That Guy

Each of us knows “That Guy”- the person who, for reasons known only to their psyche, is overzealous at the wrong time and screws things up for everyone else.

Steves Urkel and Bartman come to mind, as do numerous characters from Drew’s “Great Moments in Drunken Hookup Failure” feature over at Deadspin.

So- What does this have to do with college sports? Well, as shocking as this may be to realize, the Pac-10 (specifically Larry Scott) is “That Guy”.

Let’s take a look at this, shall we?  Back in December, the Big T1e1n announces that they are going to start exploring conference expansion, and we discover that there’s an 18 month-2 year timeline.

This spring/summer, word comes out that the conference has begun talks with specific institutions, and we start hearing about Notre Dame, Texas, Missouri, Rutgers, Nebraska, and others.

And then, on the west coast, someone gets antsy and decides that it’s time to get involved. Perhaps it was due to the need to renegotiate the conference’s TV ratings, perhaps it was due to the need to distract media attention from the all the news about certain NCAA sanctions, perhaps it was due to just wanting to be invited to the cool “expansion” party that everyone was going to… The next thing we hear is that the Pac-10 is making moves to add Texas, Oklahoma, aTm, OkSU, Colorado/Baylor/TTU.

It felt a little like the “You’re thinking about buying a new Lexus? Well, I’m going to buy three Veyrons, and drive my Lambo Limo on the weekends!!” moments we’ve all had with the “That Guy” in our life.

The bad news is that “That Guy” in this case ended up helping Texas get a sweetheart deal at the expense of everyone else in the conversation. Nebraska and the Big T1e2n ended up happy with what happened, but there’s a wistfulness for what might also have been.

To continue the theme suggested by the picture above, the Pac-10’s antics pushed the one person everyone was interested in to stay at home, made a match between the primary suitor and the person that everyone liked but never saw in that way before, and ended up making sure that all of the friends that came with the one everyone was pursuing ended up in the same situation they were at the beginning of the party, but with less money and no self esteem.

And for “That Guy”? Well, he can look forward to a future where his conference’s marquee program is on probation, and where he’s added the one program who jumped into his arms as soon as they were asked (never a good sign), and another that wasn’t even at the party and has only been relevant for a couple of years.

Kind of makes you believe in karma.