CFN.com Analysis: 5 Thoughts

[HuskerfaninOkieland]

2. Yes, Steve Pederson, you can run and win at Nebraska

 

By Richard Cirminiello

 

South Carolina was dominant. Michigan State is weaving a special season. Florida State is building a bridge to the glory days. And yet, in terms of the national championship race, Nebraska is the one program that seemed to make the loudest statement of Week 6.

 

Yeah, yeah, Kansas State was on the opposite side of the field last Thursday night, but the opponent really wasn’t the issue. Big Red has begun to impose its will on the other team, regardless of who it may be. If the game was in Austin or Norman, you get the feeling that the Huskers would still be swarm tackling and running the ball as if the Big 8 was still in vogue. Nebraska is dismantling the competition in systematic fashion. Give a ton of credit on offense to coordinator Shawn Watson, who has deftly adapted to his personnel, crafting a power system that accentuates the attributes of QB Taylor Martinez and RB Roy Helu. The Huskers are averaging 337 yards a game and a mind-blowing 7.7 yards a carry. Who needs to pass with those kinds of numbers? The defense has been stout under the guidance of Carl Pelini, holding opponents to 12 points a game. The line is getting penetration, the secondary is among the best in the country, and LB Lavonte David is evolving into an All-American in his first year out of Fort Scott (Kan.) Community College. Through five games, what’s not to like about this school?

 

To the detractors guffawing about the schedule, sure, it hasn’t been too thorny, but it’s not as if the Huskers have been pressed by the likes of Washington or Kansas State. They won each of those games by five touchdowns. Going forward, who won’t they be heavily favored to beat? Texas and Missouri are in Lincoln. Oklahoma State and Texas A&M won’t have nearly enough defensive talent to keep this juggernaut from racking up a ton of yards on the ground.

 

As always, there were plenty of impressive moments throughout the past weekend. None, though, moved me more than what’s taking place under Bo Pelini at Nebraska. The Huskers are beginning to roll, picking up a head of steam as the season unfolds. More than Ohio State and more than Oregon, I’m beginning to feel that this might be the most complete, championship-ready program in America, especially now that ‘Bama has vacated the poll position.

 

4. This week's spread quarterback to win the Heisman is ...

 

By Matt Zemek

 

I've been quite the grouchy contrarian in a lot of interactions with other football fans and writers over the past few days. I want to be clear in saying that these other fans and writers aren't being inappropriate or even uncivil. They're voicing understandable and thoughtful insights, but they're still unsettling me. Maybe that's more of a commentary on my own self and my emotional state than anything else. There's something to be said for that. After all, when a person does react strongly to outside commentary, it's often true that the nature of the reaction is connected to an awareness that one has violated the principle s/he is so vigorously trying to protect.

 

What does this all mean? Plainly put, I've been trying to get other football people - smart, informed, astute people armed with layers of statistics - to cool their jets when analyzing certain teams and, especially, players. I've been telling other college football bloggers and fans to rein in premature verdicts, especially on the matter of the Heisman Trophy race.

 

Over the first five weeks of the season, the doings of Denard Robinson - which were certainly impressive - received the kind of reaction one would expect from Sally Draper when she learned that her father scored Beatles tickets in 1965. Multiple voices in the college football blogosphere were quickly moved to pronounce that Denard was a once-in-a-generation talent, a once-in-a-lifetime phenomenon. It was as though an epic fable or a Roman legend had been born.

 

The orgy of hyperventilation was over the top. Yes, the astute commentators who made such pronouncements pointed to statistics which showed how ridiculously good Mr. Robinson had in fact been. It's not as though they didn't have the information needed to back up their claims. I respect that. If you can point to information which supports an out-on-a-limb claim, you do deserve a considerable share of props. Again, I'm not dealing with knee-jerk foolishness here; I'm dealing with a sincere attempt to identify unique players in the life and ever-unfolding history of college football. There was indeed a pool of raw statistical material which supported the Denard Robinson "once-in-a-generation" chorus. There was a certain rational basis for making such claims.

 

What was lacking, though? Perspective, which - for me - trumps statistics every time. Robinson might have established video-game numbers, but he did so against four really lousy defenses (Connecticut, UMass, Bowling Green, Indiana) and one okay defense (Notre Dame). As soon as he ran into a decent gang of 11 on the other side of the line of scrimmage, he failed to generate a modest 18 points. Michigan hit only 17 against Michigan State on Saturday, and with more heavies left on UM's schedule, the Wolverines will have to dig deep if they want a decent bowl bid.

 

Is Denard Robinson still an elite player? Yes - he's done too many spectacular things to retract that label. However, the singularity of his talents has been placed in its proper context.

 

But with Denard having been put in his place, there's another player who received more of that breathlessly premature prose: Taylor Martinez.

 

Hey, Martinez established single-game Nebraska records on Thursday night. The kid is fast, and he is indeed a great runner. Notice how I didn't say "running quarterback," just "runner." A quarterback is a lot more than just a runner. Unless he's Jamelle Holieway or Dee Dowis or some other classic wishbone/option/veer operator, he has to throw a little bit. A quarterback also has to stand up to big-league pressure against worthy opponents. A quarterback should also be able to perform against South Dakota State on home turf. Martinez definitely lit up a crummy and oh............ so.......... slllllllllllllllloooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwww Kansas State defense on Thursday, but one game against a lead-footed defense does not a 2011 Heisman Trophy candidate make. Yet, those comments were flying around on Thursday night, because Tommie Frazier and Eric Crouch never did what Martinez did. I again appreciate the stats and the awareness of history, but one has to account for the opponent and other contextual elements when making such a bold claim.

 

It's important to reiterate something: These are not knocks on Robinson or Martinez. They might certainly seem like criticisms, but the instructive point is that they're cautionary statements designed to ensure that bold comments - which are needed in a world of opinions (commentators necessarily have to call shots and stick their necks out from time to time; that's what we do in this business) - have a substantial core of legitimacy. If you think that these paragraphs are meant to say that "Denard Robinson sucks" or "Taylor Martinez is a phony," you're wrong and misguided. The point of these paragraphs is to say that Robinson and Martinez have not yet earned the level of praise they've received in many quarters.

 

Could Robinson still emerge as a once-in-a-generation talent? YES, he could! Could Martinez become - and be remembered as - an elite quarterback and a 2011 Heisman Trophy candidate? YES, he could! It's just that we haven't yet arrived at those moments, folks!

 

Joseph Campbell - the philosopher-writer whom Bill Moyers interviewed in a seminal 1988 PBS program - often talked about the wisdom of ancient tribal societies in Africa and in other rural parts of the planet. Campbell frequently stressed how the initiation rituals of those societies associated pain with adolescence and the trials of growing up to become a man. Campbell emphasized how those ancient cultures didn't just bestow manhood and respect on young people; it demanded that they suffer and endure trials that stripped them of their innocence and made them aware of what manhood really meant. There was no free ticket to adult status and all its privileges; becoming a man - an autonomous adult and a master of one's own soul - had to be earned. It wasn't just decreed or handed down. It wasn't just given in the form of an entitlement benefit, a free lunch, or daddy's inheritance.

 

So it is for the likes of Denard Robinson and Taylor Martinez. I find them to be two terrifically talented young men who have done a lot of good things and deserve to be lauded for what they've done. My problem lies not with those two quarterbacks; my problem is with the level of hype and the nature of the praise being thrown their way. If we are to follow the wisdom of the ancients, we should wait until Denard smokes Ohio State for 300 passing yards and 200 rushing yards. Then we can all agree that he's a once-in-a-generation figure in the history of a 141-year-old sport. If we are to allow manhood to be earned, let's wait for Martinez to punk Texas this weekend as a starting point, and then roll through the rest of the Big 12 before coming up with a credible performance against Oklahoma in the Big 12 Championship Game, followed by a worthy bowl effort against - perhaps - a fire-breathing SEC defense in a BCS bowl. THEN we can all KNOW that Taylor Martinez really is a top-shelf, next-level quarterback. Right now, he's earned nothing. Once more and with feeling, that's not Martinez's deficiency; it's the deficiency of commentators who want to hand him something before he's earned it.

 

 

 

[Vizsla1]

Great to read that we continue to receive some love out there. How nice that he got a plug in for Mad Men with the Beatles ref. We need to clobber Texas in similar fashion as we did K State and the nation will take notice. As for Heisman talk, TMart probably would finish in top 8, but no higher than 5.

[HuskerJosh]

Hmm...well if we wait to talk about anything until after the Big 12 Championship game, it would put people like this guy out of business.

[Husker_x]

He's right about Martinez as a running QB. We've seen the runner––the best in the biz. The tuneups are over. Time for the show. If Taylor is going to lead this team to a possible MNC run in his redshirt freshman year, the whole package needs to be assembled against a tough, fast team like Texas. Let me be the first to say, if Taylor does even half of what he did to KState against Texas, it's over. We'll be indisputably the best team in the Big XII and well on our way to the title. But if he stumbles, makes mistakes, and puts the ball on the turf three times, at least for me I couldn't honestly put us on that pedestal.