It’s time again for the Big Orange Roundtable. It’s our week to host, and while we seriously considered blowing this off since the answers to our questions will immediately be the best, negating any reason for others to throw in their two cents, we decided to be troopers and stick it out.

Also, in breaking with tradition, we’re actually going to pick a winner for this week’s Q/A session. Snarky answers are better answers. Will we win? Probably.

Without further delay are this week’s questions and our insanely awesome answers.

1. Knock on wood before answering this question, but let’s assume that Jonathan Crompton goes out with a season ending injury in the 1st half of the first game of the season. Should we just pack it up and wait until next season, or is there a glimmer of hope in any of the young backups?

First off, if we packed it up and went home until next season, would that mean that Bama wouldn’t get credit for playing us? Would that sort of be like a tie? If so, then that idea is starting to have some merit. But otherwise, there’s not been a lot of good reports coming out about the two backups, BJ Coleman and Nick Stephens. The most likely scenario is that both QBs will get a shot, but this system might be too complex to not give one guy 100% of the snaps with the first team, and that could ultimately be a weakness.

However, QB is only one position on a team of 22, so don’t look for the season to fall apart so easily. If the injury were to happen, we might have to settle for an at-large BCS bid instead of winning that national championship this year.

2. Does Erik Ainge have a future in the NFL?

Sure, but it involves sitting on a lot of benches. A LOT… of benches. He was good at Tennessee, but I don’t see him getting a start anywhere. It’s sad, but it’s the reality of the NFL. One thing that got lost in the wash of Favre going to the Jets and Pennington being released is that Ainge’s number 10 is now available. So at least he’ll have that.

3. Why in the hell did you decide to blog about Tennessee football? Aren’t there already enough Tennessee blogs?

Actually, we started this blog not to throw out more stats (Joel does a great job of that at Rocky Top Talk, and there’s no way we can compete with his in depth look at Tennessee football), but to offer a fun and sometimes sarcastic perspective at Tennessee athletics. We don’t expect this to make us any money (hence you’ll notice the lack of ads on this site), we just want to share our thoughts with others and hopefully make each day just a little better. And when you say we’re awesome, it feeds our egoes just a little bit; this is necessary due to our insanely large probably about average ridiculously small microscopic manhoods. Um, not that we’ve compared. Or anything.

4. If you could be one player in one game in Tennessee history, which player and which game would you pick? Why?

I didn’t know it would be hard answering my own questions, but with a history as steeped as Tennessee’s, there’s too many great games to want to have been a part of. However, I have to go with being Peyton Manning in the 1995 game against Alabama. Tennessee hadn’t beaten the Tide since 1986, and Peyton started a streak of 7 straight wins against them. It really put Peyton on the map and led to a resurgence of Tennessee dominance.

5. Which is your favorite rivalry and why? (Not necessarily limited to Tennessee teams)

I really want to say Tennessee/Alabama, but the fact is, I expect Tennessee to win that game, and it’s not as fun when that happens. I have to pick Tennessee/Florida. In recent years, Tim Tebow has been a media darling (see numerous man crushes from GVX and SI) and is ultimately a guy you want to hate, but just can’t figure out how. And over the last 2 decades, Tennessee has had too much trouble beating them, and every meeting has been suspenseful and fun.

Bonus: Who will win the national title this year? And by how many points will Tennessee win? (See what we did there?) Tennessee over Ohio State, 35-3 (OSU will get a mercy field goal at the waning seconds of the 4th quarter)

Head on over to these blogs to see answers which are almost as good as these:

• Loser With Socks
• 3rd Saturday in Blogtober
• Your mom fornicated with Wilt Chamberlain
• Gate 21
• Rocky Top Talk
• SouthEastern Sports Blog
• The View from the Hill
• Moondog Sports