KU @ ISU Gamethread. Anyone Out There?

[ChalkRocker]

n/m

[holidaysmore]

Lack of scholarships isn't an excuse. That is a fact. Recruiting is the life blood of college athletics. If you are upside down on your scholarship numbers and can't bring in the amount of kids like everyone else you are going to be behind right from the beginning.

The previous inept at coaching and administration has put KU football in the reality that it is in and the large hole it has to dig itself out of. Breaking the Cycle.

In the words of Hard Knocks with the Kansas City Chiefs, former head of pro personnel Ray Farmer Les Miles will have to make, 'chicken salad out of chicken shit' for awhile. That isn't an excuse. That is fact.

[PhDhawk]

I think both arguments are somewhat correct here.

I can't really sit here with a straight face when people say we don't have talent. Pooka is all conference level, and Gardner is going to be really good. We have a stable of WRs that are legitimate Big12 guys, (Robinson, Charlot, Parchment, and Lassiter). Stanley, is hot or cold but when he's hot he's a good Big12 QB. Our O-Line has a couple good guys, we need to improve there. Same with D-Line. We have some decent LBs but they're mostly young and undersized...which doesn't help the limited D-Line at all, but our Secondary is legit.

What we lack is depth of talent on our two-deep. We have a couple holes where we need better guys, but not most positions. We can't afford injuries, and we might get worn out...I think that's what we saw on Saturday.

But we have way more than enough talent to beat CC. We should have been more competitive against TCU, KSU, and OSU. We might not have the rosters to win those three conference games, but we are better than what we showed.

[CrimsonNBlue]

I think both arguments are somewhat correct here.

I can't really sit here with a straight face when people say we don't have talent. Pooka is all conference level, and Gardner is going to be really good. We have a stable of WRs that are legitimate Big12 guys, (Robinson, Charlot, Parchment, and Lassiter). Stanley, is hot or cold but when he's hot he's a good Big12 QB. Our O-Line has a couple good guys, we need to improve there. Same with D-Line. We have some decent LBs but they're mostly young and undersized...which doesn't help the limited D-Line at all, but our Secondary is legit.

What we lack is depth of talent on our two-deep. We have a couple holes where we need better guys, but not most positions. We can't afford injuries, and we might get worn out...I think that's what we saw on Saturday.

But we have way more than enough talent to beat CC. We should have been more competitive against TCU, KSU, and OSU. We might not have the rosters to win those three conference games, but we are better than what we showed.

I think you contradicted yourself. Your analysis of the roster is pretty spot on, although I hesitate to say a team has talent because of decent guys at the skill positions. Everyone has good guys at the skill positions, that's why an NFL roster is made up of skill position players from anywhere and everywhere.

But, you're basically saying we have some talent sprinkled in, no depth, holes and young and undersized players. We can't afford injuries (check) because we would get worn out (check).

Essentially that's a recipe for a not good team that might win some games they shouldn't (@BC, Tech), lose some games they should win (CC), and be prone to noncompetitive games (TCU, KSU, OSU).

Before the season, a general agreement that the talent signaled 2-3 wins. The season went about like I'd expected and perhaps even better given 2 P5 wins. What validates the hire is the competitiveness in 8-9 games, the recruiting trajectory, and, the big one, people actually talked about KU football this season.

[holidaysmore]

I certainly won't excuse some of the loses. They have been bad and pretty par the norm for KU football in general. One thing to consider here is that Les has been out of football for awhile. That has showed. Not even half way through the year you switch OCs. That has showed. KU has some good pieces, especially on the offensive side but IMO on the offensive side, especially in college it starts and ends with your QB. What KU has had at that position has been mostly poor or slightly average at best. That is Carter Stanley. Case in point against ISU in the first half. He had AP wide open on in breaking routes on two separate occasions and flat out missed the throws. That is difference between being 3-6 and 6-3.

Biggest thing, like you mentioned because of lack of scholarships is depth. They have zero. IMO there record is just about what it should. They are a team with certain guys that have very high ceilings but the overall roster is mostly devoid of talent especially at QB, o and d line.

[PhDhawk]

I think both arguments are somewhat correct here.

I can't really sit here with a straight face when people say we don't have talent. Pooka is all conference level, and Gardner is going to be really good. We have a stable of WRs that are legitimate Big12 guys, (Robinson, Charlot, Parchment, and Lassiter). Stanley, is hot or cold but when he's hot he's a good Big12 QB. Our O-Line has a couple good guys, we need to improve there. Same with D-Line. We have some decent LBs but they're mostly young and undersized...which doesn't help the limited D-Line at all, but our Secondary is legit.

What we lack is depth of talent on our two-deep. We have a couple holes where we need better guys, but not most positions. We can't afford injuries, and we might get worn out...I think that's what we saw on Saturday.

But we have way more than enough talent to beat CC. We should have been more competitive against TCU, KSU, and OSU. We might not have the rosters to win those three conference games, but we are better than what we showed.

I think you contradicted yourself. Your analysis of the roster is pretty spot on, although I hesitate to say a team has talent because of decent guys at the skill positions. Everyone has good guys at the skill positions, that's why an NFL roster is made up of skill position players from anywhere and everywhere.

But, you're basically saying we have some talent sprinkled in, no depth, holes and young and undersized players. We can't afford injuries (check) because we would get worn out (check).

Essentially that's a recipe for a not good team that might win some games they shouldn't (@BC, Tech), lose some games they should win (CC), and be prone to noncompetitive games (TCU, KSU, OSU).

Before the season, a general agreement that the talent signaled 2-3 wins. The season went about like I'd expected and perhaps even better given 2 P5 wins. What validates the hire is the competitiveness in 8-9 games, the recruiting trajectory, and, the big one, people actually talked about KU football this season.

No, that's the part I disagree with about this argument.

We're good enough not to get embarrassed like that. There are reasons you might loose a game by a wide margin, but we got our asses kicked for 60 minutes in every facet of the game against KSU and against OSU, and we're better than that.

We might not be good enough to go bowling yet, but we should look like we belong on the field against average Big12 teams.

Our roster is still behind where it needs to be, but talent-wise we should beat CC 10 outta 10 times. The final score against KSU and OSU don't reflect how bad we looked in those games, and there's just no excuse for that at this point.

I can't think of a team (all teams, not just KU teams) that have had a bigger gap between their best games and their worst games, and I don't think roster alone accounts for that.

[CrimsonNBlue]

Our guys in the trenches are FCS level. Lot of them had no offers. It's a patchwork.

In college fooball, it all starts there. If you're overmatched there, a 4 TD loss is rather easy. Having Pooka Williams means so little at that point.


The whole argument is just silly and looks like an attempt to keep excited KU fans in check--a board specialty. Are we trying to say Les Miles can't coach football? LOL. That would have been valid under previous regime.

[PhDhawk]

Our guys in the trenches are FCS level. Lot of them had no offers. It's a patchwork.

In college fooball, it all starts there. If you're overmatched there, a 4 TD loss is rather easy. Having Pooka Williams means so little at that point.


The whole argument is just silly and looks like an attempt to keep excited KU fans in check--a board specialty. Are we trying to say Les Miles can't coach football? LOL. That would have been valid under previous regime.

No argument that you have to have better Linemen to be competitive in CFB, that's a fact. And that's the area we need the most work. But we're better than FCS. You're just trying to make excuses for shitty play if that's your argument. We have a lot of work to do, but that's laughable. Adeniji could play on Sundays.

You're being really silly acting like having skill position players doesn't matter. Never heard that argument prior to it being an excuse for KU fans on this board. Chuba Hubbard is a big part of why Okie State is so good, same Duvernay at UT or Lamb at OU. Blue Blood programs wouldn't waste so much time getting blue chip WRs and RBs if it didn't matter.

It's not about the score, either, it's about how you play. We lost to OU by 25 but we looked like we belonged on the field with them. We looked like the lesser team, but we belonged. They had more better players but we looked like a Big12 team. We won't beat OU until our roster improves, we'll struggle to beat other top Big12 teams until our roster improves. I'm not arguing that.

We lost to KSU bad, and looked bad doing so, that wasn't about roster. Same with the OSU game. It's absolutely fair to criticize Miles et al. for those games and the CC game and TCU game.

If our roster was as bad as you want to make it out to be, we never would have stomped the shit out of BC on the road, we wouldn't have nearly beaten UT on the road, we wouldn't have beaten TTU.

There's nothing worse that making excuses for this team. It doesn't help to have a fanbase that wants to forgive mutliple shitty performances, or want to wait indefinitely for a turnaround.

People are already making excuses for why it's ok if we only win 3 games next season...you want to talk about taking the fun out of it or trying to keep people in check.

I like where we are and I like where we're headed, for the most part. So I'm ready to stop using excuses for this team.

[PhDhawk]

I certainly won't excuse some of the loses. They have been bad and pretty par the norm for KU football in general. One thing to consider here is that Les has been out of football for awhile. That has showed. Not even half way through the year you switch OCs. That has showed. KU has some good pieces, especially on the offensive side but IMO on the offensive side, especially in college it starts and ends with your QB. What KU has had at that position has been mostly poor or slightly average at best. That is Carter Stanley. Case in point against ISU in the first half. He had AP wide open on in breaking routes on two separate occasions and flat out missed the throws. That is difference between being 3-6 and 6-3.

Biggest thing, like you mentioned because of lack of scholarships is depth. They have zero. IMO there record is just about what it should. They are a team with certain guys that have very high ceilings but the overall roster is mostly devoid of talent especially at QB, o and d line.

This seems like a more reasonable approach...and I think the CCU game and TCU game may in part have been Les working through the rust, so to speak.

Stanley for sure is a big factor. He's been up and down like crazy. How much of that is on stanley, how much on instability, and how much on coaching? Probably all 3 contributed.

I agree that QB matters. We need to find one. If we get one, we can be on the pdub timeline. Look what Purdy is doing for ISU.

[NewtonHawk11]

We lost to KSU bad, and looked bad doing so, that wasn't about roster. Same with the OSU game.

You're absolutely crazy if you didn't think the kstate and OSU games were about the roster. They had the good 4 year seniors up front on both sides of the ball. KU has below average players.

kstate knew they could run over KU, and they did. It basically came down to kstate just whipping KUs ass up front on both sides. Skill level, KU better than kstate, worse than OSU, but line play was a significant factor in both the losses you mentioned.


We all want to see success. I think we all know we have seen progress and that winning can happen at KU. It's now a matter of when and can it be sustained.

[Deleted User 89]

the age of lineman alone (physical maturity) is significant, even if KU’s guys are talented

[NewtonHawk11]

I mean, it's obviously safe to say a QB does wonders for a program.

Every program in Big 12 has had a good QB at some point in this decade.

Baylor had RG3, Russell and Brewer is good.
Iowa State has Purdy
kstate had Klein and Waters.
OU had numerous Heisman winners
OSU had Rudolph, Weeden and hell even JW Walsh was decent
Texas had Ehlinger
Tech had Mahomes on top of guys like Davis Webb
West Virginia had Geno Smith and Will Grier

Kansas has had Stanley and Michael Cummings. So disgusting.

[PhDhawk]

We lost to KSU bad, and looked bad doing so, that wasn't about roster. Same with the OSU game.

You're absolutely crazy if you didn't think the kstate and OSU games were about the roster. They had the good 4 year seniors up front on both sides of the ball. KU has below average players.

kstate knew they could run over KU, and they did. It basically came down to kstate just whipping KUs ass up front on both sides. Skill level, KU better than kstate, worse than OSU, but line play was a significant factor in both the losses you mentioned.


We all want to see success. I think we all know we have seen progress and that winning can happen at KU. It's now a matter of when and can it be sustained.

What was the spread against KSU? 5.....?....6? I don't remember.

That's probably pretty indicative of the two rosters. Let's say on a neutral field that means they're 10 points better than we are...not 35. We shouldn't have been down 38-3. They're not 35 points better than us on paper. And again, it's not like we turned the ball over a bunch or gifted them points or anything.

As for Ok State...the final score of that game might be indicative of the difference between teams, but we had 290 yards that game and I think 160 of them came on the final two possessions. You want to argue that OSU has the better roster and I'll agree with you. You want to tell me that we got <150 yards of offense and zero points after 45 minutes because of our roster and I'll tell you you're full of shit.

[CrimsonNBlue]

Our guys in the trenches are FCS level. Lot of them had no offers. It's a patchwork.

In college fooball, it all starts there. If you're overmatched there, a 4 TD loss is rather easy. Having Pooka Williams means so little at that point.


The whole argument is just silly and looks like an attempt to keep excited KU fans in check--a board specialty. Are we trying to say Les Miles can't coach football? LOL. That would have been valid under previous regime.

No argument that you have to have better Linemen to be competitive in CFB, that's a fact. And that's the area we need the most work. But we're better than FCS. You're just trying to make excuses for shitty play if that's your argument. We have a lot of work to do, but that's laughable. Adeniji could play on Sundays.

You're being really silly acting like having skill position players doesn't matter. Never heard that argument prior to it being an excuse for KU fans on this board. Chuba Hubbard is a big part of why Okie State is so good, same Duvernay at UT or Lamb at OU. Blue Blood programs wouldn't waste so much time getting blue chip WRs and RBs if it didn't matter.

It's not about the score, either, it's about how you play. We lost to OU by 25 but we looked like we belonged on the field with them. We looked like the lesser team, but we belonged. They had more better players but we looked like a Big12 team. We won't beat OU until our roster improves, we'll struggle to beat other top Big12 teams until our roster improves. I'm not arguing that.

We lost to KSU bad, and looked bad doing so, that wasn't about roster. Same with the OSU game. It's absolutely fair to criticize Miles et al. for those games and the CC game and TCU game.

If our roster was as bad as you want to make it out to be, we never would have stomped the shit out of BC on the road, we wouldn't have nearly beaten UT on the road, we wouldn't have beaten TTU.

There's nothing worse that making excuses for this team. It doesn't help to have a fanbase that wants to forgive mutliple shitty performances, or want to wait indefinitely for a turnaround.

People are already making excuses for why it's ok if we only win 3 games next season...you want to talk about taking the fun out of it or trying to keep people in check.

I like where we are and I like where we're headed, for the most part. So I'm ready to stop using excuses for this team.

I don't think anyone is making excuses. We are a shitty program, with a shitty team, and have had some shitty performances.

We are outmatched and we all hope it gets better.

[PhDhawk]

Our guys in the trenches are FCS level. Lot of them had no offers. It's a patchwork.

In college fooball, it all starts there. If you're overmatched there, a 4 TD loss is rather easy. Having Pooka Williams means so little at that point.


The whole argument is just silly and looks like an attempt to keep excited KU fans in check--a board specialty. Are we trying to say Les Miles can't coach football? LOL. That would have been valid under previous regime.

No argument that you have to have better Linemen to be competitive in CFB, that's a fact. And that's the area we need the most work. But we're better than FCS. You're just trying to make excuses for shitty play if that's your argument. We have a lot of work to do, but that's laughable. Adeniji could play on Sundays.

You're being really silly acting like having skill position players doesn't matter. Never heard that argument prior to it being an excuse for KU fans on this board. Chuba Hubbard is a big part of why Okie State is so good, same Duvernay at UT or Lamb at OU. Blue Blood programs wouldn't waste so much time getting blue chip WRs and RBs if it didn't matter.

It's not about the score, either, it's about how you play. We lost to OU by 25 but we looked like we belonged on the field with them. We looked like the lesser team, but we belonged. They had more better players but we looked like a Big12 team. We won't beat OU until our roster improves, we'll struggle to beat other top Big12 teams until our roster improves. I'm not arguing that.

We lost to KSU bad, and looked bad doing so, that wasn't about roster. Same with the OSU game. It's absolutely fair to criticize Miles et al. for those games and the CC game and TCU game.

If our roster was as bad as you want to make it out to be, we never would have stomped the shit out of BC on the road, we wouldn't have nearly beaten UT on the road, we wouldn't have beaten TTU.

There's nothing worse that making excuses for this team. It doesn't help to have a fanbase that wants to forgive mutliple shitty performances, or want to wait indefinitely for a turnaround.

People are already making excuses for why it's ok if we only win 3 games next season...you want to talk about taking the fun out of it or trying to keep people in check.

I like where we are and I like where we're headed, for the most part. So I'm ready to stop using excuses for this team.

I don't think anyone is making excuses. We are a shitty program, with a shitty team, and have had some shitty performances.

We are outmatched and we all hope it gets better.

See, that seems like the pessimist approach to me.

I see the BC game, the UT game, the TTU game, hell even the ISU and OU games and it gives me hope.

But then it makes me scratch my head about KSU, OSU, etc.

Obviously we've had some games where we played above and below what you'd expect. Saturday may have been the closest to where we actually are, which to me means, we're a recruiting cycle away from being an average Big12 team.

[pdub]

"People are already making excuses for why it's ok if we only win 3 games next season...you want to talk about taking the fun out of it or trying to keep people in check."

This.

[ChalkRocker]

We can have a healthy convo regarding the roster, talent-levels and importance of specific positions.

Not sure some of our Big 12 brethren are fair comparos, though (think ISU, KSU), b/c they've also conquered the issue of mind-set.

Why are we competitive vs. BC on the road, but getting waxed at home to KState? I think a large part of it has to do with persuading the players that they are, in fact, talented and worthy and capable of competing (like they belong on the field) even after getting down a few scores. I'm not certain they really started believing that until this season.

Understandable, given the fact that they'd come off of multi-season a**-waxings at the hands of the rest of the conny. They didn't know what they were capable of...imo, anyway.

[ChalkRocker]

"People are already making excuses for why it's ok if we only win 3 games next season...you want to talk about taking the fun out of it or trying to keep people in check."

This.

Who's doing that? Out them...name and shame...

[CrimsonNBlue]

No argument that you have to have better Linemen to be competitive in CFB, that's a fact. And that's the area we need the most work. But we're better than FCS. You're just trying to make excuses for shitty play if that's your argument. We have a lot of work to do, but that's laughable. Adeniji could play on Sundays.

You're being really silly acting like having skill position players doesn't matter. Never heard that argument prior to it being an excuse for KU fans on this board. Chuba Hubbard is a big part of why Okie State is so good, same Duvernay at UT or Lamb at OU. Blue Blood programs wouldn't waste so much time getting blue chip WRs and RBs if it didn't matter.

It's not about the score, either, it's about how you play. We lost to OU by 25 but we looked like we belonged on the field with them. We looked like the lesser team, but we belonged. They had more better players but we looked like a Big12 team. We won't beat OU until our roster improves, we'll struggle to beat other top Big12 teams until our roster improves. I'm not arguing that.

We lost to KSU bad, and looked bad doing so, that wasn't about roster. Same with the OSU game. It's absolutely fair to criticize Miles et al. for those games and the CC game and TCU game.

If our roster was as bad as you want to make it out to be, we never would have stomped the shit out of BC on the road, we wouldn't have nearly beaten UT on the road, we wouldn't have beaten TTU.

There's nothing worse that making excuses for this team. It doesn't help to have a fanbase that wants to forgive mutliple shitty performances, or want to wait indefinitely for a turnaround.

People are already making excuses for why it's ok if we only win 3 games next season...you want to talk about taking the fun out of it or trying to keep people in check.

I like where we are and I like where we're headed, for the most part. So I'm ready to stop using excuses for this team.

I don't think anyone is making excuses. We are a shitty program, with a shitty team, and have had some shitty performances.

We are outmatched and we all hope it gets better.

See, that seems like the pessimist approach to me.

I see the BC game, the UT game, the TTU game, hell even the ISU and OU games and it gives me hope.

But then it makes me scratch my head about KSU, OSU, etc.

Obviously we've had some games where we played above and below what you'd expect. Saturday may have been the closest to where we actually are, which to me means, we're a recruiting cycle away from being an average Big12 team.

That's pretty much how I see it as well.

I believed this was a 2-3 win team going into the season and we ended up there. A little strange way to get there, but between the promise that was showed, the good recruiting class (please stay committed), and the general increase in interest around the program, I absolutely understand why most have a good feeling with where we're at with this staff all things considered.


I think anyone that predicted 6 wins or thinks that a 4 TD blowout is indicative of some major coaching flaws misunderstands that game a little. The horses matter so much, especially the big ones. There is a reason why Matt Rhule was able to turn that around so fast, and it's not because he is a Nick Saban clone.

[NewtonHawk11]

We can have a healthy convo regarding the roster, talent-levels and importance of specific positions.

Not sure some of our Big 12 brethren are fair comparos, though (think ISU, KSU), b/c they've also conquered the issue of mind-set.

Why are we competitive vs. BC on the road, but getting waxed at home to KState? I think a large part of it has to do with persuading the players that they are, in fact, talented and worthy and capable of competing (like they belong on the field) even after getting down a few scores. I'm not certain they really started believing that until this season.

Understandable, given the fact that they'd come off of multi-season a**-waxings at the hands of the rest of the conny. They didn't know what they were capable of...imo, anyway.

Plus, Boston College might have been the SLOWEST FBS team I've ever seen. KU took advantage of that all night.