Say what you want...

[hammb]

I do t understand this mindset that we returned such a awesome defense when we lost our best defensive backs. Now the new guys struggled in game one and it was all the fault of the new coaches?

This place is just whining for the sake of whining at this point.

[MarkL]

I do t understand this mindset that we returned such a awesome defense when we lost our best defensive backs. Now the new guys struggled in game one and it was all the fault of the new coaches?

This place is just whining for the sake of whining at this point.

We have Hunter, Jude, and Ward. Those are darn good defensive backs who have proven themselves when put in positions to succeed. There's a coaching problem on the defensive side. We'll see how the coaches adjust and alter because clearly something wasn't working.

[kdog27]

I do t understand this mindset that we returned such a awesome defense when we lost our best defensive backs. Now the new guys struggled in game one and it was all the fault of the new coaches?

This place is just whining for the sake of whining at this point.

And yet you didn't even watch the game as you said to know how how awful the plan, scheme and tackling were. They ran three pass plays all evening and BG gave them the exact look on play 75 as they did on play 1.

I find it interesting that someone that bashed the Brandon coaching style from day one is so quick to stick up for a style that is closely related. Maybe just a few more years evolved from it.

[Schadenfreude]

I do t understand this mindset that we returned such a awesome defense when we lost our best defensive backs. Now the new guys struggled in game one and it was all the fault of the new coaches?

This place is just whining for the sake of whining at this point.

We have Hunter, Jude, and Ward. Those are darn good defensive backs who have proven themselves when put in positions to succeed. There's a coaching problem on the defensive side. We'll see how the coaches adjust and alter because clearly something wasn't working.

This is the heart of the argument, right here. And I'm not sure where to place the blame.

[Flipper]

Add Sutton to the list of returning DB's...it's a veteran group that should have been able to tackle better than they did. That said...I do agree that our defense was a bot overrated coming into the season. We thumped the OU's, UMass' and EMU's of the world..we stopped Kent for a half when they didn't have Dri Archer. We didn't stop IU...or really stop NIU, we just blitzed the offensively, we didn't stop UT when we had them at 3rd and gazillion and we didn't stop Pitt. That's a lot of evidence to suggest that we couldn't stop a good offense last year.

The VMI game won't tell us much...the IU and Whisky games will.

[BGSU33]

I do t understand this mindset that we returned such a awesome defense when we lost our best defensive backs.

Well...when our very head coach came out and said this: "I may have the best defensive I've ever had as a football coach," said Babers....it could have led to some of the thinking we should be good. I mean, as the leader of our program, he should know better than anyone and it's actually rare to hear a coach boast like that, they usually hide behind "needing to improve" or "we have a lot of work to do." Babers also went on to say the defense may have to carry us early on in the season. On top of that, Lynch and Martin form arguably the best LB duo in the MAC. Clawson said Hunter was our top lockdown CB before he went down last year with the broken wrist in camp and he's back. He also said Ward had All-MAC written all over him.

But here's my top gripe about our defense : Our DE's. Where has the pass rush been from our edges this and the last several years? We have two seniors starters in Thomas and Walker (who both started last year also) and have a senior backing them up in Montgomery who was describe as a raw but freakishly athletic. But where is our pass rush from our ends??? Two years ago we got our best pash rush from Jones -who was a DT - and last year again it mainly came from our interior with DT's in Oullete and Campbell providing most of the rush. We must start to get some productions from one of these guys already as most games they seem to be bystanders.

[Falcon137]

I haven't been active on the board for awhile, but, here are my thoughts.

The offense is fine, it will be explosive and score lots of points. If it wasn't for drops BG probably scores 40+ in that game. I fully expect 70 against VMI and 50+ in several MAC games. Really excited for Fred Coppett and Greene this year.

Special teams were very good. 52 yard FG (I know they missed a short one), kickoffs were good, Burbrink had a TD on a punt return, had the 40 yard line not tripped him up.

The defense, oh the defense. There are 3 things glaringly obvious that are different from years past.
1 - No inside push. Chris Jones and then Jarius Campbell gave this team a push inside and kept people off of linebackers and spilled a lot of plays to the edge. Colvin is a fine player, he is not on the same level as those 2 guys. Colvin's stat line...1 QB hurry....0 tackles.
2 - The DBs are slooooooow. When Hunter was ejected, they looked even slower. I'm assuming the gameplan was to keep WKU in front of them and then make the play. This equated to death when we found out the DBs could not tackle.
3. Leadership. Paul Swan and BooBoo are missed in leadership roles.

Random thoughts -
- Middle LBs combined for 4 tackles (3 assists, 1 solo). Yikes
- I think Dino has been praying for Malik Brown to be eligible every night before bed.
- 11 penalties for 96 yards, 1 ejection for throwing a punch and maybe even more vexing, a delay of game?!?
- In better news, I thought Gabe Martin looked very good and healthy (12 tackles and a forced fumble). Brian Sutton had 18 tackles (2 for loss).
- Dino maybe the most laid back coach I have seen on the sideline. Which is fine with me, but, I people were steaming when they saw him smiling while WKU marched up and down the field.
- That loss really makes me appreciate what NIU has done. Think how hard it is to line up a good offense, good defense, and the right coaching staff for multiple years.
- The MAC as a whole looked rather putrid against teams not named Howard and Presbyterian. But, kudos to Miami for putting up a fight against Marshall.

VMI is a throw away game. It will be interesting to see what they do against Indiana, a team with more athleticism and a better QB (it can't get any worse, right?).

Just as a side note. Anyone else find it odd that Gabe Martin wasn't featured for anything all off season? Even after the injury, 5th year senior, 2 time All-MAC player, and after 1 game it was obvious he is the best player on this years defense. Always seemed like the kind of guy you wanted as the face of your program.

[hammb]

I do t understand this mindset that we returned such a awesome defense when we lost our best defensive backs. Now the new guys struggled in game one and it was all the fault of the new coaches?

This place is just whining for the sake of whining at this point.

And yet you didn't even watch the game as you said to know how how awful the plan, scheme and tackling were. They ran three pass plays all evening and BG gave them the exact look on play 75 as they did on play 1.

I find it interesting that someone that bashed the Brandon coaching style from day one is so quick to stick up for a style that is closely related. Maybe just a few more years evolved from it.

No, I didn't see the game. And I don't think I need to see it to know exactly what I'd see from what I'm reading on here. It sounds like a sloppy game with soft coverage in the backfield, no pressure on the QB, a guy lost his cool and was ejected, and overall we played like crap on the defensive side of the ball? I fully understand that and fully understand how it probably sucked to watch.

What I take issue with is all the "I knew this hire made no sense" and "He took over one of the best defenses in the nation" BS as a reason to bash our brand new coach. Our defense was vastly overrated by pounding on the crappiest teams of the MAC, but they couldn't get stops in a lot of big games against good teams. And as much as I loved Clawson for his ability to bring us home a MAC championship, I think that's painted a whole lot of orange on the glasses of his entire tenure. Look beyond that one awesome game against NIU for a second. That style of football put up a losing record against Toledo in our biggest game of the year. That style put up an 0-3 in bowl games. That style put up an O-x in games against BCS conference opponents. Bottom line, Clawson did a damn good job building a defense and ball control offense that could beat up on the dregs of the MAC, but when they really needed stops; really needed to make plays, they only did it ONCE. Now granted that once was in the biggest game of his entire tenure, and it was a thing of beauty to watch, but still, the point stands.

Now we have coach Babers who we all knew was going to be a complete 180* change in style from what Clawson tried to do. We ALL got our hopes too high (myself very much included) thinking that the defense might not lose a beat while we would suddenly have a prolific offensive scheme to go with it. I realize when I sit back to think on it that those expectations were probably not realistic. Like it or not we DID lose a lot of talent off our defense; and while guys like Jude & Hunter had been solid, if not good, players in the past we cannot forget that they made a combined total of 0 starts last year. They'll round into shape, they just weren't ready for game 1. That sucks, and we can blame the coach for that, but acting like he turned the 2002 Ravens defense into the crap you all saw on Friday is just hyperbole.

As for the Brandon comparisons, my issues with Gregg were never his offense. I loved his offense. Hell it was the one thing that he did an awesome job on. I didn't even have a problem with the fact that the offense scored too fast and that affecting the defense...nope, don't and never will. I had a problem with the fact that he was hired on the spot without any semblance of a real coaching search. I had a problem with trying stupid trick plays when he had the players and scheme to execute and score without them. I had a problem with him throwing his players under the bus in post game interviews. I had a problem with his inability to recruit enough guys to run his offense and constantly stealing the best athletes off his defense to fill offensive holes. I had a problem with his inability to find a QB (he never once recruited one himself that could run his scheme). I had a problem with the complete lack of fundamentals and discipline that were rampant from the moment the Urban boys graduated. I had a problem with his inability to have his team consistently ready to play, regardless of the schemes they were trying to run.

NONE of us have seen nearly enough of Babers to say that he's Brandon 2.0 and I've read it multiple times on this board already. People are whiny and bitchy because they think this open it up and put up a ton of points style (even if it allows a lot of points as well) is inferior to slowing it down and trying to keep the games manageable. That was NOT Brandon's downfall in the least. Nor will it be Babers's downfall. If the lack of discipline and fundamentals that were apparently rampant on Friday, then I'll start to have an issue with it, but the sample size is too small at this point.

And not that it really matters, but even with my hatred of Brandon and respect for Clawson I found Brandon's teams infinitely more fun to WATCH. I probably missed no more than a couple of games in the Brandon era, and dropped my season tickets for the 2nd half of Clawson's tenure. I think, given time, Babers will prove to put exciting teams on the field, and I think his experience as a head coach (albeit at a lower level) will help him not have the issues that plagued Brandon during his tenure.

[BGFan]

+1 Brian.

Gloom and doom after 1 game. We have the most fickle fans I have ever seen.

[bg1984]

None of us watching that game Friday night could have been anything but shocked and disappointed in that defense giving up 59 points! That performance surpassed "unbelievable" at the 40 point mark. But as I've had time to reflect on the offensive side of the ball from Friday night I'm encouraged. I felt as if the offense sputtered and had hiccups and basically ran like a car badly in need of a tune up. Yet they scored 31 points and had it not been for a couple of routine catches that were dropped, it should have at least been 46 points even with all the dysfunction.

Here were the MAC team offensive point totals from this weekend:

Akron- 41
NIU- 55
CMU- 20
WMU- 34
BSU- 30
UB- 38
MU-27
UMass- 7
OU- 17
Kent- 14
EMU- 31
UT- 54

Only Miami, WMU and UMass played FBS schools, (other than Kent and Ohio playing each other). And other than New Hampshire,none of the non FBS schools were exactly world beaters in their division of football.

When our offense clicks on all cylinders like I know it eventually will, I'm not sure there are too many MAC teams who can keep pace with us IF the defense just gets itself to a reasonable place. Our defense does not have to be dominating, it just needs to be a little above average. I'm not suggesting that they not work toward being dominate, but with the offensive weapons we have in place and the new style of play, I'm not so sure that 50-65 points won't become the norm.

Just my 2 cents.

[mscarn]

The reaction stems from a disconnect between what we were led to believe and what actually happened. The other team had a faster paced offense after an entire marketing campaign that promised otherwise. The offense stayed away from throwing deep and operated horizontally with almost no downfield passing. The defense didn't even attempt to be aggressive (press coverage, blitzing, etc.) after we were led to believe it would as well.

A failed aggressive approach is not nearly as disappointing as a passive approach when aggressiveness was expected, most especially when a more dynamic style of play was the entire rational for blowing up a championship team and starting from scratch.

[kdog27]

The reaction stems from a disconnect between what we were led to believe and what actually happened. The other team had a faster paced offense after an entire marketing campaign that promised otherwise. The offense stayed away from throwing deep and operated horizontally with almost no downfield passing. The defense didn't even attempt to be aggressive (press coverage, blitzing, etc.) after we were led to believe it would as well.

A failed aggressive approach is not nearly as disappointing as a passive approach when aggressiveness was expected, most especially when a more dynamic style of play was the entire rational for blowing up a championship team and starting from scratch.

This is exactly what my problem is.

Coach Babers created the expectations. He has gone on and on about how good of a team he has been given. Right now every word he spoke the last 6 months looks like garbage. Yes the sample size is very very small but at the moment it's what we have to go off of. He talked quite a good bit and nothing we saw backed it up.

I have said many times recently and last year that I I don't think our defense is all that great. They have however been good at stopping most MAC defenses. The Indiana's VT's and WVU's of the world will find a mismatch and exploit it all day. But they at least made them work for it. The first halves in those games were never close to being this bad defensively. They at least made them find the weaknesses. WKU on the other hand never even had to work for it. They gave them the screen to either side and that quick slant all game. Then in the rarity when they actually were forced into a third and long the QB had all day because he was staring at a soft prevent defense. If our secondary is actually that bad then one hell of a coaching job has been done in the past to cover it up. I have seen many of defenses look silly but never by such basic pass plays. Every school in the MAC has the athletes to run those same plays.

To me it's not the 700 yards and 59 points. It's how they got it or were more like gift wrapped.

[MarkL]

I have said many times recently and last year that I I don't think our defense is all that great. They have however been good at stopping most MAC defenses. The Indiana's VT's and WVU's of the world will find a mismatch and exploit it all day. But they at least made them work for it. The first halves in those games were never close to being this bad defensively. They at least made them find the weaknesses. WKU on the other hand never even had to work for it. They gave them the screen to either side and that quick slant all game. Then in the rarity when they actually were forced into a third and long the QB had all day because he was staring at a soft prevent defense. If our secondary is actually that bad then one hell of a coaching job has been done in the past to cover it up. I have seen many of defenses look silly but never by such basic pass plays. Every school in the MAC has the athletes to run those same plays.

To me it's not the 700 yards and 59 points. It's how they got it or were more like gift wrapped.

Yeah I was thinking about the big teams recently. Against VT in 2012, there was a pattern. If our offense got at least one first down before giving the ball back, our D forced a three and out. All game that pattern held true. The D showed signs of weakness when they were thrown on the field with no time to rest or plan adjustments. The O did the D no favors that day.

Against Indiana, I remember those two 4th and 1 stops. It wasn't until midway through the second quarter IIRC that Indiana began rolling. It was a mix of our D wearing out, Martin getting injured, and IU realizing that their receivers had 4+ inch height advantage on our corners.

I sincerely hope our D improves night and day between last Friday and the Indiana and Wisconsin games or those are going to be long, long days.