(10-20-2019 08:23 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  We may be looking at 0-and. There aren't many places that would keep a coach who starts out 2-21.

What are you saying? Two days after Thanksgiving HE could be 2-23 without any momentum going into 2020. This is not a team but individuals with assignments who are not executing, based on Bloomgren. I expect to hear more sweet talk about why he played three QBs when he said HIS chips were on Green. This again is on the HC and any of the staff that doesn’t speak up to let him know his system does NOT work.

(10-20-2019 08:23 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  We may be looking at 0-and. There aren't many places that would keep a coach who starts out 2-21.

San Jose State's coach (Brent Brennan) was retained for a third year after going 2-11 in year 1 and 1-11 in year 2 (2-21 vs. FBS, 1-1 vs. FCS). SJSU, however, is one of the most cash-strapped programs in the country and almost certainly would not have had the money to pay any sort of buyout so there really wasn't a choice to be made there.

In all fairness, SJSU is now 3-4 in Year 3 of the Brennan Era, with a P5 road win no less, albeit at a bottom-5 (for P5) Arkansas, and the Spartans probably won't win any of their remaining 5 games (@ Army, vs. Boise, @ Hawaii, @ UNLV, vs. Fresno). Speaking of Arkansas, they only have 2 FBS wins midway through Chad Morris's second year, and if they don't beat Western Kentucky at home on Nov. 9 -- which they very well might not -- that number may not increase and it would be hard for him not to get launched.

Kent State is also a place that literally had to let a coach stay for all 5 years of his contract (Paul Haynes, 2013-2017) despite FBS win totals of 3, 2, 2, and 2 in the first 4 years because they had no money to pay any buyout. They won 1 FBS game in Haynes's final, lame-duck year.

There's a lot of football left to be played, all of it in the 2nd-worst conference in the country, and it wouldn't surprise me too much if we stumbled into a couple wins to finish 2-10. I am on record as saying that I literally only need 2 wins this year to support a third year for Bloomgren, because that would be an improvement over the 1 FBS win from last year.

I have no illusions, though, that if we do manage the 0-fer, Stanford Joe would ever declare Stanford Mike and the Beloved Stanford Way a failure after just 2 seasons. That would be a bigger upset than my Illini downing the Badgers yesterday as a 31-point dog. The rhetorical groundwork (propaganda would be another word for it) has already been laid, with last year being termed "Year 0." I also expect to hear the excuse that the university with the $6 billion endowment "can't afford to pay buyouts."

Despite how disappointed I feel this morning, I haven't given up on this HC or coaching staff yet. This summer we all agreed that we'd likely be 0-7 or 1-6 at this point. We all agreed that the big challenge of this season would be to keep the team motivated after the brutal first half of the season. I think we're more disappointed now though because we've seen how this team can perform....and that team is definitely better than UTSA.

The good: Bloomgren has instilled a tougher and more disciplined culture, and the team is cohesive; penalties are way, way down; recruiting is improving; we apparently have superior defensive coaches

The bad: offensive strategy; in-game adjustments/play-calling/clock management

This is why I suggest that one single move now might get us back on track -- have Mack take over the offense completely and also return to the sideline. He has more experience as a head coach afterall. I know it won't happen, but just saying...

(10-20-2019 11:56 AM)Barney Wrote:  Despite how disappointed I feel this morning, I haven't given up on this HC or coaching staff yet. This summer we all agreed that we'd likely be 0-7 or 1-6 at this point. We all agreed that the big challenge of this season would be to keep the team motivated after the brutal first half of the season. I think we're more disappointed now though because we've seen how this team can perform....and that team is definitely better than UTSA.

The good: Bloomgren has instilled a tougher and more disciplined culture, and the team is cohesive; penalties are way, way down; recruiting is improving; we apparently have superior defensive coaches

The bad: offensive strategy; in-game adjustments/play-calling/clock management

This is why I suggest that one single move now might get us back on track -- have Mack take over the offense completely and also return to the sideline. He has more experience as a head coach afterall. I know it won't happen, but just saying...

In all seriousness, Coach Mac would make a fantastic interim head coach and when he possibly pulls an upset and for sure gets the win over UTEP finishing with possibly 2 wins we hand him the reigns. Hopefully he can retain the defensive staff and get this thing turned around.

PROS
Not many, but
- Rozner. Not the fastest guy but good hands and just keeps making big plays. Given our limitations at QB, his large catch radius is a drive-saver
- Green getting benched after an atrocious outing. That feels like accountability that Bailiff didn't show
- Walter looked pretty good

NEUTRAL
- Defense seemed mostly OK except for getting completely fooled on the TD

CONS
Everything else, but especially
- Coaching: the silly QB rotation, momentum-killing timeouts because of inability to call plays, etc
- QB play: just really awful all around. I'm no expert but I didn't see our guys go through their progressions even once. Against a better defense we're looking at another 2-3 turnovers
- Whither Trammell? I expected him to be a playmaker this year

(10-20-2019 12:32 PM)RiceOL83 Wrote:  

(10-20-2019 11:56 AM)Barney Wrote:  Despite how disappointed I feel this morning, I haven't given up on this HC or coaching staff yet. This summer we all agreed that we'd likely be 0-7 or 1-6 at this point. We all agreed that the big challenge of this season would be to keep the team motivated after the brutal first half of the season. I think we're more disappointed now though because we've seen how this team can perform....and that team is definitely better than UTSA.

The good: Bloomgren has instilled a tougher and more disciplined culture, and the team is cohesive; penalties are way, way down; recruiting is improving; we apparently have superior defensive coaches

The bad: offensive strategy; in-game adjustments/play-calling/clock management

This is why I suggest that one single move now might get us back on track -- have Mack take over the offense completely and also return to the sideline. He has more experience as a head coach afterall. I know it won't happen, but just saying...

In all seriousness, Coach Mac would make a fantastic interim head coach and when he possibly pulls an upset and for sure gets the win over UTEP finishing with possibly 2 wins we hand him the reigns. Hopefully he can retain the defensive staff and get this thing turned around.

Agree with Mack at least taking over offense completely. Bloom can show us through recruiting etc. if he's worth keeping around as a Jason Garrett-type

(10-20-2019 10:57 AM)illiniowl Wrote:  The rhetorical groundwork (propaganda would be another word for it) has already been laid, with last year being termed "Year 0." I also expect to hear the excuse that the university with the $6 billion endowment "can't afford to pay buyouts."

If you think about it, though, LAST year was more like “year 2” with this year suddenly looking like more of a threat to be “year 0”.
But only if you go by the number of wins rather than by the loop counter...

Wiley Green cost us the game last night. He accounted for three turnovers. The offense is bad and the play calling is suspect, but the loss is mostly due to his mistakes. We're a better team than UTSA. We should've won the game. We should be 2-5 right now.

Wiley Green had some bad mistakes last night, but most of the games where both he and Stewart platted, I was more impressed with Green. That said, I think a more mobile QB like Marshmann or the true freshman (Johnson I think) could add a needed element to the moribund offense. Not like either Green or Stewart have run away with the job.

(10-20-2019 01:44 PM)Ourland Wrote:  Wiley Green cost us the game last night. He accounted for three turnovers. The offense is bad and the play calling is suspect, but the loss is mostly due to his mistakes. We're a better team than UTSA. We should've won the game. We should be 2-5 right now.

Really? Calling out one player by name - someone with less than a full season at QB?

(10-20-2019 01:54 PM)WRCisforgotten79 Wrote:  

(10-20-2019 01:44 PM)Ourland Wrote:  Wiley Green cost us the game last night. He accounted for three turnovers. The offense is bad and the play calling is suspect, but the loss is mostly due to his mistakes. We're a better team than UTSA. We should've won the game. We should be 2-5 right now.

Really? Calling out one player by name - someone with less than a full season at QB?

Leave the individual players alone. He turned the ball too many times, but regardless still could have won the game.

One player did not lose that game, or any other game, this year or any other year.

I've said before, I really like the improvement on defense and the improved execution in the kicking game. I thought Bailiff did a very poor job in those two areas. We had two NFL-quality kickers--Martens and Boswell--and still managed to have a poor overall kicking game. We had kick-6s against SMU when successful field goals might have won us the games. But to me the classic kicking game sequence under Bailiff was a game at Tulsa where we scored a TD, for the PAT blocked and returned for 2 points, and then Tulsa returned the ensuing kickoff for a TD. We scored a TD and lost 3 points, net (6-9).

But I've never thought "pound the rock" was a viable offensive strategy for Rice. I was open minded and willing to let Bloomgren change my mind, just as I was open minded and willing to let Bailiff convince me that his country club, square-pegs-into-round-holes approach could work. But Bailiff did not convince me in 11 years, and we've get a year and a half plus with Bloomgren now, and I remain extremely unconvinced.

(10-20-2019 01:44 PM)Ourland Wrote:  We're a better team than UTSA. We should've won the game.

Sure didn’t look that way last night.

Stats were pretty even except for two area. Turnovers, Rice 4 - UTSA 1, which lead to the other - final score - the only one that really counts.

How does that translate to better than UTSA?

Better teams don’t turn the ball over 4 times leading directly to one score for UTSA and almost certainly preventing another for Rice.

I certainly don’t disagree Rice should have won the game, but the fact the Owls continue to make mistakes and fail to execute in critical situations means the Owls aren’t better than anyone they have played.

This is the offense that I liked, flexbone option running game plus run-and-shoot passing. Bob Wagner and Paul Johnson, Hawaii. Jim Leahey calling play-by-play and Rick Blangiardi doing the color.

1989 versus BYU, 56-14, Garrett Gabriel at QB:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwnbkqkV0VI

1990 versus BYU, 59-28, Garrett Gabriel at QB:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8hSNIjIfms&t=201s

1992 versus BYU, 36-32, Ivin Jasper at QB:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7VeL0MnAWQ&t=379s

(10-20-2019 02:26 PM)RiceOL83 Wrote:  

(10-20-2019 01:54 PM)WRCisforgotten79 Wrote:  

(10-20-2019 01:44 PM)Ourland Wrote:  Wiley Green cost us the game last night. He accounted for three turnovers. The offense is bad and the play calling is suspect, but the loss is mostly due to his mistakes. We're a better team than UTSA. We should've won the game. We should be 2-5 right now.

Really? Calling out one player by name - someone with less than a full season at QB?

Leave the individual players alone. He turned the ball too many times, but regardless still could have won the game.

All season long I've defended Wiley Green against the negativity here concerning his performance, so I won't feel guilty at all about blaming him for the loss. For all the good he does, and all the potential he has, he played a terrible game last night. He was directly responsible for six of their points, and he killed two drives because he fumbled two snaps.

Tom Stewart isn't the answer either. Things only get worse when he enters a game. If I were Evan Marshman, I'd be very upset. He's the second best quarterback on the team and he never touches the field.

(10-20-2019 03:54 PM)Tomball Owl Wrote:  

(10-20-2019 01:44 PM)Ourland Wrote:  We're a better team than UTSA. We should've won the game.

Sure didn’t look that way last night.

Stats were pretty even except for two area. Turnovers, Rice 4 - UTSA 1, which lead to the other - final score - the only one that really counts.

How does that translate to better than UTSA?

Better teams don’t turn the ball over 4 times leading directly to one score for UTSA and almost certainly preventing another for Rice.

I certainly don’t disagree Rice should have won the game, but the fact the Owls continue to make mistakes and fail to execute in critical situations means the Owls aren’t better than anyone they have played.

There's more than a very reasonable chance that we win easily if we only turn the ball over once instead of four times. And we definitely aren't better than Louisiana Tech, but we should have won that game also.

If last year was year zero, this year is year double zero.

I expected improvements in a lot of ways that would start a curve that would take us to respectable. I guess I bought into the ABB a bit too much.

That would have been 2018, 3-4 wins, 2019, 6-7 wins, and 2020, 9-10 wins.

We are waaaay behind the curve.

I have no issues with Green, but we seem to know who he is at this point.

Stewart is I'm sure a fine young man, but he's not a difference maker either.

Since we can now play EVERYONE and still redshirt them, I'd play Marshman and Johnson. I'm not giving up on the year... I'm getting a head start on next year. The only reason to NOT do this is that we think these guys don't have a shot at being our started next year... and if that's the case, then I'm really disappointed. When I say not giving up on this year, It's because I don't see either Stewart or Wiley as game changers... at least not right now. Green can continue to develop in practice and has plenty of game experience already. Let's see what the other two can do.

(10-20-2019 05:34 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  I have no issues with Green, but we seem to know who he is at this point.

Stewart is I'm sure a fine young man, but he's not a difference maker either.

Since we can now play EVERYONE and still redshirt them, I'd play Marshman and Johnson. I'm not giving up on the year... I'm getting a head start on next year. The only reason to NOT do this is that we think these guys don't have a shot at being our started next year... and if that's the case, then I'm really disappointed. When I say not giving up on this year, It's because I don't see either Stewart or Wiley as game changers... at least not right now. Green can continue to develop in practice and has plenty of game experience already. Let's see what the other two can do.

Agree

(10-20-2019 05:34 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  I have no issues with Green, but we seem to know who he is at this point.

Stewart is I'm sure a fine young man, but he's not a difference maker either.

Since we can now play EVERYONE and still redshirt them, I'd play Marshman and Johnson. I'm not giving up on the year... I'm getting a head start on next year. The only reason to NOT do this is that we think these guys don't have a shot at being our started next year... and if that's the case, then I'm really disappointed. When I say not giving up on this year, It's because I don't see either Stewart or Wiley as game changers... at least not right now. Green can continue to develop in practice and has plenty of game experience already. Let's see what the other two can do.

Completely agree. However, I think there is about as much of a chance of either Marshman and/or Johnson seeing any significant playing time vs USM next Saturday as there is of the Yankees playing in the World Series starting this Tuesday.