Now that the storm has passed, we can safely return to the residual effects of Hurricane Irma.
Before we do, the usual disclaimer:
On the list of concerns, college football doesn't mean diddly squat. I realized that during a dark and stormy Sunday night when a tree snapped and took out part of my back porch.
That's nothing compared to a guy down the street. The lift station flooded and he has sewage coming out of the shower.
And that's nothing compared to what Irma has wreaked on millions of people. So please feel free to scream "Who gives a (bleep) about Florida-Tennessee?!?" if your living room is currently a swimming pool.
That said, getting back to trivial matters like football is a relief in itself for a lot of people. The trivial bad news is that Irma is going to damage every team in Florida.
By the time they tee it up again on Sept. 23, FSU, UCF and Miami will have gone three weeks without a game. Florida will have gone two weeks when it plays Tennessee this Saturday, but the bye week was hardly a typical bye week.
Nothing is typical here. It would be nice to say teams will use it as a rallying point and perform better than normal.
It's far more likely they'll play worse than normal, and that's due to a basic rule of nature. The more you do something, the better you become.
The less you do something, the more tackles you're going to miss, assignments you're going to blow and interceptions you're going to throw.
That last one is especially true if the guy throwing passes was playing for Glades Central High last year.
Say hello to FSU's James Blackman, who was supposed to spend the season observing Deondre Francois. Then Francois was carted off late in the Seminoles' 24-7 loss to Alabama, and FSU's lack of quarterback depth went from theoretical to season-threatening.
Jimbo Fisher has never started a true freshman quarterback. The good news for FSU was Irma also postponed this week's game against Miami, so Blackman's first test will be against NC State.
He'll have plenty of time running the first-team offense by then. But Blackman getting a few dozen snaps against Louisiana-Monroe would have Fisher sleeping much better these days.
After the manhandling by Michigan, Jim McElwain would have played Northern Colorado in a rainy Publix parking lot last week if UF would have let him. Now the offense will begin SEC play in total disarray.
UCF and Miami will have three weeks to cool off after hot starts against overmatched teams. Saturday's game against Georgia Tech would have been the marquee attraction of UCF's season.
But what are you going to do when the national guard is using your stadium and surrounding facilities as a staging area for up to 1,000 guard members and 250 vehicles?
One thing you're not going to do is complain or put up with nitwits who do.
CBS analyst Rick Neuheisel termed Miami's cancellation of last week's game at Arkansas State "suspicious." That prompted a quick Twitter retort from Mark Richt.
"Very sad to read some of the comments of some football fans and some members of the media believing we had some other motive! U Family!!"
Being from California, Neuheisel may not appreciate how a monster hurricane might worry players and coaches who live in its path.
But forget the loss of games. Miami hasn't even practiced since last Tuesday and it hasn't been much better at the other schools.
Now they're figuring out how to handle a September reboot and looking at 10 or 11 consecutive weeks of games afterward.
From a football standpoint, that stinks.
But as the guy down the street can attest, things could stink a lot worse.
Sports on 09/14/2017