Week 2 games:
Kcmatt7
11050 posts
@kjayhawks I'd love to do that. Sorry I was in Nashville this weekend for a wedding. Wasn't even able to watch the game because I didn't realize how far in the woods this wedding would be...
Not that anyone would have done great this week... Baylor and Texas losing? Jeeze. And Texas losing even with 3 special teams or defense touchdowns. That's bad. Really bad. If UT goes .500 this year will people still believe in Herman as the savior?
For the record, I think Vick is going to make an NBA roster. I think he can be a guy like McCaw for the Warriors. I just don't ever think he will be a guy who carries a team by himself. He can't create his own shot well enough. But he can play good D, finish in transition and hit the open 3. Guys like Vick are the difference between winning championships and not.
I think Vick would be dumb to return for his senior year when he still would have upside most players aren't looked at as having their Junior years. Especially after he shoots better and plays better D. I think he will play himself into the end of the first or early 2nd round this season. I personally don't see his stock climbing any higher than that, even with a very good Senior season. He would have to have a Denzel Valentine type of season where he is amazingly efficient on offense to even think about climbing higher than the end of the first/early 2nd. I don't see that happening for Vick, or him even having the touches to do such a thing if we land the monster class it looks like we will land. Because of this, and sticking to the topic of the thread, I think that Vick will leave meaning we will lose 6 players.
@Texas-Hawk-10 Agree to disagree. You think a lot more of Vick than I do.
@kjayhawks @mayjay I literally watched all 7 seasons consecutively with my GF in a 3 week period. It was by far the best way to watch it. Because now that I have to wait a year, I'm already pissed...
@BShark This must be how it feels to be a Kentucky fan.
@Texas-Hawk-10 What does Vick have to gain by coming back?
Because, how I see it, he projects out to a 13 ppg player if given more minutes and a few more shot attempts per game. And right now, the view is he has a lot more upside. But if he doesn't, and comes back, he screws himself pretty hard. Or if he ISN'T a featured guy because Williamson and Lawson are so dominant that he stays as a 3rd option he will lose that "upside" trait.
Those are the risks he takes by coming back. Instead of being an intriguing player on a very good FF team.
@BShark De Sousa will still eat away at the 4 spot some. At least I would assume so. Preston ranks similarly and he is going to start. Bill prefers to at least start 2 posts if he has the bodies to do it.
And even if Dotson and Grimes are multi-year guys, they are going to have to be integral parts of next year's team. They are going to get minutes and are being sold on starter roles.
I'm just making my case of why I think Vick is as good as gone if we land Zion.
No Zion and Vick is a very important piece to have. Landing Zion kind of takes the sales out. Not that Vick wouldn't be a great player to have and really help us to reek havoc on D, but there is just more reasons for him to go.
I think Doke is the most likely to stay. If he stays, he plays as many minutes as he can handle. And between him and Dedric, our post D and rebounding would be the best in the country.
NBA scouts really just want to see if Doke can learn some basketball skill. He might not have any this season, and still dominate at the college level. And then advise him to return to KU and continue to work on things like footwork and free throw shooting. The NBA scouts really just want to see if you can take a next step and continue to improve. If Doke is just going to be a big ogre and not learn how to actually play the game, they won't waste their time on him. That is why I think he is the most likely to be back.
@Texas-Hawk-10 I think you are overrating Vick. He can shoot and play D. But he doesn't handle the ball well or create his own shot. What is there to feature?
Even if Dotson is as good as a Sophomore DG, that is a guy playing 32.6 MPG. Even if Grimes is Freshmen Wayne Selden or B-Mac he is playing 30 MPG. Wiggins played 32 mpg and Josh played 30 MPG despite having horrible foul problems so you KNOW Williamson would be playing 30+ mpg. If De Sousa is as good right now as Jamari Traylor was his Sophomore year, he will play 15 MPG.
My point isn't even that Vick is a this or that or even how much PT he would get. My point is that why stay here and fight for PT at all when his draft stock can really only improve marginally at this juncture, unless he completely dominates. And I personally don't see any skillset from Vick that tells me he is going to be able to score well enough or create his own shot well enough that his draft stock jumps through the roof. At least not if he has as good of a year this year as I think he will have.
1-4 Position Players:
- KJ - 0 MPG?
- Vick - 25 MPG
- Dotson - 30 MPG
- Grimes - 30 MPG
- Cunliffe - 0 MPG?
- Williamson - 30 MPG
- Garrett - 10 MPG?
- Lightfoot - 15 MPG?
- Moore - 20 MPG?
So we won't play Cunliffe or KJ? And, if we do at all, that eats away minutes. And I personally think that Garrett will be playing quite a bit by the end of this season. He will have earned more than 10 minutes probably. Do we think that KJ will be ok without playing at least 20 minutes a game? I mean we do want his brother and cousin to come here so his playing time direct effects recruiting. I assume he will at least get some PT.
And then you would only be splitting the 5 spot 2 ways with:
- Dedric - 30 MPG
- De Sousa - 10 MPG?
Ok so De Sousa will probably play more than 10 MPG, if we are to assume he is college ready. So that eats into the 4. Self usually plays 2 pgs, but even if he only overlaps them 10 MPG that is 10 minutes eating away at the 2 spot. Not to mention that Bill usually plays his starting PGs closer to 35 mpg. So that is another 5 minutes eaten up.
It is crowded enough that if I were Vick I would be gone. I would play my ass off this season and be gone. Staying an extra year to compete against 5 other guys for PT on what will be a NC level team regardless of if he stays or not, isn't that enticing if I'm him. Especially if we have a FF type of season this year.
@Texas-Hawk-10 That is still a TON of mouths to feed. I'm not sure that Vick wants to spend a 4th year only getting about 25 mpg and not being a featured player.
@approxinfinity I do. If we have Mitchell Robinson on the roster right now, I'm sure that scares some guys away.
@Texas-Hawk-10 But if we land Grimes or Langford, all of a sudden we are talking about multiple guys needing minutes. And Zion needs to play both the 3 and the 4, which is what I'm sure coach is pitching. When we are already Wing heavy.
So we are talking about:
- PG - Dotson/Moore
- SG- Grimes/Dotson
- SF- Grimes/Zion/Vick/Garrett
- PF- Zion/De Sousa/ Lightfoot/KJ Lawson/Garrett
- C - Dedric Lawson/ De Sousa
That is a lot of guys to spread minutes around to. If you're Vick's camp, that doesn't look great for you when you can leave a year early and still have "upside."
And, it really makes it look like Vick wouldn't be the featured player like you stated earlier. In fact, it looks more like he would be the 3rd or 4th, maybe 5th option after Dedric, Zion and Grimes for sure. Dotson may even be a guy who we go to before Vick.
If De Sousa thinks he is going to be a OAD, Self must be selling him that he will have plenty of PT at the 4 spot or be the first backup big if Doke stays and get 25ish minutes per game. Really meaning that Zion will get most of his minutes at the 3. Grimes added to the equation means minutes at the 2 are going to be a fight, especially when we know HCBS really likes to play two ball handlers so Moore, Dotson and Grimes will fill the majority of minutes at those two positions.
You are correct in saying that Bill is at the very least open to playing an outside-in game now though. And I do think Zion will get some minutes at the 4.
@BShark Hope he plays like the OAD he thinks he's going to be.
A path like Ike took would be devastating.
I do not think Vick is going to hang around if we win the Zion sweepstakes.
I think Doke is about our only hope for a returning starter. And that is a stretch. I think we lose 6, but only because we are going to get a monster haul recruiting.
@Crimsonorblue22 I'm excited for what this class can turn out to be now. We almost never land this big of a recruit this early. Mostly, I'm excited he's committed this early because it means Self can contact him this offseason, Hudy can give him workouts and that he will be on campus the first day he can be. And because it didn't look like we were doing well with post recruits on the surface.
Posted this in the other thread too:
That happened fast. Leaves me with so many questions.
What is his and Dotson’s relationship?
Can he graduate at semester and come early? I guess if he was a 4 year player than he wouldn’t be eligible that last semester. I’m sure there is a way to work around that though.
He plays AAU with Emmitt Williams, wonder if that could help us out?
Wonder what McCormack thinks? Could bill sell them on just being the biggest nastiest front court ever next season, especially if Doke comes back? Can we land all 3 and still get Doke or Preston back? (Williams,De Sousa and McCormack?
Is he actually 6’9? Draftexpress shows he was 6’7 w/o shoes in 2015 and 6’9 in shoes in 2016. 6’9 wingspan which isn’t out of the ordinary.
Is he actually 256 lbs or is he 220 lbs? Draftexpress shows he gained 30 lbs in a year. I hope he is 256. Means he has a college body already. He looks like he has a college body already in the videos. Also means he is a worker.
Overall, I’m excited by the signing. Solid player, but his additional possible connections makes him all the more exciting.
That happened fast. Leaves me with so many questions.
What is his and Dotson's relationship?
Can he graduate at semester and come early? I guess if he was a 4 year player than he wouldn't be eligible that last semester. I'm sure there is a way to work around that though.
He plays AAU with Emmitt Williams, wonder if that could help us out?
Wonder what McCormack thinks? Could bill sell them on just being the biggest nastiest front court ever next season, especially if Doke comes back? Can we land all 3 and still get Doke or Preston back? (Williams,De Sousa and McCormack?
Is he actually 6'9? Draftexpress shows he was 6'7 w/o shoes in 2015 and 6'9 in shoes in 2016. 6'9 wingspan which isn't out of the ordinary.
Is he actually 256 lbs or is he 220 lbs? Draftexpress shows he gained 30 lbs in a year. I hope he is 256. Means he has a college body already. He looks like he has a college body already in the videos. Also means he is a worker.
Overall, I'm excited by the signing. Solid player, but his additional possible connections makes him all the more exciting.
@BShark Really depends on how much Adidas is willing to spend to win a ring I suppose, right?
@JayHawkFanToo He basically admitted to it in his press conference. And Dayton's comments have been extremely harsh.
The likelihood of him being guilty at this point is pretty high.
@Texas-Hawk-10 You can't play like Alex smith and reduce turnovers without playing a conservative style. Both things that you have said.
You also can't beat a cover 2 doing that the entire game. Unless you are willing to take the top off of a cover 2 they won't respect the deep routes you run and will end up taking away the running game and intermediate game as a result. Just like what happened last season... We have to be willing to hit a backside post or run a 4 verticals scheme at least once almost every drive. We also don't have a good enough running game to score when we get in enemy territory and the field shrinks. Which is why it is important to try to take the top off of a defense and score from 30+ yards out on a deep ball.
@jaybate-1.0 Adenji is kind of small at 290 for a LT. But he is a stud. Will probably be a guard in the NFL. Everyone else is a good size... if the numbers aren't inflated by 15-20 lbs that is.
I think our difference of opinion stems on what we would like to see. I think you want to see us sneak out a 4th win for sure, but really shoot for a 5th. I want to see us play 11 competitive games. I would see more progress in 11 close games than I would in 4 wins and 7 blow outs.
@Texas-Hawk-10 Yea you're right, a drive where we are at the 25 and throw a pick is terrible. Except that isn't the majority of interceptions. So you can't use that as your example in this argument.
And I'm talking about measuring progress. If we put up 100 more yards per game, have a longer time of possession, have more first downs and punt less but turn the ball over just as often, we will be in more games than if we keep everything else on offense equal but have one less turnover a game.
Go look at the list of teams who lead the NCAA in turnovers last season and then look at their records. There are quite a few teams towards the bottom that aren't bad. Like Clemson and Louisville and Baylor. Then look at the teams who had the fewest first downs and the most punts. Those teams SUCK. There is a better correlation to a teams success looking at first downs and punts than there is looking at turnovers.
Wins don't necessarily show progress with this team. So playing conservatively and trying to steal an extra win or two isn't something I care about. That isn't the end game of this rebuild. I want to see consistent drives of 40 or 50 yards that may or may not end in points. At least we are showing that the offense will be able to score points once we have a full cast of talent on the line and at receiver. We can see the direction the program is heading. A season of conservative play where we won 4 games but got smoked in the other 7 isn't what I want to see.
@kjayhawks That is obviously the ideal scenario.
I just don't see this as the season to TRY to win games. They should be a result of progress. Playing conservatively limits the progress we can make. Throwing nothing but 5 yard passes again just so we don't turn the ball over didn't work last year. Why would we expect it to work this season?
I'm just tired of getting rolled through like toilet paper. Let's go down swinging instead of curling up in the fetal position and hoping our opponent knocks themselves out like Texas did last season. At least we make teams show up to beat us. If you can't score or move the ball because you are so concerned about turning the ball over you won't ever beat anybody.
It is a lot easier to play aggressively and have a great game with no turnovers than play conservatively and get lucky enough to outscore your opponents.
@Texas-Hawk-10 First downs per game and fewer punts are the metric to look at this season. Prove you can move the ball. Once you do that, then you fine tune everything else and worry about protecting it more. In the scheme of an entire game, we are talking about 3 bad plays if we average 3 turnovers. But, averaging 5 more first downs and 1 or 2 fewer punts per game is a much larger improvement than averaging one less turnover per game. That means we are averaging closer to 12 or 13 plays per game where we made something positive happen that we didn't last season.
@kjayhawks I think it will be from less fumbles if we improve turnovers.
We threw 15TDs to 22INTs last year. Kind of expect a ratio more like 30TDs to 22INTs this season. That would be a huge improvement and would certainly allow us to be in more games. If we have something like 15 TDs and 10 INTs we will still get curb stomped every week of conference play except the ISU game.
Crazier things have happened, but I agree the odds are definitely against them. It will take some kind of 10 game win streak to jump back in that 2nd wildcard spot. And we don't have the starting pitching or bullpen to do either. Nor do we have consistent enough offense.
Realistically, this team was not built to win in Kauffman stadium and that has been their downfall. 35-30 so far this season. It will be our worst Home record in 4 seasons unless something drastic happens in September. Dayton did not have a good off season these past two years, nor did Ned and Dayton evaluate the roster correctly in April coming out of Spring training. Of course hind-site is 20/20. The biggest mistake Dayton ever made was not resigning Ervin Santana to a long-term contract 3 years ago. Wouldn't have wasted money on Kennedy or Wood. Nor do we waste important bullpen arms on the Cueto trade. Could have afforded to keep Wade at the very least and would have a true ace in the rotation still. Probably would have been able to afford to keep Morales as well who is an upgrade to our DH situation this season for sure. That one was a pretty bad mistake.
@Texas-Hawk-10 Assuming a better offense will make us turn the ball over less is a dangerous assumption. We will probably score more points this year. Doesn't mean we won't average 3 turnovers a game.
@Texas-Hawk-10 I'm just not expecting major improvements. I'm going to expect mistakes. I just would rather them be 30 yards downfield instead. That's all I'm saying. I don't see us turning the ball over less than 30 times this season. So lets at least air it out if we are going to turn the ball over regardless.
I mean it all depends on what Meachem's scheme does for us. If he can help alleviate turnovers, that is a huge help. I just think between fumbles and INTs we are good for 3 turnovers a game. But who knows, maybe Bender can really play.
@mayjay It would take the same thing that caused the Founding Father's to do it. Failure of the previous system. Which is coming when we eventually default on our debts. And it will all stem from this time period when we did let our system quit functioning.
It really is the perfect storm. We have an ignorant people who can get their information from whatever source confirms what they want to believe, combined with Representatives who don't give a damn about anything other than their next election. Sounds like an inevitable collapse to me.
@kjayhawks See I didn't see a lot of tunnel screens. A ton of bubbles, but not a lot of tunnels. And when we did run a tunnel our QB doesn't zip it our there accurate or fast enough.
And, as far as turnovers, a turnover 30 yards down the field sets the D up much better than a turnover on a 5 yard pass that gets returned for 15 yards.
We can't turn the ball over on simple passes or lose fumbles. But a pick on a deep throw is basically a punt, and I'm ok with that.
@JayHawkFanToo Yea I haven't watched lately (my parents have their TV set on Foxnews 24/7 for the past 15 years of my life), only read. So again, the TV network very well could be much less biased than the Website.
@mayjay I think I got your point just fine. I think you're just missing mine.
I would respond in a lot larger context but I just feel that I would end up saying something very rude. As I typed out 10 things and they all come across as rude when I read them back to myself. I'll drop the issue for now. Only one more week of boredom to fill before football starts.
@stoptheflop I don't think that time was the problem as much as arm strength...
@mayjay I want to first state that efficient and inefficient are subjective terms and neither of us can really understand exactly what an efficient/inefficient government would look like to the other party.
Now, that list I have made are issues, but not things we are actively working to solve. What they are, are campaign promises or stances candidates take simply to get votes. It isn't that we are efficiently working on them or not working on them, we AREN'T working on them. The magnitude of them doesn't matter. We can't agree on something simple right now because conversations aren't even brought to the table. And it is because times have changed. There is far too much data available now. Too much statistics involved that candidates don't say what they believe they say what will get them elected. So now you have elected officials that don't believe in a cause that got them elected. Do you think they will fight for that cause once they are in office? Maybe. But they probably won't make that their main fight, or care about it like they would if they were fighting for the side they truly believed in. I always find it fascinating that the Catholic Church always supports Republicans. It really doesn't make sense. The Catholic Church bases it's entire decision around two stances though. Abortion and Religious beliefs. Republicans have taken the Anti-abortion stance as well as an anti-science/pro-religious stance. This gets them literally millions of votes across the country. And they do this despite the fact that today's Democratic policies would be much more favorable to the church in many ways. Their moral compasses align much more than with the Republican's. Yet, they still, year in and year out, based on nothing but two stances, cast millions of votes towards Republican candidates.
Now, to your point about money. Absolutely money has always been in politics. But people never look at the math. First off, let us look at Congressional pay. Originally, Congressman were given a per - diem for days they had to meet. Which seems very fair as many of them were great philanthropists and this was simply them doing their civic duties. Fast Forward to 1855. Congress was then given their first salaries. $3000 a year. Or, roughly $80k in today's money. With no per-diems for travel. In 1871, that was the first time that Congress gave themselves a raise not consistent with inflation. Making $5000. Or roughly $141k. They did it again in 1907. $7,500 or roughly $182k today. They kept with inflation again until, 1965. $30k salaries, or roughly $218K today. Again in 1969, $42.5k or roughly $265k today. They have since kept with inflation and their salaries are now $174k. Not including the salaries that they pay themselves from campaign funds. Or the per-diems they get for travel. (Data from: http://www.heraldnet.com/news/congressional-pay-since-1855-in-2012-dollars/ ↗ and https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/senate_salaries.htm) ↗
Now I ask, is $174k an average salary? Does it seem like a job that you would want to lose? It does not. It is too enticing of an amount of money for candidates to actually run on what they believe. This is a major flaw that the founders did not see coming.
So, I don't want to lose my job. In order to do that, I have to get re-elected. In order to get re-elected, I need money. But where do I get money? I get it from the people!! Wrong. Under 10% of people EVER donate to any candidate. And if they do, it rarely is even over $250. So now where do I get my money if I'm a candidate. The answer, PACs and Super PACs and the selling of souls. You say that money has always been in politics, but not money like today. And not advertising like today. And not numbers and statistics like today. Since just 1998, money spent lobbying has doubled. It is now $3.5B spent lobbying. Since 1951, lobbying has increased 350% from $10m to $3.5B. Or roughly 3.5 times inflation. EVERYONE in a mainstream party right now is bought unless it is their first campaign. Because that is the only way to get money to win the election to get the great salary is to say the things that the people who pay for you to win the elections want you to say. So no, there is not a way to form a coalition and rally people's support. You can't even get 10% of the population to donate to something as important as their livelihoods even once in their life. Much less get enough people or make enough noise to scare off a $3.5B lobbying industry. (Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_lobbying_in_the_United_States#Beginnings ↗
http://www.opensecrets.org/resources/learn/lobbying_timeline.php ↗
https://www.opensecrets.org/resources/dollarocracy/04.php ↗
https://www.nytimes.com/elections/2012/guide-to-political-donations.html ↗
https://www.statista.com/statistics/257337/total-lobbying-spending-in-the-us/ ↗
https://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal52-1379901 ↗
https://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal53-1365434) ↗
So to say that we used to work together, but now we don't because our system is flawed is actually accurate. What you are saying is a contradiction is like saying your old crappy laptop contradicts itself. It used to work just fine, but new technologies and coding have come out and now that system is obsolete, or at the very best running much slower than it used to.
And, you say that immediacy is something stopped by our system. When in reality, it isn't. The last time Congress declared war was 1942. And how many wars have their been since then? How many executive orders in history have completely changed something, immediately? Or now the "nuclear" option Congress can invoke? Filibuster's are basically useless now. We have allowed immediacy into our system and now we DON'T have to compromise. We can enable policies basically overnight. Decided by parties without a super-majority or by one, single person sitting in the Oval office.
So is our Democracy strong? Yes. We as a people have a democratic mindset and would fight for Democracy. That is half the battle to HAVE a democracy. That doesn't make the way our government is set up currently the best system. It needs updated to account for all the changes that have happened since the Constitution was instituted in the first place. It has to account for the changes in society. And that might be the first, most important talk we have to have. Our country was built by honest, intelligent, ordinary men who did extraordinary things. Since then, systematic and philosophical changes have taken place that they could not have accounted for as honest men. It has brought us to this point. Where we have people on two sides of an isle. And the isle is where all of the compromise happens. Except that all of them are afraid to stand in the isle because it is hot lava that could possibly end their careers and stop the gravy train from flowing.
@JayHawkFanToo bashing Trump doesn't make them left leaning. I'm no Trump fan, but I'm also on the Conservative side of the spectrum.
And tv and web are also different. If you watch rather than read, you won't see the difference. In When you compare fox articles to Other media, you see the bias.
@FarmerJayhawk He's got Bill Self big written all over him. 6'8 in shoes with a 6'10 wingspan. Doesn't remind us of anyone in particular at all...
@BShark I actually find KU's schedule favorable.
KSU is a home game. Yes, KSU should be very good this season. But they don't have as big of a talent gap as other teams do over us. As long as we play disciplined football, we should be able to stay in that game until the end. They shouldn't be able to overwhelm us with talent and speed like other teams will.
Baylor is also a home game. It really depends on how their season starts. If Baylor starts of poorly, they might just go ahead and quit.
Texas has talent. I don't see us winning that game, but we have played them tough recently. And almost everyone thought Charlie Strong was a great coach until Texas overwhelmed him. We won't really know if this is a winnable game until we see if UT is actually UT.
Other than that, KU should be pretty well matched against TTU at home. Should also have a chance to end the road streak against ISU if we don't do it vs. Ohio.
My predictions:
- SEMO - W 55-14
- UCM - W 33-24
- Ohio - W 27-20
- WVU - L 35-21
- TTU - L 42-28
- ISU - L 28-21
- TCU - L 32-28
- KSU - L 24-16
- BU - L 28-14
- UT - L 55-30
- OU - L 60-17
- OSU - L 55-20
To me, anything within two scores is a competitive game. If we can be within 1 score for 3 and 1/2 quarters in most of our conference games, I'll be more than happy with the season. I'm projecting all losses only because I don't know which game will be the one that they squeak out. And I do think they will squeak at least one out.
@JayHawkFanToo Agreed. 4 wins. 3 wins and all close games at home would be almost as good.
2 wins and Beaty needs to be on the hot seat going into next season.
@mayjay I find that our system used to enable compromise because our legislators were actually citizens. Not robots paid to say and toe the party lines. So, today, I find that it doesn't enable compromise. With all the data we have today, we campaign on polar opposite sides to ensure that we pick up every last vote we can. I mean on literally every single social issue we have. We can't agree on how much to fund education. We can't agree on how much money to give to the poor. We can't agree on whether or not killing babies is ok, or when it is even technically a baby. We can't agree on how to provide healthcare to our citizens. We can't agree on whether or not we should use our own oil or buy oil overseas. We can't agree on affirmative action. We can't agree on the meaning of the 2nd amendment. We can't agree on whether or not requiring an ID is voter suppression. We can't agree on whether or not it is wrong that we have 30+million illegal immigrants in the country. We can't agree on what the tax code/rate should be. We can't agree on when it is right to go to war or not. We can't agree on our President's decisions to counter violence from foreign countries. We can't agree on how much pollution is too much pollution. We can't agree on something literally the rest of the entire world agrees on besides half of America. We can't agree on whether racists should be allowed to go around and be racist. We can't agree on whether or not you should be able to discriminate people at a business. We can't agree on what bathrooms should look like or who should be using which one. We can't agree whether or not is ok to discriminate against transgender people in the military. We can't agree on our immigration policy for those coming form the Middle-east. We can't agree on a minimum wage for businesses.
The list never ends, mainly because nobody is willing to compromise.
So, please tell me, what DO we agree on? What issues have we actually come together on lately? What compromises have we had in the past 12 years? The only time we have compromise, is after we already screwed something up so badly we have no other choice but to fix it. The way our system is set up, it allows us to kick the can down the road and let someone else deal with it. So we kick and kick and kick until it all explodes in our faces and we as a nation have nothing else to do but come together and pick up the pieces. If that is what you call compromise, I think you and I have different definitions. In the 230 years of our democracy, how many of those years have we been in a good political state? 230 years isn't that many when you consider that we as a Country have been at each other's throats for basically the past 16 years (7% of the life of the constitution). How many other periods has the U.S. had like this? A dozen? Half of it's life?
The design of our branches creates division. The offset election years, they don't generate compromise from my point of view. The people elect a new President and then get upset at his ineffectiveness because he is stuck with an opposing Congress from elections before he got in office. And because he is ineffective the next election cycle he gets voted out. Except for the last election cycles, we elected his party into the majority of Congress and then elected an opposing president. The only presidents who have been appreciated lately are moderates who do inspire compromise. But in a society with a PC culture and where money talks more than people, saying anything that goes against party lines is basically the end of your political career.
It is a cycle of ineffectiveness. And you can see this by any metric you would like. National Debt. Growth of GDP. Ranking in Education. Ranking in Life Expectancy. The number of prisoners we keep. The number of murders we have. Any Quality of Life ranking. Pick a measurement, and we won't be the best at it anymore.
We as a Country are fading back. We used to want to be the greatest country on earth. Now, we just like to think we are.
@justanotherfan So what would your expectations be next year.
I find this to be the year, because he has been able to sell kids on a rebuild, PT and excitement. Not sure that excitement stays with the program if they don't tack on at least one more win this year than the last.
@JayhawkerRedLegs 4-5 wins means winning at least 1 conference game and winning the first 3 games.
I'm just tempering expectations I suppose. I'd rather not expect too much as it is unfair to Beaty and the program. The hole that he had to dig out of is/was so deep. To be patient like he has been is a testament to him trying to do all of the things that it takes to build a program correctly. The last two coaches felt that they could outscheme and outrecruit other programs without putting in the work. Beaty is doing the opposite of that, and so it will take time to build up depth and maximize our talent.
@JayhawkerRedLegs Got kicked off the team. I haven't heard why though.
@BShark All I want to see is that we COULD have won a game or two. Because the next year a couple of those turn into wins. And then the next season a couple of more. And so on and so forth.
Just being a tough Road game is all we really want isn't it?
@Crimsonorblue22 I think Zenger is safe. Raises money really well, and that is almost as important as anything. As long as Bill Self is happy with Zenger's job, I think Zenger is safe.
@Crimsonorblue22 Not going anywhere.
Not if he secures the funds for the stadium renovation.
This is the year that will make or break Beaty. If he shows us another 2 win team, and loses the commitment of the several players we stole of LA, I'm afraid that it will spell the end for David Beaty. Or, at the very least, only allow him to ascend to mediocrity.
This season, HCDB MUST win 3 games and at the very least be extremely competitive. Otherwise, what are we selling to our recruits? Sure, we will finally have top notch facilities. But, it doesn't matter where you are, or how nice your dorm is. Losing 30+ games over a 4 year period f-ing sucks. It is fun for nobody.
The athletic department has given HCDB all the tools he needs to be successful. It is time he shows that the resources getting put into the football program won't be wasted. Believe it or not, this is HCDB career defining season.
@drgnslayr Or giving him no information. Which is just as bad really. This is why I kept bringing up how stupid the Waiver rule is because it doesn't give the student information to make his best decision and allows NCAA to make the decision on granting a waiver or not with a bias toward a school.
If I was Robinson. I would just prep for the NBA. If I get hurt during that period, I obviously would have an insurance policy. But I could also return to school and someone would take me if I were injured and so really I'm out nothing.
NCAA should have made it clear the odds of him getting a wavier were above average and that they want a talent like that to go to college and earn some credits (and profit off of him). Stupid on their part.