Do You Know The Way To San Jose for Gameday?
Oregon State kicks off what could be at least one of their best seasons ever...in San Jose. On a Sunday, of all days.
I rewlly wonder if the road for the Pac-x (any incarnation) Champion, or to the Rose Bowl, has EVER gone thru San Jose.
But it gets the Beavers on CBS over the air network TV for the first time ever when not playing in the Sun Bowl.
Which is a big deal, exposure wise, unless you depend on DirecTV to provide CBS in the Portland market (and its still by far the dominant carrier in rural Oregon), where media squabbling (what, media squabbling where literally everyone except lawers lose is still a thing?) means you have to get Sling or Fubo, or some streaming service that buffers more than it plays.
What a way to introduce a transfer QB named DJ that just might be the biggest thing to happen to the Beavers since a kid named Quizz.
Oh well, file all that in the folder for things that just wouldn't happen in the SEC or B1G. Or Big 12/14ths/16, for that matter.
Thank you, Pac-12 leadership, and OSU leadership. Oh, wait, neither of those things actually exist.
Fortunately, Coach Jonathan Smith is the consumate focus on the football guy, which might just be the best thing that could happen under the circumstances. Same thing for Defensive Coordinator Trent Bray, who will need to patch together and reload a defense that lost most of its best players that made the Beavers one of the dominant defenses last season, especially in the latter part.
But wait, as several of the new leaders of the defense have done, there is reason to believe they will do exactly that. There are "newcomers" and new leaders who have been around for 4, 5, 6 years. Thank Coach Smith and his culture thing, that got those guys practice, and kept then around, and wanting to be kept around. No small accomplishment in the open transfer portal for NIL $s world.
In a year that will be the wierdest ever, at least until next season, and every Gane Day will be historically weird in a variety of ways, this one is even weirder by comparison.
But guess what? It's still Game Day, and Game Day, no matter what day it is, or what time game time is, or what conference you are in, or what stadium or town you are in, is still the best day of the week, and the best days of the year, And a chance to make it a memorable one, in what's sure to be a year of memorable ones, one way or another.
Go (to San Jose) Beaves!
Andy_Wooldridge@yahoo,com