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Keith Jackson was college football

TITLETOWN - Keith Jackson was one of a kind. When you heard his voice anywhere, you automatically thought college football like one of Pavlov’s dogs. He could be calling cliff diving in Acapulco on ABC's Wide World of Sports and you would be thinking about college football.

Jackson was the son of a dirt farmer who was from Roopville, GA near the Alabama state line. He was the only surviving child from a poor family. Like a lot of rural kids back then, he grew up listening to sports on the radio. After serving as a mechanic in the Marines, he attended Washington State on the G.I. Bill. He got his start in broadcasting doing the Cougars' games on the radio in 1952. He moved on to national television calling the biggest games from the most storied stadiums when ABC acquired the rights to NCAA football in 1966.

If Keith Jackson was calling the game, you knew it was a big one. He was known for this colorful expressions like "The Big Uglies", "The Big House" and "The Grand Daddy of Them All", but his most famous saying was "Whoa Nelly!". When he used it, you knew something big had happened and you hoped they would replay it in slow-motion, so you could see it again. Jackson did other sports for ABC over the years and he was the first play-by-play voice of Monday Night Football when it debuted in 1970, but college football was his wheelhouse.

“Whoa” was a common Anglo-Saxon command from the mid-1500s used to slow down a plow pulled by oxen, mules, or horses. “Nelly” was also a common name for a mule during this time which led to the two being used together as a command. The phrase was later used by American cowboys in the late 1800s to slow down their horses. The Roy Rogers Show, NBC's popular western television series from the 1950s, featured an old Jeep named "Nellybelle" that was driven by Roy's sidekick, Pat Brady. The Jeep had a mind of its own and would often take off driver-less with Pat running after it yelling, "Whoa Nelly!"

Jackson used "Whoa Nelly!" in most every game he ever called as an exclamation of surprise, or astonishment, when something unexpected happened. He was a big fan of Paul "Bear" Bryant and he loved doing Alabama games from Legion Field in Birmingham. Jackson's gift was two-fold. He made the game the most important part of the broadcast and he called the game without calling attention to himself. He passed away in 2018. College football will always miss Keith Jackson.

Keith Jackson's honorary BDFL team is known as the Roopville Mules. 

Jones is rising on the Pony Watch List

A few new wrinkles coming in 2021

TITLETOWN - The BDFL is all about improvement. 2020 brought about some challenges that have led to some changes in how undrafted players will move within the BDFL each week and how tied games will be broken in overtime moving forward and how vict'ries rewarded in such affairs.

The new WORM Rule

Change has come to the BDFL. Beginning with the 2021 season, the BDFL will institute a more liberal, open waiver wire policy, known as the WORM Rule. WORM is an acronym for Weekly One Roster Move. With the new WORM Rule, each team will be allowed one "drop/add" roster move per week for the first 12 weeks of the season. After Week 12 action, the SOL Rule will apply. The WORM Rule will operate on a first come, first serve basis with "game week" starting on Tuesday of each week during the season. If two, or more, teams request the same player in a week prior to Tuesday, the player will be awarded to the team with the "biggest need" as determined by The Commissioner of the BDFL, Iron Hand. The rule is designed to help teams in need, rather than used to stockpile, or hoard players. This rule will take the place of the older more traditional rules such as the RICKA Rule, the SICKA Rule, the Supplement Draft and the Waiver Wire Week.

New tie game tiebreaker criteria

The longest scoring play has served the BDFL well for 26 seasons in breaking a tied game, but this may not be the best way to determine a winner in these tied games. Therefore, the BDFL is instituting a new, unprecedented tiebreaker criteria to determine which team should get the vic'try in the event of a tied game. In order to declare the winner in a tied contest, the BDFL will go down the list of the six tiebreakers below, in order, until a winner is determined...

1. Most roster spots to score (5 > 4)

2. Most TDs scored

3. Longest TD scored

4. Longest scoring play

5. Most total roster points for the week

6. Flip of a coin

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