this season. The game on the road at Tuscaloosa will be pivotal. If the Hogs win, they might write their own ticket for the season with the sky as the limit. The Hogs have won in Tuscaloosa before so the task is not impossible.
The Razorbacks will also want revenge after blowing last year’s lead in the fourth quarter at home in Fayetteville. Last year at that point in the season, the team had no running game, holding the lead was slippery, and clock management was impossible. An offense that had to pass almost exclusively to move the sticks became fatal late in the game.
We move to this year. The teams will be much different on both sides. Both teams lost star players. You can bet, though, that Alabama will play great defense. Nick Saban’s teams always do.
The fans have that Alabama game circled in red on the calendar. But here is my warning. Even as I have laid out the importance of the game, it should not be overhyped.
Why? Because the Hogs have traditionally faired poorly in games that really matter, especially outside Little Rock, dating back all the way to 1969 in the Great Shootout.
Time and again, Arkansas got so hyped about the Texas game as being the be-all and end-all of the season -- and almost always lost. Don’t make the Alabama game the equivalency of playing Texas. It’s just another SEC foe who will also come to play really hard.
Vacating Not Enough for Ohio State
Ohio State took the first baby step toward honorability by offering to vacate all of their wins from last season, including the Sugar Bowl. But, it’s only a half-step. The true punishment should come in the form of a forfeit. The only thing that fits is that they take the loss, especially after willfully duping everyone to get to play in the game. Vacating is not enough.
Ohio State’s history book should take the hit, and their records should reflect it thereby knocking down their program’s overall winning percentage. Don’t underestimate the power of impacting marketing when a school likes to point that it’s one of the winningest programs in college football. Making Ohio State forfeit is a way to rectify that claim, especially since they were cheating to make that status.
My advice to Kevin Trainor, keeper of the Razorback record books and thus media guide, is to put all these vacated wins -- Alabama, USC, and now Ohio State -- in the win column for Arkansas.
The final score should be given, but put a “W” beside the game just as was done for the 1993 Alabama game that the Tide forfeited. Pretending the game was not played is stupid. It was played and one side cheated, which should be reflected forever more in the books.
Send your complaints about Ohio State to fromthebench@yahoo.com or hit me up on Twitter @rsfromthebench.
end
But Shouldn’t Be Overhyped
Robert Shields
A few weeks ago in my column, I made the bold preseason prediction that Arkansas would go 12-0 in the upcoming football season, which includes a win over Alabama, and drew a comparison to the Alabama game being similar to last year’s Georgia game.
The Georgia game was pivotal last year to the great season that ended with a win over Ohio State in the Allstate Sugar Bowl. Everyone knew going into the Georgia game how important it would be. It was going to be tough to win on the road in Athens against a traditional SEC powerhouse.
The Hogs were up to the task as Greg Childs juked a defender and raced the rest of the way to the end zone for the go-ahead touchdown. It was a tight game with a true freshman, Zach Hocker, kicking an important field goal before the half from a very long distance. If the Hogs would have lost that game, last season looks much different.
The same can be said looking into this season. The game on the road at Tuscaloosa will be pivotal. If the Hogs win, they might write their own ticket for the season with the sky as the limit. The Hogs have won in Tuscaloosa before so the task is not impossible.
The Razorbacks will also want revenge after blowing last year’s lead in the fourth quarter at home in Fayetteville. Last year at that point in the season, the team had no running game, holding the lead was slippery, and clock management was impossible. An offense that had to pass almost exclusively to move the sticks became fatal late in the game.
The fans have that Alabama game circled in red on the calendar. But here is my warning. Even as I have laid out the importance of the game, it should not be overhyped.
Why? Because the Hogs have traditionally faired poorly in games that really matter, especially outside Little Rock, dating back all the way to 1969 in the Great Shootout.
Time and again, Arkansas got so hyped about the Texas game as being the be-all and end-all of the season -- and almost always lost. Don’t make the Alabama game the equivalency of playing Texas. It’s just another SEC foe who will also come to play really hard.
Vacating Not Enough for Ohio State
Ohio State took the first baby step toward honorability by offering to vacate all of their wins from last season, including the Sugar Bowl. But, it’s only a half-step. The true punishment should come in the form of a forfeit. The only thing that fits is that they take the loss, especially after willfully duping everyone to get to play in the game. Vacating is not enough.
My advice to Kevin Trainor, keeper of the Razorback record books and thus media guide, is to put all these vacated wins -- Alabama, USC, and now Ohio State -- in the win column for Arkansas.
The final score should be given, but put a “W” beside the game just as was done for the 1993 Alabama game that the Tide forfeited. Pretending the game was not played is stupid. It was played and one side cheated, which should be reflected forever more in the books.
Send your complaints about Ohio State to fromthebench@yahoo.com or hit me up on Twitter @rsfromthebench.
end
Tuesday, July 05, 2011
From the Bench
We Got Spirit, Yes We Do (and Hot Girls)!
Robert Shields
In light of the latest hostess intrigue surrounding Auburn as chronicled by the gossip sheet Sports by Brooks, the topic of marketing colleges through the use of hot females comes to mind. What group supports its school the best? Is it the band, rich boosters who like to play athletic director, or the hostesses that lure impressionable high-school kids? I say it is your spirit squads, or as it was known back in my day, cheerleaders.
During the summer, I am notorious for filling my column with an occasional list as do the airwaves for call-in radio shows and lame cable channels. I may forgo this season doing my annual ranking of the best football coaches in the SEC before the football season starts because this list probably has more of a bearing on recruiting and thus ultimately winning.
This week you get my first-ever ranking of who has the best cheerleading group. But I’m going national. No doubt just like in most sports the SEC is in a league of its own, but it’s criminal to leave out other parts of the country who have just as much to contribute. And forevermore it goes without saying Texas A&M has the worst cheerleaders, and the sad point is that it’s done on purpose with malice. It’s sickening. On the other hand, it may be hard for any current cheerleading group to top UALR’s team of very-tight-spandex-wearing cheerleaders of the ‘90s. And they called them “Trojans in Motion.”
Sure this list is subjective, but so is gymnastics. Also be noted, it’s more difficult to move up the list if I saw men participating on the squad. It’s the same reason A&M is the worst. Here is my Top 10 list of cheerleaders based on keen observations of last year’s performances (and as usual my list runs in reverse order). So in the immortal words of Kirstin Dunst, Bring It:
10) Clemson – I have to put at least one school from the ACC on the list because that conference is the next best thing behind the glory of the SEC schools. And if I had to pick one school to represent the conference, it’s Clemson with North Carolina as the runner-up. I like the fact one spirit group is called the Rally Cats. For fans of the Big Ten and Big East, all I can say is that I’m sorry.
9) Auburn – I will keep my opinion of their football team to myself. It should not reflect on their cheerleaders, though. And if Auburn is paying their cheerleaders like their hostesses, they are getting their money’s worth. The uniforms are not the best, but the girls are cute. Plus give them their due for getting their fans into their lame routines. It’s not easy getting such a zealous fan base into sync and these girls do it.
8) Texas – Everything in Texas is bigger, so the Longhorns keep two cheer teams with the Orange squad and the White squad. Just one man’s opinion, but the White squad this past year was superior. This group would be ranked higher but to overcome those uniforms is difficult. The only solution I see is to make them wear the chaps full time. The annoying hook ‘em horns thing is just too much. It’s just criminal the outfits that they make them wear. Again, they also get deductions for keeping guys on the squad. Did I mention when they come out in the chaps it makes up for all of that?
7) Ole Miss – They always take a hit because their school is never really any good and they have dudes on the cheerleader squad, but year in year out they have some pretty girls. The fact that for years they had to hang around the strange-looking Johnny Reb mascot is a testament to overcoming adversity. The best of the Mississippi girls congregate at Oxford and traditionally they are a good looking bunch. Just take a walk through the Grove if you don’t believe me.
6) Arkansas – I often feel very sorry for the Razorback cheerleaders. They have very little to work with these days. They have a band that languishes behind other schools in originality and content. The pep band is often a shadow of its former self from decades ago under Jim Robken. Similarly, the Razorback cheerleaders also are given little original material. I’m a traditionalist and love all the old cheers, but we desperately need something new and that never happens at Fayetteville. Yet with all that holding them back, including males on the team, they never fail in helping get the crowd into the game no matter how hard and loud the advertising on the big screen works against them to get the crowd’s attention. So I give them an A for effort. I doubt any group has to work harder against its own home backdrop to get the fans involved. Would like to see the spandex come out more than once a year for the Christmas elves performance, though.
5) UCLA – They may be the ugly step sisters to the USC cheerleaders, but they consistently rate higher than just about everywhere else. They epitomize the look of California Girls and the baby blue and gold make for cute uniforms. The competition to make this team is as tough as anywhere in the country. But unfortunately because of their sports teams, they are not seen much on television.
4) Kentucky – OK, it’s not fair to leave them off just because they don’t play football. Nor is it fair that this is one of only two schools in the SEC in which cheerleaders are forced to attend men’s soccer. It’s not the girls’ fault. When Ashley Judd shows up at basketball games wearing that tight T-shirt with “Kentucky” across the frontal area, that is enough for me. As far as competitor they are at the top with Central Florida, but this is not a competition.
3) Georgia – They land at number three on my Top 10 list because they finished third in the NCA Collegiate National Championship. Please do not ask how I even know this. Plus, I like their white outfits with the black arms and black G. Also, if you know much about cheering, you know in the state of Georgia it can get pretty crazy. They get another bump in the standing for the number of fun photos on the Internet Georgia girls seem to be involved, but I get it. I like fun too.
2) The USC Song Girls – I’m a traditionalist, and I love that USC sticks with the old-school pleated skirt and long-sleeve sweater with red shoes. They have other more provocative outfits, but they don’t forget their roots. This squad is as pretty a group of people as you will find. As Beano Cook once said, “It’s unfair that the USC Song Girls only appear at USC games. They are a national treasure. They should visit other teams across the country.” The pageantry that they bring to the game is unmatched. When they came to Fayetteville, they never stopped moving the entire game (can’t say the same about Arkansas’ offense that day). At the same time, it’s the one squad that can literally just stand there doing nothing and still get everyone’s attention.
1) Oregon – If there was any debate last year, it ended in the national championship game. This cheer group followed its football team’s rise to the top. The contrast between the Auburn cheerleaders and the Oregon cheerleaders in that championship game was stark. The television coverage seemed to understand that fact quickly, yet at times I think they were also afraid to show them and distract the audience from the game. Their outfits were revolutionary for major college football on that grand of a stage. The outfits took it almost up to the point of lewd, but kept it in the realm of sporty (this is the last fashion comment you will ever hear from me).
A Fox Sports web feature recently claimed that the body temperature of an Oregon cheerleader is 186 degrees, more than double that of the average person. Not sure if that is true, but I don’t see how any Ducks fans ever watch a moment of the actual game. Maybe the football team has to change uniforms every game to draw some of the attention away from the cheerleaders.
Send your list to fromthebench@yahoo.com and follow me on Twitter @rsfromthebench.
end
Robert Shields
In light of the latest hostess intrigue surrounding Auburn as chronicled by the gossip sheet Sports by Brooks, the topic of marketing colleges through the use of hot females comes to mind. What group supports its school the best? Is it the band, rich boosters who like to play athletic director, or the hostesses that lure impressionable high-school kids? I say it is your spirit squads, or as it was known back in my day, cheerleaders.
During the summer, I am notorious for filling my column with an occasional list as do the airwaves for call-in radio shows and lame cable channels. I may forgo this season doing my annual ranking of the best football coaches in the SEC before the football season starts because this list probably has more of a bearing on recruiting and thus ultimately winning.
This week you get my first-ever ranking of who has the best cheerleading group. But I’m going national. No doubt just like in most sports the SEC is in a league of its own, but it’s criminal to leave out other parts of the country who have just as much to contribute. And forevermore it goes without saying Texas A&M has the worst cheerleaders, and the sad point is that it’s done on purpose with malice. It’s sickening. On the other hand, it may be hard for any current cheerleading group to top UALR’s team of very-tight-spandex-wearing cheerleaders of the ‘90s. And they called them “Trojans in Motion.”
Sure this list is subjective, but so is gymnastics. Also be noted, it’s more difficult to move up the list if I saw men participating on the squad. It’s the same reason A&M is the worst. Here is my Top 10 list of cheerleaders based on keen observations of last year’s performances (and as usual my list runs in reverse order). So in the immortal words of Kirstin Dunst, Bring It:
10) Clemson – I have to put at least one school from the ACC on the list because that conference is the next best thing behind the glory of the SEC schools. And if I had to pick one school to represent the conference, it’s Clemson with North Carolina as the runner-up. I like the fact one spirit group is called the Rally Cats. For fans of the Big Ten and Big East, all I can say is that I’m sorry.
9) Auburn – I will keep my opinion of their football team to myself. It should not reflect on their cheerleaders, though. And if Auburn is paying their cheerleaders like their hostesses, they are getting their money’s worth. The uniforms are not the best, but the girls are cute. Plus give them their due for getting their fans into their lame routines. It’s not easy getting such a zealous fan base into sync and these girls do it.
8) Texas – Everything in Texas is bigger, so the Longhorns keep two cheer teams with the Orange squad and the White squad. Just one man’s opinion, but the White squad this past year was superior. This group would be ranked higher but to overcome those uniforms is difficult. The only solution I see is to make them wear the chaps full time. The annoying hook ‘em horns thing is just too much. It’s just criminal the outfits that they make them wear. Again, they also get deductions for keeping guys on the squad. Did I mention when they come out in the chaps it makes up for all of that?
7) Ole Miss – They always take a hit because their school is never really any good and they have dudes on the cheerleader squad, but year in year out they have some pretty girls. The fact that for years they had to hang around the strange-looking Johnny Reb mascot is a testament to overcoming adversity. The best of the Mississippi girls congregate at Oxford and traditionally they are a good looking bunch. Just take a walk through the Grove if you don’t believe me.
6) Arkansas – I often feel very sorry for the Razorback cheerleaders. They have very little to work with these days. They have a band that languishes behind other schools in originality and content. The pep band is often a shadow of its former self from decades ago under Jim Robken. Similarly, the Razorback cheerleaders also are given little original material. I’m a traditionalist and love all the old cheers, but we desperately need something new and that never happens at Fayetteville. Yet with all that holding them back, including males on the team, they never fail in helping get the crowd into the game no matter how hard and loud the advertising on the big screen works against them to get the crowd’s attention. So I give them an A for effort. I doubt any group has to work harder against its own home backdrop to get the fans involved. Would like to see the spandex come out more than once a year for the Christmas elves performance, though.
5) UCLA – They may be the ugly step sisters to the USC cheerleaders, but they consistently rate higher than just about everywhere else. They epitomize the look of California Girls and the baby blue and gold make for cute uniforms. The competition to make this team is as tough as anywhere in the country. But unfortunately because of their sports teams, they are not seen much on television.
4) Kentucky – OK, it’s not fair to leave them off just because they don’t play football. Nor is it fair that this is one of only two schools in the SEC in which cheerleaders are forced to attend men’s soccer. It’s not the girls’ fault. When Ashley Judd shows up at basketball games wearing that tight T-shirt with “Kentucky” across the frontal area, that is enough for me. As far as competitor they are at the top with Central Florida, but this is not a competition.
3) Georgia – They land at number three on my Top 10 list because they finished third in the NCA Collegiate National Championship. Please do not ask how I even know this. Plus, I like their white outfits with the black arms and black G. Also, if you know much about cheering, you know in the state of Georgia it can get pretty crazy. They get another bump in the standing for the number of fun photos on the Internet Georgia girls seem to be involved, but I get it. I like fun too.
2) The USC Song Girls – I’m a traditionalist, and I love that USC sticks with the old-school pleated skirt and long-sleeve sweater with red shoes. They have other more provocative outfits, but they don’t forget their roots. This squad is as pretty a group of people as you will find. As Beano Cook once said, “It’s unfair that the USC Song Girls only appear at USC games. They are a national treasure. They should visit other teams across the country.” The pageantry that they bring to the game is unmatched. When they came to Fayetteville, they never stopped moving the entire game (can’t say the same about Arkansas’ offense that day). At the same time, it’s the one squad that can literally just stand there doing nothing and still get everyone’s attention.
1) Oregon – If there was any debate last year, it ended in the national championship game. This cheer group followed its football team’s rise to the top. The contrast between the Auburn cheerleaders and the Oregon cheerleaders in that championship game was stark. The television coverage seemed to understand that fact quickly, yet at times I think they were also afraid to show them and distract the audience from the game. Their outfits were revolutionary for major college football on that grand of a stage. The outfits took it almost up to the point of lewd, but kept it in the realm of sporty (this is the last fashion comment you will ever hear from me).
A Fox Sports web feature recently claimed that the body temperature of an Oregon cheerleader is 186 degrees, more than double that of the average person. Not sure if that is true, but I don’t see how any Ducks fans ever watch a moment of the actual game. Maybe the football team has to change uniforms every game to draw some of the attention away from the cheerleaders.
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