I made a half-facetious comparison of Lovie Smith and Jimmy Johnson in the Bears section today. Frank correctly pointed out that Johnson won two NFL championships and a college national championship, and so the comparison wasn't really apt. Fair enough, and as I acknowledged, I was mostly being a smartass.

But I spent the day thinking a little bit more about Johnson's time at the U. Johnson coached in Miami for five seasons. In those five seasons, he lost nine games, and he only lost four games in his final four seasons there.

That's pretty amazing in and of itself, and "did you know Jimmy Johnson lost only nine games as coach at Miami?" is one of those fun little facts you can throw out at parties or bar mitzvahs if so inclined. But maybe even more impressively, many of the games Johnson lost were absolute events--the sorts of games where a single phrase or sentence will get old-time fans nodding from nostalgia. "Ah yes, that game. Who could forget?"

Here are some of the nine games:

Hail Mary: Doug Flutie wins the Heisman, etc. One of the five games Johnson lost in 1984, and maybe the best remembered.

The Most Hated Team of All Time: the Fiesta Bowl game against Penn State. Joe Pa wins his second MNC. Miami was undefeated headed into Tempe and was heavily favored. Players showed up to official events in camo, badmouthed Penn State players, and acted like heels. Five interceptions from Vinny Testaverde killed the Hurricane's chances.

Catholics vs. Convicts: Perhaps the most written-about college football game of the past 25 years. Miami fans still think they got hosed on a fumble call in the fourth quarter.

There were memorable wins in there too (obviously, since there were so many more wins than losses). But every loss was an event. "Were you there when Miami lost a game!" There really is almost no comparison in team sports. New England went 18-1 in 2007, while Miami went 1-15. In Week Three the next season, Miami beat New England 38-13. That's really amazing, when you think about it, but that game will never be considered a milestone in NFL history like Hail Mary or Catholics vs. Convicts. It's just another quirky upset.

I have a historian's attitude towards those games, since I was too young to appreciate them when they happened (I wasn't even alive for all of them). But I remember growing up in the age of Nebraska--a Nebraska team that went 36-1(!!!) from 1993-1995...and that one loss was to #1 Florida State*....by two points...in Florida in the Orange Bowl.

*Asterisk because, as we all remember, Notre Dame beat Florida State that year.

When Nebraska lost, it was an event, an occasion. Sometimes, you'd watch, and you'd think you had it, until... Flea Kicker! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flea_Kicker). It wasn't that Nebraska were villains, necessarily, just that they were unbeatable. Nebraska never lost, never lost, never lost, never lost, for years upon years. But you had to watch, just in case.

The names change, but the game stays the same. Alabama goes almost 30 regular season games until South Carolina. Vince Young runs around USC. Ohio State gets pass interference against, yes, Miami again. Even when the linesmakers say the upsets aren't that big, damn it, they feel like they are. And then sometimes, the upsets really are that big, like when a 36 point underdog Stanford team goes into USC and does the unthinkable.

Johnson went to the NFL to coach the Cowboys, and did great things while there (his Cowboys teams were one of those few professional teams that combined hatred with inevitability as well as his Hurricane teams). But Johnson lost 15 games in his first season, six more than during his tenure in Coral Gables. Nebraska lost 16 games during the 1990s. Not every one of those losses was memorable, I'm sure. But enough of them were to keep me hooked.

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Fire Phil Emery

You have too much time on your hands.

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To add to the Miami stuff, they won 5 national titles in 20 years, if things would have gone their way, it could have been 11.

Before the Penn State game, I think if Miami beat Tennesee in the Sugar Bowl in 86, they would have been national champions.

The one against Penn State, when Miami was the better team, but Testaverde's 5 interceptions.

Against Alabama in the Sugar Bowl in 93.

Like you put against Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl.

2 long strecthes, the first in 94 when they played Nebraksa in the Orange Bowl, if Miami had beaten Nebraska and Oregon beat Penn State in the Rose, Miami would be champs.

Also in 2000, they beat Florida State, but FSU plays in the title game against OU, who knows who would have won between Miami and OU, but it would have been one heck of a game. Of course it didn't help that the team Miami lost too was 1 spot behind them in Washington.

The U has had a special run, but since the 80's and early 90's and an early run in the 2000's, they haven't had the special team lately, and the team they play today Virginia Tech has really been a thorn in their side since 95. Hopefully Miami gets back to domination and you see signs of it.

-I have reached the conclusion that college football is better when Notre Dame is a top program. They are fun and easy to hate. At the same time, when they run up against a program like the 90s Canes, its is also easy to back them.

-The focus on a single championship game has destroyed the entertainment of New Year's Day. I find the actual championship game increasingly irrelevant when it is played a week after New Years and it battles the NFL playoffs for attention.

-You cannot beat a college football game for a fun day (not just the game). I've been to three different campuses this year, watched teams I for who I have no particular passion and had a blast. I even went to St. Joseph's College for a game and was still able to make a day long event out of it.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Two people die during the season directly related to a program and no one gives a shit. Another reason to love college football.

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This isn't quite JORR worthy, but here it is. Irish Boy you mentioned Nebraska and it reminded me of "the stories". My dad loves college football and specifically his team. He attended the University of Oklahoma between 1954 and 1958. During those years, OU's record was 52 - 2. They lost to Notre Dame at home 0-7 with the Sooners inside the 5 yard line when time expired. The second loss was to Texas 14-15.

Bud Wilkinson was in the right state at the right time and created a dynasty and fanatic fan base. To this day, he has an unrealistic view of a winning or successful season.

When Nebraska lost it was at most an annual rite of the New Year. Just like tax day, or on a weekly basis, garbage day being on Monday.

Tom Osborne's run first, run last, run always offense and slow footed DBs were exposed once or twice a year the 80's and 90's. Even worse were the stiff, slow footed linemen that were exposed as frauds when they didn't outweigh the man across from them by at least 50lbs.

Every year his kids wore down in the "heat" of the Orange Bowl and every year Osborne was lauded for his gentlemanly way of accepting yet another year ending defeat. And btw, Nebraska football wasn't exactly must see tv, it was as dull as dull could get.

It was only when Nebraska's QB was among both the fastest players on the field, and Osborne decided to abandon what few ethics he still had that the University of (k)Nowledge became a real national powerhouse.

F Nebraska...history should be far, far less kind to that program. But stats lend a great credence to the (false) theory that it was a truly great program.

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There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.

It was an annual event that happened only once in three years?

Joe Paterno just won his 401st game. During that time, Nebraska won 436. No other team is within 30 of that. That's pretty impressive, even if Turner Gill threw a crappy slant against Miami in 1983 in a virtual road game.

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Fire Phil Emery

Good Dolphin, your right on your 3 points, but I am going to focus on New Year's Day. A day college football owned, but now you could make a strong case they have lost the day. Some of the talk that day is the outdoor hockey game and this year, there is a UFC event that day. To me the big mistake was having the BCS games as a package to a network, instead of separte like in year's past. If I were doing, have all the games on New Year's Day and your national title game the next night, so it is separte, look at at this year, the title game is Jan. 10.

I agree with the larger point, but the NHL game has not taken away from college football at all. I'm pretty sure that last year, the ratings for even the mid-tier bowls like the Outback Bowl were much better than that of the hockey game. The Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl absolutely demolished everything else.

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Fire Phil Emery

Your right Irish Boy, the bowls were more watched than the hockey game, but to me for college football, it was a day you owned and it seems that they have lost a little of it. I will add they are adding another bowl to New Year's Day this year, the one in Dallas, but that day will be all Big 10 Teams.

Again, I'll grant you that brief period in the mid 90's. But, from the early to mid 70's through that period, the U of (k)Nowledge often had one or two losses, one of which was a bowl game and possibly a loss to Oklahoma. Nebraska's annual big game failures were like clockwork.

Switzer cheated all those years (like Osborne did later), but he wasn't routinely pantsed on national tv like Nebraska was. And fwiw, Switzer actually produced pro talent.

As to Paterno....total # of college coaching wins from that era don't really mean much to me. 300-325 of his wins were probably laughers against no talent teams. But in fairness, virtually every one of the then 10-15 major college programs had 2, maybe 3 tough games scheduled each year and none of them were out of conference road games(with one notable exception).

Nebraska & Osborne would be a case study in padding stats for you. On an annual basis at least 5(if not 6) of their Big 8 games were easy wins. 3 yearly games were against absolute powder puff teams and the other regular season game was against a decent mid major, but never on the road. Their strength of scheduling was laughable (less than Paterno's, but not by much)

As much as I hate Notre Dame, they (unlike PSt or Nebraska) actually always had at least 3-4-5 legitimate games on the schedule worth watching.

Osborne was a good manager from a "storied" program operating in an area with lap dog fans...like Michigan and Ohio State of the early 70's to late 80's (excepting 2-3 seasons from Sparty and the pink locker room guy)

BFD

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There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.

I nearly forgot, you are an old.

I agree with you. I'd like to see fewer stragglers after that date. I have no problem with there being lots of bowls (I'm an Illinois fan, after all), but they should play the Peach Bowl on the 31st, a bunch of important ones on the 1st with the day capped by the Rose and Sugar Bowls, the other two BCS Bowls the two days after that, and the championship should be by the 4th or 5th.

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Fire Phil Emery

Part of me wishes that I grew up in a time period where even making a bowl was considered a major accomplishment. The other part of me realizes how much it would suck to never go to a bowl because Ohio State and Michigan are in your conference.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I've always thought complaints about there being too many bowl games were odd. More bowl games = more football. If you don't want to watch, that's fine. But, if nothing else, it gives us an extra data point on the season, gives the kids a reward for at least a moderately successful season, and gives programs like Baylor and Mississippi State a realistic goal.

Now, some of the ways the bowls are run, such as making teams by huge amounts of tickets, that I have a problem with. But a December game between Idaho and Ohio does not offend my core being.

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Fire Phil Emery

I don't have a problem with the number of bowl games. I just think it would be cool(and it was the one time I saw it happen) when my teams success keeps the traditional powers out.

One of my favorite memories is the Motor City Bowl game but it seemed more like a funny thing to go to and less a reward for a good season.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I love the bowls.

The one problem I have is that making a bowl is used as the same type of measuring stick for success as it was prior to the 90s. I cannot tell you how many times I hear X coach has made it to Y consecutive bowls. Who cares? For a team like Northwestern it is a little bit bigger accomplishment. For a bigger program it has no meaning. You have to have a really bad season at places like Michigan and Texas NOT to make a bowl, and most bowls would probably love to have them even if they had a losing record.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

I agree, although interestingly, not making a bowl now has a sort of bizarro effect from before. It only took one 5-7 season at Auburn for Tuberville to be forced out.

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Fire Phil Emery

it's a diluted thing. most of them mean nothing to me. and it's so far removed from the regular season that it doesn't feel like it's a part of anything. it feels like pre season.