84HuskerLaw

I was kind of expecting a Blackshirt to be given to Sam Foltz as well. It is certainly not unprecedented to award one to a great punter for a job well done. He did a fine job for us I'd say!

I think you always look at tight ends as having alternative positions as options. Often they make fine LBs and DEs. Some even turn into DTs. If they are fast enough, you can move them out to play more of true receiver spot to create some big vs small mismatches. Especially on the those fades into the corner of the end zone or something. Always recruit great athletes and tight ends are often the best athlete on the team, pound for pound.

Let's all just agree on a couple basic truths: 1. Frank Solich was a good coach (not great by any means) but was at best a mediocre recruiter. In his tenure, he took the BEST, DEEPEST, most talent rich team in the country and by the fifth year it was being outclassed by other national powers. (Miami embarrassed us in the Rose Bowl and that was just the 4th year). We could have won ten games in the 2002 schedule (Frank won 7) with the third string from '97. 2. Riley did not inherit a team with nearly as much talent as Frank did. This is not debatable. 3. This year's team has some good players on it - without a doubt. The problem is we don't have nearly enough to be even in the discussion in national terms. I think there is a long long shot that with no injuries and lots of good fortune and prayers, we can win 10 or more games.

Essentially one might as well say "We live in the age of the victimhood culture!" This is derived, in part at least, from the politics of division spawned by the liberals attempting to corral entire voter groups into blocks that they can 'own' without significant campaign efforts each election cycle. By creating a political and social narrative that members of the designated social group are somehow being victimized or unfairly treated by some other social group, the organizers intend to divide and conquer politically. This modus operandi has been dramatically ramped up and put into action by the Democrat party over the past 40 years. It is really a part of the overall effort to deeply entrench and embed a certain political thought or mindset amongst the population at large which declares as a matter of fact a political and social worldview that favors one political party (the Democrats) over the other parties (Republicans, et al). Once the underlying notion is spread sufficiently to be commonly understood or even accepted as reality, then the next step is to place political and societal blame on the opposing party (the Republicans) and to foster hate and anger and outrage towards the same.

So if we can't vote for Hillary because she was "attempting to use race" and that "disqualifies her in and of itself" for "reasonable people" to vote for her, then who is this "good candidate" we should support? Jeb Bush is an honorable man. Far and away better than the Clintons, as one of many examples. As far as I am aware, Bernie Sanders is an honorable and honest and decent man. He's a political KOOK (but so is Hillary for that matter. Huckabee is a good and decent man with governmental executive office exeperience exactly equal to Bill Clinton (same state even). Ben Carson is a good and decent and honorable man. Extremely intelligent and even Black! To give just a few

Absent injuries or other absences of vital starters (QB, OL, DL, S, P, PK are all critical in my view), I put our odds of winning for the schedule as follows ( think of these 'odds' as the number of times NU wins if we played them ten times): Fresno 9 to 1 Wyo 8 to 2 ORE 3 to 7 (more likely than not a LOSS) NW 6 to 4 ILL 8 to 2 IND 8 to 2 PUR 9 to 1 WIS 4 to 6 OSU 1 to 9 (loss very likely) MN 8 to 2 MAR 8 to 2 IA 5 to 5 (a toss up - but odds favor NU if we have won 8 or more previously IMO) Best Guess - to this point 10-2 as I think we have lady luck on our side for once. Conference Championship game participation - 3 to 7. Win - 3 to 7. Bowl game - unknown opponent but chances of a win at least 6 out of 10.

Obviously, if we land all of the ones shown (reds and blues), that's about 35! Way over the limit so there are plenty of priorities and not enough room. Our wants and needs are far above our capacity. Assume the coaches have the order of preference and the ones they hope will commit first eliminating the rest. The prospects better hurry up and get aboard as the train is leaving the station. Have to say that 35 would be an incredible class and put the Huskers well on the road to recovery.

The problem with this is there is the underlying assumption that the 'facts' and 'scientific evidence' that is being cited as proof of a given statement or circumstance is being delivered by those with built in agendas and biases which are already contrary to the other side of the argument. If the 'scientists' don't believe in God, for example, then they tend to present the scientific evidence which purports to defend their opinions, often disregarding the contrary evidence. We have seen dramatic cases wherein the 'scientific' community is claiming there is man caused global warming based on made up scientific 'data'. This obviously completely undermines their side. They need to be honest and sincerely factual and not demonstrating the often hidden agendas which they are actively pursuing. Until the science is truly scientific and NOT fabricated in support of a cause or agenda, the feelings and contrary agendas will continue unabated.

I think walk ons have always been a very important part of the team for several reasons (except Callahan who dumped the entire idea). 1. Walk ons tend to be local Nebraska guys who live the dream of being a Husker and play with all the heart and effort a coach can dream of. 2. Being disproportionately Nebraska guys, these walk ons are all but ignored by the national recruiting types so they are not heavily sought after and Nebraska gets an edge in getting what may well be solid 3 or even 4 star types. 3. Many walk ons don't make so the feeling is that if 30% of the walk ons become contributors, that is somehow a great success rate. Arguably the program ought to look at taking 50 walkons each year and awarding 5 schoarships to the top five and letting the bottom 20 move on. Repeat as necessary. Maybe that is effectively what we do now. 4. There has been a certain element of pride in being a walk on and then 'making it' - sort of a chip on the shoulder attitude of 'I'll prove the experts wrong and show em!"

The Dems have been trashing every Republican candidate for decades without regard to truth or validity. Therefore Hillary supporters are voting for her over all other candidates from all parties. They run negative ads throughout the campaign and spend majority of their campaign time spewing about their opponents (all not just Bernie Sanders). She trashed Obama as well even attempting to use race as welll. That is beyond shameful and disqualifies her in and of itself as well. It should for reasonable people. Why don't you support a good candidate? That is my point. Just to say she is better than Trump but offer no specific reasons - says you don't really have any - just knee jerk voting Dem no matter what. That is the problem in this country.

I recall that part of the defensive issue in the late 70s and through much of the 80s was difference between defending the Big 8 which was a more run oriented conference and then facing those pesky Florida schools which were pass oriented. We often did not have the pass defense ability. We built a defense to win the Big 8 but then did not match up in bowls. We changed and were fortunate that Oklahoma got in trouble and no longer was the wishbone monster that ruined our season each Thanksgiving and allowed us the freedom to build defenses to win the bowls. Just my theory but I believe there is a degree of basic truth.

I think we can all agree that negligent driving, whether it be the result of intoxication, inattention as a result of paying too much attention to your phone, your stereo, a Big Mac or your make up installation, stupidity, lack of driver ability (so often the case with teenagers and the elderly and so on), a vehicle that is not properly and safely maintained, or whatever, that results in an accident with injuries, property damage or death, is quite regrettable and many are avoidable. People do regrettable and foolish things all the time. Talking about 'the death penalty' for negligent driving is nonsensical to most people I dare say. Long prison sentences and deprivation of driving privileges, massive fines and incredibly burdensome probation terms and so forth often have a counterproductive effect. Being a negligent pedestrian can be dangerous as well. Not all accidents are CAUSED by the driver who has been drinking and this fact is almost always not even considered when the reporting and discussion of a given accident happens. Many drivers are negligent when stone cold sober. Do we imprison them? Most would say NO! Just some more perspective.

Because she'd make a better president than Donald Trump. Why do you really believe she will be a good President. It is not a question of better than Trump as Hillary has been running against many other candidates as well. Somehow she was chosen suggesting she is somehow better than all the rest. What qualities does she offer America ? I am truly curious as to what Hillary Clinton supporters see in her that qualify her to be President? Just list a handful of her best qualities and any evidence of the same that give you cause to vote for her. Although Trump was certainly not among my top 5, he has many positive qualities. He is a very shrewd business man that understands how the real world works and understands basic economics and business in particular. If you actually listen to his many speeches (yes he gives speeches instead of reading them like most other candidates), you learn right away that he understands the most basic, deep rooted problems facing our country and the world in general. You may not agree with all of his ideas to solve the problems but you surely must agree with his recognition of the problems. Hillary points out problems that she and her fellow Democrats have sponsored and fostered after decades and decades of liberalism enacted. So far, not one of the policies prescribed and enacted and followed for generations of time now have worked. The 'cures' have only sickened the patient and made matters worse. Poverty, income inequality (to the extent it is a problem), unemployment, social decay, crime, etc etc etc, are only getting worse as entire generations of Americans are left to live in squalor and despair. The highest paying jobs are exported and the Dems continue to support and promote importing more low skilled foreigners to work at near slave wages. Why?

Last year, Nebraska's total defense was right at 400 yards per game, to rank #64 nationally. Yes, that is a poor defense, but the worst defenses in the country gave up 450-550. There were only 5 teams in the entire country that gave up less than 300 yards per game, with the lowest being Boston College at 254 YPG. Wisconsin had the best scoring defense last year at 13.1 Ohio State was #2 at 15.1. Only 15 teams in the entire country gave up less than 20 points per game. Nebraska was #76 nationally at 27.8, again which is not good. Thanks. Obviously the defenses are even poorer than I realized. Those are terribly high numbers, Nobody had a defensive scoring average under 10? Wow. The holding is blatant, the pass interference and targeting penalties, the pick plays, etc etc. All enable offenses to move better, score more, etc. Thanks. Once upon a time, to average 400 yards of offense a game was considered very good. Now teams are giving up that on a regular basis. Ugh. Didn't realize how bad things have gotten.

If he uses the backs like he did in the bowl game, I am OK with seeing free substitutions to keep them fresh, happy and aggressive. I thought Cross and Zig were dynamic vs UCLA and I am quite sure those Bruins were pretty much sick of the pounding we laid on them in the 4th quarter (sooner actually). Now, Newby is the senior and I would expect that seniors and experience are getting lots of weight in the season opener. We want to not shoot ourselves in the foot with lots of silly youthful mistakes. We have got to be 40 points better than Fresno whether we play a marginally better soph over a seasoned veteran to start the game or not. Play error free and tough and give em a good 'roughin up' and we should win convincingly and get the season started right this time. By game three, the nerves should be fairly settled and we will need everything to work perfectly to beat those Ducks. Newby is faster and reports suggest he is a little stronger and running harder - he needs to if he wants to play more. Fresno may not have the team speed that UCLA had so we may well be able to run wide more successfully without the reverses and trickery, etc. Let's hope Newby can turn the corner and break a couple long ones. Newby is supposed to be able catch the ball. We know Zig can and Wilbon should signs (we need to see him in action). Tre Bryant is a player - without doubt - one of the better recruits last year. He has loads of upside. I think he might be the best RB recruit in a long time (along with Abdullah - a different style).

My God, the Clinton defenders just won't give up. It is shameful that they will even consider voting for someone whose scandalous life has been exposed repeatedly and it doesn't seem to matter. Half the voting population is willing to vote to send these Clintons to the Whitehouse AGAIN! One can debate whether or not voting for Trump is a wise move but there is absolutely no question, Hillary Clinton and Bill are criminals, more corrupt than any of have dared to run for the Presidency in at least 100 years, and offer very little in the way or real world business and management expertise. So anyone who seriously intends to vote for the Clintons has to be asked the simple question: Why? There are certainly literally thousands of good and decent and half way honorable Democrats who could have been nominated for the office. Why would all those who opposed Trump and should know better than want the Clintons, not support one of many of the other Republican candidates. There were certainly half a dozen or more of the 17 who ran that are far superior in any of many ways to the Clintons to be leaders of this country. The Clintons are greedy selfish and care nothing about America and Americans as people. They care ONLY about personal enrichment and enjoyment. They 'rented' out the Lincoln bedroom in the White House for personal profit the first time. That alone tells you all you need to know about the immorality.

I am not sure I'd agree that the offenses of today are really that much better than 20 years ago. As I said, the rules tend to favor offenses and as such scoring and yards and so on tend to be higher. The Big Ten is reputed to have better or even the best defenses, as a conference, in the country. As such, you would expect even the average Big Ten defenses to hold opponents to less than 350 yards. That to me is a rather high number. I think a great defense would give up an average of something considerably less than 300 and a poor defense give up about 400. Average ought to be less than 350 in my view. A great defense ought o hold opponents under ten a game and an average Big Ten defense (again, being among the best in the country as such) should be certainly under 20. I should also add that Big Ten teams are not known for the 'scoring explosion' type offenses. That should also suggest lower scoring and yards allowed defensive numbers. Just my opinion. We gave up way too many yards last year and I thought we were somewhere around that 350 mark. ? Our excessive interceptions ended up putting a lot of easy points in front of our opponents as well. Please note that I also expect considerable improvement for Nebraska on both offense and defense in stats, points, etc. This will reflect also in our national ranking in various categories and should enable a better won/loss record.

Looking at the stats cited: 10 plus wins by the conference champs is nothing surprising 354 yards per game given up by the average Big Ten defenses is actually poor. That number ought to be about 50 yards lower. 23 pts per game given up is also too high and should be about 5 pts lower. 2 turnovers a game is not all that high. I would suspect that even the top ten teams average at or above 1.25 or more. A little suprised its not higher really. and I think we would be doing better if we were getting more takeaways. We didn't get nearly enough fumbles and should have more INTs as well. 4.65 yards per carry on first down - ? by whom ? Hard to know what to think. I doubt we averaged that high over the past five years did we? 1.2 yards difference between average starting field position - that is an insignificant difference and means nothing unless one is arguing that we should be winning this one by about 15. I have stated many times that we are grossly underperforming in our kick and punt return game. We fair catch and or let roll far too many punts. Kick offs out of the end zone are beyond our control of course. 19000 yards rushing by the Ducks ought to be the fear of God into our coaches. Oregon is a good running team despite being known as a fast paced 'race horse' type offense. Fatigue factor as they try to wear out the opponents' defensive players with up tempo attack. When run well, it is a very very very good offense. Rules and refs favor the offenses today and this explains why playing defense is harder today that twenty years ago arguably. Don't know the exact numbers but I would guess that scoring and total yards and so on are, on average, higher today that 20 years ago.

LOL That is exactly what the entire discussion is all about. What the hell happens with the loss of our two senior QBS? Duh!!! We don't have a second string QB as we all saw what happened in Purdue. Unless Fyfe is reincarnated, we don't have a back up QB ready to lead the team. This seems to be the general opinion on this board. I don't necessarily agree but almost nobody is clammering for Fyfe to start over Armstrong. So you all insist we cant waste or burn POB's precious redshirt year to save this season. Just stupid. Now, the discussion is over. Next topic please.

No Hail Marys this year. A thing of the past. Won't need em and won't be victims either. Huskers are gonna rock and roll this year. Gotta believe! There are good vibes all around!

Great size and good speed it seems to me. Will be a fine receiving and running and blocking threat and of course will be a solid contributor on special teams and could play other places as well.

Great way to open the season. Let's see if these Nation's best Huskers can run the table all the way to another title! Go Big Red! Dominate!

Welcome to Nebraska! Thanks for the confidence. You have chosen wisely!

The stats surely indicate that Riley and Company like to throw but also will run the ball to keep the opponent off balance. It appears they will do what they believe will work the best. Bearing in mind that the seasons in which Riley had excellent throwing QBs and guys who could catch and run after the catch, the passing game would naturally be very effective in making bigger plays. Riley has said a number of times that he believes that successful scoring drives tend to include a several plays with gains of 15 or 20 yards are made. I think it can be accurately said that for most 'average' teams, sustaining long, methodical drives with consistent 4 and 5 yard gains is very difficult. Eventually, most teams suffer a couple negative or very little gained type plays. Once the down and distance become problematic (e.g. 2&8 plus or 3 & 5 plus), then the defense has the advantage. You need to average over 4 yards on run plays on first down and need to keep the 3rd down to less than 3 in my view. 3rd and four or more is a passing situation for most teams against better than average opponents. Historically, with Nebraska's great running teams, 3rd and 4 or 5 were still 'running' downs and getting the first down as still quite possible and depending on field position, many drives could be viewed as 4 down territory once beyond the mid field point. 4th and one or two could be considered as 'advantage offense' for us. Defenses therefore had to play the run first and hope we didn't throw a short sideline out or some kind of tight end over the middle. I tend to believe, based on the ten years of stats shown for Riley's Beavers teams, that they were not stout enough up front to control the ball by running right at the defenses they tended to face. Therefore, the run game was more often used to keep the pass defense honest and make them respect the run. Ideally, of course, an offensive coordinator will want to establish the run by having enough success running to force the defense to play the run first. Many defensive coaches will follow the simple rule that you must stop the run first and then play pass defense in the obvious passing situations accordingly. The great defenses will be talented enough to stop the run without having to overplay the run. They will have big quick front four and speedy linebackers that are superior tacklers and can move laterally and not be overwhelmed by bigger running backs who can push the pile. In other words, you must have LBs that can run 4.6 or better to be able to close and stop the play near the line of scrimmage and not 4 or 5 yards beyond there. I tend to believe, as we approach the start of the season, that we will have a little less effective run defense but considerably better pass defense. Especially in the first game or two. But our new D line will play tougher as they get more experience. They will have to play 'lights out' vs Oregon and we will be in serious trouble. We will have to guess right on some critical plays in that game or will find ourselves on the short end of a high scoring game. Our LBs will be much more active and make more tackles than last year. This assumes that our D line can be effective in occupying the O linement and keeping them off the backers so they can use their athleticism to make the plays. We may give up an extra yard or so on the first down runs but unless the opponent's coaches are patient and willing to try to run right at us, we will be successful enough in a base defense to not have to make ourselves vulnerable to the pass to help in the run stops. I base this all on my gut hunches from the limited information we seem to get out of practice reports and less than sufficient raw data on heights, weights, speed and etc. Maybe I will be surprised. We will know soon enough I suppose. To answer the query posed in the thread, I think Riley will run the ball first until we are not be successful in gaining 4 or more on first down. Then he will resort to the passing game. I don't think he is so stuck on the forward pass that he will not give the run game a real opportunity to work. He will throw on first down IF he does not believe the run game will be effective enough. See the UCLA game for reference.

Sounds like the one thing going for Fresno State is the element of surprise as we really don't know much about how they will line up to attack us on either side of the ball. But, actually that should work OK anyway as we will be starting the season in our 'basic' plays on offense and defense, although we ought to be able to give 'em a few shakes and shivers in our offensive formations etc. If we block the corners well, we should be able to run wide on the 3-4 successfully. I don't think a 3 man front can stop us from running right at them either as our size and strength advantage will be overwhelming (at least it should be). I believe our strength and conditioning programs with Epley back now for about a year should be really making a difference. We will be more powerful up front and even our RBs should be more difficult to stop without solid tackling techniques. Can't wait to watch Ozigbo and Wilbon and hoping Newby will make a nice jump up on the toughness scale. I would say a good opener score vs. these guys will be 52-7. We should not give up many points as our defense should be able to pretty much dominate a freshman QB and bunch of inexperienced guys. I think the crowd alone will be difficult for these guys to overcome.