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[themeatlife]

Oscar Cram Session 2024 - Watching the Academy Awards Best Picture Nominees

In 2023, there was a unique opportunity brought about by the Streaming Wars and viewing opportunities post-pandemic to be able to watch most of the Best Picture nominees for the Oscars. Last year, I viewed and reviewed 8 of the 10 nominees due to their availability on streaming services. I later saw Avatar: The Way of Water as the 9th nominee I viewed - without going into a review, I rate it a 7/10. Solid entertaining flick. I have yet to watch The Fabelmans.

For this year, there were less of them available to stream - 6 of the 10 Best Picture nominess are out on streaming right now. While there are less, I still took the opportunity to watch the ones that were available. Two of the nominees I actually got to see in the theaters - Barbie and Oppenheimer. I have participated in the "Barbenheimer" phenomenon last summer. I viewed the rest on streaming. For the ones that aren't out on streaming yet, I'll hit those up later. Here are the nominees for the Academy Award for Best Picture: American Fiction (Theaters/VOD) Anatomy of a Fall (Theaters/VOD) Barbie (Max) The Holdovers (Peacock) Killers of the Flower Moon (Apple TV+) Maestro (Netflix) Oppenheimer (Peacock) Past Lives (Paramount+/Showtime) Poor Things (Theaters/VOD) The Zone of Interest (Theaters/VOD)

I'll now review each one that I viewed, listed in alphabetical order. SPOILER ALERT, I will be lightly spoiling plot details of each of those movies.

Barbie (Max)

the Meat Life Rating - 8/10

Barbie was the highest grossing movie of 2023 at $636 million domestic and nearly $1.5 billion worldwide. It was a phenomenon at the box office. Directed by indie darling Greta Gerwig and cowritten by Gerwig and her husband Noah Baumbach, Barbie is a witty interpretation of the world famous doll. Margot Robbie as a producer and as the film's title star brings this doll to life as a story of a woman trying to discover herself in the real world and the Barbie world. It is very much in the vein of many of Gerwig's work as a director and actor (if you liked Barbie, I recommend Lady Bird and Frances Ha - both very similar in many respects). It is goofy and fun while also being very introspective into how modern women have to navigate the world today. And Ryan Gosling really steals the movie in his hilarious portrayal of Ken. Ignore the conservative backlash, this movie has a good message to young girls and women and is fun.

The Holdovers (Peacock)

the Meat Life Rating - 8/10

A new Christmas classic? I think so! The Holdovers has us look at Paul Giamatti as a cranky teacher tasked to watching over kids at a prep school that have to stay over the Christmas break. Great performances from Da'Vine Joy Randolph and Dominic Sessa. It is funny and dramatic. A look at a man looking back at past regrets and a student looking at his unknown future. The ending will tug at the heartstrings. Also love the old school vibe with the older era logos and music in the opening credits as well as the altered picture quality - really gives an older movie feel. Very much enjoyable, just felt weird because I watched this after the Christmas season.

Killers of the Flower Moon (Apple TV+)

the Meat Life Rating - 7.5/10

I want to say this upfront: this is not fun to watch. And that's kind of the point of the movie because it is an uncomfortable subject - looking at a string of murders of members of the Osage tribe in Oklahoma in the 1920s. You very much feel all three and a half hours of this film. This is probably not in Scorsese's top 10 films, but it is done very well and is a great look at the Osage community during that era. Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro propel the story and Lily Gladstone's performance was exceptional. There has been a sort of Native American surge of content in entertainment in recent years with this film, FX/Hulu's Reservation Dogs (excellent show), and Disney+/Marvel's Echo. I would recommend checking all those out.

Maestro (Netflix)

the Meat Life Rating - 7/10

This is the first of a pair of bio-pics on this nominee list. In this modern era of film, it is challenging putting together a compelling biography that shares the story of the real person as is also entertaining. Bradley Cooper plays dual roles of directing Maestro and playing Leonard Bernstein in the movie. There are artistic choices that I respect like the 4:3 aspect ratio for the earlier eras depicted in the film, the black and white in the first third and technicolor in the middle third of the film. Carey Mulligan's performance as Felicia Montealegre carries the film. It's a bit unfair to compare, but I feel 2022's Tar was a slightly better film. There are some really strong scenes in Maestro though, and all the music scenes are great with a good sound system.

Oppenheimer (Peacock)

the Meat Life Rating - 9/10

This is the favorite right now to win the Oscar for Best Picture. Oppenheimer is the second bio-pic on this nominees list. The favorite to win Best Picture, Oppenheimer was a surprise box office behemoth grossing $329 million domestic and nearly $1 billion worldwide. Definitely benefitted from the Barbenheimer phenomenon over the summer, particularly because this film is Rated R. I will probably visit the Christopher Nolan filmography soon, but Oppenheimer is definitely toward the top of the list. This film has got a huge ensemble cast. I think the film benefits from the strength of the performances of that ensemble. That being said, it is nice to see Cillian Murphy shine portraying the title character/person over the course of decades shown in the film. Nolan expertly paces this film, so you actually don't really feel the 3 hour run time. Oppenheimer is kind of split into three parts - a J. Robert Oppenheimer origin story, the assemble the team and execute of the Manhattan Project during World War II, and a court drama in Robert Downey Jr's Lewis Strauss Cabinet appointment hearing. Great film!

Past Lives (Paramount+/Showtime)

the Meat Life Rating - 8.5/10

Past Lives is probably my favorite of the bunch that I watched. It is a look at a couple who grew up together in South Korea as teenage friends who get separated and reunite in person 24 years later in New York. It is a great story about immigrating, love, and longing and the Korean concept of "in-yun." It is a fairly unconventional take on a romantic film. When my brother described this film to me before I saw it, he said to prepare for a lot of crying. Most of the way through the film I was fine, but then that final scene gets you. You also get great scenic shots of New York City in the final third of the film. This is the director Celine Song's first feature film, and what a great debut it is. Big time performance for Greta Lee in the lead character Nora.

Those are the Oscar Best Picture nominees I have viewed. I think my next couple of entries will be movie based as well, ranking the Christopher Nolan filmography and a look at Dune Part 2 (once I get to see it).

Below are the rest of the movie posters of the nominees I did not view.

Enjoy the movies and enjoy the Oscars on Sunday!

[themeatlife]

the Meat Life College Football Preview Part 2 - 2023 Season Preview

Week 0 of the 2023 College Football season is upon us! The offseason was full of conference realignment news, but we are finally going to get some actual football. It will be the final season of the four-team playoff, with next season welcoming a massive 12-team playoff. This will likely also be the final season of the Pac 12 athletic conference, featuring a loaded conference race that should be interesting all year.

Per usual, I'll go over some Heisman candidates, some Power Five Conference predictions, the College Football Playoff predictions, and to close out the outlook for the Oklahoma Sooners this season.

Heisman Hopefuls

The Frontrunner: Caleb Williams - QB USC The Contenders: Michael Penix Jr - QB Washington, Drake Maye - QB North Carolina, Marvin Harrison Jr - WR Ohio State, Blake Corum - RB Michigan, JJ McCarthy - QB Michigan The Darkhorses: Jordan Travis - QB Florida State, Quinn Ewers - QB Texas, Sam Hartman - QB Notre Dame the Meat Life Prediction: Michael Penix Jr - QB Washington

I respect Caleb Williams' talent. He has been by far the most talented QB in the country. But a lot of factors against him here. There has only been Archie Griffin of Ohio State as a repeat winner of the Heisman and that was almost 50 years ago. Also, I'll touch on this later, but Williams and USC are in probably the most competitive conference race in college football this year.

I like Washington's offense with Penix as the triggerman and I think Washington's defense will outperform USC's defense. As much as the QB position isn't related to the defense, the team's success is directly tied to a Heisman candidate's chances to win. And I'm banking on Washington in the Pac 12.

The other candidates, I think Drake Maye will have a great year statistically. Marvin Harrison Jr is going to kill defenses in the Big Ten like he did last year. And the two Michigan guys will get a mention because I think it might be a special year for Michigan this year. I threw Jordan Travis on there as a darkhorse because there's a lot of hype behind him and Florida State. Also Quinn Ewers is on there just to cover my bases. Personally I think Texas might plateau but there will be hype behind Ewers early, especially if there is a good showing against their Week 2 matchup with Alabama. Notre Dame have transfer QB Sam Hartman from Wake Forest providing a lot of experience and big play potential.

Power Five Conference Predictions

ACC

The Frontrunner: Florida State Seminoles The Contenders: Clemson Tigers, North Carolina Tar Heels The Darkhorse: Miami Hurricanes the Meat Life Prediction: Florida State Seminoles

I forgot and most people might have forgotten that Clemson actually won the ACC last year. With the coverage of their offensive struggles, you wouldn't know it. I listed the Seminoles as the frontrunners though, because the national rankings have them ahead of Clemson and FSU has the proven QB returning in Jordan Travis. Clemson will be moving to sophomore QB Cade Klubnik after DJ Uiagalelei transferring to Oregon State (more on that later). Klubnik had mixed results, performing well against UNC in the ACC Championship game but throwing 2 INTs against Tennessee in the bowl game. So I think this will be Florida State's year to win the ACC.

Drake Maye might have a special year statistically for North Carolina, but UNC's defense might hold that team back from winning the conference. And then there is the U. Will HC Mario Cristobal figure things out this season? I think they will improve but not enough to win the conference. With the ACC going divisionless, it gives Miami less of a chance at a conference championship game berth.

Big Ten

The Frontrunner: Michigan Wolverines The Contenders: Ohio State Buckeyes, Penn State Nittany Lions The Darkhorse: Wisconsin Badgers the Meat Life Prediction: Michigan Wolverines

This could be a special year for Michigan. They have won the Big Ten and beat Ohio State back to back years. They have gone to the playoff the last couple years. Now, it'll get interesting with the self-imposed suspension of HC Jim Harbaugh in the non-con schedule for supposed NCAA recruitment violation (Google Jim Harbaugh cheeseburger, good stuff), but I think they will be fine. It is Michigan's conference to lose, and I don't think they will come close to losing it.

Ohio State, once a consistent winner against Michigan, now is a question mark in their biggest game. and the other big contender Penn State usually performs well against Ohio State but struggles against Michigan. Ohio State also has to replace CJ Stroud at QB - they have yet to name the successor. Whoever they name will have tremendous WRs to throw to led by Marvin Harrison Jr.

I put Wisconsin as a darkhorse, I like new HC Luke Fickell. They will be super interesting because they will be installing a new offense with transfer Tanner Mordecai at QB. Mordecai started his college career at OU but made his bread throwing for thousands of yards at SMU. The Big Ten still has divisions, so Wisconsin already rules the West division and will make things interesting in the conference championship game.

Big 12

The Frontrunner: Kansas State Wildcats The Contenders: Texas Longhorns, TCU Horned Frogs, Oklahoma Sooners The Darkhorse: Texas Tech Red Raiders the Meat Life Prediction: Kansas State Wildcats

Is it wild that the Big 12 has had three different winners in the last three years? And they also had a team in the national title game and it wasn't the school that won the conference. For years of Oklahoma dominance, it has been kind of fun watching the conference race the past few years.

As far as Kansas State, they will have QB Will Howard do his best Collin Klein impression (with Klein as his OC!), especially since RB Deuce Vaughn has moved on to the NFL. They have four returning offensive linemen and a ton of experience back on the defense, so they look good to repeat.

TCU was that team in the national title game last year, getting waxed by Georgia. But before then they had a magical season with QB Max Duggan last year. Their biggest question will be replacing Duggan, possibly with Chandler Morris who Duggan replaced early in the season due to injury.

Texas is a contender but I honestly have my doubts. Superstar RB Bijan Robinson moved on to the NFL so it's QB Quinn Ewers' show. Ewers declined in performance when they ran Robinson less last season. Texas has had only one 10-win season in the ten years since Mack Brown was fired and HC Steve Sarkisian has never won 10 games in his coaching career. That can change, sure. But Texas' problem in the post-Mack Brown era has always been performing against teams they are supposed to win against. The big games they are always up for, but the smaller stage they usually have struggled.

I'll get to Oklahoma at the end of my entry.

Pac 12

The Frontrunner: USC Trojans The Contenders: Washington Huskies, Utah Utes, Oregon Ducks The Darkhorse: Oregon State Beavers, Colorado Buffaloes the Meat Life Prediction: Washington Huskies

What a shame. This could be the best season of football in the history of the Pac 12. This could also be the last season the Pac 12 ever plays, with 8 of its members leaving after this season and the future of the rest of the teams in limbo. As far as the football, this conference probably has the most QB depth in the country with Caleb Williams, Michael Penix Jr, Bo Nix, DJ Uiagalelei, and Shedeur Sanders. I picked the Huskies to win as discussed in the Heisman conversation.

I'm probably biased against USC, but they relied heavily on their defense getting turnovers while getting shredded for big yards. That philosophy isn't really sustainable, so I think it might come back to bite them, especially in the big games. USC couldn't beat Utah in two tries last season and the Utes are the defending champs. Utah could be in trouble early this season though, with the health status of QB Cam Rising in doubt the first few weeks of the season. Also quietly QB Bo Nix is having a renaissance and should push the Ducks in contention this year.

I put in Oregon State and Colorado in the darkhorse, one because the Pac 12 is going divisionless for their last year, and two because of the interesting storylines. Oregon State will be starting QB DJ Uiagalelei, freshly transferred from Clemson. The new scenery could be good for him. And I cannot mention Colorado without new HC Deion Sanders. He resurrected Jackson State in his short tenure there, and is planning to do the same in Colorado. They might not be great this season, but it'll be entertaining to see how far they go.

SEC

The Frontrunner: Georgia Bulldogs The Contenders: Alabama Crimson Tide, Tennessee Volunteers, LSU Tigers The Darkhorses: Texas A&M Aggies, South Carolina Gamecocks the Meat Life Prediction: Georgia Bulldogs

Some of the contenders have a lot in common, breaking in new QBs.

The defending conference champ Georgia has the most talent in the toughest conference in America, but they have to replace QB Stetson Bennett who finally graduated and moved on to the NFL. Carson Beck was named the game 1 starter and he'll have a superb supporting cast including all-world TE Brock Bowers. It will be a grind especially getting Tennessee on the road this season, but Georgia is in the driver seat.

Alabama will still have a talented squad, but they will also be breaking in a new QB as Heisman winner Bryce Young has moved on to the NFL as well. HC Nick Saban seems pretty chill for someone breaking in a new QB. Tennessee will also be breaking in QB Joe Milton to replace Hendon Hooker in HC Josh Heupel's high powered offense. It will be year 2 for HC Brian Kelley and LSU, fresh off an SEC championship game berth. They will be a force again.

I put Texas A&M as a darkhorse because of the talent. But they have a similar problem that Texas has where 10 wins are rare and it seems they can only get up for the big games. South Carolina also a darkhorse. I like HC Shane Beamer a lot and they have QB Spencer Rattler coming back after a strong second half of the year last season.

College Football Playoff Predictions

The Frontrunners: Georgia Bulldogs, Michigan Wolverines, Ohio State Buckeyes, Alabama Crimson Tide The Contenders: LSU Tigers, Tennessee Volunteers, USC Trojans, Washington Huskies, Penn State Nittany Lions, Florida State Seminoles, Clemson Tigers The Darkhorses: Kansas State Wildcats, Texas Longhorns, Texas A&M Aggies, Utah Utes, Oregon Ducks, Notre Dame the Meat Life Prediction: Semifinal teams - Georgia Bulldogs, Michigan Wolverines, LSU Tigers, Washington Huskies Championship game - Georgia vs Michigan Champion - Michigan

This may sound crazy given what two-time defending champion Georgia has done, but I think it is Michigan's year. Harbaugh will give a big eff-you to the NCAA by winning it all. They have the most experience in the key positions, particularly JJ McCarthy at QB. They will lean heavily on their RBs Blake Corum and Donovan Edwards. I just think it's time. And for Georgia, it is hard for a team to win three championships in a row - something that hasn't been done since Minnesota in the 1930s. I think Alabama will lose against Georgia in the SEC championship game, catapulting LSU into the CFP. And I'm big on Washington out of the Pac 12.

The 2023 Outlook for the Oklahoma Sooners

In the aftermath of getting burned by Lincoln Riley leaving to coach USC, 2022 was rough for Oklahoma. HC Brent Venables salvaged a recruiting class and got some key transfers but ultimately had a 6-7 season, something that has become very rare for the Oklahoma program. The Sooners just didn't know how to finish games off. In five of those losses were by one score, two of them having the lead at one point in the fourth quarter.

If they are able to figure out how to close games and keep QB Dillion Gabriel healthy (the two games he missed due to injury were blow out losses to TCU and Texas), the Sooners will improve. Now, they have a more capable backup QB in freshman Jackson Arnold, so that should open things up a little bit for Gabriel. Personnel wise, they do have more depth elsewhere as well, particularly at RB (Marcus Major and Javontae Barnes joined by Kalib Hicks and Gavin Sawchuk) and offensive and defensive lines. They will probably have a depth issue at WR replacing Marvin Mims, although they still have Jalil Farooq, Drake Stoops, and Gavin Freeman.

Compared to previous seasons, the schedule does look a little on the weaker side with Arkansas State, SMU, and Tulsa in the non-con and then Big 12 newbies Cincinnati, UCF, and BYU.

If we see improvement, I see the Sooners go 9-3 and contend for a Big 12 Championship Game berth. I would consider that a success and a good season. These things need to be incremental in some cases, and since they are building a foundation over time, I'm willing to be patient. If the Sooners get to 10+ wins, I would consider that beyond expectations and it will be a great building block going into the SEC next year.

But I completely hope they win the Big 12 on their way out of the conference. Let's grab that trophy back!

To the new season! Cheers!

BOOMER SOONER!

[themeatlife]

the Meat Life College Football Preview Part 1 - Conference Realignment and the Fall of the Pac 12

It’s the summer 2010. The Big 12 is reeling, having just lost Nebraska to the Big Ten. At this time, there were rumors that the Pac 10 was gunning to add Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Colorado, from the Big 12. Ultimately that move to make the Pac 10 the first 16 team superconference derailed. The Pac 10 wanted to control third-tier broadcast rights, while Texas wanted its own third-tier network. Colorado was the only one out of that original Pac 10 move to go out west in 2011. Texas A&M and Missouri announced they were leaving for the SEC to begin in 2012, the rest of targeted Big 12 schools stayed, Texas got the Longhorn Network from ESPN, and the Big 12 added West Virginia and TCU to get to 10 teams.

In the background of those things, the Big East dies as a football conference. Then things stabilized for a while.

Fast forward to the summer of 2023. The Pac 12 has USC and UCLA for one more season before their move to the Big Ten. First Colorado and then Arizona, Arizona State, and Utah announced they will move to the Big 12 in 2024. And then the nail in the coffin, Oregon and Washington announce their move to the Big Ten in 2024 as well. A once proud Pacific 12 Conference fell to four schools, with little options left for the remaining schools. 

From a possible superconference to near oblivion, the Pac 12 has had a rough go at it this summer. I declared years ago that the Big 12 would die, but I was wrong. I had the wrong conference. The other Power Conferences left the Pac 12 for dead.

So for now, here is what the Power Conference landscape looks like for 2024:

How did we get here?

2021 - Red River to the SEC, Big 12 Solidification

In the fall of 2016, the Big 12 explored options for expansion. The Oklahoma president at the time David Boren was bullish on expansion, wanting to make sure that the conference that Oklahoma was housed was secure in their future. In the wake of six years before, who could blame him. Ultimately the conference decided against expansion, but its research in candidates proved helpful later.

The first domino to fall in this current conference realignment era was in the summer of 2021, it was initially leaked but then confirmed that Oklahoma and Texas would leave the Big 12 for the SEC at the end of the Big 12 grant of rights deal in 2025. They would move that up a year to 2024.

I haven’t been able to find an article about it, but I believe this was the genesis. For the 2021 season, Oklahoma would host Nebraska for the 50th anniversary of the Game of the Century. In the summer while the networks were working out kickoff schedules for the September games, Oklahoma requested that Fox, who had first pick for Big 12 games that weekend, have the kickoff in primetime so there could be a whole day of festivities to celebrate the anniversary. Fox declined, as they wanted the game featured for their “Big Noon” timeslot, 11am local time. Due to the broadcast agreements, both Oklahoma and Texas have been slotted at a bunch of 11am games.

I can’t verify this either, but after being spurned by Fox and feeling they had no backing from the Big 12 for their greivance, either OU president Joseph Harroz or AD Joe Castiglione spearheaded a move with Texas to the Southeastern Conference. The rumor was they were working on this behind closed doors with SEC officials and that upset Texas A&M officials leaked the news, forcing those talks to speed up in public.

Now, the 11am scheduling snubs weren’t the only reason why Oklahoma and Texas were leaving. The Big 12′s grant of rights deal with Fox/ESPN was set to expire in 2025 and the networks were not wanting to negotiate a deal yet. The SEC, meanwhile, had just signed an exclusive broadcast deal with the SEC set at $811 million a year from 2024-2034. OU and Texas were looking for a financially secure future, and in 2021 the SEC had it and the Big 12 didn’t.

From there, battling for survival and working quickly, the Big 12 then adds BYU, Cincinnati, Houston, and UCF from 2023 onward. Those four schools were the primary candidates in the Big 12′s expansion search in 2016. Since Oklahoma and Texas were sticking around for a bit, there will be a season of overlap with the Red River rivals and the Big 12 newbies. With the exits and new entrants, it would put the Big 12 back to 12 schools for the first time since 2010.

2022 - LA Powers Leave the Pacific

While in 2021 the Pac 12 didn’t feel threatened, they should have.

As cited earlier, in the summer of 2022 a bomb dropped: USC and UCLA were to leave to the Big Ten starting the 2024 season. As with the Oklahoma and Texas move to the SEC, there were financial stability concerns that USC and UCLA has with the Pac 12. The Pac 12 Network was a bust, with carriage issues and only 14.8 million subscribers. The larger broadcasting contract the Pac 12 has with ESPN/FOX was worth $250 million per year but set to expire in 2024, with the networks yet to sit and negotiate an extension. Just by comparison, the Big Ten Network has 50 million subscribers and the Big Ten just inked a deal with broadcast channels CBS/NBC/FOX for a record $1 billion per year from 2023-2030.

The kicker was that Fall the Big 12, newly enforced by their 4 school expansion inked a couple summers earlier, jumped the line and got a renewal of broadcast rights with ESPN/Fox worth $380 million per year from 2025-2031. What of the Pac 12 broadcast rights? Up in the air.

2023 - Pacific Mass Exodus

The Pac 12 struggled to grab a broadcast deal. Their current partners ESPN/FOX were not budging, so the Pac 12 went shopping. There was a possible deal with the CW, but that fell through and eventually the ACC gave some of their third-tier rights to the CW. 

While things with broadcasts rights were in limbo Colorado decided enough was enough. To preserve a future, it was announced on July 27th that the Big 12 would welcome back Colorado beginning in 2024. Colorado returning to the conference they were a part of at their formation in 1996 and the conference’s predecessor the Big Eight since 1948. The Pac 12 losing one of their star coaches in Coach Deion Sanders.

Despite the Pac 12′s best efforts, the best broadcast rights offer was from Apple, offering an exclusively streaming broadcast package to the Pac 12 up to $20 million per school or up to $180 million per year to the conference. And those figures would depend on subscriber numbers. So while the other Power Conferences had deals inked with linear broadcast partners until at least 2030, the Pac 12 was set to expire and their best offer was from a streamer relatively new to sports broadcasting.

So a few days later, Oregon and Washington announced earlier in the day on August 4th they would be heading to the Big Ten in 2024. Later in the day, the rest of the “Four Corners” schools Arizona, Arizona State, and Utah would join Colorado and sign with the Big 12 also in 2024. Cal and Stanford tried to escape to the ACC, but was not approved by the voting members of the ACC.

So Cal, Stanford, Oregon State, and Washington State are now stranded. We’ll see what happens to those schools. And dead are the days of a major regional college athletics conference. The Power Conferences are all national conferences.

Football-wise, this could be the Pac 12′s best season with so many big name QBs returning including the Heisman Trophy winner USC’s Caleb Williams. There are probably six schools that have a legitimate shot at a Pac 12 title. And now it will be an amazing sendoff to a conference that will essentially disappear after the 2023-2024 academic year.

Other Stuff

Here’s a look at where the money is according to 24/7 Sports:

FBS TV contracts

Big Ten: $1 billion/year through 2030 (FOX, CBS, NBC)

SEC: $811 million/year through 2034 (ESPN)

Big 12: $380 million/year through 2031 (ESPN and FOX)

Pac-12: $250 million/year through 2024 (ESPN, FOX)

ACC: $240 million/year through 2036 (ESPN)

AAC: $83.3 million/year through 2032 (ESPN)

MWC: $45 million/year through 2026 (CBS and FOX)

MAC: $8 million/year through 2023 (ESPN and CBS Sports)

Sun Belt: $7 million/year through 2031 (ESPN)

Conference USA: $4.4 million/year through 2023 (ESPN, CBS Sports Network, NFL Network, Facebook, Stadium)

The ACC deal with ESPN is the longest termed contract, inked to 2036. And at $240 million per year, while a lot compared to some of the other conferences, is the lowest of the remaining Power Conferences. The ACC signed their deal before anyone else back in 2016, before seeing what the Big Ten and SEC would get. And it is a mistake that Florida State officials can’t seem to get over, calling the difference in revenue “insurmountable” when comparing to their SEC colleagues in the same footprint. While Florida State may want to leave the ACC, they may take their time to devise an exit strategy. So realignment has calmed a bit.

Confused yet? Yeah me too. 2024 will be a crazy college football year with all these schools in new conferences and the debut of the 12 team playoff. In the meantime, we’ll have 2023 becoming an end of an era.

My season preview will be coming soon!

[themeatlife]

the Meat Life Collection - Volume II - My Ultimate Playlist

Special shout out to Christine Pham-Cutaran for creating this picture. It is my head put on 20/20 Experience era Justin Timberlake for an invitation to my 30th birthday party

If you know me, you know I’m a playlist guy. 

I make playlists for situationally. Lately I have been making playlists for trips I take whether it was a trip playlist to San Diego for my brother’s bachelor weekend or road trip playlist for my son and daughter’s competitions. I make playlists!

Origins

Ten years ago for my 30th birthday, I made a playlist covering music that was released or charted for the 30 years I have been alive. Originally I wanted to keep it at 300 songs, but as with any of my playlists I kept bumping it up until it reached 333. And thus the Meat Life Collection was born.

I wouldn’t say I’m quite the level of John Cusack’s High Fidelity character Rob Gordon in terms of being obsessive about music. Or maybe I am?

Speaking of High Fidelity, I still need to check out the now cancelled Hulu series of the same name with Zoe Kravitz. It sounds like my jam and I loved the movie version.

Anyway, it is my 40th birthday. Since my 30th birthday passed, I have been working on the Meat Life Collection - Volume II. A massive and sprawling playlist spanning 40 years of music and pop culture. I originally wanted to cap it at 1000. When I included most of the Volume I list, I knew there was no way I could do that. Eventually it grew and I locked it at 1200 tracks. 1200 tracks spanning 40 years.

Philosophy Behind the Ultimate Playlist

My playlist philosophy has changed over time. 

In the days of Winamp in college, I tried to keep things flexible. Rather than try to sort different lists, I kept my entire collection at the ready and hit random. Then based on the vibe I would edit the order of what tracks were next. It was a live DJ feel, but it used up a lot of study time. 

When I moved to iTunes and got my first iPod, I began forming static playlists. My philosophy was nothing over 100 songs. I figured there would be no need for such long playlists. My college self would probably freak out looking at the length of the playlists I have now. But back then I was limited to how many mp3s I could store on my laptop/external hard drive and then port over to my iPod.

As my collection of mp3s grew, so did the length and amount of my playlists. Many of those mp3 era playlists are lost now since there was not an effective way to port lists from iTunes over to Spotify when I went to streaming over a decade ago. I’m an Apple Music guy now, mostly because it comes with my cellular service.

Now in the streaming era, with millions of songs at your fingertips, I probably overdo it when it comes to composing playlists. I initially thought the 333 song Volume I was a long playlist at the time in 2013. But I probably have multiple playlists of the 300+ range.

Usually when I build a playlist, there is a certain vibe I try to achieve. If it is one for travel, I try to include songs related to the destination or songs about flight or driving. For this 1200 song playlist, I tried to encompass all the songs that impacted my life in some way. Whether it be a song I heard at a club that one time and stuck ever since or a song that a friend from high school introduced to me and I couldn’t get it out of my head for 3 months, I tried to include or remember to include.

For you Apple Music folks, below is the link for my ultimate playlist.

The Playlist: the Meat Life Collection - Volume II

I’m a Stats Guy

Here is the numbers nerd in my coming out. So obviously with 1200 songs, there will be trends. I will lay out some things. First, the artists with the most songs on the playlist. This will show you my taste and just how Chris Mitra this playlist is.

Artists:

Linkin Park is my favorite musical artist, yes. And I think I did say once that Jay-Z was probably my favorite living rapper, by the stats he definitely is. I am surprised Taylor is so high on my list, but since I do have a teenage daughter there is a lot of Taylor played around the house. On the low end, I was also surprised I only put 5 Taking Back Sunday tracks on the playlist.

An artist I do have some hesitation with currently that has a bunch of music on the playlist is Kanye West. It is not easy to have him on there nowadays. And it has been about half a year since I’ve listened to any Kanye voluntarily. I have traditionally been able to separate the artist from the art, but I do feel a bit uncomfortable with Kanye lately. Tracks from his first five albums are classic and part of a soundtrack of my life, so eventually I’ll be able to separate the art from the artist.

Albums:

Of course for the albums, Linkin Park is on top with 7 tracks from their 2000 debut Hybrid Theory. My favorite Linkin Park album Minutes to Midnight ended up with 3 tracks on the playlist, just outside the list above. There are some iconic albums on this top 25 like Hootie & the Blowfish’s Cracked Rear View, Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill, Dr. Dre’s 2001, and Oasis’s (What’s the Story) Morning Glory. Jimmy Eat World’s Bleed American brings me back to my freshman year of college.

Most of these albums are of an era.  An era displayed below.

Years and Years

The most number of tracks on the playlist come from 1995-2006 (1998 isn’t displayed above but it is next on the list at 39 songs). This is the era of my peak interest in popular music and spans from my early teen years to my young adulthood. Of the 1200 tracks on this playlist, 594 songs - almost half the list -come from 1995-2006. A fourth of my lifetime makes up about half of my favorite songs.

Okay, I’ve blabbed enough about my playlist. If you have Apple Music, check it out and jam out to some of the best popular music of the last 40 years.

#thisis40 theMeatLife music playlists mixtape LinkinPark Jay-Z variousartists

[themeatlife]

Aftermath - A Look at Public Education in Oklahoma Five Years After the Walkout

It has been five years since the Oklahoma Teacher Walkout in 2018. This certainly affected my kids who are students in the public education system as well as many of our friends, some who have children in the public system as well as some who are teachers in that public system. I look back at how Oklahoma got where we are today as well as the current state of public education in Oklahoma.

Origins

There was a teacher walkout in April of 1990 over teacher pay and general education spending. On April 19, 1990, the Oklahoma legislature passed HB1017 to increase teacher pay and general education spending. Oklahoma at the time ranked 46th nationally. The passing and signing of HB1017 was a joyous occasion that addressed these concerns in public education in Oklahoma.

When Oklahomans think about April 19, those joyous memories are replaced by the horror of the Murrah Building bombing in 1995. Many forget there was even a teacher walkout and major education legislation in 1990.

The Golden Age of Henry

Fast forward to November 2, 2004. It is Election Day and Oklahomans vote approved the creation of the Oklahoma Lottery. Governor Brad Henry pushed Oklahomans to vote, with the main stipulation that the lottery money go directly toward funding public education. Many more remember the lottery vote in 2004 than the walkout in 1990. Studies showed that in the first decade of the Oklahoma Lottery (2005-2015), lottery funds added $625 million to the state’s general education fund.

By the time Henry left office in 2011, Oklahoma ranked 17th in national rankings for public education, climbing from the depths of that 46th national ranking in 1990.

But as time in Oklahoma distanced itself from the Henry era, the fall of public education in Oklahoma became drastic.

Tax and Budget Cuts Have Oklahoma Fallin

Origins of the 2018 Teacher Walkout can be traced back to the state budget crisis two years before. There was a $1.3 billion budget shortfall in 2016 that forced $58 million in cuts to education. The shortfall caused more than 100 school districts to go to four day school weeks and caused more than 1,000 teaching vacancies across the state.

While Governor Mary Fallin got a bulk of the blame since taxes on oil producers dropped from 7% to 2%, a large portion of the shortfall was caused by tax breaks under her predecessor Henry in 2005 and 2007. Those two combined to decrease tax revenues by 35% from 2008 to 2018. While the lottery was a boon for educational funding, it was only a percentage of the funding and small in comparison to the overall tax revenues used to fund education.

In November 2016, the state ballot saw State Question 779, proposing a penny sales tax that would go directly to a raise in teachers salaries in an effort to retain teachers already in the state as well as attract new teachers to the state. The penny tax was modeled after the successful MAPS initiative in Oklahoma City, where a penny sales tax help fund urban renewal projects across the city.  MAPS is on its fourth iteration. State Question 779 failed to pass and there was no initiative to try to put that question back on the ballot.

And while Fallin and the legislature passed a pay increase in March 2018, teachers walked out because none of the funds were set to increase funding on general education spending for creating new teaching positions or funding classroom supplies. So teachers walked out for nine days in the beginning of April.

Their efforts were largely for naught. While they secured $20 million in additional funds, it was only for one year. The biggest victory to come out was the election season after. For the 2018 election season, there were over 500 educators file for running for public office. Ultimately 100 of those ran in party primaries 65 of them winning their primary. 16 of them won their races and formed an education caucus in the Oklahoma House, 25 members strong.

The Chaos Agent and Distraction - The Current State of Public Education in Oklahoma

Where to begin? 

Well, anyone who has followed education in Oklahoma in 2023 knows the picture of the guy above. Ryan Walters. The Chaos Agent. Winning the 2022 Election for Oklahoma Superintendent of Public Instruction, Walters has made it his mission to regurgitate his campaign talking points rather than actually manage the state education department. 

He has a signature style and demeanor. He is known for his confessional style social media videos from the driver seat of his car usually, as well as his blatant disregard for respecting the educator profession. And in his crusade to end porn in public schools (there isn’t actually any porn in schools, like not even a little), he inadvertently sends “porn” to legislative members with no context or reference to if this actually appears in any textbooks or library books in any school districts in the state. There is also a controversial tweet about fighting the liberal agenda, with a picture depicting a white girl at a sink while two girls of color look over at her (infer what you will about that image).

There are efforts to limit Walters’ influence. The Oklahoman published a condemning editorial ripping Walters. There have been those in the legislature as well wanting to box Walters in. Governor Stitt feels different about Walters though. At the beginning of his second term as governor, initially leaves Walters as his Secretary of Education, a position he’s held since 2020. An unprecedented move that gave Walters two separate paychecks for two state positions for a time. Ultimately Stitt replaced Walters with an actual professor, ending the weird double-duty Walters was serving.

One of the main fights that Stitt/Walters is pushing at the State Capitol is the so-called “School Choice.” Stitt/Walters want the state to provide vouchers or tax credits in the amount of $7,500 per year to pay portions of private school tuition under the guise of school choice for low income families. Some perspective here, Oklahomans already have a choice of schools, they can transfer wherever they want freely. And if they want to go to private school, it is up to the private school to admit them. A similar initiative was passed in Arizona, and while it was supposed to be directed to lower income households to give them an opportunity to go private, half of the applicants the first year fell into the top 25% wealthiest families and 4 out of 5 were already enrolled in private school. That doesn’t sound like giving low income families a school choice to go private to me.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t want public funds going to private institutions, particularly in education where our public facilities are already underfunded and those educators are perpetually underpaid. And the rural school districts will suffer the most from this, being so far away from the “options” that the city folks have reasonable access to.

And all of this distracts for the fact that the state education is in decline. As far as national rankings, Oklahoma is down to 49th in the latest measure. While officials distract with fake problems like porn in schools or low income private school choice, there has been a mass exodus of teachers out of the state of Oklahoma. The largest has been from Oklahoma City Public Schools, which has seen 329 resignations through the beginning of March. 

While all this is going on, the state legislature is at least trying to address downfalls with a proposed $500 million increase in education spending that includes teacher pay raise as well as dedicated funds for school districts to use at their discretion to address different shortfalls. All of that is just in the proposal stages, so who knows how far that will get in the State House.

I’m going to end on a positive note. We live in the Mustang school district, probably one of the better public school districts in the state. In February in special election, the public voted overwhelming to pass the Momentum 2023 plan - two bond issues in the amount of $176.9 million and $4 million to address facility, maintenance, security, technology, supplies, and transportation needs for the district (remember, in Oklahoma teacher pay can only be addressed through the state). I feel fortunate to live in a district that is doing its best to address the needs of the student as best they can under the constraints of public education in this state. And while my kids are older and on the back half of their secondary education, I believe in public education and believe these investments benefit the greater community and in the long run society as a whole.

Not every school district in the state will have resources like this. We can only hope that the state can figure things out for the betterment of the future of Oklahoma.

[themeatlife]

Oscar Cram Session - Watching the 2023 Academy Awards Best Picture Nominees

I don’t remember the situation in years past, but this year feels like a unique opportunity.

Weeks ago when the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced their nominees for the Oscars, I was surprised at how many I’ve actually heard of this year.  And so out of curiosity, I looked up how many were available on streaming.  To my surprise, a large number were available on some sort of streaming service.  The Academy Awards just happened to land on the opening weekend of my kids’ Spring Break where we didn’t have any planned activities.

So I hopped on the TV and started watching.  I had already seen Top Gun: Maverick and Everything Everywhere All at Once, so I watched the six remaining that were nominated and streaming.

Here are the Best Picture nominees for this year’s Academy Awards along with where they are showing:

All Quiet on the Western Front (Netflix) Avatar: The Way of Water (In Theaters Only) The Banshees of Inisherin (HBOMax) Elvis (HBOMax) Everything Everywhere All at Once (Showtime) The Fabelmans (In Theaters/VOD) Tar (Peacock) Top Gun: Maverick (Paramount+) Triangle of Sadness (Hulu) Women Talking (Amazon Prime Video)

Here’s what I think will win and my reviews as well.

The Frontrunner:

Everything Everywhere All at Once the Meat Life Rating - 8.5/10

This film will likely win. The title is pretty emblematic of what the movie is.  A comedy, an action movie, a family drama, an immigrant story, a multiversal sci-fi epic.  Indie darling production company A24 lands another award winning release that is very much a product of the social media meme culture and the TikTok clip era.  Heavy genre influence as well.  But at the heart of it is the struggle between a 1st gen immigrant mother and her 2nd gen American daughter.  Star studded performances from film legends Michelle Yeoh (Best Actress Nominee), Jamie Lee Curtis (Best Supporting Actress Nominee), and James Hong, a breakthrough performance from Stephanie Hsu (Best Supporting Actress Nominee), and a wonderful comeback for Ke Huy Quan (Best Supporting Actor Nominee).

The Nostalgia Picks:

Top Gun: Maverick the Meat Life Rating - 9/10

What can I say?  This is my favorite but I know it won’t win.  My parents told me that Top Gun was my first movie theater movie when I was 3 but that I cried the whole time because it was loud.  But 5 years later me and my brother would play the movie on VHS basically on a loop for years.  This Maverick release was an even better end product in every way compared to the original but the soundtrack.  The story is enough of a standalone that it holds up well if you didn’t see the original, but it is so much richer if you have seen the original.  Tom Cruise is in his bag.  Miles Teller really does look like Goose’s son.  Great to see Val Kilmer.  And the real aerial footage is a spectacular sight.  All in all a theater experience worth the contemporary price of admission.

Elvis the Meat Life Rating - 7/10

I’m not emotionally attached to Elvis or his music.  I knew of him and heard a bunch of his hits but I wouldn’t consider myself super versed in Elvis Presley’s life or catalog.  From an outsider’s standpoint, Austin Butler totally immersed himself into the Elvis persona in portraying the title character.  Tom Hanks’ accent choice was odd.  I don’t think this was at all historically accurate, but this era of biopics don’t focus on accuracies but rather capturing the vibe.  And if you’ve seen a Baz Luhrmann movie, it’s all about the vibes.  Sidenote on Luhrmann, he’s kind of a one trick pony.  Super stylized is his thing, and all of his films kind of have the same look and feel.  In any event, the movie was entertaining for sure.

Tremendously Acted:

The Banshees of Inisheran the Meat Life Rating - 7.5/10

There is a reason that both leads are up for acting awards.  Colin Farrell, up for Best Actor, and Brendan Gleeson, up for Best Supporting Actor, play two gentlemen that were close friends until Gleeson’s character pulls away.  Kerry Condon was also nominated for Best Supporting Actress.  Other details would spoil the film.  Banshees is equal parts hilarious and heartbreaking.  And the landscape of the Irish shoreline of Inisheran as the backdrop are tremendously shot.

Tar the Meat Life Rating - 7/10

Cate Blanchett acts her ass off as Lydia Tar, a major conductor at the peak of her powers in the male-dominated industry before her world starts falling apart.  Tar is a commentary on power and the corrosive effects of such power.  Blanchett is a tour de force.  The entire film is shot following Blanchett, so there aren’t any scenes without her, and for good reason.  And the character’s Porsche Taycan is awesome.

The Uncomfortable Watches (In A Good Way):

All Quiet on the Western Front the Meat Life Rating - 8/10

A unique look at the Great War.  We have had a bunch of World War I based films, but rarely a look from the German side.  This film is a touching story of a young man Paul Baumer played by Felix Kammerer and his journey through the stalemated trench war with his comrades in arms.  There are moments of laughter and bonding that make the tough war moments much more heartbreaking.

Triangle of Sadness the Meat Life Rating - 7/10

I don’t know if satire quite describes this cringe comedy.  There are several layers of story here to analyze whether it is the haves vs have nots social commentary, or the gross out puke and poop humor toward the end of the boat scenes.  Even the opening date scene with the restaurant check scene is very cringe-inducing.  Loads of uncomfortable laughter here.

Women Talking the Meat Life Rating - 7/10

I don’t understand the Mennonite community fully.  But I do know that in these separate religious communities are a tough for women, especially when it comes with handling sexual assault.  Women Talking is a moving film about a group of Mennonite women discussing whether or not to leave their community and the heartbreak that either staying or leaving would lead to.

I know eventually I will see both Avatar: The Way of Water and The Fabelmans eventually.  I’ll give my opinion on those as well.  Enjoy the Oscars and the movies nominated as well!

[themeatlife]

Marvel Pitstop: A Look Back at the MCU’s Phase Four - Television

A continued look at the MCU Phase Four.  Unlike previous phases, this latest phase has television series included.  There seems to be an over-saturation of content with these television series popping up between the feature film releases.  I think that part of the reason for talk of middling quality of releases in the discourse is probably because of the sheer amount of content in a short amount of time to varying success as far as storytelling and quality.

Here’s a look at the television offerings.

TELEVISION

It is a bit of a mixed ride with the television series Marvel featured on Disney+.  The highs were certainly very high, while the valleys were at least entertaining but left a bit wanting.

WandaVision - Released January-March 2021 the Meat Life Rating - 8/10

Very interesting concept.  Much of the episodes in the series a small New Jersey town are trapped in sitcom life, going through the different sitcom decades set forth by Wanda’s powers but ultimately influenced by Agatha Harkness.  The series deals with Wanda’s struggle with losing her love Vision in the events of Avengers: Infinity War.  The series felt was strong.  Upon initial watch, I thought the finale was weak compared to the rest of the series.  On the rewatch, though, I felt like the finale held up pretty well.

Best Performance - Kathryn Hahn as Agatha Harkness This was a tough call because I always enjoy Randall Park in anything, it was cool to see Kat Dennings back in the MCU, we see Teyonah Parris as a grown up Monica Rambeau, and we see strong performances from the leads Elizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany.  Also the surprise appearance of Evan Peters as the sitcom version of Pietro was also good.  But in most scenes she’s in Hahn steals the show.

Best Episode - “Previously On” Throughout the episode Agatha forces Wanda through her past to find out how she was able to harness her powers.  We see the history of trauma and loss that Wanda goes through over the years and how her family would watch old sitcoms in their house in Sokovia.

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier - Released March-April 2021 the Meat Life Rating - 8/10

This is probably my favorite MCU series so far and is a more conventional approach to television series and the Marvel storytelling.  The series is the journey Sam Wilson takes as he grapples with whether or not to take on the mantle of Captain America, dealing with race and what it is to be a Black man in America.  While Sam grapples with this, a soldier named John Walker takes on the mantle, given the shield by the US government...and to disastrous results.  We also see Bucky dealing with his Winter Soldier past.  Both of these occurring while the duo learns to work as a team together to topple the Flag Smashers, an anti-national group looking break up international efforts to reestablish pre-Blip conditions.  The Flag Smasher storyline might have been very different, with rumors of a virus or bioweapon storyline edited out due to COVID-19.  You can see remnants of this when the Flag Smashers are stealing vaccines and the Smashers leader Karli Morgenthau mourns the death of her mentor due to “an illness,” later identified as tuberculosis.

Best Performance - Carl Lumbly as Isaiah Bradley Daniel Bruhl’s Zemo was great and even had meme-able moments, Danny Ramirez’s Torres had moments, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus’s surprise cameo was great.  Some of the other guest stars were good and the leads Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan’s chemistry was palpable.  But Carl Lumbly as Isaiah Bradley was the best performance.  You could really feel the pain in his voice and the performance really added depth to the Falcon storyline as he grappled with whether to take the Captain America mantle.

Best Episode - “The Whole World Is Watching” In my opinion, the first five episodes are all really close, particularly 2-Star Spangled Man, 3-Power Broker, and 5-Truth.  But the fourth episode The Whole World Is Watching is the best.  The episode has the best buildup, a look at John Walker’s struggle to live up to the Captain America mantle, the charm of Zemo, the teamwork of Sam and Bucky, and the badass Dora Milaje fight in the apartment.  And it has a clear juxtaposition with the redeeming un-brainwashing of Bucky in a flashback at the beginning of the episode and then the shocking killing of a Flag Smasher by Cap Walker with the Captain America shield after a fight with the Flag Smashers leads to the death of Walker’s partner Lemar Hoskins.

Loki - Released June-July 2021 the Meat Life Rating - 8.5/10

In much the same vein as the approach taken with WandaVision, Loki is different.  Different in a great way.  Falcon may be my favorite show, but Loki as far as quality is probably the best MCU Disney+ series.  Following the events of Avengers: Endgame where 2012 Loki steals the Tesseract and disappears, we follow Loki after he is captured by the Time Variance Authority.  The TVA is responsible for keeping the Sacred Timeline in tact and eliminate time variants that disrupt it.  TVA agent Mobius recruits Loki to hunt down a dangerous variant - a female Loki variant named Sylvie.  Loki, in tandem with Spider-Man: No Way Home, serve as MCU primer for multiversal storytelling.

Best Performance - Jonathan Majors as He Who Remains The chemistry between Owen Wilson’s Mobius and Tom Hiddleston’s Loki is great and is rivaled only by the chemistry between Hiddleston and Sophia Di Martino’s Sylvie.  Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Ravonna Renslayer and Wunmi Mosaku as B-15 are strong performances as well.  But in the season finale (Loki announced it was renewed for a second season at the end of the first season), Majors stole the show.  He Who Remains is a variant of Kang the Conquerer who we will see in the next Ant-Man/Wasp movie.  Even with only screen time in the finale, Majors’ performance and execution drive not just the series into another direction, but possibly change the course of the entire MCU.

Best Episode - “For All Time. Always.” All the episodes are solid and of similar quality, so this was a hard decision.  But I think the season finale “For All Time. Always.” changes the direction of the MCU on the level Captain America: The Winter Soldier did.  It opens up the concept of the multiverse when Sylvie decides to kill He Who Remains, wrecking the end of the Sacred Timeline and stopping the control over time variants.  We have yet to truly see how this may impact the rest of the MCU.  There were other things that disrupt things and open up the multiverse, so we may see the culmination of all these things in one of the upcoming releases.

What If...? - Released August-October 2021 the Meat Life Rating - 6.5/10

A cool concept: what if your favorite Marvel hero’s journey was different?  What would that look like?  While there were several episodes that were spectacular, a lot of the episodes, while entertaining, just felt like something was missing.  I’m not too into animation, I didn’t really get into the Star Wars Clone Wars or Star Wars Rebels animated series, so maybe that’s why I wasn’t too into this (although nowadays with all the CGI in things, the “live action” films are also heavily animated).  It also felt incomplete, for example with a Thanos-like Gamora featured on the promo art but only appearing in the finale (her episode was scrapped because of production issues due to COVID).

Best Performance - Chadwick Boseman as T’Challa Man, what a loss the entertainment world endured with the untimely passing of Chadwick Boseman in the summer of 2020.  Boseman’s voice acting in What If was the last project he worked on before his death and was featured through out the series - four out of the nine episodes, in fact.  He even had his own episode - “What If...T’Challa Became a Star Lord,” which was tons of fun.

Best Episode - “What If...Doctor Strange Lost His Heart Instead of His Hands?” Although I felt this show was the weakest of the Marvel Disney+ releases, there were a few strong episodes.  “What If...T’Challa Became a Star Lord?,” “What If...Zombies!,” and “What If...Thor Were an Only Child?” were all wildly fun.  But the strongest episode was the darkest.  In the Doctor Strange episode, the death of Dr Christine Palmer leads Strange down a dark path to gain more power in an attempt to go back in time to save her life.

Hawkeye - Released November-December 2021 the Meat Life Rating - 7/10

Based heavily on the Matt Fraction comic run, Hawkeye is a fun, holiday-themed look at the aftermath of Clint Barton’s reign as Ronin in the post-Endgame world as well as mentoring a new Hawkeye in Kate Bishop.  We get Echo and the Tracksuit Mafia run by Kingpin as the main villains as well as a look at Yelena Belova looking to avenge Natasha Romanov’s death as she believes Barton responsible.  There are some serious moments in Barton dealing with the Ronin spree as well as Bishop looking at her development and at her mother Eleanor Bishop’s possible involvement in criminal activity.  There are some weak areas (the Larpers were a bit of an odd addition) but this is largely a good.

Best Performance - Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova/Black Widow There are many strong performances.  Jeremy Renner is good, Hailee Steinfeld is great.  The surprise appearance of Vincent D’Onofrio’s Kingpin was great as well.  But Pugh steals the show with her charm and line execution.  Her banter with Steinfeld as well as her fight with Renner in the finale were excellent performances.  She kept grabbing up the screen with her performance.

Best Episode - “Echoes” We see the origin story of Echo and the relationship she has with Kazi, the head of the Tracksuits.  There is a great break out fight scene in the toy store headquarters of the Tracksuits as well as the subsequent car chase scene.  The continuous shot during the car chase from inside the car is top-notch.  And the episode ends on a cliffhanger inside the Bishop apartment as Kate tries to break into her mother’s company’s system.

Moon Knight - Released March-May 2022 the Meat Life Rating - 6/10

The 2022 Disney+ show releases are a bit of a letdown.  Moon Knight had some very high highs, but I think this show and many of the Marvel shows suffer from is a rushed plot.  I feel like this could have benefitted greatly from another few episodes to flesh things out, maybe 10 episodes rather than six.  Moon Knight the show follows a man Marc Spector as he reckons with other personalities/alter egos within himself.  Marc’s biggest conflict within himself is with personality Steven Grant.  Marc also embodies Moon Knight to do the bidding of Khonshu the Egyptian god of Moon and the night sky and battles Egyptian goddess Ammit.  It was a revealing look at a character with DID or Dissociative Identity Disorder and what those people may deal with.  It was also nice to see representation of Egyptian characters by Egyptian actors and directors.  But those storylines seem to fall apart or appear rushed.  Also, some of the action sequences were plagued by CGI issues (many times you can tell the difference between a person in costume and a CGI rendering of a person in a costume) and subpar fight choreography (not on the same level as some other Marvel projects).

Best Performance - Oscar Isaac as Marc Spector, Steven Grant, Moon Knight, and Jake Lockley For all the issues with the series, Oscar Isaac was acting his ass off.  Isaac jumping back and forth from Marc and Steven was spectacular.  Ethan Hawke was a decent villain as Arthur Harrow, a David Koresh-like cult leader who professes the wishes of Ammit.  May Calamawy was also solid as Layla El-Faouly, Marc Spector’s ex who helps Marc/Steven navigate to fight against Harrow/Ammit.  But Isaac kills it.  The British accent may be off a bit (they even joke about it in the series) but outside of that, some great work from Oscar.

Best Episode - “Asylum” In the tradition of the other Marvel Disney+ series, the fifth episode is the strongest.  Asylum is kind of the Christmas Carol type episode, in the same vein of WandaVision episode Previously On.  We see Marc after Marc/Steven dies and has to resolve the issues in their life before they can cross over to the after life.  We get Marc as a child and the origins of how the Steven personality came about.  A rough but touching episode that stretches Oscar Isaac’s acting muscles.  A great episode of television in general from a very middling series.

Ms Marvel - Released June-July 2022 the Meat Life Rating - 6/10

Ms Marvel follows Pakistani-American teen and Captain Marvel superfan Kamala Khan as she discovers hidden superpowers and her family history.  While discovering this, she has to stop the Clandestines, a people exiled on Earth trying to get back to the Noor dimension which may lead to the end of Earth. This is another series that would have benefited from a few more episodes, or perhaps separating the story out into another season.  I think, as with a lot of minority stories told in American entertainment, they were afraid this would be their only shot to get all of this done (the creators behind this - writers, producers, directors, are all of South Asian decent and were probably afraid this was their only chance to tell the story).  This feels like two different seasons smashed into one - the first part a teen comedy, the second an immigrant family backstory.  A lot of the plot feels rushed or compressed for time and could have benefited from letting the story breathe and stretch out.  The series suffers from too much going on all at once and doesn’t hit in the way say Everything Everywhere All At Once does.

Best Performance - Iman Vellani as Kamala Khan/Ms Marvel There are some strong performances from the supporting cast, particularly Matt Lintz as Kamala’s BFF Bruno, Yasmeen Fletcher as overachiever close friend of Kamala in Nakia, Zenobia Shroff and Mohan Kapur as Kamala’s parents, and Saagar Shaikh as Kamala’s brother Aamir.  But Vellani is so charming in her performance as Kamala Khan.  The naive teen discovering herself through her family’s history and her powers was really relatable and the best part of the series.

Best Episode - “Generation Why” The first episode is the strongest.  You see Kamala’s life as a regular teen in Jersey.  You also see her strong family life and her Pakistani/Muslim background.  Kamala’s strong artistic imagination is on display.  And the main conflict is the relationships she has with her friends and the contrast with the views of her family, the push and pull between American culture and Pakistani tradition.  It really encompasses the child of immigrants story very well, it is the biggest part of the story of Ms Marvel I relate to.

She-Hulk: Attorney at Law - Released August-October 2022 the Meat Life Rating - 5.5/10

I want to preface this by saying that there were some moments that were really enjoyable.  But, I have to say by MCU standards, this has very diminished returns.  I know that the teams working the CGI industry-wide are shortstaffed and overworked from all the projects out, but the CGI of the She Hulk is rough.  The She Hulk effects in action scenes are decent, but the She Hulk scenes in regular interaction with actual people is very stiff and fake looking.  It’s hard going from the Endgame Hulk and the quality of that to the low quality of the She Hulk.  And that takes you out of it.  The show takes a more conventional trial-per-epidose approach and is very Ally McBeal in its vibe.  They took some swings and I’m glad they approached this show differently from the other MCU content (like the sex jokes were a welcomed change), but for the most part this series struck out for me.

Best Performance - Tim Roth as Emil Blonsky/Abomination Tatiana Maslany as Jennifer Walters/She Hulk actually isn’t bad.  Benedict Wong is cooking in Phase Four altogether and is pretty solid straight man in this.  Mark Ruffalo is always great as Bruce Banner/Hulk.  It was nice to see Charlie Cox return as the MCU version of Matt Murdock/Daredevil, although I don’t know how I feel about that version yet.  But Tim Roth is hilarious in this.  Great performance and steals scenes.  I almost wish he was in this more.

Best Episode - Ribbit and Rip It Outside of the pilot episode A Normal Amount of Rage, I think Ribbit and Rip It is probably the most complete episode.  This is the episode She Hulk teams up with Daredevil to track down LeapFrog, who is fraudulently suing superhero suit designer Luke Jacobson.  Great chemistry between Maslany and Cox.

Originally I was going to go over the upcoming Marvel slate.  But the last couple years has seen that slate and timeline change multiple times.  So I’ll just conclude by saying that all these film and television projects might have benefited from some time between project releases.  It feels the MCU oversaturated and that the quality of the content has been down.  But if you kind of compare Phase Four with Phase One, they are very similar in how they are trying to feel out what works, what doesn’t, and where to go from there.  I will say that the movies were much stronger overall than the TV shows, particularly in 2022.

Let’s see what the MCU in 2023 and beyond will bring us.

[themeatlife]

Marvel Pitstop: A Look Back at the MCU’s Phase Four - Movies

Before we see the start of the middle part of the Multiverse Saga in MCU’s Phase Five first film Ant Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, we take a pitstop of sorts.  A look back at Phase Four.

It has felt like a lifetime since the conclusion of Marvel’s Infinity Saga in 2019 with the finale Avengers: Endgame and its epilogue Spider-Man: Far From Home.  Marvel took an unplanned break in 2020 due to the COVID pandemic, pausing some productions and leading to a packed slate.  It seemed like from the release of WandaVision in mid-January 2021 all the way to Black Panther: Wakanda Forever in November 2022, there was an almost non-stop stream of Marvel content, to varying results.  

It was revealed back in July at the San Diego Comic Con that Phase Four would end with Wakanda Forever and Phases Five and Six will all run through 2025 and culminate in back to back Avengers movies: Avengers: Kang Dynasty and Avengers: Secret Wars.  So this will be a two part post going over Phase Four, first the feature films and then the Disney+ television series's.  

SPOILER WARNING, I probably won’t spoil the whole thing but since I’ll be going over all of the releases there will be some degree of spoilers.  I’ll go over a little synopsis, best performances, and best episode of the series for the shows or best scene for the movies.

We’ll start with the movies.

MOVIES

There are a few I already reviewed here.  I won’t copy those, I’ll just let you know if I did or not under the movie.  There were a couple of great ones here and then the rest of mixed results.

Black Widow - Released July 9, 2021 the Meat Life Rating - 7/10

I didn’t review this one fully.  I feel like this was a solid entry but was released too late.  If this were release around the time when the story actually takes place (sometime between Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War), it probably would have hit different and been more effective.  But since we know she survives the events of the movie and dies later on in the MCU timeline, the stakes are impacted and kind of muted.  Still a pretty entertaining movie.  It takes a look at Natasha Romanov on the run while dealing with her past as a Russian spy-weapon and the fake family of spies she grew up with in America.  Probably the weakest part of the movie was Natasha and her found family taking down the airborne Red Room and villain head of the Red Room Dreykov.  The ending scenes seemed too reminiscent of the ending scenes of Captain America: The Winter Soldier.  I also rerated this slightly down from 7.5 to 7 from my initial review.

Best Performance - Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova This was Pugh’s debut in the MCU.  As stated in Hawkeye, Pugh steals the show.  And that’s hard to do because of solid performances from Scarlet Johannson’s lead character, David Harbour’s hilarious performance of Red Guardian, and Rachel Weisz’s performance of Melina Vostokoff.  Pugh’s charm electrifies the movie, especially when she makes fun of the Black Widow stance.

Best Scene - The Vostokoff Farm After Belova and Romanov break the Red Guardian out of jail and their plane runs out of fuel, the three head to find Vostokoff at her farm outside St Petersburg.  We see the dysfunctional family dynamic of the four while they have dinner.  Although they were put together and weren’t blood family, you could tell by the banter and emotional argument that they were a found-family that were heartbreakingly broken apart years before.

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings - Released September 3, 2021 the Meat Life Rating - 8/10

Briefly reviewed here.

Best Performance - Tony Leung as Xu Wenwu This cast is stacked with relative newcomer Simu Liu as the title character, Awkwafina as Shang-Chi’s BFF Katy, Michelle Yeoh as Shang-Chi’s aunt Ying Nan, and Ben Kingsley reprieving his role as actor Trevor Slattery.  But the Hong Kong film legend Leung is the best.  He makes his villain character Wenwu - Shang-Chi 

Best Scene - The Skyscraper Fight There’s lots to choose from here.  I love the interaction between Shawn and Katy so whenever it is just them cooking I love watching it.  There are also a lot of really good set pieces here from the Jackie Chan tribute bus fight to the end showdown in Ta Lo.  But the best scene is the skyscraper fight in Macau.  The running and tumbling in the scaffolding and the sparing off the side of the building are awesome.

Eternals - Released November 5, 2021 the Meat Life Rating - 6/10

From Academy Award winning director Chloe Zhao staring the likes of Gemma Chan, Richard Madden, Angelina Jolie, Selma Hayek, Kit Harington, Kumail Nanjiani and Brian Tyree Henry among others, this seems like it sets up to be a slam dunk, right?  Maybe a prestigy spin on Marvel?  Well, although it was the lowest domestic grossing MCU movie since 2008′s The Incredible Hulk and mostly panned by critics, this one isn’t as bad as they say it is.  What didn’t help a lot of these Phase Four movies is that Marvel’s standard was raised coming out of Infinity War/Endgame in the Infinity Saga.  But people soon forget about Captain Marvel and how out of place that film felt coming out between the big Avengers movies.  Anyway, as for as this movie, the Eternals follows a group of immortal alien beings as they protect the Earth since ancient times against threats from other alien creatures known as Deviants.  There is a twist in the middle of the film that I’ll leave you to experience.  The vibe of the film felt more closer to the DC’s SnyderVerse, maybe because this film’s approach felt more serious than typical MCU fare (there are even references to DC characters Batman and Superman in a couple instances in the film).  If you have an open couple hours you aren’t doing anything, worth a look at this movie.  It’s not great but not as bad as people made it out to be upon its initial release.  But I don’t think this will end up being vital to the MCU experience and overall storyline going forward.

Best Performance - Brian Tyree Henry as Phastos A lot of the acting in this movie is a little uneven, but probably because of the uneven material.  But I do enjoy a lot of the comic relief that Brian Tyree Henry provides in a couple of his scenes and being in Marvel’s first same sex couple.  And being the tech guy on the Eternals crew talks to me.

Best Scene - The London Deviant Sighting The Amazon scene is also a solid.  But the first Deviant sighting in London was great.  You get suspense/horror vibes when the Deviant is in the water following Sersi, Dane, and Sprite.  And then when it comes out and fights Ikaris, we get to see the reveal of Sersi’s powers.  Sersi turning a double-decker bus into rose petals as it is about to fall on her looks spectacular.

Spider-Man: No Way Home - Released December 17, 2021 the Meat Life Rating - 8/10

Briefly reviewed here.  I originally rated this movie 9/10.  But I adjusted it down to an 8.  Still a great and enjoyable film, but I think probably an overreaction a bit when I first watched.

Best Performance - Willem Dafoe as Norman Osborn/Green Goblin Some great performances from Tom Holland, Jacob Batalon, Zendaya, and Marisa Tomei.  But Dafoe steals the movie and becomes a great Big Bad in the movie.  Psycho Osborn builds off of his original Spider-Man performance and gives a chilling villain.

Best Scene - Happy’s Apartment Showdown As cool as it is when the Tobey and Andrew Spider-Men come in and as cool as it is to see them fight together, the MCU Spidey taking on the snapped Green Goblin takes the trophy.  Just Dafoe’s still face laughing as Holland’s Spider-Man is pummeling him is so creepy.  And then, as controversial as it is, Aunt May’s death is very impactful and gives stakes to this movie.

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness - Released May 6, 2022 the Meat Life Rating - 7/10

It is interesting to think that this was actually originally slated before Wandavision and Spider-Man: No Way Home and had to be reworked a ton due to shifts in the scheduling caused by the pandemic.  It would be interesting to see what this movie would have been before they had to rework.  Instead we got a movie that changed directors midway through production from the first Doctor Strange director Scott Dickerson to cult horror film legend Sam Raimi.  And you can kind of tell a bit by the vibe and style of some of the scenes who directed what.  In any event, this was an entertaining entry.  Doctor Strange has to protect America Chavez from Wanda Maximoff.  America has a special power to jump between multiverses and Wanda is wanting to take that power in order to reunite with her two sons who were disappeared at the end of Wandavision.  I love Elizabeth Olsen, and I think Marvel did her Wanda character dirty.  While she started as a villain of sorts in Avengers: Age of Ultron, she had become a hero over the years through Avengers: Endgame.  And while she was a bit of a character on edge in Wandavision, I didn’t really like that she was turned full villain in this one.

Best Performance - Xochitl Gomez as America Chavez As against the villain turn as I am, Elizabeth Olsen was solid in her Wanda role.  Benedict Cumberbatch is always solid.  I wish we got more out of Chiwetel Ejoifor.  While it was cool to briefly see John Krasinski as Reed Richards and Patrick Stewart as a version of Professor Xavier (both probably trolling fans) as well as seeing Hayley Atwell as Captain Carter, I think the best performance is from Xochiti Gomez as America Chavez.  She was the best part of this movie and gave that teenage wonder and injected it in this movie.

Best Scene - Zombie Strange in the Climax Fight Scene The opening scene where America and a version of Strange is being chased between universes by a demon was cool.  Obviously the Illuminati scene on Earth-838 was cool to see with Wanda mowing down each of them.  But probably the chaos of the last act was probably the best.  From the music note fight between Strange Prime and Apocalypse Strange was cool and then Strange tapping into Dead Strange from the beginning to fight Wanda to save America was great.  Solid Raimi stuff.

Thor: Love and Thunder - Released July 8, 2022 the Meat Life Rating - 7/10

I think the best way to describe this entry of Thor is Ragnarok off the rails.  This is director Taika Waititi throwing everything at the screen.  While most lands, some are a little over the top.  This is a fun movie but can we really believe Thor to grow dumber and more dude-bro-y after the trauma and emotional weight of Avengers: Infinity War/Endgame?  In any event, we follow Thor Odonson as he navigates to stop Gorr, the God Butcher from killing Gods across the realms.  Along the way he teams up with the now King Valkyrie and Jane Foster wielding Mjolnir as the Mighty Thor.  While some of the comic scenes go on a bit longer than they probably should to still be funny, this is a fun ride.

Best Performance - Christian Bale as Gorr, the God Butcher It was great to see Natalie Portman (always great to see Portman in ANYTHING), and it was a nice cameo for the Guardians.  I like Tessa Thompson and Chris Hemsworth is funny for the most part.  You also get a scene-stealing performance from Russell Crowe as Zeus.  But I got to give this to Christian Bale, who is performing almost like he’s in a different movie.  He gives the emotional weight and places Gorr in one of the better villains in the MCU.

Best Scene - Omnipotence City There are some touching Jane Foster scenes where you see her character’s struggle with cancer.  There is also an awesome monochromatic scene where our heroes chase down Gorr in the Shadow Realm.  But my favorite scene is probably on Omnipotence City and their interaction and ultimately fight with Zeus and the other Gods.  I know I said some of the comedic scenes in this movie go on longer than they probably should, but I could watch more of Omnipotence City.

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever - Released November 11, 2022 the Meat Life Rating - 8/10

It was pretty hard for me to rate this film.  On the one side, it is a poignant and touching tribute to their fallen friend in Chadwick Boseman-T’Challa and a story about loss and how to process that while moving forward with life.  Those aspects were among the best in the MCU as a whole and probably some of the best moments of the year in cinema.  On the other hand, some things felt out of place - but in the larger MCU sense are necessary to propel the larger storyline outside of this movie.  The Everett Ross and Valentina portions of the film in particular feel largely out of place, especially since most of the storyline was between the nations of Wakanda and Talokan and the power struggle between Shuri and Namor.  I will say, standard MCU stuff aside, this is a great and moving film.  It is beautiful and hard to watch at the same time.  Very emotionally heavy and effective movie.  And stay for the mid-credits for probably the best credit scene that could have come from the MCU.  If we remove the Ross/Valentina stuff, this movie is probably closer to a 9.

Best Performance - Angela Bassett as Queen Ramonda There is a reason why Angela Bassett is honored with the MCU’s first Oscar acting nomination for Best Supporting Actress.  Bassett kills it.  The quality of the material behind dealing with loss and trying to help her daughter get through that same loss does help.  There are other great performances including Tenoch Huerta’s portrayal of Namor and Letitia Wright as Shuri/Black Panther.  But Bassett’s performance takes the film to another level emotionally.

Best Scene - The Mid-Credit Scene There are a lot of great scenes from the film from the Okoye bridge fight, the talking scenes between Shuri and Namor, and anything Angela Bassett is in are all great.  But this movie is about loss and moving forward from that loss, and nothing is more poignant in this than the mid-credit scene.  Nakia reveals to Shuri that Nakia and T’Challa had a child before his untimely death, a child that they also named T’Challa.  The scene is so touching and had me weeping in the theater.  Kind of wish they just had this as the primary ending to the movie rather than a mid-credit scene, it’s that good.

[themeatlife]

the Meat Life 2022 College Football Preview Part Two - Season Preview

A little change of plan since the beginning of the season is upon us this weekend in the “Week 0″ portion of the national schedule.  I will do my season preview this entry, and then here in a few weeks I’ll tackle the conference realignment chaos.  In my season preview, we’ll go over the three categories I usually topple: Heisman Hopefuls, Power 5 Conference Predictions, and College Football Playoff Predictions.  And I’ll go through the same format as last year, going over the favorites, the contenders, and the darkhorses.

Heisman Hopefuls

I’m not super successful predicting these, last year the two I had listed as darkhorses were the only two players that turned out to be finalists, with Alabama QB Bryce Young winning the award.  I now have those two darkhorses from last year as my favorites this year.

The Favorites: Bryce Young, QB - Alabama Crimson Tide CJ Stroud, QB - Ohio State Buckeyes

The Contenders: Will Anderson, LB - Alabama Crimson Tide Caleb Williams, QB - USC Trojans Devin Leary, QB - NC State Wolfpack Dillon Gabriel, QB - Oklahoma Sooners

The Darkhorses: DJ Uiagalelei, QB - Clemson Tigers Spencer Rattler, QB - South Carolina Gamecocks

the Meat Life Heisman Prediction: CJ Stroud, QB - Ohio State Buckeyes

Bryce Young will get the opportunity to repeat this year.  Alabama, as always under Nick Saban, has a stacked team that will be in CFP and national championship contention yet again.  Both Young and on the defensive side Will Anderson will get plenty of opportunity to display their superiority over the course of the year.

But my favorite is Ohio State QB CJ Stroud.  Stroud hit the ground running last season, with the Buckeyes offense dominating as it has been in the Ryan Day era.  I believe Stroud’s stock took a hit after losing to Michigan and not getting to compete in the Big Ten Championship.  It will be crucial for his campaign to beat Michigan, which I believe will happen this year. And with Stroud’s main weapon back in WR Jaxon Smith-Njigba, look for the Buckeyes offense to drive Stroud to a Heisman.

As far as the rest of the field, I did included three Oklahoma QBs - two former in Rattler and Williams, and then the current starter Gabriel.  All three are put in new situations that will see some success.  Leary from NC State is exciting and I’m hoping for big things for him.  And Uiagalelei had lots of promise behind Trevor Lawrence but stumbled a bit especially early last season.  Look for him to get back into gear.

There has been some hype and odds put on Texas RB Bijan Robinson and new QB Quinn Ewers.  While both are talented, especially Robinson, Texas in the past decade has not lived up to the expectations of their top tier recruiting class promise.  So I have neither on this list.  And I don’t have any remorse about it whatsoever.

Power 5 Conferences Predictions

ACC

The Favorite: Clemson Tigers The Contenders: Miami Hurricanes, NC State Wolfpack The Darkhorses: Pittsburgh Panthers, Wake Forest Demon Deacons the Meat Life ACC Prediction: NC State Wolfpack

BOLD prediction here picking the Wolf Pack.  Clemson will be back on track, even despite having to replace long-time DC Brent Venables who is now of course the head coach at Oklahoma.  The U won’t quite be the U of old, but with new head man Mario Cristobal on board, the ship is in the right direction.  Pitt and Wake have been improving and consistent the last couple seasons.  But I’m buying NC State and Leary hype.  Their main competition is Clemson in the Atlantic division and then will have to play the winner of the Coastal division which actually seems crowded this year with Miami, Pitt, and Wake.  So yes, let’s go bold for the ACC.

Big Ten

The Favorite: Ohio State Buckeyes The Contenders: Michigan Wolverines, Wisconsin Badgers  The Darkhorses: Michigan State Spartans, Nebraska Cornhuskers the Meat Life Big Ten Prediction: Ohio State Buckeyes

It isn’t as simple in the Big Ten as the winner of Michigan vs Ohio State wins the conference. Or maybe it is that simple.  Wisconsin will always have strong defense and run game.  And the pleasant surprise of Mel Tucker’s Spartans last season is a strong competitor.  Nebraska is interesting, as 8 of their 9 losses last season were within a TD.  They have a rebuilt offense surrounding transfer QB from Texas in Casey Thompson, so that offense should be much improved.  We’ll see.  For now though, it seems the talent disparity goes Ohio State at the very top, then Michigan a tier below, and then the rest of the conference below that.  And since Michigan upset the Buckeyes last season, I think Ohio State exacts revenge on the Wolverines and ultimately wins the conference

Big 12

The Favorite: Baylor Bears The Contenders: Oklahoma State Cowboys, Oklahoma Sooners, Kansas State Wildcats The Darkhorses: Texas Longhorns, TCU Horned Frogs the Meat Life Big 12 Prediction: Oklahoma Sooners

I put Baylor as the favorite since they are the defending champion.  Dave Aranda has things flowing well for the Bears.  And Aranda has so much confidence in QB Blake Shapen that he let the QB that led him to a Big 12 title last year Gerry Bohanon transfer to South Florida.  Their defense will still be stout.  OSU has returning QB enigma Spencer Sanders back and should be as good on defense.  Kansas State is the trendy media pick to win the Big 12, which isn’t a horrible pick - and Nebraska transfer QB Adrian Martinez is a good fit for the Wildcats.  Texas is always in the mix, even though they’ll probably end up 6-6, and I threw TCU in there just because.  But the road to a conference championship always runs through Norman.  And while they have a new staff and they are transfer-heavy in key areas, the Sooners are on the right path and looking to take back the conference, having won a Big 12 title 14 out of the conference’s 25 years.

Pac-12

The Favorite: Utah Utes The Contenders: Oregon Ducks, USC Trojans The Darkhorses: UCLA Bruins, Arizona State the Meat Life Pac-12 Prediction: Utah Utes

The Utes are the real deal.  They have always stumbled early in the season, but they’ve always known how to finish strong.  QB Cameron Rising is growing into his own, and the run game and defense has always been consistent.  Oregon is a consistent challenger in the Pac-12, but Mario Cristobal’s surprise exit will definitely impact them.  Speaking of surprise exits, former Oklahoma head coach and now USC head man Lincoln Riley will try to rebuild the Trojans.  They will probably be entertaining, but they don’t have the offensive line or the defense to stay relevant in the conference race deep into the season.  And I added UCLA and Arizona State as the darkhorses because I like coaches Chip Kelly at UCLA and Herm Edwards at Arizona State.

SEC

The Favorite: Alabama Crimson Tide The Contenders: Georgia Bulldogs, Texas A&M Aggies The Darkhorses: Ole Miss Rebels, Arkansas Razorbacks, LSU Tigers the Meat Life SEC Prediction: Alabama Crimson Tide

It’s a cliche now, but the SEC is deep.  And the defending champion Georgia Bulldogs definitely have a chance to repeat.  Finally the defense and run game guided them to a championship, some may say despite QB Stetson Bennett’s limitations.  Alabama looks stacked though.  And just as my revenge philosophy in the Big Ten predictions, Alabama will have that revenge and balance factor going.  But the rest of the conference will be fun to watch, with Ole Miss and Arkansas both profiling exciting offenses, Texas A&M with that NIL-bought talent, and LSU with new coach Brian Kelly, another surprising exit from Notre Dame.

College Football Playoff Predictions

The Favorite: Alabama Crimson Tide The Contenders: Georgia Bulldogs, Oklahoma Sooners, Ohio State Buckeyes, Notre Dame Fighting Irish  The Darkhorses: Clemson Tigers, NC State Wolfpack, Utah Utes, Oregon Ducks, Baylor Bears, Michigan Wolverines, Miami Hurricanes the Meat Life CFP Four: Alabama Crimson Tide, Georgia Bulldogs, Ohio State Buckeyes, Utah Utes the Meat Life CFP National Championship Game: Alabama Crimson Tide vs Ohio State Buckeyes the Meat Life National Champion Prediction: Alabama Crimson Tide

Is that ultimate result of Alabama and a national title chalk?  Sure.  But who has been more consistent in getting to the CFP and winning titles than Nick Saban and the Crimson Tide? I included defending champion Georgia in the CFP along with frequent CFP visitor Ohio State. I threw in a darkhorse with Utah, they certainly have the defense to make at least a CFP appearance. Also be on the lookout for a team I haven’t talked about yet in Notre Dame. I know I mainly focus on the Power 5 but Notre Dame has some serious talent particularly on the defense. And I’m a big fan of their young first year head coach Marcus Freeman. They’ve got a big matchup against Ohio State to begin their season next week. That game will certainly be telling for they type of season both the Fighting Irish and the Buckeyes will have.

As always, I’ll leave with my prediction for Oklahoma. I think they’ll go 10-2, dropping games in Lincoln to Nebraska and then in Morgantown against West Virginia. They will match up against Baylor in the Big 12 title game and reclaim the conference title.

But, they have the potential to do better than that. We can only hope. Let’s have a great season!

Football is back! BOOMER SOONER!

[themeatlife]

the Meat Life 2022 College Football Preview Part One - Oklahoma’s Prodigal Son Returns

It’s been a while huh?  Well, you are going to get a bunch of entries coming.  My College Football Preview will be three parts.  The first part is on Brent Venables, Oklahoma Football’s new head coach.  The second will cover conference expansion.  And the third is my traditional season preview and prediction entry.  After all that, I have some MCU entries in the works.

Without further ado, College Football Preview Part One - Oklahoma’s Prodigal Son Returns.

After tumultuous exit of Lincoln Riley, Oklahoma Football brings back former defensive coordinator Brent Venables as the 23rd Head Coach.

Christians know the parable of the Prodigal Son.  While I would not really describe Venables as losing his way, his return was marked by celebration and the college football equivalent of slaughtering the fatted calf.  On December 5, 2021, Brent Venables returned to the University of Oklahoma.  I remember that night in bed with the TV on watching live Venables landing and being greeted at Westheimer Airport in Norman.  It was a great catharsis, especially after one week prior when Riley surprisingly left for USC.  My wife and I cheering our guy on, Coach V is back!

It was nice to be wanted, and Venables wanted to return.

Brent’s First Oklahoma Stint

Venables was with the original group of coaches that Bob Stoops brought on in 1999 when Stoops took over the struggling Oklahoma program.  Bob had coached Brent as a player and had him on his defensive staff when Bob was DC at Kansas State under Bill Snyder in the early 1990s.  Bob went on to Florida as DC and then Brent was brought on the early Oklahoma staff as co-DC with Bob’s brother Mike.  The combination was electric, with a national championship in 2000, a couple of championship game appearances in 2003/2004, and a ton of All-Americans and national award winners particularly on the defensive side of the ball.  Mike left toward the end of the 2003 season, leaving Brent to take over as DC.  While the offenses kept rolling over the years and had different coordinators (Mike Leach, Mark Mangino, Chuck Long, Kevin Wilson, and Josh Heupel from 1999-2011), Brent Venables was a constant at DC.

While he was beloved, people forget quickly that a decade ago the Sooner fanbase wasn’t as welcoming to Venables, calling for his removal or resignation.

In 2011, OU was #1 in the preseason AP poll, picked as a primary challenger to the recent dominance of Nick Saban’s Alabama Crimson Tide at the beginning years of their reign over college football.  So much promise up through the middle of the season.  Big wins over then #5 Florida State and #11 Texas.  The Texas win was especially big, a 55-17 rout showcasing a dominant defense.

But the tides turned on a stormy night in Norman.  

The start to their game against Texas Tech delayed two hours.  Something was off with the Sooners after that, with the Red Raiders able to capitalize on mistakes to get up to a 31-7 lead at the beginning of the third quarter.  The Sooners clawed back but were unable to overcome and lost 41-38, ending Oklahoma’s 39 game home winning streak.  Things got worse a few weeks later, especially for the defense.  Robert Griffin III had his Heisman moment, guiding his Baylor Bears to a 45-38 win over the Sooners.

By the time Oklahoma (surprisingly still #13) ran into #3 Oklahoma State, their lofty aspirations in the preseason was out of reach.  And the Sooners were totally outmatched that night, losing to the Cowboys 44-10.  It could have easily been 64-10 to be honest.

While there were lots to blame on the downward spiral of the season (the offensive stagnation after mid-season injuries to then walk on RB Dom Whaley and record-breaking WR Ryan Broyles primarily huge contributors to not meeting expectations), the bulk of the blame, at least from the fan chatter I remember at the time, landed on the defense and defensive coordinator Brent Venables.  Stoops must have felt the heat, because that offseason Bob decided to bring back Mike on staff.  Brent must have saw that as a signal that it was time for something different.  I also didn’t add this up at the time, but 2011 was a rough year for Venables, losing both his brother Kirk to a seizure caused by years of alcohol abuse and LB Austin Box to an accidental overdose of pain medication within a couple days in May.  Needing a change that winter, Venables signed with Clemson to be DC for Dabo Swinney.

Brent Venables: The Clemson Years

Dabo Swinney had some success in his first four years as the head man in Clemson - a couple conference championship game appearances and a ACC title in 2011.  But one thing that plagued Dabo was the definition of the term “Clemsoning.”  While out of date and inaccurate now, in the late 2000s and early 2010s, Clemsoning meant a good team (Clemson) failing to meet greatness on the big stage.  It was particularly present in the 2012 Orange Bowl when the favored Clemson Tigers were trounced by Geno Smith and the West Virginia Mountaineers 70-33.

After that beating, Swinney brought on Venables to rebuild the defense.

While it took a few years, you could see glimpses of greatness in the years following the hire.  In particular, at the end of the 2014 season when Clemson met Oklahoma in the Russell Athletic Bowl.  While Oklahoma had its issues all 2014 season, Venables defense was dominant, especially up front with players like DE Vic Beasley leading the charge and pressuring OU QB Trevor Knight all game.  Nearly a year before, Knight took apart Alabama’s defense in the Sugar Bowl.  Against Clemson, Oklahoma was shut out until the last drive of the game, falling 40-6.

Most of the country knows the story from there.  Clemson goes on to win two national titles in the 2016 and 2018 seasons.  Yes, the offense had a ton to do with it (with pre-scandal Deshaun Watson at the helm in 2016 and freshman phenom Trevor Lawrence as the triggerman in 2018), but especially in the 2018 campaign the defense guided a lot of their success.  LB Ben Boulware was the anchor of that 2016 defense, as LB Isaiah Simmons in 2018, both All-Americans and defensive award winners.  During Venables tenure, Clemson had a defense in the top 25 in total defense in all but one year - 2012 (his first year) and the #1 total defense in 2018.

Clemson’s success on a national level was linked to the defense’s success under Venables.

Brent would have offers for head coaching jobs over these years.  But he was always perceived as content being a coordinator.  For Venables, it wasn’t ever a matter of getting an offer for a head coaching job, but where that offer was coming from.  As it seems, he was waiting for the right one to open up...Oklahoma.

And while it seemed unlikely it would open, given how young Lincoln Riley was when he was given the keys to the kingdom in the summer of 2017, Brent Venables patience paid off.

Oklahoma’s Son Rewarded With the Throne

Venables’ return to Oklahoma in December was like a scripted fairytale ending. Greeting party at the airport upon his initial return.  Pep rally official press conference later that week.  And a galvanized fan base reinvigorated with his return, Sooner fans have not been this hyped about a college football season in a few years.

As with any head job, it all doesn’t come without some adversity and controversy.  There is the hiring of Jeff Lebby as his OC, a member of the Baylor offensive staff under Art Briles during the sexual assault scandals that took down Briles.  While Lebby was cleared of any wrongdoing, he was a part of Briles’ staff that turned a blind eye to these assaults and has defended Briles publicly.  And then there is the recent resignation of longtime Oklahoma staffer and head of recruiting Cale Gundy.  Given the last decade of dealing with racially-charged subject matter with the team, Gundy’s stumble is surprising.  Everyone has to take accountability for their actions, and he did so by resigning.

But those things notwithstanding, Venables’ tenure so far has been met with high regard and positive vibes by the players, the fans, and the program at large.  A big gauge of that is the Spring Game attendance numbers.  Oklahoma had the largest attendance, not just in program history but the largest in the country.

Another gauge, recruiting.  Oklahoma has been hot on the recruiting trail, and not just on the usual offensive talent.  Oklahoma has been a perennial top 10 recruiting class for the better part of the last couple decades, but there is a distinct difference in this latest class and the classes from the last five years.  Out of the 20 commitments for the 2023 class, half are highly coveted defensive recruits including 5-star edge prospect Adepoju Adebawore.  That is something that was lacking from the previous regime, high defensive prospects.  I’m not a big recruiting guy, but this is the most I’ve dove into recruiting since being a Sooner fan.

Brent Venables was with Oklahoma his first go round for a long time, over a decade.  But that’s not the main reason why he is so beloved and why he got the reception he has been getting.  He’s getting all that because of how genuine and authentic he has been, back then and right now.  

"We will employ an exciting, fast, explosive and diverse offense, combined with a physical, punishing, relentless, suffocating defense."

I don’t know how things will go once the games get to being played on the field.  But I know the culture changes implemented, the return of Jerry Schmidt as the head of strength and conditioning, and his defensive philosophy, Brent Venables has Oklahoma Football heading upward.  And who knows, maybe, just maybe, Brent will get OU over the hump in the College Football Playoff, and just in time for Oklahoma’s move to the SEC.

Boomer Sooner

[themeatlife]

The Batman - A Look at the New Film and the Legacy of Batman

I finally got to see The Batman this past Saturday.  There has been a long history of Batman in film, from the original motion picture in 1966, to the start of modern interpretations of the caped crusader in 1989, through to this latest iteration in 2022.  I’ll first write about the newest release, then I’ll rank the feature length film releases of Batman, including the Snyder team-up movies.  For The Batman, I’ll try not to spoil too much, but if I go over too much this will serve as your spoiler warning.

The Batman

the Meat Life Rating - 8.5/10

The Batman is a pretty dark murder mystery featuring a detective duo of Lt Jim Gordon and a Batman in his second year as the mask vigilante, hunting down serial-killer and Gotham conspiracy theorist The Riddler.  The movie plays like a crime noir only one of the detectives is in a Bat suit.  The run time is close to three hours but the pacing keeps the film moving pretty well.  

As much as the Nolan Dark Knight Trilogy tried to be a more grounded, real world interpretation of Batman, director Matt Reeves’ The Batman is the most grounded and realistic portrayal of Gotham City and Batman yet.  From the limited tech featured (regular motorcycles, a muscle car-like Batmobile, a video recording contact lens, and the computers in the Batcave), to Batman’s battle against city government corruption and the mob, it is a highly realistic take.

There are eerie parallels where The Riddler uses social media to motivate copycats a la QAnon/Trump loyalists motivate the January 6th Capitol Riot.  It’s worth noting that this was written and in production before the riot, so it is not a direct or carbon copy of those events.  But art reflect life and life reflects art.  

And then there is the romantic tension between The Batman and Selina Kyle.  Some of the movie they work well together and there is a palpable chemistry.  But situations come up where they both are at odds with each other.  The dynamic between the two grows throughout the movie and is a nice added touch to the overall story.

Overall, worth a watch in the theater on the big screen.  Robert Pattinson is a solid Batman, a bit on the emo side with the hair, mood, and Nirvana song in the background.  The cast is great, from Jeffrey Wright as Gordon, Zoe Kravitz as Selina Kyle, Andy Serkis as Alfred, and then the villains Carmine Falcone (John Tuturro), Penguin (Colln Farrell), and the Riddler (Paul Dano).  Great performances all around. If you wait too long, The Batman will be available on HBOMax in mid-April.

Ranking Batman

There were many feature film releases of Batman.  I’ll briefly go over each when I rank them.  Here’s the ranking:

14) Batman & Robin (1997) the Meat Life Rating - 2/10 Wow, yeah this one was horrible.  Director Joel Schumacher channeled the campiness of early interpretations of Batman and then went over the edge.  This probably singlehandedly ended Alicia Silverstone’s movie career.  While it is the worst of the Batman entries, it is certainly an inflection point as cited by Sean Fennessey of the Ringer.

13) Suicide Squad (2016) the Meat Life Rating - 5/10 Batman and the Joker were in a couple scenes.  Those were probably the best scenes in the movie.  Not as horrible as Batman & Robin, but at times gives it a run for its money.  Not worth a watch.

12) The Lego Batman Movie (2017) the Meat Life Rating - 6/10 Decent kid movie and very entertaining.  But not really high caliber.  And much like the second Space Jam movie is a big ad for Warner Brothers properties.

11) Batman (1966) the Meat Life Rating - 6.5/10 This is very camp and not really my bag as far as an interpretation of Batman.  But it is fun to revisit to see how far Batman movie storytelling has come.

10) Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) the Meat Life Rating - 6/10 Theatrical, 7/10 Ultimate If you are going to watch, load up the Ultimate Edition, which is actually the default edition on HBOMax.  It is about an hour longer than it needs to be, but it was an okay Batman movie.

9) Justice League (2017/2021) the Meat Life Rating - 5/10 Theatrical, 8/10 Snyder Cut Throw the Joss Whedon version in the trash.  The Snyder Cut is great, but it is 4 hours long.  It plays well as a mini-series and is even broken up into chapters which makes it play very much like a mini-series.  The Snyder Cut also has a couple of endings that would lead into a sequel that probably will never come now.  But if the WB/DC did decide to move forward with that story, it would probably do well as an HBOMax series (WB, I’m full of ideas, call me!)

8) Batman Forever (1995) the Meat Life Rating - 6.5/10 Director Joel Schumacher’s first entry into the Batman universe.  It is camp, but has an aesthetic and is actually a bit fun.  The cast is crazy good for a mid movie: Val Kilmer, Nicole Kidman, Tommy Lee Jones, Jim Carey, Chris O’Donnell, Drew Berrymore.  And Kiss From A Rose by Seal.

7) Batman Returns (1992) the Meat Life Rating - 7/10 I’m probably going to catch heat from this, but I’m not a big Returns guy.  Some rank this higher than the first Keaton/Burton Batman.  While this is very good, it doesn’t quite measure up to the first.  Some great performances from Michelle Pfeiffer, Danny Devito, and Christopher Walken.  But with the Batman and Gotham in a Christmas backdrop, Tim Burton gives this Batman the Nightmare Before Christmas vibes intentionally or unintentionally.

6) Batman Begins (2005) the Meat Life Rating - 7.5/10 The first Batman installment since the travesty of Batman & Robin.  Director Christopher Nolan promised a more reality grounded Batman.  While the Batsuit, gadgets, and Batmobile are all from a real world form and the tone is more serious, the storyline is very much still comic book with the mysticism of The League of Shadows and Ra’s Al Ghul trying to destroy Gotham.

5) The Dark Knight Rises (2012) the Meat Life Rating - 8/10 This personally is my favorite Batman movie.  The scope and scale is large.  Bane breaks Batman/Bruce Wayne’s back.  Anne Hathaway as Selina Kyle. And before Batman sacrifices himself he reveals to Commissioner Gordon that he was the little boy he helped after his parents died. The epic score.  Love it.  In reality there are some storytelling problems here and there and Talia Al Ghul’s death scene was a little on the lame side.  I think this might have benefitted from being split into two movies - the first part could have been The Dark Knight Falls and chronicles Batman’s return up through Bane breaking his back, the second part could have been The Dark Knight Rises showing Wayne in the prison building his strength back up on through to the end (see WB, I’m full of ideas).

4) The Batman (2022) the Meat Life Rating - 8.5/10 Review is above.  Very good movie.

3) Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993) the Meat Life Rating - 8.5/10 I was an avid Batman: The Animated Series watcher as a kid.  This animated movie came out when I was ten, at the peak of me watching these comic based cartoons.  I was mainly a Marvel guy, loving the X-Men and Spider-Man Fox animated shows, but my favorite was and always has been Batman.  This is a rather dark story for a cartoon.  But it is really great.  If you haven’t watched, it is available on HBOMax, and it is lean as well at an hour 16 minute run time.

2) Batman (1989) the Meat Life Rating - 8.5/10 The OG.  This movie is probably the birth of the modern comic book adaptation.  Director Tim Burton gives us a dark and lived in Gotham.  Jack Nicholson played the Joker iconically being the standard comic book villain until Heath Ledger’s interpretation nearly 20 years later.  For many, Michael Keaton is the definitive Batman.  Still highly entertaining to watch three decades later.

1) The Dark Knight (2008) the Meat Life Rating - 9.5/10 The gold standard, not only for a Batman film but for comic book adaptations in general.  Director Christopher Nolan and cowriter Jonathan Nolan went for crime thriller disguised as a comic book movie.  Here is my initial review of the movie.  While Keaton might be the definitive Batman, Christian Bale might be the definitive Bruce Wayne.  The Dark Knight Trilogy you see a solid arc for Wayne, with the strongest film being this sequel.

I hope you enjoyed this look at The Batman and all of Batman film’s past.  Next entry I’ve actually been working on for a while, a look at Phase Four of the Marvel Cinematic Universe so far - both the television series and the feature films.  See you next time.

[themeatlife]

the Meat Life turned 11 today!

#tumblr birthday #tumblr milestone

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The 2021 Pandemi Movie Year in Review

It’s been a strange movie year.  But compared to 2020 and not having a summer movie season, I’ll take it.  Much has been made of the lowest total box office totals in 30 years (check out the yearly box office totals here).  But hey, it’s the pandemi baby.  No matter how Christopher Nolan insists films need to be in a theater, the COVID pandemic has affected people’s willingness to go to theaters and theaters’ willingness to be open with the exception of Spider-Man: No Way Home.  Here is a look at the box office totals for 2021:

Here are some short reviews of the movies I’ve seen.  I’ve only been to the theater for Shang-Chi and Spider-Man: No Way Home, so most of these I viewed as a PVOD viewing or through a streamer.  I’m going to rank my top ten of the year that I’ve seen and then list the ratings of the rest I’ve seen.

Top Ten of 2021 (That I’ve Seen)

1) Spider-Man: No Way Home - Theaters the Meat Life Rating: 9/10

First of all, wow.  Wow!  Sony and Marvel did it.  Without spoilers, they made a touching, funny, introspective, sentimental, action-packed movie that connected the past to the future in our present.  This is definitely recency bias acting here, but it is probably the best standalone MCU movie and in the top five of comic book based movies ever.  Yeah, it’s that good.  If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend seeing it while it is still in theaters.

2) Judas and the Black Messiah - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 8.5/10

Based on actual events, this story follows the FBI informant William O’Neal as he befriends and later crosses Fred Hampton and the Black Panther Party.  It is compelling, well acted (Daniel Kaluuya is probably one of the best actors right now), and well executed story.  A must see.

3) Dune - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 8.5/10

I had my doubts, but I was thoroughly impressed.  Visually stunning.  Some of the effects you wonder how they made it look so real.  The story is a bit of a slow burn and the movie is a bit longer than I realized, but if you like director Denis Villaneuve, you’ll love this movie.

4) Luca - Disney+ the Meat Life Rating: 8.5/10

Actually didn’t know this was coming out, so this was a great surprise.  Great summer family movie.  It’s got the standard Pixar flare and a great story and message.  I love the exploration of family, not just the biological family but the family you choose.

5) In The Heights - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 8/10

Lots of hype before the release of this Lin-Manuel Miranda/Jon Chu project.  Although the box office numbers didn’t live up to the hype, I thought it was a great movie.  Lots to love here, good songs, solid storylines, and Latinx representation.  A feel-good musical about the New York neighborhood Washington Heights and how home is where you make it.

6) Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings - Theaters - Now on Disney+/Blu-Ray the Meat Life Rating: 8/10

Great to see a superhero of Asian descent lead a film.  And they developed a great story.  I loved the complicated father-son conflict and dynamic and how the plot is very family-driven.  Makes it for a more realistic depiction of Asian life within the MCU frame.  I also liked a lot of the nods they gave to the different fighting styles in cinema over the years.  You can see the influences from the likes of Jackie Chan and films like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

7) Zack Snyder’s Justice League (The Snyder Cut) - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 8/10

For what it is, Zack Snyder’s version of the Justice League is actually pretty good.  Now, it does say that there are issues if it takes you four hours to tell a story that normally fits in two.  DC just made the mistake of not building up backstories in previous films and expected for things to work in two hours.  It helps that Snyder splits this up in “chapters” that are around 40 minutes a piece, so if you aren’t game to take it in all at once it does work in an episodic manner as well.  But this story is much clearer than the theatrical version that was released in 2017.  Worth a look but not for everyone.

8) Music Box - Woodstock 99: Peace Love and Rage - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 8/10

Bill Simmons’ The Ringer produces this music centric docuseries and kicked things off with their doc on Woodstock 99.  I remember seeing some of the carnage on the news and MTV back in 1999, but this dives into how ill-prepared the organizers were and the dominos that fell into place that led to the fiery conclusion of the chaotic music festival.

9) Raya and the Last Dragon - Disney+ the Meat Life Rating: 7.5/10

This was going to be my favorite animated movie of the year before Luca came out (I’m counting Soul as a 2020 movie since it was released last Christmas).  Another big example of great Asian representation (what can I say?  I gotta rep).  Great animation, love the story and the actors in this (Awkwafina is in this and Shang-Chi, she’s in everything?).

10) F9: The Fast Saga - Theaters/PVOD - Now on Blu-Ray the Meat Life Rating: 7.5/10

Dom Toretto and the superpower of family.  You’ve seen the memes all summer.  I’ve said before on this blog that the Fast Saga is a guilty pleasure of mine.  I don’t mind the ridiculousness of the stunts or some of the premises.  Like I’ve told some of my friends, if you turn off the logic part of your brain and ride along, these are very enjoyable.  This isn’t the best installment, but certainly solid entertainment.

Rating the Rest

Black Widow - Disney+ the Meat Life Rating: 7.5/10

Jungle Cruise - Disney+ the Meat Life Rating: 7.5/10

A Quiet Place Part II - Paramount+ the Meat Life Rating: 7/10

The Suicide Squad - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 7/10

Red Notice - Netflix the Meat Life Rating: 7/10

No Sudden Move - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 7/10

The Matrix Resurrection - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 6.5/10

The Tomorrow War - Amazon Prime the Meat Life Rating: 6.5/10

Mortal Kombat - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 6.5/10

The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 6.5/10

Godzilla vs Kong - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 6.5/10

Cruella - Disney+ the Meat Life Rating: 6.5/10

Reminiscence - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 6/10

Without Remorse - Amazon Prime the Meat Life Rating: 6/10

Those Who Wish Me Dead - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 6/10

Clifford the Big Red Dog - Paramount+ the Meat Life Rating: 6/10

The Little Things - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 6/10

Tom & Jerry - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 5/10

Space Jam: A New Legacy - HBOMax the Meat Life Rating: 4/10

Others I would like to see: Lockdown Minari Nomadland The United States vs Billie Holiday Coming 2 America Wrath of Man Spiral: From the Book of Saw Summer of Soul Old The Green Knight Stillwater Val Free Guy Respect Sweet Girl Candyman Malignant Cry Macho Dear Evan Hansen Venom: Let There Be Carnage No Time To Die The Last Duel Last Night in Soho Eternals Ghostbusters: Afterlife King Richard Encanto House of Gucci The Beatles: Get Back West Side Story Sing 2 Don’t Look Up American Underdog Licorice Pizza

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Airing It Out - The End of the Lincoln Riley Era

I’m going to start this in 2015. Then Oklahoma head coach Bob Stoops had fired OU QB legend and offensive coordinator Josh Heupel after a disappointing 2014 season. Stoops brought in offensive prodigy Lincoln Riley, the 32 year old OC of East Carolina. Riley was in the beloved (by OU fans) Mike Leach coaching tree and an Air Raid guy.

Early in the 2015 season, it seemed Riley was sticking with the traditional Air Raid - subbing a lot of traditional runs with the short passing game. With running back weapons like Samaje Perine, who had broken the single-game rush yards record the year before, and Joe Mixon, a threat in both catching out of the backfield and running with both speed and power, the run game was almost nonexistent for the Sooners. In particular, the 24-17 loss to a 2-4 Texas team saw Perine/Mixon combine for only 16 carries.

Being the frustrated Sooner fan, I proceed to tweet out my frustration with the lack of commitment to the run game, which was the weakness to then HC Charlie Strong’s Texas defense. I didn’t @ anyone in particular on the Sooners coaching staff, but I did vent my frustration with the offensive play calling and strategy for that game, as many fans often do on the platform.

A week or so passed and someone on my Twitter timeline retweeted something from Lincoln Riley. The only thing is, I couldn’t see it. So I clicked on Riley’s Twitter page. Lo and behold, I was blocked. Probably the only person (that I know of) that has blocked me (and a pretty famous one at that). I also found out he blocked my brother-in-law as well.

Six years later in 2021, I am still blocked by Lincoln Riley.

I found out Lincoln was leaving from my wife. Sunday we are taking a break from football for a little bit since I was still recovering from the Bedlam loss. We were watching Home Alone 2. My wife was on her phone and gets the ESPN alert. “Hey Lincoln Riley is leaving for USC.” I replied no, the rumor was LSU and he squashed that last night. She said no, he’s leaving for USC. Sure enough, the reports verified. I had KD flashbacks, I found out KD was leaving OKC the exact same way. Little did I know the KD vibes would linger.

Lincoln’s Rise

Riley’s coaching career rose fairly quickly. He started out as a walk-on QB for Mike Leach’s Texas Tech in 2002. Leach saw him better as a coach, so Riley transitioned to student assistant and later graduate assistant and then eventually inside receivers coach in 2006. At the end of the 2009 season Mike Leach was fired from Tech (Leach’s firing was a farse, but I won’t get into that here), Riley was set to take on play calling duties for Tech’s bowl game. Tech won 41-31 over Michigan State in the Alamo Bowl.

Ruffin McNeil, Leach’s defensive coordinator at the time, took over the head coaching job at East Carolina. He brought Riley with him and set him up at OC. From 2010-2014, Riley built ECU’s offense up - peaking in 2013 when their offense was 9th in the country in scoring. ECU went 10-3 that season. In 2014 under Riley, ECU WR Justin Hardy broke OU’s Ryan Broyles’ all-time NCAA receptions record (that record was broken by teammate Zay Jones a couple of seasons later, after Riley had left).

I had written about Oklahoma’s struggles after the 2014 season. Stoops had fired Heupel, a disciple that was basically the heir-apparent to the head coaching job. Stoops has said he wanted to return to the Air Raid roots of his earlier teams, and Lincoln Riley was a young, up and coming OC in the Leach coaching tree. So it seemed only natural for Stoops to hire Riley to replace Heupel. And with Stoops thinking about life outside of Oklahoma football, Riley would become Stoops’ heir sooner than expected.

Lincoln’s Run at Oklahoma

The Stoops hire of Riley was fire from the beginning. At the push of Stoops, Riley leaned heavily on the run in the second half of the 2015 season. His offense ended up fourth in the country. Oklahoma finished atop of the Big 12 for the first time since 2012 (technically 2010, 2012 they finished tied with K-State even though the Wildcats beat the Sooners that season. The Big 12 awarded conference titles to both teams. Those years without a conference championship game were weird). Oklahoma finished 11-2 and they made their first appearance in the College Football Playoff, getting spanked in the second half by Clemson and losing 37-17.

2016 started rough with losses against Houston and Ohio State in the non-conference. But after that 1-2 start, the Sooners won their nine conference games to win the Big 12 and won the Sugar Bowl against Auburn 35-19. Riley’s offense was third in the country that season. Both QB Baker Mayfield and WR Dede Westbrook we’re invited to New York for the Heisman ceremony.

The summer of 2017, Bob Stoops drops a bomb and announces his retirement, handing the keys to the kingdom to his OC Lincoln Riley. Everything was in place for Lincoln. The 2017 recruiting class was Oklahoma’s highest ranked class in nearly a decade, Oklahoma had gotten another year of eligibility for QB Baker Mayfield with Kyler Murray waiting in the wings. There was a ton of talent on the offensive side stockpiled. Riley would remain the offensive play caller his entire tenure as head coach.

I won’t go over each of his five seasons as head coach. I will recap some highlights and some critiques that have come his way over the years.

In his five seasons, Riley goes 55-10, with three straight College Football Playoff appearances his first three years. This season was the first time he didn’t lead Oklahoma to a Big 12 Championship, owning conference titles from 2017-2020. His first two years he had two Heisman winners in Mayfield in 2017 and Murray in 2018 and then a Heisman finalist in Jalen Hurts in 2019. The Oklahoma offense finished in the top six in the country every year but 2021 (currently 11th) including number one in 2018 (Murray threw for 4361 yards and ran for 1001, Kennedy Brooks ran for 1056 yards and Trey Sermon almost ran for another 1000, Marquise Brown and CeeDee Lamb finished with 1318 and 1158 yards receiving respectively, that offense was stupid good). But the defense…

The biggest Achilles heel for Oklahoma under Lincoln Riley has been the defense. The biggest example of this was the playoff game for the 2017 season in the Rose Bowl against Georgia. More on that later. Bob’s brother and defensive coordinator Mike Stoops was fired by Lincoln in 2018 after and embarrassing 48-45 loss where Texas put up 501 yards of total offense. Arguably he should have been let go after that Rose Bowl the season before. After an interim stint for Ruffin McNeill at DC, Lincoln hires Alex Grinch at DC to resurrect the defense. In 2018 before Grinch, Oklahoma finished 101st in team defense. 2019 they improved to 64th, in 2020 all the way up to 28th. 2021 they’ve regressed so far to 59th, the pass defense being the main culprit due to injuries. They had shown some improvement late in the season, causing turnovers. But Oklahoma ended Riley’s run at Oklahoma 1-2 over his last three games.

2018 Rose Bowl College Football Playoff Semifinal - #3 Georgia Bulldogs vs #2 Oklahoma Sooners

I am going to use the Rose Bowl/CFP Semifinal as a microcosm of Lincoln Riley’s time at Oklahoma. I’ll also describe this as Oklahoma’s peak during the Lincoln Riley Era. Riley peaked too early, plateaued, and in some cases regressed a bit since Stoops left. The Rose Bowl was the best of times and the worst of times. This might seem like an angry fan take, but whatever - fuck it, he left so I get to be mad.

The good: fast start, offensive explosion, balance, cute trick plays (cute when they work)

You see Heisman winner and now Sooner legend Baker Mayfield as well as talent like RB Rodney Anderson and WRs Marquise Brown and CeeDee Lamb. The offense humming against the vaunted Georgia defense in the first half. Oklahoma nearly blowing the Bulldogs out, leading 31-14 (pre-squib kick) and compiling 375 yards of total offense in the first half. They even got cute with a double-reverse WR pass to the QB. Today the play is known as the Philly Special because the Eagles used the play in the Super Bowl in their win against the Patriots over a month after the Rose Bowl. If Oklahoma would have won, maybe it would have been known as the Sooner Special, who knows. This embodies many of the blowouts and hot starts in the Lincoln Riley Era. Lots of yards, lots of points, getting up early.

The bad: special teams, offense fizzle in the second half, defense defense defense

Squib kick at the end of the first half was botched, leading to good field position and a FG for Georgia, killing the momentum Oklahoma had built in the first half. Instead of a dead Bulldog team trailing 31-14, a hopeful Georgia went into the locker room down 31-17. The momentum was dead and the Riley offense stalled. Out of the eight second half drives, OU punted on six of them. We see at times during the Riley Era the offense stalls or Lincoln “taking the foot off the gas” with the lead. With the offense stalling, the defense was on the field most of the third quarter and big runs from Bulldogs RBs Sony Michel and Nick Chubb, Georgia tied things up 31-31 by the end of the third quarter. Baker throws a pick at the beginning of the fourth leading to a Georgia TD. Baker did throw a TD and then the Sooners defense did get a fumble for a TD to take the lead back but Georgia tied the game late in the fourth 45-45. Going into OT, they exchange FGs in the first OT. Second OT, K Austin Seibert gets his FG attempt blocked in another special teams miscue. Georgia wins 54-48 on a long Sony Michel TD run. The Oklahoma defense gave up 317 rushing yards, much of it coming in the second half. Now I don’t know what records are but I have to believe not many teams win when they let 300+ rush yards go.

The ugly: the playoff reputation

The Rose Bowl was Oklahoma’s best showing in the College Football Playoff, and it was a double-OT loss. The Sooners would go on to lose three straight playoff semifinals: this 54-48 2OT loss to Georgia in the 2017 season, 45-34 loss to Alabama in the 2018 season, and a 63-28 blowout loss to LSU in the 2019 season. There may be some Oklahoma fatigue from the CFP selection committee although there hasn’t been an opportunity the last couple season for Oklahoma to be ranked in the top four at the end of the season. But Lincoln Riley and Oklahoma may have plateaued, not being able to get over the hump those three times they made the playoff early in his tenure. Kind of feeds into that hot start and fizzle toward the end pattern established by Riley.

Lincoln Leaves and the Aftermath

All this smells of shady shit. Like I said earlier, hella KD vibes. I listened to Sooner football podcasts all day Monday, all had similar accounts (also found out some journalist on the OU beat are also blocked by Riley on Twitter…soft). Lincoln didn’t like the impending move to the SEC, whether upset that he wasn’t consulted for his opinion or was just opposed to the move altogether. Some accounts were that Riley was planning to leave since September (which would explain the subpar, ill-prepared looking, underwhelmingly close wins early in the season), other accounts were things started rolling during the bye week (which explains the weird behavior the week of the Baylor game and getting absolutely outcoached by Dave Aranda).

Whichever one is true (could be both), the timing of the whole thing is horrible for Oklahoma. Early signing day is December 15th. With the news of Riley leaving, a bunch of high profile recruits have decommitted from OU. Oklahoma will find out what bowl game they draw this weekend but will have to field a team without DC Grinch, WR Coach Dennis Simmons, strength coach Bennie Wylie, and ops director Clarke Stroud. Basically Lincoln’s guys that didn’t play for OU left with him early Monday morning on a plane to LA. QB Spencer Rattler entered the transfer portal (as expected since his midseason benching) as well as WRs Jadon Haselwood and Theo Wease. We’ll see who all they are able to field for a bowl game. With the defections, there were also some players tweeting a location pin, presumably saying they are staying. Also there are a few recruits who are also tweeting that they are staying committed to Oklahoma.

In the interim, Oklahoma has installed Bob Stoops to hold the ship together while AD Joe Castiglione conducts his impromptu coaching search. They had a presser Monday (a couple hours before Lincoln’s USC presser no less). I’ll just let you watch the tweeted video:

I think as a Sooner fan, I needed to hear that. Stabilize things. Calm things down. You can hear the defiance in Bob’s voice. But the message was directed to the players in particular. They are the program. After listening to that, I figure so many fans and maybe some of the players and remaining coaches are ready to run through a wall for Stoops. And Bob is ready to get to work. “Going out recruiting tonight.”

There’s a lot of chatter (mostly by fans) for possible coaching candidates like Clemson DC and former OU DC Brent Venables, Carolina Panthers HC Matt Rhule, former OU TE Coach and current South Carolina HC Shane Beamer, or Cincinnati HC Luke Fickell. But in the meantime, I’m down to have Stoops for one last ride in the bowl game. We’ll see where it all falls in the coming weeks (crazy shit is happening like Brian Kelly leaving Notre Dame for LSU).

Looking forward to seeing who Oklahoma gets for the coming era.

Boomer Sooner

#Youtube

[themeatlife]

September 11, 2001

Tuesday morning in the late summer.  I didn’t have class until 2pm that day, partially by design and partially because of my limited selection being an incoming freshman when I enrolled.  To be honest I can’t remember what class it was that I had that day, that first semester of college wasn’t my best academically.

My friends and I had been getting into the routine of eating breakfast at the cafe before their morning classes.  I would wake up to join, eat, and go back to bed.  Had to take advantage of the decent meal plan that the University of Oklahoma had at the time (I hear it has improved since I’ve been there).

A bit before 8am, we head back to Walker Tower.  My friends including my roommate getting ready for their classes, me brushing my teeth to go back to bed.  Our room was the hangout room for my friends from Lawton, generically nicknamed “The Spot” by me.  I was into nicknaming things and people in college.  

Aaron, my roommate gets a call on our room line.  Odd it wasn’t on his cell phone.  It was his girlfriend, she lived back home in Lawton where we were from.  She had called saying there was a plane that had crashed into one of the World Trade Center towers.  She wasn’t very specific, so we thought it was a small biplane that hit the building.  We were pretty dismissive about it, not sure why.  Aaron left for class, I lied down.

But something eventually didn’t feel right.

We didn’t have cable or an antenna for our TV, we were cheap freshmen.  So I hopped onto my laptop.  Every news site I went to was down.  ABC.  NBC.  CBS.  CNN.  New York Times.  Error.  Could not load site.

The rooms in Walker Tower shared a bathroom, two rooms connected by a bathroom made a suite.  We were pretty cool with our suitemates.  I yelled through the bathroom “Hey!  You guys home?”  They had cable.  Silence.

So I turned to the final media left.  I had an alarm clock with a radio.  I didn’t know which station was a news station, but in this case I didn’t have to.  Every station was on NPR or some type of news.  I stopped on one station just as they narrated that a second plane came in and hit the south tower of the World Trade Center.

The rest of the day was kind of a blur here and there.  I remember my friends shortly after I turned the radio coming back to the room, their classes cancelled.  They said all the TVs in the Union and where ever on campus had the news on.  My 2pm was cancelled but no email about my 6pm one (yeah, I really had a shitty schedule).  We listened to the radio as the Pentagon was hit.  Our suitemates came back to their room and we turned on the TV to see the south tower of the World Trade Center collapse.

My friend Ethan got a call from his dad shortly after lunchtime saying we better stock up on gas, because there was talk about gas prices going up if there was an war coming to the Middle East in response to these attacks.  So Ethan and I drove around Norman looking for a gas station that wasn’t busy, every place with a line flowing out to the street with prices as high as $6/gallon at some places we passed by.

That afternoon we talked about who it could be that was behind this tragedy.  Aaron and Garrison went over and over about Osama bin Laden, a guy I remember was interviewed in 1998 by American media shortly before his organization al-Qaeda carried out dual bombings of American embassies in Tanzania and Kenya.

I called home at some point.  My parents and brother were okay.  My sister in Texas was okay as well.  My mom was scheduled to work that morning, she had worked at the military clothing sales store on Fort Sill at the time.  She said they closed the post and there was a long line.  She had to wait a while before she was able to turn around and go home.

For the last few years prior, the checkpoints to get into Fort Sill were open.  They hadn’t checked IDs and closed the gates in years.  September 10th was the last full day Fort Sill was open like that.  I had been home a couple times since college started and on the way back to Norman from my parents’ house I used to go up 52nd/53rd and took the gate into Fort Sill, taking the winding countryside roads on post to make my way to I-44.

Labor Day was the last time I took that route.

I eventually made my way to my 6pm class that day.  Calc II.  The instructor said something I will never forget.  “I’m not cancelling class.  That is how the terrorists win.”

That Friday I went back home.  I didn’t plan to come back for another month since I was just there Labor Day weekend, but I felt I needed to.  

You know the story thereafter for America.  “United We Stand” for a few months and then the broad War on Terror, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the Patriot Act initially the consensus but since (and among other things), dividing the country.  Air travel is so different now than it was pre-9/11.  The American economy has been shakily recovering since an initial collapse after 2001. Almost ten years after the attacks, on May 2, 2011, a Navy Seals team kills bin Laden in Afghanistan neighbor Pakistan.  Troops only just recently leave Afghanistan. A nation once pretty united right after the attacks now painfully divided.

We all have complicated feelings about all these things since 9/11.  But we all remember how we got to this point, Americans all remember where we were on September 11th.  Every generation has a touchpoint where they remember specifics of where they were when it happened.  My generation has had quite a few of these touchpoints, to be honest.

We all remember the fallen.

9/11/2001

AA11 08:46

UA175 09:03

AA77 09:37

UA93 10:03

2977

World Trade Center

Pentagon

Somerset County

Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May their souls and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

[themeatlife]

Heisman, Conference Predictions, and the College Football Playoff - 2021 College Football Season Preview - Part 2

Let the countdown begin!  

We are about a week away from a handful of games next weekend and a couple weeks before the rest of college football kicks off.  If you know me, you know I watch whatever sport is on, but in particular any football that’s on.  But even though I’ll watch whatever game, I’m only really going to go through Power 5 predictions, because well that’s usually the only ones that matter.  Sure every few years we’ll get a good story like Boise State or UCF come up and challenge from the Group of 5, but I’m an Oklahoma fan by trade so we are going to mess with the Power 5.

In this preview, I’m going to look at who people are looking at for the Heisman, who will challenge and win in the Power 5 conferences, and who to look at challenge and possibly get into the College Football Playoff.  I’m going to do something new and carry it through each preview category.  I’ll put everything in these three groups: the Favorites, the Contenders, and the Darkhorses.  So let’s get to it!

Heisman Hopefuls

The Favorites: Spencer Rattler, QB - Oklahoma Sooners Sam Howell, QB - North Carolina Tar Heels D’Eriq King, QB - Miami Hurricanes JT Daniels, QB - Georgia Bulldogs

The Contenders: DJ Uiagalelei, QB - Clemson Tigers Breece Hall, RB - Iowa State Cyclones Brock Purdy, QB - Iowa State Cyclones Kedon Slovis, QB - USC Trojans

The Darkhorses: Bryce Young, QB - Alabama Crimson Tide CJ Stroud, QB - Ohio State Buckeyes

the Meat Life Heisman Prediction: Spencer Rattler, QB - Oklahoma Sooners

This is probably the most obvious pick of the entire entry.  Rattler is in his third year under Head Coach Lincoln Riley’s system.  He made great strides the second half of the season last year.  Riley has a history of getting his QBs in a position to win the Heisman, with Baker Mayfield and Kyler Murray winning back to back years and both Baker and Jalen Hurts getting invites to New York.  So this is Rattler’s award to lose.

The other favorites in the field: Sam Howell out of UNC gives me hella Baker vibes.  D’Eriq King, if he’s fully over the leg injury from last year, will be a big challenger.  And Georgia finally has a dynamic QB in JT Daniels.  As far as the challengers, DJ Uiagalelei showed well in relief of Trevor Lawrence against Notre Dame last year and looks the part.  Iowa State’s success and how much they lean on either Breece Hall or Brock Purdy will determine how far they get in Heisman race (as well as the Cyclones’ chances in the Big 12 and CFP).  And USC seems to have found the QB to lead them on the way back to previous glory.  I put both Bryce Young and CJ Stroud as darkhorse because we have yet to see them in full game mode.

Power 5 Conference Predictions

ACC

The Favorite: Clemson Tigers The Contenders: North Carolina Tar Heels, Miami Hurricanes The Darkhorses: Boston College Eagles, Virginia Tech Hokies the Meat Life ACC Prediction: North Carolina Tar Heels

Bold prediction?  Sure.  But this is probably the best chance anyone has had to take the ACC crown away from Clemson. It may very well end up as Clemson for the 7th straight time, but I like Howell and head coach Mack Brown for the Tar Heels.  It will certainly be something to watch.  King and the Hurricanes as well if King comes back from injury as his old self.

Big Ten

The Favorite: Ohio State Buckeyes The Contenders: Wisconsin Badgers, Penn State Nittany Lions The Darkhorses: Indiana Hoosiers, Iowa Hawkeyes the Meat Life Big Ten Prediction: Ohio State Buckeyes

Although Ohio State will be grooming a new QB to replace Justin Fields, there seems to be a gap between the Buckeyes and the rest of the Big Ten.  Defensively these others have been good enough, but only Indiana last season was able to push the Buckeyes to the brink offensively.

Big 12

The Favorite: Oklahoma Sooners The Contenders: Iowa State Cyclones The Darkhorses: Texas Longhorns, Oklahoma State Cowboys, TCU Horned Frogs the Meat Life Big 12 Prediction: Oklahoma Sooners

Iowa State will get a second crack at challenging Oklahoma for conference supremacy this season.  Oklahoma gets Iowa State at home this season, so that’s a plus for the Sooners.  And the Sooners are fielding their best defense they’ve had in the last decade.  Texas will be interesting, lots of hype behind Casey Thompson at QB...but it’s Texas.  Oklahoma State will get to see if QB Spencer Sanders can take that leap.

Pac-12

The Favorite: Oregon Ducks The Contenders: USC Trojans, Washington Huskies, Utah Utes The Darkhorses: Arizona State Sun Devils, Colorado Buffaloes the Meat Life Pac-12 Prediction: USC Trojans

As previously stated, Slovis could be what the Trojans have been looking for to get back to success, so I’m counting on him to lead the Trojans back to the top of the Pac-12.  Oregon obviously going to do its best to defend its weird Pac-12 title from last season.  Washington didn’t get to play in the conference title game due to COVID, so they may challenge Oregon in the north.  Utah always has a solid squad to challenge for the conference title.

SEC

The Favorite: Alabama Crimson Tide The Contenders: Georgia Bulldogs, Texas A&M Aggies The Darkhorses: Florida Gators, LSU Tigers the Meat Life SEC Prediction: Georgia Bulldogs

Another bold pick from me, although that’s not to say Alabama can’t win the conference or a national title.  But Georgia finally has a triggerman in JT Daniels and Alabama’s QB is inexperienced.  Texas A&M enjoyed a great run last season derailed by Bama.  They could challege but they are going to break in a new QB.  Florida could challenge if they grew back a defense.  And LSU is a good offense away from being great.

College Football Playoff Predictions

The Favorite: Alabama Crimson Tide The Contenders: Oklahoma Sooners, Clemson Tigers, Georgia Bulldogs The Darkhorses: Ohio State Buckeyes, North Carolina Tar Heels, Iowa State Cyclones, Texas A&M Aggies, Miami Hurricanes the Meat Life CFP Four: Georgia Bulldogs, Oklahoma Sooners, North Carolina Tar Heels, Alabama Crimson Tide the Meat Life CFP National Championship Game: Oklahoma Sooners vs Georgia Bulldogs the Meat Life National Champion Prediction: Oklahoma Sooners

Yep, I made the homer pick this time around.  The Sooners have the best all-around team they’ve fielded in quite some time.  For years it has been offensive-heavy, but last year they depended on their defense to win some games.  I don’t want to jinx things, but this team has the best chance in the last decade to get their eighth national title.  I’m hoping for big things.  So don’t let me down!  BOOMER SOONER

[themeatlife]

NIL Begins, CFP Expansion, Oklahoma and Texas to the SEC, and More! - 2021 College Football Season Preview - Part 1

Wow, a lot to talk about since I last wrote about college football.  I skipped last season’s preview because at this point last year we had no idea if there would have been a season at all.  In 2020, we had no spring ball, abbreviated or conference-only schedules starting at different times, with little to no fans in the stands.  2021 will be more like a “normal” season, with most schools able to have a spring, full schedules, and (for the most part) full stadiums.  We may see more of what Tulane is doing for stadiums, especially in areas with high COVID infection rates.

So where to begin?  So much to talk about!  

Name, Image, and Likeness

From not being able to have any sort of endorsement deals to being able to profit off name, image, and likeness (NIL), the college athlete has come a long way.  Remember when people would get busted for getting stuff for free?  Well, now athletes, not just football players, can hire agents to help them manage their brand and sell their image.

The landmark Ed O’Bannon case opened the gates.  Several state legislatures pushed the NCAA by making it legal in those states for athletes to profit off their likeness starting July 1st.  It was only a matter of time before the NCAA would have to bend, and now athletes are able to make money.  And not through their schools but through endorsement deals.

And what timing!  The Women’s College World Series just wrapped up with the Sooners winning the title.  It was right before college football season ramps up their fall camps.  And NIL opened right before some of these college athletes compete in the Tokyo Summer Olympics.  Couldn’t have been better timing.  Nick Saban stated that his QB Bryce Young, who has never even started a game, was approaching 7-figures in NIL deals!

A long time coming for the college athlete.  While we don’t know all the repercussions (like the rich athletic programs getting even richer in talent), this is a win for the college athlete, particularly the college football athlete.

College Football Playoff Expansion

I didn’t think this subject would come until closer to the end of the current CFP contract in 2024, but here we are.  In early June, there were rumors of expanding the field from 4 to 12.  12?!?  Late in the month, the CFP board pushed for a summer study of the feasibility for a 12 team playoff.

The proposed 12 team format would use the existing committee ranking teams.  They would use the top 4 ranked Power 5 conference champions and then fill out at-large bids based on ranking from there.  It would have an opening round where the top 4 teams would have a bye and the remaining higher seeds would host playoff games.  The quarterfinals and semifinals would occupy existing bowl games.  And the championship game would be hosted by a bidding stadium like it is now.

There are two things that have sort of thrown a wrench in the possible expansion to the playoff: the Rose Bowl and conference realignment.  More on the second piece later.  Like the BCS and the initial CFP, the Rose Bowl demands certain criteria like playing on New Year’s Day and having the kickoff at 2pm local time, as well as accommodating their traditional Pac-12/Big Ten tie-in.  The CFP may bend to these to make it happen, or they could go on without the Granddaddy of Them All.  

There’s a ways to go before they expand, but we are much closer to an expanded playoff than any of us thought we were before.

Conference Realignment!  Oklahoma and Texas Move to the SEC in 2025 (or sooner)

2021 is the 50th anniversary of what has been known in some college football circles as the Game of the Century - 1971′s Big Eight epic matchup between #1 Nebraska at #2 Oklahoma.  Nebraska won that matchup 35-31.  To mark the occasion, Oklahoma and Nebraska (now non-conference foes) scheduled a home-and-home series, with Oklahoma hosting the 50th anniversary game.  The game was picked up by Fox Sports to broadcast, due to Oklahoma, the Big 12, and the Big Ten’s contract agreements.  OU AD Joe Castiglione asked Fox for a primetime kickoff so there can be a number of pregame festivities to commemorate the anniversary.  Fox designated the game for 11am, part of their Big Noon Kickoff package.

Why am I going over this?  Because this was possibly Joe C’s breaking point and the primary catalyst for Oklahoma’s move to the SEC.  I’m not quite sure what the breaking point was for Texas, but with the amount of 11am kickoffs, the fact that the SEC and ACC grant of rights broadcast contracts run through 2036 (ACC) and 2034 (SEC) and the Big 12′s expires in 2025, and then there is the SEC’s game of the week package going from CBS to ESPN in 2024 for a lucrative $300 million per season.  CNBC stated it as simply as it can get: follow the money.

If it seemed the Oklahoma/Texas move to the SEC was quick...well, it certainly developed that way.  The Houston Chronicle was the first to report on July 21st a rumor that both Oklahoma and Texas had reached out to the SEC about the possible move.  The article that broke the story was written by Brent Zwerneman, a Texas A&M beat writer, so it was likely a leak from the Texas A&M administration.  The next day in response to the rumor, the Big 12 called a conference call with the administrators of member schools.  Notably absent on that call - officials from Oklahoma and Texas.  On July 25th, Big 12 commish Bob Bowlsby met with Oklahoma president Joseph Harroz and Texas president Jay Hartzell.  The meeting was said to be cordial but the next day Oklahoma and Texas announce they would not be renewing their grant of rights with the Big 12, announcing by releasing a joint statement.  On July 27th, Oklahoma and Texas send SEC commish Greg Sankey a letter asking to join the conference and on July 29th the SEC membership voted 14-0 to accept Oklahoma and Texas as members by 2025.  On July 30th, Oklahoma and Texas board of regents both vote to accept their SEC invitations.

So in less than 10 days a rumor became reality, shaking the college football landscape.  The Big 12 has since considered and reached out to the Pac-12 for possible scheduling alliance or merger, Bowlsby has accused ESPN for conspiring in other conferences recruiting the remaining Big 12 members, and most recently the Pac-12, Big Ten, and ACC are in discussions about scheduling alliance.  And we’ll see if lawyers for Oklahoma and Texas can speed up the exit process, otherwise there will be some very hollow and bitter years between now and their scheduled 2025 exit of the Big 12.

I have professed the end of the Big 12 for years, since the beginning of the last round of conference realignment, to a few years ago when the Big 12 looked at possible expansion.  The Big 12′s biggest weakness is it has never been proactive.  They have always been reactionary.  They did nothing after Nebraska and Colorado left in 2011, only added teams to replace Texas A&M and Missouri when they left in 2012, and they spent so much money on a research firm to explore expansion but ended up doing nothing and not adding teams in 2016.  It was only a matter of time that anchor schools Oklahoma and Texas would leave.  And we ended up at that time a few years ahead of the end of the broadcast contracts.

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Next week, I’ll have my Power 5 conferences, Heisman, and CFP previews