Ramius

Typical douchebaggery by the Buffalo media. And of course, right on cue, you have tim graham reacting in his typical "maturity of a 5 year old" level.

I did a similar study/post years ago on this same topic, but it was lost in the great board crash of '08. What prompted me to do it again was the ridiculous arguments that Mario Williams has a "sub-par" season or that somehow 10.5 sacks is an insignificant amount. My post will address 1 main theme: that the NFL sack leaders, even with gaudy numbers, all pile up huge sack numbers in a couple of games (usually against inferior teams) that inflate their overall numbers. The fallacy is that there are these great DEs that record sacks in almost every game and don't "pad" their stats. This held true back in '08 when people were trashing Schobel for his double-digit sack seasons, and seems to hold true again in 2012. Here are all the players with 12 or more sacks. JJ Watt - His 20.5 sack season was freakish. He did pile up 8.5 sacks in 3 games, recorded 1 sack in 11/16 games. Aldon Smith. 19.5 sacks. 5.5 of them came in a single game against a horrific chicago OL. He recorded sacks in 10/16 games. Von Miller: 18.5 sacks, 10 of them came in 4 games, but he amazingly did manage to record a sack in 12/16 games. Cameron Wake: 15 sacks, 7.5 of which came in 2 games. He recorded a sack in 9/16 games. Clay Matthews: 13 sacks, 6 of which came in 2 games. Recorded a sack in 8/12 games. Geno Atkins: 12.5 sacks, 6 in 3 games. Recorded 1 sack in 9/16 games. Charles Johnson: 12.5 sacks. ultmate hit or miss. 1 game with 3.5 sacks, 4 games with 2 sacks. Sacks in only 6/16 games. Jared Allen: 12 sacks. 6 sacks in 3 games. 9/16 games with a sack. So the data seems to bear out that the top players pile up large sack numbers in relatively few games. And unless one of your players puts up a freakish season for the ages (like Miller or Watt last season), the top sacks guys still go plenty of games without recording a sack.

I agree that conferences are getting too big, and its ruining a lot of traditional games/rivalries. 12 was the perfect size for a conference. If you guys look, my system of eliminating divisions would allow for a conference of 14 teams where each team plays every other team a minimum of 5 times in 10 years. I'm in favor of getting rid of divisions because you are supposed to win your conference, not your division. I want to see the top 2 teams in a conference play for the title, not watch one great team have to sit out because they lost a close game to a top ranked team in their division, while the opposing division sends a 4-6 loss team in the title game because they won a tie breaker in a ****ty division.

Havent been to the one in Tallahassee in a long time, for 2 reasons: The food was absolute garbage, and there are hotter waitresses at regular restaurants here in Tally.

Its been about 3 months since the last Big Cat anti-Stevie crusade so we were about due. The most hilarious post in this thread was the one saying the 90s super bowl Bills wouldn't tolerate this "immaturity." That being the group that wasn't mature enough to stay sober enough for one week to win a Super Bowl. But yeah, the real reason the Bills haven't made the playoffs in 13 years is because Stevie wears a crude (but funny) shirt.

With conferences inevitably getting larger, i think divisions are becoming obsolete. With only 8 conference games in most conferences, but now 7 (and probably inevitably 8) teams in each division, they are becoming more and more cumbersome. You now play 6 of 8 games within your division, and given a protected rival is a 7th conference game, there's 1 game that rotates with your cross divisional teams. This leads to long stretches where you simply don't see many of the teams in your conference for years at a time. Whats the point of a conference if 4 or 5 years goes by between instances of playing a team? My solution is to get rid of divisions. Go back to a single conference of 14 (12) teams. Put the top 2 teams at the end of the season in the conference championship. This gets rid of the goofiness where a top 10 team gets left out of a title shot in its own conference for a 7-5 team that won a weak division. You wouldn't have to worry about divisional imbalance, and there'd be no worry about a single loss to a top team effectively blocking your team from a title shot. In the ACC last year, 10-2 (7-1 in ACC) clemson got left out of the ACC title game while 6-6 GT made it in. I would have rather seen my Noles face Clemson again than play a crap ass tech team. As for scheduling, you can assign each team 3 protected rivals than they play each season (or even 4), and you rotate the other 10 teams across the other 5 conference games. If you rotate 2 teams off/on your non-protected schedule each season, this guarantees you'll play each team 5 times in 10 years. For FSU, you can give us protected rivals of Clemson, Miami, and NC St. For 'Bama you give them protected rivals of Auburn, Tennessee (i think), and LSU. This is much more reasonable scheduling setup than the soon to be standard of playing a team in 2014, and not seeing them until 2020.

Astro, no way in hell Clint Trickett is the 109th best player in the country. He's a great kid and all, and i like him, but he's merely a serviceable college QB. I highly doubt he even gets drafted. He has neither the size nor the requisite athletic ability to do anything in the NFL.

There are no names in NCAA games (both football and basketball). You'll get a complete roster, and the numbers will be accurate, but as i said, There's no EJ Manuel on FSU. There's "QB #3" with EJ's height and weight, and his physical attributes reflecting his on the field ability. When you actually play the game, on the field you'll see "QB #3" as the jersey nameplate. Every roster is the same in that manner, the position and the number. In this years game, South Carolina doesn't have Jadeveon Clowney. They have "DE #7." Now, the rosters are editable, so you as an individual can easily change the names of all the players to their real names, but that's after market, and not something EA is involved in.

Its amazing how many people are eager to get rid of our better players and then gnash their teeth when players like Jones are cut.

The difference is this: Did the NCAA (and now the individual conferences/schools) actually sell rights to player likenesses? Or just rights to school logos and such? And what exactly constitutes a likeness? In Madden, they actually transpose player images into video game characters. Do they do this in NCAA? I've played both games and the players in NCAA do not resemble their actual picture likeness nearly as good as in Madden. What EA does do is closely mimic an individual players measurable attributes. For example, take EJ Manuel. In the old NCAA games, he's listed as QB #3 for FSU. His height and weight match, but thats public information. They then create his attributes based on what they believe is the most accurate representation of his on-the-field skills, ie running speed, passing strength and accuracy, etc. Its something you and I could do if we wanted to spend the time. Everyone knows who those players are, but EA can hide behind the argument that they are making "random" players for each team. The new game will probably follow the same philosophy. Teams wont sell player images to EA, just team logos. Then EA can create whatever "random" players they want. Its similar to how colleges sell player jerseys. You can't sell a jersey with a collegiate players name on it, just a number. Yet, magically every year, the most popular players are the jerseys numbers available for purchase.

This probably won't affect anything about the game. The only differences you'll see next year is that all NCAA logos/references will be removed from the game, and it'll be called College football '15 instead of NCAA '15. Individual schools handle their own licensing deals, and i can't imagine a single D I-A school not wanting to miss out on royalities from the game.

7 sacks in 9 games after his surgery. The man legally owns guns and promotes proper gun ownership and gun safety. He has done some very commendable things for law enforcement. We need more NFL players like Mario. The people criticizing him in this thread are the problem, not Mario.

Graham is the jackass. The attacks against him started off as criticisms of his article. He then basically said, "how dare you criticize me, you should be grateful that i take the time to sit here on the board." Then he threatened to take his ball and go home is people didn't stop criticizing his articles. Thats when the personal attacks started. Tim Graham is a pompous ass with the maturity level of a 14 year old girl.

Its absolutely ridiculous that you need to pay microsoft a monthly fee to use non-MS products. Even Apple isn't that !@#$ed up.

How about the fact you need to pay microsoft $60/year just to use Netflix on your Xbone?

Thieves are gonna have a field day. They get 3 free hours of smash and grab fun with having to now keep purses out in your car.

There in lies the rub. If i pay $60 for a game, i want to own the game and do whatever i damn well please with it. I certainly wouldn't mind simply buying a game license if that only cost say, $25-$30.

The biggest problem is that microsoft gives you no options for the XBoner. The online features are great, especially for most of us are connected all the time. But the 24 hr REQUIREMENT to check-in is absurd. What happens when the servers go down (See latest sim city)? What happens if you're in a place with spottty or intermitent access to internet, like on a foreign military base? Those kids are some of the biggest gamers out there, but i guess they can't take an xbox out there. Also, what happens when in 5 years they release the Xbox 2 and decide to shutdown the xbox 1 servers? You're left with a $500 paperweight that no longer plays games, unlike every other old game system. The kinect watching you is downright creepy and Orwellian. What happens when movie execs decide they don't want more than 4 people watching a movie at any given time and use the kinect to spy on you and restrict playback? The used games issue is nothing more than a money grab, plain and simple. If you buy a game, you own it, so why does Microsoft and the developers "deserve" a cut of any profits you may make after you bought it from them? Its no longer their property. Or, what happens when you're done with a game and want to trade it in towards another new game? I know tons of people that do that, and by restricting used game sales, you're going to restrict total sales as well. Furthermore, you limit any potential new customers that might get in on a new game series only after trying a used version of the original (like i've done many times). Or, on an even lower level, when happens when you're like me, who will sometimes pass along old games i no longer play to some friends that don't have the money to buy new games? they love the freebies, even if they're years old. The good thing is that Sony basically kicked the **** out of MS with the PS4. I'm still baffled that there are people who look at the xbox1, and say, "so i pay a ton of money to have no control over when and where i can play, and what i can do with my games, all while i'm being watched by microsoft? Sign me up!"

It wasn't arbitrary. The reason for the post was because of the asshats (see a few posts above this one) that insist that gaining 1,000 yards is no big deal, when in fact, it is. Be it holdouts, injury, etc, there's a very small number of WRs that have accomplished the feat in the past 3 seasons. Stevie has gotten 1,000 yards in the past 3 seasons, so i simply looked at who else managed this. I was a bit surprised that the list was so small. I figured it'd be roughly double, with guys like Bowe, Vincent Jackson, Welker, etc. I'll also toss in AJ Green and Julio Jones, because they should hit that benchmark this season. If you double the list with those guys, then its a group of about 15, which is right where i'd rank Stevie. He's in that 15-18 group to me. Basically, looking at all NFL WRs, if i was choosing a WR for my team, there'd be only about 15 guys i'd take before Stevie.

As much as people try to poo-poo Stevie putting up 1,000 yards 3 years in a row, (because its "so easy" to put up 1,000 as a WR, or so i have been told) he's one of 7 WRs to do that in the last 3 years. Here's the other 6: Megatron, Fitzgerald, A. Johnson, Colston, Marshall, R. White I don't think there's any argument that those guys are clear cut #1 WRs, yet we've got people still claiming Stevie's nothing more than a number 2. No matter how you cut it, he's in some elite company.

http://www.tallahassee.com/article/20130601/NEWS/130601002/ http://www.wctv.tv/h...-209780241.html The fact that they had to use a taser means i'd score this one a victory for the llama.

Thanks for the input! Check your PM. Thanks for the input eball. To me, the differences between the $100 and $135 are stark, especially when you have them side-by-side in the store.

Has anyone on here seen or own a Nike Elite jersey ($250 retail)? I'm looking at a new jersey and want to know what its like with all the "paneling" and such that Nike touts. I've seen the Game ($100 retail) and the Limited ($135 retail) jerseys in stores, so i know what those are like, but have yet to see/feel/try on one of the Elite jerseys. Any input would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Re #6, a chick thats a 4 in tallahassee is an 8 in Buffalo.

sorry, ya old coot. The "video game" generation is here to stay. I'm 31 and still play video games, and don't plan on stopping anytime soon. I'll be playing when i'm 40 and 50, and 60, etc.