Undone

Super abbreviated version: -I think we lost to Colorado mainly because of turnovers. -I think we lost to Troy mainly because of terrible special teams.

I hadn't seen that, good catch. Yes, frustrating.

Good thoughts. And though it's only been two games, our tight ends have been pretty absent from the game plans so far in my opinion. It's possible that this is because Frost sees the need to establish the run in a new playbook/blocking schemes, which I'd totally understand.

Your posts are all over the board. Try to convey some kind of point you're wanting to make.

And Farniok just completely whiffs on his guy. That was probably the biggest problem for the play.

What a great find, @BlitzFirst. +1.

Yes. And surely not having Martinez in the game contributes to this. With Martinez in the game, the edge blitz doesn't come as often because defenses know that he can just side-step that s*** like it's nothing (see his first touchdown last week) and gash them. Despite what Frost might say to the contrary, I suspect that we have a bit of a crippled playbook with Bunch in the game combined with getting the box stacked more often. Hard to consistently have success with inside zone running in this scenario. This is why I was screaming yesterday in the second quarter to throw the WR screen. When we did that on that first successful drive, the field opened up. But we just couldn't capitalize on 3rd and shorts too often yesterday to get into the red zone enough. It's going to be really interesting to see who starts against Michigan...

I'm going to guess that the mood of the board will slowly shift greatly between today and Friday. It usually does. Biggest question really is, what is Martinez's injury status? Because honestly, Michigan State and Wisconsin both look like they're down a lot this year. We could win both of those games. If Martinez is back and is somewhere around 90% healthy against Michigan, I'd say don't schedule the 12/01 game.

Good points, @3rd and long.

And you'd hope in the Red Zone that you can lean on your experienced offensive line to plow some running lanes. We just couldn't do it on the drive where we wound up kicking for the missed field goal. Honestly, that was really the difference in the game.

Yes. And I couldn't believe we didn't get into the end zone where we wound up kicking for a missed field goal.

Didn't want to create a new thread for this and didn't know where to put it. Another thing that was incredibly frustrating to be honest was Young's play on their final touchdown drive. Here's the first play. Gifford's on the edge on the left side of the line. The way Young bites to the right of the field instead of staying home is seriously so hard to watch: The second play (their touchdown) isn't quite as bad because he does get blocked, but the whole defensive effort is just bad and not smart: Need to play in space better in conference play. It seems to have been the motion man both times that got us off of our assignments. Hard to watch! We really needed Mo Barry on this drive, IMO.

First of all...as to the bolded, you joined this board in July of 2016. So how tf would you know? To everything else you said, Martinez got injured during what might have been a touchdown drive to seal the win against Colorado and didn't play against Troy. And the next best QB on the team transferred. Pump the brakes on your outrage. It's so outlandish that it almost feels like trolling.

Honestly it would just be really nice if threads wouldn't devolve into arguing over past coaches and who did/didn't support them. This thread has good potential to actually discuss our team's play.

You're all about trying to catch people in double standards over the past couple of weeks, aren't you, Guy! Taking the Prodigal Son and his tie to 90's glory out of the current equation, there's one main reason to be patient right now as opposed to that situation in 2015, and his name is Adrian Martinez. I honestly still can't believe that we recruited him - as he's an unbelievable talent - and he's injured. So maybe to just get ahead of your argument a bit (and I'm not making this personal at all towards you - you're one of the best posters on this board), one would almost be a complete idiot for not having patience right now.

We were just -1 in the turnover margin against Troy, but we're now -4 for the season. Sure, maybe that season total would be less if we had actually played Akron...but maybe not. So, turnover margin is already pretty bad. And for us as fans that have watched that for so long, I think it even feels worse. Let's say we down their punt returner within 10 yards of fielding the punt that he took to the house, and then let's say they get no points on that drive. If we then make that second half field goal we missed, we probably win 22-17. So compare things to the situation we were in after losing to Northern Illinois last season. Is it the same? No. Completely different feel to things, and for several reasons. Hard to say which of the two teams' defenses we've faced so far is actually better. But the box score is kind of crazy; with Martinez playing the majority of the game against Colorado we rushed for 329 yards. Without Martinez against Troy, we rushed for 187. And we left a ton of 3rd & shorts out onto the field. That was so painful to watch.

You cherry picked just one of the things that I said in that post. The point of my original point was that Bunch played well enough for us to have won that game.

Hornibrook is average. Their offense isn't really as good as people think it is when their star receiver and tight end are out. No threat to go over the top. Damn I wish Martinez hadn't gotten hurt...

That's bordering on being a pretty stupid point you seem to be trying to make. As we have at least the second best wide receiver group in the conference, I'd expect them to catch most everything that comes into their area. He threw for 70% as a walk-on. He actually had at least one pass (and maybe two, but at least one) that got dropped that should have been caught, also.

I can't believe I'm saying this but I actually think our defense is good enough to beat Michigan. The problem is not having a healthy Adrian Martinez. If he's not 100% by next Saturday, I'd agree with an 0-4 prediction.

He threw for a 70% completion percentage. The fact that our special teams let them run a touchdown back and our kicker missed a field goal was not his fault. Our offensive line got horrible push on multiple 3rd & shorts. That was just painful to watch. We should have won the game 23-17.

You're right. Sorry for the aggressiveness.

GTFO of here and go chug a few beers. Seriously.

After three quarters of watching it be awful, the coaching staff needs to do something differently. I'm not saying that I would have passed when we ran on 3rd & 2 or anything ridiculous like that. I just probably would have worked the ball to the outside quickly more around the middle of the 3rd quarter. Dedrick Young missed two tackles that just killed us in the fourth quarter. That was also really, really tough to watch.

I thought about this all game. I would have shot Spielman & Lindsey across the middle for short slants into the middle when the outside blitz was evident. Would have ran jet sweeps. And I would have pitched the ball outside to Washington more. Honestly I was almost shocked we even scored that last touchdown. Our red zone offense was made out to look like s*** because we just couldn't take advantage of the way they were stacking the box. That leaves me really frustrated. I'm not frustrated with Bunch and I seriously hope that this board doesn't harp on him one bit.