personally i dont think all these issues can fall directly at his feet. our secondary is terrible. how much of that falls at bills feet rather then the feet of the d coordinator guy whos name i cant spell. personally i think we have too many show boats on d and not enough team players. if you compare how our guys play d vs say oregon last night vs usc they were two different animals. yes o prolly has better athletes then us. but the fact is they were playing as a unit. sfaties were making good decisions on ver the top coverage, and corners new when to hand a guy off to a linebacker (who then picked up the zone coverage) and then said corner woudl return to his area if it got invaded by another wideout.

quite simply to me the blame falls on castill. if bs go’s, id rather him stay in the program has a scout/recruiter. the level of talent he has picked up is fantastic

When HCBS says, i.e. on last week’s walk-through with Caridi and finished the conversation with hopefully we can “squeak” through a win. Damn! That drives me crazy! That’s thinking like showing up in a Volkswagen with straws and spit balls when he should be indicating we are the equal to an M1 Abrams Tank capable of 60 mph!
There’s a way to parse the words and leave the infurance. He needs the coaching for words by a sports media specialist.

away from the Offensive skill positions. I do agree Brown has regressed. The OL just isn’t getting it done. Look at how many OL we’ve been recruiting. Is Johnson part of that problem too? Maybe, but this is the first time in 4 years that they’ve had the same position coach 2 years in row. In the defensive backfield, we have one starter and one major contributor to PT who are both converted QB’s. Our DL was razor thin at the start of the season and injuries and bone-headedness have exposed that as well.

I also believe it goes back to my post about the 2006 recruiting class. Those guys are red-shirt juniors and true seniors, what most would hope to be major contributors at this point in their college careers. There are only 5-6 from that class who even sniff PT. Sure, the offensive “skill” talent is there, but other than that, show me depth anywhere. The cupboard was bare, people and the new recruits (typically) need at least a year under their belts to contribute.

Am I excusing this staff completely, no. Argue all you want about how Stew wrecked this and that, but I argue that just about any staff would be having the same problems with the talent we have (away from the offensive skill guys).

We gave the last guy a few years to “get his guys” The talent seems to be coming…will it develop?

I’m sorry but the ’05 – ’07 teams did not have more talent than we do now. Jay Henry, Marc Magro, Bobby Hathaway, Boo McKlee, Doug Slavonic, Warren Young, Mike Villagrana, Tito Gonzalez, Dorrell Jalloh, Anthony Mims, Antonio Lewis, Larry Williams, Ridwan Malik, Brad Palmer. Shoot even Jamal Adaie sucked. These are all guys that made significant contributions to stellar teams, that are far from stellar talents. And many of the people not getting the job done now were very solid backups on those teams.

The individuals on our current O-line are more highly regarded than Dan Mozes, Jake Figner, Jeremy Sheffey, Greg Isdaner, etc., etc.

We were successful because we had a great O-line coach, a bunch of average role players who bought in and played steady, and then we kept the ball in the hands of transcendant players White, Reynaud, Slaton.

Now our O-line and role players don’t pull their own weight, and our transcendant players, Noel, Jock and Tavon COMBINED for 22 touches on Friday night.

You say the ’06 class sucked. I say the 02-05 classes sucked. But we used to do more with less. We used to cheer for success on the field. We used to develop talent. We used to be famous for finding diamonds in the rough, recruiting speed and coaching it up.

Again, people are bandying the word “mediocrity” around, and again I say, a lot depends on how you define that word. Eric just wrote: “Wanting a top 10 team every year does not make anyone a bandwagon jumper.” Agreed, but being Top 10 each and every year is currently the province of about five or six schools - USC, Ohio St., Michigan, Florida, Texas and Oklahoma - and we aren’t one of them. I guess Rich spoiled us in his short tenure, but I believe, even though I think our status as Top 25 program is undeniable, our runs at a title are going to come in cycles, not yearly. When we are in Purdue’s spot, stuggling each year to go .500 and hoping to get an obscure bowl berth, then we can start calling for coaching changes, because then we will be mediocre, as I define the term.

Everyone acts like the state of the program is precarious if you have one bad season…well, I don’t believe that. A couple of great players can drastically change the way things are, and I believe we are getting those kinds of players.

Friday night’s loss was horrible, but USF isn’t bad! At the beginning of the year, was anyone thinking definite win in Tampa? Hell no. Also, each game is its own event, and clearly USF has the right scheme to stop us. We have never had a dominant performance against them. The fact that they had been manhandled by Pitt and Cincy coming into our game didn’t make me confident. It made me nervous that they would play with some wounded pride. But just because those teams handled USF and USF handled us, doesn’t mean that we are suddenly a walkover for Pitt or Cincy. Also, call it excuse-making if you like, but there was some horrible officiating in this game (I about lost my mind when the play that was ruled a catch-and-fumble on the field was
reversed!) and BJ Daniels didn’t spot us any of the turnovers or terrible decisions he did Pitt and Cincy.

This is why the games are actually played. Maybe I am high, but I expect us to win at least 3 of the next 4, and I don’t think it is an impossibility that we could win out.

Lastly, I don’t think the BE is indisputably the worst BCS conference, regardless of what pundits like Cowshit or other ESPN schmucks say. A good argument can be made that the ACC is pretty damn bad. What is so special about the Big 10 when Ohio St. has 2 losses and the league leader is an Iowa team that has trailed in 8 of 9 games and beat Northern Iowa by one in the season opener — a team that just lost to powerhouse South Dakota St. Also…of the 12 in the Big 12…who is any good besides Texas, Okla., Okla. St., and Missouri? I would say that top to bottom the Big East holds its own.

It comes down to this for me: after the game Friday night I was downright negative, as negative as anyone else. I was raging and storming around the house and breaking shit…acting like a total asshole. My 8-year old son was watching me and I know he was a little scared and he said: “Well, at least we didn’t lose by a lot, Dad.” Perhaps he’s the kind of fan that will lead us down the road to mediocrity. But the game isn’t a belief system to him. It’s just a game, where we tried hard, but the other team was better that night. My son is the kind of fan I want to be…I sure as hell don’t want him growing up to be the kind of fan I was Friday at midnight.