Go Beavs!

So what do you guys think?

I fall into the “Beavs have a shot in this game” camp.

Washington State is a solid team, but the Beavs have toughened up as the year’s gone on. It seems like GA and the team are finally in sync — the players seem to want to give him as much effort as they can, and, in general, soak up as much information as they can. Good sign. GA, meanwhile, is maximizing the roster talent pretty well (minus the QB situation, which is the glaring weakness/disaster).

The formula for victory should be self evident: run the ball, wear down the clock and the WSU D, and then disrupt Falk’s rhythm. Oh, and catching passes sure would help. A lot will depend on injuries. Nall and Decoud being the key injuries. If the Beavs had a healthy roster (depth), I’d think we’d see a string of good games to end the year, but these injuries might derail that.

If McM isn’t good this week, we can start to deduct he’s just not very good. There should be opportunities to make plays. I thought he was okay last week given the situation.

My initial reaction is close game, with WSU winning by 4 to 7 points, but let’s see how the injuries play out.

It’s interesting how week to week the mood changes during a rebuild. Everyone is waiting for that “ah ha!” moment where there’s tangible evidence things have turned the corner. Versus Washington, you could see it in things like effort. But just a few weeks prior everyone was ready to jump ship, myself included. Many of us haven’t gone through a complete rebuild like this with a new coach, so we don’t know that this all comes with the territory. Or if we do know (via watching other teams do it), we want to skip steps and get to the fun part. Lesson learned, for me at least.

I can definitely see improvement. That’s what I wanted to see this year and it’s there.

On a side note, I told a reader who wrote me privately that Oregon and Stanford remind me of Apple. In that, when Steve Jobs died, Tim Cook was asked not to rock the boat but to just keep it steady…and basically not fuck it up. It’s lead Apple down a path of zero innovation, only not wanting to mess up what Jobs created. Oregon and Stanford are the same. Both coaches are running the prior coaches schemes and just trying not to fuck up the juggernauts. Helfrich even uses “win the day”, a Chip Kelly slogan. Shaw is finally being exposed as all Harbaugh’s guys have now left and the toughness they instilled is gone. GA is doing the opposite of these coaches. He’s rocking the ship to the point he’s flipped it over and we don’t even recognize it anymore. IMO this is better because with it comes the freedom to follow your own vision rather than another coaches.

On another note, we see how important the QB position is yet again as Oregon goes into decline the moment they have QB issues. People in the prior thread were asking if we’d prefer a mobile QB or a passing QB. Definitely a passing QB. I’d like someone to ask GA how he prioritizes the “win with this arm, mind, legs” line. It should be in this order: mind, arm, legs. OSU fans have suddenly put a huge priority on running QBs. Historically they aren’t very good players and we should not fall into that trap. The mobile QB is a siren.

3:30 on pac-12 network.

Go Beavs.

I feel like people hate this guy for some reason. Most fans seem to be hoping he fails this weekend so they can say, “See, told you he stinks.”

They also don’t seem to understand this guy was highly recruited.

When he has a good game (Civil War, Utah), it gets spun that he had a bad game. When he has a bad game, nobody seems to realize it’s because of drops or bad play calling (e.g. the screen vs San Jose State). It’s like the guy can’t win.

He literally has to go out and throw for 250-300 yards and beat Washington for anyone, including his coaches, to gain his respect. Meanwhile, everyone had respect for Garretson even though he wasn’t highly recruited and played in a lowly conference. Even now after 6 bad games people like Garretson over McMaryion, in general. They’re willing to make up excuses for Garretson (bad line, wind, drops etc), yet McM gets no benefit of the doubt with his many valid excuses, the least of which is that he gets throw into awful situations where he is likely to fail constantly. Why do these other QBs get a long leash and McM get the short leash? Where does this bias come from? His career numbers aren’t good, but stats do frequently lie or at least tell an incomplete story; given the situations he’s been put in it’s impossible to deduct from the stats. But he passes the eyeball test throwing every time.

Anyway, he gets another tough draw this weekend in Washington. I’m not convinced Washington is unbeatable and a powerhouse. They’re a good team, but Arizona stinks and they hung with them. If McM moves the ball and the D plays like they did last week, the Beavs will be in the game, at least for a half before they tire.