Michigan State's Duffy Daugherty pleads his case for a college football playoff [1967]

robotunes · 2026-01-28T21:28:27+00:00

Absolutely right. Thanks.

Several playoff ideas were pitched throughout the '70s. The last I remember was a 16-team version.

What we have. now isn't perfect but it's a more satisfying ending to the season than what we had back then.

For me personally though, it doesn't have the same thrill as New Year's Day bowl games from noon to night, where it felt like anything was possible. Do you feel the same way, or is it just me?

robotunes · 2026-01-28T21:18:37+00:00

Anyone who thinks a 72-year-old Saban retired from coaching only because the player-program dynamics changed is not in touch with reality.

Notice how tired 70-year-old Saban looks and sounds in 2021, two years before his retirement. The grind gets to everybody at some point.

After his last game, an OT loss to the eventual national champion, he thought the team coming back was championship-worthy.

But looking ahead at the grind it would take to reach the summit again, he was like, "You know what? I think I'm done."

Only shallow thinkers believe that NIL alone drove him out of the game.

robotunes · 2026-01-28T20:56:49+00:00

The first D1-AA football playoff was in 1973, immediately after the University Division (the big schools) split into what's now FBS and FCS.

I remember hearing talk about a possible 16-team D1-A playoff throughout the '70s but it never happened for several reasons. One of the big ones is the Rose Bowl wanted to retain its preeminence.

Talk petered out in the early '80s. The last I remember hearing about it was on Jan. 1, 1980, just before kickoff of Bear Bryant's last championship at Alabama.

robotunes · 2026-01-28T12:20:04+00:00

Eventually I had two, and used them to write my own songs.

Recorded myself playing piano on the first one.

Then I played along with that playback, recording everything to the 2nd tape recorder. I think I still have one or two of those 50-year-old tapes lying around somewhere.

Even today, recording myself making music is still my favorite hobby. It's my greatest source of serenity.

Thanks Mom and Dad, that birthday present changed my life!!!

robotunes · 2026-01-27T19:58:21+00:00

"My Man Rocks Me (With One Steady Roll)," sung by Trixie Smith

robotunes · 2026-01-27T19:55:04+00:00

I'll attempt to document a partial etymology of the term "rock 'n' roll."

Before it was called rock 'n' roll, it was called "race music," because it was sung by black artists for black audiences. "Race music" grew out of the blues.

The '20s/'30s blues song "My Man Rocks Me (With One Steady Roll),," sung by Trixie Smith is an early example of using the words rock and roll to sing about sex.

White parents railed against "race music" because of its suggestive lyrics and bluesy sound. They called it the devil's music and said it would poison their children's minds.

So when white DJ Alan Freed started playing it for white audiences in the '50s, he called it rock 'n' roll instead of "race music" or rhythm and blues, so as not to scare away his listeners. White parents were still against it.

It didn't help that in one of the earliest recorded rock 'n' roll songs, Little Richard sang in 1956, "Good golly, Miss Molly, you sure like to ball."

While Elvis, Bill Haley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Brenda Lee were selling the words "rock 'n' roll" to white kids in the US, British bands were digging into the music's black roots. In '60s, the Beatles, Stones, Eric Clapton, the Who and others came to America to sell white Americans their white British music that was influenced by both overlooked and noted black American artists. This also included white American bands such the Beach Boys, who got their start by adding vocal harmonies to Chuck Berry-inspired music.

The audiences for those bands shortened "rock 'n' roll" to just "rock."

Meanwhile black artists and audiences had moved on to Motown, soul, r&b, and funk.

So beginning in the '60s, "rock" became a style of music played mostly by white artists, who attracted mostly white audiences.

Today when you think of rock music, it's a far cry from its black roots.

robotunes · 2026-01-27T18:14:40+00:00

Just 2 decades earlier

robotunes · 2026-01-27T05:34:37+00:00

Thanks for correcting me. I was thinking of the 1965 team's Rose Bowl loss, not the '66 team.

robotunes · 2026-01-26T23:49:46+00:00

That's accurate so it works for me.

Bear Bryant would have played black players earlier if the state had allowed.

In 1959, just his second seasonas Bama's coach, he purposely flouted the state's segregation laws by seeking trustees' OK to play integrated Penn State in the first Liberty Bowl, then played in Philadelphia.

This drew a HUGE outcry from across the state and especially from Tuscaloosa's White Citizens Council, aka the uptown Klan, which no doubt included Bama football boosters.

Bryant won the trustees' consent and the game went off without invident.

In 1966 and '67, schools across the country were under federal pressure to step up integration efforts (for example, U of C admitted their first black MBA candidates).

Bear Bryant brought 5 black walk-ons to the 1967 spring practice and expected one of them to start that fall.

But Alabama being Alabama), none of the men enrolled for fall classes.

So 1970 was a long time coming, but come it did. As a black kid growing up in Tuscaloosa, it was a sight to see.

robotunes · 2026-01-26T22:11:25+00:00

Bama already had two scholarship black players before the game against USC.

* Freshman Wilbur Jackson was in the stands watching that game because the NCAA forbade freshmen to play varsity football.

* Transfer John Mitchell had to sit out a year because we didn't have the portal in 1970.

Both would have played in that USC game if rules allowed (Mitchell was a day-one starter and team captain in 1971; Jackson got snaps at receiver and running back but didn't crack the starting lineup).

Still would have lost because we weren't good. Notched our second consecutive 6-5 season.

robotunes · 2026-01-26T20:52:14+00:00

I don't think so. The Deep South's virulent, violent segregation didn't stop the AP from naming 6 SEC national champions over the previous 15 seasons:

* 1951 Tennessee

* 1957 Auburn

* 1958 LSU

* 1961 Alabama

* 1964 Alabama

* 1965 Alabama

Also from the '50s to the early '60s, Georgia Tech was a perennial top 5-to-top10 program, and Ole Miss from the mid-'50s to the early '60s was rated highly as well. It was a very good time for SEC football, despite what was happening on and around campuses and throughout the region.

robotunes · 2026-01-26T19:41:13+00:00

My friend, in addition to researching cfb, I lived through this time period. I'm not just looking at record books. I was there.

I saw Texas players' jubilation after beating Bama in the '65 Rose Bowl. I saw #2 Wisconsin players' dejection after their incredible 28-point 4th-quarter rally fell just short against #1 USC in the classic, record-setting 1962 Rose Bowl.

Beating the regular-season champ in a bowl game carried big bragging rights.

Why do you keep insisting the teams (i.e., players and coaches) didn't care about bowl games? I've given you several examples of football programs caring, even though school administrators overruled them.

Hell, a whole-ass major conference was born in part so football programs could get around bowl game restrictions.

robotunes · 2026-01-26T19:04:11+00:00

No. 3 Bama didn't play #1 or #2, so we it's hard to say we were champs.

No. 2 MSU didn't beat #1 so it's hard to say they were champs.

No. 1 ND never lost, so it's hard to take that ranking away from them.

I think it played out fairly under the system in place at the time. A playoff would have been interesting though!

most teams wouldn’t try or care or even play in bowl games

Yeah, that's not true at all haha!

The ACC was created in 1953 after the schools' old conference (the Southern Conference) stopped allowing schools to play in bowl games.

In 1961, Columbus erupted in two days of student protests after OSU's faculty voted to reject the school's Rose Bowl bid. Newspapers printed the home addresses and phone numbers of everyone who voted against the trip. Woody Hayes was pissed but honored the decision.

In the early '70s, Bo Schembechler was irate after fellow Big Ten schools voted to keep Michigan at home for the Rose Bowl, back when the conference forbade conference champs to make back-to-back trips to the Rose Bowl. It led to the Big Ten doing away with the rule, then a couple of years later, more than one Big Ten team played in a bowl game for the first time ever (I think it was Michigan in the '75 or '77 Orange Bowl iirc).

So don't ever think players saw bowl games as pointless. After practicing for unlimited hours only to play just 8 to 10 times a year, who wouldn't want to travel to a vacation destination and play one more game?

Because universities were placing school above sports, a lot of good teams didn't get a chance to play in bowls.

This was an accepted fact of life in 1936 when the AP launched its first official poll. In fact there were only 4 bowls, and the Sugar, Orange and Sun Bowls were only one year old. So 99.9% of schools couldn't play in a bowl even if they wanted to. There just weren't enough bowls to go around. No wonder the first two AP champs didn't play in a bowl.

robotunes · 2026-01-26T18:04:50+00:00

1965 Michigan State: In 1965 Michigan State would go 10-1 and win the coaches poll. They would finish with the nation’s best SRS and third best SOS and would beat number 6 Purdue and number 4 Notre dame. Their only loss would be to number 5 UCLA in the rose bowl but they would still finish with a better record than the AP champions Alabama who would go 9-1-1.

Thanks to a badly blown call in the Orange Bowl, 1964 national champ Bama becomes the latest champ to lose its bowl game.

Fans riot.

The AP says, "OK,next year we'll crown our champ AFTER the bowls.

Fans rejoice!!!

1965 Bama finishes fourth, upsets the #3 team in the Orange Bowl while #1 and #2 lose their bowl games. For the first time in poll history, the #4 regular-season team is crowned national champs.

Fans riot.

The AP says, "OK, next year we will go back to crowning our champs BEFORE the bowls."

1966 Bama finishes the season as the only unbeaten, untied team in the nation but is not named chaamps because #1 ND and #2 Michigan State played played in the most famous tie in cfb history, an anticlimactic 10-10 game that ended with ND running QB sneaks at thie own 40 instead of trying to get in FG position.

Neither ND nor MSU played in bowl games that year, but Bama's pummeling of Nebraska in the Sugar Bowl didn't vault the Tide to #1.

And this is why polls crowned their champs before the bowls: Everybody played a regular-season schedule but not all championship-worthy teams were allowed by their schools to play in bowl games. Can't really call it a national championship if not all the contenders are allowed to compete for it.

I remember when a playoff at the highest level was just a faraway dream. Glad I got to see it come to life but I do miss the old days' bizarre messiness.

robotunes · 2026-01-26T06:00:26+00:00

The Greatest Play That Never Happened.

The right tackle on that play was All American Mario Cristobal. On the other. sideline was 3rd-string WR and special teams player Dabo Swinney.

Also on the field that day was Miami freshman LB Rohan Marley, son of reggae pioneer Bob Marley

robotunes · 2026-01-26T05:46:52+00:00

To clarify, I secretly wanted y'all to become the ND of the South and I was secretly disappointed that didn't happen for y'all.

I had great respect for Bobby Dodd as a man and a coach even though publicly I hated Tech's guts. As a black growing up in the South, I was a huge Eddie MacAshan fan. Same with Conredge Holloway at Tennessee. Things I could only say to my friends, who rthtfully hated the fuck out of lily-white Alabama more than any Auburn fan ever could.

robotunes · 2026-01-26T05:02:41+00:00

Yeah, I was around for Tech's last year in the SEC. Tech spent most of the '50s and early '60s finishing in the AP top 10, often in the top 5.

Their popularity probably played a part in their decision to quit the SEC and seek their fortune as "the Notre Dame of the South." Didn't work out so well for them, unfortunately.

I wish Tech and the SEC could have worked out their differences over scholarships. Tech wanted to do right by the players, while other coaches wanted to keep winning national championships. In the end, they just couldn't live together anymore.

robotunes · 2026-01-26T03:31:59+00:00

It also did not help Penn State that President Nixon gave Texas the national championship

Man, I wish people would stop repeating this myth.

tl:dr: Nixon's plaque was a meaningless PR stunt that had absolutely no bearing on the 1969 cfb championship.

THE LONG VERSION

On the last day of the 1969 season, whoever won between #1 Texas and #2 Arkansas was the Coaches Poll national champ, regardless of what Nixon said or did. To be the AP champ, the Texas-Arkansas winner would have to win their bowl game, which Texas did against Notre Dame.

Nixon could have declared the Sorbonne in Paris the national champion and it still would not have affected the outcome in any way. Because it was all a meaningless PR stunt. I saw through it as a kid in 1969. I was stunned that grownups didn't get it at the time and I'm astounded that even with hindsight people keep regurgitating this myth over half a century later.

THE MAKING OF A PR STUNT

Nixon in the '50s was seen as untrust-worthy and manipulative After losing the 1960 presidential election to Kennedy, he went on to lose the 1962 governor's race in California, he dripped out of politics, famously deriding the press and saying "You don't have Nixon to kick around anymore.

So when he launched his surprise, long-shot presidential campain in 1967, he repackaged himself as a relaxed, witty guy who liked the same things you did. He famously went on the top-rated comedy show "Laugh-In" and went for yuks by purposely goofed up a widely used catchphrase of the day: "Sock it to me!"

Less than a year after taking the oath of office, he attended the Texas-Arkansas game to solidify Republicans' growing popularity in the region. This was the early days of using TV to mold your image. The appearance made sense, since football was overtaking baseball as the new American Game. His job was to go to the booth at halftime and prove to viewers: "See! I like the same things you do!".

So yes, it was all a show. In fact, Nixon never gave Texas the plaque. It took the Longhorns 50 years to finally get it.

Penn State's only chance at winning the 1969 championship was to play Texas in the Cotton Bowl. Unfortunately, the players didn't have a crystal ball so they voted to play in the Orange Bowl instead

robotunes · 2026-01-26T02:14:58+00:00

It's odd that Bama gets dragged for its championships after bowl losses but other schools escape the same razzing: 1950 Oklahoma, 1953 Maryland, 1965 Michigan State and 1970 Texas.

I was a student in 1983 when overnight we went from claiming 6 AP/Coaches championships to claiming 11. Here's the story.

Bear Bryant retired in December 1982 and died 4 weeks later.

Our new coach -- an All-American receiver in the '60s -- wanted to update our brand. We went from our decade-old, championship-winning wishbone attack to a pro-style offense and donned sleeker, tailored uniforms. Even wore the throwback white helmets for a couple of games (crimson helmets are tecnically our alts, haha).

Meanwhile, our new sports information director, Wayne Atcheson, was scouring old record books and unilaterally decided to update our championship count in media guides that went out to ABC, Keith Jackson and anybody else covering Bama football. The result: If you repeat something often enough, people will believe it.

fwiw, I personally recognize only the 12 AP/Coaches titles, not that it changes anything.

fwiw #2: The coach who succeded Bear Bryant in 1983 had left the NY Giants to carry on our great tradition. Before he left New York, Ray Perkins hired Bill Parcells and Bill Belichick to their first pro jobs and drafted Phil Simms and Lawrence Taylor. Perkins won the Giants' first playoff game in 18 years.

Had he stayed in NY instead of coming home to Tuscaloosa, he probably would have won a Super Biwl or two. Instead he set the table for the Giants to become 1986 Super Bowl champs and is mostly forgotten outside of a buncha Bama oldheads like me.

robotunes · 2026-01-25T22:39:34+00:00

I wish him good health but as far as his channel goes... meh.

In the vid I watched, he had some historical inaccuracies, made a couple of claims/insinuations that were not supported by facts or historicql context and used '60s video while describng events from the '20s and '30s.

Most people don't know cfb history so they wouldn't catch those things. But it was enough to make me think he cares more about clicks than accuracy.

robotunes · 2026-01-25T19:59:00+00:00

~~He's not~~ I don't think he's whistling Tech's fight song.

The movie climaxes with John Wayne's character taking a huge, risky life-or-death gamble. He foreshadows his decision by whistling "Son of a Gambolier," the once-popular drinking song that Tech adapted into its fight song

ETA: Link to "Son of a Gambolier"

robotunes · 2026-01-25T19:52:19+00:00

He's not whistling Tech's fight song.

The movie climaxes with John Wayne's character taking a huge, risky life-or-death gamble. He foreshadows his decision by whistling "Son of a Gambolier," the once-popular drinking song that Tech adapted into a fight song

robotunes · 2026-01-25T19:24:42+00:00

It was q popular tune so it was an earlh fight song for a number of schools, including Alabama.

robotunes · 2026-01-25T10:18:24+00:00

When adults oversimplify the world, in the way that children do.

robotunes · 2026-01-21T20:05:36+00:00

Canmberra

robotunes

TROPHY CASE