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Memorable AB Comments from USC

104

Some great comments tonight that sum things up.

1. Riley needs to go Last Samurai and fire himself in shame.

2. This was a fucking disgrace about which nothing will be done.

3. So obviously this game will be defined by the hail mary that shouldn’t have been. I’ve been following this thread and lurking on this site for a while now but that ONE PLAY made me want to spam every OSU message boards with “Fire Riley!” posts than any other in recent memory. With that ONE PLAY, I think (HOPE!) we have reached the tipping point in Riley’s career at Oregon State. There is no way people watching this game see that unfold and maintain their support. If they do, then our fan base is truly as broken as our coaching staff.

4. Wonder how many times we get told tomorrow how lucky OSU fans are to have Riley as a coach. 500 times is the minimum

5. And this one I wrote on Twitter @Riley: Earth moves around the sun; we call this time. You can figuratively stop it by saying “time out” or making a T with your hands.

 

By the way, when I try to follow Riley on Twitter I get this message: “You have been blocked from following this account at the request of the user.” Nice to see coach is open to criticism and suggestions. I guess when you have everything figured out, as he clearly does, you don’t need the input.

The thing about this game is the Beavers could have won it. The score makes it look like a blowout, but it really wasn’t. The defense played okay and they should have been in it ’til the end. The usual suspects cost them chance at victory (again).

104 COMMENTS

  1. Riley is living in a fantasy world where he believes Mannion is better than he actually is. So he forces the passing game. Mannion is an average QB with some glaring limitations that become more obvious the more he’s asked to throw. Riley is so enamored he can’t see them, so he asks him to throw more. It’s a bad cycle.

    • Yeah, Riley and every analyst and commentator are all wrong about his arm strength and extreme accuracy when he has a few seconds to throw. Good thing you see through all the BS.

      What QB looks better than average when his line can’t block and his receivers can’t generate any space? Come on.

      • This isn’t based on one game. It’s his career. He’s Derek Anderson. He doesn’t have any signature wins in 4 years (unless you give him 10-7 over Wisconsin). Wilts in the spotlight (4INTs vs Washington in 2012, 4INTs in Civil War. He is now 0-8 vs Oregon, USC, and Stanford, which are the most meaningful games the Beavs play in any given year. Another big game vs Texas was a loss. Yet because he sets passing records (the byproduct of starting as a freshman), you want me to believe he’s a great QB? He cannot perform once the competition is good. He is the prototypical “Tweener” who will get drafted high due to his height and a dumb owner eating up the passing records, but he will be out of the NFL within 2 years.

    • Let’s not get on Mannion. The guy is a good QB. Game planning did him in. This was a game where logic stated that running should have been emphasized to take pressure of the QB. Coaches are responsible for giving players best chance to succeed. This is called game planning. Mannion was hung out to dry by the coaches.

      • Why is he a good QB? 0-9 in big games. A lot of passing yards vs terrible teams. Remember that 7-0 start vs bad teams, then his collapse once the competition improved? I’d say he is an average QB who LOOKS the part of a great QB but is not one. Sometimes stats are misleading, and this hype about his passing yards is just that.

  2. Interesting to see Mamma Machado pretty critical of the clock issues…could be end days for Riley if the media turns on him. They will beat CO, though, and everyone will forgive and forget this.

    • I wouldn’t be so sure about that one. I watched some of the CU/Cal game today and Colorado has every tool they need to beat OSU.

      It’s not like Riley is hard to scheme against.

    • Media is giving the team an unbelievable pass today from what I’m reading. Much excuse making for the injuries. I think it’s going to take a loss to CU for any fog to lift. Riley is so easy to work with, they don’t want him gone.

      • yep. That accessibility we all prize at spring ball and and during summer/fall camp; it’s actually a detriment to our long term strategic prospects.

  3. Bottom line: Riley peaked in 06-09. Those seasons, despite their frustrations, were solid and each had a chance to be more. Since then we’ve been declining. ’12 was a nice season that is now looking like a clear outlier.

    We have a balanced offense, but we ‘re calling plays like its an Air Raid. Sadly we have neither the personnel nor the play book for an air raid to function. Woods is playing great this year and we are not using him. Really hard to watch.

    Riley has lost it with regard to play calling, and he has regressed in in-game management. Time to give Garrett a shot. Can’t be any worse. If we’re stuck with Riley for years to come he absolutely must recognize and delegate his weaknesses.

  4. Couldn’t agree more Angry. Totally winnable game. USC did nothing to win the game, except for cash in on gifts. Ran into a few Beavers fans leaving the SC game and the “we gave it a good shot” and “Aw shucks I though we had ’em there for a minute” comments are pretty typical of a good portion of the fan base. This program really doesn’t know how to win and the Pollyanna fans don’t expect more. Getting f’ing sick of this. Fire Riley already!!

  5. Riley should just retire with grace (whatever grace he’ll have left, that is) after the season is over. Before he leaves, get Banker to take that job in Hawaii. Maybe then we can reboot with a new coach and inject some new blood into the program.

    I mean, he’s definitely not getting fired by Bob DeCareless.

  6. Not sure any game is winnable with less than 200 yards of offense. I really don’t get the “Mannion love” from the media and others. In my mind, he’s put up gaudy stats against some shitty teams with no gritty, signature wins in his tenure. I guess the plan is that he gets drafted by a NFL team with an unbelievable offensive live and amazing speed at receiver. He’s going to need it.

  7. Last night was a reality check re Mannion and Riley, and it wasn’t pretty.

    Sean Mannion won the passing competitions at the prestigious Nike and Manning 2014 summer camps. He throws the ball accurately and strongly when there is no one in his face. But under pressure last night on national TV at the Coliseum, Mannion (a 5th year senior and 4-year starter) looked and played at times like a scared rabbit. NFL scouts/teams have to be wondering whether this is fixable, or whether instead this is just who Mannion is — and always will be.

    And then there was the embarrassing failure by Mike Riley to understand and appreciate what Sark was doing at the end of the first half, when Sark had the USC offense take the field and start running the clock down from 20+ seconds to 1 second. Riley apparently did not understand that Sark was setting up a Hail Mary. Riley did not understand that you need to call a timeout to stop this from happening. And so it happened.

    It may be time for Riley to recognize and admit to himself that he has slowed down mentally (which does happen to some people at his age — 61+ — although certainly not all people at his age). This is evidenced by Riley’s slow play calling (leading to delay of game penalties), his repeated mismanagement of the clock under pressure, and the look of befuddlement one sometimes sees on Riley’s face during games. Degradation of mental capabilities is — of course — a very hard thing for anyone to admit to himself. It’s unclear whether anyone at OSU has the fortitude to raise this subject directly with Riley. But it’s becoming the elephant in the room, and needs to be addressed.

    • His mental decline in daily living activities is the elephant in the room on campus. Pat Summitt at Tennessee knew when to hang it up, but she did have a stronger AD who encouraged her to leave. People know it with Riley but won’t push it.

      • He may be slowing down and from what? If you slow down from being extremely clever, particularly bright, and having a high IQ, even if it’s only football IQ, you descend to, perhaps, average. If you start from where Riley in my mind has always been – very average to begin with, you end up with what we saw last night. I was listening on the radio – I thought Jim Wilson was going to jump through the sound system “They need to call time-out!.” This was at (I think) 47 seconds.

        • Wilson made a great point after the game too. Callan was insistent of getting Wilson to admit that the game was lost on the Hail Mary. What he said was, “the game was lost during half time. SC figured out what they wanted to do, apparently OSU didn’t”

      • Arony’s point about his mental decline being apparent to the campus community just begs for further elaboration and some true investigative journalism.

  8. Riley steps down. To be replaced by Danny Langsdorf, and Banker staying on as DC. Rumor has it Jonathon Smith returns as OC/QB coach, and Nick Barnett will be the team PED supplier and nutrition coach.

  9. Riley should have hung it up 4 or 5 years ago. The longer he coaches the closer he gets to his mean of .500 and the less legitimate his “legacy” becomes.

  10. Riley should have hung it up 4 or 5 years ago. The longer he coaches the closer he gets to his mean of .500 and the less legitimate his “legacy” becomes.

    True, empirical mediocrity.

  11. I should get credit for this thread!
    Angry you stole some of my candidates for post of the week, all good ones.
    What will happen first, Riley get fired or Beav4Life finds the caps lock key?
    Outcast calling the hail Mary play “Now going to give usc a shot @ hail Mary play instead of forcing to punt.”
    PDXBeav with “Hautau looks so overweight and slow.”
    Angry calling out fans who think they can see the whole field on their tv and determine that receivers aren’t getting open.
    But the winner of post of the week is MudnSticks quoting Timber! “Timber called it…. This is the type of game the Beavs tease us then usc athleticism breaks our back and takes it home because we didn’t capitalize. Ring a familiar bell?”

  12. Hey..beavblazer. Since you asked before the game. I will leave game commentary/fire Riley to others. Beating a dead horse, no need to pile on.

    Watching from the sidelines gives you whole new perspective on the game. First of all you sign a contract acknowledging that “game situations can be hazardous.” You absolutely need to pay attention and retreat quickly as the play comes your way. It’s not so much the ball carrier its the pursuit that will wipe you out. Being old and cowardly I “was outa there.”

    We were restricted to our quarter of the field to the left of the SC bench from their 35, where the team box starts to the goal line. So sometimes we were right in the thick of things, sometimes the game was a long way off. Plus its hard to see past giant lineman standing around.

    It’s fun to watch the mini-squad meetings that the position coaches hold, while their guys are waiting for the ball to change hands. Quick adjustments to counter whats happening on the field.

    From the opening kickoff you could feel the intensity but as the game progressed you could definitely feel that the SC bench and players were becoming relaxed to confident, that they were going to win fairly easily. Lots of banter, even a discussion of post-game plans.

    We left with about five minutes to go to beat the traffic and make it back to PS.

    • Of course none of this was new to you after spending your career on the sidelines, right coach?

      I almost won some sideline passes to the sdsu but was runner up, so instead i watched the winners from my comfy seat. It didnt look all that awesome how they were behind players and the chain gang all night, and the action on the field was often far on the other end of the field. still cool that you at least got to experience the song girls up close. Those tri-focal lenses probably came in handy.

        • Deservedly so. Maybe that’s why you only held the pass/punt/kick tryout in the quad only the first year.

          Because you’re going to find many more good players in the quad than are already on your roster.

  13. I stopped watching after the hail Mary.

    I’ll watch the rest later at my own leisure. But I knew the outcome when we went down by that much in that way at the half. If we would have been close, there would have been a chance. But oh well.

    • here’s the ultimate irony in my mind. Say the Beavs get that second touchdown and the hail Mary never happens. That team, coached by that coach, would have figured out a way to lose it.

  14. Watching our team loose a winnable game is bad, but seeing a bunch of cheap shots and unsportsmanlike play is a real embarrassment to our school. Can’t say i’m proud to be a Beaver when i see this crap.

    My prediction of a 4 win season is on track….. my hope is that the fans and alumni can rally for change.

    • What sucks eggs is that we’ll still probably win 8 or 9. Utah broke down. UW and SU suck. Cal and CU? Only 115 points boys? Zony Gig? Buh bye. No UCLA.

      Wazzu is the only team I’m afraid of at this point.

      If we can’t win five more of those, then what’s the point?

  15. Just got back from a week of elk hunting in Oregon’s Blue Mountains, and watched this game on my DVR. What a wreck of a game. Our offense looked surprised to be playing football. Why can’t we get a play sent in on time? And why can’t our QB not look at the play clock and call a timeout when he breaks the huddle with 4 seconds remaining? Why not run the ball against a porous run defense, instead of hurling it at a clearly under-qualified and depleted receiving core?

    I’m also beginning to think that all the BS about Mannion’s “quick reads” and “strong arm” is just him winding up and chucking it as hard as he can to a pre-selected receiver.

    What’s even more shocking is that this bullshit continues to surprise me.

    • “Why not run the ball against a porous run defense, instead of hurling it at a clearly under-qualified and depleted receiving core?”

      Because… just because.

      I’m going to change my handle to “Finding Identity.”

  16. There was a point in the first half where we were running the ball with success but killing ourselves with penalties. And the announcers were talking about how USC wasn’t using Buck Allen and how that was killing them. Then we started to play like a mid-major who was behind, and they started to use Allen.

    Why do we have to look like the JV team in some of these games? We don’t just lose. we look like the practice squad.

    • two comments on Eggers piece. (1) he, like all the beat reporters, has really glommed onto Mannion’s taking responsibility, “it’s all on me” cant. It’s rote PR folks. a form of coach-speak. means nothing. Don’t expect anything different going forward.

      (2_ Speaking of coach speak, Riley on the frustration evidenced in the late game penalties not being his deal. The seemingly hidden point there (I confess this is psych 101 from my freshman year) is that the players knew they were capable of doing better but “circumstances” stole that opportunity. In short, there were frustrated with the their leadership.

  17. I’m always amazed when watching the pros how the WRs and TEs are always 10+ yards down field and making second and third moves on the two count.

    I think anyone who wants to say they run a “pro-style” offense needs to not hold the ball for a five count and think they run a “pro-style” offense.

    Btw… this Martellus Bennet guy is pretty good. I wonder why he looked like a bust in the Big D.

  18. I’ll leave this here. Perfect summary of Riley’s repeated losing pattern:

    My take on this whole thing… (Long)  bhowren

    This was a serious debacle. I will give my opinion on things. Feel free to disagree. Position by position analysis: 
    Offense

    QB- Yes Mannion looked tentative, shaky, inaccurate. All those things are true! However, I don’t believe he was put in a position to succeed. When you have a QB who is having a bad game, the play calling should be adjusted in order to help him gain confidence and find success. When will our coaching staff figure out that in a Pro-style Offense you need to run to set up the pass. Our coach/es consistently refuse to commit to the run. This will continue to kill us in every big game against a decent opponent. USC is not that good, and they were able to destroy us due mostly to this facet of the game. Balance for a Pro-Style Offense like ours needs to be more run than pass! It not only makes the rest of the Offense more successful, but it controls the clock and keeps our Defense from being on the field most of the game, getting worn down.

    RB- Woods and Ward ran the ball well! They were taken out of the game by the play calling! Ward averaged 4.1 YPC and Woods averaged 6.8 YPC. Our fly sweep, like our passing game, needs to be set up by the run. If a team doesn’t have to play the run, there is no incentive for them to crash. This means the guy running the fly sweep has nowhere to go. Any time we started to get something going with the run, the play calling reverted back to the pass. It almost looked like we were purposefully trying to shoot ourselves in the foot by not running.

    Receiver/ TE- Receivers were covered all night long by multiple DBs. This is also a product of no commitment to the run. Corners and Safeties don’t have to play the run, if there is no threat of it. This leaves them free to blanket the receivers with double coverage. It is amazing how much better Receivers look when the Defense has to play for the run. All of the sudden players who couldn’t get open before look pretty good. There was also no threat from our Tight Ends! This further aided in making our Receivers look bad. The Tight End thing can partly be blamed on a lack of good pass blocking, but not all of it.

    O-Line- Yes they looked over-matched pass blocking. Again, this can be partly attributed to a lack of commitment to the run. When there is NO threat of the run, the Defense can pin their ears back and just worry about Pass Rushing the QB. This happened a bunch last night! I’m not convinced our O-Line isn’t Much Better at run blocking than pass blocking. It is hard to tell since by not committing to the run, they are not given their best shot at succeeding at pass blocking. We have some linemen that either need to learn the snap count, or be replaced! Enough already!

    Defense- I thought our Defense, for much of the game, played pretty well until they were worn out and dinged up.

    DB’s- Played pretty good coverage for much of the night. Did get worn out. Obviously had no idea what to do on a Hail Mary! A time out with 30+ seconds left should have made this play turn into a punt. Great kick return by Murphy!

    D-line- Did the job until they were dinged up (USC chop blocks didn’t help) and worn out. Starting to believe Boom needs to be an every down player. Disrupts things on a regular basis!

    LB’s- Played pretty well, but also wore out eventually. The whole Defense was eventually worn down and tried to arm tackle later in the game.

    Coaching- Grade would be an F-!

    I am convinced there will never be a commitment to the run under this coaching staff! I wish they would just quit saying they are going to do it in interviews. It isn’t true! 

    Our Head Coach needs to quit calling plays and concentrate on being a Head Coach! He spreads himself thin by concentrating on play calling, when he should be concentrating on the whole game. Other coaches may do fine with this, but he doesn’t. Let Garrett do the job you hired him for! He/we will never know if he is capable of doing it unless he is allowed to. When our Head Coach calls plays he loses focus on things in the game like clock management.

    At some point this week, work on defending the Hail Mary! We will see it again after that poor display of Defending it!

    I will probably think of more later, but for now rant over!

    • “I am convinced there will never be a commitment to the run under this coaching staff! I wish they would just quit saying they are going to do it in interviews. It isn’t true!”

      DING! DING! DING! DING! DING! Ding! Ding! ding….

      • The weird thing is they used to run too much. Like when they had Bernard…they’d feed him and Quizz too much, imo, given their size. But that was better than this.

        • Totally agree with this assessment. You can’t expect your defense to stay on the field as long as they did and not give up points. Again, so frustrating. We can never seem to put together a complete team. When our offense is good, defense sucks. When defense is good (now), offense sucks. We haven’t had a complete team since Erickson. So tired of it. Don’t want to hear any excuses either… there is no reason OSU can’t recruit a whole team.

          • I think this might be one of the most complete teams Riley has ever had; experience at the receiver position is the only thing that is glaring. The Oline could play better, but the physical capacity is there.

            Had Brandin Cooks stayed, this team would look different. And I don’t mean that as an excuse, I think their one WR away from completeness: ST coverage is good; legitimate DT size for the first time in several years, experienced OLBs, decent+ MLBs, Nelson at one corner, TEs, senior QB (who didn’t act like it) and the most depth and diversity Riley’s ever had at RB (Ward, Woods, Brown for speed, Haskins for toughness). Woods ran very hard last night but has to do that every game. He looked like he put the concussion issues behind him.

            Given the complexity in Riley’s schemes, he’s not going to have a better chance to have a special special season in the foreseeable future.

            I think the Moore-led Sun Bowl team was pretty complete for Riley recruiting. A senior Moore would have likely beat USC last night.

  19. Riley has always said that there’s more to being a QB than throwing the ball. He talks about in general terms about “quarterbacking” the team and “managing the game.”

    Last night, a 5th year, 4-year-starting QB had a chance to show those other qualities. Leadership, motivation, encouragement, decision-making, perhaps even telling Riley what he sees and advocating for running plays (I can’t recall ever seeing Woods run so hard in his OSU career). This was an opportunity to forge a running game identity. Mannion seemed to miss on the abundant and necessary opportunities to apply those skills.

    Instead, Mannion looked like he was just out for a reluctant ride on this car called “first team offense” and he didn’t want to go. Jesus Christ you have a great opportunity to beat USC on the road. Where was the fire?

    Judging by the look on his face on all night, I thought Mannion had just been dumped by his girlfriend and had been listening to Coldplay whines pre-game.

    Look for Riley to prop him back up in any potential blow out victory, if there is one.

    • “Last night, a 5th year, 4-year-starting QB had a chance to show those other qualities.”

      Mannion is also the first OSU football player to be chosen by his teammates as a captain three times. Last night’s nationally televised game at USC should have been Mannion’s moment to come up big and lead his team to the promised land. Instead, Mannion played one of his worst games, and often looked skittish — even scared — out there. Last night’s performance will likely haunt Mannion for a very long time. No joy in saying this — but these are the facts.

      • In mannion’s defense, he had never played at the colesium before last night and that was apparent…it’s a different animal where we don’t play well…

    • not a HINT of fire or leadership. truly pathetic. And to think some pro team is going to waste millions on him.

      As for Del Rio I have just this to say: what Kline’s status?

  20. The 08 Civil War was the end. It was obvious that Riley had peaked and anything gained from that point on was some stroke of luck that would soon end. The fact that it’s taken 6 years for others to come to that realization is why OSU will always be an afterthought in my lifetime.

  21. I was listening to Riley on 1080 the fan espn radio in Portland on Thursday after work(every Thursday around 5:15 pm) and he stated that he had still to yet WRITE OUT BY HAND his entire game plan…..apparently in 48 hours, Riley can’t write a complete game plan, recruit, watch film, coach practices, travel, and practice some more before game time…he’s over working himself and needs to learn to deligate duties to is hired OC and not be head coach and “OC”, time manager all at the same time…it’s apparent that john Garrett is a glorified QB coach with the title of OC.

    • Riley doesn’t actually do the game plan. He oversees the work prepared by assistants. He doesn’t recruit, he is the closer. Film is put together by others and broken down by the position coaches. Practices are mostly run by position coaches. His job being oversight. Travel, are you referring to planning his next vacation? Do you really think that he books the airlines and hotels himself? You have got to be kidding about being overworked. His problem is too much delegation and not enough hands on, dirt under the finger nails, sweat and snot leadership by example.

      • Have you ever met Riley? I have and he’s upfront and honest. He said he hand writes his gameplay and he helps out in recruiting, and what I meant by traveling is getting on the plane and flying to their destination and travel arrangements are done by the athletic department. He was in So. Cal Thursday night on a recruiting trip, so he wasn’t with the team…the team as a whole looked disorganised and distracted the whole night. They were fish out of water if you will.

    • “Gameplan. Date: Any. Opponent: Any.

      Run ball.

      If running ball at 4+ YPC or more, switch to pass.

      Pass.

      Pass more.

      Coach. M. Riley”

      That takes 24 hours?

  22. At this point I’d also say that Garrett needs to be in the booth and calling plays. He can talk to Mannion on the phone between series. His theory that his being on the sideline somehow helps Mannion is thoroughly debunked.

  23. I was struck by the comments by Sarkasian pregame…. basically that at USC it is EXPECTED to be great….to WIN….and that pressure is there all the time. Riley clearly just HOPES to be … just good. You can see it in his comments.

    You guys have nailed it. There might have been a time in Riley’s career when he could and would scheme to win a game like this, but that is GONE. He is a shell of a coach. Just going thru the motions. Very sad.

    Without the pick-6 and the hail Mary, its a winnable game, with just a bit of ordinary offense. But he put nothing into that. No touchdowns by the offense, with a career record holding QB. Pitiful. Just pitiful. Riley, you are a LOSER.

  24. Pollys at PO even starting to question Riley’s judgement, decisions, clock management:

    “OK, I really like coach Riley and have defended him to the ends of the earth, but today in the presser he said he didn’t take the time out at end of half because “SC would have had 3-4 tries”. Coach, it was 4th fricking down! What is going on with him? He also said ‘Now it seems we should have run more”. Is he watching the game?”

    Watching it more than coaching it I’d say….

    http://www.pure-orange.net/cgi/anyboard.cgi/bscpigskin2?cmd=get&cG=1333533313&zu=3133353331&v=2&gV=0&p=

    • he meant IF they got a first down

      On if he wishes he would have called timeout when USC had fourth-and-15 with about 30 seconds left in the first half before the Hail Mary:

      “I think you play with fire there, too. Because if they do indeed go for it and get the first down in that deal, then they’ve got a couple of shots either for the end zone or a field goal possibility. So you give them more plays. The only thing I wish now that I would have done was call timeout right when they got set up with one second to go. You still have to make the play, right? But I’d rather give them one play than three or four possibilities. I don’t think that that’s wrong.”

      http://www.oregonlive.com/beavers/index.ssf/2014/09/mike_riley_post-usc_im_not_gon.html#incart_river

      • Gazette has it different… Riley didn’t want to give them 27 seconds in case they got a first down with a chance to take 3-4 more chances after that, but what he does wish he would’ve done was call a timeout once USC lined up, but that’s hindsight. Riley didn’t think it was guaranteed they were going to punt the ball if he had called a timeout. Sark was hoping Riley would play into his hands by not calling timeout and Riley didn’t. If he had called a time out, that’s giving them options.

      • He was worried they would go for it on 4th and 15… and maybe make it?

        That is really fucking pathetic. Apparently we can add one more person to the list of those who just don’t believe in our coaches and players.

        • Agreed.

          An opponent going for it on 4th and 15 from midfield? It’s a low percentage play, which is why it happens so rarely in college and pro football games (heck, even in high school games….) Rather than being worried, a good coach would be licking his chops at the prospect of an opponent going for it on 4th and 15 from midfield. Go ahead, make my day!

          Riley being “worried” in this situation says volumes about Riley’s current state of mind and outlook. Riley seems to be coaching scared (analogous to the way Mannion appeared to be playing scared against USC). “Only the Bold”??

          • For the record, I believe in our players. That’s why I do not like the very obvious coaching deficiencies. Do not count me as someone who doubts our boys. Count me as someone who doubts the coaches have a clue.

            But this specific quote is the coach doubting his own team. This is the one guy who actually has the power and motivation to believe in our team and make that all apply to them by sheer will if necessary.

            This one quote is almost as bad as CR’s “if I get fired” quip. We as fans can lose faith or be fickle or pollyannas or constantly cynical or whatever. We are the single uncles in this family. We get to give gifts and praise and be weird or whatever. The coaches can never ever lose faith in their charges like this… or lose faith in their superiors like CR did.

  25. What bugs me was I actually believed. I truly believed OSU was gonna win last night. Right up till the point the Hale Mary TD.
    I will never be fooled again. BDC and Riley both need to go. New leadership is needed. We can only hope Tinkle is like Casey and raises his programs expectations on his own. If you raise them, you can achieve them.

    • There’s nothing wrong with believing OSU is going to win. Better to be overly optimistic than constantly looking on the dark side of things.

      And before anyone says they’re just being realistic, there’s a clear difference between realism and an overly negative outlook.

  26. Garrett today had some comments and I was left flaberghasted im disbelief. Everything he was talking about was routes and dropped balls and passing related aspects. Did not even mention running. Looks like Riley has him firmly indoctrinated to Happy Gilmore Passing mode.

    If this is the mentality of what went wrong and not the recognition that we needlessly and stupidly abandoned the running game when Storm was averaging 7.1 per carry but only got 9 touches, then I am afraid OSU is leaving themselves right back into a beaver trap.

    This is a road game and if Riley gets pass happy if we get down 7 points like he almost always does then we will be playing right into CU’s hands and could actually lose a game we gave no business losing. Run as often or more than we pass it and this is essentially a guaranteed win. Riley though won’t make it quite that easy.

    Run the ball people. Let Woods and Ward help carry the load with Sean and the passing and defense also will benefit and it all starts working. If Riley wasn’t in love with the ball in the air to his extreme level and took pride in having a running game on every series we can actually be a pretty good team. All about having a greater run game and having the toughness to grind out drives and keep the chains moving. Then the passes start working and players have the extra inches that they tend to make the catches. Run first and pretty soon the defense is guessing and play action and screens are hitting.

    This game will be close if we don’t get out to atleast a 10 point lead by early in the 3rd. I can see tgem hanging close to us and Riley starting to lean on the pass as usual which will make it anyone’s game down the stretch. Run enough and we can literally start to run away with the game and can win with relative ease.

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