Monday, January 03, 2005

Aaron Rodgers, we hardly knew ye

Cal's fantastic, Montana-esque quarterback Aaron Rodgers is heading for a crappy NFL franchise near you. I would love to see him with the Niners (although I would feel really sorry for him), but I'm not sure he's a number one pick (unless the Niners trade down, which is always possible). Although when Cal played USC at Southern Cal, Rodgers clearly had a better game than Matt Leinart, the Heisman Trophy winner.

Anyone who cares knows by now that Texas Tech smoked Cal in the Holiday Bowl, prompting Rhonda to want to bomb Texas off the map and forcing me to regret buying a Holiday Bowl shirt before the game. Rough month for California, getting shafted by the BCS (but prompting clever "BCS - C = BS" shirts), getting their butts handed to them by a team their BCS nemesis Texas beat by 30, and finally, watching Michigan choke down the stretch at Pasadena to the hated Longhorns.

I was scared about Texas Tech but in denial, because I knew two things. Geoff MacArthur's injury against Southern Miss was the beginning of the end - of his Cal career (sadly, injured for both the Insight and Holiday Bowls), of the Rose Bowl hopes, and effectively, Cal's season. Without MacArthur or Chase Lyman, Rodgers wasn't likely to have anyone get open against Texas Tech. And having seen Cal all season, I knew the secondary was their weakness. I'm incredibly surprised no team had exploited that all season, but looking at Texas Tech's stats I knew it was a bad match-up.

How would Cal have done against Michigan and their freshman quarterback? We'll never know. Cal still deserved that Bowl, regardless of the outcomes - bowl games are awarded for season performance, not for which team is better at the end, an injury-ravaged California or a relatively-healthy Texas.

Wait till next year!

No comments: