I’m going to bring this back from a few years ago because I never finished it properly. I started something called the College Football Playoff of Candy, and I wanted to reintroduce the players alongside my now better understanding of the bracket configuration. What I’ll do is introduce the candy/sweet contestants, along with a description, and then identify who the teams are who represent the candy. Here goes nothing, scamps:

First Round: #12 Grandma’s Green Candy Dish versus #5 Saltwater Taffy

A classic matchup of the candy nobody fucking wants. The lower seed, Grandma’s Green Candy Dish, includes a hodgepodge of candy that could or couldn’t be fifty plus years old. From those yellow wrapped caramel hard candies to the strawberry wrapping that goes around a red candy that inauspiciously doesn’t taste like strawberries at all, the Green Candy Dish is the staple of candy in households that nobody wants but is always there. People speak of it nostalgically, but let’s face it, we’d toss it in the trash if no one was looking.

The stronger of the two, Saltwater Taffy, can be great when it’s fresh, but over time seems to get stale, overly chewy, and lacks flavor. No matter how you dress it, it’s still the same old chewy, chalky crap that you’ll settle for. Let’s be honest, you wanted a sweet-tart after you took that long walk with your cousins after Thanksgiving dinner, and not this, but it’ll do. In the end, the flavor fades, the chewing gets annoying, and though people want to dress it several different ways, it’s the same, empty feeling when you’re done “enjoying” it.

The Reveal: #12 Candy Dish – Notre Dame; #5 Saltwater Taffy – Oregon.

Predicted Score: ND 27, Oregon 7

Round One: #11 Pecan Pralines versus #6 Mississippi Mud

Pecan Pralines are great. Better in ice cream, in my opinion, but best enjoyed when you’re three bourbons deep and looking for a sweet treat next to a sulphur smelling river or ocean. Enjoy on a bench by the bay, the ocean, or with another inebriated friend. Eat the whole box. When you puke later in the night, it’ll be less acidic and more like you’re regurgitating a sweet coffee drink. Because you won’t stop drinking after the box of pralines, will you. Nooooo. Of course not. And you’ll have to crawl your sorry ass back in to the candy store in the morning and face the same coed you hit on the night before as you buy a box to take home to your wife and kids, so best grab a lunch sack for the ride home as you dry heave the whole way back. It’s a staple of southern delicacies, has a rich history, and though the younger crowd may have forgotten, was once a dominant force in the south. But you had to keep on drinking, didn’t you? Your wife was already pissed, don’t make it worse. Buy the extra box, hide your receipts, and drink lots of electrolytes on the way home, Way to go, numbnuts.

Mississippi Mud boasts Wilfred Brimley, diabeetus-level concentrations of sugar. One bite, and you’ll be in love. Another bite, you feel your vision starting to gloss over with stars, a third bite and you’re drinking a gallon of orange juice and wondering why you feel so warm and where the guy in the corner wearing a rabbit outfit came from. Note: he’s not there, you need to seek medical assistance, immediately. It’s the delusion that you’re into something good, until you wake up the next day in a coma, and realize that it was all a dream, an illusion, and you are, in fact, just in Mississippi.

With either snack, you’ll realize it’s great at first, then as you have more, you just want to puke or die.

Reveal: #11 Pralines – Tulane, #6 Mud Cake – Ole Miss

Predicted Score: Ole Miss 45 – Tulane 17

Round One: #10 Brigadeiros vs. #7 Lindale Peppermint Sticks

The advantage here is to the staple of most office candy dishes and Christmas stocking stuffers for many years. Lindale Peppermints are thick with the red part, shiny, and yummy as hell. But let’s face it everyone, it’s nice for a season but all year long? Seriously, everyone calls this one of the blue bloods, a tradition. Even if you don’t like them, they shove them down your throat in any season. It’s great for hiding a night out on the breath, it’s good for sucking one down before a date or that first kiss, or drowning out the coffee breath that sits on top of your stupid, late-for-work ass forgetting to brush your teeth even though you brushed your hair. It’s appearance, and it works in a pinch, but the annoying presence and belief that you should think this is a great candy overwhelms the otherwise life-saving presence of this candy.

On the other hand, you have the little known Brigadeiro. You may see it and say that’s a Ferrero Rocher, you know, the candy that the one kid in the house demands to have but they are wild, untamable, and dance distinctly to flamenco and seem to know how to samba. You have to buy them in small packs of four, eight, or in a traditional holiday shape but either way, they’re expensive. A Brazilian truffle, this is for the wild at heart, but they’re so busy swooning and wooing women they could care less about their football teams, just the sunny beaches and amor that comes with it. Good for snacking, or rubbing all over your body before making sweet, sweaty, passionate love. Just please, for once, don’t let it be with yourself.

Reveal: #10 Briagdeiros – Miami, #7 Lindale Peppermints – Texas (no, I’m not including A&M, they’re already sweet all by themselves…but let’s face it, in any season, Texas is intolerable).

Predicted Score: Miami 27, Texas 24

First Round: #8 Divinity versus #9 Fudge

Divinity has been deemed to be the favorite candy staple of this state, and why not. Sweet, light outside, deceivingly sweet. Then you bite into it, to find some chewy joy but you keep chewing just to find some hard, crunchy, filling-jarring nuts. It’s the perfect description of the state. It looks nice on the outside, seems okay once you’re into it, then you find yourself in a pickle with some locals where they’re demanding that you squeal like a pig. Like a Dickey-inspired nightmare, you find yourself too deep to escape into this sister-loving, mud-bogging, and miller lite swilling nightmare that you can only capitalize on later in life by writing a dark novel that would turn into a movie where Burt Reynolds is the lead and Ned Beatty plays, well, an unfortunate role. Just realize you’ll get buck fever, catch some fish, and grab a sapling by the creek in desperation, but it all ends the same. Regret.

On the other side, let’s harken back to pralines of Louisiana, very much the same but you’re sunburnt and replace swilling bourbon with drinking Natty Lights all day while wishing you’d made some very different like choices while staring at the Atlantic on Myrtle Beach. It seems like fun, and the fudge tastes sweet, but somehow, none of it is satisfying. You don’t know how you got here, you have a raccoon tan from your Oakleys that you kept over your eyes all day, and this place is like the county fair on steroids and somehow more expensive. Time to reconsider calling the lawyer and laying it all on red to get out to something different. It’ll do, but it ain’t ideal.

Oh, and the fudge was peanut butter. It sticks to your mouth, but you still can’t believe you took a bite. Momma was right, son. You should’ve picked the other one.

Reveal: #8 Divinity – Alabama, #9 Fudge – Clemson

Predicted Score: Alabama 13, Clemson 12 (no, I didn’t include Oklahoma, but you can replace fudge with Oklahoma, but the redness around the Oakleys is from windburn and tornadoes, still just as bad).

Tune in next week for the byes versus the winners.