FirefightnRick

I agree with most of your oppinions on this subject other than this statement gangreen, in that Danny isn't taught to "READ" defenses in this system like what most would believe. Let me explain. For years we have been wondering why our passing seems so watered down? It became apparant to some that Hall/Smith never seemed to audible. Plus, if we pass, we pass regardless if the reciever was there or not, unless the QB is forced to run. Later on in his carreer Hall learned to throw it away more if the reciever on that side of his rollouts(ALWAYS an indication of a pass...ALWAYS) was covered. Finally, last year there was a report on Scott Hall, DD, Flanigan and our offense and it revealed what many here had guessed for years. In the report Hall admitted to the reporter that, unlike most high schools, we do not allow our QB to audible out of the play. Scott stated he could change which side the play is to go to, but he could not audible out of the called play. It explained a lot, at least to me it did. Therefore, it is my oppinion from the fact that this inept offense not only handcuffs the most powerful weapon on the field, the QB, from allowing him to change the play at the line of scrimmage, I also do not believe the QB checks off recievers. One reason for this oppinion: You never see our QB's roll out and throw towards a covered WR(either throwing it away or forcing it, making a bad read) while everyone on the sideline and in the stadium is yelling for him to look at some other reciever that the defense allowed to slip by and getting wide open. You know those: AH, look, look, look, he's wide, he's wide, Ahhh No, no damnit he was wide open!!!! type of plays. I know this doesn't happen a lot of times with other programs, but you see it now and then. Never at NT. Also, The "OTHER" reciever knows the ball isn't coming his way so you always see him get down field, clearing his man, then start to block with his back to the ball. If he was an option, he would be trying to gain separation by continuing his route or coming back, instead of blocking away from the play. Read those last two lines...again. If you have watched enough Mean Green football these past 8 years, this makes perfect sense for what you have seen. I would like to propose a question to everyone. Not including punters or Brian Waters, who's the last offensive player to make it to the NFL? 4 conference championships now, surely somone made it, right? Still pulling my hair out! Rick

ttunt, I was there to see some of those wins also. I would like to add to that list the final game in '88 in which NT went down to Houston and wiped the floor up with Rice. I remember the freak rain storm that came from no where in the 3rd quarter in which everyone headed for cover under the East side overhang. Everyone but the NT fans because we were having such a great time watching NT go up and down the field on a SWC school. The vast amount of luxuries that NT had to do without during it's 1-AA years made those wins fantastic for us. But as great as that season was in '88, and as great as the win over TCU in '86 was regionally for us, I would trade them all to have seen in person the win over Tennessee in '75. Rick

By the way I'm curious. Our current conference(Sun Belt), which we have dominated is still ranked below other 1-AA conferences in several ratings, and our conference still has teams losing to teams from our old 1-AA(Southland) conference(ULM losing to Northwestern Louisiana State this year). Does anyone have the information showing what the SLC was rated back when we played in it? Rick

Very good question. For the record, FFR is NOT calling for DD's head. He deserves our respect for all he's done. I want to see him take us to the next level but I don't see it happening with the current system. I just want a new offensive philosophy that is entertaining and gives us a chance to play with anyone and is not counted out when we get behind. Rick

What is even more hilarious is how you continue to drag our veteran offense in with our young defense to make your arguement that there isn't anything wrong. King was referring to my previous post concerning our offense. Our defense IS rebuilding and I have yet to see anyone here say otherwise about it. TCU is doing the very same thing, but with a back up QB on offense who only saw one play prior to the BYU game, but you certainly don't see them trying to play for field position, hoping to KEEP IT CLOSE for the 4th quarter. They know they are going to get scored on, so they go out and try to put as many points on the board the ENTIRE game using any means necessary. Replacing three starters on offense doesn't make it a young offense that is having to start over. Especially considering our RB situation which, any team in the country would love to have. I have always feared this was going to happen at some point after Deloach left. That once we finally had a year in which we truly had to rebuild our defense without him, and had to rely solely on our offense to take up the slack, that people would refer back to our great domination of Sun Belt teams as an excuse that there is not a problem offensively. This offense has alway's struggled and always will. It's had flashes against very poor teams, but for the most part it's struggled against weak programs and get's easily defeated against equal or stronger programs. In it, our players are taught to keep it close, play ball control, keep the other team back on their end of the field and hope our defense sets us up so we can score with a short field at some point late in the game. That's a defeatist attitude that does not scare anyone. DD has referred to this philosophy countless times on his show and in the paper. After the K State game he clearly stated that once we get behind, we are placed in a situation that does not favor our system. Really? So basically fans can go on out to the car when we get behind because we have little hope of coming back? That's not how you sell tickets. Rick

Good points for sure, and yes, I and many others would like to see it as well. I guess for me all in all, one play keeps coming back to me that solidifies our limited chance of ever seeing a new system under the current staff or ever seeing a change of any kind. 4th and inches in which we hand off deep. Even had Jamario held onto the ball I wouldn't have liked the call due to the unecessary risk. We got stuffed on it at MTSU and got stuffed again against Troy regardless of the fumble. I see no reason to hold onto the current system that supposedly is built to our strengths. Because right now, it isn't our strength and we have fallen back to 1999 all over again. Yes, it's worked against much weaker Belt teams...barely on many occasions I might add, and moreso due to the fact that we have had a very good defense to keep us alive which in truth, has been our true strength. We do not have that now. During our Conference run we have won 14 games by ten points or less. 6 of those were by 5 points or less, 5 of them were by 3 points or less. Our so called strong running game in the previous 4 years has lost to two provisional 1-AA schools and has been stuffed by numerous unranked OOC teams including 3 beatings in the bowl games. During our 26 conference game winning streak, which started in '01, we have beaten 2 teams with a WINNING RECORD. That's TWO TEAMS!!!!!!! An 8-3 MTSU team in only their 2nd full year in 1-A, and a 7-5 NMSU team in '02. So for me the conservative running game has been good against Belt teams. But I expected more improvement by now. It's been 8 years to build depth in this system and it's failed miserably. The current system has been proven to be easily defended by non Belt opponents, and now by them as well. I see no reason how it would disrupt the program to change to a more updated, open style of offense at the end of the year. Bring in a Todd Dodge or someone else as OC who can teach the system and start from there. We would have nothing to lose. By the way, just to remind what has cost us offensive production, so we are told, that due to current players not being able to gel from a lack of playing together? Unless Lineberry graduates in May and qualifies for grad school we will not only lose him, But also lose May, Davidson and Cobbs. That's 4 more players to replace, forcing next year's team to wait until who knows when for this team to GEL in this so called strength of ours. Rick

4 of our five O linemen have blocked for a national rushing leader and tab 40 starts under their belts. We replaced a QB, a tightend and our center. 11 offensive players have played in over 151 games. I'm not saying we expected to be the best team in the land this season, but to average less than 3 yards a rush with those two backs is shocking. And nice read on the game LongJim, but I get the feeling this was your first game to watch? We didn't do the run, run, run and punt last night, we tried to change it up..............finally! Two, three seasons too late in my oppinion and the lack of our new QB being able to make it all come together in one game, one season showed. Many of those plays were not there against MTSU, Tulsa, which is the only way your going to get experience running them. If by any chance we here have made up the "We only run, run, run, and punt all the time" out of the thin blue sky, why do you suppose Troy/MTSU, Tulsa, K State, Southern Miss......etc played 9 in the box with the safety 7 yards off the line? Why? We have watched it for 8 years now. Yes, some play action passes were mixed in, but most were the same tire routes, the same tired play action passes blah blah blah. But overall, nothing has changed. Rick

Allow him to play towards his strongest skills(running the ball) by installing a base option offense. Then let him pass off of the reads. We all watched two-a-days. We all saw his best skill was running the ball. By uitilizing his best skills you give him a better chance to succeed. But that would have had to have been done in August. Not October. Too late now. We are going to force this square peg into a round hole regardless if Danny gets the team on track or not by continueing to set up the play-action with the run first. Rick

Danny did look better. He looks like he could be scary-like affective running the option. He's fast, possibly the quckest QB we have seen in some time. So if we are going to be so @#$#ing committed to running the ball, why not utilize his skill he seems best at,(RUNNING THE BALL) along with the two streak-fast backs we have behind him, and run the option? Pulling my hair out....still! Rick

I suppose those 23/24 are more from the defensive side of things. If so, and I believe they are, our defense played it's ass off to hold Troy to 13 points after playing in 76 plays on the night. As I have stated earlier, our current offense has players with over 140 starts and over 151 games played in. That is fact, not an estimate or a guess, but fact. I can sit here and list every player and every start or game they played in by their listing on meangreensports.com and in the media guide. Rick

Good post 66. And thank you to 96 for posting that article about Coach Fry. In a report in last year's Startlegram, I beilieve it was in their football preview, not sure?, but they surveyed graduating HS seniors throughout the region on what they rate from most to least importance for their choice of school's to attend. There were several major program's AD's interviewed including Deloss Dodds at UT and the guy from TCU. I can't remember the exact percentage, but playing time was near the top. I have gotten to know many of our players over the years and when asked just about everyone of them said the opportunity to play at North Texas right away was a major factor in their decision to come here. Of course, by now, after 8 years into this sytem, I would have thought that would not be the case any longer due to DEPTH, however I'm still hearing that? Which I believe is one of the major problems we face right now. Rick

I haven't watched the replay yet but I'll bet we didn't balance the pass early in the game. Only after we got behind did we pass to catch up in the stats, and only pass to the same usual routes. The 12 and out, the 8 and out in which the LB's knew exactly the spot to go to disrupt the pass many times including an INT, and the long streak toss up. Tell me what other successful program uses this same offense and offensive philosophy. It's been great against the belt. But they have caught up to us. The fact that Troy's safety played 7 yards deep all night say's they knew what was coming, knew how to defend it and knew we would not change nor be able to execute the change because WE DON'T PASS. WE RUN. Tire of this whole arguement, very tired. Rick

Very true! RV has done an amazing job. Last night was complete proof of just how much of a difference his efforts has made. Rick

But running the spread or the no-huddle offense would require ingenuity, forcing us to try and score. Wake up people, your not with the program. We have to try to keep it close into the 4th, not lead? Geez! Rick

History tells us we start to mix it up more during OOC play. You saw what happened towards the end when you spread them out with the pass, but the 2 or 3 routes we run did not change other than the one crossing route Muzzy ran in the 3rd. A very rare crossing route I might add. But where was the tightend? Danny threw behind Davidson early on that 3rd down pass and I don't remember us ever going back to it. My point is, practice this stuff in the spring. Install passing plays that utilize more of the field and more of the tightend like Tulsa did. Install an option attack. We have the personell to run an option gameplan and Meager had some success with it earlier in the game. Where was that stuff against Middle? Where was it against Tulsa? And when we do run it, you can tell from how poor the execution is that it's not a concern. The lack of ability to spread out a team playing 9 and 10 men within 3 yards of the line, with the safety within 7 does not earn anyone a pass whatso ever. Especially the 4th and inches play handing the ball back 4 yards deep? Rick

at North Texas. Teaching us again how to raise awareness, spirit, money, show incredible class all with an urgent Can-Do attitude without any excuses for failure that has been rarely seen on the gridiron at NT these past many years. Did you see the clip they showed on the jumbo screen of him at a press conference back in the 70's? If not, you may have missed one of the most direct, pinpoint examples from a qoute of his that signifies just how great an opportunity North Texas lost when the man left Denton. While standing in front of a microphone during a press conference he yells back at a reporter: "SOMEONE HAS TO BE RANKED NUMBER ONE IN THIS COUNTRY, WHY NOT US?" Huge kudo's to GMoney and the lettermen association for getting him back on campus, and also a major thank you to GGII for bringing the great Sears Woods back as well. I got Sears to sign my Flyin Worm T Shirt that was given away by RHA last year. I also got to meet Coach Fry tell him how proud I was of his accomplishments here. After he signed my shirt he handed back my pen with a laugh and said: "NOW YOU'VE GOT YOUR CHECK MADE OUT TO ME, RIGHT?" That's just how he was. He could sell snowballs to eskimos and coached his ass off here. I couldn't believe all the ex athletes standing in line for what seemed like forever for their turn to give him a hug and a handshake. You could easily tell by watching them just how much they loved and respected him. It was magical just to be there and listen to him talk. He still is everything I have ever heard that he was. You couldn't stand there and hear him speak for 1 minute and not admire the man. He said he only quit coaching due to prostate cancer. He later stated that he only left NT because it had become quite apparant that his teams here were not going to be allowed to attend a bowl game. I'm glad he got to go on to a bigger and better carreer. But it will alway's hurt deeply to think what could have been had he stayed those remaining 20 some odd years on the sidelines coaching the Mean Green? Rick

..............Fumbling It! I lost it at this point. We handed off 4 yards deep on a similar play at mid field at MTSU and got stuffed for a turnover. So I could not believe my eyes that in such a crucial game, at such a crucial time we were going to do it again, in the same formation, and we did. MTSU converted 3 times against us by having Marks just lean forward. Why in hell can't we do the same? Why? There is only one exchange which limits chances for a fumble. And what did we do? Hand off for a fumble. For three quarters we showed Troy who was getting the handoff on short yardage plays and they stuffed us every time. Why run it again for 6 inches? Why I'm completely at a loss for words other than, get used to it. We only have 3 more years of it to go. Rick

No sir. Only roughly $20 Million of tU's $83 Million budget comes from donations. The rest come from yours and my pockets. Rick

I think the rest is pretty much self explanatory. But the criticism about the color of the uni's and having logos painted on the field goes back to the URCM department. They didn't even tell the athletic department what logos they were going to be allowed to push until May, nor what the correct color would look like, university wide, until April. Orders for any new equipment go out much earlier than that which is why we are still in the darker green. The fact that there was anything to buy with the new logos on it before the start of the season was surprising. The positives very much outweigh the negatives. Rick

We are dead ass last on total offense, and we are ranked 92nd on rushing offense averaging 2.9 yards per cary. Can't even hardly believe that considering all we had coming back this year. Troy ranks 82nd in rushing defense giving up 3.92 yards per carry. I expect something new and refreshing tonight on offense. This is not K State, Tulsa or even MTSU's defense we are facing tonight. Something must, will change for the better. Rick

Good Job 92. Hopefully your hard work pays off. Rick

When did this promotion go out, today? And unless he sat out some games that I can't remember in '03 I believe this will be Cobb's 10th start against Sun Belt teams. 11th if you count FAU last year. Rick

Makes perfect sense. Rick

I thought baseball was over? I'll be there tomorrow with my green on, of course. Rick

No. Only when they play UT. A&M's budget in '03 was $43 Million by the way. I was rooting like hell for the Texas State Bobcats the other night as they drove up and down the field on a program 5 times or more their size, money wise. I don't care. I said I don't understand why people root for teams like UT who buy wins all the time with a sickening amount of resources most others don't have. For me it would be boring. You would be surprised at all of what I have wasted, or rather spent my time on. Reminds me of a response a Blue Raider fan at the pregame tailgate party threw at me the other day when I told him I just drove in from Texas to be there for the game. With a surprised look on his face he asked: "You DROVE here.....................FROM TEXAS?! Rick