ColoradoHusk

2020 recruiting class should be the last class with a “free COVID year”. That means it will still be a possibility for guys to use a 6th year for the 2025 season. I think most coaches will start to push guys along, as Rhule is doing.

If he said “concucked” I would be thinking “how does he know so much about my personal life?”

Man, all of the crazy posts and articles from local media about Garrett Nelson “leaving early” even though he played 4 full years as OLB for NU was terrible.

No doctorate degrees for those guys!!! Personally, I will be glad when the extra COVID year of eligibility is available. It’s too hard to track, and people get too worked up about a guy “leaving early” when he’s already played 4-5 years and he’s 23 years old.

Regardless of NIL, guys want to play. Thompson was given the starting QB job at FAU his former Texas head coach, so he took it. I would hope he had plenty of cash leftover after getting 6 figures from NU in 2022. NU also paid for Thompson’s shoulder surgery done in the spring.

Throwing more of other people’s money at the problem always seems like the right answer.

Unfortunately, I don’t think it a good thing that Haarberg is being counted on to be the starter in early 2023.

I also think that fans want NU to stick with running the ball despite the success of running the ball or the strength of the opponent. Some fans think passing the ball at all, isn’t sticking with a “run the ball” identity. Although NU did break a big TD run in the 4th quarter against Michigan’s backups.

This is complete speculation on my part here, but before Haarberg’s senior year of high school, Frost and Verduzco were striking out on recruiting a better QB than Haarberg, and then Frost faced a lot of local pressure to offer the big kid from Kearney. Haarberg had offers from Vandy and NC State, so Frost felt pressure to offer HH. This was also peak COVID times, so visiting recruits was tougher. Looking back on it, Cole Payton was probably the better choice between the 2 in-state QB’s but that’s hindsight.

I may be wrong, but I only remember one option run the entire game (can’t remember when) and that was a 2 yard gain on a Haarberg keeper. When it’s 21-0 early in the 2nd quarter, and obvious that the team is overmatched, I think the strategy became “let’s continue to have Haarberg work on his passing game, and limit his running, because we have another game in 6 days”. Yes, HH can get injured taking a sack, but he was obviously sore at the end of the game against La Tech, due to running it so many times in games 3 and 4. With this game, I don’t have an issue with the coaches accepting defeat early, and moving on. Haarberg knows how to run the option (at least the keeper), but he needs to continue to work on his passing, and the coaches need to find areas in the passing game which he can succeed.

I never realized that their stadium runs east-west, and I have been there (although I was super hungover for that game). Most football stadiums are situated north-south. The only other major stadiums that I know of that run east-west are Oklahoma State’s and AT&T Stadium (where the Cowboys play). Jerry Jones is so dumb that he has windows on the West end zone, which let the setting sun in the west shine through and blinds the players and fans on late afternoon games.

The lazy walkers are also the same people who don’t walk straight, so if you try to “pass them” there is a good chance you bump into them, and you look like a total a$$.

That sounds brutal. I can’t stand slow walkers!!!! Move it along people.

Listening to this week’s Doc Talk Podcast, and they mention that part of the discussion of the capital investment by the Athletic Department and other University leaders was building a whole new stadium. There is no mention of where it could have been built, but I’m glad they didn’t do that. College football stadiums need to be on/near campus, and Memorial Stadium is uniquely situated so close to downtown Lincoln.

Great job!!! Hope your investment is worth it!

Oregon has Phil Knight $, so I don’t think that’s a good example. Kentucky donors will give to basketball over football.

I am not a donor at NU in any way, shape, or form, but I do find it interesting when people do complain and whine about the money being spent, when they donate zero dollars themselves. If they want a say in what the $ gets spent on, open up their checkbook.

I know we all get frustrated when young guys aren’t seeing the field, when we think they can contribute. But, at some point it comes down to the player to do the work and do well enough in practice to see the field. I was one who didn’t think Malachi would make much impact at WR this year. I thought he was raw and would need time to develop, and as @Red Five mentioned, Coleman’s recruiting rankings came from his size, speed, and athletic ability, and not necessarily his production in high school.

I tend to think that when past coaches tried to change HH’s throwing motion, it was ineffective and that if he was throwing the ball with a “correct arm motion” there wasn’t the same velocity or accuracy with the ball. That’s why HH still has the sidearm delivery. While not ideal, it has done well enough for him to get where he is now. I think the Haarberg experiment at QB is going to be for this year only. Sims may take over the job when he gets back to 100% and perform well enough to retain the job. Rhule and Satt will need to bring in a transfer QB in the offseason.

Haarberg is in his 3rd year at NU, so if he was going to change his throwing motion, it needed to be done under the previous staff. I’m not a fan of his motion, but it is what it is. Supposedly Rhule was asked about HH’s motion in the press conference, and Rhule answered they looked at it in the Spring, but couldn’t change anything. I actually think the coaches wanted Haarberg to be 3rd string QB, with getting snaps at TE (which he did early in the season). But, Purdy was limited with injuries and Sims got injured as well, thrusting HH into the starting role. Nobody knows how injured Sims still is, but if it’s a high ankle sprain, they can linger for a while, and it limits what he’s best at (running the ball). If Haarberg is able to limit mistakes, and keep NU in games this year, I think he’s serviceable (but not good). I actually did think he had one good pass yesterday where Michigan took away a slant route to Kemp, and HH stayed with Kemp as Kemp continued on his route through the zone defense. HH made a good pass and it was a good play. For this year, I’m just looking for some way for NU to win games. I don’t know who the answer at QB is this year, just because it’s an overall mess.

While the Michigan game was slightly worse than I expected, I still expected NU to lose handily. The talent gap and overall execution of the teams are far too wide. I have always said that rebuilding a program starts with beating teams that NU is even or more talented than. The good news is that NU has 3 straight games to see if Rhule and staff have made progress with this team. NU plays 3 opponents which NU has lost 5 of 6 games over the past 2 years. These games are very winnable, with 2 at home. NU hasn’t won 3 straight games since 2016, but I’m not going to make any judgement on the staff or direction of the program until the end of October.

I had no idea Haarberg threw sidearm like that, but he probably shouldn’t have been recruited to Nebraska in the first place. Im not sure if Frost was facing a lot of pressure from in-state fans to take Haarberg, but Frost’s QB recruiting after Martinez was abysmal.

You want to make a decision on hypotheticals. I would prefer when coaches make decisions based on facts. Again, I’m not saying I like either one at QB, but I have embraced the fact that Nebraska is going to need to win very ugly this year. In my opinion, that means whoever isn’t turning the ball over which costs the offense scoring chances, and gives the opponent short fields. Yes, Haarberg had a bad turnover against Michigan today, but that opponent is completely different than any opponent NU has seen all season. In the first 2 games, I defended Sims due to the lack of talent around him, but he still had 7 turnovers which were really on him, and not turnovers forced by the defense. If I am going to try to win games by limiting teams to points, I have a hard time trusting a QB who is prone to turnovers and who isn’t healthy right now. This could all change if Haarberg starts against Illinois and stinks up the joint. But, I don’t think Sims is anywhere near healthy enough to be an option at QB right now.

Jamaal Lord was a great running back. Calling him a dual threat QB is false, because he couldn’t pass.

There is a difference in how players perform in practice and how they perform in games. For whatever reason, Sims can’t take what he does in practice into the games. I am not high on either player, but if the offense is going to be so limited no matter who the QB is, I would rather go with the guy who doesn’t turn the ball over to the other team. At this point, it’s Haarberg. But, IMO, that’s a fluid situation depending on health and game by game performance.