BN Blogpoll Draft Ballot - Week 5

by Nestor on Sep 25, 2006 10:05 AM PDT in Football

Here is my draft ballot for blogpoll ballot weak 5. Obviously Dorrell's program doesn't deserve to be anywhere in this list.

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Ohio State	--
2	Auburn	--
3	Southern Cal	--
4	West Virginia	--
5	Florida	--
6	Michigan	2
7	Texas	1
8	Georgia	1
9	Louisiana State	--
10	Louisville	1
11	Iowa	1
12	Oregon	1
13	Virginia Tech	1
14	Notre Dame	1
15	Tennessee	1
16	Oklahoma	4
17	Clemson	1
18	Cal	3
19	TCU	3
20	Boise State	6
21	Purdue	5
22	Florida State	3
23	Boston College	6
24	Rutgers	2
25	Missouri	1

Dropped Out: Alabama (#18), UCLA (#19), Wisconsin (#23), Arizona State (#24).

Honestly I am not in the greatest mood to offer my thoughts on what happened around the country in the world of college football. But thoughts on couple of games are worth mentioning with our team in context:

Notre Dame: I am not sure where I fall in WRT to Willingham/Weiss debate. I am not that enamored with Willingham. I think he got Stanford team to the Rose Bowls in a decade when Southern Cal and UCLA were fielding weak teams. Perhaps he has the Huskies back on track. But make no mistake about it. The result of the UCLA-Washington game had lot more to do with Dorrell's incompetence than Willingham's great coaching. Now going back to Weiss, the Irish-Spartans game showed to me what it is like to have a coach, who the players and the fan base believe in. Simply put the Irish never quit. They were not holding back in a dire situation. Last year Bruins were running up the gut when Mildcates were walloping us in the desert. Yet there was Weiss going for it on 4th downs. From SMQ (via Rakes of Mallow):

SMQ isn't sure, for example, that Notre Dame can win a big game without fourth downs, as it hit two more critical conversions in its comeback in the rain-soaked yet defensively barren thriller Saturday night: when he says they have a very small margin of error, it's because the Irish always seem to be against the wall - on plays like the 27-yard fourth-and-one connection to John Carlson in the second quarter, immediately preceding a Jeff Samardzisosopo touchdown, and later the fourth quarter, fourth-and-five that Samaradzizjaija singlehandedly took 43 yards against flailing defenders to kick off the comeback - and delivering. ND was perfect on four fourth downs against Penn State, remember, and scored after all of them. Many teams wouldn't attempt or wouldn't convert those plays, especially not in such dramatic fashion, and difference in those teams and Notre Dame is often only that the Irish thrive on those crunch plays. Certainly they wouldn't have been anywhere near the victory without them Saturday.

Well we know our spineless, cowardly coaching staff wouldn't make those calls. And to make excuses they would point the fingers at their QB, who apparently needs to be babied despite being a 23 year old, red shirt sophomore, who was the number 1 player out of high school.

CU v. Georgia: You wouldn't see Mark Richt making those kinds of excuses who rode the arm of his third string QB, red shirt sophomore Joe Cox to pull of a thrilling win against Dan Hawkins' scrappy and outmanned Colorado football program. The difference between a loser like Dorrell and an elite coach like Richt? Here is CAJason80:

Saturday is far and away the best example I can give of the coaching gap between UGA and UCLA. UGA's struggling against Colorado nearly the entire game, and I swear, I wasn't really all that worried. In the back of my mind, the whole time, I was thinking "Don't worry, Richt will figure out a way to pull this one out." And what does the man do? He makes a quarterback switch towards the end of the 3rd quarter which sparks the team, and the Dawgs pull it out against Colorado with under a minute remaining. Dawg fans often complain about some of Richt's play-calling, but the bottom line is the man just knows how to win, and when it comes to dictating pace, momentum, and belif in the team, he gets it done.

Contrast that with UCLA's debacle on Saturday. Is there any doubt that Dorrell is in way over his head? The man looks like a deer in headlights in every critical play-calling juncture, and even worse, he actively seeks out to destroy confidence and momentum for the team. Not even once do you consider going for it on 4th and goal from the 5 yard-line and in? Do you have that little faith in your offense? That little faith in your defense to hold a team if somehow you don't score?

The worst flaw about Dorrell is he has so little imagination it almost boggles the mind. Adjustments seem to be way beyond the scope of his intellect. I wonder what he does at halftime sometimes, while all other coaches are making adjustments. He seems to be so singularly focused on whatever gameplan he comes in with, no matter the adjustments made at halftime, he fails to react.

Contrast that with someone like Richt: gameplan not working? Quarterback struggling? He makes adjustments and the team is better off for it.

I don't have anything to add to that.

As for the blogpoll lemme know if there are adjustments that needs to be made. And as always please use facts to make your case.

GO BRUINS.

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Comments

KD and the job

It is obvious that creativity, daring, risk taking during a game (when millions can be watching as well)are all characteristics of someone who has confidence and experience. ND HC has it. SC PC has it. When UCLA hired its new head coach, the AD sat in on the interviews for the assistants, as you remember that many of them were head coaches before coming to Westwood. So the AD knew he was putting someone in a tough situation. Since then the coaching staff has turned over, the new assistants have more traditional assistant backgrounds, and exposed the vulnerabilities of the current situation. If the school can be patient, maybe something good will happen, but week in and week out, it will be a crapshoot for now, IMO.

BillSouthBay

by Mensgym on Sep 25, 2006 11:18 AM PDT reply actions

I Don't Get the Georgia Comparison

Georgia sleepwalks through almost the entire game, allows a vastly inferior team to hold the lead all day, then is lucky enough to pull it out right at the end.

That's supposed to be a contrast to what KD's teams do? I think Mark Richt should have to pay Dorrell royalties.

by vanaaron on Sep 25, 2006 1:23 PM PDT reply actions

Good teams have bad days

The difference is...good teams (and good coaches) know how to win those games.

Keep in mind Georgia also had its team in the hands of an inexperienced freshman quarterback. He's going to have days where he can't move the ball. He's going to have days where he looks clueless. Saturday was one of those days.

The thing - to me, at least - that shows the difference between Dorrell and Richt is that Richt made some adjustments that ultimately allowed the team to win. Richt also had a great track record of dealing with quarterbacks and quarterback struggles (see: DJ Shockley and David Greene). As a result, the team has faith in him. They trust his decisions.

After Stafford was pulled in the 3rd quarter, he admitted that he was struggling and it was the right decision.

Contrast that now with Dorrell: Can you imagine anyone on UCLA standing up for one of Dorrell's decisions in the same way? Hardly. Dorrell might be a 'nice guy', but he doesn't seem to engender a whole lot of respect. Olson has struggled a bit in the past couple of weeks, and to me, it appears that all Dorrell has done is destroy the kid's confidence. 3rd and goal from the 10? Run the ball.

You mine as well post a big sign up on the JumboTron that says "Hey Ben, we think you suck."

Now, I'm not pinning everything on Dorrell. One of the great things about Georgia football is that we have a plethora of talent. But yet another thing I see in terms of gaps between UCLA and UGA is a huge leadership gap. In the 4th quarter of the Colorado game, after Cox had come in to sub for Stafford, he went into the huddle and said "14 points is nothing. If we can't score 14 points, we don't deserve to wear the G's on our hemlets."

Keep in mind, this sort of leadership was coming from the 3rd string quarterback. On UCLA? Too many indians, not enough chiefs.

Some of that lies with the players, but at the college level, a lot of that also lies with the coach. Keep in mind these are 18-22 year-old kids, not NFL players. Leadership has to be groomed and nutured by the coaching staff at the college level to a certain extent. We're not seeing that, especially this year.

by CAJason80 on Sep 26, 2006 1:35 AM PDT up reply actions

Destroying BO's confidence

You may be on to something CA.

This kind of reminds me (again) Lavin destroying Ced Bozeman's confidence when the kid was billed as the next great pg out of Westwood. Lavin misused him and ended up totally screwing up the kid mentally until Howland saved him by coaching him up.

by bluestreet on Sep 26, 2006 6:56 AM PDT up reply actions

I agree . . .

that Richt showed a lot of faith in his young quarterbacks. It's fair to contrast that with UCLA's meek play-calling Saturday, which not only hurt our chances of winning the game, but may also have hurt Olson's confidence.

I do not agree that Georgia managing to pull out a close game against an inferior team demonstrates that it has better coaches. UCLA pulled out a whole series of close, come-from-behind wins against inferior teams last year, so if that is a sign of great coaching, KD should have been Coach of the Year.

by vanaaron on Sep 26, 2006 8:25 AM PDT up reply actions

I would still drop Georgia a couple of slots

Probably more around 11 or 12 than 8. Our only rather convincing victory has been against South Carolina, who just barely beat Wofford - and....uh....the Colorado game wasn't exactly a shining moment.

I think to me the Colorado game shows that the QB position is and will continue to remain a huge variable for the team. Stafford has enough natural talent to take the team to a BCS game; that said, he's still a freshman, and he's likely going to have a couple more of these "I have no clue what I'm doing" games.

The defense will carry the team this year, and for all the accoldaes they received after the USC/UAB games, this defense still isn't quite as potent as the Van Gorder-coached defense of 2002.

I would also struggle to rank Florida State while leaving out Georgia Tech. While I loathe the Jackets, it's becoming more difficult to argue they easily could challenge for the ACC Coastal crown in a very weak division this year. This weekend's game is the big test for them.

by CAJason80 on Sep 26, 2006 4:06 AM PDT reply actions