Here for the Wins

Who exactly was one and done other than the QB? Upfront they had several multi year OSU guys. Same on offense. Tate, Smith, Egbuka were OSU guys. Many of the Oline guys were OSU guys. Ransom, Burke. Other than Downs, Howard, Judkins, I suppose Gee Scott, who was there?

Hutson is the only one with substantial experience. Lots of factors that go into whether someone is maxed out. I’d say few college football players are maxed out. Bo Nix and Michael Penix may be as good examples as any to say there’s room to improve. Um T Sweat, Vernon Broughton as recent examples. Going back in time, there’s a reason there’s a Gaskamp award.

None of the freshmen can do this? If not, why have we not recruited this role?

Then he had them against A&M. Because again, 3 of his top 10 worst throws all year were in that game. Maybe 3 of the 5 worst. Steve Sax, Chuck Knoblauch, Rick Ankiel. Those were the most known in baseball. Basically ended their careers as they were. “The "yips" are a sudden, involuntary loss of fine motor skills in sports, causing an athlete to mess up routine actions, often due to extreme performance anxiety or neurological issues, manifesting as twitches or loss of concentration, common in golf (putting) and baseball (throwing) but seen in many sports. It's a psychological and physiological phenomenon where the brain-muscle connection gets disrupted, leading to poor performance under pressure, sometimes linked to overuse or stress.” Per our friend AI. When Arch underthrows his first throw of the season, with pressure in his face no less, then hits his second on the money. I’d never say the first was a yip. The misses on the short crossers to Wingo at Ohio State were part poor throw based on finding the passing lane, part pressure. The first one he threw a nice ball to Parker on the very next play. One underthrown ball to Wingo versus SJSU when his adjusted completion percentage is near 80% is not really a yip. Golf is a completely different game. What we saw from Arch was called quarterbacking. But, yeah, I suppose we have different definitions and the connotation of the term is more extreme than he made some poor throws.

Sure, limited experience will always lead to some hesitation. And that’s what good to great defenses like Ohio State will do to you. Even veteran QBs. It’s possible that a Caleb Downs can make that more difficult. Indiana with a very experienced QB that ran up lots of points against a number of teams struggled to finish drives and get points against OSU. It was not because guys were never open. And they had 12 games of tape whereas we went in blind. It’s speculative on my part, but there are reasons to believe Arch knows the game, how to read a defense, etc. You can use that against a guy. Give him the read that dictates where you want him to go with ball, but that false read was never the actual defense. And their pass rush is good enough, consistent enough so that it’s harder to go pre-snap read to post -snap because you don’t have tons of time for the post snap element. I am not a big mechanics guy. It’s not that I don’t understand the value of repeatable movements. But so many big plays are off schedule that’s it’s as much instinctive as anything. It’s difficult to get those mechanics learned because practice is almost always controlled. The more reps you get in live fire the better you potentially get instinctively and mechanically because you know what works and what doesn’t. As an individual player rather than what the coaching book says. i am a big fan of what he brings to the table. It’s still a team game. For his game, I just want him to progress. There will always be chances to pick apart plays here or there. Just make enough so that the end result is in our favor.

Yips as it’s been referenced historically is guys that have had career altering issues. There was absolutely none of that here. Not close.

Sorry, I get fired up about stuff. Your second paragraph here is a big deal. Get him in a rhythm. I think Vandy is a great example of this and look at those results. To me, it was like we spent the first half of the season trying to be a different offense every week. That ties into a QB not being in a rhythm. You can attribute that to the entire offense really.

This yips discussion is ridiculous. Arch versus A&M had as many poor throws as any game. The rollout right that was nowhere near the WR. The ball well short of Endries in the left flat. The early second half ball in the dirt after leaving the pocket to a wide open WR in the end zone. Even the TD to Wingo was a little off. That’s 3 balls in one game that were as bad as any in any game. Yet not a single, solitary yips discussion. Sometimes a QB just throws a crappy ball. Sometimes the QBs rhythm is off because of pressure. Sometimes a QBs timing is off for a myriad of reasons - maybe it’s inconsistent route running, maybe the play calling hasn’t gotten him into the flow of the game or maybe that’s not the QBs strength. It is merely speculation but yeah I’m sure he was nervous at OSU, but Sark and the run game fell short of making a difference. I’d wager OSU gave him some looks that were not anticipated then they made some good plays. The pressure was pretty constant too. Nevermind it was game 1 and as Bobby told us the QB and WRs really had limited work together thru the spring and into summer. Arch was pretty solid versus SJSU yet I’ve read numerous times on boards that was not the case. Or maybe just think real hard at the ball at Wingo’s feet and think “that’s the yips” as if that’s indicative of how the game played out. Nevermind if you watch closely the route is questionable but the effort is poor on attempting to catch the ball. Ignore those plays he evades the rush and hits the receiver in stride because of a penalty or a drop. UTEP. Sark screwed this one up. I don’t remember how I calculated it, but it was 70/30 run pass ratio. For the previous 16-ish games that I reviewed only 3 were greater than 50/50 with only 1 at 60/40 in favor of run. Given the run game struggles to that point, it was clear the preparation for the week and the gameplan was work the run game. Nevermind that Wisner was out. Baxter got 1 play. Moore didn’t play. Moseley still was out. And on drive 1, on 4th and 4, Arch “yips” it into the ground. Or the truth is that when your QB is moving left you as a WR do not keep moving to his extreme right. Arch anticipated reasonably well. Wingo did not. As a result the pass looked terrible. Watch it again. If Wingo sits, it is right there. Then against OU we saw a great example of how Wingo should have responded in such a situation. First down. Then we had a sequence of poor Arch plays, but there are only 3 of real significance. Two were overthrows and one non-throw. The ultimate failing was on Sark here with the gameplan. It’s quite possible that if we get a normal plan with respect to run/pass, that we score more, the QB gains confidence and the arm chair QBing wanes sooner. Yeah the QB needs to hit the throws but I’ve watched two-three games of football and those misses happen. Just yesterday I saw Beck completely miss a wide open deep throw and on his first 3rd down throw it was well behind the receiver. Even the throw that Toney fumbled was on his back shoulder. Let’s get some Film Guy review of this game. How about it Benkert.

Less patience for development these days.

Those decisions on Reed and Mateer should be based on dollars. A&M needs to restock the Oline. Not sure on OU, but they need to improve there though. How much will they cost? How much do the alternatives cost? It’s pretty simple. You win upfront. People will soil their drawers about an aggressive defense, but the more often you can win upfront with 4 you’ll be far better off. Collin Simmons, Ethan Burke, Barryn Sorrell are the types you need. You need those guys that are multifunctional that need not be schemed free. There aren’t just a ton of those guys out there. There was quite a bit of hype on the WRs in today’s game, but their impact was modest.

BMD?

Yep. Jacoby Jones, decent player, got hurt after the OU Wr ran himself out of bounds.

2021. The defense had some struggles, but that was a very stout conference schedule. Repeatedly ignored by message board posters. Every board I’ve been on. Rinse and repeat. I also repeatedly read discussions on officiating errors. Since 2021, the poor officiating pales in comparison to the examples set from the Big 12 that year. So, yes, the 2021 defense faded in 2nd halves, the offense struggled to make the plays too. Sark, while deserving considerable credit for many aspects as to where the program stands today, in terms of wins and losses in his 5 years has underachieved more than he’s overachieved. Now, this move. He wanted Muschamp from the get go so it’s understandable he’d bring him on board when ready. There are legitimate questions about what has Muschamp done lately. Per Georgia’s website, he was Co-DC in 2022-23. Also per their website, Schumann was co -Dc in 2019 and promoted to DC with play calling duties in 2022. Here’s a little reminder that Kyle Flood is listed as our OC. I doubt many here would be comfortable with him calling plays for Texas. The trajectory shows Schumann is their primary DC with Muschamp in potentially an advisory role. There is legitimacy to questions about what Muschamp has in the tank and how much he’s been engaged recently in spite of him being Co-Dc in 2022-23. I’ve yet to read any insight into what he did in this role but rather assumptions that it’s significant. And that those who question that are to take it as gospel. If Schumann was the defensive play caller, then that makes those questions legitimate. As to Muschamp, I like him. I also like Pk. That doesn’t mean that certain things didn’t frustrate me, but you’ll get that with every single coach. On its face, I don’t like this move. Not because of Muschamp so much but because of PK and all we’re left with is perception of how it went down.

I’m a little curious how in 2023 we were 2nd in 3rd down defense and 8th in 2024 but that is indicative of “bend but don’t break defense.” That’s counterintuitive.

Too many teams, too few games, too many unbalanced schedules. This discussion has centered entirely around the number of teams. The inequality of seedings is impactful. Ole Miss and Oregon are getting gifts this year due to seeding. Tech is the #4 because of their weak schedule. Tech and Ole Miss were gifted their seeds and to a lesser degree Oregon. OU was fortunate to get a spot yet gets a home game. Miami played what 8 home games? They never left home until October. We played as many games away from home in October as they and Ole Miss did the entire season. Also due to imbalanced schedules you have to address whether you want the best X number of teams or the x best seasons. It’s a legitimate case that Texas and Notre Dame were top 6-ish teams at the end of the year. They’re actually two teams that could impact things. If you want to chase a system for playoff purposes, you have to limit the teams so you can balance the schedules. Even within a divisional structure you’ll still have unbalanced schedules, but you have some defined structure.

Let’s not confuse Wingo with a 2nd year broke hand Worthy, particularly after Worthy put up the freshman year he did.

That is not Pff. Overall, pff had Campbell higher with Robertson not too far off. Think they had Hutson as higher graded in run blocking. PFF had one Olineman that was a disaster for us, which is probably a reasonably accurate depiction.

I said trending more to a casual fan not that there aren’t many casuals as it is. Attendance at many institutions hasn’t changed dramatically over the years. That’s what I would consider a large population of non-casual fans. You may be right on fans not tuning in as much as they say they do. But my small population of known fans don’t really miss any Texas games. To get more eyeballs on the tv, it has to be the casual fan. Some of those become serious fans but probably smaller proportions.

Trending to a more casual fan because of greater access is not a positive in many ways for us non-casual fans. But that’ll just take a generation or two to wipe us out. There still is only 1 championship. You can say Tulane and James Madison are competing, but are they really? In all years past, the SEC and Big 10 teams were competing. You just didn’t like how that looked.

If 9-3 is the minimum requirement, guess what that means? You’ve now enticed more teams to schedule less vigorously in the non-conference. People need to consider that increasing the number of playoff participants that will ultimately jockey for position. The more that are jockeying for position with a such a qualifier, the fewer risks more teams will take. So maybe a borderline top 20 team contemplates playing Georgia. Why when that’s a 25% chance at a win? Or a Tennessee in the SEC, says no way am I scheduling anyone worth a damn. Ironically enough, a talking point for playoff expansion encourages tougher scheduling. Look how long that took to question that belief. Think of all the middle tier conference teams that they think they’d have a shot at 16 or 24. You are not incentivizing them to have more difficult schedules. There are reasons college football has the greatest regular season that lasts 3 months. So many willing to sacrifice for the hope of one good month. Keep chasing that perfect solution that doesn’t exist. Actually 2005 was about perfect, never to be seen again.

Bobby, uninformed or inaccurate stuff is a message board tradition. If you remove all that, what do we have left? I will never quite understand the mentality of fans wanting the program to push people out the door assuming they go about their business the right way. With NIL and the portal, things have shifted, but I’m not quite to that point. Obviously we can improve, but this team didn’t lose games because we were physically incapable. We simply did not make enough plays at the right time. We were far from healthy too and the schedule was the most difficult to navigate. I am woefully uninformed on NIL allocations and with that I cannot begin to discuss the proper moves regarding the roster. So I take the guys for who they are and their upside, which for many players that upside is realized over the years and not necessarily from year 1.

The argument can also be made for Notre Dame and Miami.

I gave my reasons subsequent to Kevin’s initial post. Rather than being so arrogant and stating there was zero logic there perhaps you should inquire as to what my logic is before making such a declaration. And the point you are making is not one that applies only to a 24 teams playoff. Sure, this year I’d rather be in than not. And you can certainly track my posts to reflect that. I am an old man now. So many years ago, the last time I played a game of football I never knew, never thought it’d be my last. It was. There are emotions associated with that. So I’m not going to call a bowl game or any game meaningless. But you go ahead. And as a fan, I’ll look forward to it and cheer the Horns on. Additionally on the season ticket holder bit, I feel the need/desire to be there for all the big games. The more games you have the more pressure from a financial and time perspective. Perhaps you have more of those resources than I do, perhaps less. I have no idea. But I’ve already gone through the exercise of attempting to manage this thought process last year. Adding another layer does not help that but also just expands the issues on the selection process. These dudes can’t handle 12. They won’t be able to handle doubly thst.

It’s expensive enough as it is. You’re also getting into family time. I’ve missed maybe 5 home games in 30 years, one being Clemson for that very reason. The 24 teams devalues the regular season. You only play 12 games so we may be in the midst of a debate as to whether we schedule tough teams. I care little about a team that loses 4 games (or 33%) getting a shot at an undefeated. So there’s a possibility that we shelve the marquee games. If so, I’ve now lost one of the best reasons to have tickets. Even if you get that one back in the postseason, you may be paying for an extra throwaway game early on. All in favor of shuffling the chairs on the Titanic. The more teams you allow in, the more debate will ensue. Not just who is in but the seeds. Those seeds determine who gets byes, who gets home games, who get the James Madisons. All those factors will get teams hyper focused on manipulating their schedules to maximize their opportunities.