It’s sadly time to stop discussing trannies and penixes and instead to focus on da Beavs. Here’s my game by game breakdown.

Boise St – W
Fresno St – W
Montanta St – W
USC – W
Utah – W
Stanford – L
Washington St – L
Colorado – W
Washington – W (and a broken Penix)
Cal – W
Arizona St – L
Oregon – W

So I have the Beavs breaking through this year with a 9-3 record. Last year I was spot on with a 7 win bowl team. Smith of course is the wildcard again this year. If he goes for 4th downs at the same pace, I think he costs us at least one game. Last year that figure was 1 game per the math, but if you watched the games it was at least 2. This year I do think he has slightly better talent so maybe one or two of those 4th downs go our way this year that didn’t last year.

Something else I’m going to be looking for is the Beavs finally winning those “if only he made that catch” and “if only he actually caught that interception instead of batting down the ball” type plays. I feel like we finally have the players in the system to complete plays. Those plays are the difference in games, and thus they become the difference in seasons.

Possible outcomes +/- 2 games due to Smith and the “if only” plays. In other words, I have the range of outcomes as 7-5 to 11-1, so I’m settling at 9-3. The brutal (and key) part of the schedule is Utah, Stanford, Washington St. On the road at Utah = physical game. Then they have to go play Stanford on the road. Physical game. So I think that makes Stanford a definite loss. Same reason I think Washington St is a loss. They likely won’t be recovered from that rough stretch until the following week. It makes winning the first 5 games key to the season. Falter there and again we could be looking at that lower end of 7-5 or so.

Let’s hear your predictions, etc.

Another Fall camp is upon us.  This might be the least tuned in I’ve been during a summer off-season, so I really don’t know what to expect out of this group this year.

On Offense:

Returning QB (but may have already hit his ceiling)
Replacing a couple OL
Replacing RB1
Most productive WRs are returning.
Replacing TQ

On Defense:

DL should be stronger
DBs should be stronger
Replacing ILB1
OLB should be stronger
New DC

What are you hoping to see out of this camp?  What are your expectations for the season?

Also, sounds like we should have a few more verbal commits in the month of August.

I’m hoping to enjoy another month of Summer before really getting into football season. Hope that’s not OSU’s approach.

Go Beavs!

I posted this in the prior thread, but might as well make it it’s own thread:

I remember years ago writing that it made no sense (from the rest of the conferences standpoint) to have OSU in conference sharing revenue when they don’t really contribute any. Said they should ditch OSU. I was told that would never happen because (a) they were an original team and (b) these teams had academic and cultural similarities that trumped money.

Need to find the post and comments. You guys remember this talk? Must have been 10 years ago during the expansion.

Here we are…the other teams finally realized it. People can blame Larry Scott all they want, and he was bad, but you know what’s worse? Years of losing, having your media support that because they want access to coaches over excellence, and not to rock the small town vibe. OSU is getting the results of everything the fans demanded and asked for. Not everyone here, but the fanbase at large wanted and rigidly supported things that lead to this. OSU has OSU to blame. Now it’s see if the BIG12 lets us teet suck for a while, but my guess is they’ll see the same problem with us. My prediction is everyone but Washington state and OSU join the Big-12. Only hope is Oregon demands we come along…