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Saturday, October 13, 2012

Texas Longhorn's Football- A Mid Season Report

          Here’s the mid season report and I have to say what was the quote, don’t get mad if I don’t get it right. But it goes something like this; "Those the cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it". The season started off ok, this progressed to much better, only to fall flat in October against their biggest rival. Truth be told it is ok to lose a game now and then. It isn’t ok if that game is against OU, it is beyond not OK for that game to be a out and out beating like the one today. I don’t know if the answer is for Mac Brown to step down, or for him to get back to doing what made Texas great. Like making big plays in big games something we had done against weaker teams this year, but failed to do against the top notch ones. We have also begun to revert back to those teams pre-Vince Young, that were really good against the good to weak teams, and would fall flat in the big games. We have also reverted back to playing soft. Something I just cannot stand. The teams that won Championships (Conference and National) would hit you in the mouth, attack, and make the big play when it mattered (If they had too, usually they had the game well in hand). Coach Brown hit the self destruct button on the offense right after the loss to Alabama, and Texas hasn’t been the same since. Maybe he destroyed too much, or the rebuilding job is just gonna have to take a lot longer.

         Offensively before the OU game David Ash had been making great strides in raising his completion percentage, cutting down his turnovers, making better choices at critical times, and being an overal strong game manager(11tds, 3ints). Then the OU game came and the wheels just came off. Also he may be done for the season, or at least a good amount of games if that giant lump on his wrist turns out to be a bad broken wrist on his non throwing hand. Case McCoy may have a chance to get back into the quarterback battle if he gets to play a few games, and hasn’t been bad when coming in relief, at 10-16-166yds, 3 tds, and 0 ints. Malcolm Brown had been hard to catch averaging 6.1 per carry when he got them, but again he went down with a nagging injury and hasn’t played since game in Stillwater. Joe Bergeron has been solid especially near the goalline and leads the team with 9 scores, but hasn’t been able to get through many holes on the rest of the field. Freshman phenom Johnathan Gray has shown signs of becoming a real home run threat with long runs in two big games. He may have to be the work horse for the team if they decide to go even more run based with Ash out. Jeremy Hills has played strong especially on 3rd down when he gets a chance to. Wide outs Mike Davis, Jaxon Shipley, and Marquise Goodwin have appeared and disappeared through out the season, with no one really stepping out as the number one go to receiver. The offensive line at times has held up well, especially with all the injuries that haven’t been major but have caused some shuffling of positions. That said the Sooners proved that if you can get pressure on Ash, and shut down the run then Texas will not be able to do much. Overall on offense we have been good most of the time, and yet just utterly awful against OU. As a whole the team needs more consistency, and has to cut down on all the injuries, maybe its time to get a new training staff, or better training, because somebody is hurt all the time.

        Defensively the Longhorns have played some of the worst football any Longhorn ever has. As of this last game they are giving up 32.5 pts per game, allowing 449.7 yards per game, and 209.2 of it being rushing. I don't think many people really expected the Longhorns to be this bad against the run. Granted they are set up to slow down and stop the pass, but they haven't done it. Many can point to the middle of the Ole Miss game when Jordan Hicks went down as the point that they just stopped being able to stop anyone. While this is true, the competition they have faced since then has been a lot tougher than before he was injured. Never in my life as a lifetime fan have I seen so many missed tackles, straight up poor wrapping, up and missed assignments as I have of this which was supposed to be one of the best defenses in the country. Other than the West Virginia game pressure on the quarterback has been non excitant, and so has the ability to make a stop on 3rd down, where in the last three games Texas Opponents has gotten the 1st on 3rd down 46.5% of the time, and when they actually hold them on 3rd Texas Opponents are 10 of 13 on 4th down this season that’s a whopping 76.9 percent against them on 4th down. No wonder West Virginia went for it 5 times and got all 5. On defense its time to start having open tryouts for all the positions, to see who wants to play, or maybe its time to show Manny Diaz the door. Because through out the history of the Texas Longhorns we have prided ourselves on playing hard, smash mouth defense. Right now this is just awful. Tell me another defensive Cordinator in the country who wouldn't love to have the bookends we have at Sr Alex Okafor, and Jr. Jackson Jeffcoat. Or a secondary with Kenny Vaccaro at strong, and Carrington Byndom, and Quandre Diggs at corners? The Linebackers were gonna be young, but very talented. What has happened? If you can't win with stars like these are at least hold people under 32 pts a game maybe you should be doing something else with your time.

Just go word that Jr. Jackson Jeffcoat is done for the season with a torn left pec, the same one he that had previously kept him out of spring ball, Jordan Hicks should be considered a happy surprise if he comes back. So things are looking grim on that side of the ball.

GAMES SO FAR

-(0-0, 0-0)-Sept. 1, 2012 vs. Wyoming (0-0) 37-17.
-(1-0, 0-0)-Sept 8, 2012 vs. New Mexico (1-0) 45-0
-(2-0, 0-0)-Sept 15, 2012 at Ole Miss (2-0) 66-31
-(3-0. 0-0)-Sept 29, 2012 at Oklahoma State (2-1) 41-36
-(4-0, 1-0)-Oct 6, 2012 vs. #8 West Virginia (4-0) 45-48
-(4-1, 1-1)-Oct 13, 2012 vs #10 Oklahoma (3-1) 21-63
 (4-2, 1-2) 255PF (42.5pg)           195PA (32.5pg)

TEAM STATS

1st Downs         Texas 130 (21.7)                              Opp 130 (21.7)
Total Off            Texas 2,676 (446.0)                         Opp 2,698 (449.7)
Passing              Texas 1, 555 (259.2)                        Opp 1, 443 (240.5)
Rushing             Texas 236-1,121-4.8ypc-186.8ypg     Opp 244-1255-5.1ypc-209.2ypg
Turnovers         Texas 6                                            Opp 11      +5
Time of Possession Texas 31:21                               Opp 28:39

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