Calling Out The Defense

[Cr1028]

8 minutes ago, GMG24 said:

Ok.  You're the AD you're trying to make the job attractible.  A trip to the other destinations... not so much? Quit _itching about stuff that has no Bearing in our game. 

They already have the job, why do we need to attract them to a job they have now? So the AD pays to fly and whatever else 15 wives? They flew in the team plane right? Great investment and clearly not a distraction at all.

Edited October 22, 2017 by Cr1028

[MeanGreenZen]

I'm talking about a college coaching staff paid millions of dollars to prepare their team to play 13 games a year. Just 13. 

That was the most poorly prepared and coached game I have seen in my 20 years of following this program closely. 

Bringing their wife on a vacation to their work detracted from those coaches preparing our team and contributed to that embarrassing performance and that is the fault of Seth Littrell and Wren Baker. 

Take your wife on a vacation to Boca in the off-season. NOT ON GAMEDAY.

PS: I'm not talking about HS coaches. Good HS coaches are some of the most important people in the country.

[cdizzle86]

At this point, if we make it to a bowl game I hope it’s in Idaho so we can’t get distracted.

[Side Show Joe]

45 minutes ago, MeanGreenZen said:

Coaching staff brought all their wives to Boca and must have had a fun time NOT preparing their football team.

Did the coaches and staff take their wives to Hattiesberg? If not, then this is a big problem for me. Now I see why the players were at the pool. You can't tell the players to focus on the game when your coaches aren't.

[Mike Jackson]

5 minutes ago, MeanGreenZen said:

Bringing their wife on a vacation to their work detracted from those coaches preparing our team and contributed to that embarrassing performance and that is the fault of Seth Littrell and Wren Baker. 

Take your wife on a vacation to Boca in the off-season. NOT ON GAMEDAY.

PS: I'm not talking about HS coaches. Good HS coaches are some of the most important people in the country.

This way a business trip that the players and coaches treated like a vacation, especially on the defensive side.  You want a vacation get to a bowl game and fly the wives there.  This is a conference game and every 3 years we should be traveling to FAU or FIU.  Maybe if this was an out of conference game against SDSU, Hawaii, USC, or UCLA I would understand.  Because who knows when the team will ever return to those cities.   

[cdizzle86]

1 minute ago, Side Show Joe said:

Did the coaches and staff take their wives to Hattiesberg? If not, then this is a big problem for me. Now I see why the players were at the pool. You can't tell the players to focus on the game when your coaches aren't.

Doubt it. This coaching staff and AD are young, but they let the fans down tonight. Handle business then have fun.

[Mean Green 93-98]

52 minutes ago, MeanGreenZen said:

Coaching staff brought all their wives to Boca and must have had a fun time NOT preparing their football team.

I've seen coaches' wives at other away games as well, which all happened to be in much less tropical climes.

13 minutes ago, MeanGreenZen said:

Bringing their wife on a vacation to their work detracted from those coaches preparing our team and contributed to that embarrassing performance and that is the fault of Seth Littrell and Wren Baker. 

You don't know that.  See the above.

[Cr1028]

Wren Baker's tweet says they take the wives on one road trip per season. Which fabulous vacation destination did they go to last year? Gainesville to see Jim McElwain ride a shark?

Edited October 22, 2017 by Cr1028

[Ben Gooding]

1 minute ago, Cr1028 said:

Wren Baker's tweet says they take the wives on one road trip per season. Which fabulous vacation destination did they go to last year? Gainesville to see Jim McElwain ride a shark?

I'm sure they do. Well, uh, maybe they should stop. It's not as if the team is there for 72-96 hours or something. It's a day before flight usually paired with a post game direct flight home. What is the point to bring in the distraction? There is none. And bet your ass they all get a say in where and when they go. The whole damn university, administration, coaching staff, and players should be ashamed. 

12 minutes ago, Mean Green 93-98 said:

I've seen coaches' wives at other away games as well, which all happened to be in much less tropical climes.

You don't know that.  See the above.

No, he doesn't know that. But he doesn't know otherwise either. 

There is sure as shit some evidence to suggest his theory is at lest close to accurate. 804 pieces of evidence. 

[Got5onIt]

Not a big deal, imo. Bringing wives doesn’t take away from preparation & practice. Now, I will say tonight’s unpreparedness is directly related to the over confidence from beating a mediocre UTSA squad. That’s sorely on the coaching staff. 100% coaching F up tonight. Getting a little nookie throughout the week shouldn’t have changed that. The staff needs release during the season. 

Edited October 22, 2017 by Got5onIt

[Cr1028]

1 minute ago, Got5onIt said:

Not a big deal, imo. Bringing wives doesn’t take away from preparation & practice. Now, I will say tonight’s unpreparedness is directly related to the over confidence from beating a mediocre UTSA squad. That’s sorely on the coaching staff. 100% coaching F up tonight. Getting a little nookie at throughout the week shouldn’t have changed that. 

Maybe they were up late getting bitched at and it threw theiir gamecalling off.

[Got5onIt]

1 minute ago, Cr1028 said:

Maybe they were up late getting bitched at and it threw theiir gamecalling off.

 

Oh man, you’re gonna open that can of worms?  😀

[FirefightnRick]

We looked like the 96th ranked defense tonight, not FAU.

 

Rick

[Ben Gooding]

2 minutes ago, FirefightnRick said:

We looked like the 96th ranked defense tonight, not FAU.

 

Rick

We have to recruit better at the LOS on both sides of the ball. Until then, we're tinkering between Dodge 2.0 and luck. 

[Mike Jackson]

I am done with this controversy this was literally the biggest road conference game ever for building momentum to drive attendance and revenue for the program.  Distraction or not anything out the routine that doesn't translate to better prepared for the game is HORSE BLEEP.    This coaching staff has not won anything yet.  So I believe adding the wives to the trip reinforced the feeling in the locker room that they have "arived".  Coach Saban would call that "deadly rat poison" that would be detrimental to his program and he sure as hell wouldn't clear it for  a game against a solid SEC opponent on the road in mid-Season.

 

That being said, I propose a challenge that requires your imagination.   Imaging you are Troy Reffett's agent.  What would you say to sell him to another program now?  (Remember he is the DC and Safeties Coach) 

Can't think of anything to say?..... My point exactly.  He could stay in Boca on vacation as far as I am concerned and have all the time with his wife he likes.

[Ben Gooding]

1 minute ago, Mike Jackson said:

I am done with this controversy this was literally the biggest road conference game ever for building momentum to drive attendance and revenue for the program.  Distraction or not anything out the routine that doesn't translate to better prepared for the game is HORSE BLEEP.    This coaching staff has not won anything yet.  So I believe adding the wives to the trip reinforced the feeling in the locker room that they have "arived".  Coach Saban would call that "deadly rat poison" that would be detrimental to his program and he sure as hell wouldn't clear it for  a game against a solid SEC opponent on the road in mid-Season.

 

That being said, I propose a challenge that requires your imagination.   Imaging you are Troy Reffett's agent.  What would you say to sell him to another program now?  (Remember he is the DC and Safeties Coach) 

Can't think of anything to say?..... My point exactly.  He could stay in Boca on vacation as far as I am concerned and have all the time with his wife he likes.

Nick Saban or any self respecting coach would never do such a thing. Never.  He MIGHT have spouses come to some games, but guaranteed it's gimmies and I guarantee you they are at the leisure of entertaining themselves for the entire trip leading into the trip until and through the game. Even then, I doubt he permits this kind of shenanigans. It's bush league. It makes every single person associated with this administration, coaching staff and university look like bush league. There is no other way to say it. 

[GrandGreen]

30 minutes ago, FirefightnRick said:

We looked like the 96th ranked defense tonight, not FAU.

 

Rick

No where near 96th best.   This was a 130 effort without question.

[Venson]

I don't know if the wives had anything to do with this loss or not. What I do know is that this defense is giving up more points per game than they did last season. What's the difference? The difference is Ekeler is gone and Reffett is the lone DC. Maybe that's why Ekeler left. Maybe he didn't agree with what Reffett wanted and got tired of it. Reffett has been a DC before and it was short lived. He should go back to his Alma Mater which is UTEP. There is no way a defense with basically the same people as last year should be this bad except that the DC is that bad. It's too late now to change, but at the end of the season Seth needs to have that difficult talk with Reffett. If Seth is expecting to move up to a P5 school, he has got to prove that he can win in all three phases of the game and not just on offense. When a team has to rely on it's offense to bail them out, that is a recipe for disaster. It has always been true and is true now, defense wins championships.

[Mike Jackson]

1 minute ago, Ben Gooding said:

He MIGHT have spouses come to some games, but guaranteed it's gimmies and I guarantee you they are at the leisure of entertaining themselves for the entire trip leading into the trip until and through the game.

Exactly and it's not like Alabama doesn't have the resources to do nice things for coaches wives.  And at that level throwing more money doesn't mean a whole heck of a lot.  Any one on Alabama's staff could be hired away by an NFL job at any time.  I like Seth a lot but his lack of head coaching experience gave me some reservations.  I don't think an experienced FBS head coach allows this.  Majority of Reffet's experience was in the Sun Belt.  I think you hire coaches from programs you aspire to be like, not programs that you have distanced your program from with a conference affiliation upgrade.  Even the terrible ESPN3 commentators mentioned the lack of focus on defense.   If you look on the resumes of the offensive coaching staff compared to the defensive coaching staff those comments rings true.   None of the defensive staff I am read about on Meangreensports.com have P5 coaching experience, but maybe I am missing something.   Most of the offensive coaching staff have P5 level coaching experience even if is just one or two seasons in some cases.  We are expecting the defensive staff to learn on the job and it is not happening from all the evidence we have seen this year.

[Ben Gooding]

1 minute ago, Mike Jackson said:

Exactly and it's not like Alabama doesn't have the resources to do nice things for coaches wives.  And at that level throwing more money doesn't mean a whole heck of a lot.  Any one on Alabama's staff could be hired away by an NFL job at any time.  I like Seth a lot but his lack of head coaching experience gave me some reservations.  I don't think an experienced FBS head coach allows this.  Majority of Reffet's experience was in the Sun Belt.  I think you hire coaches from programs you aspire to be like, not programs that you have distanced your program from with a conference affiliation upgrade.  Even the terrible ESPN3 commentators mentioned the lack of focus on defense.   If you look on the resumes of the offensive coaching staff compared to the defensive coaching staff those comments rings true.   None of the defensive staff I am read about on Meangreensports.com have P5 coaching experience, but maybe I am missing something.   Most of the offensive coaching staff have P5 level coaching experience even if is just one or two seasons in some cases.  We are expecting the defensive staff to learn on the job and it is not happening from all the evidence we have seen this year.

You're not missing much of anything. A lot of this staff is from G5 programs aside from Fialni (1 year), GH (1 year) and SL himself. From that, it's been at smaller programs. 

Nevertheless, this was a small time move and they got what they deserved, small time results. 

[Venson]

I believe the coaches have to cut their teeth somewhere and I am assuming they are using North Texas for that and I am okay with it. My problem is when a defense plays as bad as ours have this year. Even the DC at Denton High School or Ryan High School could do better. This was just embarrassing and against a team that is really not as good as we made them look tonight. ODU played them tougher than we did. Iowa didn't beat us a bad as FAU did and Iowa is a P5 school. Maybe they needed this ass kicking to wake them up. Sometimes teams get embarrassed like this and they go on a tear for the rest of the season. Sometimes they pack it in and fold. Let's hope it is the former in our case.

[GRN-WHT]

Have to fire Reffett. 

Giving up 804 yards to FAU is a fireable offense.

It’s not just this one game. The defense has been bad all season. You can’t rely on the offense to play lights out all season. The defense has to step it up and win a game themselves a time or two. 

Edited October 22, 2017 by GRN-WHT

[Venson]

5 minutes ago, GRN-WHT said:

Have to fire Reffett. 

Giving up 804 yards to FAU is a fireable offense.

It’s not just this one game. The defense has been bad all season. You can’t rely on the offense to play lights out all season. The defense has to step it up and win a game themselves a time or two. 

Exactly.

[Ben Gooding]

7 minutes ago, GRN-WHT said:

Have to fire Reffett. 

Giving up 804 yards to FAU is a fireable offense.

It’s not just this one game. The defense has been bad all season. You can’t rely on the offense to play lights out all season. The defense has to step it up and win a game themselves a time or two. 

+1. Firing Reffett is an absolute necessity. It's not even an option at this point. BUT, coaches like being buddy, buddy and keeping their boys on as long as possible especially when there is no real demand for improvement such as UNT. So, odds are, Reffett will be at UNT next year as well. Nature of the business at place like UNT. 

 

9 minutes ago, Venson said:

I believe the coaches have to cut their teeth somewhere and I am assuming they are using North Texas for that and I am okay with it. My problem is when a defense plays as bad as ours have this year. Even the DC at Denton High School or Ryan High School could do better. This was just embarrassing and against a team that is really not as good as we made them look tonight. ODU played them tougher than we did. Iowa didn't beat us a bad as FAU did and Iowa is a P5 school. Maybe they needed this ass kicking to wake them up. Sometimes teams get embarrassed like this and they go on a tear for the rest of the season. Sometimes they pack it in and fold. Let's hope it is the former in our case.

I mean I get the cutting of teeth, but that's for growth on the field as coaches, not for outright shenanigans. And WB transparently put his foot in his mouth tonight I hear on twitterverse. It was as if he was acknowledging the probable issue that may or may not have led to the distraction and condoning the possible distraction because they did it last year too (at some game, somewhere). Almost as if it was all A-OK and it's "just what we do." More small time BS. 

[Venson]

3 minutes ago, Ben Gooding said:

+1. Firing Reffett is an absolute necessity. It's not even an option at this point. BUT, coaches like being buddy, buddy and keeping their boys on as long as possible especially when there is no real demand for improvement such as UNT. So, odds are, Reffett will be at UNT next year as well. Nature of the business at place like UNT. 

 

I mean I get the cutting of teeth, but that's for growth on the field as coaches, not for outright shenanigans. And WB transparently put his foot in his mouth tonight I hear on twitterverse. It was as if he was acknowledging the probable issue that may or may not have led to the distraction and condoning the possible distraction because they did it last year too (at some game, somewhere). Almost as if it was all A-OK and it's "just what we do." More small time BS. 

If that's true about WB, he needs to reevaluate himself and what he is doing. Right now he hasn't proved he can be a successful AD yet. Let's face it. Seth Littrell came in under RV, Jalie Mitchell came in under RV, John Hedlund has been with Soccer for awhile, and Palileo was here with Volleyball before WB. The only hire he has made is GMac and we do not know how that is going to turn out yet. He should wait until his hires and his changes start to work before he starts doing stupid stuff. The only good move he has made so far is firing Tony Benford.