Iron Bowl Grades: The Report From The Tire Store

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An excellent edition of the grades, Commissioner.  Probably your best effort of the season and this has been a season of championship writing.  A lot of fans were able to focus on this season as a whole and to enjoy all of the highlight moments that it brought including the team's spectacular play on the road at Penn State in what turned out to be our last game against a Joe Paterno-coached team, a thrashing of an Arkansas team that looked like a championship team against everyone except Alabama and LSU, an entertaining if disappointing game against the Bayou Bengals, and whipping long-time rivals like Tennessee, Mississippi and Mississippi State in a way reminiscent of whatever you consider the glory days of Alabama football (which I find varies depending on how old you are).

But down here at the Tire Store this season has been focused on one thing – putting out the burning ember deep inside that has been smoldering since last Thanksgiving weekend.  Perhaps it’s because we attended that game, but all of last year is a fuzzy, hard-to-see image obscured by one disappointing half of football in Tuscaloosa.  That ember flared up every time we saw an ugly orange tag on a car, every time Scam Newton’s name got mentioned, every time we walked back in the stadium -- even for A Day.  It flared up again when we had to sit through endless CBS references to last years game, when we noted the halftime score and again when Auburn managed a quick score after halftime.  But now, that burning sensation has been soothed, and in permanent fashion.  The world is once again in its proper order.

Alabama beat Auburn about every way you can think of to do it.  Alabama ran the ball in the hard, straightforward, traditional fashion, sometimes hitting a pile of players at the line of scrimmage and moving it forward three or four yards.  Alabama passed efficiently, on at a least two plays completing passes to players so wide open that you couldn’t see defenders on the television picture.  Most of all, Alabama played a suffocating brand of defense.  Auburn couldn’t run, couldn’t pass, and had its most effective play at the quarterback position be a pooch punt.  This all with two players the quality of Barron and Hightower significantly limited by injury.  Even Alabama’s field goal game, held in much derision by the Plains-dwellers in the week leading up the game, contributed in solid style to the victory.

Last year looks more and more like an aberration. One year removed from winning it all, there are calls for coaching changes on the Plains.  The offensive style of the future – misdirection, gadget plays, odd formations, quick snaps, etc. -- that was supposed to change how things are played not just our conference, but throughout the country, has been exposed.  The smoke has cleared and the mirrors are cracked.  Basically, if you don’t have one incredibly talented athlete who can frequently make chicken salad out of a pile of chicken feathers, you won’t score many points on a good defense that has a decent amount of time to prepare.  Playing defense as an afterthought, mostly so that your offense can have time to think up some new pass routes, won’t do either.  Auburn ends the season 7-5 and could have easily been 5-7.  They are waiting for bowl assignments after next weekend’s games, not in the top 25 in any poll and hoping to beat out a 6-6 Florida for a trip to the Gator Bowl to play Urban Meyer’s new team. Alabama’s plans are somewhat more exciting.

Alabama has won three of the last four games against Auburn by a combined score of 131-63.  None was any more satisfying than this past Saturday.  Roll Tide everyone. 

The Correspondent From The Tire Store