Speed kills, absolute speed kills absolutely...

Against SEC teams you can run but never fast enough

     All college football teams have players who are fast. Invariably, the running backs, wide receivers, and defensive backs have speed. The SEC is just like those other teams and leagues with one exception. In the SEC you have defensive ends and linebackers as fast as running backs. Have you ever wondered how it felt to be a big time running back and have a player like Dont'a Hightower chase you down?

     In the South every single football fans knows that you can't run wide against SEC teams and have much success. Against some SEC teams you will have no success.  Count Alabama and LSU in that latter group. Next weekend the entire nation will actually see a game where two SEC teams play and the speed lane will be even. You can analyze the game everyday and come up with a different winner each time you think about it. Alabama will win because... or LSU will win because... and one of those theories is going to prove true. Alabama fans think it will be the Tide. The LSU followers say it is the Bengals. Both fans have one thing in common. They may pick their team to win but deep inside their fanatical brains lurks doubt. The anticipation of the game and who will be the  ultimate winner is so great that some fans pick against their own team so they won't feel as depressed if the home team doesn't win.

     That is one of the hardest things about being SEC fans. Losing on Saturday isn't something that allows Sunday or the next week to continue like normal life. It is almost like fans wear a scarlet L on their foreheads if the home town team doesn't win. If football is recreation, what do we do for fun? Once a clinical psychologist suggested that type of attitude exists because many people live miserable and unfulfilled lives. Yeah, we live in Alabama and that is probably true. Our State is not exactly the center of American culture. No, but it is the center of college football and that's a lot more important than whom might be first violin in the local symphony.  Football isn't a sport in the SEC it is a way of life. Below the Mason - Dixon line we don't have fairy tales. We daydream about draw plays with happy endings. In the SEC the meek don't inherit anything but ridicule and the Music City Bowl.

     Where we live, down and out is a pass play and not a mental state of mind or economic status. We wouldn't have it any other way. In our neck of the woods we can't think that there is any other way of approaching life.  Where we live Roll Tide and War Eagle are greetings and an acknowledgement of something shared between brothers and sisters in arms. So why is the SEC the greatest football league in the NCAA? Speed on defense. Our love of the game has demanded its evolution to greatness. The Southern pursuit of excellence has caused linebackers to have the speed of running backs. It has also caused running backs to be faster and look like linebackers. When you always running full speed, and full speed is a warp number you are going to win games. In the SEC that means a lot of wins.

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