A Plea for Rationality

Irrelevant. Harbaugh is a great coach. It took Harbaugh three years of mediocrity before running out a championship-caliber team. Therefore, it is possible for a great coach to take 3+ years before running out a championship team. Follow?

At the same time this doesn't mean that a coach should be given a 4th year after when their are obvious flaws that remain uncorrected. Or any coach given a 4th year will have Harbaugh's results.

Obviously.
 
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Irrelevant. Harbaugh is a great coach. It took Harbaugh three years of mediocrity before running out a championship-caliber team. Therefore, it is possible for a great coach to take 3+ years before running out a championship team. Follow?

At the same time this doesn't mean that a coach should be given a 4th year after when their are obvious flaws that remain uncorrected. Or any coach given a 4th year will have Harbaugh's results.

Obviously.

There in lies part of the problem.
 
Some good discussion here - thanks for keeping things relatively civil. Please keep it going!
 
Didn't say that. Talent to go 11-1? No.

Who in the starting 22 sees meaningful time on a good UM team? You posted a picture but how about actual discussion.

I mean, I can post a picture of our last 3 draft classes if you want.

While you're at it post a pic of Duke's last 3 draft classes. Yep, only one player drafted and still won the shltty division. You mentioned that Duke was a senior laden team but that isn't true- Their offense carried the team and only had 3 sr starters. They were a well coached team, instead...

But it took how long to get to that?
 
Didn't say that. Talent to go 11-1? No.

Who in the starting 22 sees meaningful time on a good UM team? You posted a picture but how about actual discussion.

I mean, I can post a picture of our last 3 draft classes if you want.

While you're at it post a pic of Duke's last 3 draft classes. Yep, only one player drafted and still won the shltty division. You mentioned that Duke was a senior laden team but that isn't true- Their offense carried the team and only had 3 sr starters. They were a well coached team, instead...

But it took how long to get to that?

Forever...It is Duke. Al just doesn't have the talent excuse like Duke and Wake does. He definitely doesn't have 6 years.
 
Forever...It is Duke. Al just doesn't have the talent excuse like Duke and Wake does. He definitely doesn't have 6 years.

What does Golden have to do with it? Was Duke's success due to coaching? If so, why didn't he just coach them three years ago? If you say that he didn't have the talent, then you admit that even great coaches need talent. But for Pete's sake, can people stop saying that Duke became good this year because their sixth year coach is so good?
 
Forever...It is Duke. Al just doesn't have the talent excuse like Duke and Wake does. He definitely doesn't have 6 years.

What does Golden have to do with it? Was Duke's success due to coaching? If so, why didn't he just coach them three years ago? If you say that he didn't have the talent, then you admit that even great coaches need talent. But for Pete's sake, can people stop saying that Duke became good this year because their sixth year coach is so good?

I think this Duke example is overblown till they repeat the success. A lot of things went right for Duke last year. Somehow they wound up beating VT and UNC. They were even down to WF in the 4th quarter.

If Cutclife wins 9 games this year (during the regular season), I will call it more than the stars perfectly aligning.
 
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When we first hired Coach Golden I figured it would take 2 years to purge what Randy did to the program, however the NCAA cloud hung over us far longer than anyone could have fathomed, so I'll give Golden a pass for last year. He has improved our win total every season which is a sign that things are slowly moving in the right direction.

However if there isn't a large improvement on the defense this season it will be supremely disappointing. I'm not saying we need to go out there and go undefeated but winning the Coastal and getting to double digit wins is paramount this season. A 10-2 regular season record and a bowl win is what I think we need to see out of this team this year.
 
When we first hired Coach Golden I figured it would take 2 years to purge what Randy did to the program, however the NCAA cloud hung over us far longer than anyone could have fathomed, so I'll give Golden a pass for last year. He has improved our win total every season which is a sign that things are slowly moving in the right direction.

However if there isn't a large improvement on the defense this season it will be supremely disappointing. I'm not saying we need to go out there and go undefeated but winning the Coastal and getting to double digit wins is paramount this season. A 10-2 regular season record and a bowl win is what I think we need to see out of this team this year.

Solid rational post..
 
Im honestly suprised CaneAlmighty has time to post on here in between his Al Golden blowjobs and dissecting our future top 10 defense this season

No sure why you decided to share your homoerotic thoughts with us. But this board is pretty liberal. To each his own I guess.
 
make or break year period, no excuses, we got a stacked team (minus the DT spot), a very winnable schedule, we can easily win the coastal, now its on the coaches at this point the talent and the cloud stuff is out the window
 
I don't understand why we need NFL draft picks all over our defense to not give up over 450 ypg against FBS opponents.

What about to Golden's eye for talent everybody was creaming over when he was hired? Muhammad Wilkerson! Terrance Knighton!
 
So let me get this straight. OP makes a thread about a "plea for rationality" yet bases his post on nothing other than hopes, wishes, and what-if's. 3 years worth of statistics pointing in one direction ≠ rationality but making assertions like "what if we beat Louisville" is the paradigm of rationality.

Par for the course I suppose.
 
Umfire... It was a nice try but you can't reason with mutants. 3/4ths of the responses to you have ZERO substance. It's this boards theme nowadays. Just post pictures and "neg" people.

These guys don't care that we graduated 7 defensive starters and not 1 of them is going to sniff the draft.

They don't care that Duke Johnson, a top 5 talent nationally went down in game 7.

They just want to **** and moan in a circle jerk together.

Back to shadows board where at least those who are against the staff can articulate real reasons why they are so.

I've articulated my displeasure with our current staff plenty of times. Particularly with several charts and graphs. I'm a numbers guy.

I've compared our defensive rankings to teams that play against teams with unquestionably more talent than they have (Ole Miss, Maryland,Wake Forest, Vanderbilt, Miss. St.), teams with offenses that execute far worse than ours (Va Tech, Florida, South Florida), teams with actual sanctions (USC, Penn State) and offenses that have worse TOP than us (Oregon & Baylor). Guess what? These teams not only had better defenses than us, they were also top 50 at worst!

I've compared Golden's defensive history as a DC and HC. Charted his team defense rankings as well as scoring defense rankings. Guess what? He's barely average! Average total defense ranking of 68 and average scoring defense rank of 47. Should that give us hope?

343.jpg


I charted this seasons game's against FBS opponents: what their total offense ranking was, their average ypg and what they did against us. Guess what? We only held two teams below their season average for total yards. One of those teams, FSU, still gained over 500 yards and the other, Georgia Tech, gained over 400 yards. We only held two of our FBS opponents below 400 total yards. That's ****ing pathetic.

176.jpg


In case you're wondering, the top 60 defenses allowed less than 400 ypg and we couldn't even do that.

Don't act like those of us who've lost faith in Golden and this staff don't bring intelligent discussion to this board. Because when we do bring numbers into the equation to back our displeasure those who still have faith point to the 1 or 2 seasons in the man's entire career where his defense wasn't mediocre to complete trash.

While I applaud your effort to at least bring substance to the discussion (which is a rarity here) you can't just look at this defense from a strict "numbers" perspective.

Just like business, people matter as much as production. In fact you can directly correlate your results to the "quality of people" you have.

So please, with these numbers, can you please post who our 2 deep was last year and in 2012? I think that would give us the REASON why these numbers are so poor. Remember the old adage, "figures don't lie but liars figure?" It applies here because there is NO CONTEXT.

When you have AJ Highsmith who runs a 4.9 and shies away from contact starting
Kacy Rogers who had all the physical tools but was completely ineffective to the point where Jenkins was seeing more time than he was.
Porter who isn't even listed in NFL draft lists (even though he did his job rather well)
Cornelius who would never make a 2 deep at Miami from 83-2001
Armbrister, who is most likely a #2 or scout team player on good Miami teams
Chickillo, who is a decent player, but wouldn't be relied upon so heavily if we recruited better
No depth behind Porter unless you think Robinson fit that role... he was decent, but come one. He was passed by Renfrow who was a Virginia cast away and had 1 year in the system

Then you lose talented guys like T Finnie and Eddie Johnson.

What was the real expectation for this defense? All of the talent was in their first and second year:

Bush
Howard
Grace
Kirby
Kamalu
McCord
AQM
A Carter
Elder
Jenkins

That doesn't support the reason why the numbers are the way they are? You have upper classmen who know the system but are unable to get into position athletically to make the plays OR if they are there unable to make the plays (see Rogers). And you you have a bunch of under classmen who are athletically gifted enough to get there and make the plays, but don't know the play book because they have 1 or at max 2 years under a brand new, complicated system.

Again, thanks for the numbers, but be responsible and add the context with it.
 
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I don't understand why we need NFL draft picks all over our defense to not give up over 450 ypg against FBS opponents.

What about to Golden's eye for talent everybody was creaming over when he was hired? Muhammad Wilkerson! Terrance Knighton!

theres flowers and feliciano, but i wonder if that was him or kehoe who found them, the only other one i can think of is jackson but he hasnt hit the field yet, ill maybe give him eddie johnson but thats just one
 
Umfire... It was a nice try but you can't reason with mutants. 3/4ths of the responses to you have ZERO substance. It's this boards theme nowadays. Just post pictures and "neg" people.

These guys don't care that we graduated 7 defensive starters and not 1 of them is going to sniff the draft.

They don't care that Duke Johnson, a top 5 talent nationally went down in game 7.

They just want to **** and moan in a circle jerk together.

Back to shadows board where at least those who are against the staff can articulate real reasons why they are so.

I've articulated my displeasure with our current staff plenty of times. Particularly with several charts and graphs. I'm a numbers guy.

I've compared our defensive rankings to teams that play against teams with unquestionably more talent than they have (Ole Miss, Maryland,Wake Forest, Vanderbilt, Miss. St.), teams with offenses that execute far worse than ours (Va Tech, Florida, South Florida), teams with actual sanctions (USC, Penn State) and offenses that have worse TOP than us (Oregon & Baylor). Guess what? These teams not only had better defenses than us, they were also top 50 at worst!

I've compared Golden's defensive history as a DC and HC. Charted his team defense rankings as well as scoring defense rankings. Guess what? He's barely average! Average total defense ranking of 68 and average scoring defense rank of 47. Should that give us hope?

343.jpg


I charted this seasons game's against FBS opponents: what their total offense ranking was, their average ypg and what they did against us. Guess what? We only held two teams below their season average for total yards. One of those teams, FSU, still gained over 500 yards and the other, Georgia Tech, gained over 400 yards. We only held two of our FBS opponents below 400 total yards. That's ****ing pathetic.

176.jpg


In case you're wondering, the top 60 defenses allowed less than 400 ypg and we couldn't even do that.

Don't act like those of us who've lost faith in Golden and this staff don't bring intelligent discussion to this board. Because when we do bring numbers into the equation to back our displeasure those who still have faith point to the 1 or 2 seasons in the man's entire career where his defense wasn't mediocre to complete trash.

While I applaud your effort to at least bring substance to the discussion (which is a rarity here) you can't just look at this defense from a strict "numbers" perspective.

Just like business, people matter as much as production. In fact you can directly correlate your results to the "quality of people" you have.

So please, with these numbers, can you please post who our 2 deep was last year and in 2012? I think that would give us the REASON why these numbers are so poor. Remember the old adage, "figures don't lie but liars figure?" It applies here because there is NO CONTEXT.

When you have AJ Highsmith who runs a 4.9 and shies away from contact starting
Kacy Rogers who had all the physical tools but was completely ineffective to the point where Jenkins was seeing more time than he was.
Porter who isn't even listed in NFL draft lists (even though he did his job rather well)
Cornelius who would never make a 2 deep at Miami from 83-2001
Armbrister, who is most likely a #2 or scout team player on good Miami teams
Chickillo, who is a decent player, but wouldn't be relied upon so heavily if we recruited better
No depth behind Porter unless you think Robinson fit that role... he was decent, but come one. He was passed by Renfrow who was a Virginia cast away and had 1 year in the system

Then you lose talented guys like T Finnie and Eddie Johnson.

What was the real expectation for this defense? All of the talent was in their first and second year:

Bush
Howard
Grace
Kirby
Kamalu
McCord
AQM
A Carter
Elder
Jenkins

That doesn't support the reason why the numbers are the way they are? You have upper classmen who know the system but are unable to get into position athletically to make the plays OR if they are there unable to make the plays (see Rogers). And you you have a bunch of under classmen who are athletically gifted enough to get there and make the plays, but don't know the play book because they have 1 or at max 2 years under a brand new, complicated system.

Again, thanks for the numbers, but be responsible and add the context with it.
You want context?

Golden has fielded 3 Top 20 defenses (not even Top 10 or 5) during his entire tenure as a football coach (coordinator or head coach).

But yeah, adding some nice recruits who won't contribute here for another 2-3 years is going to pay dividends next year.
 
I don't understand why we need NFL draft picks all over our defense to not give up over 450 ypg against FBS opponents.

What about to Golden's eye for talent everybody was creaming over when he was hired? Muhammad Wilkerson! Terrance Knighton!

Straw man...

We don't need " NFL draft picks ALL OVER our defense" but there wasn't 1 outside of Perrymen that was an upper classmen. Not 1. Maybe Gunter.

Name 1 senior from last year on defense that is making an NFL team in a significant role next year? You will be found wanting.
 
I don't understand why we need NFL draft picks all over our defense to not give up over 450 ypg against FBS opponents.

What about to Golden's eye for talent everybody was creaming over when he was hired? Muhammad Wilkerson! Terrance Knighton!

Straw man...

We don't need " NFL draft picks ALL OVER our defense" but there wasn't 1 outside of Perrymen that was an upper classmen. Not 1. Maybe Gunter.

Name 1 senior from last year on defense that is making an NFL team in a significant role next year? You will be found wanting.

Rice had the 30th ranked defense. How many NFL draft picks they putting out in this draft?

Southern Alabama had the 50th ranked defense. How many NFL draft picks they churning out this year?

Where were their recruiting classes the past 5 years in comparison to ours?
 
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