skersrule,
Do you see us recruiting adequately, numbers make little difference to me. I am looking for quality, play makers, game breakers with good footbally savy. If we were recruiting these by the boat loads I would have expected a lot more freshman playing every down as others do at other programs.
Do you feel they are not playing due to the difficulty of the system, too much to learn. We will see what Bo has recruited this year, most will be his kids. Do you feel he has brought in the ability that Hoke and Meyers have brought in in their first years, do you feel we are getting everything out of ours as Hoke seemed to last year. I followed Hoke at San Diego State where he quickly turned that program around, which I never thought could happen.
Do you honestly feel that Bo is on a level with either Hoke or Meyers, in any part of the game?
Like stated, Bo gets a pass from me for the way he runs the program, he makes the kids grow, become men, or in least in my mind he does. I just don't think he has the skills yet to be a top head coach. Time will develop that I hope, but there are many that do not want him at Nebraska, and it is not just his coaching that they are concerned about. I know most on here laugh that off, but I have friends that put a lot of money into this program, and a growing number are not happy about the face of the program.
I think he made tremendous improvement this past year, but I know he has been told he had to. But that is part of growing up and I think he is making strides, but for me there are a lot corrections to be made on the coaching side. I hope his new assistants are as good as he thinks they are or they will take him down I am afraid.
Okay let's take this one point at a time:
1. In 2011 Nebraska played Aaron Green, Ameer Abdullah and Braylon Heard--all three true freshman RBs. Jamal Turner played WR as a true freshman. Tyler Moore played OT as a true frosh. That's five true freshman I can think of off the top of my head on offense alone--what more do you want?
2a. Considering we've been through three different offenses, with two different OC's in the last three years it's literally impossible to say at this point if the "system" is too complicated or not. Taylor was a redshirt freshman in '10 and made freshman mistakes. In '11 his only real bad game was against Wisconsin when he threw three consecutive interceptions. After that debacle he was solid with his decision making although numerous times his WRs and OL didn't hold up their respective ends. Any QB looks a heck of a lot better when those around him execute and make plays consistently. How good do you think Russell Wilson would have looked had he been throwing to our mostly stoned- for hands WRs?
2b. This is the first time in Taylor's career that he's been in the same offense in consectutive years and I think we'll see a much improved offense all around.
3. If you look at simply recruiting sites and judge talent by recruiting rankings then no Bo has not brought in the kind of talent that Hoke and Meyer have. However, recruiting rankings, while fun to point to and brag about, are pretty much meaningless once the recruits join the team. How smart they are, how they take to coaching, living on their own for the first time, staying out of trouble, coaching changes (whether their position coach moves on or the head coach is fired), their attitude, focus, and work ethic are all unquantifiable variables that make recruiting the inexact science it is. At this point all I can do is look at the film of the recruits we've signed and contrast that with film from other recruits and make an educated guess that athletically we're right there with most of the top teams. We certainly don't have the elite 1st round talent of Alabama but then again no one else does either. Because once you get past the Su'a Cravens (which are few and far in-between) it's a virtual crap-shoot as to which recruits become stars or busts. I mean really, how do you differentiate on a consistent basis if some 3* is automatically worse than a 4 or 5*? It's what the coaching staff does with them once they get onto campus and to this point the jury is still out regarding Bo. I do know one thing though, in 2010 three players from our secondary were drafted: Prince, Gomes, and Haag. That has to count for something.
4. I'm right there with you in agreeing that Bo still has tremendous room for improvement. However, let's look at the situation through honest evaluation and compare Bo to a coach that I think everyone can agree is at the top of college football right now: Nick Saban. This is Bo's first tour as a head coach and he's in year 5 which is upcoming. Nick Saban had two different stops at Toledo and Michigan State encompassing 10 years before landing at LSU in 1999. It then took him another three seasons, in an elite talent rich state like Louisiana no less, to win a national championship.
5a. I totally get that you're skeptical because there's absolutely nothing wrong with a healthy dose of it nor is there anything wrong with viewing something (even Nebraska football) with a critical eye. But when you only see the bad and down play what went right that's when I think a person isn't being fair-minded.
5b. What if Nebraska doesn't throw three interceptions in a row against Wisconsin? Do we win? Maybe, maybe not but the score wouldn't have such an embarrassing road loss. What about the game against Michigan? Trailing at halftime by 7, what if, instead of fumbling, Kenny Bell scores a TD or at the least hangs onto the ball? What about the other turnovers we lost, the punt which was blocked, the lame roughing the punter call? If none of those things happen, do we beat Michigan? I don't know. And then there was the bowl against South Carolina. We're up 13-9 and then we lose two turnovers in the red zone and miss a FG--could have been up by 21 heading into halftime.
See the pattern here? Last season was Nebraska's coulda, shoulda, woulda but didn't season.
If we can just stop beating ourselves I seriously do not think any team can beat us. But Nebraska needs to get it right between their ears because that's the last hurdle in their way.
