A look back at my 5 crazy predictions

Before the season I made five crazy predictions about the Big 12 season. You can read them all here, but let’s recap what they were and where I hit and where I completely whiffed.

1. Tech finishes with 10 wins while TCU doesn’t

If you read my prediction, you’ll see I thought TCU was incredibly overrated. Many pundits, such as Kirk Herbstreit and Stewart Mandel, had TCU in their final four. I knew losing the pieces they did wouldn’t make for a successful season. I was right. They were awful.

I absolutely whiffed on Tech winning 10 games. We’ve documented what went wrong with the season over the past five months, but I was confident we’d be better than we were. And I’m still confident will be better next year than we were this year.

2. Baker sulks while Pat flies to NYC

I missed on this one, but it wasn’t because of Baker or Pat. It was because of Tech’s defense. If Tech was able to make some stops and put themselves in position to win nine games Pat would have been in NYC as a Heisman finalist. Don’t tell me his numbers weren’t good enough. Baker had a great year, especially with his efficiency, but I’ll take Pat’s year over Baker’s.

3. Texas finishes in the top half while Baylor doesn’t

This was my best prediction. Texas didn’t finish in the top half, but they did finish sixth in the conference. Baylor finished eighth, one spot behind Tech. But the best prediction I made here was that Baylor would start the season 6-0 and then go 0-6. Go read the article linked above and you’ll see I hit that one square on the nail.

4. The Perine/Mixon due doesn’t lead the league in rushing

I nailed this one too. Samaje Perine and Joe Mixon ran for a combined 2,157 yards, which is fantastic production out of any backfield. I thought Iowa State’s rushing attack would be better with Mike Warren. But D’Onta Foreman led the Big 12 with 2,028 yards, and paired with Chris Warren, who was injured early in the season, accounted for almost 2,400 yards rushing the ball.

5. Texas and OU are both 1-2 headed into conference play

Notre Dame is the only thing that stood between me and this prediction being perfect. We all know that Texas beat the Fighting Irish and was thought to be “back,” but it turns out Notre Dame was awful and this was a very mediocre win. Texas lost to Cal and OU lost to Houston and Ohio State. I was close. I was very, very close.

I swung for the fences, hit a couple out, and whiffed pretty badly on the others.