JTrain

I think Lil Red is pretty sweet. The suit itself is creatively designed. The reason most people have to say they hate him is because it's football and everything has to be machismo in order for it to be cool. Well, that attitude might be helpful in picking a good middle linebacker, but on the sidelines, I don't see what the big deal is.

Not a bad tradition, but it's a shame they have to schedule top teams to begin the season. Looked kinda silly last year, burning the big Bevo head and then losing 52-10. I don't suspect we beat them that bad, but we'll likely win by three touchdowns or so. Next year I guess they have UAB so maybe they will start a win streak.

I hope someone remembers these threads in December.

Holt and Bell

Did they have a DT at QB, though?

You mean the Joker, right?

I've always wondered if a 2-QB formation would work. I've never seen anyone actually try it the way I'm imagining it, but I dreamed it up back when we had Crouch and Lord. Basically they would both be in shotgun position (possibly with a RB as well) and the snap could go to either player. Could throw the defense off, maybe with Lee and Washington. Lot's of creative plays.

What day's the depth chart?

Obviously he didn't mean 0%. There's always a chance. I don't think it'll happen this season. I don't see us beating VT, especially without Q's help in the backfield. We'll need a couple turnovers, and Tyrod is turnover prone so it could happen. If we pulled it off, the sky's the limit for the rest of the season. Can you imagine going into a home game with #1 Oklahoma at 8-0 and in the top 5?

From Stassen CFB: Best I-A teams, by winning percentage, Devaney Era (62-72) 1 Nebraska 0.82927 101 20 2 123 2 Texas 0.82353 97 20 2 119 3 Alabama 0.80242 98 23 3 124 4 Southern Cal 0.79412 92 22 5 119 5 Arizona State 0.79386 90 23 1 114 6 Penn State 0.76695 90 27 1 118 7 Arkansas 0.75630 89 28 2 119 8 Ohio State 0.74519 77 26 1 104 9 Louisiana State 0.74180 88 29 5 122 10 Notre Dame 0.74107 81 27 4 112 Best I-A teams, by winning percentage, Osborne Era (73-97) 1 Nebraska 0.83550 255 49 3 307 2 Penn State 0.78405 235 64 2 301 3 Michigan 0.77667 229 63 8 300 4 Alabama 0.75497 227 73 2 302 5 Ohio State 0.75415 223 70 8 301 6 Oklahoma 0.74232 214 72 7 293 7 Brigham Young 0.73237 227 82 3 312 8 Florida State 0.72297 212 80 4 296 9 Notre Dame 0.72203 211 80 4 295 10 Miami-Florida 0.70242 203 86 0 289 Over 5 percent difference between us and Penn St. Wow. Best I-A teams, by winning percentage, Solich Era (98-03) 1 Miami-Florida 0.85333 64 11 0 75 2 Marshall 0.81818 63 14 0 77 3 Florida State 0.79221 61 16 0 77 4 Boise State 0.78947 60 16 0 76 5 Oklahoma 0.77922 60 17 0 77 6 Tennessee 0.77632 59 17 0 76 7 Kansas State 0.77215 61 18 0 79 8 Texas 0.76623 59 18 0 77 9t Michigan 0.76000 57 18 0 75 9t Ohio State 0.76000 57 18 0 75 9t Virginia Tech 0.76000 57 18 0 75 12 Nebraska 0.75641 59 19 0 78 Best I-A teams, by winning percentage, Callahan Era (04-07) 1 Southern Cal 0.90385 47 5 0 52 2 Texas 0.86275 44 7 0 51 3 Boise State 0.84314 43 8 0 51 4 Louisiana State 0.82692 43 9 0 52 5 Auburn 0.82353 42 9 0 51 6t Ohio State 0.82000 41 9 0 50 6t West Virginia 0.82000 41 9 0 50 8t Oklahoma 0.79245 42 11 0 53 8t Virginia Tech 0.79245 42 11 0 53 10t Georgia 0.78431 40 11 0 51 10t Wisconsin 0.78431 40 11 0 51 ... 55t Houston 0.55102 27 22 0 49 55t Nebraska 0.55102 27 22 0 49

OK, but I wasn't talking about Boise St. I was comparing Oklahoma, Texas, USC, Florida, Ohio St., and LSU. All are in BCS conferences, so winning percentage does tell us something between them.

Winning percentage, past 10 seasons: 1 Boise State 0.844 2 Texas 0.822 3 Oklahoma 0.820 4 Southern Cal 0.780 5 Ohio State 0.770 6 Virginia Tech 0.769 7 Georgia 0.766 8 Florida 0.750 9 Texas Christian 0.740 10 Miami-Florida 0.736 11 Louisiana State 0.727 robsker, your elite group members are ranked 4, 8 and 11. Your second-tier teams are 2, 3 and 5. Might want to rethink your groupings, unless you're going only by number of BCS NC games won.

Where was Q at in the OU game? Yeah I know, he stunk in that game. But I would think the Clemson game was probably a better measure of how he might have performed this season, just due to chronology. But either way, his overall stats show he was valuable in short yardage. And Helu was occasionally banged up and had stamina issues, only the former of which may be helped by his extra muscle this season.

I think VA pretty much nailed it. The biggest question left is, who ends up with the redshirt: Green, Washington or neither?

BTW, all the posters saying Q wasn't a good short yardage back in that thread are proved pretty plainly wrong with this statistic. Averaging 5.7 yards in 3rd and 4th down short yardage is pretty amazing, and converting 14 of 16 is even more amazing.

It's really going to hurt us against Virginia Tech. Against stronger front sevens, Q was a huge asset for us (see Clemson). And sustaining long drives in a hostile road game is incredibly important. Not saying it's impossible with Helu but it would have been great to have them both.

And to answer your question, my idea of "arriving" isn't much different. I would say, over a three-year period, we would need to: 1. Beat at least two top 10 teams 2. Win at least two Big 12 North titles 3. Win at least one Big 12 Title 4. Win at least 29 games 5. Finish in the top five at least once I'm not a sunshine-pumper and I still think this is realistically possible. OU has accomplished all of these things consistently over the past nine years. And in that period, the South has been considerably stronger than the North. So there's no reason we can't reach the same level if this coaching staff turns out to be as good as we all hope it is.

Did someone forget to mention this rule to Bob Stoops?

Well that sucks. I know the economy is bad, but c'mon.

Anybody else wanna share? I know this got sidetracked with the whole Castille story.

I wonder if there is any remaining chance of a redshirt, if he emerges as the clear #2 come September 5.

Well, not really a T-shirt design, but:

This whole ESPN hates Nebraska thing has gotten so out of hand. ESPN doesn't hate Nebraska. In reality, they don't really care about Nebraska. And who can blame them? We haven't been in the national spotlight since 2001. The Big 12 North has not been significant on a national level for the better part of the last several years. First-degree murder is newsworthy, like it or not. And when a former DI player (especially from a major FBS program) is found guilty of the most serious crime there is, it's going to be in the news. Sorry, but it would be that way for any other major program. And it's not like it's a big headline article. It's a little text blurb on the sidebar (also included are headlines like "Tulane players back on field after flu quarantine".)

I hate to bitch, and I'll still buy every one of these that I'm not able to attend in person (as I did last year), but $30 and no HD? C'mon, FSN, get with the program. It's 2009. $30 is not chump change for many of us, and to put it in standard definition on top of that price, well that's pretty ridiculous. With ESPN Gameplan, you get 10-12 new games for less than $25, and most of them are in HD.

OP said Unity Council voted to boot Q. LJS said Unity Council was not involved. Am I the only one interested in this major difference in stories?