Greetings, lady and gentlemen.  Sorry for the non-Samardzija related content over the last fortnight, but it was a busy few weeks, with a wedding, The Dark Knight and my move down to DC to start the real world.  (The actual real world, not The Real World: DC.  I’m not sure if that would be more or less fun than what I’m doing now.)  I’m working weird hours at my job and won’t be writing there, so it’ll be somewhat hit or miss for the foreseeable future, with some weekends where I’m not free to write but some weekdays where I am.  Thanks to the scheduled post application that shouldn’t be too much of a challenge for pre-arranged content (we’ll be resuming the "Profiles In Fear" series to get us through August and to San Diego State), but breaking news might be a bit trickier.  For that, I’m trying to expand the staff here a bit, tapping into some friends who are informed Irish fans and quality writers.  Barcus already has a few nice posts up below, and hopefully that’s just the start, with business really picking up once September rolls around

But for now, let’s hit on a few things that have come across the radar over the last few days.

In 2010, Notre Dame will be taking on the Utah Utes in a one-and-done match-up in mid-November.  Some Irish fans aren’t happy, but as far as plugging holes in the schedule in a relatively short-term manner (a scant two years away), you can’t do much better than the crew from Salt Lake City.  After a rough start to the 21^st century, the Utes have been just as good if not better than the Irish, a model of ass-kicking consistency.  They’re currently on a five game bowl winning streak and have a BCS victory on their resume, a number one pick in the NFL draft an undefeated season that should have resulted in a share of a national championship (2004 was not the best year for the BCS).  They also ran the sweetest f*ckest play I’d ever seen in their humiliation of Pitt, which is thankfully available on YouTube.

I fully support the addition of Utah to the schedule, and for those of you with a Midwest Bias, you can check them out in action on opening weekend while the Irish are still resting (or make that torturing all of us) at home: They open up the season in Ann Arbor in a straight-up spread off, putting Brian Johnson and the Kyle Whittingham-guided, Urban Meyer-created version against whatever Rich Rodriguez has cobbled together with snake oil, rubber cement, Carlos Brown and shiny new Adidas jerseys.  Unless there is a definite drop-off in the quality of Utes football over the next two seasons – and Notre Dame improves dramatically like we all hope they will - the November 13, 2010, match-up should be one between two very capable teams.

The rest of the Irish weekend at Wrigley was rather hit or miss, as The Shark picked up Career Save Number One on Sunday, but not before Charlie Weis got booed singing the Seventh Inning Stretch on Saturday.  How often do you think Weis thinks back to the halcyon days of the 2005 season and the first two games of 2006, before Prescott Burgess ran back a Brady Quinn interception and Irish football went straight to hell?  He was generally regarded as a genius and some sort of savior, and now he’s locked onto the hot seat, with expectations ranging between seven and ten games depending on the amount of medication the Irish fan you’re talking to is taking.  I still don’t think the booing was that bad, plus Samardzija was awesome on Sunday, so I think the weekend definitely comes out as an overall plus.  The Shark also finished up the game last night, allowing an insignificant run in the ninth inning.  Lou Piniella also said he’ll be in the running for the closer position as long as Kerry Wood is missing time with blister issues.

As we approach the simmering month of August, my mind has begun drifting towards the BlogPoll, and who in the world I’m going to be filling in for the preseason top ten.  As you may or may not know, my annual system is to do the preseason rankings based on where I think everyone will end up at the end of the year, taking into account schedule, talent and anything else that might pop into my head.  That’s a one week-only plan, however, as we then shift into heavy resume ranking, which is the only smart way to do rankings, other than the fact things can look pretty silly until you get to October and sample sizes start to enlarge.

I’m pretty comfortable with my top three (Florida, Southern Cal and Ohio State in some order), and I like Georgia despite their murderous schedule (at LSU, Auburn and the Ol’ Ball Coach along with the Cocktail Party).  Oklahoma intrigues me, but I saw that highly-touted defense skewered one too many times towards the end of the season, by land (West Virginia) and by air (Texas Tech) to really be comfortable, especially when you consider that Sam Bradford will probably be regressing and they’ll have to survive the Horns, Red Raiders and most likely a capable team in the Big XII Championship game.  I’ll trust Clemson to live up to preseason hype three days after never, and Gary Pinkel’s Missouri squad may be a one-year wonder, although it seems silly to bet against Chase Daniels after a season of evidence overwhelmingly in his favor.

The Big East has a couple interesting prospects in West Virginia and South Florida, but I’m wary of both for different reasons.  The Mountaineers had the coaching change and lose anti-big game performer Steve Slaton to the draft, but more importantly, they lose a lot of guys who just reeked of Country Road, including top receiver-by-a-mile Darius Reynaud, folk hero Owen Schmitt and sackmaster Johnny Dingle.  South Florida brings a lot of starters back, including Heisman hopeful Matt Grothe, but their drunken stumble down the stretch last year, culminating in that hazy New Years Eve blowout loss to Oregon causes me to pause.

There are a couple of dark horses I could consider (Texas Tech getting warmed up on an easy schedule and then torching the Big XII, LSU on some odd "Heart of a Mythical, Sort-of, Acknowledged-By-No-One Champion" run, Virginia Tech), but I just don’t know.  So as we approach August, loyal readers, what does your top ten look like?  Any strong arguments for or against a team others may consider a lock?  Check out the general consensus here and react.

I’m not sure if you caught the Outside The Lines expose/witch hunt of the Penn State program this weekend, but it was pretty entertaining if not entirely fair.  The Nittany Lion program is already making a few changes, but there’s probably some sort of clock in the locker room counting down to the next apartment invasion, street fight or oddly violent prank.  Perhaps more embarrassing than all of these antics for Penn State?  How about their 2009 non-conference schedule, which consists of Syracuse, Temple, Eastern Illinois and Eastern Michigan.  I know the Alabama series starts up in 2010, but I don’t think you have to start conserving energy that early.