This post is sponsored by EA Sports NCAA Football 2011.

Below is a message form the fine, fine folks at EA Sports, who would greatly appreciate it if you would consider buying their college football video game. Available in stores today!

When you go to a particular school or grow up around college football, you are more than just a fan. It’s who you are. We thought we could leverage this pride in your roots and show that "where you come from" is more than just a statement about geography. By positioning NCAA Football 11 as a game that understands this pride and is authentic to these traditions, the takeaway should be that anything that is in college football is in NCAA Football 11.

And this doesn’t just include game play (though that’s a huge part of it). It’s rivals and mascots; it’s legends and stories. It’s those things that are at the very fabric of the game itself. Of course the game is great this year as well. With authentic entrances, mascots and specific offenses for each team, the term "where I come from" takes on a much larger meaning. While playing NCAA Football 11 is ultimately a great sports sim, it should also give you a sense of the pride and emotion one has for being a fan of a team they will never not be a part of.

This post is sponsored by EA Sports NCAA Football 2011.

It's difficult to lay out expectations when heading into the first season of a head coach who is taking over a program that just suffered through one of the most disappointing stretches in its history.

Charlie Strong has done just about everything possible to rejuvenate the program and the fan base during the offseason, but those positive vibes make it easy to overlook the fact that - with the exception of Jordan Campbell - the players he's signed or brought in are all either freshmen or high school seniors-to-be. While the future appears promising, this is still going to be the most talent-depleted U of L football roster in recent memory.

That said, here are seven things I expect from the Louisville football team in 2010:

1. A drastic increase in effort/excitement

Even more so than ratio of wins-to-losses, the most disappointing aspect of the Steve Kragthorpe era, to me, was the fact that I always felt like I cared more than 75% of the players on the field and the coaches on the sidelines. Three years, three very difficult teams to support.

I'll be extremely disappointed if the product on the field in 2010 is anything less than something every supporter of U of L sports feels like they can be behind wholeheartedly.

2. A drastic increase in competency

No more 12 (or 13, or 6) men in the huddle penalties, no more using timeouts before extra points, no more blind stares and mass confusion on the sidelines, no more broken plays, no more completely unchecked receivers, no more wondering if the team isn't practicing between games.

3. Keeping the Kentucky game competitive

This might be the worst UK team since Petrino's second season at U of L, which makes the fact that we can't make winning the game an expectation (or guarantee) that much harder to swallow. But things are the way they are, and beating Kentucky for the first time in four years would, sadly, be a welcome surprise.

It's unfair for any of us to expect or demand victory on Sept. 4, but I don't think keeping the game interesting and competitive is too much to ask.

4. No more hollow cliches

I'd say "play our balls off" was a promising start.

5. Win the games you're favored to win

It probably won't happen often, but it'd be nice to meet the expectation when it does.

6. Put the best players on the field

No more ridiculous attempts to "make a statement" or prove your coaching "genius." It's not difficult to discern which guys are and aren't getting the job done on the field. Keep the guys who are out there.

7. Provide hope for the future

This goes hand-in-hand with the previous six, but it's the most obvious and important expectation of the season ahead. No one is hoping for double-digit wins, but they are looking for signs that those days can be reached again in the somewhat near future. We want to see a staff that has it together, players that care, offensive and defensive schemes that can have success and a program poised to re-attain its former status as one of the most exciting in the country.

This post is sponsored by EA Sports NCAA Football 2011.

Today's EA Sports topic is favorite players. There's really no mystery as far as who Card Chronicle's all-time favorite football Cardinal is, but this obvious answer begs a more complicated question: Who is the gold-footed godsend's favorite U of L gridiron hero?

Ladies and gentlemen, your favorite Lou Groza award winner and my favorite Chronicloid: MR. ARTHUR M. (maybe his middle initial, maybe not) CARMODY...

One of the beauties of college football that I love and at the same time hate is that you only have four years, and in some instances three years, to enjoy the talent that you see on the field. Every game is magnified that much more and the memories of those games stick that much longer. When the G.O.A.T. (Greatest of All Time) blogger himself Mike Rutherford asked if I would possibly make my first guest blog appearance on Card Chronicle, I said absolutely, because just like with Bobby Petrino or Charlie Strong, when Mike Rutherford asks you to do something, you don’t say no. 

Today’s EA Sports series is all-time favorite players. I spent most of my day at work going over this topic with my colleague Jonathan Boudreaux (a great south Louisiana name if there ever was one). I threw out some names to him and he did what all Louisiana football fans do when put in this situation: immediately compare them with past LSU football players. While in debate, I realized that I couldn’t name my favorite players because, with this being the best Cardinal blog out there, I was pretty sure nobody wanted to read about why I rooted so hard for Ron Powlus and Derrick Mayes for Notre Dame back in the mid-'90s. That’s a completely different story for later. Instead, I decided to tell you about my favorite Cardinal teammate from my 2004-2007 career.

With apologies to Dane Mattingly, Rod Council, Stefan Lefors, Adam McCauley, Justin Deeley, the entire 2005 offensive line, Elvis Dumervil, Montrell Jones, Trent Guy, and my college roommate Brian Brohm (sorry Brian, I could devote a whole page to you if Mike would let me), my all-time favorite is a guy that not only made many great memories for Cardinal fans, but was on the field helping me make many of my own. That guy would be none other than Harry Douglas IV. 

 

Everyone knows Harry as one of the best receivers in Louisville football history. I am going to talk about Harry Douglas, my holder. I first met Harry and his family in August of 2003 when, as freshmen, we reported to the Bettie Johnson Hall. Harry was asking every guy what position they played and was already talking trash about his skills on the field. When he got to me the first thing he said was: "small white guy, you got to be a kicker, right?" I went in for the white guy handshake and he immediately stopped me and told me I had to give him a little "dap" which would be a big part of our future relationship. 

In the summer of 2005 Coach Petrino tried every possible holder to replace Stefan Lefors and, against my wishes (like I really had any opinion), he stuck me with Harry and said make it work. During two-a-days, I had a few practices where I was struggling badly and couldn’t quite figure out why. One night at dinner after practice, Harry grabbed me aside and said he had figured out why I was missing. It was because there was no "dap" before I took my approach. We came up with a quick little handshake that would be performed before every kick. The rest, as they say, is history. 

Harry was one of the hardest working guys I played with. He was constantly working on his craft, trying to get stronger, and working his way into one of the best receivers in the country. No matter how tired he was after summer workouts or in the bitter cold of winter, he would always stay after if I needed him to hold some kicks for me. He would complain about it for a little while, but nevertheless he would stay as long as I needed him. He also would always have a comment on any big field goal I attempted from my sophomore to senior year. After winning the 2006 Lou Groza Award he was one of the first guys that I called to thank and the first words out his mouth were, "hey man, I am real proud of you and all, but why didn’t you mention me on national T.V.? That is pretty messed up, Art." 

He was a huge part of my football career at Louisville, and before and after every season I would take him and my snapper out for a steak dinner to thank them for all of their hard work. He was also the only guy I knew that would want to go to Red Lobster for a steak. I am pretty sure he was trying to flirt with one of the waitresses that worked there but I have no proof. After the 2007 season he went off to train for the combine and I didn’t get a chance to take him for that steak dinner. I owe you that steak dinner Harry, and thanks for being my all-time favorite Cardinal.  

This post is sponsored by EA Sports NCAA Football 2011.

This is the kind of post where we're going to struggle. 

As you might expect, a basketball school which has tasted the vast majority of its gridiron success in the past 20 years isn't exactly drenched with tailgating traditions. We have the Card March, we have the party train and we the shenanigans of the student lot, but a fall road trip to Columbus or Athens or any other place of similar ilk reveals just how different the world outside PJCS and the world of big-time tailgating are. 

My personal tailgating traditions are a sad shadow of U of L's. I had never owned season tickets up until about a month ago, and therefore most of my pregame rituals were based on the person or people who were taking me to the game. 

I suppose my biggest contribution to tailgating is a how to (tailgate) speech I gave my junior year of college which served as the (unwanted) catalyst for my selection to the university speech contest finals. The bulk of the speech escapes me, but I do remember comparing myself to Einstein and Jordan, and I remember a rule about not being able to drink more beers than the total number of losses between the two teams playing after the halfway point of the season. 

I like to drink beer (but if it's a big game I'm cutting myself off at least an hour before kickoff to avoid any game time spent in football's worst bathrooms), I like to eat food, I like to throw the football if there's one around and I'm a pretty solid cornhole player. Basically, I'm the most boring tailgater in college football. 

Pick me up in the comments section. Make up a story if you have to. 

You'll never be able to convince me that there has been a better Louisville football squad than the '04 one that went 11-1 and beat an undefeated Boise State team in the Liberty Bowl (handing the Broncos their first loss in the postseason is, we've found out since then, a rather tall task).

However, when the topic is favorite teams, my conversation begins and ends with the 2006 Orange Bowl champions.

This was the team that officially took Louisville football from a fall distraction to the biggest show in town and made every Saturday (or Thursday) feel like an NCAA Tournament game. This was a team that had more hype than any other in program history, that was ranked third in the country with three weeks left in the season (how much does that blow your mind right now?) and that ultimately played in and won the first BCS bowl game in Cardinal football history.

The team electrified and captured the city of Louisville in a way many thought could never happen, and achieved a status that Charlie Strong and company are now simply attempting to regain.

Here's part of what I wrote about the team's effect on the Derby City a week and-a-half after the enormous victory over Miami:

The city of Louisville has committed adultery.

Surely you noticed and simply looked the other way, but while the wormy apple of marriage still survives, the denial must cease.

The infidelity can be traced directly to the persistent advances of a fiery young flame that plays it's games on a surface that isn't bouncy and with a ball that isn't round.

'Tis the same temptress that caught our eye for the first time a decade and a half ago.

It was something new, it was bold, and it felt like the very thing we'd been missing all our lives. The innocent, early courting days seemed to have gone so well, and yet she rarely called over the next several years. And then even when she did the conversations seemed a bit forced, certainly nothing was said to make us entertain thoughts of leaving a comfortable relationship founded on decades of trust.

She clawed back into our lives near the turn of the century, only this time it appeared she'd reinvented herself. She was edgier, sexier and her once starry eyes now held the undeniable hungry glare of desire. With the new look came new problems, she was unreliable and overly outrageous. Certainly nothing worthy of commitment.

And then she almost had us for good two years ago. She'd shown us she could change, that she was ready to devote everything she had to making us happy. But it was a minor slip up, just for a brief second, that was enough to keep us from falling head over heels.

And now we've finally bitten. The total package is here, the flash of the Doctors of Dunk, the speed and the spirit of Secretariat, and the fight and resiliency of Muhammad Ali. We've taken our hearts and we've moved them from midcourt to the 50-yard-line.

The team took that momentum and ran with it, reeling off eight straight victories - including the "end-game" blackout victory over West Virginia - before the dream died in Piscataway at the hands of an ill-advised haircut.

Still, the team won the Big East and earned a New Year's trip to Miami, a fitting reward for the elite band of U of L fans who had suffered through decades of many mediocre Cardinal teams (and many more less-than-mediocre Cardinal teams) with the hope that at some point a season like this would come along.

It was a hell of a ride, and if we'd known what was in store for us next we probably would have enjoyed it a little bit more.

 This post is sponsored by EA Sports NCAA Football 2011.

The following tale is not exciting or particularly interesting. Please read on.

My earliest memories aren't of playground shenanigans, trips to friends' house or preschool nerves, they're of winter nights and afternoons spent in front of the television watching basketball and asking my father if the good guys were wearing red or white this time.

I wasn't well versed on the rules of the game, I couldn't name a player, but I knew that I cared...a lot.

My father was and still is a basketball man. He played on some outstanding teams at Male High and later on some OK teams at the now defunct Kentucky Southern College. As far as fandom is concerned, he was never a strong blue or red lean until he followed the 1983-1984 Kentucky basketball team for a Season on the Brink- esque book about the Wildcats that was backed by the Courier-Journal. I was born the same year the book was published and my "which ones are the good guys" questions were never met with a hint of hesitation by the old man.

My passion for Louisville sports grew along with my body...until 6th grade when my body stopped growing (Seriosuly. Same Size. It sucks. )...at that point my passion started growing without my body. I spent free periods in grade school writing fake news stories about Cardinal sports (and, not coincidentaly, getting beat-up during recess), I wore long-sleeve shirts cut off at the stomach for my flag football games so I could look like Aaron Harris and I wore red U of L garb to school on game days. The last one isn't exciting or unusual, but it's important and thus worth noting (11-year-old Chronicloids, stand up).

I left the state for college for a couple of years before returning home with a 700-day hangover and a handful of average to slightly-above-average reports cards (earmuffs, 11-year-old Chronicloids). I was 21-years-old, I was living at home, I was bored and I had a computer. The result of this lethal combination was a blog about Louisville sports that eventually became Card Chronicle.

Over the past four years, CC has served as a personal outlet, a sanctuary and a place to watch the game with friends, all at the same time. It's made me both a more enthusastic fan and, I think, a better fan.

I'm 25-years-old and when the topic of fondest memories is introduced, a handful of my first thoughts are always days, moments or events that involve Louisville sports. It sounds silly, and in the grand scheme of things it is silly, but if you're reading this you probably understand. Louisville is my city, the Louisville Cardinals are my team, and I will love both immelsely until the day I die.