Alabama v. UF: Lowered expectations is the key to happiness.

 

1. What we’re saying:

The muted confidence of the Florida contingent comes largely from the defensive side of the ball and Florida’s ostensible offensive “breakout” last week against Kentucky.  The more realistic among the Gator Nation are still asking albeit inwardly, can we win this game?  Short Answer:  Yep.

Alabama is 103rd in the country in sacks, managing only four sacks on 130 passing attempts by opponents. Furthermore, three of those sacks have been courtesy of a blitzing DB.  This means the front-seven of Alabama has accounted for exactly 1 sack in four games (simple math, flock).  Alabama is also, bye the bye, an effeminate 116thin the country in tackles for loss with the Light-loafered Lobos of New Mexico State breathing down their neck. 

Alabama’s run defense has also taken a step back, at least statistically, though its stillla respectable 27th in the country.  Further review, however, reveals that ‘Bama is 45^th in the country in average yards per rush.  The piece de’ resistance is that ‘Bama has faced four teams whose rushing attacks rank are 113th, 61st, 72nd, and 104th, respectively.

‘Bama has also been in control of each game except the Our-Kansas match-up, which means the feverish intensity necessary to play stifling defense didn’t show up until ‘Bama founditself down 13 points on the road last week to a top-10 team.  Thus, while the statistics may suggest that Florida, with its hordes of 4 and 5-star mega-recruits may havewhat it takes to upend the Saban’s shock troops, the eyeballs say this is going to be a fight.

2.  What they’re saying:

Listening to Alabama talk radio this week has given us a peek into the brash but largely unsophisticated psyche of the Ally-Bammy folk.  Paraphrasing in a way that is assuredly more artistic than the caller’s on Mr. Burns’…..errr……Finebaum’s show, ‘Bama feels like Florida’s offense is the equivalent of the trailer from the Prince of Persia.  In other words, there’s a good scene or two, but the movie sucks.  As an aside, collecting workers’ compensation for your bad back seems to be lucrative in Alabama, and apparently affords you a great deal of time to call radio shows to publicly eviscerate pronouns.  But we digress…

The inarticulacy of ‘Bama’s fans is “what it is,” but they know football and have done plenty’o’ “reckonin’ and figurin’” over their fried mayo sammiches and taken note along the way of the ongoing struggles of the Gator offense through the first three games. They’ve seen the unbearable impotence against the little Miami, the unimpressive show in Knoxville, and the 1^sthalf of the low-country boil against USF.  They’re aware that John Brantley has been coolly efficient but has shown no propensity to strike fear in the heart of the defense with the laser attached to his right shoulder;  Which is a politically expedient way of saying that they believe that either a) Florida’s receivers can’t get open, or b) that Brantley lacks the stones to let it go downfield (only two completions 25 yards or longer ). 

Throw in the optimists stew the fact that one of our scud missiles, Jeff Demps, is playing on a lame wheel-if at all-and that white-girl lovin’ Rainey is out due to idiocy (anyone else find it weird that his…errr… “girlfriend” is 35 years-old?).  For sh**s and giggles go ahead and admit that Deonte Thompson remains more notorious for dropping perfectly thrown touchdowns than anything else, and you’ve got the recipe for the 8^th-ranked offense in the SEC, which is where we’re at. 

What comes out of the hopper here is that Florida will need at least 23 points to win this game, and we’re not sure they can get it.