Media Still Disrespecting The ‘Cute’ K-State Wildcats

Jason O. Watson-US PRESSWIRE

Despite its on-field success, ESPN and other major news outlets have still turned
their backs to what K-State has achieved when compared to their ‘sexier’ BCS opponents.

(Alternative title: K-State Is The Best Disrespected Team That Everyone Says Nobody Says Anything About)

A few weeks, ago K-State sat at 4-0 after going down to Norman and beating a very good Oklahoma team. It had suddenly became fashionable to start talking about the Wildcats again. Nobody wanted to say how good they were, but stories about Bill Snyder’s resurrection job popped up on every news outlet. There was no new reporting here – everyone was merely dusting off the same articles they wrote last year about how Snyder took the laughingstock of NCAA football and turned it into a national power after K-State cracked the top ten in the polls. Those articles written last year were merely rehashed from the prior year when everyone was curious as to how K-State would fair in Snyder’s second tenure. And those articles were copy-pasted from articles written when Snyder retired. I love reading about the genius of Bill Snyder as much as the next guy, but ESPN putting it on its front page makes it far from original reporting – it just means its a slow news day.

There’s a new popular news story surrounding the university now: everyone’s talking about the fact that no one is talking about K-State. Commentators are falling all over each other to mention how no one else is mentioning Kansas State in the national title picture. In doing so, K-State is damn near getting more mentions on Sportscenter than the Oregon Ducks.

This situation is an interesting example of the national psyche. It’s representative of how everyone loves rooting for the little guy and talking about how they think it’s awesome the little guy has a chance to compete with the big boys. It also demonstrates the fact that people still don’t actually respect K-State. Name the ranked teams Oregon has beaten. I’ll sit here patiently and wait. Yet which team receives more points in the polls? Now name the ranked teams Alabama has taken down. I’ll be waiting nearly as long. Maybe it’s crazy to believe K-State is better than Alabama. Sure, Alabama shellacked Michigan to kick off the season – but are we that impressed? They beat up on the BCS #22 team at a neutral site down south. K-State beat up on #19 West Virginia at West Virginia. Alabama doesn’t have another win over a top 25 opponent under its belt. K-State beat Oklahoma in Norman. Alabama it looking for a victory over a conference opponent with a winning record. K-State beat a team in Ames that’s knocking on the BCS top 25. Oregon, we should remember, has not played an opponent currently ranked.

It’s a crazy idea, but maybe, just maybe, you should have to prove your ranking at some point. Yes, the schedules for both Oregon and Alabama toughen up going forward. Good for them. When they manage to beat somebody, voting these teams ahead of K-State can be justified. But they’re being voted ahead of K-State today – it’s only the computers that put the Wildcats ahead of Oregon. Which just goes to show that everyone is still talking about K-State because they think it’s cute that the team from backwoods Kansas with a quirky coach and a bunch of cast-offs are trying really hard. They don’t actually respect what this team has done. The second half of the season should be fun, because this team is gonna just keep giving East Coast writers something to talk about.