One of the main issues I have, is that we're dealing with a Sports Illustrated top ten list. It's not just some person's 10 favorite games, this is a well respected sports media entity. To put together such a lousy list, with such overt bias is an example of why so many people are turned off by large media outlets and the journalists working for them. The issue is if you put together a slanted list, fine, just label it accordingly. Let it be know that you're not even trying to be objective. If she'd called it her 10 favorite games of the past 10 years I wouldn't complain. But top 10? That's a load of crap. As per usual, I'm not sure if it's slanted because they want to deceive the reader, or slanted because the journalist is really that blind to their own bias. Either way it's not acceptable, they're getting paid to do this, I expect more.
This is a valid assessment. Let's be clear: the LIST as a whole is pretty awful. I can only see maybe 3 of those games being IN the top ten (to say nothing of their ranking) in the last decade - the Kick Six, last year's national title game, and (possibly) App St-Michigan.
Put another way: I don't for one second believe that the 2010 Iron Bowl is one of the ten best games in the last decade, and it has nothing to do with us losing, either. In fact, that was probably not even the best game played that day much less that year - Nevada knocking off Boise State was a better game even if fewer people saw it.
I key thing here is entertaining. She started off with that in mind I guess, but really the list broke down into two types and that just shows the overall ineptitude. The first 6 were all Big 12 style football games. Every single one included a team from that region (she did after all go to Missouri right?). Not only that, but of the 4 match-ups that included a team from outside the region, 3 of them were won by the Big 12 region team. So, basically she was putting together a top 10 list of Big 12 region games .
Another problem with this list is that unless she's been covering football for those years for SI (and she doesn't look old enough) then what this list REALLY is is "the top ten games I personally saw in the last ten years," which is VERY subjective and presupposes that no exciting games were missed by a particular person. I think your evaluation here bears out that this is precisely what she did.
Then, she changed course. The top 4 were the big bad wolf gets beaten games. Every single one included a top 5 all-time program losing to a team with less prestige (stark contrast since up until then she's left elite programs out entirely). Though, to be fair these games are more what people have in mind when they think of the 10 best games. But, what is her list really? It is the most entertaining list? Not necessarily, if you accept the criteria of the Tulsa game, then how does the 2010 Alabama/Auburn game make it in? It wasn't a high scoring back and forth affair. She just made her favorite games list.
Let's face it: she's probably only watched two Iron Bowls and probably hates Alabama, too.
Ok, we have entertaining but now we have exciting to. I'd agree with the basic notion that those all were exciting and entertaining games. But remember, this is basically a the best game each year list. Not a top 10 for that year, not a top 100 for the past ten years. Even if you give her a break for some acceptable bias, her list just plain sucks. She did a terrible job and it was obviously governed by her bias.
No argument here buddy.
A couple of years ago I was really critical of some article written claiming that Alabama was going to play a very soft schedule. It was just poorly done, a load of crap, based on nonsense. Once again, was the writer inept or trying to skew perspective? I can't say for sure, but I can say that Alabama finished with one of the top SoS that year, so it darn sure was wrong.
I recall that quite well. I also recall making the point that NOBODY - not you nor me nor anyone - can REALLY say how 'soft' a schedule is until after the season is played. Many times a team looks to have a monster schedule and then four opponents on that schedule all have off years at the same time and suddenly it doesn't look so good. In 1984, people rip on BYU for their schedule and while the argument has a certain level of merit, it wasn't all their fault. BYU had scheduled the game with Pitt when a guy named Dan Marino was playing there and Pitt was a national power. How could BYU possibly know that Pitt would implode in 1984 given they were a nine or ten-win team (in 11-12 game schedules) almost every year from 1974 onward, including the 76 championship?
BYU played the Herschel Walker Georgia team in 1982 and only lost on the road by three. They beat the 1984 Rose Bowl champion UCLA team in LA in the regular season. They opened 1985 against BC, UCLA, and Washington in three straight games (combined 1984 record of 30-6 and all ranked in the top ten) and went 2-1 and STILL nobody respected them. Not their fault that Doug Flutie was gone or that Washington wasn't as good as 1984.
If we make a top ten list, we have to agree on some sort of a measure to selection. Now, hers was clearly a 10 favorite list, but she tried to pass it off as a "top" list. What would a top 10 list really look like though? Well, what are we aiming for? Entertainment? Exciting? Best? Memorable? Important? I think you have to go for a mix of all of the above. For instance, Missouri vs. Kansas was important at the time, but was it memorable? I haven't heard anything about that game in years. Was it important? Houston vs. Louisville? East Carolina vs. Tulsa? Not so much. I'm just giving examples, but I think you really get a feeling the games might not really belong there until you get to the top 4, when she completely changes gears.
That's really the issue, and you raise some good points here.
Let's take a GREAT example that nobody will dispute: 2005 Texas/USC. Nobody who loves the game will argue that that was NOT an all-time classic, regardless of where one would rank it (Keith Jackson put it ahead of the 79 Sugar Bowl he thought was the greatest before that).
We'd need a sort of sliding points scale like they used to evaluate Hall of Fame credentials of similar players. Here are some things:
was "everyone" talking about the game the next day?
was it exciting?
did it wring emotion out of people who had no specific rooting interest in the game?
was there a signature play that you could see a picture of years later and know what game it was?
was the final score close?
If the final score was NOT close then was the game close throughout until the end? (looks like a massacre on the scoreboard but was a great game)
were the stakes for the game high? (and what is meant by high stakes, is an SEC divisional title really important other than it gets you into the SEC title game?)
I'll list some in the next post for evaluation by folks.
It's the biggest, more memorable games she left out though that leave the list wanting. I am not arguing all of these games be included, but just look at Alabama games, and you get Alabama vs. Tennessee in 2009, Alabama vs. LSU in 2011 (regular season), Alabama vs. LSU in 2012, Alabama vs. Georgia in 2012, Alabama vs. Clemson in 2015, etc... you broaden that and get both some other huge games and some really entertaining ones. Does the 2015 Arkansas vs. Ole Miss game not meet the criteria she set forth in her first 6 games, a 53-52 OT game with a crazy ending? Come on, that's more entertaining and memorable than a few games on her list for sure. What about 2007 LSU vs. Florida? I'm not Selma so I can't recite a lot of games without looking them up, but you get the point, I could probably make a better top 10 list with just SEC programs.
The funny thing is I agree with everything here EXCEPT I don't think 2009 Alabama-Tenn was by any means an exciting game. It was an exciting (and even frightening) ending, a great last three minutes but the game as a whole was pretty damned boring. Yes, Cody's first block was important but most fans don't even remember it.
Seriously - how many folks here can recite more than 2-3 plays from any time in that game other than the fourth quarter and those are the same three plays: the two blocked FGs and the completion to set it up.
But, it's not just the SEC of course. What about the Big 10. You guys realize she completely left out the Big 10? Her regional bias was so strong though that she only included one Pac-12 team as well. And, it's not like you have to look far for great games. How about Ohio St. vs. Michigan last year? Big implications, OT game, we still remember that one right? It was entertaining and exciting right? Just look at 2012 Notre Dame, they played in multiple exciting and memorable games. I could go on, but it's just a lousy list. I get it, it's her favorite games, but she'd have been better off posting her opinion on a message board than putting that on Sports Illustrated.
Let me build on one of your points here.
How exactly can we decide some of this stuff even setting aside our biases as much as possible?
Consider this: the 1999 Alabama-Florida regular season game was an absolute classic in every sense of the word. The scrappy underdog with a coach on the hot seat against the high octane attack on the road in a place they'd not lost in five years......and the game turns on a botched punt play and a kicker missing the PAT followed by the OTHER kicker first missing and then making the PAT.
But the SEC title game between the same two teams was REALLY just as exciting until the final minutes. Remember, Alabama only led by one score (8 points) with 12 minutes left. Then Milons hit the corner and was gone and Grimes picked off the pass and returned it for a TD - all in about 20 seconds or less of game time. All of a sudden a 15-7 struggle is a 28-7 rout. But that was an exciting game, an important game, and a great game. By contrast, the LSU game with the Marvin Constant injury a month earlier was a BORING game that we merely survived even though the final score was closer.
So what role does the final score play in how great a game was?
My Dad and I used to talk this all the time. You go back and look at the early Super Bowls, almost all of which were total duds. In fact, in the first 30 Super Bowls, there were only SIX decent games: III (mostly historic), X, XIII, XIV, XVII, XXIII, and XXV. You look at SB V ending on a game-winning field goal with a 16-13 score and think, "Wow, that must have been a great game." But Dad said it was absolutely a boring snooze-fest save for the controversial Mackey TD. The Colts had seven turnovers and still won!!! Super Bowl VII - where Miami moved to 17-0 - was another boring game save for Garo Yepremian's gaffe that made it a contest for about three minutes or so.
Even III, famous for Namath's guarantee was NOT a well-played or exciting game, it was just important because it was a shocking upset and flipped the apple cart. I have that game via original broadcast, and it's just.....boring (except for the cigarette commercials which were legal back then).
A lot of fans remember Sid Bream sliding home with the pennant for the Braves 25 years ago and how exciting that was. And it was. But the game BEFORE the bottom of the ninth was absolutely boring. After the first inning, the Pirates only got two runners to third the rest of the game and one scored from second anyway. The Braves only got one runner as far as third base until the ninth - and he got picked off on a double play to end the inning. In fact, in the ninth inning when the Braves scored three runs to win the pennant, they did it on only TWO hits - being helped along by an error and two walks. I'm a Braves fan and enjoyed the win immensely - but the GAME as a whole was not worth seeing again.
But folks remember the moment and so it turns the game into something it wasn't.
The final score of the 1991 Orange Bowl was 10-9. Sounds boring. It was phenomenally interesting and riveting, though.
We can apply this to so many cases and I don't think we'll ever come up with anything resembling her top ten.