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Liberty was not really a terrible loss, relatively
Posted on 11/7/22 at 7:06 am
Posted on 11/7/22 at 7:06 am
Over the past ~ 10 years I can think of many worse losses. To name a few:
ULM
Toledo
North Texas
Colorado State
One of several ~50 point losses to Bama
Auburn 56-3
A&M 2022
Auburn 2021
Mizzou 2020
San Jose St
Western Kentucky
Rutgers
These are as bad, most worse than losing to a top 25 Liberty. Yes there’s a talent discrepancy and we should have beat them. But they do have P5 talent due to Freeze and the portal.
I say all that just to say, what I’m going to say isn’t a melt or an overreaction to a single game.
Sam Pittman is not the head coach we need. You can see it from the little things that well-coached teams do better than us. Our execution of simple things. Our personnel management. Special teams. Red zone execution. Opening drives. Time management. Challenge decisions.
These are areas where a head coach’s ability is usually on display. And they’re all areas where we’ve been pretty bad for all of Sam’s tenure.
Even his biggest win, vs Texas last year, required some luck. Remember the muffed punt that would’ve given them a TD if they didn’t step out of bounds? That boneheaded play could’ve been the equivalent of A&Ms scoop and score. A momentum changer. Maybe we still win but I really doubt it would’ve been a blowout like it was.
I don’t know if I’ve ever seen worse personnel management. Trotting Fortin out there ahead of Hornsby. Everyone in the state knew that was retarded. Then Hornsby comes out and proves it. Sure he made some bad plays, things you expect from a QB they’ve never let throw the ball against real competition. But he showed he has a high ceiling as a college QB. So what do we do? Stop putting him on the field at all, and then when the QB 1 is clearly no where near 100%, you still refuse to give Malik an opportunity.
The punter situation could be worse. The Aussie’s punts were not good enough to keep a scholarship, much less keep a starting job. Bauer has been pretty bad too, but still much better than Loy, both this year and last. How the decision was made to bench him, I will never understand.
We have a clear trend of an inability to assess and manage the talent within your own team. We could get into Hudson Clark/Mcadoo as well.
Our problems aren’t just of offense, defense, or special teams.
Coordinator changes will make no difference. Odom and Briles are both top 25 coordinators in FBS in my opinion. I won’t give out special teams coordinator the dignity of even saying his name, but even moving on from him isn’t going to solve our problems.
I think we all like Sam as a person. We want it to be a Briles problem or an Odom problem but it’s not, sadly.
Sam has at least brought some stability to the program. But I’m afraid he has already peaked. We can stick with him another year, but if we have an opportunity to go after a sure home run, like a Hugh Freeze, we should take it.
ULM
Toledo
North Texas
Colorado State
One of several ~50 point losses to Bama
Auburn 56-3
A&M 2022
Auburn 2021
Mizzou 2020
San Jose St
Western Kentucky
Rutgers
These are as bad, most worse than losing to a top 25 Liberty. Yes there’s a talent discrepancy and we should have beat them. But they do have P5 talent due to Freeze and the portal.
I say all that just to say, what I’m going to say isn’t a melt or an overreaction to a single game.
Sam Pittman is not the head coach we need. You can see it from the little things that well-coached teams do better than us. Our execution of simple things. Our personnel management. Special teams. Red zone execution. Opening drives. Time management. Challenge decisions.
These are areas where a head coach’s ability is usually on display. And they’re all areas where we’ve been pretty bad for all of Sam’s tenure.
Even his biggest win, vs Texas last year, required some luck. Remember the muffed punt that would’ve given them a TD if they didn’t step out of bounds? That boneheaded play could’ve been the equivalent of A&Ms scoop and score. A momentum changer. Maybe we still win but I really doubt it would’ve been a blowout like it was.
I don’t know if I’ve ever seen worse personnel management. Trotting Fortin out there ahead of Hornsby. Everyone in the state knew that was retarded. Then Hornsby comes out and proves it. Sure he made some bad plays, things you expect from a QB they’ve never let throw the ball against real competition. But he showed he has a high ceiling as a college QB. So what do we do? Stop putting him on the field at all, and then when the QB 1 is clearly no where near 100%, you still refuse to give Malik an opportunity.
The punter situation could be worse. The Aussie’s punts were not good enough to keep a scholarship, much less keep a starting job. Bauer has been pretty bad too, but still much better than Loy, both this year and last. How the decision was made to bench him, I will never understand.
We have a clear trend of an inability to assess and manage the talent within your own team. We could get into Hudson Clark/Mcadoo as well.
Our problems aren’t just of offense, defense, or special teams.
Coordinator changes will make no difference. Odom and Briles are both top 25 coordinators in FBS in my opinion. I won’t give out special teams coordinator the dignity of even saying his name, but even moving on from him isn’t going to solve our problems.
I think we all like Sam as a person. We want it to be a Briles problem or an Odom problem but it’s not, sadly.
Sam has at least brought some stability to the program. But I’m afraid he has already peaked. We can stick with him another year, but if we have an opportunity to go after a sure home run, like a Hugh Freeze, we should take it.
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Posted on 11/7/22 at 7:18 am to The Sultan of Swine
This is a terrible loss. You can't make excuses and say that it wasn't as bad as the losses before but it feels exactly the same. Losing to Liberty is no different than any other G5 team and we are supposed to be a power five team? It a damned joke we call ourselves a major program and a loss like this is why we have been laughed at.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 7:19 am to The Sultan of Swine
quote:
Trotting Fortin out there ahead of Hornsby. Everyone in the state knew that was retarded. Then Hornsby comes out and proves it.
I agree with you, it was a terrible decision, but there were people on this very board wondering if Fortin should start over KJ after he went 4/10 against Bama in mop up duty.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 7:30 am to dchog
quote:
This is a terrible loss. You can't make excuses and say that it wasn't as bad as the losses before but it feels exactly the same. Losing to Liberty is no different than any other G5 team and we are supposed to be a power five team? It a damned joke we call ourselves a major program and a loss like this is why we have been laughed at.
I think you're missing the point of the thread. Where am I making excuses?
The point is, this isn't a single game thing for me.
This post was edited on 11/7/22 at 7:32 am
Posted on 11/7/22 at 7:35 am to The Sultan of Swine
Pittman ain’t the coach for me. Not anymore.
- Slow starts
- disrespecting opponents
- fragile team psyche
- getting out-coached in nearly every game, in several cases profoundly
- consistently misfiring on roster management and talent evaluation (Fletcher over Bauer, Fortin over Hornsby, Pool over Paul, a banged up KJ over Hornsby despite MH getting QB1 reps all week, McAdoo, etc)
- not handling success well at all
- being overly deferential to coordinators and not overruling incomprehensibly dumb play calls
- Slow starts
- disrespecting opponents
- fragile team psyche
- getting out-coached in nearly every game, in several cases profoundly
- consistently misfiring on roster management and talent evaluation (Fletcher over Bauer, Fortin over Hornsby, Pool over Paul, a banged up KJ over Hornsby despite MH getting QB1 reps all week, McAdoo, etc)
- not handling success well at all
- being overly deferential to coordinators and not overruling incomprehensibly dumb play calls
This post was edited on 11/7/22 at 8:16 am
Posted on 11/7/22 at 7:59 am to Feral
I might overlook a lot of these things when it’s our feel good story O-Line coach at head coach. But he’s the one who went and got Jimmy Sexton in the off season. If he wants big boy money, then we need better results than this. He’s the one that raised the bar.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 8:14 am to BallHawg10
quote:
I might overlook a lot of these things when it’s our feel good story O-Line coach at head coach. But he’s the one who went and got Jimmy Sexton in the off season. If he wants big boy money, then we need better results than this. He’s the one that raised the bar.
Great point, and completely agree.
Just as the dynamics with (and expectations of) players have changed in the era of NIL making them no longer above reproach, the same applies to Pittman after he hired Sexton and got a sweetheart extension.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 8:16 am to Feral
quote:
Pittman ain’t the coach for me. Not anymore.
- Slow starts
- disrespecting opponents
- fragile team psyche
- getting out-coached in nearly every game, in several cases profoundly
- horrible roster management and talent evaluation (Fletcher over Bauer, Fortin over Hornsby, Pool over Paul, a banged up KJ over Hornsby despite MH getting QB1 reps all week, McAdoo, etc)
- not handling success well at all
- being overly deferential to coordinators and not overruling incomprehensibly dumb play calls
You had me until here. He has said in multiple interviews I tell him to quit throwing, I tell him to run more… etc for Briles.
On the other hand he let Scott Fountain do a clusterfrick on the punter and he has let Barry put out that shite show all season with the excuse of injuries.. while not really recruiting at all.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 8:28 am to FayetteNAM
quote:
You had me until here. He has said in multiple interviews I tell him to quit throwing, I tell him to run more… etc for Briles.
Yeah I think we use the coordinators as scapegoats for things that have Sam’s fingerprints on them
Posted on 11/7/22 at 8:29 am to The Sultan of Swine
You said the Liberty loss was not a terrible loss comparing to other G5 losses but the fact is it is a terrible loss.
It would be more tolerable if this was his first year with no expectations. But shite this year Arkansas was ranked in the top 20 with good players coming back and now it is possible they may not make a bowl with the most returning experience that this program has had in awhile? This is just an epic failure on Sam if this team doesn't make a bowl game.
This all would be avoided if Sam had his team ready, better game management, make adjustments during the game instead of letting teams get a huge lead then go into panic mode and try to win it the fourth quarter. That bullshite gets tiring.
It would be more tolerable if this was his first year with no expectations. But shite this year Arkansas was ranked in the top 20 with good players coming back and now it is possible they may not make a bowl with the most returning experience that this program has had in awhile? This is just an epic failure on Sam if this team doesn't make a bowl game.
This all would be avoided if Sam had his team ready, better game management, make adjustments during the game instead of letting teams get a huge lead then go into panic mode and try to win it the fourth quarter. That bullshite gets tiring.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 8:46 am to The Sultan of Swine
quote:
Yeah I think we use the coordinators as scapegoats for things that have Sam’s fingerprints on them
I don’t disagree, and it’s why I blame Pittman for the offensive shitshow on Saturday instead of Briles. We couldn’t do anything on the ground and it was obvious they were twisting and keying in on the stretch runs, and we were having success whenever we’d throw the ball but inexplicably kept trying to stubbornly force the run. That had Pittman’s fingerprints all over it.
By “incomprehensibly dumb play calls,” I’m talking about the reverse, trick play, double pass bullshite that Briles will call at inopportune times where Pittman retroactively claims “well it worked in practice.”
Posted on 11/7/22 at 8:48 am to Hogssmellgood
quote:
I agree with you, it was a terrible decision, but there were people on this very board wondering if Fortin should start over KJ after he went 4/10 against Bama in mop up duty.
I was one of those, and I still say Forting throws a better ball than KJ. Better QB? No, but Hornsby might be.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 8:51 am to Feral
quote:
By “incomprehensibly dumb play calls,” I’m talking about the reverse, trick play, double pass bullshite that Briles will call at inopportune times where Pittman retroactively claims “well it worked in practice.”
If it works in practice it’s more an indictment on our defense. It doesn’t work on anyone because everyone has switched from size to speed after the hurry up came.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 8:53 am to troyt37
quote:
I was one of those, and I still say Forting throws a better ball than KJ. Better QB? No, but Hornsby might be.
The reason KJ is a better QB is because of the intangibles. He can run in and move a pile.. mostly because he is a tight end playing QB.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 8:58 am to FayetteNAM
quote:
You had me until here. He has said in multiple interviews I tell him to quit throwing, I tell him to run more… etc for Briles.
That's because we keep going 3 and out and killing our defense. At some point, the folks who love Briles and this offense are going to have to admit that we telegraph plays like a high school team. Defenses read us like a book. They know when we are going to run, they know when we are going to pass, that's how you get shut down completely by inferior teams like Liberty.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 8:59 am to FayetteNAM
quote:which shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone since that switch happened about 10 years ago
switched from size to speed after the hurry up came.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 9:00 am to FayetteNAM
quote:
The reason KJ is a better QB is because of the intangibles. He can run in and move a pile.. mostly because he is a tight end playing QB.
With a little bit of playing time, Hornsby might be able to run around, or right by the pile. Running in and moving the pile is NOT what you want your quarterback doing. We are seeing the results of it now.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 9:01 am to BallHawg10
He is no different than any other head coach that gets a raise or an extension. They lose the fire and have no need to put up the effort. Sam is 61 and a few years from drawing full social security.
If Sam is concerned about his legacy then he needs to coach like he has nothing to lose and if not then he needs to retire.
If Sam is concerned about his legacy then he needs to coach like he has nothing to lose and if not then he needs to retire.
Posted on 11/7/22 at 9:07 am to troyt37
The ends from Liberty in the first half kept crashing down and some were unblocked. I don't know if they adjusted in the second half but the Liberty defense had 15 tackles behind the line of scrimmage.
I don't know about the rest of the games but Liberty got into the backfield more than any team this year.
I don't know about the rest of the games but Liberty got into the backfield more than any team this year.
This post was edited on 11/7/22 at 9:10 am
Posted on 11/7/22 at 9:11 am to troyt37
quote:
That's because we keep going 3 and out and killing our defense. At some point, the folks who love Briles and this offense are going to have to admit that we telegraph plays like a high school team.
Well we went 3 and out with runs.. so what’s the difference.
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