Good, sure-tackling athletes can expose the Spread, the offensive system that fooled us into believing that the Missouri Tigers were national-title contenders and that Chase Daniel might be the nation&#8217;s top collegiate quarterback.</p><p>We acknowledge now that the Spread is not a magical elixir, because the Oklahoma Sooners have slapped us with reality three straight games.</p><p>Saturday night at the Big 12 championship game, the Sooners rolled up the Spread, thumping the Tigers 62-21, proving the 2007 results were far from a fluke and justifying OU&#8217;s inclusion in this game and potentially the BCS championship.</p><p>Oklahoma is Big 12 champ again, and Missouri again gets to claim runner-up status, even though we realize the distance between No. 1 and No. 2 is more like No. 1 and No. 5.</p><p>The Sooners just have too much talent. Their exotic blitzes and athletic down linemen have little trouble disrupting Daniel, forcing him to throw wildly and into coverage. When Daniel does find a receiver, the Sooners rarely struggle to get him on the ground and put the Tigers in third and long.</p><p>Man, Missouri&#8217;s Spread looks tantalizingly lethal against Nebraska, Kansas State, Iowa State and Big 12 South bottom feeders. The offense racked up dazzling numbers and lots of victories, and even had the Tigers at the top of the rankings a year ago.</p><p>Now it&#8217;s fair to question the real value of the Spread. For a while, it was a great equalizer, the scheme of choice for underdogs who wanted to run with the big dogs for an afternoon. Well, now the big dogs know how to defend it. They run the offense, too. They practice against it every day in the fall and the spring.</p><p>An offense that used to break down routinely inside the 20 can now be had at the 50 and anywhere on the field. The key, of course, is QB pressure and the ability to make one-on-one tackles.</p><p>Oklahoma can do that. We saw the Sooners do it twice last year against the Tigers, and again on Saturday. The margin of victory is growing with each encounter. A season ago, Oklahoma whipped Mizzou 41-31 and 38-17.</p><p>This time, the Sooners jumped to a 38-7 halftime lead and scored 60 points for the fifth straight game. In one half, the Sooners picked off Daniel and caused him to fumble. Daniel looked nothing like the QB who entered the 2008 season as a Heisman Trophy favorite.</p><p>He finished the game 27 of 43 for 255 yards, two TDs, two interceptions and one fumble.</p><p>Daniel will leave Mizzou with a marvelous r&#233;sum&#233; and be recognized as the school&#8217;s greatest quarterback. You can&#8217;t argue with 12,000 passing yards and close to 100 TD passes.</p><p>But at some point, we&#8217;ll need to put the Spread numbers in proper context. We&#8217;re going to have to put all the new-millennium passing numbers in some sort of realistic context. The Spread and modern passing offenses have turned decent quarterbacks into statistical legends.</p><p>It seems like every QB completes 65 percent of his passes. I can remember when a completion percentage of 55 percent was magnificent and rare. Daniel entered Saturday&#8217;s title game completing 75 percent of his passes. Is he really that accurate? Or is the Spread that effective? And do our expectations and standards need to be elevated?</p><p>There&#8217;s a myth right now that darn near every quarterback in the Big 12 is a legitimate Heisman Trophy candidate and a potential NFL starter.</p><p>It&#8217;s just not true.</p><p>The game has been dumbed-down for college QBs. They step to the line of scrimmage, look to the sideline and get instructions on exactly what to do.