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Coach Babers’s Show will be at the new Marriott Syracuse, (the former Hotel Syracuse). The first show will be Wednesday night at 7PM because the game is Friday, (the show will normally be two days before the next game). They will be in Shaughnessy’s Irish Pub, which can be accessed from the street.
This article contains the schedule:
New Home for AmeriCU Dino Babers Show
You can also listen to the show live each week on the Syracuse IMG Sports Network and Cuse.com. Wednesday's show will be on 99.1 FM and 97.7 FM, as well. The show will regularly air on 99.5FM (Syracuse) 99.1 FM (Utica) and 1200 AM.”
You can also get it on: Listen to The Jim Bohannon Show on WGVA on TuneIn
There hasn’t been any change in the phone numbers, which last year were 315-424-8599 (local) or 1-888-746-2873. You can call to ask questions or submit them via Twitter at: #AskDino hashtag on Twitter
Or through Cuse.com, (the SU Athletic website):
Syracuse University Athletics
You can (or could last year, anyway), listen to a podcast of the show, probably the next day, at: Search results for babers | Free Internet Radio | TuneIn
I’ve been asked to continue doing the summaries, even by people who listen to the podcasts. I may focus on the major points, rather than trying to record everything.
My Question(s)
Coach, watching the Wake Forest game I thought I was watching Syracuse play a better Syracuse. I occurred to me that both you and Dave Clawson came from Bowling Green but that he got there two years before you got here and we had some freshmen and sophomores going up against juniors and seniors in a lot of cases. Was that the main problem and was Wake an image of what Syracuse might look like in a year or two?
The Show
(I sometimes re-arrange the comments so that statements made on the same subject are reported together, even if they came at different points of the show.)
Coach said the team has “a bad taste in our mouths and a difficult task ahead but people have accomplished bigger things this season. Last week was a happening.”
“Not what we are accustomed to. Our defense has made a great turn around.” (They did a lot of turning around Saturday.) “With Lamar Jackson, it’s like the Jordan rules- he’s going to have success against your defense- you have to bottleneck everyone else…. They’ve given up at least 39 points in every loss this year.”
I ahev the program’s number on speed dial but Liam from Pompey beat me to it again. “That was a tough loss coach. It wasn’t the way you wanted it. What was your mindset on the three passes into the end zone in the second half?” DB: We are leading the ACC in first downs. We like first downs. Wake was playing more men closer to the ball and less deep. That’s a tighter window for a back-up quarterback. On first down we threw to the end zone to Devin Butler and it wasn’t completed. The second was an option to Ismael who decided to take it deep. But the pass was out of bounds. We’d thrown to each sideline so we decided to throw over the middle, a pass that can be thrown short or deep. Ish broke open but it was incomplete.”
Matt said “Everybody wants the coach to be aggressive but they are low percentage plays and when they don’t work they ask ‘Why did you do that?’” DB: Fourth down plays have to pay off about 40% of the time to be worthwhile. We are around 60%. We are an aggressive crew. If that doesn’t work out, I’ll hand my whistle over to somebody else and they can do what they want to do.” Matt said we are among the national leaders in converting fourth downs.
I got on and asked my question. DB: “Extremely humbly, I tell you that I would like to think we’ll be better than Wake in two years. Coach Clawson believes in building a program slowly and loading up on the back end with redshirts so he has a good team when his players become juniors and seniors. I want to win every game. I don’t think it’s fair to the juniors and seniors you inherit to tell them that we are going to wait a couple of years to win.” I marveled that Coach expects us to better than 64 points and 700+ yards in two years. DB: “Watch this: We will be. I promise you we will be.” Matt said “Steve make a note of that.” I suspect I won’t be the only one.
Frank in Watertown begged the coach not to hand his whistle over to anybody. He wanted to know where Coach got his motivational style and speech-making ability. One source was Dick Tomey- his coach at Hawaii, who he said had just written a book: “The Rise and Fall of Hawaii Football”. Not quite:
Rise of the Rainbow Warriors
Another was his high school coach John Shacklett:
John Shacklett
Dino referred to Tomey’s speech-making ability and called Shacklett “a Remember the Titans type of guy”. Dino’s philosophy: “You want to get young men listening with both ears but you have to be quick – millennials have a short attention span. You want to hit a string on the guitar that they will remember and tell their grandchildren. I never have anything written down-it’s all ad lib.”
Marty from Ithaca wondered how we got from Clemson to Wake Forest. Why did the offense grow stagnant? (It wasn’t in the first half!) Also: how do you stop a Heisman Trophy winner? DB: “We had a back-up quarterback who misfired, although it was many guy’s fault. There was no excuse for 5 second half points. Our defense has bene outstanding all year. This game was not indicative”, (the way coach says it, it sounds like “vindicative”),” of how good it is. We’re going to play better this week. Faith is belief without evidence and I’m asking you to have a lot of faith that we will do better.”
Tom in Nedrow, (the show is getting so popular that it’s mostly phone calls now), suggested Coach use a “spy” on Lamar Jackson and use a better running quarterback so we could run some option. DB: “Of the quarterbacks we have, Eric Dungey is easily the best runner. The other scan run but Dungey is outstanding.” (As opposed to unreal- which is what Lamar is.) “We need to hit this quarterback like he is a running so he gets the ‘owies’”, (as in “Ouch!”, I guess.) “When you do that the opposing coaches stop calling plays where the quarterback will run the ball because it’s hard to win with a back-up quarterback.”
The had an injury report which consisted entirely of saying that both Dungey and Strickland were “questionable”. The decisions will be made at game-time, just like last week. Both are “getting better but we have complete confidence we can win with Zach and Moe Neal, who can do a fantastic job.”
John in Baltimore, noting that Lamar Jackson was very fast, wondered: who was the fastest player on our defense. Also: was Wake Forest’s success due to scheme or execution? DB: “Scoop Bradshaw or Chris Frederick would be our fastest defenders, although Antwan Cordy would be the fastest guy if he was healthy.” The fact that Scoop seemed to be on the verge of being caught by the placekicker was discussed: the kicker had a shorter distance to go and an angle: Scoop actually outran him by 30 yards. Also: “Scoop and one arm since the other was in a cast and that slows you down. When Salton blocked it and it fell in front of Scoop I knew I was in good hands with Allstate.” (That’s one of the show’s sponsors.) Coach said that “Wake changed their scheme drastically over the last 2 ½ games. They are running something similar to what we do.” (And doing it better.)
Jim in Onondaga Hill feels we are “going in the right direction, thanks to you, Coach.” He jokingly asked “Is Silverado really the toughest truck?”, a reference to one of the many commercials Dino has appeared in. He wondered why we seemed to be slowing down the offense: we get to the line quickly, but then take time to decide on the play and get it off. DB: We have four speeds: Super-Fast, Fast, Normal and Slow Down. Sometimes we call a play and we don’t care what defense they are in. Sometimes we have to see what they are in. Sometimes they aren’t in what we thought they were in and we have to change the play. Sometimes we just want to slow it down.” (We did get off 99 plays from scrimmage to Wake’s 89.)
They talked about weather conditions. It’s supposed to start warm but chance of rain is 100% the whole game. How do they prepare for that? Receivers are playing without gloves, (which become ineffective in the rain). Balls are dunked in water before each play. Punter’s hands are sprayed with water. Coach is old-school when it comes to catching the ball: he could never afford gloves when he played. “Gloves are almost cheaters. Catching was an art in the old days.” But it won’t bother Steve Ismael: “Ish has ET (Etta Tawo?) hands: so long he doesn’t have to phone home. He’s have the day of days in bad weather.”
Louisville had a lot of guys get hurt on defense but they are getting them back, including a “shut down corner” named (Jaire) Alexander who may be a top draft choice this year. Alexander vs. Ismael should be interesting. “Jackson has better stats this year than last year. He’s the most dynamic player in college football and he’ll be a first draft choice. If he doesn’t become a dynamic NFL quarterback, he’ll become a dynamic wide receiver instead. He’s 6-3 210with 4.3 speed.”
Matt mentioned something about all the close games Buffalo has lost this year and he related that to “us and to Florida State. Give a team a couple more touchdowns and it can change their season.”
Tom in Bernard’s Bay had a technology question: what technology does the team use to prepare for games, other than the traditional films? He noted that Scott Shafer had them using virtual reality. Dino paused and apologized for the rant he was about to go on. “About 9 years ago I was an assistant coach and invited my unit over to my house for a barbeque – you can do that once a year. I didn’t have any video game player but the kids wanted to bring theirs over. I told them OK if you can hook it up. I had the food all ready and went inside to find a tournament going on. I watched it for a while and realized that what was on the screen was the exact offense and defense we’d bene trying to teach them on the field. I told them ‘I’ve bene trying to teach you this stuff and you’ve bene playing it for 9 years! I’d rather they digest the information and then translate it to the field. We still have virtual reality but I don’t like it. Dungey likes it. Mahoney and DeVito like it and so does Coach Lewis so we let them use it. I think we can do the same thing the old fashioned way – through video tape, where we can point things out.”
Nick Monroe, the z secondary coach was the special guest. His nickname is “Swag Daddy”, although Dino called him “Swag Daddy 2”. He was asked how he and team were responding to the poor performance vs. Wake. He cited the 24 hour rule, saying that their concentration has been on the next opponent since Monday. “Sometimes you get complacent, although I’m not saying we were. We are humble and hungry and have to flip the negative into the positive. Lamar Jackson will make things happen. We have to slow him down. We have to have our eyes in the right place. We have to maintain leverage. He’s got a cannon arm, too. He could play 7-8 different positions. His burst and athleticism are out of this world. I just want each man to take another step in their development as a player.”
This article contains the schedule:
New Home for AmeriCU Dino Babers Show
You can also listen to the show live each week on the Syracuse IMG Sports Network and Cuse.com. Wednesday's show will be on 99.1 FM and 97.7 FM, as well. The show will regularly air on 99.5FM (Syracuse) 99.1 FM (Utica) and 1200 AM.”
You can also get it on: Listen to The Jim Bohannon Show on WGVA on TuneIn
There hasn’t been any change in the phone numbers, which last year were 315-424-8599 (local) or 1-888-746-2873. You can call to ask questions or submit them via Twitter at: #AskDino hashtag on Twitter
Or through Cuse.com, (the SU Athletic website):
Syracuse University Athletics
You can (or could last year, anyway), listen to a podcast of the show, probably the next day, at: Search results for babers | Free Internet Radio | TuneIn
I’ve been asked to continue doing the summaries, even by people who listen to the podcasts. I may focus on the major points, rather than trying to record everything.
My Question(s)
Coach, watching the Wake Forest game I thought I was watching Syracuse play a better Syracuse. I occurred to me that both you and Dave Clawson came from Bowling Green but that he got there two years before you got here and we had some freshmen and sophomores going up against juniors and seniors in a lot of cases. Was that the main problem and was Wake an image of what Syracuse might look like in a year or two?
The Show
(I sometimes re-arrange the comments so that statements made on the same subject are reported together, even if they came at different points of the show.)
Coach said the team has “a bad taste in our mouths and a difficult task ahead but people have accomplished bigger things this season. Last week was a happening.”
“Not what we are accustomed to. Our defense has made a great turn around.” (They did a lot of turning around Saturday.) “With Lamar Jackson, it’s like the Jordan rules- he’s going to have success against your defense- you have to bottleneck everyone else…. They’ve given up at least 39 points in every loss this year.”
I ahev the program’s number on speed dial but Liam from Pompey beat me to it again. “That was a tough loss coach. It wasn’t the way you wanted it. What was your mindset on the three passes into the end zone in the second half?” DB: We are leading the ACC in first downs. We like first downs. Wake was playing more men closer to the ball and less deep. That’s a tighter window for a back-up quarterback. On first down we threw to the end zone to Devin Butler and it wasn’t completed. The second was an option to Ismael who decided to take it deep. But the pass was out of bounds. We’d thrown to each sideline so we decided to throw over the middle, a pass that can be thrown short or deep. Ish broke open but it was incomplete.”
Matt said “Everybody wants the coach to be aggressive but they are low percentage plays and when they don’t work they ask ‘Why did you do that?’” DB: Fourth down plays have to pay off about 40% of the time to be worthwhile. We are around 60%. We are an aggressive crew. If that doesn’t work out, I’ll hand my whistle over to somebody else and they can do what they want to do.” Matt said we are among the national leaders in converting fourth downs.
I got on and asked my question. DB: “Extremely humbly, I tell you that I would like to think we’ll be better than Wake in two years. Coach Clawson believes in building a program slowly and loading up on the back end with redshirts so he has a good team when his players become juniors and seniors. I want to win every game. I don’t think it’s fair to the juniors and seniors you inherit to tell them that we are going to wait a couple of years to win.” I marveled that Coach expects us to better than 64 points and 700+ yards in two years. DB: “Watch this: We will be. I promise you we will be.” Matt said “Steve make a note of that.” I suspect I won’t be the only one.
Frank in Watertown begged the coach not to hand his whistle over to anybody. He wanted to know where Coach got his motivational style and speech-making ability. One source was Dick Tomey- his coach at Hawaii, who he said had just written a book: “The Rise and Fall of Hawaii Football”. Not quite:
Rise of the Rainbow Warriors
Another was his high school coach John Shacklett:
John Shacklett
Dino referred to Tomey’s speech-making ability and called Shacklett “a Remember the Titans type of guy”. Dino’s philosophy: “You want to get young men listening with both ears but you have to be quick – millennials have a short attention span. You want to hit a string on the guitar that they will remember and tell their grandchildren. I never have anything written down-it’s all ad lib.”
Marty from Ithaca wondered how we got from Clemson to Wake Forest. Why did the offense grow stagnant? (It wasn’t in the first half!) Also: how do you stop a Heisman Trophy winner? DB: “We had a back-up quarterback who misfired, although it was many guy’s fault. There was no excuse for 5 second half points. Our defense has bene outstanding all year. This game was not indicative”, (the way coach says it, it sounds like “vindicative”),” of how good it is. We’re going to play better this week. Faith is belief without evidence and I’m asking you to have a lot of faith that we will do better.”
Tom in Nedrow, (the show is getting so popular that it’s mostly phone calls now), suggested Coach use a “spy” on Lamar Jackson and use a better running quarterback so we could run some option. DB: “Of the quarterbacks we have, Eric Dungey is easily the best runner. The other scan run but Dungey is outstanding.” (As opposed to unreal- which is what Lamar is.) “We need to hit this quarterback like he is a running so he gets the ‘owies’”, (as in “Ouch!”, I guess.) “When you do that the opposing coaches stop calling plays where the quarterback will run the ball because it’s hard to win with a back-up quarterback.”
The had an injury report which consisted entirely of saying that both Dungey and Strickland were “questionable”. The decisions will be made at game-time, just like last week. Both are “getting better but we have complete confidence we can win with Zach and Moe Neal, who can do a fantastic job.”
John in Baltimore, noting that Lamar Jackson was very fast, wondered: who was the fastest player on our defense. Also: was Wake Forest’s success due to scheme or execution? DB: “Scoop Bradshaw or Chris Frederick would be our fastest defenders, although Antwan Cordy would be the fastest guy if he was healthy.” The fact that Scoop seemed to be on the verge of being caught by the placekicker was discussed: the kicker had a shorter distance to go and an angle: Scoop actually outran him by 30 yards. Also: “Scoop and one arm since the other was in a cast and that slows you down. When Salton blocked it and it fell in front of Scoop I knew I was in good hands with Allstate.” (That’s one of the show’s sponsors.) Coach said that “Wake changed their scheme drastically over the last 2 ½ games. They are running something similar to what we do.” (And doing it better.)
Jim in Onondaga Hill feels we are “going in the right direction, thanks to you, Coach.” He jokingly asked “Is Silverado really the toughest truck?”, a reference to one of the many commercials Dino has appeared in. He wondered why we seemed to be slowing down the offense: we get to the line quickly, but then take time to decide on the play and get it off. DB: We have four speeds: Super-Fast, Fast, Normal and Slow Down. Sometimes we call a play and we don’t care what defense they are in. Sometimes we have to see what they are in. Sometimes they aren’t in what we thought they were in and we have to change the play. Sometimes we just want to slow it down.” (We did get off 99 plays from scrimmage to Wake’s 89.)
They talked about weather conditions. It’s supposed to start warm but chance of rain is 100% the whole game. How do they prepare for that? Receivers are playing without gloves, (which become ineffective in the rain). Balls are dunked in water before each play. Punter’s hands are sprayed with water. Coach is old-school when it comes to catching the ball: he could never afford gloves when he played. “Gloves are almost cheaters. Catching was an art in the old days.” But it won’t bother Steve Ismael: “Ish has ET (Etta Tawo?) hands: so long he doesn’t have to phone home. He’s have the day of days in bad weather.”
Louisville had a lot of guys get hurt on defense but they are getting them back, including a “shut down corner” named (Jaire) Alexander who may be a top draft choice this year. Alexander vs. Ismael should be interesting. “Jackson has better stats this year than last year. He’s the most dynamic player in college football and he’ll be a first draft choice. If he doesn’t become a dynamic NFL quarterback, he’ll become a dynamic wide receiver instead. He’s 6-3 210with 4.3 speed.”
Matt mentioned something about all the close games Buffalo has lost this year and he related that to “us and to Florida State. Give a team a couple more touchdowns and it can change their season.”
Tom in Bernard’s Bay had a technology question: what technology does the team use to prepare for games, other than the traditional films? He noted that Scott Shafer had them using virtual reality. Dino paused and apologized for the rant he was about to go on. “About 9 years ago I was an assistant coach and invited my unit over to my house for a barbeque – you can do that once a year. I didn’t have any video game player but the kids wanted to bring theirs over. I told them OK if you can hook it up. I had the food all ready and went inside to find a tournament going on. I watched it for a while and realized that what was on the screen was the exact offense and defense we’d bene trying to teach them on the field. I told them ‘I’ve bene trying to teach you this stuff and you’ve bene playing it for 9 years! I’d rather they digest the information and then translate it to the field. We still have virtual reality but I don’t like it. Dungey likes it. Mahoney and DeVito like it and so does Coach Lewis so we let them use it. I think we can do the same thing the old fashioned way – through video tape, where we can point things out.”
Nick Monroe, the z secondary coach was the special guest. His nickname is “Swag Daddy”, although Dino called him “Swag Daddy 2”. He was asked how he and team were responding to the poor performance vs. Wake. He cited the 24 hour rule, saying that their concentration has been on the next opponent since Monday. “Sometimes you get complacent, although I’m not saying we were. We are humble and hungry and have to flip the negative into the positive. Lamar Jackson will make things happen. We have to slow him down. We have to have our eyes in the right place. We have to maintain leverage. He’s got a cannon arm, too. He could play 7-8 different positions. His burst and athleticism are out of this world. I just want each man to take another step in their development as a player.”
