The Kamikaze Kid

Hoosers 37-31 1 Turn over 2 Sacks 315 Passing

I was going to say that the Ducks are the elephant in the room that everybody is trying to ignore. After thinking about it a bit, I think they're more like the werewolf in the room that everyone's just closing their eyes to and hoping that it just goes away.

I think this topic scratches the surface of an over arching topic. Is recruiting itself about to change? The college football landscape is in a state of complete overhaul but an obvious change in direction seems to be emerging. It seems like high level recruits would be best served by going to low level teams straight from high school, get early playing time, build a portfolio then shop themselves to playoff caliber teams. I think the days of five star guys waiting for their turn are over. Especially with the real threat of being passed by an incoming portal guy. I can see rolling the dice on some three star diamonds in the rough and portaling in plug and play four and five stars as the blue print for the future. This could also help lower level teams like Boise State stay relevant by playing a bunch of high level one and done freshman. This direction seems inevitable to me but what do I know?

On the other hand, Moore to Moore might be a little more than they can deal with.

Ducks over Horns 27-24 Dawgs over Lions 17-13 Ducks over Dawgs 18-17 Book it!

The new playoff formatting is like the seven stages of death for bowl games. Lanning wants us to just skip ahead to acceptance but reality is still at the denial phase.

Potential. Where reality and fantasy pretend to be the same thing.

The two and three deep is littered with four and five star dudes at most positions. We're going to have to trust them to be able to step up into starting spots sometime. Hopefully the coaches got a good feel for who's ready and who's not.

Too bad portal guys that come to the Ducks fade into obscurity and regret their decisions. Oh wait, that's what happens at SUC my bad! Actually, portalling over to the Ducks usually pays off with increased exposer on the national stage and moving them up the draft rankings.

Personally, I'm taking Lanning's approach of bring it on whoever we play. That being said the committee really blew it. With the automatic bids placing lower ranked teams into higher ranked seedings they should have acted like the humans in the room instead trying to be reality detached robots. Since three teams bumped up to much higher seeds in the automatic bid slots the number two team was simply dropped down three spots to No. 5. This is where the humans needed to show some situational awareness and not try to mimic AI. Four vs five would normally be four vs five with the lowest possible seed advancing to play No. 1 but this is not a normal format. Since No.5 is actually No. 2, it practically guarantees a 1 vs 2 match up in the quarter finals. To make matters worse, that game is scheduled to basically be a home game for the No 2. team putting the No. 1 team at a huge disadvantage. The humans really failed here. Also with the tree slot drop down, the 8 vs 9 game that determines No. 1's opponent actually features No. 5 vs No. 6. This means the No. 1 team will probably face the N0. 5 and No. 2 teams before even getting to the Championship game. The humans really dropped the ball here. It should have been their job to compensate for the fatal flaws in the system not just cement them into reality. With that said, this is OBD's opportunity to go on the most impressive championship run in history and achieve a legendary championship status unrivaled before and after for all time. In the end, I think that's exactly where Lanning prefers his team to be.

In hindsight, I think they should have backed off the top four conference champs to the top eight.. Things would look way different if ASU and BSU were seeded seven and eight.

Auburn and Oregon would have also been a split poll that year with both going undefeated and playing in two different bowl games. I have never ever once wished for that pathetic alternate scenario.

For a thirty year old football fan it would be for a few years in grade school......

It's almost unfair how much us against the world material the world has given us. The more fuel in to the FEBU machine the better.

Trailing by seven and facing 4th and 9 on the road in hostile confines heading into the fourth quarter, Lanning hosted a pre planned dance party to keep the team loose and prepare them to focus on closing out the game strong. It was as if he borrowed Doc's time traveling Delorean to get a peak at the moment before hand. They then calmly complete a perfect pass for the first down, conclude the drive with a game tying touchdown, win the fourth quarter 10-0 and exit the field with a W like a boss on the way to an undefeated season. To me that's coach of the decade type of stuff.

Great insights GD!

This cluster hooey is what happens when you take a strict adherence to rankings and throw in arbitrary landing spots of conference champions in the 1-4 spots. Putting super powers like No. 2 and No.3 teams into 5 and 6 seeds can create match up nightmares for all the top ranked teams allowing other highly ranked teams to skate right threw with easy seedings. If Penn St had been seeded 5th instead of 6th the entire top of the BIG conference would have been slotted in the one seed path. Ridiculous!

Can you imagine the basketball selection committee sending a No. 1 North Carolina to play in a mid west regional in Kansas to play against a No. 3 Kansas and then if they win, they end up playing No.2 UCLA in LA? That's pretty much what the football committee just did.

FEBU vs Boo hoo

The two first half three and outs that let Penn St back in the game were started off with 1st down incompletions in our own backfield. There was also another one in the second half but we recovered from that. If Oregon doesn't beat Oregon, I don't think anybody else will.

Nobody in Oregon's way has an easy path. I doubt Day has the mental fortitude to deal with Lanning a second time.

Puts up 114 points against three teams in the top eight. 37 against No.3 Boise St, 45 against No. 6 Penn St, 32 against osu2. Also went 3-0 against three playoff teams. There is nobody even close to those accomplishments.

Tez's moves are more like basketball fakes and hesitations. They are way more subtle than a Barry Sanders like football fake. I don't think football players know how to deal with it. His 0 to 60 acceleration after the move is simply unmatched. He's basically playing a different game than everyone else. I remember watching his first spring game. He caught a standard 10-12 yard pass in traffic, applied one of his now standard moves and was gone for about a sixty yard TD untouched. After consulting the roster list,. I knew this new guy Tez was going to be a problem!

I think the BIG panic button has just been pushed and I’m loving it!

The 70's just called and said "Hold my Shlitz Malt Liquor".