Texas Longhorns

The Big 12 coaching hot seat has been pretty quiet lately, but Kansas' Turner Gill heated his up in a hurry by losing the final 10 games of 2011 and failing to win a conference game. It's pretty difficult to get fired after two seasons in college football, but going 5-19 and winning one conference game in two seasons is a good way to do it.

Losing six games last season by 30 points or more helped, too.

So, what's the hot seat in the Big 12 look like heading into 2012? Here's what CBS Sports' Dennis Dodd says, followed by my comments:

Art Briles, Baylor

• 2011: 2.0 (safe, but you never know)
• 2012: 0.5 (Can't be touched)

This is what a 10-win season and Heisman winner at Baylor does. You could easily make the case that Briles is now a living legend in Waco.

Paul Rhoads, Iowa State

• 2010: 1.0 (Very safe, change unlikely)
• 2011: 0.0 (Can't be touched)

Rhoads led ISU to an amazing second bowl game in three years, and capped off the season by signing a 10-year extension to his contract. Big upsets (Nebraska '09, Iowa/Texas '10, Oklahoma State '11) have put ISU on the national college football map, too.

Charlie Weis, Kansas

• 2011: 2.0 (safe, but you never know)

Weis is a newcomer with a fresh slate at KU. Expectations are low, which may aid him in the short run.

Bill Snyder, Kansas State

• 2010: 0.5 (Can't be touched)
• 2011: 0.5 (Can't be touched)

You don't fire a coach whose name is on the highway entering the city. Moving on ...

Bob Stoops, Oklahoma

• 2010: 0.0 (Can't be touched)
• 2011: 0.5 (Can't be touched)

Stoops didn't shy away from national championship expectations last year, but the Sooners fell well short, all the way to three losses and the Insight Bowl. There's no reason to believe that was the start of a program decline, though.

Mike Gundy, Oklahoma State

• 2010: 1.0 (Very safe, change unlikely)
• 2011: 0.0 (Can't be touched)

Gundy loves Oklahoma State, and OSU loves him even more than ever after giving the program its first-ever Big 12 title and returning a team that should easily make a bowl game in 2012. These two are stuck together for the long haul.

Mack Brown, Texas

• 2010: 2.0 (safe, but you never know)
• 2011: 2.5 (safe, but you never know)

Totally disagree with this one. How does an improvement from five wins to eight wins equal a rise in seat heat? This is the year where Texas has some more expectations, and if the Longhorns stumble to 6-7 wins, Brown will be feeling a lot of heat entering 2013. It'll only come from the fans to start, but the administration will be forced to listen if the Longhorns can't climb back near the top of the Big 12 heap.

Gary Patterson, TCU

• 2010: 0.0 (Can't be touched)
• 2011: 0.0 (Can't be touched)

Where's MC Hammer on those rare occasions when he's needed? Welcome to the Big 12.

Tommy Tuberville, Texas Tech

• 2010: 1.5 (Very safe, change unlikely)
• 2011: 3.5 (On the bubble, feeling pressure)

Tuberville might even be pushing a four in my book. He's had lots of legitimate excuses for Tech's recent slide, most notably injuries. That said, patience is wearing thin, even in the face of record contributions and outstanding recruiting classes. Tech needs wins now.

Dana Holgorsen, West Virginia

• 2010: 1.5 (Very safe, change unlikely)
• 2011: 0.5 (Can't be touched)

Holgorsen doesn't have enough capital built up to the point where a couple rough seasons wouldn't faze the fan love he's feeling, but WVU is doing everything to move in the right direction, and winning a Big East title and BCS game in your first season earns a whole lot of love from the Mountaineer faithful.

Today we're saying goodbye to the BCS after its death warrant was effectively signed by college football's commissioners and university presidents.

I actually didn't hate the BCS -- to be replaced by a playoff in 2014 -- as much as many did. I saw it for what it was: better than the old bowl system, even if it presented lots of high-volume arguments over the course of its life. That said, I've always been pro-playoff, even if I never truly believed I would see it in my lifetime. I'm so, so happy to be wrong.

To help lay the BCS to rest, we're naming each conference's best and worst BCS moments, so here's what qualified for the Big 12.

BEST MOMENT: Oklahoma slides into title game ahead of Texas

My apologies, Longhorns fans, but give me a second to explain myself. The 2008 season was one of the craziest in the history of the BCS, and the epicenter for the craziness was the Big 12 South. Oklahoma, Texas and Texas Tech tied for the South title, but the three-team tiebreaker had to be settled by ... wait for it .... the BCS rankings. Oklahoma got the edge and played in the Big 12 title game, despite Texas winning the head-to-head matchup in the Cotton Bowl in October and the teams having identical 11-1 records at the time.

Oklahoma advanced, routing Missouri in the Big 12 title game while Texas fans flew planes over the stadium towing "45-35" banners commemorating the score of the seemingly meaningless Red River Rivalry game earlier that season. It was an ugly moment, but it was one of the many instances that highlighted the silliness of the BCS -- and it was a showcase for just how strong the Big 12 was that season. All three Big 12 South co-champions finished the regular season 11-1.

WORST MOMENT: Creation of the "Kansas State Rule"

In 1998, the very first season of the BCS' existence, Kansas State racked up a school-record 610 points on the way to an undefeated regular season and held the nation's No. 1 ranking entering the Big 12 title game against Texas A&M. The Aggies upset the favored Wildcats in double overtime for their only Big 12 title, and despite falling to No. 3 in the BCS standings, all of the BCS bowls passed on inviting K-State. The Wildcats beat three top-20 teams during the season, but A&M was the first top-10 team they'd faced all season. Instead, K-State fell all the way to the Alamo Bowl, where it lost to Purdue.

That served as validation for some, a team lost in time and rendered irrelevant by an ugly bowl loss to a middling, unranked Big Ten team. That doesn't change the fact K-State got royally shortchanged by the BCS in that first year. After that disaster, the BCS installed a rule that required teams ranked No. 3 in the BCS (and No. 4 if the No. 3 team was a conference champion) to be given a BCS bowl bid. USC took advantage of that rule in 2002; Texas did so in 2004 and 2008; Ohio State used it in 2005; and Michigan did so in 2006. The most recent team to qualify? Last season's Stanford team, which lost to Oklahoma State.

Honorable mention: Alabama plays for national title ahead of Oklahoma State in 2011; Missouri gets passed up in favor Kansas for a BCS bowl after the 2007 season, despite beating KU and losing twice to Oklahoma; TCU gets matched up with fellow non-AQ member Boise State in the 2010 Fiesta Bowl.

AUSTIN, Texas -- In the wake of the Ricky Seals-Jones decommitment, Texas coach Mack Brown let it be known he was not opposed to any of his players participating in another sport.

“… it would not be a problem at all,” he said.

Yeah, but talk is cheap. For real evidence of the coach’s stance on pick and rolls as opposed to blocking and tackling, look no further than Camrhon Hughes. The soon-to-be freshman backup offensive lineman took a severe step back in his progress by tearing up his knee playing hoops last month. OK, so maybe Hughes is not exactly on the same level as Seals-Jones when it comes to excelling at two sports.

But the point is, at least Brown allowed Hughes to play two sports, even if one is at a rec center not the Frank Erwin Center.

“I talked to my buddies across the country that are coaching, they want to all pull [the players] off Twitter, Facebook, not let them play basketball, not let them do this, do that,’ Brown said. “They are human beings, and they're kids.”

They are also valuable commodities. Texas spends more than $550,000 putting together a football recruiting class. In Hughes’ class of 28, that is roughly $20,000 spent on each player signed. Once the player is in school, Texas spends $42,000 per year.

That is a sizable investment even for a school with a $150 million budget. In Hughes’ case, the return on the investment has now been delayed or even possibly scuttled altogether.

Remember Ivan Williams? Brown does. The running back ruptured his patella tendon playing pickup basketball.

“It really curtailed his career,” Brown said. “He went to fullback instead of tailback after that.”

Williams played in 23 games as a freshman and sophomore before the injury and played in 15 after the injury. Still pickup basketball is a fixture in many of the players’ day. Tweets are sent out looking for players, times arranged and fun is had by all. That is until someone goes down like Hughes did.

Then the fun comes to a crashing end. In Hughes’ case all 6-foot-7, 320 pounds of it.

“I think Camrhon's dad said, ‘Medicine ball is the only ball you'll be picking up in your future,’” Brown said after the injury. “Parents usually handle (the restrictions placed on their kids.) We just tell them to be careful.”

That’s really all they can do. Despite the fact that Texas invests more than $100,000 in a four-year player’s career, these are amateur athletes. Pro athletes often have clauses in their contracts restricting them from playing pickup basketball. For example, Aaron Boone of the Yankees tore his ACL and was then cut. Chad Pennington tore his as a free agent and saw his stock go down. Terrell Suggs has vehemently denied tearing his Achilles playing hoops despite eyewitness accounts to the contrary. All of those professionals potentially have money to lose.

Hughes might too some day. But, right now, he’s just a freshman doing what most other freshmen football players do, run the court in his spare time. If Brown were to forbid the players from playing basketball, it very well could cause some strife among the team. And it could certainly be used against him in recruiting.

So for now, Texas and Brown will just have to live with the possibility that injuries might happen on the hardwood. Like he said, players are “human beings and they’re kids.”

They are all kids who are more than welcome to play two sports at Texas.

Strike up the band. Ring the bells from here to the Swamp to the Coliseum. College football's playoff has arrived after more than a century of playing the game, which essentially means more than a century of clamoring for a playoff like every other major sport in America.

"This playoff is long overdue. It took some time to get to the right model, but I think we have found something that will only make college football better," Texas Tech coach Tommy Tuberville said in a statement while on a Red Raiders alumni cruise in Rome. "This is a great day for our sport, and most importantly it will give us a national champion that is settled on the field."

Fans surely welcome the development, but for each conference's supporters and teams, a batch of new questions arises: How will this affect us, and how can we best take advantage of this new world in college football?

As we've mentioned before, the Big 12 likely had the least to gain and the least to lose of any conference in these discussions the past few months.

The league has had big success in the BCS era, reaching the title game seven times, more than any league but the SEC, though the Big 12 has gone just 2-5 in those appearances. The league's chances to place more than one team in a four-team playoff seem minimal at best.

Where does the Big 12 have the most to gain?

The Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex-based Cotton Bowl was squeezed out of the major-bowl rotation with the advent of the Bowl Alliance in 1995. It'll almost certainly be folded back into the rotation as one of the six bowl sites for the semifinal games when the new plan takes effect in 2014, with the championship game likely to be bid out to neutral sites.

When the Cotton Bowl got pushed out, so did the Big 12's chances of playing in a national title game within its footprint. Oklahoma had to play Florida and Florida State in national championship games in Miami. Texas had to try to take down USC at the Rose Bowl (it succeeded). Oklahoma had to walk inside a powder keg called the New Orleans Superdome to try to knock off LSU (it failed).

The Cotton Bowl released a statement in the wake of Tuesday evening's playoff news that surely brought smiles to plenty of Big 12 faces.

"It’s a great day for college football. We congratulate the conference commissioners and presidents for their diligent work to enhance the post season. We look forward to learning more about the opportunities that will be created by today’s announcement. With partners like AT&T and Cowboys Stadium, we believe we have a great story to tell."

Nobody wants to hear that story more than Texas, Oklahoma and the rest of the Big 12. The Cotton Bowl stepped under the big top three seasons ago when it moved from the State Fair of Texas fairgrounds in Dallas to Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas, ready to play its game at America's finest football cathedral.

The Big 12 will no longer have to worry about situations such as in 2011, when No. 3 Oklahoma State was pushed out of the national championship game in favor of eventual champion Alabama, which knocked off fellow SEC team LSU in a rematch of a 6-3 November rugby match.

That'll be nice, but nothing will be nicer for the Big 12 than getting a chance to suit up with everything on the line only a few hours from its campus, in a city full of its alumni.

Today is the next step in a new series on the Big 12 blog that we've never done before. I love predicting the standings from top to bottom, but we're going to do it week by week leading up to the season. The end goal is to offer my official prediction for each Big 12 team's record heading into the bowl games.

Remember, these are preseason predictions. We'll obviously still do week-to-week picks once the season arrives, and they may change between now and then. There are a lot of preseason practices and a whole lot of games between now and the end of the season.

There are always teams who disappoint and teams who surprise. But here's how I see the Big 12 shaking out in Week 3.

PREVIOUS PREDICTIONS

• Week 1
• Week 2

Baylor 47, Sam Houston State 17: Baylor didn't get to finish this game last year; the fourth quarter was canceled because of weather. The Bears won't put on a show like RG3 did in the first three quarters, but they take care of business against a pretty good FCS team (which is like a "pretty good Big East team." I kid.)

Iowa State 31, Western Illinois 10: Finally, ISU doesn't have a nailbiter. The Cyclones bounce back from a rivalry loss to Iowa to dispatch the FCS Leathernecks easily.

TCU 41, Kansas 17: Kansas coach Charlie Weis had his team practice kicking a game-winning field goal and reaching 3-0 in this game during an open practice in the spring. Not happening. TCU goes to Lawrence and debuts its first Big 12 game the right way. KU will improve this year, but it's not happening just yet.

Kansas State 47, North Texas 20: Former Iowa State coach Dan McCarney is back taking on an old Big 8 foe, which makes for an intriguing story line, but not much of a football game. Lance Dunbar can't save you now, Mean Green. (K-State fans know what I'm talkin' about.)

Oklahoma State 41, Louisiana-Lafayette 24: Don't sleep on these Ragin' Cajuns. U-LaLa is a decent team who won nine games and beat a very good San Diego State team in the New Orleans Bowl last year. This defense picked off Brandon Weeden three times last year and led at halftime when these two teams met in the Bayou in 2010. This one won't be easy, but the Cowboys pull away late.

Texas 27, Ole Miss 10: Unless Texas is distracted by hoards of its mascot being grilled in The Grove outside the stadium, the Longhorns should take care of business in the Big 12's only matchup against the SEC in the regular season. That sounds sexier than it is. Texas is on its way back to national prominence. Ole Miss is restarting under new coach Hugh Freeze after a two-win 2011.

Texas Tech 47, New Mexico 17: We've been over this. New Mexico: Awful. FBS by name only, I'd say.

West Virginia 44, James Madison 17: Madison shocked eventual ACC champ Virginia Tech back in 2010, but these Mountaineers are better and won't make the mistakes the Hokies did just a week after a heartbreaking loss to Boise State. FCS is still FCS. Can we start conference play now?

BIG 12 STANDINGS (after Week 3)

1. Kansas State: 3-0
1. Oklahoma State: 3-0
1. Texas: 3-0
1. Texas Tech: 3-0
5. Oklahoma: 2-0
5. West Virginia: 2-0
5. Baylor: 2-0
5. TCU: 2-0
9. Kansas: 2-1
9. Iowa State: 2-1

You've got to love the fresh look every season brings. For all the preseason prognosticating, you never really know what the fall will bring.

In 2010, the league's biggest breakout player was easily Oklahoma State's Justin Blackmon, who raced to a Biletnikoff Award and proved himself as the Big 12's best player over the course of the season.

Last year, there was once again no question. Kansas State's Collin Klein entered the season with modest expectations, and finished it as a record-holding touchdown machine, cashing in on 27 scores throughout the year, carrying Kansas State to 10 wins and a Cotton Bowl berth, despite being picked to finish eighth in the Big 12.

Who will earn that nod in 2012?

Colleague KC Joyner says among first-year starters, it'll be Texas receiver Jaxon Shipley. Shipley started a few games as a true freshman last season, but against BCS conference opponents, Shipley was extremely productive in the short passing game (see Joyner's full article for a chart on just how productive he was).

Comparing Shipley's yards per attempt to the 2012 receiver class would have placed him at No. 7, which is even more impressive considering the revolving door of inexperience that was the quarterback position at Texas last season.

That's impressive, and I'd lean toward agreeing with Joyner. The biggest star? Maybe not. There's no question in my mind that Shipley's due for a big year. He's instinctive and to me, stuck out as the best player on Texas' offense last year, even with Malcolm Brown crashing the party.

Will Shipley be the Big 12's biggest breakout star in 2012? Vote in our poll, and if you don't think so, name your pick in the comments.