Prediction time!

They'll play the Peach Bowl and the Fiesta Bowl today, on New Year's Eve, which does not seem right because they'll play 'em the day after the Orange Bowl, which they played 48 hours before New Year's Day -- which isn't right either, but, oh, well. The bowl schedule hasn't made sense for 20 years or so now, and no sense carping about it.

("But you just did," you're saying now)

("And get to the point," you're also saying) 

Point is, the Peach and Fiesta -- aka, the two College Football Playoff semifinal games; aka, the only bowls that aren't just exhibitions anymore -- go off today, and so I suppose the Blob should make its predictions for said games. So let's get on with it, shall we?

* The Fiesta Bowl might be a better game than you think.

This is because everyone seems to think TCU is just a big old patsy that totally lucked into its 12-1 record, and won a bunch of games via miracle, besides, and lost to Kansas State in the Big 12 championship game besides that. And so Michigan, which made all of Columbus, Ohio, weep a month ago, will stomp the Horned Frogs into formless goo and win by, I don't know, 52-7 or something.

The Blob doesn't think so.

The Blob thinks the TCUs will have their backs up after a month of hearing they're just a bunch of imposters who got into the CFP with a fake ID. And their quarterback, Max Duggan, is not the laydown type. 

So ... 

Michigan wins. But they'll have to fight for it, at least for awhile. Call it 31-20.

* The Peach Bowl might be a better game than you think.

And, yes, the Blob realizes it just said that about the Fiesta Bowl, but the same applies to the Peach. Everyone figures Georgia is so much better than any of the other three teams they'll win both CFP games by 30, but maybe not. Maybe the Bulldogs will prove to be human beings with human foibles after all.

Like, for instance, taking an opponent juuuust a touch lightly.

Hard as it is to imagine Ohio State ever being overlooked by anyone -- especially in a playoff game -- it seems entirely unlikely the Georgia kids will simply forget about the spanking the Buckeyes took from Michigan. The last impression is always the clearest impression, after all. And the last impression of Ohio State is the Buckeyes getting bulldozed all over Ohio Stadium by the Wolverines.

They got trucked, is what happened. And now here comes a tank after them.

And yet ...

And yet, the Buckeyes still have C.J. Stroud. They still have Marvin Harrison Jr. and Emeka Egbuka and Julian Fleming and a bunch of other guys running flight patterns. And from Stroud right down to the last guy on the bench, they've all been doing a slow burn for a solid month.

So, again: Georgia wins. But not by 30.

Call it 38-30.

The ridicule portion of this post is now open.