The Kamikaze Kid

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.

I think Lanning said that the offense was Frankensteined together by all the coaches and the basic principles weren’t going to change. I’d expect Stein to add his favorite ingredients to the mix instead of a whole sale system change. Also, I wonder if Harbor could be turned into a tight end/ receiver hybrid to keep his weight down at Olympic levels. After the olympics, he could then add weight and play either edge or tight end to prep for the pros. The combination of Stein wanting to regularly throw down field and having your tight end be the fastest guy on the field sounds like a nightmare for D coordinators. Also sounds like a great selling point for bringing Harbor into the flock.

Heavily courted to an NFL QB coach? Probably not by the chargers.

Altman was at his best coaching up 3 and 4 star players. This era of five star one and dones has been a step backwards for the program. I'd way rather watch a team build chemistry and players develop skills over time than watch a bunch of guys just biding their time for a year before they can run off to the pros where most have failed to have much of an impact at.

Just wait till they whine about how much those Rutgers, Ohio St back to back road games suck.

Quack! = Signed So far so good = Commited

UGA 31-17 2 2 285

I'm not an Xs and Os guy when it comes to defensive schemes but I wonder if both Sewell and Flowe Excelled in more gut instinct game plans of the past and then struggled under Lanning's more complex defensive scheme.That could explain the confusing regression both players took this year but it is just speculation with no data to back it up.

If the D shows up next year and the O is pretty much the same, they should be favored in every game. Playoffs should be the goal.

Is this the team SUC fans where just yapping about that shoulda been in the playoffs?

Step 1: Sign him up. Step 2. Let him play whatever position he wants. Step 3: Let him run track. Step 4: Give an honest evaluation of where he should prioritize his athletic skills. Step 5: Let him do what’s best for himself.

Camden Lewis kicked that crazy extra point off the up rights to seal the game. If you take a closer look on the replay, you can see his planting foot almost spin completely to the left causing him to nearly fall down. He was kicking on that freshly tilled side of the field. In real time I thought he almost blew the game but now I see that he actually saved it and should get some well deserved props.

I don't think of it as rooting for the fuskies. I see it as hoping they don't blow it for the Pac.

Great review. I see one concerning common denominator for UO's last four games (UW, UU, OSU, NC). In all four games, the Ducks looked like the superior team and took control of all four games. Also in all four games, one or more bizarre you'll never see that again type of plays happened against the Ducks. After said plays in all four games, the Ducks lost confidence and found themselves in tight battles. I'd say, you could add the UGA game to this list because after the two early interceptions, the Ducks lost confidence that never came back and the game got away from them quickly. This is where real time leadership needs to kick in. I think this is where Lanning has the most room for growth as a coach. I think Lanning will process his own short comings in these situations, have talks with Coach Smart on these topics and return next year better as an in game leader of the team. I've always loved the Mike Tyson quote about everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face. I think that is the biggest factor this brilliant first time head coach faced this year. This year he seemed to try to get momentum back with risky gambles on forth down and onside kicks. Hopefully next year we'll see better in game adjustments on both sides of the ball and less panic and wild gambles in those situations. I'm already looking forward to the Spring game. I think Lanning will get this head coaching thing figured out sooner than later and playoff runs will be returning for the Ducks.

LOL. I was thinking the same thing!

Way to finish Ducks. What a game!

UO 48-38 2 1 345

I remember a press conference where Lanning was bringing up the dark side of the portal and if we really wanted to go there? Like any other game, Lanning is playing the portal/ recruiting game to win and is getting national praise for doing so. Still, it was good for me to see him make that statement. Uneasy with knowing what winning the portal game requires but also prioritizing doing what makes the team better. I'd much rather have Coach Lanning handling these tough calls with some compassion than Coach Prime practically gloating over the fact that he's going to be giving a lot of his team the axe.