UPSET WATCH: Stupidity 10 Usefulness 21

As a big time college football fan I try to keep updated on the scores as they happen. Its fun to know how games are unfolding, and if there is a good game I ought to pay attention to. Since I don't yet have the resources to build a 15 Plasma screen TV rec room with Games streaming in from all corners of the nation, I have to keep updated with more basic means. The score tracker at the bottom of many games is useful for this. However, even more useful is online updated scores, which you can search through at your leisure.

My website of choice is ESPN, and I think they do a pretty good job of quickly updating all the games. My only beef with the system is a tool which should be useful but usually is just annoying: The UPSET WATCH!

The upset is one of the joys of sport, and in no sport is it more enjoyed than College Football. Knowing this, at the top of the scores page ESPN tries to key you in to any games in progress which may be headed toward an upset. The intentions are great, the execution is lousy.

First, the Upset watch just gives you a score, but no indication of the time remaining or who has the ball or anything. This isn't so bad, as you can just search out the game on the page to get the details. Sadly, upon looking up the game you are likely to find that there is still plenty of time for the game to unfold, sometimes even 3 whole quarters.

My real beef with the UPSET WATCH is the games they choose to put on it. There are a number of examples:

• Putting a game where a definite favorite, say a top 10 team, is trailing in the first half, usually by only a few points. I've seen it where the score was 3-0 for the underdog in the first quarter and it suddenly warranted UPSET WATCH status. The final score was something like 45-3 for the favorite.
• Putting a game where the underdog is actually losing, but losing "close" in the late stages of the game. "Close" usually means less than 10 points, and often the underdog is at least a TD down.
  
• Showing a score of a game where two ranked teams are locked in a close battle. When the #9 team is in danger to the #11 team, that's not really a big upset, especially given the weird nature of rankings.
• Relying too much on early season rankings. Last week's Clemson vs Bama game is a good example. Clemson came in #9, Bama #21, but really those rankings weren't based on anything. Similarly, when a team with a low rank is in danger of losing to a good but unranked team, its not really that big a deal, especially early in the season.
  
• And the biggest problem I have with UPSET WATCH is that once a game is on there it stays on there, no matter how it plays out. Its sad to see UPSET WATCH and then read Favorite 35 Underdog 14, just because the score had been 14-14 at one point. After the favorite puts its foot down and takes control like this, its no longer an upset watch worthy situation.
  

If I had to guess, I'd say 90% of all the games on UPSET WATCH fall into these categories. I understand why this happens: they are trying to drum up interest in games which actually have no hook for viewers. But it makes your billion dollar website look lame when your UPSET WATCH flashes Florida 42, NW Central Sisters of the Poor 14.