SWC75
Bored Historian
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- Aug 26, 2011
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- This is what it is to be a Syracuse football fan: I walk into the Dome knowing that Louisville is doing to Florida State exactly what they did to us: even worse, in fact, (that won wound up 63-20 instead of 62-38). Suddenly I realize we aren’t so bad after all. Then we come out loaded for bear, (or Bull) and power to a 17-0 lead in a game we were dominating at least as much as the score indicated. Then I have to sit through a soul-crushing 3-45 stretch to end the game that was worse than any stretch Louisville had against us. I don’t who we are or what we’ve got. I just know we’re not very good, after all.
- This was the 8th time in ten games we’ve lost to a school that didn’t even have a football program until Donovan McNabb’s junior year. It’s the fifth time we’ve lost by at least three touchdowns. Overall, we’ve been outscored 164-346. You can do the averaging.
- I’m known as a stats guy but I’ve always insisted that contributory stats not be elevated in importance above bottom line stats. It’s not just what you do, it’s when you do it. It’s also what else you and don’t do. In this game we out-gained the Bulls 549-454. We out first downed them 30-20. We possessed the ball 37:48 to 21:22. We were out-rushed by only 40 yards and out-passed them by 135 yards. We got off 105 plays to 64. We converted 14 third and fourth downs to their 5. And yet not only did we lose but we got blown out. Go figure.
- Not only were we -3 in turnovers but we had 10 penalties for 69 yards to 4 for 4 for 50. Our yardage wasn’t much greater because we had a lot of those 5 yard penalties that are the product of a loss of concentration, something a struggling team with a 17 point lead should not have a problem with.
- We’re supposed to create confusion but we seemed the more confused team, at least those last three quarters. We had trouble getting people lined up properly, had guys sprinting off the field at the last second, (one time they didn’t make it). On Marlon Mack’s run, every defender was on or going to the same side of the field. The paly was to the other side and Mack waltzed in untouched from 52 yards out.
- Last year’s lousy Scott Shafer offense averaged 27.25 points per game. This year’s high-powered Dino Babers offense is averaging 27.0 points per game- and they’ve scored less in each successive game.
- Maybe meatheads are under-rated. When you build up a lead and the other team finally scores, an awful lot depends on what happens next. We were up 17-7and drove from our 19 to our 47. It was 3rd and four. We ran the &%@$%! draw play to Moe Neal for nothing. Now its 4th and 4. We try for it with a pass which is incomplete, (I thought Ismael was interfered with but it wasn’t call). I suddenly had this empty feeling, realizing that that means we can’t punt and they had the ball in our territory. They marched right down and scored and were in control from that point on. It’s fun to go for it on fourth down, but if you don’t make it it’s a turnover, whereas a punt is not, (or at least it’s the equivalent of a pass interception on a long bomb instead of a fumble at the line the scrimmage). We were 2 for four on fourth down conversions. You could argue we were -6 in turnovers.
- We’ve given up eight scoring plays of 20+ yards in two weeks, half of them of more than 50 yards. Most of them were plays where you knew they were going to score shortly after the play began. I listen to the games on the radio as I watch them at the Dome and I’m getting tired of hearing Chris Gedney sigh or say “Oh, Know…” as Matt Park counts down the yard lines: “to the 40, 30, 20, 10….Touchdown!”. Another thing Gedney said rings true: “They can’t get off their blocks and they are too slow to get to the sidelines to cut the play off. I have never seen a Syracuse defense, even in the G-Rob years, anywhere near this bad.
- The injuries are piling on an already thin defense. We’ve now lost Antwan Cordy, Juwan Dowels, Kienan Whitner and Kayton Samuels, (the latter two in this game: I don’t know for how long). On offense Jason Emerich didn’t start and Omari Palmer went down during the game. On a team like Syracuse there can be a dramatic drop off from the first to the second team, (Samuels is 6-0 314: his back-up is 6-1 273). But that’s not the big problem: Players alternate at most positons and the second string guy often plays nearly as much as the first string guy. The big problem is that the third string guy now has to replace the second string guy. That’s where the biggest drop-off comes because not only are these guys not as good or not as ready as the two guys above them: they haven’t been playing. Three games in and we’re playing them at half a dozen positions.
- I am tired of that dam draw play we run over and over again, right up the middle with the QB faking a pass that everyone knows is a fake because he never has the ball. I realize it’s intended to set up other things but we keep running it long after the defense has adjusted to it and we use it in situations where it obviously isn’t appropriate, like third or fourth down plays. You can set up the pass with multiple running plays. You don’t have to use the same one over and over. And I thought this offense was about setting up the run by spreading the defense out with the pass. This play would always be much more effective if we’ve established the pass first. And is the quarterback ever going to actually keep the ball and throw it? That ought to be wide open by now.
- Dungey is putting up some big numbers in this system but he really hasn’t played well yet, as Babers has pointed out in his pressers. Today the passing game never seemed quite in synch. The first interception was badly under-thrown and the second one was a play in which Erv Phillips had gotten behind the defense and was waving his arms. Dungey didn’t see him and threw to the sideline, where the pass was intercepted.
- Gedney was talking about Brisley Estime and said that he hasn’t gotten the ball that much because he has to “buy in” to what they are doing and the coaches told him that he hasn’t done so yet. That also may be why Jordan Fredericks is third string, (even though he’s averaging 6.1 yards a carry to 3.8 for Stri8ckland and 4.4 for Neal) or Steve Ismael hasn’t been thrown to much. If they don’t buy in, they may not be here much longer.
- South Florida isn’t Louisville but we made them look as if they were. We are 1-2 coming off this “home stand”, (having lost to the only two FBS teams). That’s half our home games. We have one more in the next eight weeks. And Notre Dame, Florida State, Clemson and Pittsburgh await. We aren’t as good as any of them. I’m not sure who we are better than.
- This was the 8th time in ten games we’ve lost to a school that didn’t even have a football program until Donovan McNabb’s junior year. It’s the fifth time we’ve lost by at least three touchdowns. Overall, we’ve been outscored 164-346. You can do the averaging.
- I’m known as a stats guy but I’ve always insisted that contributory stats not be elevated in importance above bottom line stats. It’s not just what you do, it’s when you do it. It’s also what else you and don’t do. In this game we out-gained the Bulls 549-454. We out first downed them 30-20. We possessed the ball 37:48 to 21:22. We were out-rushed by only 40 yards and out-passed them by 135 yards. We got off 105 plays to 64. We converted 14 third and fourth downs to their 5. And yet not only did we lose but we got blown out. Go figure.
- Not only were we -3 in turnovers but we had 10 penalties for 69 yards to 4 for 4 for 50. Our yardage wasn’t much greater because we had a lot of those 5 yard penalties that are the product of a loss of concentration, something a struggling team with a 17 point lead should not have a problem with.
- We’re supposed to create confusion but we seemed the more confused team, at least those last three quarters. We had trouble getting people lined up properly, had guys sprinting off the field at the last second, (one time they didn’t make it). On Marlon Mack’s run, every defender was on or going to the same side of the field. The paly was to the other side and Mack waltzed in untouched from 52 yards out.
- Last year’s lousy Scott Shafer offense averaged 27.25 points per game. This year’s high-powered Dino Babers offense is averaging 27.0 points per game- and they’ve scored less in each successive game.
- Maybe meatheads are under-rated. When you build up a lead and the other team finally scores, an awful lot depends on what happens next. We were up 17-7and drove from our 19 to our 47. It was 3rd and four. We ran the &%@$%! draw play to Moe Neal for nothing. Now its 4th and 4. We try for it with a pass which is incomplete, (I thought Ismael was interfered with but it wasn’t call). I suddenly had this empty feeling, realizing that that means we can’t punt and they had the ball in our territory. They marched right down and scored and were in control from that point on. It’s fun to go for it on fourth down, but if you don’t make it it’s a turnover, whereas a punt is not, (or at least it’s the equivalent of a pass interception on a long bomb instead of a fumble at the line the scrimmage). We were 2 for four on fourth down conversions. You could argue we were -6 in turnovers.
- We’ve given up eight scoring plays of 20+ yards in two weeks, half of them of more than 50 yards. Most of them were plays where you knew they were going to score shortly after the play began. I listen to the games on the radio as I watch them at the Dome and I’m getting tired of hearing Chris Gedney sigh or say “Oh, Know…” as Matt Park counts down the yard lines: “to the 40, 30, 20, 10….Touchdown!”. Another thing Gedney said rings true: “They can’t get off their blocks and they are too slow to get to the sidelines to cut the play off. I have never seen a Syracuse defense, even in the G-Rob years, anywhere near this bad.
- The injuries are piling on an already thin defense. We’ve now lost Antwan Cordy, Juwan Dowels, Kienan Whitner and Kayton Samuels, (the latter two in this game: I don’t know for how long). On offense Jason Emerich didn’t start and Omari Palmer went down during the game. On a team like Syracuse there can be a dramatic drop off from the first to the second team, (Samuels is 6-0 314: his back-up is 6-1 273). But that’s not the big problem: Players alternate at most positons and the second string guy often plays nearly as much as the first string guy. The big problem is that the third string guy now has to replace the second string guy. That’s where the biggest drop-off comes because not only are these guys not as good or not as ready as the two guys above them: they haven’t been playing. Three games in and we’re playing them at half a dozen positions.
- I am tired of that dam draw play we run over and over again, right up the middle with the QB faking a pass that everyone knows is a fake because he never has the ball. I realize it’s intended to set up other things but we keep running it long after the defense has adjusted to it and we use it in situations where it obviously isn’t appropriate, like third or fourth down plays. You can set up the pass with multiple running plays. You don’t have to use the same one over and over. And I thought this offense was about setting up the run by spreading the defense out with the pass. This play would always be much more effective if we’ve established the pass first. And is the quarterback ever going to actually keep the ball and throw it? That ought to be wide open by now.
- Dungey is putting up some big numbers in this system but he really hasn’t played well yet, as Babers has pointed out in his pressers. Today the passing game never seemed quite in synch. The first interception was badly under-thrown and the second one was a play in which Erv Phillips had gotten behind the defense and was waving his arms. Dungey didn’t see him and threw to the sideline, where the pass was intercepted.
- Gedney was talking about Brisley Estime and said that he hasn’t gotten the ball that much because he has to “buy in” to what they are doing and the coaches told him that he hasn’t done so yet. That also may be why Jordan Fredericks is third string, (even though he’s averaging 6.1 yards a carry to 3.8 for Stri8ckland and 4.4 for Neal) or Steve Ismael hasn’t been thrown to much. If they don’t buy in, they may not be here much longer.
- South Florida isn’t Louisville but we made them look as if they were. We are 1-2 coming off this “home stand”, (having lost to the only two FBS teams). That’s half our home games. We have one more in the next eight weeks. And Notre Dame, Florida State, Clemson and Pittsburgh await. We aren’t as good as any of them. I’m not sure who we are better than.
