Recalibrated expectations

This season will be just like every other season over the last 15 years, until it isn't. 

Probably around 10 wins.  1-2 nice wins.  A loss to any team that is just as good as us or better.  Get into a decent Bowl Game and look completely unprepared and lose.  I mean this is what we are.  It ain't pretty but it is reality.  Could also be worse.

Definitely an alarming two games but DPJ is arguably our most explosive player and he’ll be back for the Wisconsin game. If Shea isn’t 100%, Harbaugh needs to go with Mccaffrey. Shea refused to keep the ball in RPO with at least 10 yards of open space. Give Dylan two whole weeks of preparation with the 1’s and I believe we win in Madison.  

Agreed. FWIW, my theory is that it isn’t the coaching staff, but rather a major QB injury issue & now the schedule shakes out. 

There was a ton of wide open yardage to be had all game but it was clear they told Shea not to pull & run. Once Army figured that out it was Charbonnet for 2 yards a cary, especially with Runyan still out.

My working “meta” theory is that Shea is either a hair away from being out for the season and/or he CAN get up to near 100% in 3-5 weeks if he doesn’t aggravate it, and also that our #3 QB sucks. So, until our #1 can get healthy, we can’t risk injuring our #2 right now because there’s a decent chance McCaffrey may become our #1 with NO effective backup for the rest of the season. 

My working theory now is, their goal is to limp through offensively the next month or two to get/keep Shea healthy. 

Week 1: MTSU. Nonconference cupcake.

Week 2: Army. Non conference. Army will likely end up ranked this year.

Week 3: Bye 

Week 4: Wisconsin (western division, so less critical of a game). 

Week 5: Rutgers. Basically a bye. 

Week 6: Iowa (western division, so less critical of a game) 

Week 7: Illinois (western division so less critical of a game & soft team). 

That is a solid stretch of the team being credibly able to muddle through by severely limiting their offense to guard QB health as much as possible until the real rough stretch. 

My theory is they’re willing to drop Wisconsin or Iowa if needed because they’re western division teams. They were willing to drop Army because it’s nonconference & they’ll be a ranked team end of year. 

As a result, I think they’re willing to risk having 1-2 losses (nonconference or western division) if it significantly boosts their chance of a healthy & good QB 2 deep once we hit the MSU/PSU/ND/OSU section of our schedule. 

If not for the TERRIBLE turnovers (if Shea has injured ribs does it make him slow firmly tuck the ball?) and sloppy play, this strategy would be totally unnoticed by us fans at this point, as we’d have crushed MTSU & been up on an annoying Army about 24-14 in the 4th quarter yesterday. 

Bottom line is this: my expectations on this team will have several inflection points, most of which likely hinge on QB health & not offensive coordinator competency. Which also means unless sudden disaster strikes, I won’t be aware of upward or downward trajectories, as they will likely be kept under wraps as Shea subtly either gets healthier or his injuries linger/aggravate. 

This offense is average at worst. You overly negative people are insane. 

Sounds about right. It's still early in the season, hoping our tackles get healthy, our QB finds a rhythm, DPJ gets healthy and freshman runningback gets better as the year goes on. Nebraska improved a lot over the course of last season, we seem due for a season the team gets better during the season, of course people can argue the reason we haven't been is due to coaching. 

Too early to give up on the OC but I'm starting to feel like Saban is pranking us with the coaches we hire from his staff, like it could be Nussmeier all over again. 

Agree...let's see how we do in two weeks.

What nobody has mentioned is that like Oklahoma, it took OT to beat Army.  Unlike Oklahoma. Michigan actually ran 10 more plays than Army and unlike Oklahoma, time of possession was not heavily one-sided in Army's favor.  The D played well.

On top of that, as bad as Patterson was, and I believe he is hurting more than Harbaugh has let on, he still completed 66% of his passes, averaged 7.1 YPA and had no INT's.  It's the Fing play calling that I don't get.

Yep.

I'm looking for a reason to expect change. Desperately.

Not finding one.

Tarik had 2 drops but I don’t recall any outside of that 

Why do you assume everyone will be healthy in 2 weeks?  You're assuming that players who are so far away from being ready that they aren't even in uniform for the game are going to be back and playing well at Madison?  As a general rule, if everytime a player was in street clothes for a game, you placed a bet that they would not appear in the next game, you would make money in the long run.

Watching BTN in 60 right now; actually a nice way to watch the line work and how Shea made decisions. I'm not as mad at either as i was yesterday. O Line did get some decent push, but again, Shea was giving, giving, giving when he should have been pulling. I can't for the life of me understand some of these reads unless he was coached specifically to just keep feeding Turner & Charbonnet. 

The D line did not hold up; as Army is as Army does. That's disappointing but not a huge surprise. The secondary basically could have just had the day off. 

Honestly, if not for the fumbles and if Metellus' TD didn't get called back, this would have looked like a totally different game and we'd all be fine with it. 

The playcalling and coaching is just... Weird. 

I agree with this, but I’d say 4/5 losses with notre dame in there, I would say the one win comes against MSU or psu

9-3, I can't concede the MSU game.  Still emotional from the game on Saturday but I was at 10-2 to start the season, so I've been more pessimist than most on the board.