Say no to College Football 25, Barstool, hot dog-eating contests and Pete Rose

Strangers don’t want to hear what annoys us or what we don’t care about, but you and I are friends and we indulge each other.

Which is why I’m telling you I don’t care about the coming EA Sports College Football 25 video game.

For one thing, it’s a video game. I dismiss them all, except Guitar Hero II. There’s no question Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood would be impressed with me jamming on the Rolling Stones’ “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking.”

Or maybe not. They’re 80 and 77, and they’re still getting it done.

Anyway, I don’t care about College Football 25’s ranking of the top 100 players. Once Week 1 of the real season starts, the game’s opinions become obsolete. Or so I assume. Maybe AI is involved, and that’s a different can of robot worms.

Speaking of Week 1 of the college football season, I don’t like it. It’s a scam.

Iowa and Iowa State start this season with games against representatives of the Missouri Valley Football Conference. Also opening against FCS teams are Illinois, Purdue, Rutgers and Washington of the Big Ten.

Ohio State will play Akron. Oregon hosts Idaho. It’s like the Dallas Cowboys playing the Arlington Renegades and the Kansas City Chiefs facing the St. Louis Battlehawks.

At season’s end, these games fluff up the records of the big boys. Ten of the ACC’s 14 teams had winning overall records last year, which shouldn’t be mathematically possible if the thing wasn’t crooked. Another of its clubs, Syracuse, was bowl-eligible at 6-6 thanks to opening its 2023 season against Colgate.

Syracuse then lost 45-0 to South Florida in the Roofclaim.com Boca Raton Bowl. This year, that game will start at 5:30 p.m., ET, after most of Boca Raton’s citizens have finished dinner.

I don’t care about Roofclaim.com, either. I had my Cedar Rapids roof repaired after the 2020 derecho. If another derecho tears it asunder, I’ll be going to MovingVan.com.

At the risk of offending an outfit that could be vengeful, I don’t care about Barstool Sports or Barstool Anything. That enterprise has a lot of loyal followers, which is fine for those who never want to leave their mental frat house.

Against my alleged better judgment, I checked it out one day last week. Among the headlines:

A Bunch Of Amish Guys Showed Up To A Random Inner City Park And Gave Some Indiana Dudes "That Work"

Is He In The Wrong? Guy Goes Viral For Dining And Dashing On His Hinge Date After She Brings A Friend And Orders Surf And Turf

Argentina's Soccer President Having His Own Personal Sweat-Wiper During Games Is The Ultimate Sign Of Power

It makes TMZ Sports look like the Iowa Writers’ Workshop.

Oh my gosh, I really don’t care about eating contests. When gluttony is celebrated, are we far from paying tribute to wrath, envy and sloth?

But a hot dog-eating contest? That’s not just overeating to the point of spontaneous combustion, it’s consuming mass quantities of something that could make you extinct before you burst into flame.

The Nathan’s Famous International Fourth of July Hot Dog Eating Contest held annually at Coney Island, has been a monument to treating your body like a temple. If, that is, one of the spiritual rituals held in it is stuffing it with beef trimmings, sodium nitrite and collagen casings.

The contest is criminal for a simple reason: Contestants dunk their hot dogs in water to help them slide the “food” down their throats.

That’s not eating hot dogs. It’s like running a marathon by traveling the first 25 miles by motorcycle.

The whole contest, if you want to be frank about it, should make you sick.

Finally, I really don’t care about HBO’s upcoming four-part documentary about Pete Rose.

It debuts July 24 and is called “Charlie Hustle & the Matter of Pete Rose.” HBO says the series “paints a portrait of a complex individual full of contradictions — one seeking redemption but not quite ready for full atonement.”

Is it just me, or has Pete Rose always seemed about as complex as Pete Rose’s haircut? Bowl, meet head.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I must go read Barstool Sports’ story on wearing open-toed shoes in a gas station bathroom.

Comments: (319) 398-8440; mike.hlas@thegazette.com