Auburn fans incoming...

Tequilla said:

AU2xguy said:

Baseman said:

AU2xguy said:

HorrifyinglyAlluring said:

auburn2eugene said:

@puppylove_sugarsteel what questions do you have?

I have an interesting take on Auburn with a West Coast view. After Auburn, I moved to Eugene Oregon and lived there for 2 decades before moving back to the South recently.

I know you guys hate the Ducks, it's like the Auburn vs UGA rivalry, but I will give an honest take on Auburn by someone with a Left Coast POV.

So any questions, from puppy or anyone, ask away

How do you reconcile this:

http://twitter.com/TomFornelli/status/1027626995897847809

Do you think it's fair to play 8 conference games (not 9) and be able to play a patsy before your big rivalry games in November? Does this have a material effect on wins/losses and team overall health?

Let me take a stab at this. The tweet only talks about true road games. Since 2000, we've played the following. Remember, some of these were when teams still only played 11 game seasons. I'll also include upcoming games:

2001: at Syracuse
2002: at USC, vs. Syracuse
2003: vs. USC, at Georgia Tech
2005: Georgia Tech
2006: vs Washington State
2007: vs Kansas State
2008: at West Virginia
2009: vs West Virginia
2010: vs Clemson
2011: at Clemson
2012: Clemson (neutral site)
2013: vs Washington State
2014: at Kansas State
2015: Louisville (neutral site)
2016: vs Clemson
2017: at Clemson
2018: Washington (neutral site)
2019: Oregon (neutral site)
2020: North Carolina (neutral site)
2021: at Penn State
2022: vs Penn State
2023: at Cal
2024: Cal

I listed those out to basically show that AU does make an effort to play a Power 5 non-conference game every year (exception was 2004) and has some cool home/home series upcoming. Some may ask "Why did WSU go to Auburn twice with no return visit?" The answer is simple: WSU's stadium is too small. I can guaran-damn-tee you Auburn would bring at least 15k fans to Pullman. That 32k seat high school stadium just won't cut it. If you need proof of how AU travels for big non-conference games, understand that we took 15k fans to Manhattan, Kansas for a Thursday night game in 2014, 15k for a Thursday night at West Virginia in 2008, and nearly 30k fans to USC for a Labor Day night game in 2002. For a new venue/opponent, our folks will spend money and travel.

As for the 8 vs 9 conference game thing, you have to understand two things:

1) Malzahn and Saban are the only two coaches in the conference pushing for it. Most fans would love it though.

2) That extra guaranteed home game is huge for some of the towns these schools live in. Remember, the economies Seattle, Los Angeles, Phoenix, etc don't revolve around college football. The cities of Auburn, Tuscaloosa, Fayetteville, Knoxville, Clemson, etc absolutely do. That one extra home game can mean millions of dollars to the local economy and be the difference between a business making it or not.

Finally, don't blame the SEC for figuring out that playing a patsy in November is smart business. Go yell at the Pac-12 scheduling office for backloading the conference schedule on y'all. Even if we moved to a nine game conference schedule, we'd still play a cupcake that week. Just take off a cupcake in September or October to make the trade. And the thing is, I don't hear people yelling about it being unfair to the SEC when AU played a conference game to start the season in 2015 or that the biggest game of the Eastern Division's year is in week 2 this season (UGA/South Carolina). That's just the way it rolls man.

Strange question. Did you get a masters degree @ TCU?

I feel like I'm missing a joke here somewhere. But no, got both my Bachelor and Masters from Auburn. I do live in Texas though.

It’s a dig at me and a reference for your wall of text