TheTastyGreek

Bad news strikes again! Turn to proven coping skills... Can we blame his dad?

Sounds like a bizzarre celebration. But what if I want to go Outback tonight?

So I got a call from Quoner telling me I should break my vow to avoid political threads to check out this one. Frankly, I wish I had one of these things to put some more distance between me and what I just finished reading: crfGXmxJ1vM

Don't make me break out the search function again... There's a very vocal faction that does seem to think the coaches are super fantastic. "I believe in...", "They'll prove all the doubters wrong..." "He'll have us nationally ranked within ___ years..." and so forth and so forth. Insinuating or flatly stating that Todd Dodge was the real mastermind behind Gary Pinkel's offensive success. Long time posters (not just GGII in one of his trademark rants) suggesting more than halfway through last season that Dodge's contract should be extended even though there were still three and a half years left on it. I will say that I do indeed believe that we've got a fantastic defensive coaching staff. DeLoach, Nelson, Petersen... I like Buckels and I think that Rausch will grow tremendously working under Nelson. This is a hell of a staff, and my main reason for optimism this season is the proven ability of nearly every coach on that side of the ball. And I'll say that I'm a big believer in Leftwich on the offensive side of the ball. Gandy... The man's contributions as a recruiter alone make him a valuable member of the staff. Beyond those two, I don't have much nice to say, so I'll say nothing else about them here at all. Honestly, I don't want to see Dodge fail because I don't want to see us take a chance with a new defensive staff. The guys we've assembled... That's a phenomenal team of talent for a school with our budget and our recent struggles. If Dodge IS fired, any new head coach would probably want to bring in his own team of assistants. Anyway, I've lost sight of my point. I'm not going to put words in anyone's mouth... If nobody wants to wave the flag for Dodge here, I'll let it go. I'm pretty sure this isn't the last time this sort of stuff will come up.

Sounds very reasonable to me.

What does Orlando Mendez-Valdez have to do with anything?

The talent level is far greater. The coaches are light years beyond the ones we used to have. The schedule is arguably the most favorable one we've seen in a decade. That's what I've been reading, seeing, and hearing. So... What happens if this season is 4 wins or less? Not a prediction on my part, just a question. If the coaches are the right fit and the talent is head and shoulders above what we used to have... What do we do if the wins and losses aren't delivered this season?

I'm not listening to anyone. Just keeping my hopes high and my expectations at the level that has been established the past two years. But if you HAD listened to the experts the past two years, you'd have read outrageous predictions like this one: Hell, if Phil Steele really thought we were going to finish 2-10 or 1-11 in 2007, he should have come down here to see our team himself! Of course, he'd have seen us finish 2-10... With one of those wins coming in the last two games of the season... But, still! INDIGNANCE!!!

What do I think about a 5-7 record? I think that not just good, but GREAT things are happening for the Rangers! Sounds like their years and years of patience are finally paying sweet dividends to Rangers fans! (I missed you, KRAM. Really, no disrespect intended here. Also, I never pegged you for a Norma Rae, especially not for the cause of jackassery. Swing by the tailgate and we'll have a hot dog for you or something.)

Steele doesn't actually predict us to win 6 games. He has nine metrics he uses to predict wins and losses. Two of those nine put us at 6 wins. The actual prediction is less than 6, enough less that we're 7th in conference. But he does say that all six of our home games are winnable. The "Steele predicts us to win six games" thing is just a slight misunderstanding that's rapidly morphing into GMG fact. See here for my favorite example of how that works.

Other than Cam Montgomery, Gabe Hollivay, Kevin Dickerson, Alex Lott, Roderick Johnson, and of course Fitz and Santiago... That might just be true. Throw in Vizza, who wasn't exactly in over his head, or at least wasn't the reason for our offensive struggles until he left North Texas and everyone realized that they'd secretly hated him all along... And that leaves three other guys on the field. One of those was Coleman Feeley, who played in place of Tyler Bailey at Dodge's discretion. Also could have plugged 4-star/800 pound prospect Nate Jenkins in there if he'd shown up in shape, or maybe Robert Peachey or Ajani Banks if Dodge hadn't run them off before game one, year one. And another was J.J. Johnson, who started at center because our only other real option was Chad Rose, a guy who was barely good enough to start 24 straight games before Dodge showed up. That accounts for 10. But I'm sure that the other guy, whoever he was, was the single and sole reason that our offense struggled. Otherwise, it might seem like Dodge made it a point to play only guys who were his recruits or who he could effectively claim as his own products. Like Fitzgerald, since he hadn't earned his scholarship until Dodge showed up, and Santiago, who was originally recruited as a defensive lineman before Dodge officially moved him to the other side. Still, though... What you said is probably right. I'll just go over here and make some more fluffy kitten jokes.

Very true. Halfway through the season, a player's parent pointed out to me during a game that there were only two Dickey recruits seeing time on offense: Casey Fitzgerald, who never got to start under Dickey, and Estaban Santiago, who redshirted in his only season under the old coaching staff.

Ioyt2zzm530

The women, so long as they don't ever say anything. Otherwise, not much at all, sir. Not much at all.

Nope. D-1AA/Transitional D-1A. Think of it as 1 and a half-A. So technically, it might be a 4-A championship.

Cooley seems to think that this kid is a PG.

This quote made me realize... With one win over a D-1A school, and two wins against D-1AA schools... That's 5 A's! Chalk up another 5-A Championship!!!

Quoner already touched on this, but there's a big difference between one bad year and 4 years near, at, or slightly above .500 and two seasons of being arguably the bottom team in all of D-1A football, with only one D-1A win to show for the effort. I don't believe I've ever said Dodge should be fired... Yet. I've said his performance is so epically poor that it would be justifiable. I've said that if we DIDN'T fire him after the start he had, 120 years of NCAA football history says that there's only one example of a guy pulling himself out of a hole on the scale of what Dodge had dug for himself. But to answer your question, I'll be gracious enough to double the JJ learning curve. If Dodge finishes .500 this year, and the next two years, too... I'd support giving him a 6th year. But remember- Johnny Jones had ONE bad year, where he still won a quarter of his games. The other 4 seasons, he finished just one game under .500. So yes, if Todd Dodge gets through years 3-5 at one game under .500, I'm willing to give him year six to get us into the postseason. ---------- EDIT: Forgot to add that if Dodge has another season like the last two, I expect to see a new head football coach shaking hands with Johnny Jones at a big Super Pit introduction.

I seem to recall one of them being you. It is indeed funny how attitudes change. P.S.: Year six is when we won our SBC Championship, went to the NCAA Tournament, and started our three years and counting run of 20 win seasons.

I wouldn't count UTA... That's not really fair since they don't have a scholarship football program. Sub in Lockhart Stadium, "home" of the FAU Owls.

If your analogy holds, wouldn't that mean that there's a football Johnny Jones out there for us somewhere?

Vinko Bogataj got a tremendous amount of TV exposure, too. Seriously, though... I hope the Phil Steele analysis turns out to be accurate, I hope we beat Ball State and a whole lot of others. But this is a year where I'm going to have to see it to believe it. I was very, very optimistic going into the last two seasons, and I'm going to have to see some coaching improvement before I start getting excited about our prospects this year.

I'm not saying that people shouldn't be able to talk politics, either. But when I replied to Rick's post, there were 17 active threads from the day. And 10 of them not only had nothing to do with North Texas, they had nothing to do with sports of any type. Given how much political threads seem to have taken over the discussion lately, it doesn't seem unreasonable to set up a specific place for them.

Maybe if Green P1 had called, he'd be able to post, too.

That's true, but I think that you, like I and many other posters, use the "View New Posts" option to navigate the board. I've been making it a point NOT to read any of the political stuff, and it's tough to do without overlooking the actual sports threads. And I've only been back less than 24 hours. Also, if we split general discussion from Non-UNT sports, we wouldn't have to hide that forum from the public anymore.