Official 2015-2016 college football thread

[HORNS]



It's time to put JT Barrett in.

You're so histrionic.

 

[MrG]

So, fellow Dawgs, what's the feeling on our esteemed head coach? I'm a huge Richt fan, and I want very badly for him to be The Guy, but I'm not sure how much longer I can wait. The complete faceplants in big games are bad enough, but I'm more worried about the big picture. We've been the close-but-almost kids for half a decade now (more, really). At what point have we given him enough time to get over the hump? Have we already? If not, could this season get bad enough for you to advocate for his ouster? If so, what is "bad enough?"

I'm not sure where I fall on this. I'm incredibly grateful for what Richt has brought to our program (I remember the 90s), and I know a new coach isn't a guaranteed upgrade. On the other hand, it really seems like Richt upgraded us enormously early on and now might be stuck in the wrong gear, and UGA is the type of place where someone like a Saban or a Meyer could come in and build a dynasty.

Paging @nerdykarim and @Gibonius.

Ugh, I just saw the injury.

Yeah. It was awful. Like potentially Lattimore-esque. I hate it for him.

 

[HORNS]

Richt's been on the hot seat every damn year - I've seen it discussed on fora every year. It's hard as hell in the SEC, so if you want to not just have a competitive team but have a National Championship team you will have to find "that guy", and I don't think injuries are an excuse enough for Richt.

 

[nerdykarim]



So, fellow Dawgs, what's the feeling on our esteemed head coach? I'm a huge Richt fan, and I want very badly for him to be The Guy, but I'm not sure how much longer I can wait. The complete faceplants in big games are bad enough, but I'm more worried about the big picture. We've been the close-but-almost kids for half a decade now (more, really). At what point have we given him enough time to get over the hump? Have we already? If not, could this season get bad enough for you to advocate for his ouster? If so, what is "bad enough?"

I'm not sure where I fall on this. I'm incredibly grateful for what Richt has brought to our program (I remember the 90s), and I know a new coach isn't a guaranteed upgrade. On the other hand, it really seems like Richt upgraded us enormously early on and now might be stuck in the wrong gear, and UGA is the type of place where someone like a Saban or a Meyer could come in and build a dynasty.

Paging @nerdykarim and @Gibonius.

For me, cfb is more than big wins and national championships. It would take a couple of consecutive 3-4 win seasons for me to jump on the "Fire Mark Richt" bandwagon. Realistically, it will never happen.

I really hope Nick Chubb can play football again.

Frankly--and y'all know how much I love CFB, given my posts in the SF CFB thread for the last few years--I think high school and college football are just too dangerous to be played. I'm very conflicted about how much I enjoy watching on Saturdays in the fall. I think my stance on football, generally, affects my opinion on the CMR "hot seat" issue...

 

[venividivicibj]

Oregon wtf?

 

[venividivicibj]

Ahh guess their QB is still out.

 

[edinatlanta]

So I always love this talk about UGA and CMR for multiple reasons and I always like to point out a few things...

First: UGA has finished the season with a mean BCS ranking of 8.7. That number is slightly skewed because 1 (I might have missed one year of them being ranked but I don't think so--slightly buzzed) and 2 (the 2001 BCS poll only went to 15 but they ended the AP poll at 22--that with Donnan players). That's twice as number 3 in the nation, six times in the top 10 and only three unkranked at the end seasons. Continuing the arbitrary numbers theme: there's 8 times UGA has been in the top 15 in the country. The mode is 7.

Second: in that time they've had to face the tail end of Tennessee as a serious program, a Florida program that probably had the greatest college-system QB of all time, USC with the only legitimate sings of life in its program's history, Auburn on two national championship runs, and the SEC when it's been on it's toughest 12-year run ever.

Third: they've had some really poorly-timed injuries that have set the season back. That's a strength-and-conditioning coach issue not so much a HC issue (and IIRC correctly, UGA did not have such a coach until recently).

Fourth: Mike Bobo.

Fifth: could some coach have done better? Yeah, maybe. But ****, UGA's had a phenomenal run under CMR. If you're upset over their performance, like, I don't know what to say. IT's kind of like the kid in HS who whined about getting a new Caddy when he wanted a Benz. Sorry I'm not sorry. Lose homecoming to an FCS team after a byeweek.

Anyway, it's hard to have too much sympathy for UGA. I don't mean that in an antagonistic way just that... sorry you guys have merely been very good with spurts of excellence for 15 years.

 

[Gibonius]

Well said edina.


I'm not an old school Georgia fan, but I feel like some people who were fans back in the 80s have this vision of Georgia as this dominant program. Dooley won because Herschel was an otherworldly college player, just like Mack Brown won because of Vince Young. Georgia's been damn good, but never "good enough" for Richt's whole career. Maybe damn good and fishing for that transcendental year is the best we can reasonably hope for.

From the program's side, I suspect they're still making money hand over fist. I believe Mack Brown got booted because it got bad enough that the big boosters turned on him. If that doesn't happen at UGA, I think he's safe.


Also, damn but we've had an astronomical run of bad injuries. Marshall, Gurley, Murray, Cubb, bunch of second rung guys. It's nuts.


The other thing to consider with Georgia is that Richt has principles, and has to cost the team wins. We've kicked off a LOT of players that ended up having damn good careers somewhere else. They're all scum, but it seems like programs that want to win tend to look the other way for a couples win, pull their trophies, and then let everything implode. We had AJ Green sitting on the bench for bullshit, while guys like Jameis are playing through the season hoping that it doesn't blow up and invalidate all those wins.

 

[HORNS]

Been some very good games today - I've been in front of the TV for 12 hours.

 

[HORNS]

1989:

 

[ReubenR]

For me, cfb is more than big wins and national championships. It would take a couple of consecutive 3-4 win seasons for me to jump on the "Fire Mark Richt" bandwagon. Realistically, it will never happen.

I really hope Nick Chubb can play football again.

Frankly--and y'all know how much I love CFB, given my posts in the SF CFB thread for the last few years--I think high school and college football are just too dangerous to be played. I'm very conflicted about how much I enjoy watching on Saturdays in the fall. I think my stance on football, generally, affects my opinion on the CMR "hot seat" issue...

I'm incredibly conflicted on this. I agree that it can be a very, very dangerous game but I also feel that a significant amount of the long-term danger comes from a lack of education amongst coaching staff and an outdated culture that leads to players being told to "walk it off". Then again I can't see that attitude being changed anywhere near as quickly as it needs to be without fairly strict enforcement and regulation . . .

Our Athletic Training staff is actually doing some really interesting work with collision detectors in helmets, I'm looking forward to seeing where that goes. I think it's no exaggeration to say that Ron Courson is one of the top 5 or 10 head AT's in any collegiate or professional sport and one of UGA's most underrecognized strengths.

So I always love this talk about UGA and CMR for multiple reasons and I always like to point out a few things...

First: UGA has finished the season with a mean BCS ranking of 8.7. That number is slightly skewed because 1 (I might have missed one year of them being ranked but I don't think so--slightly buzzed) and 2 (the 2001 BCS poll only went to 15 but they ended the AP poll at 22--that with Donnan players). That's twice as number 3 in the nation, six times in the top 10 and only three unkranked at the end seasons. Continuing the arbitrary numbers theme: there's 8 times UGA has been in the top 15 in the country. The mode is 7.

Second: in that time they've had to face the tail end of Tennessee as a serious program, a Florida program that probably had the greatest college-system QB of all time, USC with the only legitimate sings of life in its program's history, Auburn on two national championship runs, and the SEC when it's been on it's toughest 12-year run ever.

Third: they've had some really poorly-timed injuries that have set the season back. That's a strength-and-conditioning coach issue not so much a HC issue (and IIRC correctly, UGA did not have such a coach until recently).

Fourth: Mike Bobo.

Fifth: could some coach have done better? Yeah, maybe. But ****, UGA's had a phenomenal run under CMR. If you're upset over their performance, like, I don't know what to say. IT's kind of like the kid in HS who whined about getting a new Caddy when he wanted a Benz. Sorry I'm not sorry. Lose homecoming to an FCS team after a byeweek.

Anyway, it's hard to have too much sympathy for UGA. I don't mean that in an antagonistic way just that... sorry you guys have merely been very good with spurts of excellence for 15 years.

In my opinion, this is by far the most legitimate criticism of Richt. The strength-and-conditioning coaching issues were self-imposed. As much as I love Coach T and Coach Kasay as individuals and as damn colorful characters around the locker room, they didn't have anywhere near the knowledge or level of training required to run S&C for a top-level college football team. There's a good reason 70's and 80's training programs weren't being revived by any other team, and it probably starts with squatting multiple sets to failure, multiple times a week, during the season.

As far as firing CMR goes, there's no way I could defend that. I'm not going to try and weigh in on the football side of things but I can without a doubt say that Coach Richt is one of the best men I've ever met. He truly and deeply cares for every player on the team and his concern goes well beyond their performance on the field. I'll take an 8-10 win team with transparent and consistent disciplinary policy and a concern for player wellbeing that extends past their eligibility any day of the week.

 

[venividivicibj]

Re concussions - UCLA had concussion monitors in their helmets, and practices with those soft shell things.

 

[nerdykarim]

This sort of opens up a rabbit hole, but I think the issue is much bigger than just concussions. My understanding is that there's consensus in the medical community that repeated subconcussive impacts can cause cte (see e.g. 1, 2).

Additionally, for many players, these hits start in middle school and high school--where coaches are significantly less experienced in teaching block and tackle techniques (and there is more variability in the protective technologies available to players, on a school-by-school basis).

Reuben is definitely more knowledgeable than I am with respect to both the physiological elements and also the operational/football elements at play, so I'll defer to him on the science. But even though I have come to love cfb since I've been in grad school in Athens, it's hard for me to get over how damaging it is for many players (let alone all the ligament injuries and all the other stuff that can happen on the field).

 

[nerdykarim]

In less morbid news, next week should be awesome.

(6) LSU vs (8) Florida
(7) MSU vs (12) Michigan
(9) TAMU vs (10) Bama
(15) Stanford vs (18) UCLA
(17) Iowa vs (20) Northwestern

(13) Ole Miss vs (27) Memphis
(4) Utah vs (28) ASU

It'll be another Saturday in which I sit in front of the computer and try to do research while constantly distracted by good cfb.

 

[ReubenR]

This sort of opens up a rabbit hole, but I think the issue is much bigger than just concussions. My understanding is that there's consensus in the medical community that repeated subconcussive impacts can cause cte (see e.g. 1, 2).

Additionally, for many players, these hits start in middle school and high school--where coaches are significantly less experienced in teaching block and tackle techniques (and there is more variability in the protective technologies available to players, on a school-by-school basis).

Reuben is definitely more knowledgeable than I am with respect to both the physiological elements and also the operational/football elements at play, so I'll defer to him on the science. But even though I have come to love cfb since I've been in grad school in Athens, it's hard for me to get over how damaging it is for many players (let alone all the ligament injuries and all the other stuff that can happen on the field).

Yeah, that's part of why I'm so impressed with the research they're doing! They're looking at all the impacts, not just the big, concussive ones. I'll be interested to see the results when they're done with everything. The cumulative subconcussive impacts are what really affects the guys in the trenches, too. You rarely get a big hit on a lineman like you see between the skill guys, but you get a lot of those smaller ones, even more in practices. One of the things I think would make a huge difference is regulating the number of full-contact practices per week in high school and I wouldn't be surprised if some changes like that were in the pipeline.