Opinion: For Weis, cover-up worse than punt fake
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New Keegan article: http://m.kusports.com/news/2013/nov/08/opinion-weis-cover-worse-punt-fake/
I’m not a huge Keegan fan but I’m beginning to respect him more recently as he’s not been a cheerleader/propaganda journalist I’d gotten used to seeing at LJ World. His most recent pointed remarks about Weis are as follows:
"If Weis does reverse the losing ways of a football program that has lost 26 consecutive Big 12 games, he’ll be remembered for having an offense ill-suited for a college team that can’t count on having superior offensive-line play year in and year out and for a remarkably lousy passing game.
Those who realize the importance of issues beyond wins and losses will be grateful for the turn-around he has executed in the area of failed tests ranging from urine to math to English."
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I agree. Keegan clearly likes Weis, so I was pleasantly surprised to see Keegan call him out like this.
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While watching Baylor dismantle Oklahoma last night, the thought that kept running through my mind was " Why? Why can frickin Baylor University ( or is it the University of Baylor…) consistently put together very good football AND basketball teams? As far as football goes, are they getting THAT much better caliber players to lovely Waco, Tx or are they making the most of what they’ve got? Ie; do they have better coaches?
Like everyone else, I loved our Orange Bowl team, but I’d think that even the most die-hard Jayhawk fan would have to admit that it was kind of an anomaly. I was intrigued (and sometimes amused) by Coach Mangino, but before him and since he left we have been widely regarded as pretty low on the college football ladder. Why? I mean, other than the fact that we can’t seem to win…
This all sounds better in my head that it translates to “ink”, but I’m just really confused as to why a great University in a great college town can’t attract the players and coaches to consistently win some football games.
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That’s the burning question, nuleaf, of all Jayhawk fans. Why the extraordinary juxtaposition of the success rates of our two major sports teams? The failures of Kansas football are not merely due to geography. Or is K-State’s success the anomaly in a football-poor state?
I do think eventually KU will figure it out and have a consistently decent football program. There seems to be the will and the resources. Even mediocre would be fine. I just hope it’s within my lifetime. But I’m not holding my breath.
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I’m in the DC Area and have watched the Nats, Orioles, Wizards and Redskins underachieve for a decade (and recently do a little better). I’ve attributed some of this to the enormous expectations put on teams to succeed in the nation’s capital, sometimes unfairly, and often causing the self-perpetuating acquisition of over-the-hill talent at the price of truly rebuilding the roster. I’m not sure if any of this applies to Kansas football over the last few years, but sometimes it feels like it does. People look at the success of the basketball team and see the massive disparity, and that fact hangs on the football team at all times, whether spoken or not. So the football program and the people around it are fighting an apparition rather than whole-heartedly focusing on the incremental needs to get where we want to go.
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I don’t understand with KC in our backyard to recruit from why we keep stinking up the football field. Tired of getting beat by 20 or 30 points every week. Obviously Weis is not the answer, just worry about the rest of our teams doing well.
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The problem for KU is threefold.
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Kansas does not produce enough D-1 talent through the high school ranks.
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That talent pool is divided in state between 2 programs, with at least 5 other major programs (Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Missouri, Nebraska, Iowa) that consistently get players from Kansas.
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Kansas football has no identity.
Take Baylor. Baylor was awful for years before Art Briles arrived. He came in and established an identity for the program. There’s a great article on Grantland about how Briles turned the program around by bringing in the offense he ran successfully in high school and establishing that was how Baylor would play as well.
That has not happened at KU. Even during the Mangino years, KU ran the spread, but there was no feeling that KU ran that offense because that was a part of KU’s identity. It was more as if KU was just a part of a fad. It’s especially telling because prior to Reesing, that was not the offense that Mangino ran.
Defensively, the story has been the same. It’s not as if you can say KU is an aggressive defense, or they are a gap defense, or this or that. There’s not a clear identity, which hurts recruiting because we can’t sell wins, or history, or things like that, and on top of that, we can’t even say come to the Hill and play this specific style.
I’ve come to the conclusion that Weis is not the guy that can do that. I’m not calling for his firing because I don’t think hiring a fourth coach in six seasons is helpful either, but the next KU football coach needs to have an idea of how to establish a program identity. KU needs someone that can come in and establish that identity, not bring an identity from somewhere else.
To compare it to basketball, you know what the identities of the major coaches are - Self runs the high low, Williams runs the secondary break motion, Calipari runs the dribble drive, Coach K has his motion offense, Pitino has that trapping press, Boeheim has the matchup zone. There isn’t a single recruit in the country that doesn’t know that about those coaches. They can recruit based on that. Look at what a school like VCU has done with that crazy trapping, pressing, ball pressure defense they play. They get kids to come to VCU specifically to play that style.
KU needs to be able to say come to Kansas because you can play like this, whatever this may be. That’s what Oregon did, that’s what Baylor has done, that’s what Nebraska did during the Osborne era. In my opinion, that’s the only way KU will be successful in football. Otherwise you’re depending on luck to crank out a decent team every 8-10 years.
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Justanotherfan, that’s about as perfect an explanation as I’ve read about the problem with football at KU, particularly #3.
Duke, North Carolina and Kentucky have the same challenges (although Duke has been slowly building an identity with Cutcliffe at the helm).
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I don’t know. I just think it’s the way the guy talks. He’s telling the truth isn’t he? He was an idiot for the fake punt play. The players made a bad play in the 3rd quarter. Blame all around.
Just because he doesn’t spin soft cliches to protect the fragile egos of his players doesn’t mean they don’t deserve some blame.
When Bill Self says something like this it’s no big deal.
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Even if this is Keegs just trying to stir things up, I do agree it was refreshing to read.
I posted on the article over at Kusports under my “real” name, Chandler Accipiter ( I know, what a coincidence that I live in Chandler, AZ and "accipiter is latin for “hawk”). I now feel like when I comment over there it’s like playing with the JV team , and then I can come to KUBuckets to play with the varsity. Oakville started back up this week, so next week he’ll be ready to make the leap over here.
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Hey, how did winky face get in there? Obviously I should stay on the varsity bench.
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To the point of Kansas talent pool. In the mid 70’s when we were in the big 8 kansas had a windfall of talent- David Haynes, buce Adams, Cromwell, Laverne smith, billy campfield, etc that has never been repeated to my knowledge. Most the hs football talent these days is texas, Florida, and California- and a few private schools elsewhere, check the high school football rankings. I live in Houston, we have numerous perennial powerhouse teams here - the talent is at another level. Playing at baylor where relatives can see a lot of games is a big draw compared to teams located out of state. Even if our program was decent lactation plays a big part of the equation.
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Decent location.
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That’s hilarious. Is lactation what autocomplete felt was relevant?
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Jayhawkrock78 - that’s the breast comment I’ve seen all day.
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At least that little autocorrect milked a few replies-
Ba doom boom!
