OU-UO: The Reaction to the Reaction

Because of all the emotional outpourings and notable events that have come to define the aftermath of the Oklahoma-Oregon game, there is a need to make one last attempt (and I do mean "last"; after this, we'll move on to week four of the season) to make sense of the situation, which is and has been an ultimate "teachable moment" in the world of football analysis.

But before we delve into the world of football analysis, a few brief words must be devoted to the non-football dramas that have emerged in the wake of the OU-UO firestorm. The first stunning development concerns the health of Gordon Riese, the No. 1 replay official for the game. Many Oklahoma fans have said, directly or not, that they're not in any way upset that Riese's health has deteriorated in the wake of this incident. That, plainly put, is disgusting and a moral offense of the worst order. Yes, Oklahoma got jobbed in the worst way, and yes, a failure of this magnitude does indeed demand a firing, but for Sooner fans to wish poor health on Mr. Riese--or to not be the least bit concerned about his skyrocketing blood pressure and extreme stress level--represents behavior far more outrageous than the bad call made by Riese on Saturday. If any sense of real perspective, any degree of genuine humanity, is to be brought to this situation, then the concern of everyone toward Riese's health, safety, and overall well being must be paramount. The college football world must wish Gordon Riese a full recovery and complete healing from this traumatic incident.

The second non-football story that has emerged from the OU-UO aftermath was the demand by OU President (and former U.S. Senator) David Boren that the results of this game be stricken from the records by the Big XII. Predictably, national media reaction strongly criticized Boren for this action, along the familiar line of "doesn't he have anything better to do?" Well, in a word, no--he didn't have anything better to do, and this is where hypocrisy begins to rage its ugly head in the world of big-time college sports.

Those upset at Boren are so bent out of shape because of the view that Boren should be focused on academics and other matters pertinent to the world of higher secondary education. However, in this shortsighted view of education, a lot of pundits have conveniently forgot (or is it pushed aside?) the fact that a university president is, in many ways, a chief spokesman and fundraiser for his/her school. And as we all know, education doesn't happen without resources... especially at the university level. Boren, then, was doing something quite simple--and necessary: he was asking for dollars while also winning the trust and confidence of anyone and everyone who might want to donate money to the University of Oklahoma.

College football, after all, is big business, and no rational, clear-eyed person could ever deny this reality in today's America. Making a BCS bowl means tens of millions of extra dollars for a conference, and a few million extra dollars for an individual university (unless you're Notre Dame, in which you keep the whole $12-14 million payout). The difference between that and a lower-tier bowl is substantial. And given the amount of money OU (and other big football schools) devotes to football, it's quite important that the Sooners and Bob Stoops give the state a big return on the university's investment in the football program. Boren's actions and words represented nothing other than a profound attempt to demand important symbolic and financial recognition of the Sooners' plight. As the representative of a university where football possesses powerful cultural, emotional and political significance, David Boren--on the afternoon of Monday, September 18, 2006--was certainly doing the most worthwhile thing he possibly could have done at the time. Today--Wednesday, September 20, 2006--he's surely gone back to more policy wonk details about math classes and science labs and engineering facilities and the like. But for one afternoon, weighing in on this firestorm was indeed the best use of his time and energy. Hypercritical comments about Boren overlook the centrality of money in secondary education, and they also misread the role of a university president.

That blessedly concludes the non-football portion of the proceedings. Now we get to the good stuff, in an attempt to make sense of the arguments made on all sides of the debate in the wake of the real movie blockbuster of the year: "OU-UO: The Robbery in the Willamette Valley."

I've read plenty of arguments--and complaints, and charges of bias (*sigh*)--in the wake of this game, and I must maintain that I will never, ever hold Oregon fans personally responsible for (almost) anything they say or do, because they are in a psychologically impossible and logically untenable position. I wouldn't want to be an Oregon fan right now; as bad as Oklahoma fans have it these days, the position of the Duck fan is an even worse place to be. See, this language might seem rude or incendiary, but it's only analytical--dry, dispassionate, and clinical in nature. Why can I say this with confidence? Because like any other sports fan, I've been there. This brings us to the emotional center of this very important discussion.

Let me tell you, college football fans of America (and especially Duck fans), about one occasion when I was purely a fan, and resided in a psychologically impossible and logically untenable position:

As someone who, from a very early age, almost always preferred passing teams to running teams, I rooted very hard for Florida State against Auburn in the 1989 Sugar Bowl. With the lack of offense in that game, I got more and more furious as the clock ticked along, fuming at Auburn's minimalist style and wondering why Bobby Bowden's team wasn't burying the Tigers under an avalanche of swiftly-delivered points. But late in the contest, with FSU clinging to a six-point lead and Auburn driving, I seem to recall (though my memory might be a bit clouded) Pat Dye's Tigers gettting absolutely screwed on a non-pass interference call near the goal line. At the time, I thought nothing of the incident, saying to myself, "Hey, Auburn scored only 7 points! Serves them right! Shoulda scored more points during the rest of the game! Can't let one call beat you! The better team was meant to win!" I was a jerk in those days, folks. I would make every rationalization in the book, and then some, when a team I was rooting for benefited from a disproportionately significant bad call. This is what fans do, and quite frankly, it's not that bad a thing in itself. As I'm told on a consistent basis, fan is short for "fanatic," and if you're not seeing the world through your team's glasses, well, you might not be a fanatic. The passion people invest in their schools is a big part of what makes college sports so special; if you take away the emotions of gamedays, college sports might as well fold the tent.

But what's different about fan reactions to games, compared to 17 years ago (when I disregarded occasions when my teams won unfairly), is that in the Internet/YouTube/Google/podcast/streaming video/ESPNews/blogosphere age, fans now have a full assortment of communications outlets and technological tools through which they can obtain extensive amounts of information and merge that raw data (numerical, visual and otherwise) with their own editorial commentary. This blurs the line between fandom and journalism, and it's why fan-journalist relationships merit constant attention and exploration in this era. It's also a huge reason why very careful, levelheaded and detatched methods of football analysis must be taught by those in the seats of real journalistic and editorial authority. "Teachable moments" such as this Oklahoma-Oregon game demand as much from the writers and pundits who dare to weigh in on these situations. If I'm going to say Gordon Riese should be fired (while also wishing him to reclaim good health and safety, and to be free of insane and outrageous threats to his well-being), I better have a good explanation. If I'm going to say that Oklahoma got robbed--and that Oregon's win was out-and-out tainted--I better have a very good explanation. If we're going to separate fan reactions from (more) responsible editorial commentary, there needs to be a rigorous set of standards that can be applied. Some might scoff at the length, complexity and nuance of it all, but this stuff is so deep--and, on its own level, significant--that it demands those qualities and more. The details of a game such as "Oklahoma-Oregon 2006" require elaborate and extended attention; sound bytes and snappy one liners can't sufficiently explain the hardest case studies in the world of mature, adult football analysis.

At this point, some of you (especially teed-off Oregon fans who are, understandably, emotionally exhausted from having this game dragged through the mud yet again, especially by a stubborn contrarian such as myself) might be thinking a thought I hear from time to time about those of us who--in college football or in politics--work as editorial commentators and news analysts: "Why does that damn Zemek tool, that know-nothing hack, keep representing his analysis as fact, like all other jerkwad pundits and columnists?!"

The time-honored element of any piece of sound editorial commentary is that it must combine fairness with authoritativeness. Opinion-giving is a tricky game because it uses objective realities to make subjective points. Opinions sound like facts--and readers perceive that editorial commentators are presenting their views as facts--because opinions are given in a necessarily strong manner while being supported by genuine facts. A solid and sound opinion doesn't represent absolute truth, but it must represent a legitimate and credible viewpoint on a given issue. Legitimacy and credibility in an opinion, then, are built on the backs of logical reasoning and factual evidence. If you don't have a mountain of facts and arguments that can accompany them, chances are you can't forge a really strong opinion that will represent your larger views on a subject. This is the "big boy table" of human discussion and debate. It's not just having a "strong take" or saying something with tremendous passion or emotion; the real "strength" of an opinion comes from its logical consistency and its factual foundations. The need to back up opinions with sound logic and relevant facts is precisely what makes opinions seem like facts when presented and articulated by an editorial commentator or news analyst. If you think that columnists assume their views to be factual truths, you're wrong, and you're missing the point: opinions, in order to have credibility, must have supporting facts behind them. This does not mean that there's only one viewpoint--or one set of facts--for each and every story. This leads us into a fuller explanation of the Oklahoma-Oregon game and the reaction to the immediate postgame reaction.

Colleagues of mine in the college football punditocracy--inside and outside CFN--have taken an opposing view on everything about the OU-UO game: its ending, its aftermath, and its overall message. This doesn't mean they're wrong, or that I'm right (or vice versa); none of us has a corner on the facts or the truth of the situation, a reality that always applies to editorial commentary and news analysis. We columnists all put forth our own personal views of what the situation meant--to the sport as a whole, to OU and UO fans, and to the principals involved on the field, the sidelines, and the press box. These views were not presented as facts, but as strong assessments of a very heated and newsworthy series of developments. The very emotional and volatile nature of the situation demanded authoritatively-stated viewpoints; not facts, just viewpoints supported by sets of facts that supported each piece of editorial commentary.

From a standpoint of football analysis, then, the argument that competed against my argument was as follows: while I said that Oregon's win was tainted, those who disagreed said that OU had multiple chances to win after the onside kick fiasco, and still couldn't get the job done. This is, plainly put, the most legitimate and reasonable line of argumentation one could produce in response to the larger situation. It is a line of argumentation that has its own set of facts... facts that give it credibility and logical consistency as an editorial opinion. If I were inclined to see this game differently, I'd be making that same argument today. This brings us to the heart of the matter...not just with respect to this game, but any football game that's hard to objectively analyze in a very balanced way.

Why does Matt in Seattle think UO's win was tainted, while other commentators in the Midwest (or those working for the corporation in Bristol, Connecticut) view the Ducks' triumph (and Oklahoma's loss) without a gnawing sense of injustice? It's not that one commentator is more factually-oriented than another, or that some editorial writers are more arrogant than the others; it's not that one football writer did his homework whereas another one didn't. No, these differences of opinion emerge because--as we Americans need to begin to learn (I don't think we've done so at this point in our collective national life)--two reasonable people can indeed look at the same thing and honestly gain different meanings and truths in the process. This is another way of saying that the entirety of truth is much bigger than one view or personal perspective. Let's be clear here: there's a lot of truth, wisdom and credibility behind viewpoints which contend that Oregon's win was fair, that the game was evenly played, and that David Boren is a fool. However, I personally find that the truth of another set of views--Oregon's win was tainted, the Sooners played much better, and David Boren stands on very solid ground--is much more substantial and compelling. This doesn't mean my views are more factual; it only means that I place more weight and emphasis on the truth of my claims than on opposing claims. And in the end, that's why you choose to form a specific opinion: you think it's the best way of viewing a situation and its attendant facts. (You wouldn't express a given opinion if you didn't think that it was the best way of viewing a situation, would you?)

When you consider why one pundit is supporting Oklahoma's view of the larger situation, while other pundits are favoring Oregon's view of the very same situation, it should occur to you--as a fan--that editorial commentators don't support teams, but the VIEWS that unavoidably attach themselves to teams. Writers and journalists would tell you--and we'd certainly like to believe we'd be honest and professional enough to do this--that if this Oklahoma-Oregon situation had been reversed, with Oklahoma winning 34-33 in Norman under a very similar set of circumstances (with lousy Pac-10 refs still being on the field, according to Big XII policy!), we'd be writing the very same kinds of articles. I'd be saying Oregon got robbed, that the Ducks outplayed the Sooners, and that the University of Oregon president was entirely right to demand this loss be stricken from the Pac-10 record books; colleagues with a different view would say that Oregon had multiple chances to win, but didn't get the job done, and that Oregon's president was way off his rocker in making his requests.

What should this tell you, college football fans of America (and especially those in Norman and Eugene)? It should tell you that every college football columnist--like every other human being--has a unique personal story shaped by millions of different events. My colleagues at CFN have watched many of the same games I've watched over the years, but they've watched more total games (since I'm the youngest of the staff columnists on our roster), and have watched those games in places--intellectually, emotionally, geographically--that are different from the places I've been as a college football fan and, later, as a journalist. In 1990, I was a 14-year-old kid in Phoenix who didn't have cable and loved passing teams. At that same point in time, my CFN colleagues were in different cities or towns, doing different things, watching fewer Pac-10 games (for sure), and getting a different impression of what "real football" or "winning football" meant. My late father grew up in Czechoslovakia, and always liked baseball more than anything. I had to form my understanding of football myself. Other football writers (before they became football writers) likely grew up and actually played the game (I never did) under the watchful eye of a father who doubled as a football coach. The nature of these fathers--as men, and as football coaches (Were they gentle or stern? Pass-happy or defense-first? Creative or rooted in fundamentals? The same man on and off the football field, or totally different?)--surely shaped the lives of many football fans who now work as college football writers. The journey of each football writer to his (or her) current destination is a product of countless experiences that have all helped to shape his or her football views.

To put a finer point on all this (i.e., to name a few names), ESPN.com's Pat Forde--a prominent and very respected college football columnist (one of my favorite columnists, period, not just in the college football world)--views the whole Oklahoma-Oregon situation in a way that stands in near perpendicular opposition to my own views. Does this mean Mr. Forde is full of it? Heck, no! I sharply disagree with him on this (rare) occasion, but it's not as though Forde doesn't have stacks of his own facts to stand on when registering his own opinions on the matter. Surely, Forde's life in and around the sport of football--and his encounters with many football people (Forde actually does legwork and first-hand reportage on games, unlike myself)--has taught him to place tremendous emphasis on the importance of "playing through bad calls and sucking things up to get the job done in adverse circumstances." For Mr. Forde, his set of experiences in and around the game of football has taught him to bring that kind of a viewpoint to the situation faced in the Oklahoma-Oregon aftermath. My own set of football and life experiences led me to a different view. Let me tell you about my life experience that surely had something to do with the way in which I viewed the OU-UO game and its aftermath:

For the past three years, I have worked at a soup kitchen in Seattle, serving the homeless, low-income and elderly populations of the city just east of its downtown core. I have seen, heard, read and felt the many ways in which disadvantaged people are screwed (and this time, it's a lot more than winning or losing a football game) by a system and a political infrastructure that has turned a deaf ear to their needs. I have personally encountered hundreds of people who, through a combination of bad choices and very bad luck, were put on the edge, and who received no help from the society and the government that are supposed to be there for them. In some cases, people got kicked to the curb with good reason; but in many other cases, the coldness of a roommate, spouse or neighbor left people homeless for no good reason. And on still other occasions, governmental inefficiency and mismanagement caused people to slip through the cracks, without any backup plans or other outlets for desperately needed help. As you can see, after spending years with people who expected help from certain places but got none, I am very, VERY sympathetic to anyone in life who--when expecting help or the redress of their sufferings and grievances from a person or entity expected to provide as much--gets stiffed and left to deal with the awful physical and emotional wreckage of that rejection. In fact, to provide an interesting little anecdote in the wake of "OU-UO: The Robbery in the Willamette Valley," I got one dissenting opinion from an Oregon fan who also works for the California Republican Party. I don't know this person's views, to be sure, but chances are that--as a Republican--he won't have the same views or attitudes of a soup kitchen worker. These are the kinds of things that shape the views of each and every editorial writer--within the college football industry or any other field of expertise. This brings us to the final point of this concluding discussion on OU-UO.

What fans ultimately need to do--in order to become better football analysts and, one day, remove me from my columnist's chair if they so desire--is to form more rigorous standards and consistent benchmarks for various evaluations and viewpoints. Keeping in mind that a good football writer focuses on the events first and on the teams second, football analysts need to be very intellectually honest and open minded about the countless ways in which a football game plays out. It's not just a matter of looking at box scores and weighing various disparities in total statistics; it's about ascertaining the real significance, relevance and value of the various statistics.

Here's how a good football analyst thinks: he or she doesn't just look at differences in yards, but at the connection between yards and points, yards and field position, and yards in relationship to adverse circumstances (i.e., being behind most of the time). A good football analyst won't just look at third down conversions, but third-down conversions on individual drives and, even more importantly, third-down conversions in the final third of the field (inside the opponent's 35 and especially inside the 20, aka, the red zone). A good football analyst will realize what is happening when a team has to attempt an onside kick: namely, that the team is kicking the ball because: A) it just scored, but B) it still trails, meaning that C) it was losing by two possessions until very late in a football game, which means that D) it got outplayed to a somewhat decisive extent before making a late, desperate surge.

A good football analyst, when evaluating the real quality of an offense, will look at points scored when leading by one possession, tied, or trailing by one possession. And, among many other things, a good football analyst will also factor emotions into the ebb and flow of a game, attempting to discern how each team performed when alternately "jacked up," "depressed," or in a relatively "settled/normal" state of mind. However you might juggle numbers, psychology and football performance, you ultimately need to have some kind of overall framework that goes far beyond statistics, and which looks at meaningful realities that pertain to peak moments and clutch situations in football games. My own complex framework--based on a very specific recognition of the meaning and centrality of an onside kick as an indicator of the flow of a football game--favored the kinds of events and accomplishments that sided with Oklahoma; other football analysts had a framework that favored the kinds of events that rested with Oregon. One thing I can be sure of, though: none of my colleagues in the editorial realm of college football writing have a shred of institutionalized bias toward one school (or conference) over and against the other. We looked at events first, and then attached those events to OU and UO, the teams involved; we didn't start out rooting for one team and then attach an interpretation of events to our rooting interest.

So that's a wrap--fully and finally--on OU-UO and the reaction to the reaction. Don't react to this column; it's intended to get you thinking and reflecting... no matter what side of the tracks you're coming from. And if you're a fan who wants to one day become a low-paid football writer (I'm sure there are plenty of 20- and 25-year-old men just itching for a shot; I used to be in that position), please use this occasion--especially if you're a Duck fan--to sharpen your skills as an analyst and realize that opinions aren't presented as facts... they just have to have solid facts and reasoning behind them. Trusting both your own personal experiences and an intellectually rigorous set of analytical standards will enable you to become a credible yet stimulating football analyst who improves your own profession and increases the knowledge of your audience. I hope I've been that kind of football writer today.