TAKES. FOURTH EDITION. VOLUME FIVE.

I am about to blister your fanny with a take so hot you won't be able to sit down for weeks. You  might not be able to sit down for MONTHS. This take is seven inches from the midday sun. This take is hotter than a pawn shop pistol. This take is hotter than two rats consummating their marriage inside of a wool sock. Don't touch this take - you'll get burned.

- Maybe we all suck and the SEC is horrible. Hell yeah, I said it. What if not one team from the SEC makes the College Football Playoff? Maybe "suck" is harsh.

Okay. What if we all beat each other twice and no SEC team makes the College Football Playoff? On Saturday, Alabama looked like the most dominant team in the conference, but are you absolutely convinced they won't lose another game? I'm not. Texas A&M can beat them. LSU can beat them. Florida or Georgia can beat them in the SEC Championship Game. Maybe Alabama runs the table, but it looks really, really unlikely.

So...who? LSU? Texas A&M? Florida? Do you believe that any of those teams survives the rest of this season with less than two losses? When none of them have played Alabama? Or each other?

It's not that the conference isn't as good, it's that the conference has more parity. And we knew that was coming. We knew that was coming when the Nick Saban hire demanded that everyone else in the league hire the best of the best. Except Georgia, which is totally happy with winning nine games every year.

Someone has to lose every week. If The Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin share a bill, one of them has to open the show. Steve Spurrier is one of the greatest coaches in the history of the greatest conference in the land and his team sucks.

We all brought this on ourselves. We petted the rabbit and petted the rabbit and petted the rabbit and stroked its little fuzzy ears and now the rabbit is dead. Are you happy, Lenny? Because this is only fun for Alabama fans right now. And, again, you can't convince me that even the mighty Tide, which looked better than anyone in the country on  Saturday, will win out.

- But about that San Jose State game. I know that it seems foolish, ungrateful, or plain stubborn to be disappointed in a victory. But there just isn't much to be optimistic about. Now that the cards are on the table, we know that any realistic fan can not expect to win more than six games.

Maybe Auburn has miracles left in them. But the biggest homer among you must know that what happened at the end of the 2013 season doesn't happen. It doesn't happen once, let alone twice.

Auburn isn't going to be able to run the ball 50-60 times every game and throw ten. Its defense can't continue to get torched on the ground by players at schools like Jacksonville State and San Jose State if it hopes to compete with schools like Alabama and Georgia.

I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. This shouldn't be difficult to understand.

So as I contemplated what to write in this space, I just thought: "NEAT."

i don't think Gus Malzahn has forgotten how to run an offense. And I don't think everyone's head should roll. But I know it doesn't look right. So what of it? Maybe we can say that something isn't right, but also not jump to the other extreme. There was a time before 24-hour sports takes when superlatives weren't necessary. You're probably too young to remember it.

Do you want positivity? Ok. If it clicks, magically, between October 5 and October 15 when the next game is played and Auburn runs the table, it will still likely have a record as good as anyone's in the conference.

That isn't going to happen. But if you want to dream big, I won't stand in the way. War Eagle. Always.