David Marsh

This was the Oregon team we expected to see this year. First half defense was a bit underwhelming but it did feel like the Beavers put everything they had into the first half and had nothing the second. Solid half time adjustments. Also ... Huskies lost! Great day to be a Duck!

I think 24 and 25 was very generous of Oregon to buy out their opponents to make room. But until our schedule opens up it feels like a pretty big ask to break all those contracts.

I was referring to the Pac-12 that included all the former members. This new Pac-12 will probably get 10mil each.

Oh they have the money if they want... If they paid the Pac-12 around 35-40 mil per school in media rights Fix and ESPN would be paying close to what they are now ... And probably less in the long run. They wanted to destroy the Pac-12 so they pretended like they didn't have the money. They could totally pay 10mil out per school if they wanted to.

Oh I doubt they'll pay anything near a price that they pac-2 want. Mountain West Media payouts are around 6mil if I remember correctly. So if OSU and WSU Cherry pick all the best MW teams and themselves I could see them getting something in the range of 10-15 mil. A major upgrade for MW teams but still a far cry from any P4... Including the ACC which is locked into a horrible contract that's around 20mil per school. I mean they'll want 30 mil like the Big 12 but as I went over in my article a year ago... I suspect that the 30mil payout was designed to murder the pac-12 more than a realistic value for the conference and it's inventory.

Fox and ESPN will certainly pick them up but not at the same rate as B1G, SEC or Big 12 games. They will be given something maybe slightly better than the MW gets now. But this will come at a major cost... This will be seen as late night inventory. These games will have a lot of 7pm start times because both Fox and ESPN want games for that West Coast time but don't want to pay too dollar for them. So maybe they also cut a deal with CW to have some games that are not at night.

I don't think the Ducks have lost their fight... I think the Boise State game showed that this team cares about the outcome and will fight for it. I think what is lacking is execution and some leadership. This doesn't feel like a complete team but against Boise State in particular it didn't feel like they were flat, just incompetent at times. I think this team is motivated and they just need to turn that motivation into development. This week they should take another step forward.

Part of me finds it difficult to see FCS power houses like North Dakota want to leave the FCS for the FBS. Sure it's a bigger pond but I think so much of what makes that program tick is that it's a big fish in a smaller pond. They have been kings of the FCS for some time and would they want to trade it out to be a G6 school that rarely gets whiff at the playoff?

Oregon and Washington can receive some small piece of the blame for the Pac-12's demise. They were able to leave based on their investments and merits and a credit to them as they were placed in a difficult situation, and by all accounts it seems like the Huskies pulled the trigger first and the Ducks decided to go along with it so in that regard even less blame can be placed on the Ducks. I don't think we should shy away from our part in the story of the end of the Pac-12, if we choose to stay the conference would be a little better off, it would probably consist of Oregon, Washington, Oregon State, Washington State, Cal and Stanford and that would be it... and all would be in athletic financial ruin. So I am not saying we should have stayed because leaving was absolutely the right decision and we alone did not put Oregon State and Washington State in this position as it was the culmination of decades of decision making from every school in the former Pac-12. We left we take some fragment of the blame for the death of that conference and I can live with that. The Beavers and Cougs will kill the Mountain West and they will take far more blame for the death of that conference that we should for the Pac-12. And they will have to live with that.

The blood of the Mountain West is on OSU and WSU's hands. But UCLA and USC along with Fox and ESPN have the blood of the Pac-12 on their hands. I'll even say Colorado has their fair share of Pac-12 blood on their hands. I think it is fair for Oregon and Washington to share some blame but no where near as much as those previously mentioned. By the time Oregon and Washington jumped ship the mismanagement had hit a crisis point and there was really no fixing it. Especially since the two big media partners of Fox and ESPN both walked away from the table to ensure the conference would die. Is killing the Mountain West as big of a deal as what USC and UCLA did to the Pac-12? Not really... but let's not sugar coat it and saying they are absolved of any conference realignment wrong doing here. If the Beavers and Cougs were serious about not doing this they probably could have gotten themselves into the Mountain West last year. They may have even used those millions from the Pac-12 to buy their way into the Big 12. I mean they could have said no media money for three years and have been able to float it in the Big 12. But they burned their bridges with the Mountain West and decided to take their top teams and run. That's blood on their hands if you want to get down to it. Though does anyone really care? Those left behind in the Mountain West do... but otherwise not really. We care more about the conference realignment drama and specitical than OSU and WSU creating a G6 conference with old P5 branding.

Going to be honest this probably wont happen. Stanford won't be caught dead in the same conference as Boise State and Cal is in the same boat. The thing here is that these conferences do share resources academically as well as the athletic component. Upon joining the B1G, Oregon got access to the entirety of the conference library system. Cal and Stanford don't see the value in most of these MW schools on an academic level.

Or... we hit the field goal in OT and win in another OT. I think we missed a field goal that game during regulation as well... though I'm not sure.

If we didn't score TDs on special teams yeah we probably lose... However, special teams can score points and we did score points. It is outright discounting a part of the game. If special teams didn't exist yeah we probably lose but they do exist and as much as we managed to score on those plays Boise State played poorly those plays. We can flip that around too... If not for those two forced fumbles Boise State loses by double digits! See... we can ignore turnovers being a thing too.

If we win by double digits we start rolling the other way! I think this might be the week we see our real Ducks for the first time this season.

A run game getting good yards. It feels like that has been woefully lacking the last two games. James has good yards but we need to let him loose and run the ball.

The way we are playing right now feels like the Mario era... constantly playing down to our opponents. Let's hope we get back to the Lanning era this week and get back to crushing.

Though there are fun parallels this is still a completely different team. The timeline this time around is off by about two weeks. We also have a more talented team from top to bottom than we did in 2014, just need that talent to all come together. I do think our defense is better than it was in 2014 even with those big names and NFL all stars in large part because the scheme we have today is better and the roster is deeper. It is also important to remember that Arizona won the Pac-12 South, and was the consensus no. 2 team in the Pac-12, in 2014. They were a quality team that in the rematch with Oregon got blasted. I think Boise State is more akin to 2014 Arizona than Oregon State is to 2014 Arizona. That's not to say that Oregon State is going to be a pushover, they'll fight. However, I do feel that our timeline and depth this year is different enough that it may prove to our advantage. For instance it is possible we might see Bedford enter the lineup on Saturday, I think there is a good chance they hold him back and give him two more weeks to heal up, but it's possible.

This also feels a bit retaliatory because the MW didn't want to schedule games with OSU and WSU next year. So they were left out to cobble together independent schedules but they just decided to pull the trigger and take from the MW to form a slightly better MW... by slightly better I mean they have the best teams from the MW and none of the bad ones so they are now slightly better. It's still the MW.

You can do that already in the Mountain West! They don't need to move! No way the other P4 give them back autonomous standing. This is a G5 conference with a P5 label. The label means nothing at this point because we all know what's in it. They won't get their automatic bid.

I love how Limar had the piece of mind to pick that ball up in the end zone last Saturday. Because I saw the touchdown run and I immediately knew that he wasn't holding that ball long enough across the barrier. I'm happy it counted as a touchdown and I think it's a great lesson for the team in both a positive and negative way. Positive in that it counted a d a touchdown because Limar picked the ball up and finished the play. Negative because for all that work Whittington didn't (or shouldn't) get a touchdown on his stat sheet.

Anger, yelling and blaming tends to entrench people in what their doing rather than reevaluate their stance and actions. In some ways they become more motivated to not help someone shouting at them and saying that they're bad. I know what that sort of thing comes up, I've played enough online video games to have people spew obscenities at me, that it doesn't motivate to do anything, except do worse out of spite. Expressing disappointment, frustration and even anger in a calmer atmosphere is how problems are resolved and how respect is built between all parties. If you need someone to play better you fire them up and maybe get them angry but not angry at the team or the leadership of the team. You want to use passion to motivate and people to get maybe angry that they're not doing enough in the moment. That doesn't come from telling at people for being bad on the sideline during the game or in public. Right now I do feel the offensive line needs to play better but I think a large part of that comes from the coaches not fiddling with the line up as much. As much as getting players to do better and put the work in. The latest episode of Ducks vs Them has Bassa rallying the defense on the sideline. He's fired up and calling on everyone to put their best effort forward. He clearly cares about the game. But that's not the time to throw blame at players for messing up ... But to encourage them to get it right the next time. There is a big part of me that really thinks the tablets and replays in the sideline is a bad thing for this team. They can't change the past and need to just focus on the next play and bond as a team. As for the 2016 final Helfeich team... Doing a deep dive into everything from that year is on my list of articles to write. I might get around to it after this season. Lots of interesting moving parts on that one.

Three weeks in a row with the same helmet?!?!?! This is madness! But I like this combo.

Spoilers people! But yes .. you're onto what my article is about tomorrow!

Stay tuned for tomorrow... this year reminds me of 2014 actually and my article tomorrow will break it down. There are some interesting similarities.

I saw the interview the other day with Nishad that said he felt more comfortable at left guard than right. I know my article the other week about flipping the offensive line got some feedback that it wasn't so easy to just flip players around... and I get that it is the case... but it does feel like that is precisely what the coaches are doing.