College Football Roundup:

Yankee Bowl?: The New York Yankees announced the formation of the “Yankee Bowl” yesterday. Which will pit the 4th place finisher of the Big East against the 7th place team in the Big 12, or potentially Notre Dame if they don’t have a better bowl offer. The game will be played at Yankee Stadium starting in Dec. 2010. If approved by the NCAA (which lets be honest isn’t going to turn down the New York market or the Yankees) the “_____” Yankee Bowl (can’t wait to see who will be the corporate sponsor here), will represent the 35 post season bowl game in college football. I love the idea for two main reasons. One it brings to mind the nostalgia of a time when football and baseball shared stadiums, and it will be interesting to see how they reconfigure Yankee Stadium for the game. The other reason I like the idea, is I’m in the group of people that don’t mind all the bowl games in December/January. Look I want to see the BCS scrapped and replaced with a playoff system as much as the next guy, but that doesn’t mean you have to get rid of all the various bowls to do it. Its a topic for a longer post, but taking the top 8, 12, or 16 teams and separating them out in a playoff to determine the National Champion, should have no impact on all the other bowl games out there. Already these bowl games have no impact on the National Championship and are for league and team pride, which I see nothing wrong with. We still have the NIT and other postseason basketball tournaments that have no impact on the NCAA tournament. I like having a number of bowl games to watch around the holidays, why because I enjoy watching football. Also these bowl games are crucial to a number of programs survival. Plenty of teams really don’t have National Title hopes, but they do have a chance to get a moderate bowl, and that money allows them to recruit better, build a program, and maybe one day be an elite program.

Injuries piling up: Baylor sophomore QB Robert Griffin is now out for the year with a knee injury. Griffin is a dual-threat quarterback that made the Bears a team with upset potential against the big boys in the Big-12. Senior cornerback Walter Thurmond will miss the rest of Oregon’s season with a knee injury as well. Thurmond was the Ducks best defensive player, and one of the best defensive backs in the nation. He was a dangerous return man as well, already returning one punt this season for a touchdown. The Ducks will need some help in the defensive backfield with Washington and USC coming up on the schedule. Speaking of USC their freshman defensive end (sack machine) Nick Perry, who leads the Pac-10 in sacks will likely miss Saturday’s game against the California Golden Bears. Its a huge game for USC on Saturday, if Perry can’t go they will need to find someone else to generate pressure in the Golden Bears backfield. USC’s senior running back Stafon Johnson is communicating after surgery yesterday to repair this throat after a serious weightlifting accident on Monday. Johnson’s playing days at USC are done, but the fact that he is alive and well, and should make a full recovery after the injury that he had, is a great blessing for him, his family and all of USC football.

Heisman Quarterbacks, Coming Back: The last two Heisman winners, Tim Tebow and Sam Bradford should be making their return to the gridiron soon enough. Bradford who has been out since week one, could play in this week’s match up against Miami. He will almost assuredly be back the following week when the Sooners begin their conference schedule against Baylor. Personally I’d give the redshirt freshman Landry Jones a chance to see what he can do against Miami, and have Bradford there in case things go sour quickly. Don’t rush your star QB back when you still have your whole season ahead of you. As for Tebow, he won’t miss any games since Florida is off this week. But it sounds like it was a pretty serious concussion if he is still dealing with headaches and prohibited from watching game film. The Gators face a major challenge in two weeks against LSU, and will need Tebow at 100% to stay undefeated.