The Inaugural Couldn’t Be Me Weekly Recap

Welcome to the very first ODB Couldn’t Be Me college football recap. Every week on Couldn’t Be Me we’ll look to shine a light on and bring awareness to some of the issues plaguing our fellow college football fans around the country. And by “bring awareness to” I definitely mean “take pity on the fools and be grateful that we’re not them”. Millions of college football fans went through unimaginable pain and suffering during week 8. Can you imagine being one of them? I can’t. Cause it Couldn’t Be Me.

THE Ohio State University

THE #2 team in the country featuring THE nation’s leader in TD passes with what many considered to be THE easiest remaining path to THE College Football Playoff got THE ass kicking of THE year from...Purdue? You were supposed to walk to the CFP and you blew it on account of...Purdue? And it’s not even like Purdue’s stadium (you can’t name it off the top of your head either can you? It’s Ros-Ade Stadium, apparently) is some legendarily difficult place to play. They have home losses to Mizzou, Northwestern and EASTERN MICHIGAN this season. But they just put the fear of God in the Ohio State Buck-Lies.

Imagine your national title hopes getting dashed because you gave up 49 points to PURDUE. Couldn’t be me.

Tennessee

If their first 8 games of the season are any indication, Alabama’s opponent is gonna be on this list every week because Bama is comically good. Not comically as in comedy. Comically as in comic books. Alabama is Thanos with all the infinity stones. They’re Bane breaking Batman’s back except Batman is college football and Batman’s back is everyone’s hopes and dreams. Enter Tennessee - apparently a rival of Alabama, whatever that means - who had the misfortune of playing Bama and new God King of college football Tua Tagovailoa in Knoxville as a 29.5 point underdog. It went about as you’d expect.

In the first 12 minutes of game time there were 7 drives. 4 for Bama, 3 for Tennessee. Here is the result of each of those drives.

Bama: 9 plays, 58 yards, Touchdown
Tennessee: 3 plays, -22 yards, Fumble
Bama: 2 plays, 3 yards, Touchdown
Tennessee: 3 plays, -2 yards, Punt
Bama: 1 play, 77 yards, Touchdown
Tennessee: 3 plays, -3 yards, Punt
Bama: 9 plays, 93 yards, Touchdown

That’s right. Bama went up 28-0 in 12 minutes and in that time outgained Tennessee 231 to NEGATIVE TWENTY SEVEN. Imagine your rival coming to town and INSTANTLY boatracing you in to next year. Couldn’t Be Me.

Minnesota

The Scott Frost era at Nebraska was off to an absolutely terrible start. The once proud Cornhuskers started the season 0-6 including an all time great choke job last week at Northwestern and a 46 point #BEATEMDOWN suffered at the hands of Michigan earlier this year. What could possibly get Nebraska back on track and get them the first win of the Frost era? A home date against Head-Coach-Everyone-Was-Hyped-About-But-Now-No-One-Mentions PJ Fleck and the Golden Gophers of Minnesota. Minnesota gave up FIFTY THREE points to a team who didn’t have a win on the year prior to yesterday.

Imagine your favorite team getting taken to the woodshed by a team that started 0-6. Couldn’t be me.

Mississippi State

There’s no shame in going to Death Valley and losing a game to 5th ranked LSU. That’s a thing that happens to people and is fine. What is not fine is #22 Mississippi State’s drive chart from Saturday evening in Baton Rouge. Let’s discuss.

1st Half:
Interception
FIELD GOAL!!!! GET HYPED!!!!!!!!!!!
Punt
Interception
Punt
Punt
Punt
Punt

2nd Half:
Turnover on Downs
Punt
Punt
Interception
Interception

Mississippi State lost 19-3, managed just 59 yards and 4 interceptions on 24 passing attempts, and went 2-14 on 3rd down. Imagine throwing an interception on about 17% of your passes but only converting on 14% of your third downs. Couldn’t be me.

This guy that plays in the CFL

This isn’t college football and I don’t have any actual commentary on it I just want you to watch this and know that this couldn’t be me.

TCU

Ohhhhhhh TCU. Where do we begin? There are so many things I could discuss here. There are about 6,158 reasons I could take pity on TCU. I could wax poetic on their disappointing performance against another team that made this list (THE team that lost to Purdue by 29 points). I could write beautiful prose about how sweaty and gross their coach is. I could pen the finest metaphors to describe the...uh...signature look of the TCU campus.

I could analyze all the reasons why OU gained 536 yards against noted Defensive Wizard Sweaty Gary Patterson’s vaunted defense while TCU could only come up with 275 total yards against a team who just got its Defensive Coordinator up out the paint a couple weeks ago. I could give a thorough breakdown of why they got stomped by Texas in Austin or why Texas Tech went to Fort Worth and held the Horned Frogs to 14 points. All of these things would be very difficult for me to imagine going through and I can’t see any of them being me. But, honestly, the BIGGEST reason TCU couldn’t be me only reveals itself when you take a peek at the current Big 12 standings.

TCU is 1-3 in the conference and 3-4 on the year. Do you know what that means? That’s right.

COULDN’T. BE. ME.

Thanks for checking in to the first ever Couldn’t Be Me recap. Imagine not coming back to see us next week.