The Kamikaze Kid

Great review Charles. I was at the game and the vibe in the air was electric, I think it will turn into the recruiting bonus that Lanning was looking for. After reviewing the video yesterday, I'd say all of my in person perspectives were validated. First, the sound of that ball being punted was music to my ears. Punt punt punt punt! The improvement on D all across the board was impressive. good passes turned into contested receptions or broken up incompletions. Ball carriers went down when met by the D most of the day on both sides. Who knew that was even a thing! I'm not concerned about the O at all. There are play makers everywhere. They just ran into a much improved D. The glaring red flag I'm afraid is TT at QB2. I hope he thanked the refs after the game because on his very first play, he passed the ball on the 19 yard line back to the 18 where Funa blew it up. Instead of a live ball scoop and score, the refs blew the play dead. There were too many more near pics to count. On film you can see him just stare at where he's about to throw. His emotionless whatever demeanor was also more disturbing to witness in person. QB3 Novosad looked much more energized and into the game. I say either he jumps to QB2 today or portal in a senior QB2. I was really impressed with Hill as a linebacker. It looked like he was easily doing what Lanning wanted done at that position last year. He brought down Bucky fairly easily in a 1 on 1 battle with no help and we all know how hard that is even for a good lineman.Burch also looked like the real deal. I think Tez will be that DAT like spark the offense has been missing for years and Holden will be the go to guy to keep the chains moving. Overall, I was very impressed. I think with a QB2 upgrade, this is a legit Pac Championship game/ playoff contender.

If this was last year's veteran group, I'd say what we saw was a much improved D line. Since there is a lot of turn over this year, with a one game sample size, it's hard to know if the improved looking D was due to an over matched O line or that the O line is fine but the D has just vastly improved. Like I said before, I'm not worried about the O line. I think we saw a D that is ready to spell trouble for the rest of the Pac and a newly formed O line that was just trying to deal with that reality.

Pluses All defensive position groups. Huge sigh of relief. Additions at receiver. Welcome aboard Tez and Traeshon! Dowdell looks to be the real deal. Minuses QB2 TE depth OL? Not really a minus but didn't stand out as dominant yet. Still work to be done but not worried about it.

A boringish game was exactly what I wanted to see from an improved D perspective. Looked like better tackling and positioning than last year.

Would the group fleeing from the CU football team be considered The Not Ready For Prime Time Players?

Can't wait for that epic Alabama vs Middle Tennessee St battle. It will be an instant classic.

Shortening the game = removing commercials and the Pac is the only conference that hasn't locked in a TV contract yet. Great timing.

Jalil Tucker enters the portal. Jalil Tucker Enters Transfer Portal 247SPORTS.COM Jalil Tucker Enters Transfer Portal

On the topic of Kieth Brown to the portal, I just consulted the ChileDuck Depth Chart in the repository link on this page. It lists Brown as first at his position but check out this right up of second at his position Jestin Jacobs. As A Redshirt Freshman at Iowa (2021) Played in all 14 games at outside linebacker, earning starts in eight contests … Finished the season fifth on the team with 53 tackles and in solo stops with 33 … Caused two turnovers, forcing one fumble and picked off a pass … vs. No. 17 Indiana (Sept. 4): Earned a then-career best grade of 78.0 by Pro Football Focus after making four tackles, including three solo, along with a half TFL … at No. 9 Iowa State (Sept. 11): Started at outside linebacker, earning a career-best PFF grade of 83.9 with an elite run defense grade of 90.1 while finishing with four tackles, all solo, a pass breakup and a forced fumble that led to a touchdown … vs. Kent State (Sept. 18): Had a career-high eight tackles with three solo stops, holding the Golden Flashes to 264 yards total offense … vs. Colorado State (Sept. 25): Matched career-high with eight tackles, including four solo stops en route to allowing just 250 yards total offense … at Maryland (Oct. 1): Made four tackles, including two solo stops to hold the Terrapin offense to 271 yards … vs. No. 4 Penn State (Oct. 9): Started at outside linebacker, finishing with three tackles (two solo) and first career interception … vs. Minnesota (Nov. 13), Had four tackles, including two solo tackles … vs. Illinois (Nov. 20): Made four solo tackles and added a quarterback pressure to help hold The Illini to 64 net rushing yards … vs. #22 Kentucky (Jan. 1): Finished with four tackles, including two solo tackles, in Citrus Bowl start. He was injured most of last year and only played in a couple games. I don't have any inside scoop but if Jacobs was starting for Iowa as a redshirt freshman two years ago, I would think he just came in and took the starting job.

I think Altman should just go after his type of guys and forget about star power. I am convinced that a junior/ senior lead team of scrappy gym rats that buy in to his vision would compete for Pac championships and be threats to make the sweet sixteen and beyond some years.. Throw in a few upper four stars that want to really get better at the game for a few years instead of being a late second round one and done.They could still be a deep tourney run threat most years and we'd actually get to care about the guys that make up the team and watch them grow and develop their game year after year.

From Altman's post NIT comments, I'd say he is done with 5 star one and dones. Personally, I'd way rather cheer on a scrappy group of under dogs win or lose than guys just putting in their obligatory one year of semi pro ball before joining the NBA. Does anybody remember freshman Freddie Jones missing two end of game free throws his freshman year? The Ducks ended up losing to the mighty Arizona by one point and Freddie took it real hard. Flash forward three years and Senior Freddie Jones destroys Arizona by 30 in route to winning the Pac and making it to the elite eight. Jones also one Pac Player of the year and became the #10 player selected in the draft. Watching the journey of a gifted freshman become a senior team leader is half the fun of rooting for a college team. I really hope Altman shifts his recruiting strategy back in that direction.

I think the Pac should just grab SD St and pick one: UNLV, Fresno St, SMU, CSU. Then I think they should extend invites for the B12 Texas schools for when their contract is up. In six years, the Pac could extend down the west coast and over to Texas and regularly have close to a third of the top 25 teams in all the major sports with all the best Western media markets locked up. That should garner a legit contract for the next negotiation cycle. Heck, UCLA may even come crawling back at that point.

Five or six years under a new contract could also give the Pac/ B12 and Mountain West schools time to talk and possibly form some new conferences. I think straight up mergers water things down with too many teams. I could see a new conference form that covers the west coast and the south west through Texas. UCLA may even decide to join this new conference. I'd think a conference that had Seattle, Portland, the Bay area, LA/ San Diego, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Texas and UO's national fan base would be competitive with the Big and SEC while keeping local rivalries intact.

If Apple and Ion are jumping in the ring, I hope to see SCTV jump in as well. The McKenzie brothers calling games would be fantastic.

I'd like to see movement towards an entirely new conference set to start up at the end of the B12 media contract. By starting from scratch, this new conference could have representation in all the major pacific coast cities from the Pac and all the Texas schools from the B12. Next, include the other main players from the Pac and B12 (Utah, Ok St, BYU) and possibly some footprint expanding schools (Tulane, Cincinnati). The current Pac leadership collectively always seem to be at least couple steps behind and never seeming to grasp the gravity of the situation. I'd have far more faith in a new group of schools actually working together keep up with what's required to do to remain nationally relevant.

This is why I'm saying work things out now and have the new conference form at the end of the media contracts. At this point, all members of the B!12 and Pac are going to get left behind the B10 and SEC financially no matter what kind of realignment the conferences do. Heck it may even be possible to bring USC and UCLA into the new conference if it could generate something close to what they'd get in the B10.

This is why I'm saying it would require the Uncle Phil type movers and shakers to get together behind the scenes and workout a plan then approach the schools of interest. I have zero faith that conference leaders will do anything more than simply try to duct tape SD St and SMU onto the sinking Pac ship. If the the Big10 and SEC become the super conferences that they are currently heading towards that will only alienate the rest of the country and national interest in college football would plummet. Does anybody care who won the G league championship? Who one the AAA baseball crown last year? That's all a semi pro Big10-SEC division would be reduced to. I think for college football to retain national relevance, it's going to take outside the box thinking to restructure it to fit the current revenue generating landscape.

At this point I have zero faith in the long term relevance of either the Pac or B12. I also feel a simple merger of the two just creates a bloated conference that has too many teams. In the age of conference realignment, I think it’s necessary to go outside the box and create some new conferences that reflect the priorities of media value while attempting to keep regional groupings. What I envision is something I’ll just refer to as The Great West Conference. This would be a sixteen school conference with four four team pods. One possible grouping could look like this. NW Pod UO, UW, Cal, Stanford SW Pod SD ST, UNLV, UA, ASU Midwest Pod OK St. KU, Utah, Cincinnati Texas Pod TTU, TCU, Baylor, Houston In football, each team would play all three pod mates plus two teams from the others for a nine game schedule. In other sports, home and away games with all pod mates first then maybe the same thing with the closest neighboring pod (NW and SW pods for example) then fill out the rest of the schedules with the more distant pods. This new conference would have a strong Texas presence and cover the largest media markets the west has to offer. OSU, WSU, Fresno St and BYU could be the main teams in another new conference that would be an upgrade from the Mountain West. I think some big time movers and shakers like Uncle Phil and his pals could get the ball rolling on this and have a plan in place by the time the next round of media contracts are up. If a plan like this doesn’t happen, I’m afraid all schools not in the B10 or SEC will just end up being in glorified Mountain West conferences anyway.

Kind of a head scratcher. I’d think that with UO’s coaches budget coupled with the recent track record of Lanning’s assistants moving on to better gigs, he’d be able to bring in someone with a better resume. Then again, I thought the same thing with the running back coach who has turned into one of the best coaches on the staff. For now I’ll consider this a classic what do I know move.

What if UO and Fuskies just started talking with a couple top B12 teams about forming a new conference when the B12 media contract expired? With a nucleus of UO, UW, UU, Ok St and TCU, I’m sure a solid competitive conference of 12-14 schools could be formed. I’d say taking this type of direction would be best in the long term and then whatever you get out of the upcoming contract wouldn’t be that big of a deal. If both the Pac and B12 stay on the current course, years of receiving half or less than B10 and SEC schools will leave us being not much more than the Mountain West Conference. I think we are looking “Go big or go home” directly in the eye and I don’t trust the Pac leadership at all at this point.

To me, it seems if you’re going to bring in SD St and expand into Texas with SMU, you should go all in. What if you also brought in UTSA and Tulane? I don’t see SMU moving the needle much but what if all these CA/ Texas/ LA schools come into a P5 conference together? With the expanded revenue from being in the PAC would bring, their competitiveness and fan interest should grow and add value by the next media contract. Whatever the answer is to this problem, I’m concerned that the PAC leadership will not be able to meet the challenge of the moment.

I think the biggest problem the Pac has is that the leaders of the Pac never thought there was a problem. The next problem was that the new commissioner didn't recognize the scope of the problem soon enough at the beginning of his reign. Now, all options appear to fall into the too little too late category with no real positive solutions to be found. I feel the Pac presidents are getting what they deserve for being way too out of touch with the current sports landscape for way too long. Unfortunately it will now come at a cost to west coast sports fans, athletes and the schools themselves.

Win the championship? Probably not. Make championship game. Possible but not likely. Make the playoffs? Quite possible.

Frat boy? Now waaaaaait a minute!

Something tells me this story will be continued in next year’s portal.