Harry's Barbershop Report Week 1 (CAL)

Harry · September 4, 2023

So as hot as it was yesterday at the Cal game, I felt like it may not have been in the top 5 hottest UNT games in the last 20 plus years. I got there around 10:30 and there was some decent cloud cover most of the day, even a light breeze to boot. If you were lucky enough to be on the alumni side it was almost pleasant at times, especially in the second half. The hottest UNT football games I can recall were Baylor at home in 2003 (the game away in Waco was also hot in 2004) and another one was our first home game against Rice in Fouts Field September 11, 2010. The Baylor home game was notorious as the UNT concessions ran out of bottled water in the second half.

Cal game GMG tailgate (9.2.23), Jase Earle, Mike Randle, JD Davis and Head Coach Ross Hodge

The announced home crowd was 21,350 for Cal and that seemed about right. I thought the alumni section looked decent and the students were a little light. The 3pm start time is tough. On the postgame show, Hank lead into the Coach Morris interview by saying that playing a P5 to open the season could go wrong and thus was a risky proposition for a program like UNT. I disagree with that. The program absolutely should be able to take on a quality opponent to start the season and the performance in these types of games should be held to a very high standard. These pay for win games against lessor competition give us no idea where we stand and worse a false sense of security,

Among the many visitors that came by Tony’s GoMeanGreen.com tailgate on Saturday, we were especially pleased to welcome Head UNT basketball Coach Ross Hodge, along with assistant Jace Herl and 4 mainstays on the 2023 NIT Tournament Championship team, Aaron Scott, Moulaye Sissoko, Rubin Jones and Matthew Stone. What a great group of young men we have here. They took pictures and hung out with the fans and watched the end of the TCU Colorado game (which was a barnburner). Intelligent and well-spoken, these kids are great athletes but even better people.

If there is any consistent theme coming out of the absolute drubbing UNT received from the Bears on Saturday, it is that in this new era, the portal, and teams like Colorado and yes Texas State figured it out faster than many others. It’s not that UNT was not using the portal as best they could, but Colorado and Texas State took it to a whole new level. They were landing top notch P5 transfers in big numbers, which computes for Neon Deon and his Colorado program which is heading to the Big 12. In fact, there is irony in the fact he beat one of the very best at playing the transfer portal and NIL in the past few years in Sonny Dykes who landed the TCU job primarily because of his portal and transfer work at SMU. The bad news is that Texas State does not have the resources that North Texas does, and they were able to make it happen anyway. As much as I would love to focus primarily on high school players, the NIL combined with the transfer portal have diminished those opportunities. You don’t have 4-5 years to build a program anymore. And Texas State head coach GJ Kinne is the real deal.

GoMeanGreen.com has a new team of contributors who will be assisting in covering the team this year, the one and only JD Davis is back covering recruiting and everything else with UNT sports as he does so very well including articles, podcasts, social media, and the kitchen sink. We are welcoming back our good friend Lorenzo Robles, who will also be assisting us with his excellent content as well as his computer expertise and great photography. A new face is Miles Meador who is actual a current UNT student, and big UNT fan who will be our man on the ground in Denton and will be covering the team and taking photos and video as well as giving us the student perspective.

DC Matt Caponi (Courtesy UNT Athletics)

The reality is you cannot run the 3-3-5 defense without athletes. And right now, we don’t have enough of them. And that was the worst tackling technique I have ever seen. Defensive Coordinator Matt Caponi has his hands full this season. On a positive note, I think our secondary is pretty good. But what does it say when your leading tackler in the Cal game (9) is Jaylen Smith, a walk-on from Hamilton, Ontario?

Early line for the roadie against FIU in Miami is -14. FIU barely beat Maine 14-12. Looking at the schedule, this may be one of the best chances to grab a win early on and the second half of the season is looking frightful with SMU, Tulane, Memphis and yes even UTSA in a close loss to UofH will be very difficult games to win. Morris really needs his first road win at UNT in a big way this week.

And as always, Go Mean Green!

untcampbell · September 4, 2023

Harry, always enjoy your missives. You are a fine writer.

GMG

Hunter Green · September 4, 2023

Great analysis. Thanks, Harry.

greenminer · September 4, 2023

Booger was a guest on the call and he said that Baylor game was the hottest, far and away.

meangreenbob · September 9, 2023

On 9/3/2023 at 8:59 PM, Harry said:

So as hot as it was yesterday at the Cal game, I felt like it may not have been in the top 5 hottest UNT games in the last 20 plus years. I got there around 10:30 and there was some decent cloud cover most of the day, even a light breeze to boot. If you were lucky enough to be on the alumni side it was almost pleasant at times, especially in the second half. The hottest UNT football games I can recall were Baylor at home in 2003 (the game away in Waco was also hot in 2004) and another one was our first home game against Rice in Fouts Field September 11, 2010. The Baylor home game was notorious as the UNT concessions ran out of bottled water in the second half.

Cal game GMG tailgate (9.2.23), Jase Earle, Mike Randle, JD Davis and Head Coach Ross Hodge

The announced home crowd was 21,350 for Cal and that seemed about right. I thought the alumni section looked decent and the students were a little light. The 3pm start time is tough. On the postgame show, Hank lead into the Coach Morris interview by saying that playing a P5 to open the season could go wrong and thus was a risky proposition for a program like UNT.   I disagree with that. The program absolutely should be able to take on a quality opponent to start the season and the performance in these types of games should be held to a very high standard. These pay for win games against lessor competition give us no idea where we stand and worse a false sense of security,

Among the many visitors that came by Tony’s GoMeanGreen.com tailgate on Saturday, we were especially pleased to welcome Head UNT basketball Coach Ross Hodge, along with assistant Jace Herl and 4 mainstays on the 2023 NIT Tournament Championship team, Aaron Scott, Moulaye Sissoko, Rubin Jones and Matthew Stone. What a great group of young men we have here. They took pictures and hung out with the fans and watched the end of the TCU Colorado game (which was a barnburner). Intelligent and well-spoken, these kids are great athletes but even better people.

If there is any consistent theme coming out of the absolute drubbing UNT received from the Bears on Saturday, it is that in this new era, the portal, and teams like Colorado and yes Texas State figured it out faster than many others. It’s not that UNT was not using the portal as best they could, but Colorado and Texas State took it to a whole new level.   They were landing top notch P5 transfers in big numbers, which computes for Neon Deon and his Colorado program which is heading to the Big 12.   In fact, there is irony in the fact he beat one of the very best at playing the transfer portal and NIL in the past few years in Sonny Dykes who landed the TCU job primarily because of his portal and transfer work at SMU. The bad news is that Texas State does not have the resources that North Texas does, and they were able to make it happen anyway.   As much as I would love to focus primarily on high school players, the NIL combined with the transfer portal have diminished those opportunities. You don’t have 4-5 years to build a program anymore. And Texas State head coach GJ Kinne is the real deal.

GoMeanGreen.com has a new team of contributors who will be assisting in covering the team this year, the one and only JD Davis is back covering recruiting and everything else with UNT sports as he does so very well including articles, podcasts, social media, and the kitchen sink. We are welcoming back our good friend Lorenzo Robles, who will also be assisting us with his excellent content as well as his computer expertise and great photography. A new face is Miles Meador who is actual a current UNT student, and big UNT fan who will be our man on the ground in Denton and will be covering the team and taking photos and video as well as giving us the student perspective.

DC Matt Caponi (Courtesy UNT Athletics)

The reality is you cannot run the 3-3-5 defense without athletes. And right now, we don’t have enough of them. And that was the worst tackling technique I have ever seen. Defensive Coordinator Matt Caponi has his hands full this season. On a positive note, I think our secondary is pretty good. But what does it say when your leading tackler in the Cal game (9) is Jaylen Smith, a walk-on from Hamilton, Ontario?

Early line for the roadie against FIU in Miami is -14.   FIU barely beat Maine 14-12. Looking at the schedule, this may be one of the best chances to grab a win early on and the second half of the season is looking frightful with SMU, Tulane, Memphis and yes even UTSA in a close loss to UofH will be very difficult games to win. Morris really needs his first road win at UNT in a big way this week.

And as always, Go Mean Green!

So, and that’s a big so, if we don’t have the athletes needed to run a 3-3-5 then why are we paying an individual $475k a year who obviously doesn’t know, recognize or understand that very fact?

Furthermore, why are we paying an individual $1 million a year who not only hired that individual but also allowed him to install this 3-3-5 knowing we did not have the athletes needed to succeed. Or, did he know?

greenminer · September 9, 2023

2 hours ago, meangreenbob said:

So, and that’s a big so, if we don’t have the athletes needed to run a 3-3-5 then why are we paying an individual $475k a year who obviously doesn’t know, recognize or understand that very fact?

Furthermore, why are we paying an individual $1 million a year who not only hired that individual but also allowed him to install this 3-3-5 knowing we did not have the athletes needed to succeed. Or, did he know?

So, never hire anyone that is outside the previous regime's schemes, Is that what you're suggesting?

I think the coaches do know what they have and do ot have in front of them. It would just be awful, IMO, for them to say publicly "yeah, these are not the athletes we need."

meangreenbob · September 9, 2023

1 hour ago, greenminer said:

So, never hire anyone that is outside the previous regime's schemes, Is that what you're suggesting?

I think the coaches do know what they have and do ot have in front of them. It would just be awful, IMO, for them to say publicly "yeah, these are not the athletes we need."

So that is what you derived from my statement? 🤯

Edited September 9, 2023 by meangreenbob

greenminer · September 9, 2023

2 hours ago, meangreenbob said:

So that is what you derived from my statement? 🤯

Was hoping you'd clarify, because I want to believe that is not what you meant.

Coaches have to adapt. They should have a few packages based out of the different formations. But, they all have their bread and butter and usually stick to it for a career. A 3-3-5 guy is probably not being called to Denton and being told he's going to have to switch to a four man front.

In this case, Morris looked at this 3-man front because our DC made it work really well in the BXII. He probably thinks it will work for what he wants to do in our new conference, and is willing to go through the initial growing pains to get there.

Edited September 9, 2023 by greenminer