Charles Barkley is an Auburn alum, so he isn’t too keen on the Crimson Tide winning tonight…

“I always tell people the three saddest days of my life were the day Elvis died, the day JFK died and the day Alabama fired Mike Shula. This could be the longest year of our lives if they win. They are the worst winners in the history of civilization.”

— Charles Barkley, via al.com

Barkley goes on to predict a three-point victory for the Longhorns.

The photo is from a SI collection of iconic 76ers photos. Check out the entire collection here.

Originally published 12/28/07. Updated 1/6/10.

It’s that time of year again. Much like the post-draft letdown all fantasy owners go through in August or September, the end of the fantasy football season can be a depressing time indeed. I know a lot of baseball fans are already looking forward to spring training and their fantasy baseball drafts, but I’m not a baseball guy, so I need to look elsewhere for comfort. Here are 10 reasons why it’s good that the fantasy football season is finally over. (Seriously, guys, it’s not that bad.)

1. Your busted picks won’t haunt you anymore.
Just think about it: you don’t have to set your lineup for another nine months. No more looking at the injured Michael Turner or the disappointing Brian Westbrook wasting away on your bench. You can add Larry Johnson, Terrell Owens, Marshawn Lynch, Ronnie Brown, Steve Slaton and Matt Forte to that list. All of these guys were early picks that managed to sabotage fantasy seasons to one degree or another. If you only had one of these guys on your team, count yourself lucky. Two or more and your season was probably over before it started.

2. You can start (truly) rooting for your favorite team.
No more fragmented alliances. If you have a favorite team (and who doesn’t?), chances are that at one point or another, you were rooting against them this year. Either your favorite team was playing against a particular player on your fantasy team, or you needed a field goal instead of an extra point from your favorite team’s kicker. At some point, you wanted your team – whose colors you claim to bleed – to fail, somehow or someway. The best thing to do is fess up, ask forgiveness, and cheer as loudly as you can if your team was fortunate enough to make the playoffs.

3. If you won, you can collect your cash.
This only goes for about a quarter of fantasy teams, but if you finished in the money, you can finally collect your winnings. If you won your $50 or $100 league, you should be in for a pretty nice payday. Have you been holding out on buying a new flat screen? Vizio makes a very nice value HDTV. You can get a 55-inch for the same price as the Sony and Samsung high-end 46-inch models. Buy one of these suckers during the after-Christmas sales, order HD from your cable/satellite provider, and watch the NFL playoffs in style. Life is good.

4. No more hovering over the computer on Sundays.
If you’re like me and have multiple fantasy football teams, it can be tempting to watch each and every score. This usually leads to unnecessary frustration as you live and die with every good and bad thing that happens to each of your teams. Forget about figuring out whom to root for. I had eight teams this season and often found myself rooting for and against the same player. I did discover that — to truly enjoy the games — it helps to have only one or two teams or a boatload. The more teams you have, the easier it is to sit back, enjoy the games and just let things happen. You’ll deal with the aftermath on Monday.

5. It’s a great time to gloat (or criticize others for doing just that).
Fantasy football is about entertainment, money and bragging rights, and not necessarily in that order. If you won your league’s championship, it’s time to send out a mass email to your league thanking them for contributing to your TV fund. Describe the features of your new flat screen and talk about how great the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders look on your 55-inch screen in high def (and be sure to use that exact term to irk those in your league that still don’t have HD). If your team missed out on the money and you’re subjected to one of these blowhards, you can tell your league champ that no one likes a braggart. Make sure you point out how much random luck (injuries, draft order, etc.) played into his victory, effectively bringing his fantasy football skills into serious question. Tell him that you learned as a kid how to win graciously and imply that his parents didn’t raise him the right way. That’ll surely piss him off. Bring it up again at the draft and you’ll throw him off his game.

6. The BCS Championship Game and the NFL playoffs are right around the corner.
January is a great time for football. For all its faults, the BCS Championship Game is usually compelling. This year we have a matchup between Alabama and Texas while a few other teams continue to argue that they should have had a shot in the big game. In the NFL, the top 12 teams battle it out every weekend in January for the right to represent their conference in the Super Bowl. In the AFC, Indy looks like the alpha dog, but the Chargers are hot as a pistol. In the NFC, the Saints look vulnerable, and just about every other NFC team that made the postseason seems capable of making a run.

7. If the season lasted another week, you’d probably be single (if you aren’t already).
Let’s cut the crap. Aside from a few oddballs, most women hate fantasy football. Over their lives they’ve learned to tolerate football, but the appeal of fantasy football just doesn’t compute. As the holiday season rolls around, most wives and girlfriends want you to focus on them, not on the score of your fantasy football game. Luckily, the only meaningful games that took place over the last couple of weeks had money on the line, and if there’s one thing that can get a girl interested in fantasy football, it’s the prospect of her boyfriend/husband winning some extra dough (which, of course, would be spent on her, not on a new flat screen).

8. March Madness isn’t too far off.
Not too long after the Super Bowl, college hoops heats up with a plethora of conference tournaments that have NCAA tourney berths on the line. Once March Madness tips off, you’re looking at three thrilling weekends of college hoops action. It starts with the frenetic first weekend, where 48 teams are eliminated, and continues with the Sweet Sixteen and the Elite Eight, which generally feature a load of great matchups and Cinderella stories. By the third weekend, only four teams remain, but they are battle-tested and ready to put it all on the line for a ring. It’s arguably the best three weeks of sports, and it’s less than three months away.

9. The NBA playoffs tip off three weeks later.
I know, the NBA season can be a grind, but once the playoffs start, things can really heat up. The financial state of the NBA has turned the league into a collection of haves and have-nots, so the postseason should feature high quality basketball. Is Shaq the answer in Cleveland? How about Vince Carter in Orlando? Or Rasheed Wallace in Boston? Was the Ron Artest-Trevor Ariza swap a good idea for the Lakers? Can Richard Jefferson revitalize the Spurs? Are the Mavs for real? Can the young Thunder make the postseason? Plus, this summer’s free agency period figures to be one of the most interesting of all time with big names like LeBron, Wade, Bosh, Amare, Joe Johnson and Carlos Boozer possibly changing zip codes.

10. Training camp starts in August.
Once the NBA free agency period is over, it’s time to start researching for your draft. Who are the top rookie running backs that are sure to get major time this season? Which early round draft picks have the best chance to continue their dominance and which ones are most likely to falter and sabotage your season? Who will be 2010′s Miles Austin or Ray Rice? Just answer these questions correctly and the other guys in your league could be buying you a flat screen next January.

Photos #1 and #2 from fOTOGLIF

Poll Answers

If Texas works over Ohio State, you can add another team to that list. And the more, the better.

While it’s great for fans to see an exciting BCS title game, the perfect storm would be completed if Florida narrowly beats Oklahoma in a boring game. The idea is for neither team to look particularly good, which would only strengthen the position of USC, Utah and, potentially, Texas.

We could look back on the 2008-09 season as the year that the BCS shot itself in the proverbial head.

LSU vs. Florida
“The Showdown at the Swamp” marks the first time the last two national champions have faced each other since Notre Dame defeated Miami, 29-20, in 1990. The stakes are high for both schools; Florida must win to maintain any realistic hope of staying in the hunt for a berth in the BCS championship game, while LSU needs the win to stay on course to repeat as National Champions. And the matchup got even more intense after Tigers defensive lineman Ricky Jean-Francois promised that the LSU defense will try to knock Gator quarterback Tim Tebow out of the game. Later in the week, Jean-Francois said his comments were misinterpreted by the press. National coverage begins Saturday at 8 PM ET on CBS.

Major League Baseball LCS Series
The animosity between the Tampa Bay Rays and the Boston Red Sox is not ready to approach the level of the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry, but their contempt for each other is a good undercard. Back on June 5th, the Rays’ Game One starter, James Shields, hit Red Sox outfielder Coco Crisp with a pitch that triggered a bench-clearing brawl between the two teams. Has this issue been resolved? Stay tuned for the answer. Meanwhile, the National League Championship series boils down to how well the Los Angeles Dodgers left-handed pitchers throw to the Philadelphia Phillies lethal left-handed hitting. The Phillies led the NL with 214 homeruns, with Ryan Howard leading the way with 48 followed by Chase Utley with 33, and both players bat left-handed. The top of the Phillies’ lineup also includes switch-hitting Jimmy Rollins and Shane Victorino, who both have outstanding on-base percentages. NLCS Game Two is Friday at 4:30 PM ET and Game Three is on Sunday at 8 PM ET; all NLCS games are on Fox. ALCS Game One is on Friday at 8:30 PM ET and Game Two is on Saturday at 8 PM ET. All ALCS games can be seen on TBS.

New England Patriots vs. San Diego Chargers
Their franchise quarterback is out for the season, and somehow the Patriots have still put together a successful start to their 2008 season. On the other side of the field, the Chargers have been one of the biggest disappointments in the NFL. To avoid falling further back in the AFC standings, the Chargers must try to defeat a Patriots team that has eliminated them from the past two post-seasons. Inconsistent play on both sides of the ball has plagued the Chargers all season; they have lost three games by a total of 10 points. Coverage begins at 8:15 PM ET on NBC