Honest Abe and Viral Video

To put a different slant on the timeless Abraham Lincoln quote, "you can't make all of the people happy all of the time."  That was my thought process before the Big Ten Conference announced its new football divisions.  Full disclosure, I didn't spend the last two and a half months analyzing and hypothesizing the 567 different combinations of possible divisions, but I think the conference did a pretty good job.  It's kind of like the NCAA basketball tournament bracket - there are too many factors involved for the seeds and sites to make perfect sense for all 65 teams in the field.

Is it a little sad to know that Wisconsin and Iowa will no longer meet every year?  Sure.  But some collateral damage (in this case, the Heartland Trophy) was to be expected.  The Hawkeyes will still battle for Floyd of Rosedale annually, and a new rivalry has emerged; Iowa and Nebraska will meet in the final game of the regular season the next two years (and hopefully every year). At least from the Hawkeyes perspective, the new divisions seem pretty fair.

Shifting gears, I've watched the video of Josh Koeppel's motorcycle colliding with a truck at least two dozen times.  (If you haven't seen the police video, check out the video player on the sports page at whotv.com) Why are most humans (myself included) fascinated with, for lack of a better term, graphic video?  Thankfully, and miraculously, the Iowa lineman picked himself up off the pavement almost immediately.  Koeppel was treated for minor injuries and released after just a couple hours in the emergency room.  But I have a feeling if the outcome hadn't been as fortunate, a large number of people still would have watched the video. Remember how popular that "Faces of Death" video was? Something to think about.

College football starts Thursday night.  I'm ready.

Shawn