Football is easily the most popular sport in America. So you’d think with all the attention it gets, people would have figured out by now how important the offensive and defensive lines are to a team – especially in college.

Nope. The casual fan is still fixated on the “skill” players – the quarterback, running backs, wide receivers and those tight ends who catch the football on a regular basis. This opens up a wide lane for handicappers to swoop in, get an information advantage on the competition, and make some cash.

A star quarterback with a lousy offensive line is going to underperform. Over in the Pac-10, one of the few question marks with this year’s USC Trojans is whether the O-line is stout enough. Meanwhile, the less famous Oregon Ducks have a fearsome front four that should make QB Nate Costa’s job a lot easier. The Ducks are flying under the betting radar and well worth investigating.

We’ll learn next month who will go into the 2008 college football season with the No. 1 ranking in the polls. USC was a near-unanimous choice last year, and the Trojans could find themselves right back up top – they’re the 3-1 favorites to win the BCS championship.

The Georgia Bulldogs are getting lots of love from commentators at 6-1, tied with Florida, Ohio State, and Oklahoma in what promises to be a wild season. But the Bulldogs are having some trouble on the disciplinary front. Seven players have been arrested thus far, for everything from aggravated battery to rubbing the belly of a pregnant woman.

Most of the Bulldogs players involved are linemen, including potential starters Jeremy Lomax on defense and Clint Boling on offense. Add the foot injury that will keep starting fullback Brannan Southerland on the shelf for five games, and Georgia’s betting value takes a bath in the insanely rough SEC waters.

We’ve had another contentious offseason in American college sports, and it’s still only June. Crimson Tide LB Jimmy Johns was let go after his arrest on five charges for selling cocaine; would-be Arizona point guard Brandon Jennings might go play in Europe if he doesn’t pass his SAT exams.

The NCAA has a checkered history when it comes to cranking out student-athletes. According to this year’s Academic Progress Rate report, 36 member schools face penalties after their football programs failed to meet minimum standards. That jumps to 53 for men’s basketball, although there are also many more member institutions with basketball programs: 1,026 across all three divisions, compared to 627 for football.

Based purely on those numbers, you could draw the conclusion that basketball players are smarter. But it’s common knowledge now that the student part of the student-athlete’s college experience is a secondary consideration. Even Steve Nash skated by as a sociology major at Santa Clara.

If three-martini lunches and unlimited expense accounts are your thing, then the 21 Club in Manhattan is your kind of place. But for one day at least, football took over from Fendi as the topic of conversation.

New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning was the star attraction last week at the 21. He was there to promote the launch of the National Football Foundation’s “Gridiron Club of New York,” designed to pump up interest in college football in a town where the NFL is king. Some 100 guests including former mayor Rudy Giuliani were there to press the flesh.

Manning’s father, Archie, is the chairman of the NFF and has been on the board for nearly 20 years. The group was founded in 1947 by the powerhouse trio of General Douglas MacArthur, Army coach Earl “Red” Blaik and legendary sports writer Grantland Rice. Imagine talking football over caviar and blini with those distinguished gentlemen.

Gators coach Urban Meyer

One of the quickest ways to find value in college football is to look at the teams with new coaches for 2008. Some of these coaches will be working in the national spotlight for the first time, after climbing the ranks from the lower majors up to the big time – think Urban Meyer and the Florida Gators.

All eyes are on Paul Johnson after he left a very successful run at Navy to join the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets. Tech is 100-1 odds to win the 2009 BCS title game; the main question is whether Johnson’s triple option will work against major-conference competition. At these odds, there’s lots of room for optimism.

Bill Stewart doesn’t have the same cachet as Johnson, as he moves up from assistant to head coach at West Virginia (25-1). But the Mountaineers still have much of that talent Rich Rodriguez left behind, and Stewart was at the helm for their 48-28 Fiesta Bowl win over Oklahoma.

Bears hibernate. Football fans estivate – the summer equivalent of taking a long nap in the snow. But instead of shutting their systems down during the offseason, sharp handicappers are learning about what’s on tap for 2008.

You can’t throw a virtual brick without hitting a web page dedicated to college football. Even conventional sources like ESPN and FOX provide their readers with useful content – it might be buried under headline stories about the crazy things that happen in dorms, but the Web leaves plenty of room for those niche stories about what’s happening on the field.

We’ve just been through a very informative glut of spring practices. Players and prospective players from across Division I took to the gridiron in April; their progress was documented more heavily this year than ever before, driven in part by the handicapper’s thirst for information. By studying this information now, a sharp capper will start the 2008 college football season with a sizeable knowledge gap over the betting public.

Because it’s never too early to start thinking about the 2008-09 college football season, here’s the upcoming College Football Bowl Season Schedule:

San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl
Dec. 23 / 8 p.m. ET, San Diego, ESPN

Congressional Bowl
Dec. 20 / 9 p.m. ET, Washington, D.C.

Pioneer Las Vegas Bowl
Dec. 20 / 8 p.m. ET, Las Vegas, ESPN

St. Petersburg Bowl
TBD Dec. 21 to 23 / 9 p.m. ET, St. Petersburg, Fla.

R&L Carriers New Orleans Bowl
Dec. 21 / 8 p.m. ET, New Orleans, ESPN

Sheraton Hawaii Bowl
Dec. 24 / 8 p.m. ET, Honolulu, Hawaii, ESPN

Motor City Bowl
Dec. 26 / 7:30 p.m. ET, Detroit, ESPN

Champs Sports Bowl
Dec. 27 / 4:30 p.m. ET, Orlando, Fla., ESPN

Emerald Bowl
Dec. 27 / 8:30 p.m. ET, San Francisco, ESPN

Meineke Car Care Bowl
Dec. 27 / 1 p.m. ET, Charlotte, N.C., ESPN

Texas Bowl
Dec. 28 / 8 p.m. ET, Houston, NFL Network

PapaJohn’s.com Bowl
Dec. 29 / 3 p.m. ET, Birmingham, Ala., ESPN2

New Mexico Bowl
TBA, Albuquerque, N.M., ESPN

PetroSun Independence Bowl
Dec. 28 / 8 p.m. ET, Shreveport, La., ESPN
Alamo Bowl
Dec. 29 / 8 p.m. ET, San Antonio, ESPN

Pacific Life Holiday Bowl
Dec. 30 / 8 p.m. ET, San Diego, ESPN

Roady’s Humanitarian Bowl
TBA, Boise, Idaho, ESPN2

Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Bowl
Dec. 31 / 12 p.m. ET, Fort Worth, Texas, ESPN

Sun Bowl
Dec. 31 / 2 p.m. ET, El Paso, Texas, CBS

Gaylord Hotels Music City Bowl
Dec. 31 / 3:30 p.m. ET, Nashville, Tenn., ESPN

Chick-fil-A Bowl
Dec. 31 / 7:30 p.m. ET, Atlanta, ESPN

Insight Bowl
Dec. 31 / 5:30 ET, Tempe, Ariz., NFL Network

Outback Bowl
Jan. 1 / 11 a.m. ET, Tampa, Fla., ESPN

Konica Minolta Gator Bowl
Jan. 1 / 1 p.m. ET, Jacksonville, Fla., CBS

Capital One Bowl
Jan. 1 / 1 p.m. ET, Orlando, Fla., ABC

AutoZone Liberty Bowl
Jan. 2 / 5:00 p.m. ET, Memphis, Tenn., ESPN

AT&T Cotton Bowl
Jan. 2 / 2 p.m. ET, Dallas, FOX

International Bowl
Jan. 3 / 12 p.m. ET, Toronto, Canada, ESPN2

GMAC Bowl
Jan. 6 / 8 p.m. ET, Mobile, Ala., ESPN

And just for the fun of it, the early odds on winning the 2009 BCS Championship: USC 3/1, Ohio State 6/1, Oklahoma State 6/1, Florida 6/1, Missouri at 14/1, and your longshots are…too many to list.

Trojans coach Pete Carroll is probably working on his tan during the offseason. NOT.

Sharper college football handicappers are well aware how much work there is to do after the national championship has been decided. The media saturation isn’t quite as thick as it is during the NFL offseason, but the wires are still humming with news about draft eligibility, spring practices and the unstoppable coaching carousel.

Let’s take the USC Trojans as an example of how to do things right. They lose quality players to the NFL every spring, because Pete Carroll keeps bringing quality players to campus. This year’s exodus includes seven men taken in the first two rounds, led by defensive tackle Sedrick Ellis to New Orleans at No. 7.

Carroll’s stud-filled 2008 recruiting class to the rescue. Parade All-American Tyron Smith leads the way at offensive tackle; he’s a gifted player coming out of Rancho Verde H.S. in California, but even at this “non-skill” position, Smith will be hitting the playbooks as hard as the tackling dummies this offseason.

Odds on the USC Trojans to win the 2009 BCS Championship? 3/1.

So much for introducing a playoff system into the college football Bowl Championship Series.

The B.C.S. held its annual meetings this week and lots of folks were hoping to see a major overhaul to the system (like maybe a playoff system that would inevitably produce a clear champion at the end of the season?).

No such luck.

That idea wasn’t even on the table, as it happens, but another idea was: The “Plus-One” system. Introduced by the Southeastern Conference Commissioner Mike Slive, under this system the four top teams are chosen and then they would square off in a playoff system of sorts, with two semifinals, one title game, and in the end producing one champion.

No matter, that idea was squashed. It was rejected by he Big Ten and Pac-10 representatives, as they thought it would only lead to an even bigger playoff system down the road, which they are adamantly opposed to.

So, it’s business as usual. Bowls, bowls and more bowls.

Feb. 6 was the first Wednesday in February, which meant National Signing Day for college football teams. But the top-rated prospect on nearly everyone’s chart has yet to sign a letter of intent. Terrelle Pryor is reportedly thinking Ohio State, Penn State and maybe Oregon. The Buckeyes are rumored to have the inside edge.

So what are these letters of intent, anyway? They’re binding contracts with the NCAA and the Collegiate Commissioners Association; the student agrees to stay at his college of choice for one academic year, in exchange for their scholarships.

Pryor is absolutely worth spending a scholarship on. The reigning Parade National Player of the Year reminds recruiters of Vince Young, except even slightly bigger at 6-foot-6 and 235 pounds – in his last year of high school. Not only that, Pryor is also one of the better basketball prospects in the nation, and would prefer to play in the NBA. He can afford to take his time.