I want to be positive today.

[mmisbg]

I was a huge fan of Omar Jacobs......heck, I still am. He is an exciting player to watch. My first instinct upon hearing his decision to go pro was to be angry. I thought that he should stay at BG and deliver us the championship that he owes us. But, once that passed I started to look at what the team will have to work with next season.

I think that Anthony Turner will turn out to be a great Quarterback. Yes, he has some things to work on. He needs to become more patient in the pocket, and he needs to stop throwing the deep ball under pressure. However, if you can get past the rookie interceptions that he threw, there is some real potential there. His mobility is clearly better than Omar's, and that will help him bring back the Josh Harris style of offense we love so much.

This is where I think we stand:

Bobby Thomas is an excellent answer to P.J. Pope. He didn't see a lot of game time, but I think he had a good showing this year. Corey Partridge toward the end of the season showed that he can be a good replacement for Cole Magner. And while our style of offense doesn't make frequent use of a tight end (at least not as a reciever, because they usually need to serve as a blocker) Ruiz has had some impressive plays.

If we can get some fast guys with good hands to allow us to send the ball down field, somebody to back up Bobby Thomas, the offensive line holds, and Anthony Turner developes.....our offense should be as potent as it ever was. That may sound like a long list, but they are very attainable goals.

On the defensive side of the ball, it is not as bleak as people say that it is. At the end of the 2004 season, everybody talked about how weak our secondary was. Well, we got an answer to that this year. Unfortunately, our linebackers were fighting injury the entire season. That killed us. If our new defensive coordinator can capitalize on being able to recruit his own players and having more time to prepare them for the season opener.....well, we'll see. I don't expect dramatic improvements in one year, because it is difficult to recruit linebackers in the MAC. Bottom line, they were faster this past year than before, they just need to do better at wrapping guys up and stoppping the run.

We need kickers. We need them badly. I don't know where they intend to find them, but find them they must.

If you believe in omens, here is one for you. In 2003, we were predicted to be between 50-75 depending on what "expert" you asked. In 2004, they said that we would be terrible without Josh Harris. In 2005, we were described as "the biggest disappointment in the MAC" by ESPN.

We are not the only team that has some rebuilding to do. Almost every team does. I guess my optimism comes from the fact that our biggest questionmark right now on everybody's mind is the QB position, and his replacement has shown potential.

When Omar Jacobs got knocked out the ENTIRE team quit. Turner was going to make some mistakes. However, I don't think that is an excuse for us losing to Western and Akron. We lost those games because EVERYBODY stopped playing. And what makes me even more mad is the fact that people stopped showing up to support the team. After the Akron game I said that Bowling Green doesn't deserve a good football team, because we don't support them.

It is time for us to take a lesson from those teams up north and down south, and get behind our football team. Stadium attendance problems have a lot of consequences, both short term and especially long term. So lets get our butts to the games and act like we want it!

Go Falcons!

[BGGrad01]

somebody to back up Bobby Thomas

If Dan Macon is anything close to the running back that he was in the spring game 2003 (??), then I think he is our starter at RB. It should be interesting to see the battle for carries between Thomas, Macon, Bullock, and other young guys.

[PGY Tiercel]

Great first post. I really enjoyed reading it and think you made some excellent posts.

Don't forget about Dan Macon stepping up at RB too. I'm pretty sure he was redshirted this year. In 2004 he carried the ball 12 times and had 1 TD. After sitting on the bench this year I am sure he is ready to make a statement next year. He and bobby thomas will both fill the holes left by Pope and Lane.

[orangeandbrown]

Welcome aboard! I think much of your post is right on.

One quibble--I don't recall anyone thinking we were gong to be "terrible" without Josh Harris.

[da3mite]

Very good post, mmisbg. I agree that Anthony Turner is going to be a pretty good QB. One problem I saw when he was in, is that BG wasen't running an offense that was fit for Turner. They were runnning Omar's offense. Hopefully they do go back to the Josh Harris type offense for the 06 season.

[jpfalcon09]

I think this team is going to be a lot better than everyone is giving them credit for. I understand that we can be a little dejected after Omar's choice, but it was a reality coming into this season. Guys like Macon, Patridge, Thomas and Parks have all had time to watch the starters at their respective positions and learn, and even get in some game time. I can't judge Turner based on the hybrid west coast offense he was put into. All we can bank on is that there are great athletes still on this team, and there's 8 months for these guys to only get better. Count on an exciting season and all of our worries will be put to rest.

[TG1996]

very good first post, and solid follow-ups! welcome to the board mmisbg!!


Only thing I'd say about that is that I don't believe Omar, or any other player, "owes" us a championship. Championships come. What they "owe" us is to give their very best while wearing the brown and orange, and to represent our University in a proper, professional manner. With very few isolated incidents, and only a couple games over the past five years, I believe a large majority of players have done just that.

[Flipper]

Ruiz is now a WR. Sean O'Drobinak is the TE. He proved to be a very valuable asset in the red zone as both a blocker and (gasp) a reciever

[mmisbg]

Wow! What a great response to this topic. I really was afriad that this would turn into something other than what I had intended. I will respond to thinking that Omar owes us a Championship.

It may have been wrong of me to get that feeling, but it was definetly an emotion which came out of frustration. There have been times in the past few years where I walked away from the game saying, "The team that played today would have beaten just about anybody." Other times I have walked away saying, "It was extremely impressive for this team to give such a quality opponent such a run for their money." But, come the end of the season, we've wound up with no respect because we've failed to win the MAC.

It would lead to my second dissertation in one day for me to list the reasons why I've become frustrated with all of the politics in college football. Our football team has played well enough to get more respect than they do, and they've bounced back from annual attrition much better than many expected them to. The problem is that the entire MAC is viewed as a weak conference (I'll admit, there are times I wonder myself), and BGSU is not going to get respect from these "experts" until we start making a habit of winning the conference.

I'm not going into how the MAC has its strong points and its weak points, and how this is true of every conference. Once again, I'm already proving myself to be quite long winded.

I'm just very proud of the improvements made by the football team since the days when I was watching the games from the FMB section of the stadium. I think it is hard to deny that BGSU's football team is the most feared by Non-Conference opponents. I just think that it is time to bring the MAC title back home where it belongs. Then, we can start to complain about how the "experts" don't give us any respect.

Go Falcons!

[FLCoach]

We need kickers. We need them badly. I don't know where they intend to find them, but find them they must.

Go Falcons!

This one is visiting this weekend.

http://www.kicking.com/members/view.asp?id=SeanEllis10

[hammb]

If we can get some fast guys with good hands to allow us to send the ball down field, somebody to back up Bobby Thomas, the offensive line holds, and Anthony Turner developes.....our offense should be as potent as it ever was. That may sound like a long list, but they are very attainable goals.

While I do agree that they are all attainable goals, I cannot help but think of this like a poker player. Certainly football is not poker, but when you're hoping for this many potential outcomes I cannot help but likening it to a running flush draw. Sure there are still 9 cards in the deck that help you, and you only need 2 of them. Very attainable, but the odds of actually getting both of them sit at about 3%.

Anytime you're counting on that many variables the odds of having all of them hit the way you want start to compound. Even if we assume all of them are 50/50 shots you're still loking at 16-1 odds that all those will hold true. Certainly it's possible, but I think it's best to assume that our offense will take a step back. If 2 or 3 of those things happen I think that step could hopefully be marginalized, but it will still be a step back.

What we really need is for the defense to step up and become a unit that can win us ball games.


All in all, good post, welcome to the board

[Falconfreak90]

Welcome to the site, mmisbg! I enjoyed reading your posts.

FALCON FOOTBALL....ANOTHER FIX IN 2006.