Socratic Dialogue on this year's College Football Playoffs

(Really more trash talk than a dialogue.)

Socrates: Hail Thracymachus!

Thracymachus: Hail Socrates!

Socrates: College football championship season is nearly upon us. Have you decided yet upon your rooting interests?

Thracymachus: Indeed I have. Roll Tide!

S: Ah yes, my front-running friend. I forgot that in spite of your having no connection to the state of Alabama whatsoever, you yet pretend to fandom. And may I say, your houndstooth tunic is quite fetching.

T: You wound me, Socrates. Surely were I the front-runner you claim, I should be wearing Clemson gear this week. The Tigers are, after all, #1.

S: For the moment. But I did not declare you a fickle front-runner, Thracymachus. Nay, for that you are too clever by far. This Bama bandwagon you have joined is built for many years of joy (Hail Saban!), whereas Clemson will surely prove itself a paper tiger by next season at the latest.

T: And those colors, too.

S: That orange, so reminiscent of vomit absorbent.

T: The better for cleaning up after Clemson fans once more grow sick over another late-season collapse.

S: Clemson’s gonna Clemson. Only perhaps not this season. It has been an odd year, after all.

T: How mean you?

S: Well, your vaunted Crimson Tide lost at home. To Ole Miss.

T: Not our fault. Our defense had not yet been swag-proofed.

S: There was a considerable portion of swag in that game.

T: So much swag.

S: Industrial levels.

T: They’re still cleaning it out of the recesses of Brian-Denny.

S: I find that swag is much like black mold. Once it’s in, it’s in, and you might as well move. Still, that loss will condemn your beloved Bama to the vast purgatory that is the non-championship bowl season should the Tide fall a second time to Florida this weekend.

T: This will not occur.

S: And how can you be so certain, worthy Thracymachus?

T: The SEC East does not deserve the name.

S: The South-least-ern Conference?

T: That division’s fourth-best team was Vanderbilt, which lost to Western Kentucky.

S: To be fair, Western Kentucky was arguably the greatest of all the Kentuckies this season.

T: Is that not much like being the shyest Kardashian, Socrates?

S: If a Kardashian falls in the forest, and there is no Us magazine photographer around, do the other Kardashians mock her?

T: Mercilessly, to be sure.

S: As if she were an Iowa Hawkeye fan, perhaps.

T: You go too far, Socrates. Iowa does not deserve such scorn. Not this year. They are 11-and-0!

S: Speak truly, Thracymachus. How highly would you rate Iowa on a list of prominent Hawkeyes. Above Hawkeye Pierce?

T: Alan Alda on M.A.S.H.? Certainly not. That guy was comedic gold.

S: Quite right. And Hawkeye in The Last of the Mohicans?

T: Above Daniel Day Lewis? Be not absurd. The man is an Oscar winner.

S: Of course. And what of Hawkeye from The Avengers?

T: There I must hesitate.

S: Why so? Because shooting arrows accurately is not a superpower?

T: One must greatly dilute the meaning of “super” to make such an assertion.

S: Much as one must dilute the meaning of “Power 5 Division Champ” when that division includes Illinois and Purdue? In a conference that apparently counts in base 14 without admitting it?

T: I concede to your wisdom, Socrates. Iowa is, indeed, yet deserving of mockery.

S: And yet we must root for them, must we not?

T: Rather than for the hated Spartans!

S: Always running around shirtless, yelling, “This is Sparta!” this and “This is Sparta!” that. You would not catch an Athenian behaving so.

T: When in their hearts they must acknowledge that they actually live in East Lansing.

S: Their university is not even in the main Lansing! How many Lansings can a state need?

T: Still better than the Trojans.

S: Who names their team after a city that got fooled by a wooden horse?

T: That’s bad juju.

S: As we saw this season.

T: Indeed. Still, haven’t we forgotten some teams that are yet in contention? What of North Carolina?

S: Basketball school. It’s only a matter of time before their quarterback attempts to dribble. In any case, they already lost to the other USC, the one whose fans are always yelling, “Go Cocks!” That entire team is but an elaborate dick joke.

T: That explains why Spurrier did so well there.

S: A bit dickish, wasn’t he?

T: I would pay that man a decent salary just to listen to him insult me.

S: He would do it for free.

T: I think there needs to be a contract, or that kind of thing will get you arrested. In any case, we haven’t talked yet of Stanford. They have an outside chance.

S: Yes. If Alabama loses.

T: The gods forbid!

S: And Clemson loses.

T: Because North Carolina gets hot from 3.

S: But the committee still doesn’t pick the Tar Heels.

T: Which would be cruelty indeed.

S: I don’t see it. The committee would surely hold its nose and let North Carolina earn the right to get destroyed by Oklahoma. There is no way they could pick 2-loss Stanford over them.

T: And why is that, Socrates?

S: If for no other reason, then because the team still insists on calling itself “The Cardinal.”

T: Like they think they’re the Highlander. There can only be one.

S: Ohio State would get in first.

T: Would they have a chance?

S: It depends on what quarterback they’re on.

T: They get better the further down the list they go, don’t they?

S: The Buckeyes’ fifth-string quarterback is a twenty-year-old clone of Peyton Manning.

T: Their sixth-stringer is a clone of Tee Martin.

S: Indeed.

T: [Sighs.] So, Oklahoma, then, Socrates?

S: Which do you mean, Thracymachus? The state or the musical?

T: The team. I take it that you expect the Sooners to win the championship.

S: And how have you reached this conclusion?

T: Because you mocked them less than all the rest.

S: Ah, that was an oversight. I simply could not be bothered making fun of a team that lost to Texas this year. A Longhorns team that got shut out. By Iowa State.

T: Ooh!

S: Yes.

T: That’s not good.

S: No.

T: So, can anyone win this year?

S: Clearly not.

T: So for whom should we root?

S: You must root for the Tide, my friend. I have done you some disservice. I recall now that you supported them even during the Shula years.

T: Those were dark times.

S: You have earned your fandom.

T: But what of you, Socrates? For whom shall you root?

S: Am I not a gadfly, Thracymachus?

T: You are the most irritating man I know, Socrates.

S: Greater even than Spurrier in this respect?

T: I believe so. When it comes to it, I think he is less likely to be forced to drink hemlock than you.

S: A fair standard. Very well. As a gadfly, I must choose the rooting interest that will most irritate others, thereby stimulating reflection and contemplation.

T: And that would be?

S: The problematic #1 team it is. Go Clemson!

T: I shall enjoy your pitiful weeping on Saturday, Socrates.

S: And my vomit?

T: Especially your vomit.