Keep Submissions Coming
I know plenty more of you have something in mind for the Southern Proper/RCR contest but have not yet simply elucidated it.   Just make sure to get them in soon.  If we don't get enough submissions, nobody's getting a tie or a shirt--save for Juco.  Tough shit.

Ole Miss stadium expansion pondered | Parrish Alford
With the never-before-seen clusterfuck that is buying an Ole Miss ticket right about now, Pete Boone has actually talked about possibly expanding Vaught-Hemingway Stadium.  If we keep experiencing ticket sales like we are now, this is only to be expected.  My suggestions would generally involve the removal of those horrible north endzone bleachers, allowing for the east and west sides to wrap around until they reach the PoweTron.  Then, under the PoweTron, there could be some seating and a pavillion type thing as to not obstruct the screen.

Players Getting Healthy | David Brandt
Hardy, Lockett, Jason Jones, and Gerald Harris all should be fine in time for Memphis.  Hardy, Lockett, and Jones all practiced yesterday.

For the Old-Fashioned Sports Columnist, It's Game Over | The New York Observer
This, along with something similar written by Spencer Hall, looks at the future of the Rick Clevelands of the world.  With the omnipresence of the internet and it's incredible accessability, traditional print media is evolving.  Some (Tim Brando's loud ass comes to mind) find this threatening, while others (David Brandt) have completely embraced it.  As a bloggeur and general bane of the existence of frumpy old media types, I think it is important to delineate the difference between what I do and what the "mainstream media" does.  First of all, I'm not a journalist.  I have never claimed to be such.  I am a fan with an opinion who, along with other folks of a similar ilk, runs a website through which our opinions are expressed.  Second of all, all I have done is taken a new media form and used it to publicly broadcast and store my thoughts.  Why that is so threatening, I'll never know.  To those who are afraid that their media is dying in favor of our rogueish tomfoolery, I'd like to remind you that if people didn't enjoy the blogosphere, they wouldn't visit it.  We may write something more on this later.

Assessing Ole Miss' top-10 credentials, point-by-point | Dr. Saturday
I've been looking forward to this piece for a while now.  Matt "Dr. Saturday" Hinton has expressed his reservations about Ole Miss' chances this fall on numerous occasions over the last few months, albeit subtly.  Finally, he has written a complete piece on what he feels it will take Ole Miss to win big this upcoming season.  It is--as with all of his work--well written and fairly well researched.  He concludes that Jevan Snead is a badass, Mike Oher will be missed, we'll make-do without Peria Jerry due to a deep defensive line, our defense should somewhat improve upon last season, and that, through our 2008 victory in the Swamp, we have proven that we can beat elite teams.  He also concludes that the assumption that "(Ole Miss') overall talent level is higher than it's been in years" is "busted."  I have some contention with this.  I have always thought that Hinton relies too heavily on Rivals.com recruiting class rankings to ascern the talent level of any given team.  I find this to be a highly flawed metric in that he is putting a ton of stock in rankings designed to determine the potential of a high school athlete to do well at the next level while looking very little into what they have actually done since arriving on campus.  I know I've linked it before, but in Andy Staples' recruiting class "re-rankings," which are all based entirely on production in college, the Ole Miss 2006 recruiting class was ranked 7th.  No, not 7th in the SEC.  7th in the nation.  That class had some all-SEC and even all-American caliber guys like Greg Hardy, Dexter McCluster, Shay Hodge, and Daverin Geralds who contributed very little to the class' Rivals.com rankings.

Trust us, Matt.  Ole Miss' overall talent level is higher than it's been in years.  Don't let a bunch of yellow .gif stars fool you.  Other than that difference in opinion, I thought it was an excellent look at our Rebels.

Finally, This'll Arouse You a Little