Top 5 Current Beefs with Prisoners of the Moment
If you’ve been coming to Maroon and White Nation long enough you know of my disdain for prisoners of the moment. It’s those people who over-react to everything be it positive or negative. Some folks just say, “well, I’m a fan so that’s how I’ll act”. How about let’s be educated and not morons. This generation, my generation, is full of people who have no perspective. Their over-reactions and inability to learn from the past is scary. So I don’t care for the prisoner of the moment attitude. Here are a few things that I’m grinding on today…
5. Don’t let the first series, or the first few series of a football game make you feel like you know how the game is going to turn out. This last weekend was a prime example. MSU was down 14-0 to La Tech but then outscored them 45-6 the rest of the way. Ole Miss was up 14-0 but Memphis then scored 31 unanswered points. So many times people lose all perspective in the 1st quarter. How many of you freaked out last year when Texas A&M drove down the field and scored with ease to take a 7-0 lead? Two hours later the Bulldogs were up 41-17. Take a deep breath, it’s only the first quarter.
4. A team is not defined by what just happened last week. Three weeks ago Kentucky was a good team. Then they struggle with Eastern Kentucky before winning in overtime – and they are terrible, but 4-1. Each week people change their minds on Alabama:
- Week 1: Alabama is Alabama
- Week 3: Dynasty is over
- Week 5: Alabama is back
- Week 6: Tide are vulnerable
- Week 7: Looks like it’s LSU vs. Bama for the West
Stop with all the violent swings of opinion. The same Bama team, or any team, isn’t going to show up every week. It’s a 12-game season and we don’t have to decide the playoffs in Week 3 or Week 7 or any other time except after Championship Saturday.
3. Stop with the talk that Nick Fitzgerald is better, or going to be better than Dak Prescott. Wow, he can throw a deep ball and run well – he’s just as talented as Dak!1!1! There is nothing incredible about Prescott’s skill set – he’s got a really good one but Fitzgerald’s is just as good. Elijah Staley’s is better than both of them. But what sets Dak apart from most players is his leadership abilities, his ability to block out all the noise around him and his desire to keep improving. That’s why he’s the best quarterback MSU has ever had. To suggest that Fitzgerald could be better than Dak is getting the cart way before the horse and is completely unfair to Fitz and Staley.
2. Can we stop anointing teams as undefeated in the middle of the year? After Ole Miss beat Alabama everyone said they would be 10-0 going into the LSU game. Whoops, they are now 5-2. Now Memphis is going to be undefeated so let’s discuss if they can get in the playoff…..how about not. The season is half over. Instead of discussing what will happen in December, let’s enjoy what’s going on in October. Why are folks so eager to get to December, be it Christmas or college football. The fall is the best time of the year and when it is December you’ll wish it was October again.
1. Immediately following the Michigan State win over Michigan, pundits began discussing if it was the greatest play in college football history. Good grief. Maybe it’s in the top 25 of greatest plays to finish a football game, but let’s stop with this mess of saying ____ is the greatest thing to happen just because it happened yesterday. A Big Ten game between two top 15 teams in the middle of the season will never qualify for the greatest play ever. In addition to that, the Spartans only executed said play due to the folly of the Michigan punter, not of their own doing. But enough about the specifics of the play, this constant over-reaction to stuff is really annoying.
Maybe the one type of prisoner of the moment I’ll advocate for is enjoying the next five games. Forget about next year or the year after. Forget about what bowl game we might go to. Forget about the Egg Bowl or the Bama game. This week MSU plays Kentucky and it’s one of the last three times you’ll get to see Dak Prescott on Scott Field. There’s only five more regular season games we have with a really special player who has lifted the program to sights never seen before. Enjoy it and quit complaining about what you think he’s not doing – he’s a great player who has broken the mold at MSU.