2007 may or may not be remembered as the Year of the Upset in college football. But it should be.

It started on New Year’s Day, when five of the six bowl games were won by the underdog. Then Florida (+7) won the national championship over previously undefeated Ohio State.

Small potatoes. Try Appalachian State 34, No. 5 Michigan 32. The Division I-AA champions pulled off the biggest upset in college football since The Citadel beat Arkansas back in 1992, if not bigger. Making life in the Big Ten even worse, Minnesota fell to North Dakota State last week, 27-21.

At least USC didn’t get beaten by a lower-division program, but losing to Stanford 24-23 as a 39-point chalk comes pretty close. The Trojans had won 35 straight home games before that debacle. If FIU (+39) somehow manages to beat Arkansas this Saturday, the Razorbacks might as well quit football and take up macramé

Is it a surprise that the Boston Red Sox came back from a 3-1 deficit to win the ALCS over Cleveland? Maybe not. They were favored in every single game, after all. So unless you include Fausto Carmona’s poor pitching – again, not a shock considering his youth and his opponents – the National League is our source for wackiness in the 2007 playoffs.

It started with the elimination of the Chicago Cubs. OK, we’ve heard this story before. But the Cubs were handed a very beatable Arizona team with one reliable starting pitcher (Brandon Webb), and they couldn’t get the job done.

The Philadelphia Phillies, meanwhile, had the best offense in the National League with 892 runs, second only to the Yankees in the majors. But they could only muster eight runs in three games against Colorado’s fair-to-middling pitching. Including one game at Coors Field.

Least surprising? What’s happening with the already-eliminated Yankees is more interesting than the games themselves.

Cleveland rocks. The Indians have all the earmarks of a well-run franchise from top to bottom. But they won’t erase the memory of the worst season for Major League Baseball since the 1994 strike.

This was the year Barry Bonds hit home run No. 756, breaking Hank Aaron’s career record. It was met with muted enthusiasm at best. Bonds was never the fan favorite, but once he became the center of the league’s ongoing steroid controversy, MLB officials distanced themselves from Bonds as if he were made of cancer.

Next month, George Mitchell is expected to release the results of his investigation into steroid use in baseball. Names could be named. If the use of performance enhancers is as widespread as anecdotal evidence suggests, some of those names will be from the Indians.

No matter who’s side you are on, this report is already the overwhelming baseball story of the year. And it’s only going to get bigger.

Greater Boston is the 11th biggest metro area in the United States. But their fan base for sports covers roughly the entire galaxy. The Boston Celtics, freshly loaded with Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen, are favored at 5-2 to win the Eastern Conference and play in the NBA Finals.

The Detroit Pistons are next at 7-2, followed by Chicago, Cleveland and Miami at 9-2. These odds are just begging to be exploited. The Heat might be a playoff bubble team – a year older, and without Eddie Jones to help save them like he did last year. The Bulls, meanwhile, appear to be on the cusp of Eastern greatness, and the Pistons are at least a proven commodity.

Nobody can say for sure what the new-look Celtics are going to accomplish. They certainly have plenty of star power, but that bench? Somebody call Greg Kite and see if he’s busy this year.

Is it possible to get used to surprises? If so, the NFL is as boring as ever this year. Here are the five biggest shockers of the 2007 campaign thus far.

1. The winless Saints: These guys were 8-1 to win this year’s Super Bowl. Instead, New Orleans is 0-4 and going nowhere fast.

2. Derek Anderson, Browns savior: Brady Quinn was supposed to be starting by now. Anderson is hanging in there instead with an 80.5 passer rating.

3. Marc Bulger benched: Bulger has cracked ribs and has been pulled for Gus Frerotte, but if St. Louis were 3-2 instead of 0-5, Bulger would still be in there.

4. Arizona, heading to the playoffs: Ken Whisenhunt has the Cards at 3-2 and poised to win a poor NFC West.

5. Running back Blues: LaDainian Tomlinson, Larry Johnson and Steven Jackson, none even close to the Top 10 in league rushing.

It’s all about the matchups. Some NFL players are licking their chops at the thought of facing their Week 6 opponents. Bettors and fantasy players are doing the same for the following stars.

LaDainian Tomlinson: The Raiders are ranked dead last in the NFL in rush defense. LT was a little slow last week with 67 yards on 21 carries; Oakland will be his tonic.

Kurt Warner: You don’t think Warner is loving this? He has a chance to lead the Cardinals to the NFC West title, and Carolina is all the way down to No. 28 in the league in pass defense.

Larry Johnson: Johnson had 12 yards rushing against Jacksonville last week. He’ll be amped to make amends versus Cincinnati’s No. 26-ranked rush defense.

Plaxico Burress: Bobby Petrino’s not known for his defense. Atlanta is 17th against the pass and 22nd against No. 1 wideouts. Burress has seven TDs despite a gimpy ankle.

We’ve got a day or two to catch our collective breath after a very interesting quartet of Division Series. Good thing, because we’ve got some outstanding pitching matchups on tap.

The NLCS breaks ground with Arizona’s Brandon Webb trading pitches with Colorado’s Jeff Francis. Webb led all NL pitchers with 236.3 innings, four complete games and a 3.35 xFIP. Francis isn’t too bad himself: 215.1 innings and a 4.25 xFIP. Both will be well rested for Thursday’s tilt.

Now check out the ALCS opener: Cleveland’s C.C. Sabathia versus Boston’s Josh Beckett. These are easily two of the best pitchers in the big leagues. Sabathia led the majors with 241 innings pitched (!), striking out 209 batters and posting a commanding 3.63 xFIP. Beckett had some minor health problems, but still topped 200 innings and was a beast on the mound at 3.56 xFIP. Will anyone score a run Friday night?

It’s inevitable. Major League Baseball will institute some form of video replay. We have the technology – and we clearly have the need.

There isn’t supposed to be anything subjective about baseball’s rules. We know that’s hardly the case; put a dozen umpires in a room, and you’ll get 13 different interpretations of the strike zone. But there is no wiggle room whether a ball is foul or fair, a home run or off the wall. These are critical calls that umpires sometimes miss, even in the playoffs with a six-man crew. For example, we nearly had a home run by Yankees’ leadoff hitter Johnny Damon kept off the scoreboard in Game 1 of the ALDS against Cleveland.

The argument against replay usually boils down to “the human element.” We’ve seen far too many instances in other sports where the human element becomes the criminal element. Does MLB need its own Tim Donaghy before we get instant replay?

Been playing the underdogs so far in the baseball playoffs? Good work, at least after the first four games. Puppies went 2-2, with Colorado winning twice in Philly to make handicappers a quick half-unit.

No reason to stop now. We were still waiting at press time for a line on Game 2 between the Yankees and Cleveland, but check out the other ALDS matchup: Los Angeles (+140) against Boston. The Angels are sending Kelvim Escobar to the mound; Boston replies with Daisuke Matsuzaka.

Dice-K’s only got a 4.42 xFIP after a lousy second half of the season (5.19 ERA in old-school terms). Escobar is at 4.31 xFIP and was strong all year, at least until September when he honked three starts. As long as Escobar’s shoulder inflammation has truly subsided, the Angels have the edge in starting pitching Friday. Amazing what you can buy for +140 in the MLB playoffs.

MLB playoff teams with relatively thin starting pitching, like the Arizona Diamondbacks and New York Yankees, are looking forward to shortening their starting rotations. But that doesn’t mean they’re out of the woods.

There is still a drop-off in pitching production the farther you go down these rotations. Look at Arizona’s first three starters: Brandon Webb (3.35 xFIP), Doug Davis (4.72) and Livan Hernandez (5.62). Now the Yankees: Chien-Ming Wang (4.35), Andy Pettitte (4.47) and Roger Clemens (4.52).

Pettitte and Clemens are holding up their end of the bargain in their advanced years, so the Yankees can survive a Wang loss in Thursday’s ALDS opener against Cleveland. The Snakes aren’t so resilient. Davis is facing a huge “must win” (not technically facing elimination, but close enough) in Arizona’s Game 2 matchup with the Cubs. You can win with two dominant pitchers like they did with Randy Johnson and Curt Schilling; one usually isn’t enough.