I’m struggling to think of an example of this, but I feel like there’s a generic movie and TV scene where the characters are joking around and then one breaks and starts crying his eyes out. Everybody’s having a good time, and then we find out one person has been holding in all of the frustration and all of the disappointment and all of the hurt, and now it’s all coming out.
This week’s college football vibe check, from worst vibes to best:
Caleb Williams and Oklahoma, Together Again
I liked Caleb Williams crying. Not that I wanted him to cry, but it made me think more highly of him. I think a lot of us have been trying to figure Caleb Williams out. A tremendous talent with an even more tremendous publicity machine, Caleb Williams became the rare athlete whose hyperactive media blitz made us know him less. We got to know his dad pretty well, but our only real knowledge of Caleb Williams was what we saw on his field and the anecdote that he likes to sport painted nails. That anecdote provided a little blockade, in a way. It gave the illusion of knowing him, even if we didn’t really know him. Seeing a 21-year-old sob in his mother’s arms after a good-not-great football team took away even more expected glory on what was supposed to be his coronation tour? That helped us get to know him.
Ours is a Lori Loughlin era, one in which personal reward is more and more pedestaled above triumphs of communities, to the point where even the law-abiding parents of this genre send their kids this sort of message: Go get yours, everyone else be damned. College applications are a zero-sum game. The best college athletes are pushed feverishly by media to skip postseason play and focus on professional contracts. In some white-collar workplaces, if you say you care about the work you’re doing and the success of your broader organization, you’ll be looked at as though you have three heads. Parental investment is a great thing in children’s lives, and athletes getting money for their talent and effort is important, and workplaces valuing professional development are conscionable and good. But our societal push against exploitation and our societal fixation on the “success” of kids have been plagued by a shared blind spot: They treat each person as an island unto themselves, ignoring the symbiotic joy that comes from giving yourself to a team or to another broader cause.
I don’t know what Caleb Williams has been hearing from his inner circle, but I know what the broader sporting world has been saying, and I know what the rumors have said is coming out of that circle. Caleb Williams has been told he is excellent, that he is historic, that he is God’s gift to football and can and should revolutionize sports. But on a night when Caleb Williams electrified the Los Angeles Coliseum, continuing his rally after disappointing performances last month against Notre Dame and Utah, Caleb Williams didn’t seem to care that he’d regained his footing in the NFL Draft picture and solidified his Davey O’Brien Award candidacy and overcome adversity to put up gaudy personal numbers. Caleb Williams seemed to care that he lost. Caleb Williams seemed to care that his team lost.
You can tell a guy that he’s so good he should get to be a partial owner of the football team that drafts him. You can speculate that he should sit out the remainder of the season once his national championship dream and repeat Heisman hopes are dead. There’s an important natural instinct in humans, though, and in plenty of other animals. It’s an instinct that’s helped us get this far. This instinct pushes us to care about those around us, and to work with those around us, and to crave collective triumph with the people to our right and left.
Caleb Williams will probably be the first overall draft pick come April.
I don’t think he really cared about that last night.
Halfway across the country, other tears were presumably being shed by Oklahoma Sooners, by either players tucked away in a dejected visiting locker room or fans at home across the state heading out for long, crushed walks. Oklahoma had outgrown Oklahoma State, we were told. Oklahoma was a big, national championship-caliber program. Oklahoma was Dallas, wealth and flash, and Oklahoma State was Skiatook and Enid and a hundred other little towns or places outside of towns, places that don’t get named. Oklahoma was SEC. Oklahoma State was teetering on the edge of mid-majordom.
This all still may be true. Oklahoma is going to make a lot more money than Oklahoma State in the near and medium-term future, and Oklahoma has been making more money in virtually the entire past as well, and Oklahoma wins more than Oklahoma State wins. Oklahoma is entering the most professional of these semi-professional leagues, and they’ve earned that, on the field with their performance and off the field with their amassed following.
I don’t think Oklahoma really cared about that last night.
Kansas State vs. Notre Dame
From the early games, I don’t know who’s the more unhappy. K-State and Notre Dame both appeared to be better than their marquee orange opponents, and while they were the ones trying to pull off dramatic comebacks, it still felt like each gave up some hard-won territory in this unforgiving struggle to climb the college football ladder. I think Notre Dame is angrier. I think K-State is sadder.
Missouri
Speaking of sad.
Missouri did something great yesterday, competing with a team against whom we thought they had no business competing. They also did something unspeakably cruel, which is to show their fans they could beat Georgia and then not even give those fans the dramatic final moment. Missouri broke down the gates in Athens and couldn’t figure out what to do next.
Nebraska
Nebraska fans are probably hardened to this by now, but Michigan State finally got a win yesterday, for the first time since their coach was fired for embarrassing the university by masturbating on a phone call with a woman he and the school had hired to help teach the football team how to stop sexual assault. Who did Michigan State beat? Nebraska, obviously. Of course it was Nebraska. Nobody loses unlosable games like Nebraska. If the NBA really wants to stop tanking, it should start making all the lottery teams play Nebraska. Nebraska is tank-proof.
Boise State
Next to Nebraska in the dejection category: What the hell happened to Boise State? Andy Avalos, what have you done? Yeah, sure, whatever, they went 8–0 in the Mountain West last year. They also lost the conference championship, and they lost to UTEP in the nonconference stuff. And they’re now 4–5. Boise State is 4–5. Boise State has lost five games for the third time since 1998. The second time? Also under Andy Avalos. Some programs have a natural gravity which lifts them to success, but I don’t think Boise State is among them. I think Boise State never got over that line where past success secures a higher natural finish. I think Boise State had a bunch of good stewards, and now it might be going away.
Washington State
Next to Boise State in the 4–5 category: How did Washington State beat Oregon State? Oregon State’s not worldbeaters, we’ll begrudgingly acknowledge that, but we are poking Washington State’s body with a stick and it is not responding.
Texas A&M
I’m not sure I fully understand what’s happening in College Station, and I don’t mean the cult stuff, though I don’t understand that either. I just don’t get why this team isn’t better? And also I don’t know how good they are or aren’t? They could beat Georgia (hypothetical matchup) and I would say, “Oh, sure, that seems right.” They could lose to Jacksonville State and I would say, “Yep, that tracks.” Texas A&M is weird. Again, I’m not referring to the cult stuff, though yes, that does also apply.
Colorado
What I would give to hear someone ask Deion Sanders if the vibes are bad in Boulder.
I think what Colorado is facing here is a Vibe Test. This iteration of Colorado should be a program that makes its own vibes. That was its whole selling point the first three weeks of the season. It overpowered foes with vibes. Now, though, the vibes are bad. So, did Colorado make its own bad vibes? Also, I think a lot of quarterbacks are banged up. I have no doubt Shedeur Sanders is in a lot of pain, but it feels like the Coach Prime Industrial Complex is hitting that angle really, really hard, continuing with the implicit castigation of the offensive line even if the explicit piece is in the past.
Maybe Shedeur is really tough, but if he is, and if he’s still limping that much, should he be in the game? That would imply to me that he is the most injured.
Incarnate Word
You can take G.J. Kinne out of San Antonio, and it will leave Incarnate Word as a pretty mediocre team again. Condolences to those on the bandwagon. I’m assuming you were the ones who built it, which probably makes it hurt all the worse.
Air Force
I don’t get the idea that those who love the Air Force Academy allow themselves to grieve losses in football. I picture the reaction at Air Force this morning to be extra calisthenics, focuses on worldly things, and energy directed at re-engineering some combination of airplanes and wrinkles to the flexbone offense. All of this, though, I would imagine to be accompanied by a flavor of rage. Honestly, it’s a pretty productive way to react to arguably the most disappointing loss in the history of your program.
North Dakota State
Similarly, I don’t think North Dakota State people are too mad about losing to the Jacks again. I think they’re expecting it by now. That isn’t good, but this is not an agitated vibe.
Ohio State, Penn State
Ohio State didn’t lose, but everyone is so ready for Ohio State to lose that a 19-point win in which they only trailed for five minutes is being cast as a scare. Against a 6–3 team! Ohio State went on the road and matched the spread against a solid Big Ten foe and the narrative is, Man, these guys suck. The AP writeup begins, “No. 3 Ohio State has been finding ways to win the close ones all season, and they added another one against a team they have traditionally blown out.” Setting aside the fact the AP cites its own poll in these writeups rather than the CFP Rankings…Ohio State won by three touchdowns! Ohio State was never in danger after their first post-halftime drive!
(Cut to Penn State, in the corner, squeakily yelling, “Yeah! Us too!”)
Texas, Washington, Georgia
So, uh, Texas has a problem. I don’t know how ready Texas fans are to admit that, though. I think where Texas fans are at is that they’re ready to turn on the blame jacuzzi jets at full blast once the second loss happens, but it hasn’t happened yet, and they like to be recklessly optimistic, which in most cases in this world isn’t a bad way to be. The good case for Texas is that Maalik Murphy is the guy who makes the throws he made in the first quarter yesterday, or that Quinn Ewers comes back soon. The bad case is that Maalik Murphy is the guy who makes the decisions he made in the second half yesterday, and that Quinn Ewers is still out a while. The issue for Texas—one Texas should especially know well—is that what we described with Maalik Murphy is a carbon copy of the rap on Jalen Milroe. Alabama had to figure out how to adapt. The probability that Ewers returns makes adaptation less obviously necessary for the Longhorns.
Washington has a problem too, but I don’t think they know it at all. It was an impressive win last night, but the defense looks bad, and we’ve seen enough from other defenses to know it’s possible to not get gashed all night by USC. Michael Penix Jr. threw another bad pick last night, making it continue to feel like we’re headed for one meltdown game. Maybe they keep dodging that moment, or surviving it when it happens (like it did a few weeks back). Maybe they survive all the way to the Pac-12 Championship. Maybe they pull some voodoo and beat Oregon again. But we’re dealing with a lot of maybes with Washington. Penix is good, but he’s very much still a college quarterback. Washington might need him to be a pro.
I still don’t know if Georgia has a problem. One theory says Georgia plays to the level of its competition. One says Georgia has so much talent they can get away with shit. One says Georgia’s inconsistent. One says Mizzou is good. I don’t know which is true, but I love that Lane Kiffin is coming to Athens as a relevant playoff character. Maybe he will shatter Georgia’s mystique, maybe he won’t. The possibility existing says a lot, though, about what this Georgia team has been. Not the strongest vintage.
Sam Houston State
The Bearkats got their first win of the year yesterday, holding off fellow FBS transitioner Kennesaw State (they started the process later so they’re still technically an FCS team), who is also very bad. Happy for you, Sam Houston State.
Alabama
I think Alabama is still dreading what’s to come, but they’ve gotten past some of the worst realistic cases, and they won a really fun one last night. We mentioned this above, with Texas, but Alabama seems to have figured out Alabama. They’ve figured out what they can do with Jalen Milroe and they’re doing that. They aren’t asking him to make so many decisions, they’re encouraging his strengths, and the result is that they spent the second half pulling away from LSU. Milroe limits Alabama’s ceiling, and the offensive line incohesion earlier this year is still loud in the short-term memory, but depending how good the rest of the country is, Alabama might win the national championship. Not all national championships are created equal.
James Madison
I didn’t catch any JMU yesterday but I did see the video of the man (I presume a student back in Harrisonburg) shooting fireworks off his head to celebrate the Dukes getting to 9–0. JMU might be having the most fun of any football team ecosystem in the country right now. JMU is having a fucking blast.
Clemson
Dammit, Tyler. What the fuck, man? Now Clemson gets to do the “we all we got we all we need” and make getting to 5–4 an accomplishment again. You motherfucker, Tyler. It’s not like they’re even including you in their celebratory vibe. You made your favorite team personally hate you. You made the rest of us hate you too.
Montana
Is Montana Back?????????
Oregon, South Dakota State, Lane Kiffin
Yeah, Oregon’s vibing. I don’t have many more specifics but Oregon is vibing right now. Oregon is going to see USC walk in the door next weekend and ask why the energy just got so bad in the room. Oregon is going to try to burn sage in the direction of USC.
South Dakota State? Also vibing. I think South Dakota State might be a top-ten team. In all of college football. Very curious how South Dakota State would do against Mississippi.
Lane Kiffin, as is often the case, just really vibing. No idea if Mississippi is good or bad (that’s part of the South Dakota State question, to be transparent), but I know I like Lane Kiffin. I’m not the first to say it, but that man IS a vibe.
Kansas
Oh these guys had a blast last night. Whoa.
For a while, Kansas was looking good these last two seasons in a cheat code way. Jalon Daniels was simply too cosmically powerful some days for Jalon Daniels to lose. Now Jason Bean is dropping dimes, though? And the receivers are catching them? I am curious how high Lance Leipold can rise. Is Lance Leipold going to win eight Super Bowls and bring peace to the Middle East? He’s only 59, after all.
Austin Peay
The thing about Austin Peay is that they are a bangers-only football team. They only produce bangers. The Governors improved to 2–0 in overtime games and 3–0 in one-score games yesterday, and while they didn’t score 40 for the first time since September 23rd, they did score a touchdown and allow a touchdown in the same final minute of regulation, and that’s basically the same thing. (I thought I was going to have better numbers to go off of. Those numbers do not support my case very well.)
Louisville
I don’t *think* Jack Harlow was there, so how good could the vibes be, but Louisville basically clinched a spot in the ACC Championship yesterday by running Virginia Tech’s underpants up the flagpole. It would be very funny if Louisville’s basketball season began and either 1) everyone stopped paying attention to the very good football team to focus on the very bad men’s basketball team or 2) the bad energy released by Louisville men’s basketball led to Louisville losing out. I don’t want that to happen—I have no quarrel with Louisville—but it would be really, really funny.
Oklahoma State
Not a lot to say here. Happy for you, Pokes. Really happy for you. You achieved the perfect fall day.
