Sez Me …

This is it. We have begun the year of the 12-team College Football Playoff. I’ve been waiting for it since I saw Hopalong Cassady hopping around in the mud the last time it rained on the Rose Bowl.

A good thing. It’s how it should be. No what-ifs. The room for the left-outs to bitch has been reduced in square feet from the Pentagon to a matchbox.

College football’s national champions used to come complete with “mythical” scribbled on their toe tags.

What did that mean? The titlist was a guess. Assumed.

And, while we never should assume, it was the only way to determine the champ from 1869 — when Rutgers and Princeton tied — to 2014, when the College Football Playoff was born.

Worst of all, it wasn’t won on the field. National titles were determined by the polls, filled out by sportswriters and coaches.

The journalists who cover college football do great work, but by the very nature of their work, it’s impossible for them to see all the teams play.

Coaches? They watch film of the teams they’re playing next. Many of them leave poll voting to their school’s Sports Information Director.

The Final 12 also will be decided by a CFP poll first released in November. Maybe the committee missed a few times when the tournament was made up of four, but it’s not screwing up the 12. Anyone complaining about not making it now simply didn’t play well enough and gets no sympathy. As it is, the five power conference winners get automatic entry, the top four byes.

Of course, the new format isn’t going to dismiss the usual powers. But NIL and the transfer portal have created chaos in college football, which is a funky stew right now. With so many new and unfamiliar faces, it could take awhile for some of the strong boys to show all of their muscle.

But now teams with two losses are going to get tickets, and as with the NCAA Tournament in basketball, there’s going to be more room for upstarts and upsets. I can’t see this new format hurting San Diego State. The Aztecs getting to the old format was nearly impossible. It was nearly impossible for most schools.

The winner will deserve it now. Leave the myth crap to Edith Hamilton. …

I didn’t see much greatness opening weekend. Georgia didn’t impress much and Ohio State, with 85 future draft choices, didn’t — vs. Akron. …

Utah QB Cameron Rising will be back for his seventh season, tying the record set by Faber College’s John Blutarsky. …

The Holiday Bowl will play in Snapdragon, but I loved it in Petco, where it was unique, and its surroundings superior for fun seekers to those in Mission Valley. Tourists don’t flock to Costco, Ikea and Lowe’s, although Costco does have samples and Ikea Swedish meatballs. …

Deion Sanders believes he has the press cornered, refusing to take questions from Denver Post columnist Sean Keeler. Not smart. I’ll be a columnist on this paper 40 years this month, and I’ve never cared if a player, coach, owner, GM, manager or politician shut me out. Columnists get by with their own quotes. …

I’d tell him: “Thank you, Deion.” …

But, tell you what, Deion’s son, Shedeur — who doubles as Colorado’s quarterback — is going to play in the NFL. So, instead of not talking to the press, he can just say trite things. …

Shedeur has First Overall Pick written all over him. …

He has magic to him. Simply a great arm and vision, with a monster football IQ. …

And Travis Hunter, Colorado’s two-way stud, is the best pure football player in America. Just think. He just played 100 snaps — at altitude. …

Back in the 1980s, Padres boss Ballard Smith called to tell me he was never speaking to me again. “I told him, “Ballard, I spent the first 30-plus years of my life not talking to you; I can do 30-plus more.” …

Several months later, I ran into Ballard, and he said: “Where’ve you been? I haven’t talked to you in awhile.” …

Say, when Padres General Manager Jack McKeon basically made himself Padres manager, I wrote a column saying being both GM and skipper is a mistake. Jack didn’t speak to me for two years. I got by. And I was right. …

I know people are idiots, but those claiming the Padres are better off without Fernando Tatis Jr. couldn’t spell “a” if you spotted them the “a.” …

Most people used to avoid saying something stupid. …

If Jackson Merrill isn’t NL Rookie Of The Year, he’s Most Important Rookie Of The Year. And that’s more important. …

Jurickson Profar must dream about bunting. Wake up! …

Luis Arraez is a terrific hitter. But he’s a DH. To paraphrase my late colleague and friend Scott Stewart, he plays defense with a glove on one hand and a map in the other. …

When asked if he were doctoring the baseball with a foreign substance, Don Sutton said: “That’s not true. Vaseline is manufactured right here in the United States.” …

The Colts have released a third of their 2024 draft class — fifth, sixth and seventh-round choices. At the time, GM Chris Ballard said: “We couldn’t believe they were still on the board.” …

I’m wondering if I’ll ever get used to the NFL’s new kickoff alignment. Seems unprofessional and video gamey. …

Brittany Mahomes, wife of Patrick, says she doesn’t give an “F” word about what people think of her publicly endorsing Donald Trump. Doesn’t appear she can be like her husband and block out a bad play. …

Babe Ruth’s “called shot” jersey has sold at auction for $24.2 million. It tripled in value after George Costanza dumped strawberries all over it. …

Steph Curry will make $62.57 million this season. The entire Oakland A’s payroll is $62.59 million. The Athletics brass made sure Curry wasn’t making more than their entire team. …

Amazon Wonderly — and I wonder what that is — wants the Kelce brothers podcast and is paying them $100 million over three years for the rights. Amazon apparently has found out too late that Taylor Swift isn’t a part of it. …

Kansas City signed former Patriots starting QB Bailey Zappe. The Chiefs are like the Dodgers, so if Zappe is forced to play, he’s MVP. …

The heat index in Iran the other day hit a world record 180 degrees, breaking the mark set just a day earlier while the Padres were playing in St. Louis. …

Colorado sportsbooks took $320 million worth of bets in July — $9 million on table tennis. The state gets 4.4 percent of the winnings. California, with around 35 million more residents? Nothing. …

Walden Pond is being endangered by development. I didn’t know it was in San Diego. Let me guess: High-rise condos with no parking, an access road smooth as railroad tracks, and a $25 million bike lane around the shore. …

“Women and men simply are not the same. They’re just not.” — Katherine Hepburn

Originally Published: August 31, 2024 at 3:00 p.m.