As Oregon prepares for its first game of the season against Washington, I think it’s necessary that we put the Huskies plight into historical perspective. They enter 2008 seeking (yeah, I said seeking) their 5th consecutive losing season and sixth consecutive non-winning season. Even Stanford is saying, “at least we’re not the Huskies.” How bad is it? See for yourself. Special thanks to jhowell.net for having an unmatched database of information. I’m assuming it’s all accurate and since this is a blog, “assuming” is all that matters.

• Last losing season prior to the current run: 1976
• Last consecutive losing seasons: 1973-74
• Years it took to achieve 4 losing seasons before 2004-07: 35
• Since 1916, percentage of overall losing seasons the 2004-07 run has accounted for: 17.39%
• Previous long for consecutive losing seasons: 3, 1947-49
• Number of teams not named Oregon State to ever go an entire Pac-10 season (since 1978) without a conference win: 3 – Washington State in 1998, Cal in 2001 and Washington in 2004
  Note: Oregon State is an entirely different story with 7 such seasons. I finally understand why grown men cried in 1999 when they went 7-6.
• Until 2003 when no Huskies were selected, last season that Washington didn’t have a player drafted to the NFL: 1960
• Last time Washington lost 4 consecutive games to Oregon: 1928-31.
• Last time Washington lost 5 consecutive games to Oregon: 2004-August 31, 2008 (call me clairvoyant)
• Number of times Kenny Wheaton’s interception in 1994 has been played on jumbotrons, laptops, desktops, ringtones, radio and television: 6,263,817,485 (It took exhaustive research, but this is an exact number)
• Ratio of obnoxious Husky fans to pleasant ones from 1977-2002: 234,089/.002
• Ratio of obnoxious Husky fans to pleasant ones from 2003-present: Has anyone seen a Husky fan recently?

You can’t have a blog, run a website, post in forums or basically breathe oxygen without at some point sitting down and doing your pre-season predictions. As such, I might as well do mine. But before I get to that, I’d like to remind you that I did get 1 out of 10 exactly right in 2007 so you can pretty much go straight to Vegas (or your favorite off-shore betting website, ahem) with the following:

1. USC
What can I say, I like to live dangerously. If anyone picks any other team here, they should apply for a job on ESPN. I’m not saying the network employs an overwhelming number of people who say stuff they don’t mean for attention, it’s just…no, that’s exactly what I’m saying. Just pick USC and get on with it.

2. Oregon
“Hey, homer! Nice pick!” Thank you, whoever just said that. I do think it’s a nice pick. Look, tell me which team in the Pac-10 you feel absolutely, positively comfortable declaring is the second best team behind USC. Arizona State? Cal? Oregon State? Given this uncertainty I feel, I’m going with the homer pick. The secondary has three sure-fire NFL guys starting and the offense is a quarterback away from being dominant again. They have five guys to choose from, so whoever becomes the starter has to be great. I mean, that’s how the lottery works – you buy five tickets instead of one and your chances of winning are 500% better. It’s just math, people.

3. Arizona State
I’m just not sold on ASU as a great team. Everyone got all excited over their 8-0 start last year, but only one of those 8 teams finished with a winning record in their respective conference. And that one team – Oregon State – is notoriously bad in September. Eventually, they lost easily to Oregon, USC and Texas. Maybe year two of the Dennis Erickson experiment, otherwise known as the “time to look for a new job phase,” will see them elevate to another level but I don’t think so.

4. Oregon State
Yeah, I said it. Oregon State. I was going to do this whole hate rivalry thing and put them last, but then I realized they’re not actually that hated. Hey, don’t blame me. Ted Miller wrote it. Or should I say, didn’t write it. Do I actually believe Oregon State is the fourth best team in the conference? No, not really, but they have been consistently finishing in the top half of the conference lately, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to have to listen to my dad bitch about getting no respect.

5. Cal
I’m giving the Bears the benefit of the doubt here, simply because they’ve earned it under Jeff Tedford. Last year is an anomaly in his tenure and you have to imagine they will bounce back. Plus, when previewing the Oregon-Cal game last year, I learned that Jack Bauer got his degree at Berkeley. There’s no way you bet against Jack Bauer, especially when he hasn’t saved the world in two years.

6. UCLA
Yep, it’s Slick Rick, Norm Chow and Dwayne Washington, the three greatest coaches that ever lived, the saviors of Westwood, the end of the USC dynasty. Yep, it’s all of that. I need to stop listening to LA radio.

7. Arizona
Not going to do it – not this year. Picking Arizona to have a good season is like waiting for Kevin Costner to make another good movie. Whoops, I’m not supposed to say that about Oregon’s newest baseball fan. Seriously, if your leader is capable of getting a 15 yard penalty that proved costly in a two point loss to New Mexico, you might have a volatile, irritable, whiny, obnoxious, annoying, pouting, crying Stoops brother for a head coach.

8. Stanford
Three wins last year was the first real miracle we’ve seen since baby Jesus. That stunt they pulled at USC was unspeakable. I still don’t know much about them, can’t name a player other than Tavita Pritchard, and still have never met a Stanford football fan, but dammit, they are better than anything in the state of Washington.

9. Washington
I continue to be saddened by the demise of this program. I may be the only Duck fan to say that, but football was just more fun when they mattered. Saint Locker of the Seattleites is going to try his hardest to lead them back, but unfortunately, he still doesn’t know how to throw a football – truly unfortunate when he’s your quarterback.

10. Washington State
Alphabetically and for lack of talent, the Cougars come in last. There is literally nothing to be excited about with this team and I’m as sure that they will finish last as I am that you have no idea who Paul Wulff is.

Note: The FOTB makes her debut with picks sometime this week.