Guy Chamberlin

I don't know. But the day after Thanksgiving I sat down to watch Nebraska play Iowa in a seemingly meaningless game, pretending I had stopped caring (this season), and found that I was just as riveted as always.

If it costs UNL a few million not to have Bo Pelini at a major university, where his name would remain in the news and the second guessers would keep measuring wins, it's a reasonable price. Really, you couldn't ask for better closure all around.

Frank Patrick. He was a 6' 7" quarterback who could throw the ball a mile but was among the most inaccurate an inefficient in Husker history. Patrick started for Devaney in 1967, was replaced by Ernie Sigler mid-season 1968, and finished his career as a second string tight end. For some mysterious reason he was drafted by the Green Bay Packers in 1970, lasted three seasons and played in four games. Bart Starr himself marvelled at how far Frank Patrick could throw the ball, but apparently getting it into a receiver's hands remained a problem. Vince Ferragamo remains the only Nebraska quarterback to take significant snaps in the NFL.

We've had the "what's our offensive identity?" conversation several times in the last few years. I never thought our offensive identity was a problem. I'm not sure offensive identity is even a thing unless you're losing and frustrated. But I do think teams develop identities, and the Nebraska dynasty we like to remember was built around linemen. Big ass linemen. Offense and defense. Winning in the trenches. Forget the Heisman, Nebraska was busy churning out Lombardi and Outland candidates every year. Because of that rep, we had a pipeline to high school OL/DL talent and sent them into the NFL on the other end. If you run first, you still have to pass. If you pass first, you still have to run. A good OL is required for both. And the blackshirt tradition was a constant through all those quarterbacks and offensive variations. Quarterback is the single most important position, but an offensive line that gives him an extra second and a defense that doesn't put him in a hole sure can make a QB look better.

In 1997 Tom had the chance to go out in style, go out on top, and go out without another quadruple bypass. The precise timing of his retirement also helped him win that '97 championship, nudging the coaches to give Osborne the sentimental nod over Michigan. (I know. We totally deserved that title regardless of sentiment. But it was hardly a given that pollsters would unseat their own #1 team, which had just completed an unbeaten season.)

That also makes it a helluva gamble. If we are to take Riley at his word that no one from Nebraska had contacted him prior to Pelini's firing, and knowing that Riley had previously turned down USC and Alabama, it was quite a risk to go all-in on Riley, especially with Michigan and Florida in play. Hard to imagine there was no go-between who pre-confirmed Riley's interest before Eichorst made his initial phone call.

You can cry bias about anything. Even computers have to be fed criteria by humans. Humans who went to college. If you watched the Selection Committee week by week, it honestly seemed like knowledgeable people making subjective choices about the four best teams, ignoring the typical pollster protocols which often get lazy and biased themselves. Was Ohio State a payoff to the Big 10 or a punative action against the Big 12? I don't know. But when I saw Ohio State absoutley whup-ass Wisconsin with its third string quarterback, I realized how much I wanted to see Urban Meyer have a shot at Nick Saban. If Ohio State had prevailed say, 34 - 21, I don't think they squeeze in. I'm all about the eye-test. I honestly don't think the Selection Committee had to answer to or apologize to anyone. That was the whole point of the excercise, and why the NCAA chose the judges they did.

Or what if Joe Ganz had one more year of eligibility? Funny game indeed.

While I predicted this first year of the four team playoffs would piss more people off than ever, the end result feels surprisingly right. Only TCU and Baylor could make a case for injustice, and they've made it fairly meekly. For all the other college football fans not invested in a single team, these are the games we'd like to see. The teams left out can make their separate cases in other bowl games, just like the old days. But as long as there are 5 major conferences and 3 potential Cinderallas, an 8 team playoff will always sound better.

There's nothing more relaxing after a stressful coaching career than taking a job in the U.S. House of Representatives.

I'm trying to imagine how I'd feel if Kirk Ferentz had been announced as the new Nebraska coach.

Fire Bo Pelini!

why do people keep saying he is going to play DE in the NFL he is being projected by everyone to be a 3-4 OLB this thing about staying to get bigger doesn't matter They are saying the same things about Gregory that they said about Aldon Smith. Whether linebacker or DE, Aldon Smith takes the end, usually with an eye for the quarterback but fast enough to contain a running back working the edge. Aldon Smith didn't need to add any weight and leading the NFL in sacks was a great precedent for guys his size.

In private? Rant away. But if it has any chance of going public, be very, very careful because the place that hired you probably isn't that different than the place that fired you. College fooball is a small world. Burning bridges has an excellent chance of backfiring. That said, I'm sure it's full of guys who genuinely can't stand each other.

The math's pretty simple: Nothing to prove + Everything to lose = Hello NFL.

Interesting that the clips they showed of Riley had him hurling his clipboard and headphones, and generally looking pissed on the sidelines.

Football moves fast, and it can be hard to follow as a fan without instant replay and a helpful telestrator. But there were several Nebraska games where I watched plays unfold and had time to look up and see our defenders still five yards off the play, waiting for it to come to them. I would yell at the TV, but they acted like they didn't even hear me.

I understand wanting to put this season behind us, but 2014 was a great year for Husker highlight reel plays. Maybe the best in recent memory. Know what? Between Ameer, Westerkamp, Bell, Armstrong, Pierson-El, Gregory, Gary, Collins, even Cotton falling on his ass, I bet you could actually make us feel warm and squishy.

Irregardless of what you guys think, CycloneClyde is a fellow human bean and deserves are respect. Even the Precedent of the United States makes misteaks!

I think an even larger group considers your entire premise flawed. Subtract the coaches who are totally unavailable and the coaches whose only recommendation is sentimental, and you have maybe a couple guys no better than Mike Riley. The future is always uncertain. Hope is free. Some pretty smart people consider the Riley hire a coup. Husker Nation can be united simply by keeping an open mind. What's the risk in that?

We need good down linemen. Offense and defense. But especially offense. We used to have a reputation and a pipeline for offensive linemen. It hasn't been lost forever. It just hasn't been maintained. An upgrade on the offensive line would make everyone look brilliant.

so you were ok with Bo's 9 wins, but anything less than 11 and a championship is reason for termination? you f'in up every thread with nonsense is starting to get old - please at least tell me you're trolling and not serious with most of this 9~10 wins wasn't good enough for Bo. Are we changing the standards now? Bo had to rebuild this program as a first time head coach. The new guy doesn't have to rebuild, he has to change some things and has about 15years head coaching experience. The schedule is even more beneficial next year than it was this. the talent is there. If this guy is really as elite as Shawn makes him out to be, then no, I'm not kidding. 11 wins should be his basement. For seven seasons I refused to assign Bo Pelini a magic number to guage his success. For me it was an eye test and a gut test. I'm gonna stick with that system for Mike Riley. The basement next season is improvement. I'll decide it when I see it. Please join me.

If I may take the Husker Nation Divided question to slightly different territory. I live in California. My brother lives in Lincoln. Not only does my brother think Bo Pelini should not have been fired, he thinks Bo represented everything good about college football (players love him, graduation rate, clean program.) I was relieved by Pelini's dismissal without even knowing his replacement. My brother was appalled by this. He sees a divide between In-State Huskers and Out-State Huskers. His friends who moved away disliked Bo for two or more seasons, considered him a black eye to Nebraska. My brother's friends in Nebraska were far more apt to defend Bo. My brother contends that EVERYONE he talked to in Lincoln thought the firing was a huge mistake, hates Eichorst (Perlman puppet), and thinks the team is doomed to another Callahnesque era. He claims Lincoln's high school football coaches are considering not funnelling players to UNL, they're so disgusted. He says every article in the Lincoln Journal was critical of the firing, every conversation with strangers either sad or angry. My brother exaggerates like a billion times more than I do, but I'm also well-aware that Internet bulletin-boards don't represent the silent majority. Do in-state Nebraskans tend to circle the wagons and defend Bo Pelini against perceived outsiders more? And do your casual conversations with real people match up with HuskerBoard trends? Do out-of-state Nebraskan take their cues from national media sources, missing out on the local scuttlebutt? Is one perception more valuable than the other? Is this post pellalucid or willful obfuscation? For what it's worth, my brother has really warmed up to Mike Riley in the past 72 hours.

I'm going through the same thing with my San Francisco 49ers at the moment. So many different things seem flawed and broken. An entire culture needs to change. Or maybe we just need a better offensive line. Seriously. Sometimes you're just a couple players away from a world of difference.

Please tell me more about Obama's secret ring, and how this undeniable fact lends credence to your theory.