Today's High Five: Excuses are for losers ... and so is the BCS

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5. I hate it when athletes, coaches and teams make excuses. I especially hate injury excuses.

The Packers won the Super Bowl last season despite a dozen important players being out with injuries. That being said ...

Aaron Rodgers wasn't one of the injured Packers.

It would seem there are injuries, and there are facts.

Fact is, the Bears are toast without Jay Cutler. Not because Cutler is a great QB but because Cutler sometimes plays great -- and because the only other option is a never-will-be named Caleb Hanie. (Which, naturally, is Jerry Angelo's fault for generally mismanaging the most important position in pro sports.)

And now, RB Matt Forte -- unquestionably the team's MVP -- is out up to a month with a knee injury.

The Bears were a flawed team with little margin for error. They managed to win 7 of their first 10 games thanks to defense, the kicking game and just enough offense led by Forte and Cutler. They are 0-2 since Hanie had to take over for Cutler, including Sunday's 10-3 home loss to a terrible Kansas City team.

OK, those are the facts. Even a skeptic such as myself should be able to differentiate between such cold facts and common, everyday excuses, right?

Well, that terrible KC team was being quarterbacked by a never-will-be named Tyler Palko because their starter, Matt Cassel is out.

Meanwhile, the playoff-bound Texans are 2-0 since starting QB Matt Schaub and backup Matt Leinert got hurt, with third-stringer T.J. Yates at the helm.

If the Bears can't beat a Palko-led Chiefs team at home, they weren't good enough to matter, anyway.

4. The notable thing wasn't Tiger Woods finally winning a tournament, because it was a limited-field event that he stages for himself and his pals. For me, the big thing was the camera shot of Tiger lining up the winning putt ... with TV viewers getting a clear view of his Ping putter.

Swoosh be damned!

3. Even when Rodgers and the Packers clearly aren't at their best, they are amazing.

They will win the rest of their regular-season games, and I see absolutely no way an NFC team beats them in Green Bay during the playoffs. That means New England, Pittsburgh or maybe Baltimore will have to do it in the Super Bowl.

2. Of course, the biggest victory of the weekend involving a team from the Land of Cheese and More Cheese was ...

Marquette 61, Wisconsin 54.

My wife and I watched the game at a Charlotte establishment with several other MU alums and it was a joy to behold.

Despite playing without their starting point guard and despite getting almost no production from standout forward Jae Crowder, who was in foul trouble throughout, our Golden Warriors dominated every aspect of the game and led almost from tip to horn.

This is the deepest, most athletically dynamic team Buzz Williams has had at Marquette, and I have a feeling I'm going to be thrilling (or boring) you many times this season with tales of their exploits. Deal with it!

1. For the sixth straight year, I will not be watching one second of any of the meaningless exhibitions masquerading as college football from now until early January.

I call it Boycott College Sham.

Not the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl, featuring Illinois and UCLA teams that have a combined 12-13 record and have fired their coaches; not the Pinstripe Bowl, which will take place on what's sure to be a sunny Dec. 30 day in the Bronx; not even the Beef O'Brady's Bowl, which by name alone should humiliate participants Florida International and Marshall.

And certainly not the mythical championship game, in which LSU gets another chance to beat an Alabama team that has no more of a claim to this spot than any of a half-dozen other squads.

This is not to hate on 'Bama. It might be one of the top two teams ... and it might not be. We simply cannot know as long as the BCS is allowed to exist.

I know my one-man protest means nothing. Hell, it meant nothing even when I had a real voice as a newspaper columnist and enlisted a few followers.

It just makes me feel good not to be party to a system that rewards hypocrisy, stupidity, rigidity and mediocrity.

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