Monday Morning Cage Match XIV:Over the hill, two villainous masterminds square off.

Not to get too grandiose about things, but Saturday night I think we witnessed the beginning of the end of the Steve Spurrier mystique. Not so much because his South Carolina team lost a heartbreaker to Georgia -- clearly, that's happened before on several occasions -- but because it was so obvious that he's lost a lot of his power to intimidate. When Georgia state patrolmen are fist-bumping one another right in front of you after your final attempt at pulling out a win falls incomplete, it's clear that there aren't a lot of people trembling at the sound of your name anymore. (Contrast that to the '95 Georgia-Florida game in which Spurrier dumped 52 points on the Dawgs in their own stadium. Nobody in the state of Georgia's employ was doing any fist-bumping that afternoon, I assure you.)

But it's not like Spurrier is the only so-called villainous mastermind who's started running out of steam on the back nine of his career, either. Ernst Stavro Blofeld, founder of the SPECTRE international crime organization, came to epitomize the "evil genius" archetype even though he got his ass kicked by James Bond nearly every time they crossed paths. Which fading mastermind desperately clinging to relevance still holds the greater claim to the title of Evil Genius? The Cage Match will tell us, as we pit Spurrier vs. Blofeld.

	Steve Spurrier	Ernst Stavro Blofeld
Childhood home	Johnson City, Tennessee	Section of Germany that is now north-central Poland
WINNER: Blofeld
Accessory	Visor	White Persian cat
WINNER: Blofeld
Parodied by	Hal Mumme	Dr. Evil in the "Austin Powers" movies
WINNER: Blofeld
Famous quote	"You can't spell Citrus without UT."	"This organization does not tolerate failure."
WINNER: Spurrier
Greatest success	12-1 record and national title behind Danny Wuerffel in 1996	Getting revenge on James Bond by assassinating his wife on their wedding day
WINNER: Spurrier
Greatest failure	12-20 record with the Washington Redskins	Foiled in his plan to steal a Lektor cryptographic device from the USSR
WINNER: Blofeld
Current status	29-23 at South Carolina (15-18 SEC) and 1-4 against Georgia	Killed after being picked up by a helicopter piloted by James Bond and dropped down a smokestack in the North Thames gasworks
WINNER: Spurrier, but barely

FINAL SCORE: Blofeld 4, Spurrier 3. Steve may have the better career W-L record, but when it comes to villainous megalomania he's still playing from behind.