Phew! Spared from the ignominy of a winless B1G campaign! Things were looking dicey there for a while, and I found my eyes occasionally drifting to the top of TCF Bank Stadium and running some calculations about whether eight stories at 9.8m/s^2 provides a lethal dose of sidewalk. Thanks to THE CELESTINE PROPHECY, though, I can file that nugget of info away for later use, probably the Wisconsin game.
I guess Croft ain't the answer, eh? Dude looked like a back-up dancer for Beyonce, hopping around in the pocket every time he dropped to pass. He seemed so poised against MSU, feeling pressure and escaping to make a solid decision. That was nowhere to be found this week, which was rife with bad decisions and seemingly less confidence in the pocket than Rhoda Boat.
Looking at our QB situation, I'm reminded of Jerry Kill's "gold mine" comment on the quality of what Fleck was inheriting. There was talent on the team, particularly at DT, LB, running back and one-man-defensive-backfield Antoine Winfield. But, as it turns out, quarterback is kind of an important position and we were left with, well, this. Can you win with a smoldering garbage fire threatening a nuclear waste facility under center? Sure, I guess, if you don't mind a little cesium poisoning. But absolutely everything else has to click and, well, we don't really have the pieces for that to happen either.
Our offensive line is a M*A*S*H unit (ASIDE: the M*A*S*H theme song should really replace Kenny Loggins at the end of the third quarter. That song would suck the life out of the positivity Voltron of PJ Fleck Tony Robbins, so if you're going to do something to kill the vibe, Gopher Athletics, go all effing out.) and when the hell was the last Gopher OL to get a cup of coffee in the NFL? If you replace weaksauce talent/development with weakersauce talent/development, you're going to have a bad time.
Our defensive backfield could have been tried for war crimes under the Geneva Convention with their inability to stop the run the last two games, but looked moderately better on Saturday. Kunle has looked like god damn Deion Sanders since moving to cornerback (as a friend pointed out, it's probably because he's just responsible for part of the field instead of all of it, but beggars can't be choosers, yo). But, again, with #traingate and injuries to Winfield, et al. it's pretty tough to see the gold in them thar hills, Jer.
On another note, I'll be stabbing anyone carping about the performance of the team and then referencing Poock as their first complaint. I liked him last year, but Karl Effing Mecklenburg he ain't. Barber has done a pretty good job in the middle and I see him doing nothing that would justify him getting ganked in favor of Poock. There's a lot to complain about this season - OL at run blocking, WR production, QB production, DBs in run fits - you pick the ONE SENIOR on the team who is getting considerably less playing time than last season in front of me and you'll be wearing an eye patch for the rest of your days.
Anyway, we won. Much like this piece, it was inconsistent, scattered, but is now done. We can ride high into Iowa City against a team that might be more offensively inept than we are, take the goddamned pig back with us and shake our collective dicks to the south for a year. Enjoy Hate Week, friends.
Croft is a RS sophomore QB that has only seen a handful of meaningful series. This was his first start and first full game of action. What did we see on the field? A jumpy, nervous, mistake-riddled performance. It's what you would expect from a first start and full game for a young QB. His feet moved so much in the pocket, all his passes were not well-timed...like an inexperienced QB.
ReplyDeleteI'm interested in how he looks as the season goes on. My guess is he improves incredibly with more experience. We saw flashes of his ceiling late in the MSU game, let's give the kid a few more games.