Welcome to Bevo’s Fake Nuts, our weekly column about the Texas Longhorns.
They got me.
They got me good.
I was responsibly skeptical. I was appropriately skeptical. I said Texas was going to have trouble with the bulk of the Big 12 schedule. I said the one-point loss to Alabama was the exact kind of thing that could breed complacency. And then I saw Texas beat the third-best team in Conference USA and I said, “Is Texas tough?” I fell for the trap. They lured me in and they went and lost to Texas Tech, their not-really-a-Heisman-candidate-but-called-a-Heisman-candidate fumbling to set up the knockout blow.
DAMMIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I’m hot and cold on Texas. But I’m cold on being wrong. I don’t like it. I especially don’t like it when I’m wrong because of a pivot I made less than one week before the wrongness was proven.
How could they torment the Nuts the most from here? (“Torment the Nuts” is a phrase we should come back to—editor, write it down.)
I think it starts by struggling against West Virginia. Winning, but struggling. Going into the two-point shootout portion of overtime and winning. Making it look like disaster is coming, then going up to Dallas and…winning again in the two-point shootout portion of overtime. Beat Oklahoma, give all the sycophants their opportunity to write about the Heartstoppin’ Horns who play overtime games every week and can evidently win a few. Welcome Iowa State to town and piss me all the way off by winning big, then go win in overtime again at Oklahoma State and again against Kansas State, and then get absolutely blasted back in Austin by TCU.
Ok, that last part wouldn’t torment the Nuts. This has been a helpful thought exercise. It turns out I want Texas to go 7-5. I want them to win the games they should (West Virginia, TCU, Kansas, Baylor), sneak out one they shouldn’t (let’s say Oklahoma State), lose to Oklahoma so I don’t have to hear the hype again and risk falling for it, and lose to the teams to whom I’m sympathetic (Iowa State, Kansas State) before winning big in a crappy bowl so they’re at least hyped enough to make Ewers v. Manning a saga this offseason.
Like the dog catching the mail truck, I know I don’t want Texas to ever actually win it all (and neither does Steve Sarkisian, who’s hopefully been told what happens when you win a national championship in this town, or even just a conference title accompanied by a win in one of your sport’s premier nonconference events). But I do need Texas to stay relevant. We’re in an uneasy dance, Texas and I. They provide me with economic manna, I make fun of them. But I must remember to never again go full believer. Those bastards made a fool out of me.
