Anchor Drop, July 4, 2022: 54 Days to Kickoff

Good morning.

Optional Musical Accompaniment

We are now 54 days away from Vanderbilt football’s August 27 season opener at Hawaii. There is no 54 on the roster at the present time.

It’s the Fourth of July, which means there isn’t a ton of news — though here’s USC site Trojans Wire arguing that the Pac-12 should try to add Vanderbilt. Yeah, I, too, admit to being interested in the logic of why Vanderbilt would give up SEC money to have its games broadcast on a channel no one gets:

The SEC isn’t going to expand to 20 teams and search for bigger football-centric schools without shedding some baggage. Kliavkoff could convincingly say to Vanderbilt administrators that while SEC TV money is great, they’re going to get kicked to the curb fairly soon.

Oh. Oh, okay.

See, this logic only works if the SEC is going to stay at 16. If the SEC is going to expand to 20, well, there aren’t actually that many schools that are going to move the needle enough to make it worth kicking Vanderbilt out. There’s Clemson and Florida State and Miami and, uh, holy shit, are they really going to kick us out so they can add Oklahoma State? Think this through, guys.

Meantime, here’s College Football News’s Vanderbilt preview. (Not gonna lie, I used to read that site all the time.)

Anyway, have a good Fourth everyone. Don’t do anything stupid.

Sports on TV

All times Central.

• 7:00 AM: Tennis: Wimbledon (ESPN)
• 3:10 PM: MLB: Royals at Astros (ESPN+)

(Ed. note: This is it? On July 4? What the hell did Rob Manfred do?)

Scoreboard

MLB: Royals 7, Tigers 4 ... Marlins 7, Nationals 4 ... Brewers 2, Pirates 0 ... Rays 7, Blue Jays 3 ... Reds 4, Braves 3 ... Guardians 2, Yankees 0 ... Mets 4, Rangers 1 ... Astros 4, Angels 2 ... Orioles 3, Twins 1 ... Red Sox 4, Cubs 2 ... Rockies 6, Diamondbacks 5 ... White Sox 13, Giants 4 ... Mariners 2, A’s 1 ... Padres 4, Dodgers 2 ... Phillies 4, Cardinals 0.