Herbstreit makes unfair diss, and other thoughts

Scattershooting around the college football scene with just more than a week to go before all this preseason stuff comes to an end.

THUMBS UP: Nice timing by the Lobos. A day before a gloomy headline hit the program on Wednesday, New Mexico officials gave head football coach Rocky Long a 5-year contract and a raise from $439,000 to $750,000 a year.

THUMBS DOWN: The NCAA placed New Mexico on probation for academic fraud on Wednesday. Is the academic work in Albuquerque (to get in or stay in school) that tough that somebody would need to fudge?

HE SAID IT: After a rash of injuries in UCLA's camp, Rick Neuheisel fielded an interesting question about balancing physical play in practice — something BYU played the conservative card with during its two-a-days.

His response was even more interesting.

Said Neuheisel, "That would certainly be an option. But if you stop being physical, you stop giving yourself a chance to play, because it is going to be a physical game. I can call (Tennessee coach) Phil Fulmer and ask if we could just play touch. I don't think he'll go for it."

STATISTICALLY SPEAKING: The Cougars ranked last in the country in 2007 in field goals attempted (15). Utah tried 22 and Utah State 21.

AFTER FURTHER REVIEW: Here are the penalties handed down for the Lobos' football program. New Mexico can only recruit four junior college players who were nonqualifiers coming out of high school instead of the allowed nine. The number of paid visits to prospective student-athletes has been reduced each season to 46 for 2008-09, 48 for 2009-10, and 48 for 2010-11. UNM will not be allowed to save any of its unused visits for the next year.

DUMB AND DUMBER: Most of America's sports media with room temperature IQs would at least give BYU a decent chance of playing in a BCS bowl at the end of this college football season. That's what makes ESPN's Kirk Herbstreit's dissing of BYU in favor of ESPN family member Fresno State kind of strange. Herbstreit says BYU "doesn't deserve it."

On the other hand, everybody is 0-0, preseason hype means nothing, every team — including the Cougars — has everything to prove and can only do so after kickoff. So, what's Kirk's deal? Why go there in August?

UNSUNG HEROES: BYU and Utah long snappers Chris Muehlmann and Clint Mower. You don't notice them until they mess up.