Previewing the 2026 season
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Nice summary of the preseason.
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@approxinfinity said in Previewing the 2026 season:
@kjayhawks2.0 lol hopefully Coack K makes us greater than the sum of our offensive parts
I think he will help but don’t see a ton of talent on that side of the ball. I’d be very happy to be wrong but not seeing a single prediction that has us better than 12th in the 15 team B12. At least we have baseball now lol
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Coach Leipold mentioned in his press conference on KU Athletics that he expects both QBs to play in each game. Ugh, I can't think of a time when that has produced a stronger offense. Maybe, that was just said to motivate our guys so early in camp.
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I don't think it will be a real time share. Ballard will start and Marshall will come in to run some wildcat plays a couple times per game
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I actually really like WR. Nik McMillan and Nahzae Cox are legit. McMillan was first team MAC last season.
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I’m starting to question Lance a little bit on his team building capabilities. The back to back bowl appearances were with roster loaded with Les Miles recruits.
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How much impact K had on this success.
Now he is back.
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The offense will be better this year. JD (who had a good overall career and whom I do not mean to insult) struggled the last couple of seasons and moving on from him will be good for us. Adding coach K will help and the run game should be better also with Dylan Edwards and a bulkier o-line. The defense, unfortunately, will be a highly-damaging liability. We have the same defensive coordinator who has failed us in the past and the same conditioning coach who allows our players to take the field too weak to make a solo tackle.
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@Jayhawk_69 I feel the same way about JD as I did about KJ and Juan on the basketball team. Great dude I wish all the success in the world but they were very detrimental to their teams success. JD with the game on the line the last two years is quite simply put the worst QBing I’ve ever seen in my life. That’s with me watching my sons 4-6th grade teams the last two years. I’ll always wonder what would have been if not for the injuries because he just wasn’t the same after those. People forget he was on a preseason Heisman list prior. That being said the 3 turnovers a piece vs UNLV and Illinois in 2024. Add in back to back fumbles in Manhattan, if we kneel and punt we prob win the game. If I’m not mistaken he had something like 17 turnovers in 5 games that season and it was just back breaking. Last season he was better but still had some of the bone headed fumbles. The Missouri game where he had ample time to just throw it away instead changed the entire game with a safety on 2nd down. The Cincinnati game the defense was atrocious, that being said if he don’t reach the ball out to the goal line we have first and goal inside the 1 and go up two scores. Then the Utah game where he had 3 picks, two of which were in the end zone. He tried way too hard to be the hero and it was terrible. Sometimes you just have to make the smart or simple play and live to play another down. He never had that in him and it was very costly.
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Everything you say about JD the past couple of years is correct. I would still argue he made a net-positive impact on the program because he was huge in our upset over Texas which seemed to be the springboard for our rise and he was huge in getting our 2022 team to bowl eligibility (which is one of the best moments in KU football history) but we would have been better without him the past couple of seasons. I am not a Ballard believer. Maybe I am being too hard on him, but I don't think he will be very good and I would prefer to see Marshall start. That said, I think whomever we start will be an upgrade over JD, who cost us so dearly with so many boneheaded turnovers
