I stayed away for a couple of days

[storange]

and as I could have guessed ...every coach every player, every beer vendor, every band member now sucks and has no clue what they are doing. I'm as frustrated with the string of mental and physical mistakes as anybody...but give me a break.

 

[sufandu]

A lot of people over react after a loss, however, there is no way we should out gain a team by over 200 yards and lose by 2 touchdowns. The big plays given up in the passing game is a trend that goes back to last season. Our secondary is full of veterans. Everyone on this board knew they had big play threats at WR, yet we give up two long TD passes in the first quarter. That's unacceptable and it's on Shafer and Bullough because it's a trend that shows no signs of ending.

 

[TheCusian]

and as I could have guessed ...every coach every player, every beer vendor, every band member now sucks and has no clue what there doing. I'm as frustrated with the string of mental and physical mistakes as anybody...but give me a break.

Welcome back - most of the crazy "I only post when we lose" people have cleared out.

I'm high on our chances next week. ND looked good but hasn't played anyone. I think we might be the best team they've seen (yes, Michigan has more talent - but they are awful). Golson scares me - but apparently he's not a big fan of contact. And they are not a good running team at all.

 

[upperdeck]

A lot of people over react after a loss, however, there is no way we should out gain a team by over 200 yards and lose by 2 touchdowns. The big plays given up in the passing game is a trend that goes back to last season. Our secondary is full of veterans. Everyone on this board knew they had big play threats at WR, yet we give up two long TD passes in the first quarter. That's unacceptable and it's on Shafer and Bullough because it's a trend that shows no signs of ending.

this is just dumb thinking.. because they have NFL WR we should never allow them to catch a td pass? a screen pass that the LB/safety didnt adjust too is not on the coaches of they had a plan for it which they said they did. the other was a perfect pass to good coverage.

 

[SmilinBob]

Reddish was perfect all the way up to the ball being snatched away from him. That was the way that game just seemed to flow.

 

[Pyle]

I'm back too. Seems a lot easier to stomach some of these losses by avoiding the venom that comes out after a loss. We simply couldn't get out of our own way. The offense was clearly good but I felt like I was watching a Detroit Lions game. No matter how good we played, we still found a way to blow it at the most crucial times. It was an extremely frustrating loss but not a disheartening one. HCRE really pisses me off with his ability to beat us so frequently.

 

[sufandu]

this is just dumb thinking.. because they have NFL WR we should never allow them to catch a td pass? a screen pass that the LB/safety didnt adjust too is not on the coaches of they had a plan for it which they said they did. the other was a perfect pass to good coverage.

Is that what I said? No. Try reading it again. We gave up passes of 25 and 90 yards. When we know they have NFL wide receivers, we need to do a better job of staying in front of them so we don't give up big plays. Someone expressed the same sentiment in a thread earlier (Rocco maybe) when he saw us come out in press coverage to start the game. If this was the only game it happened or if it was just the one play, fine, but, as I said before, it's been a trend with the defense going back to last year and it was two big plays. It didn't happen the rest of the game so I suppose they made the adjustments, but you can't give up two big plays for touchdowns like that in the first quarter, especially when you knew what you had to gameplan for.

It seems like we've always got a plan for something that beats us, and there's always a reason it doesn't work. On pass defense, our guys seem to be out of position or have a miscommunication far too often. Is our talent just not as good as we were all hyping to ourselves on the this board all off season or are the players just not prepared well? If this was Clemson or FSU I'd shrug my shoulders and say they're just that much better than us, but it wasn't. It was Maryland, and we have to stop giving these games away if we want to be respected nationally.

 

[upperdeck]

the 90 yd pass was a backwards screen pass to a RB though

 

[storange]

Welcome back - most of the crazy "I only post when we lose" people have cleared out.

I'm high on our chances next week. ND looked good but hasn't played anyone. I think we might be the best team they've seen (yes, Michigan has more talent - but they are awful). Golson scares me - but apparently he's not a big fan of contact. And they are not a good running team at all.

Noticed that in the Purdue game, made some bad throws when he was under any pressure. Give him alot of time and space and he'll kill us though.

 

[sufandu]

the 90 yd pass was a backwards screen pass to a RB though

So those should go 90 yards? Ours never do. I suppose I shouldn't have specifically said just the secondary. As you pointed out, on one play a LB/Safety didn't make an adjustment. How many times are we going to fail to make an adjustment, get burned because we're blitzing aggressively, lose contain on a quarterback, have a miscommunication in the secondary etc etc? I see other teams, not just the highly ranked ones either, that seem to play without making mistakes. Since last year, this team seems to either repeat mistakes or when we adjust we go so far the other way, we leave other things wide open. It started against Penn St with Robinson getting 7 catches for 133 in one half and another one of their receivers burning us for a 54 yard TD. Then Northwestern has a guy get 9 catches for 185 to go with their 206 yards rushing (did our defense do anything right that day?). Of course there was no way we were going to beat Clemson, but seeing receivers not named Watkins running 10-20 behind our secondary catching more than one TD pass of 40 yards or more because someone thought they had help when they didn't, was more frustrating than having Watkins just out run our guys. Then if Georgia Tech's running game wasn't embarrassing enough (is it really legitimate to say no one player ran for 100 yards against us when we give up 394 yards rushing to a team in one game?), even they throw a 46 yard touchdown pass against us in that debacle. Then this year we know that Villanova has one player we need to worry about and he kills us all day. We should still be thanking their kicker for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory for us.

Did I leave out some games from last year? Sure. My question is, when do we stop making the same mental mistakes or using poor strategy? This isn't just one game. This is a pattern. It may not always be the exact same mistakes, but we seem to substitute one for another. If we're not blowing a defensive assignment our QB is turning away from the sideline before he has the whole play (that's the first time I've ever heard that one). We were supposed to come out of the blocks well this year, given everyone's familiarity with the offensive and defensive systems, the number of veterans on the team, and the relatively easy schedule. I'm sick of seeing teams that seem to have it figured out on opening weekend when we take half the season to figure it out.

This was the opportunity we had all been looking forward to to make noise early and go into a nationally televised game with buzz. We've laid two eggs at home. Unless we beat Notre Dame, can anyone really complain that we won't be able to draw the casual fan to the Dome for any game other than FSU?

I'm certainly ranting out of frustration, but am I not supposed to be frustrated by seeing us getting beat because of mistakes and not because an opponent is simply better than us?

 

[Pyle]

So those should go 90 yards? Ours never do. I suppose I shouldn't have specifically said just the secondary. As you pointed out, on one play a LB/Safety didn't make an adjustment. How many times are we going to fail to make an adjustment, get burned because we're blitzing aggressively, lose contain on a quarterback, have a miscommunication in the secondary etc etc? I see other teams, not just the highly ranked ones either, that seem to play without making mistakes. Since last year, this team seems to either repeat mistakes or when we adjust we go so far the other way, we leave other things wide open. It started against Penn St with Robinson getting 7 catches for 133 in one half and another one of their receivers burning us for a 54 yard TD. Then Northwestern has a guy get 9 catches for 185 to go with their 206 yards rushing (did our defense do anything right that day?). Of course there was no way we were going to beat Clemson, but seeing receivers not named Watkins running 10-20 behind our secondary catching more than one TD pass of 40 yards or more because someone thought they had help when they didn't, was more frustrating than having Watkins just out run our guys. Then if Georgia Tech's running game wasn't embarrassing enough (is it really legitimate to say no one player ran for 100 yards against us when we give up 394 yards rushing to a team in one game?), even they throw a 46 yard touchdown pass against us in that debacle. Then this year we know that Villanova has one player we need to worry about and he kills us all day. We should still be thanking their kicker for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory for us.

Did I leave out some games from last year? Sure. My question is, when do we stop making the same mental mistakes or using poor strategy? This isn't just one game. This is a pattern. It may not always be the exact same mistakes, but we seem to substitute one for another. If we're not blowing a defensive assignment our QB is turning away from the sideline before he has the whole play (that's the first time I've ever heard that one). We were supposed to come out of the blocks well this year, given everyone's familiarity with the offensive and defensive systems, the number of veterans on the team, and the relatively easy schedule. I'm sick of seeing teams that seem to have it figured out on opening weekend when we take half the season to figure it out.

This was the opportunity we had all been looking forward to to make noise early and go into a nationally televised game with buzz. We've laid two eggs at home. Unless we beat Notre Dame, can anyone really complain that we won't be able to draw the casual fan to the Dome for any game other than FSU?

I'm certainly ranting out of frustration, but am I not supposed to be frustrated by seeing us getting beat because of mistakes and not because an opponent is simply better than us?

MD was better than us. They had a better QB, better WRs, were more disciplined, and had a more experienced staff. Yes we beat them last year, without their top 2 wideouts, and a beast interior DL for us. Well they got their wideouts back and there's no question this DL isn't as good as last year's. Losing Raymon to injury was huge. As for the other 2 games, no complaints about CMU. And Nova has proven they are not just a good FCS team, right now they look like an elite FCS team. They are 2-1, in their 2 wins they've put up 50 and 49 points. One of those games was against Fordham, who outside of the Nova game is smashing their opposition. They are 3-1 and have outscored their opponents in those wins by a combined score of 155-30, Nova routed them 50-6. Nova would beat most of the lower half BCS(do we still call them that, D1-A again?idk) teams this year, I'd bet on it. We managed to "beat" them without Hunt or 2 of our OL. It wasn't pretty and their kicker definitely lost the game for them in reg. We needed a few big plays in OT, we got them, Nova didn't and we won. I wouldn't call that laying an egg although to the casual fan who only listens to Mike and Mike in the morning, I'm sure it looked like one in the paper.

 

[OttoinGrotto]

You missed some good discussion, actually.

 

[DoctorBombay]

MD was better than us. They had a better QB, better WRs, were more disciplined, and had a more experienced staff. Yes we beat them last year, without their top 2 wideouts, and a beast interior DL for us. Well they got their wideouts back and there's no question this DL isn't as good as last year's. Losing Raymon to injury was huge. As for the other 2 games, no complaints about CMU. And Nova has proven they are not just a good FCS team, right now they look like an elite FCS team. They are 2-1, in their 2 wins they've put up 50 and 49 points. One of those games was against Fordham, who outside of the Nova game is smashing their opposition. They are 3-1 and have outscored their opponents in those wins by a combined score of 155-30, Nova routed them 50-6. Nova would beat most of the lower half BCS(do we still call them that, D1-A again?idk) teams this year, I'd bet on it. We managed to "beat" them without Hunt or 2 of our OL. It wasn't pretty and their kicker definitely lost the game for them in reg. We needed a few big plays in OT, we got them, Nova didn't and we won. I wouldn't call that laying an egg although to the casual fan who only listens to Mike and Mike in the morning, I'm sure it looked like one in the paper.

If losing to a Maryland can be so easily rationalized, then we're in more trouble than we thought.
Maryland PLAYED better than we did and didn't have the killer miscues, but we outgained them by a ridiculous amount in the final tally.
We had the better team, IMO, but as the previous poster stated- can't seem to get out of our own way.
This reminds me of other games where we clearly dictated play, but couldn't seem to get over the hump.
Its no longer just a matter of talent, IMO, its now become a pattern.
Again, FSU, Clemson, PSU- fine...they're just better. But we shoulda, coulda, woulda, been able to beat a Maryland...no more excuses.

 

[Pyle]

If losing to a Maryland can be so easily rationalized, then we're in more trouble than we thought.
Maryland PLAYED better than we did and didn't have the killer miscues, but we outgained them by a ridiculous amount in the final tally.
We had the better team, IMO, but as the previous poster stated- can't seem to get out of our own way.
This reminds me of other games where we clearly dictated play, but couldn't seem to get over the hump.
Its no longer just a matter of talent, IMO, its now become a pattern.
Again, FSU, Clemson, PSU- fine...they're just better. But we shoulda, coulda, woulda, been able to beat a Maryland...no more excuses.

MD's defense was horrible and our offense had our way outside of the stupidness, but our Defense really had no answer for their offense either. Many predicted this to be a shootout, just nobody thought we'd shoot our own foot about 4 times while trying to get the gun out of the holster.

PS. I was the poster who also said we couldn't get out of our own way. Fact is our offense vs their defense was better than their offense against our defense, but we made more mistakes and that was all she wrote.

 

[sufandu]

MD was better than us. They had a better QB, better WRs, were more disciplined, and had a more experienced staff. Yes we beat them last year, without their top 2 wideouts, and a beast interior DL for us. Well they got their wideouts back and there's no question this DL isn't as good as last year's. Losing Raymon to injury was huge. As for the other 2 games, no complaints about CMU. And Nova has proven they are not just a good FCS team, right now they look like an elite FCS team. They are 2-1, in their 2 wins they've put up 50 and 49 points. One of those games was against Fordham, who outside of the Nova game is smashing their opposition. They are 3-1 and have outscored their opponents in those wins by a combined score of 155-30, Nova routed them 50-6. Nova would beat most of the lower half BCS(do we still call them that, D1-A again?idk) teams this year, I'd bet on it. We managed to "beat" them without Hunt or 2 of our OL. It wasn't pretty and their kicker definitely lost the game for them in reg. We needed a few big plays in OT, we got them, Nova didn't and we won. I wouldn't call that laying an egg although to the casual fan who only listens to Mike and Mike in the morning, I'm sure it looked like one in the paper.

MD may have been better, but we didn't lose because of their talent. We lost because of our mistakes. We out gained them by 200 yards. I would love to know stats on which teams have had the most yards per point scored in a given game this year in the NCAA. Our game this past weekend has to be up there.

 

[DoctorBombay]

MD's defense was horrible and our offense had our way outside of the stupidness, but our Defense really had no answer for their offense either. Many predicted this to be a shootout, just nobody thought we'd shoot our own foot about 4 times while trying to get the gun out of the holster.

PS. I was the poster who also said we couldn't get out of our own way. Fact is our offense vs their defense was better than their offense against our defense, but we made more mistakes and that was all she wrote.

I think we're all on the same page and that's what's so frustrating. During the depths of the GRob ERROR, you knew going in you basically had no shot. We are now at the stage where we can theoretically anticipate wins in certain games, Maryland being a prime example. Honestly, we "should" be at a point where we beat teams like this, or if we lose, it's not mostly self-inflicted.

Note: sufandu was the "previous poster" I was referring to.

 

[ImperialOrange]

You missed some good discussion, actually.

Yeah, it wasn't all doom and gloomers. Frankly, there are quite a few reasons for optimism but requisite frustration because we screwed most of them up.

The board was much worse after we won against Nova because they outplayed us. Vs UMD, we were the better team and lost which just causes a lot of confussion as far as what to think to correct it.

 

[OrangeMojo]

MD's defense was horrible and our offense had our way outside of the stupidness, but our Defense really had no answer for their offense either. Many predicted this to be a shootout, just nobody thought we'd shoot our own foot about 4 times while trying to get the gun out of the holster.

PS. I was the poster who also said we couldn't get out of our own way. Fact is our offense vs their defense was better than their offense against our defense, but we made more mistakes and that was all she wrote.

their defense scored 24 pts, with 7 of those coming on a short field after a special teams collapse. There is just no way a bubble screen should go for 90 yards - ever. The coaches should have seen the defense wasn't prepared and called a timeout.

It seems that every time SU plays a well coached opponent with some offensive playmakers, they're down 2 scores before they even realize the game has started. It kills the spirit of the kids and the fans. I'm really worried about what Brian Kelly will have prepared to start off the game - this just feels like it'll be the exact same situation again and it'll be incredibly frustrating if that's the case.

 

[Upstate]

A lot of people over react after a loss, however, there is no way we should out gain a team by over 200 yards and lose by 2 touchdowns. The big plays given up in the passing game is a trend that goes back to last season. Our secondary is full of veterans. Everyone on this board knew they had big play threats at WR, yet we give up two long TD passes in the first quarter. That's unacceptable and it's on Shafer and Bullough because it's a trend that shows no signs of ending.

While that is true, it has nothing to do with coaching. The coaches put the players in position to gain a ton of yards, they just didn't finish it out. I guess Shafer and GM gave up a pick 6 in the RZ -- that and that alone could have been the 14 point swing SU needed to essentially tie the game.

 

[sufandu]

While that is true, it has nothing to do with coaching. The coaches put the players in position to gain a ton of yards, they just didn't finish it out. I guess Shafer and GM gave up a pick 6 in the RZ -- that and that alone could have been the 14 point swing SU needed to essentially tie the game.

I would agree if it was an isolated incident or if it was one player making repeated mistakes. It is a pattern that we shoot ourselves in the foot. Some of it is repeated mistakes by different players. Some of the mistakes are by different players in different ways, such as hunt not looking at the sideline long enough to get the whole play.

Some teams have a reputation for playing mistake free football. The reputation seems to remain as older players leave and are replaced by new guys. That's not simply players. That's a culture that is established by coaching. I fear that our culture that is being established is one of a lack of attention to detail and being mistake prone. It is happening too often and by too many different players to simply dismiss the coaches responsibility in it.

 

[Upstate]

I would agree if it was an isolated incident or if it was one player making repeated mistakes. It is a pattern that we shoot ourselves in the foot. Some of it is repeated mistakes by different players. Some of the mistakes are by different players in different ways, such as hunt not looking at the sideline long enough to get the whole play.

Some teams have a reputation for playing mistake free football. The reputation seems to remain as older players leave and are replaced by new guys. That's not simply players. That's a culture that is established by coaching. I fear that our culture that is being established is one of a lack of attention to detail and being mistake prone. It is happening too often and by too many different players to simply dismiss the coaches responsibility in it.

Find a team in the country that doesn't make mistakes. Go ahead. I'll give you as long a you'd like. I'm sure Shafer isn't coaching them to make mistakes. QBs throw picks, QBs/WRs/RBs fumble. Sometimes they are inopportune, sure, but its hard to play a mistake-free game every week. I'm not "selling" on SU yet. You don't pick up 569 yards on blind luck. You don't protect your QB extremely well on blind luck. You don't have one of the best rushing offenses in the country on blind luck. It's true, some players make mistakes that seem repetitive. It happens at every stage of the game and at every level. I'll say this about Shafer and Co. They play a high-risk, high-reward style on defense. Anyone who knows football knows that blitzing so much can leave you vulnerable in certain areas -- in which you just have to try to contain the big play, but it can also set you up for some great plays.

Football isn't exact and it'll never be perfect, regardless of staff or team or tradition. Boneheaded plays can be made by any player at any time. Both FSU and Clemson, two teams better than SU made huge mistakes at the end of the game. They're on par with eachother the way SU and Maryland are probably on par with eachother talent-wise. It just happens. As much as we hate the bubble screens, it helps open up the run game. As much as we hate not taking shots downfield, would we rather Hunt throw into coverage? I don't blame the staff, it's almost entirely player responsibility that may not be there next week. It may go away and come back. I like the team, I like the way they play offense, I like the OL, I like the run game and the pass game is adequate enough to keep some teams honest. Shafe's culture is a bit risky, but it evens itself out more often than not.

 

[sufandu]

Find a team in the country that doesn't make mistakes. Go ahead. I'll give you as long a you'd like. I'm sure Shafer isn't coaching them to make mistakes. QBs throw picks, QBs/WRs/RBs fumble. Sometimes they are inopportune, sure, but its hard to play a mistake-free game every week. I'm not "selling" on SU yet. You don't pick up 569 yards on blind luck. You don't protect your QB extremely well on blind luck. You don't have one of the best rushing offenses in the country on blind luck. It's true, some players make mistakes that seem repetitive. It happens at every stage of the game and at every level. I'll say this about Shafer and Co. They play a high-risk, high-reward style on defense. Anyone who knows football knows that blitzing so much can leave you vulnerable in certain areas -- in which you just have to try to contain the big play, but it can also set you up for some great plays.

Football isn't exact and it'll never be perfect, regardless of staff or team or tradition. Boneheaded plays can be made by any player at any time. Both FSU and Clemson, two teams better than SU made huge mistakes at the end of the game. They're on par with eachother the way SU and Maryland are probably on par with eachother talent-wise. It just happens. As much as we hate the bubble screens, it helps open up the run game. As much as we hate not taking shots downfield, would we rather Hunt throw into coverage? I don't blame the staff, it's almost entirely player responsibility that may not be there next week. It may go away and come back. I like the team, I like the way they play offense, I like the OL, I like the run game and the pass game is adequate enough to keep some teams honest. Shafe's culture is a bit risky, but it evens itself out more often than not.

Of course all teams make mistakes, but not all teams shoot themselves straight in the foot as often as we have recently. You know that's the truth.

 

[retro44]

the 90 yd pass was a backwards screen pass to a RB though

someone pointed this out the other day and was actually right that we had two guys covering 3 receivers on that side. The safety was very late to get in the play from up top. looks like brown checked into that play as I watched the play more than a few times over...great read on his part

 

[DoctorBombay]

Find a team in the country that doesn't make mistakes. Go ahead. I'll give you as long a you'd like. I'm sure Shafer isn't coaching them to make mistakes. QBs throw picks, QBs/WRs/RBs fumble. Sometimes they are inopportune, sure, but its hard to play a mistake-free game every week. I'm not "selling" on SU yet. You don't pick up 569 yards on blind luck. You don't protect your QB extremely well on blind luck. You don't have one of the best rushing offenses in the country on blind luck. It's true, some players make mistakes that seem repetitive. It happens at every stage of the game and at every level. I'll say this about Shafer and Co. They play a high-risk, high-reward style on defense. Anyone who knows football knows that blitzing so much can leave you vulnerable in certain areas -- in which you just have to try to contain the big play, but it can also set you up for some great plays.

Football isn't exact and it'll never be perfect, regardless of staff or team or tradition. Boneheaded plays can be made by any player at any time. Both FSU and Clemson, two teams better than SU made huge mistakes at the end of the game. They're on par with eachother the way SU and Maryland are probably on par with eachother talent-wise. It just happens. As much as we hate the bubble screens, it helps open up the run game. As much as we hate not taking shots downfield, would we rather Hunt throw into coverage? I don't blame the staff, it's almost entirely player responsibility that may not be there next week. It may go away and come back. I like the team, I like the way they play offense, I like the OL, I like the run game and the pass game is adequate enough to keep some teams honest. Shafe's culture is a bit risky, but it evens itself out more often than not.

Doubt if anyone is selling on this team, not at this stage. Another trend w/ our program is that we've gotten stronger as the season goes on. Hopefully that happens again and we sneak into another bowl. There is still the frustration of treading water in the "6-6 Zone" every year.That's what really pisses me off- when do we take the next step and become an 8-10 win team? :bang:

 

[CuseOnly]

MD may have been better, but we didn't lose because of their talent. We lost because of our mistakes. We out gained them by 200 yards. I would love to know stats on which teams have had the most yards per point scored in a given game this year in the NCAA. Our game this past weekend has to be up there.

They weren't better, they were better on 3 plays that happened to be the difference in the game.