Talent?

[Pennsyhusker_rivals246774]

I have been reading on here from some that you can't blame our coaches for yesterday's debacle because the issue is we lack talent at key positions. Blame Pelini.

We have also been told on here over and over that Ferentz is a joke.

So I am confused. If you look at Iowa's recruiting rankings they have been well below ours over the past five years. So if we have the better coaches and the better talent, then why did they kick the **** out of us yesterday?

I am not buying it. Our defense looked pathetic yesterday against a VERY average offense. Big play after big play. Two of their longest plays from scrimmage all year. More points scored on us than they did against Illinois. And please don't tell me how weak our defensive ends are. That whole defense looked flat-out stupid yesterday. What I saw was a poorly coached defense. Piss poor. Cosgrove poor.

My take? We have, just as DiNardo said, a soft PAC 12 type team. I also think our line coaches (especially offensive line) need a serious look in the mirror. We are not tough or physical. And as much as Bray seemed to work miracles last year with our depleted linebackers, his backers this year have been horrible.

This is not the Nebraska football I remember. That style of football is apparently dead.

 

[lemarshusker]

Clearly we have more talent, but Iowa is simply the better program right now and has been for quite some time. Sure, our overall resume destroys theirs, but like the OP said the days of the 90's aren't coming back. We are a mediocre program that isn't even on Iowa's level and that's pathetic.

 

[Pennsyhusker_rivals246774]

Clearly we have more talent, but Iowa is simply the better program right now and has been for quite some time. Sure, our overall resume destroys theirs, but like the OP said the days of the 90's aren't coming back. We are a mediocre program that isn't even on Iowa's level and that's pathetic.

Pathetic is the proper word.

 

[donahues17]

It comes down to primadonna type players. Iowas players came out of the LasU game with a vengence and wanted to prove that thay werent as, bad as everyone thought. Nebraskas players came out flat
On those 3 big plays, guys failed to do their jobs by over pursuing. The coaches screwed up by selling out to stop the run as Iowa hasnt had a passing game for most of the season long pass). Nebraskas LBers dont know how to stay home.

 

[jlb321_rivals110621]

I have not done a deep dive on the rosters but my superficial impression is the Iowa is getting a hell of a lot more out of their home grown players (hell and even some players from Neb) than Nebraska is out of players from Nebraska.

What has happened to Nebraska high school football.

 

[tpmcg_rivals137159]

very similar results for many years. coaching is flatlining here. there should be enough talent to be competitive.

at some point we have to get better in big games. then again, this wasn't even a big game...

 

[regoratsginrom]

I keep reading that Nebraska has more "talent" than Iowa. Based upon what...recruiting rankings? From what I'v seen the last two years their players play better than our players. How does this advantage in "talent" actually manifest itself.

Their running backs looked better than ours. Their lines played way better. The Butkus LB is a total stud.

Looked to me like the more talented team won?

 

[lemarshusker]

I keep reading that Nebraska has more "talent" than Iowa. Based upon what...recruiting rankings? From what I'v seen the last two years their players play better than our players. How does this advantage in "talent" actually manifest itself.

Their running backs looked better than ours. Their lines played way better. The Butkus LB is a total stud.

Looked to me like the more talented team won?

I was referring to recruiting metrics. They come in with more talent but they don't leave with more talent.

 

[PeliniTheCrutch_rivals294365]

God dang Bo Pelini.

 

[Pennsyhusker_rivals246774]

I keep reading that Nebraska has more "talent" than Iowa. Based upon what...recruiting rankings? From what I'v seen the last two years their players play better than our players. How does this advantage in "talent" actually manifest itself.

Their running backs looked better than ours. Their lines played way better. The Butkus LB is a total stud.

Looked to me like the more talented team won?

This is kind of my point. Recruiting rankings do give us a metric and they are often reliable. But they also often don't tell us anything. Look at Texas and Notre Dame. Iowa and Wisconsin both have lower rankings than we do usually. And yet they seem to have better players.
Coaching?

 

[Redscarlet]

Sorry, I didn't get a chance to read your thread before I posted. But we are thinking on the same line my friend. We may have more talent at wide receivers but Nebraska needs to get better on both sides of the ball of course more depth will help in the future but you have to recruit and Coach it up.

 

[Carolina Hawk_rivals190569]

I keep reading that Nebraska has more "talent" than Iowa. Based upon what...recruiting rankings? From what I'v seen the last two years their players play better than our players. How does this advantage in "talent" actually manifest itself.

Their running backs looked better than ours. Their lines played way better. The Butkus LB is a total stud.

Looked to me like the more talented team won?

In the field yesterday Iowa was more talented at every position other than WR and I will give safety a push. If someone disagrees I would be curious To hear what position I am wrong.

 

[jawbreakingsafetyplay]

We are beaten in the talent gap on both lines very very badly

 

[Redscarlet]

In the field yesterday Iowa was more talented at every position other than WR and I will give safety a push. If someone disagrees I would be curious To hear what position I am wrong.

Maybe TE but Iowa has more depth I don't think Kettle is better than Carter and the draft will tell that story.

 

[jedimasterjed]

I hope people stop blaming Pelini for everything. Even he could win 9 or 10 games and he out recruited Iowa every year. It's time for coach Riley to in the mirror and make the changes needed.

 

[HuskerO58]

I hope people stop blaming Pelini for everything. Even he could win 9 or 10 games and he out recruited Iowa every year. It's time for coach Riley to in the mirror and make the changes needed.

Pelini can legitimately be blamed for some things. i.e. our lack of depth.

What he most definitely cannot be blamed for is the lack of effort that was shown yesterday.

 

[nu2u]

Ferentz does not recruit a player based on ratings, whether it is Rivals or any other commercial service. The fans love to focus on player ratings and rankings. Ferentz couldn't care less about that.

More to the point, he looks for players who have talent but they must also fit his philosophy on leadership and character. The week's presser and the newspaper interview he gave a few days ago basically mimics what he has been saying for the past 18 years.

He looks for players that will fit his mold - demonstrated leaders who work hard, follow the rules, and most of all - guys who buy into the team concept. Pat Fitzgerald has the same philosophy as far as I can tell.

Here is the biggest difference: a lot of coaches will say that they value the same principles. At Iowa, once you join the program, you have to continually prove it or you won't see the field. Ferentz is constantly filleted by fans for "not playing the best players" (i.e. the "higher rated"
players). Ferentz doesn't give a **** what you were rated by Rivals when you played high school football. Did you learn your assignments, follow the rules, and earn the right to start on the practice field? If so, you start. If not, you sit until you prove your better than the guy ahead of you.

 

[PeliniTheCrutch_rivals294365]

Pelini can legitimately be blamed for some things. i.e. our lack of depth.

What he most definitely cannot be blamed for is the lack of effort that was shown yesterday.

You forgot to include the brainwashing effect. That takes at least 6 years to wear off.

 

[SDBaller]

some of talent you bring in comes from so far away from your recruiting base that you don't know what you are getting. I remember you guys bot in Marlon Lucky in everybody in Cali was just shaking their head while you were celebrating. It will get tougher, you simply are not Penn State (Maryland, PA, Ohio) Michigan (national brand) Ohio State, OH and best coach in country with national brand..

Maryland and Rutgers are in a better competitive position to compete year in an year our for talent than UNL. Penn State is decent and our guys ran right by Iowa all night, and actually dominated the game at both LOS.. and we are not even close to where will be when our recruits guys get seasoned in the weight room.

Your best bet is to play tough Iowa football.. that is simply not Mike Riley's game at all. You will need the right coach to do it, and it could take a few years of "bloody" practices to get back to tough. For 10+ years now you have been getting blown out.. Wisky, Colorado, tOSU, even Iowa now. You can bring in all the QB's you want, if you can't better at the LOS you will simply have a bunch of hurt QB's.-sg

 

[Salaunese2]

There was a noticeable difference in how Iowa's OL and DL looked vs their Nebraska counterparts. The eyeball test alone showed me something. Iowa recruits well on the OL and line recruiting is a lot different than recruiting nationally for skill position guys. Iowa graduated two 4 * guys from the 2015 OL but they've got some young, athletic OL guys maturing into a decent unit. It helps that our best OL players (#78 and #79) came back to play after missing the ISU/NDSU/Rutgers games. #75 is a big, lanky guy that was a TE in HS and I think he'll end up on an NFL roster after next season.

 

[hddude55]

We are beaten in the talent gap on both lines very very badly

And this has been the biggest problem going back to the last couple years of Solich. Obviously Suh was a great talent but other than him both lines have been populated with mostly mediocre players and depth has been nonexistent.

 

[Pennsyhusker_rivals246774]

We can analyze this all day long from every angle. We can talk bad Pelini recruiting and roster management. We can talk Riley not yet having the players for his system. We can talk about injuries. Blah, blah, blah.

The Iowa beat down was a turning point for me. I am fed up and pissed as hell. We got abused on both lines by a good, but certainly not great, Iowa team. We were out coached and out muscled. Our guys played like it was the first game of the season rather than the 12th. They gave up.

I am disgusted and tired of excuses. Nebraska ought to be able to find a coach that can field bruising, competitive teams that play smart and play hard. Riley is just another guy who is running a job service for his old buddies. Banker=Cosgrove. Cavanaugh=Cotton. Read=Happy Gilmore. If he does not make changes I have little hope that we will improve.

Next year had better be better than this **** fest. We fired Pelini because of embarrassing losses like this. Riley needs to brand that into his brain. I don't want to hear anymore that we will be competitive "next year" or "in two more years". The time is now. Do it damn it or go back to f$cking Oregon.

And I don't care what anyone says to me on here about this. Truehuskerfan will be on here I am sure with his "more Husker than thou" act in full throttle. Bring it. I am tired of our program's descent into complete irrelevance

 

[cecilB]

Clearly we have more talent, but Iowa is simply the better program right now and has been for quite some time. Sure, our overall resume destroys theirs, but like the OP said the days of the 90's aren't coming back. We are a mediocre program that isn't even on Iowa's level and that's pathetic.

I think we've lost our bearings on evaluating talent. Iowa has a Butkus finalist, better RBs, a Thorpe winner, match with a NFL TE of their own, better OL and DL pretty much across the board. Where is Nebraska better-receiver-yes. QB- tough call.

Talent comes in all shapes at all positions. We've been seduced by star rankings. In the heyday, that wasn't a concern. We had off the radar lineman, and tough as nails defenders. And, we won... often.

There are 22 people on a 1st unit...only a few are pretty boy receivers

 

[jawbreakingsafetyplay]

And this has been the biggest problem going back to the last couple years of Solich. Obviously Suh was a great talent but other than him both lines have been populated with mostly mediocre players and depth has been nonexistent.

I'm not saying that the current staff is taking us to the promised land but given that the OL is 5/22 of a football team, you should have 18-22 guys along the OL on scholarship and you don't replace them all in one season. You have to split it up to cycle and stagger the roster. You can get by with marginal talent at the skill positions if you have a great line, but you won't beat elite teams without OL talent. The DL is a smaller portion of guys but the same thing applies, it simply takes time to rebuild a roster there. Only time will tell whether or not it works out with this group of coaches but that is worth repeating, it takes time to fix.

 

[Pennsyhusker_rivals246774]

Sorry, I didn't get a chance to read your thread before I posted. But we are thinking on the same line my friend. We may have more talent at wide receivers but Nebraska needs to get better on both sides of the ball of course more depth will help in the future but you have to recruit and Coach it up.

I am not even so certain anymore that our receivers, other than Westy, are as good as people say.

 

[Husker Sledge]

Besides terrible roster management from the previous staff, this program seems to have lost that "eye of the tiger". We had that swagger, that edge back in the 90's. The pressure is on this staff to identify and recruit a higher level of talent, coach them hard and train them even harder! Hopefully our depth issues will be resolved and practice will be much more physical. Also, it's pretty obvious our special teams coach is awful and needs to find employment elsewhere!

 

[stxhusker]

7 years of Pelini proved that the best that you can do with Pelini level talent is 9 wins...this year just reinforces that. With just a REAL QB, do we win at least one or maybe even two of the three games that we lost...Maybe, probably...I guess we'll find out next year.

 

[Pennsyhusker_rivals246774]

7 years of Pelini proved that the best that you can do with Pelini level talent is 9 wins...this year just reinforces that. With just a REAL QB, do we win at least one or maybe even two of the three games that we lost...Maybe, probably...I guess we'll find out next year.

Assuming Tanner Lee is worth a crap and POB has developed. At this point who knows? It has been so long since we had a real QB, and not an athlete masquerading as a QB, that I don't even know what one looks like anymore

 

[husker56_rivals334530]

I am not even so certain anymore that our receivers, other than Westy, are as good as people say.[/QUO there not and damn sure not very tough.

 

[HuskerO58]

You forgot to include the brainwashing effect. That takes at least 6 years to wear off.

I know you're being funny, but it probably took just one year to remove the brainwashing.

 

[RealHusker]

There are a lot of good points in this thread. The fact that there are a lot of good DIFFERENT points is telling. NU has a lot of work to do. I think (hope) a lot of this is in progress.

O-line: Need better players. And lots of them. If Iowa and Wisconsin can recruit and build powerful and effective offensive lines, then NU can too. Without this, nothing else matters.

Depth: NU has depth at RB and WR to a certain extent. Maybe in the secondary, too. But too many areas are razor thin. It is fair to ask whether the previous staff's recruiting approach and abilities contributed to this. It is also reasonable to allow the current staff more than two seasons to address this.

QB: There are many positive things we could say about Tommy Armstrong. Many. Unfortunately, he simply is not the QB Mike Riley needs. Both TA and MR did their best with this forced, awkward marriage, but the pending divorce is necessary. Having a nice collection of skill position players is pointless if you have no way to get them the ball. It's remarkable how different the QB position will look next year, with 3 seemingly legitimate (including Gebbia who will presumably redshirt) QBs on the depth chart. NU's QB recruiting had been a colossal failure for more than a decade.

Coaching: We're obviously not getting our money's worth out of the Special Team's coach. In addition to that, one has to ask how Iowa - in two consecutive games against NU - can rip off an embarrassing number of huge chunk plays. The dreadful breakdowns in scheme and execution that pile up in a single 60 minute football game are hard to understand. None of the players on this team played in the 'defense-optional' Big 12.

 

[cmhawks99]

Hers the deal, I'm an Iowa fan for sure but honestly my bigger frustration with sports anymore is the pure unadulterated blindness of fans. Iowa's included or especially & I say this because I'm not in here to be a homer and I post very, very sparingly on ANY board. I just dropped in here to see if there were comments about the supposed racial slur during the game.

So here I am...

1) Although I was shocked they hired Riley he is a good man and a fine coach. Though Pelini was a better coach than he got credit for, so is Ferentz, so was Les Miles, etc...Fans are stupid for the most part in my personal opinion.

2) Yes recruiting ranking are a nice guide, they are also horrendously flawed when you get past the top 200-300. Furthermore when it comes to teams like Iowa and Wisconsin, they have out performed their rankings for 15-20 years maybe longer. By a lot too I might add... And I personally find it insulting to suggest our "coaches" are "developing" them. Many of these kids are playing early and often, meaning they were way under-ranked. Personally I think Nebbie is some what famous for this as well, aren't they? Iowa alone has put 25 plus 2-star/walkons in the NFL during KF's tenure.

3) As far as the talent goes, I'd say Iowa and Nebbie are pretty close. I think our Db';s right now are better, even with Depth, safety maybe, maybe not....DL and Lbers are better and O-line and Rbers, QB, who knows, both up and down. Our WR are very average too poor. Fast enough, but don't understand routes and hot reads and dropping in soft zone and can't catch the ball.Of course our fans think we play the wrong guys but hell none of them catch the ball...did I say fans are stupid?!?!

4) I honestly don't know what is wrong with Iowa, I really don't. I like KF but I am also OK with him leaving, I don't want him to leave but its "ok"... but my historical perspective is far-sighted enough that I'm not so stupid that I think they would automatically "upgrad" nor should you guys....

5) I get that ultimately it comes down to the coaches to win games but when you get pasted by a team 41-14 like we did against PSU and then beat Michigan in a game that wasn't lucky, we played very good but not great, we actually played better yesterday against you. Or you guys getting lambasted 62-3 vs tOSU, yes they are good, yes they are far and away the most talented team outside of Alabama but its not 59 points worth...My point is the players have to be responsible for that kind of swing.

6)Here is a less polarizing example for us.....Texas Tech lost to Iowa St 66-10 and then crushed Baylor. It doesn't make sense and we spend hours and days waxing poetics about it. Its not your team or my team, its every team. The closest game Bama has had this year was vs 5-6 Ole Miss when they gave up 43 points. The next closest was 7-5 Arkansas when they gave up 30. The same Arky who just lost to 4-8 Mizzou....

Its sports, it is what it is...........and getting more volatile all the time.

 

[RockyMtnHusker]

We can analyze this all day long from every angle. We can talk bad Pelini recruiting and roster management. We can talk Riley not yet having the players for his system. We can talk about injuries. Blah, blah, blah.

The Iowa beat down was a turning point for me. I am fed up and pissed as hell. We got abused on both lines by a good, but certainly not great, Iowa team. We were out coached and out muscled. Our guys played like it was the first game of the season rather than the 12th. They gave up.

I am disgusted and tired of excuses. Nebraska ought to be able to find a coach that can field bruising, competitive teams that play smart and play hard. Riley is just another guy who is running a job service for his old buddies. Banker=Cosgrove. Cavanaugh=Cotton. Read=Happy Gilmore. If he does not make changes I have little hope that we will improve.

Next year had better be better than this **** fest. We fired Pelini because of embarrassing losses like this. Riley needs to brand that into his brain. I don't want to hear anymore that we will be competitive "next year" or "in two more years". The time is now. Do it damn it or go back to f$cking Oregon.

And I don't care what anyone says to me on here about this. Truehuskerfan will be on here I am sure with his "more Husker than thou" act in full throttle. Bring it. I am tired of our program's descent into complete irrelevance

Unfortunately, I think you're right on many of your points here, especially the blah, blah, blah. Every time we lose or don't look good the barrage of excuses start coming in like a tsunami. "It's Pelini's fault" and "the cupboards are empty", "we have walk-ons starting", and finally "our facilities are terrible, how can we recruit?" (Oh yeah that was the last place they coached).

The results you see are the results you'll get. Action speaks louder than words. This IS Nebraska football now.

Whatever happened to taking a kid and molding him in to the player you want him to be? (That thing called development) I'm not saying you make TA in to a Joe Montana. But if TA is the problem, why in the world is he still starting?

In defense of Mike Riley, I think he has come in and already accomplished what he was hired to do: reestablish a perception of integrity and respectability to the university and whoever else cares. Mission accomplished. He's the anti-Bo while still delivering Bo-like results.

I'm not saying you ride Mike Riley out of town. You cannot expect him to be Nick Saban or Urban Meyer or Bob Devaney or anybody else. This is his style of football and he's 9-3. Is it the "Nebraska football" as many of old guys know and love? Not even close and I dare say it never will be. This IS Mike Riley Nebraska football. This is the new normal. It's a decent product that is sort of fun to watch but sometimes frustrates. I suspect based on Riley's leadership he makes kids better people off the field and better prepared for life after football. That's a big deal and also more of the objective when he was hired. It's the reason ex-NFLers want their kids to play for him.

It's not perfect, it's not 12-0. It's 9-3 and the 3 is maddening and frustrating. We should be able to do better. Enough with all the excuses. It is what it is but maybe that's OK.

 

[spinner4_rivals42045]

Besides terrible roster management from the previous staff, this program seems to have lost that "eye of the tiger". We had that swagger, that edge back in the 90's. The pressure is on this staff to identify and recruit a higher level of talent, coach them hard and train them even harder! Hopefully our depth issues will be resolved and practice will be much more physical. Also, it's pretty obvious our special teams coach is awful and needs to find employment elsewhere!

I've stated it many times on this board and I'll state it again, the depth issues the previous staff left could have been helped by recruiting a few Juco lineman. However, the staff avoided an immediate quick fix and focused on a longer plan. So all of us need to move past the blame on Bo for depth issues. This staff had to know we were a 9-3 type of team this year, and it's fine. It's improvement. The lines are being rebuilt and won't be ready until 2018. If this staff thought it was a piece or two away from having a great team next year, I gotta believe they'd go hard after a Juco or 2. But it's not there yet.

And we had our chances yesterday to beat Iowa. How many deep passes did TA over throw where our WRs were open down field? I gotta think a quick TD on some of those could have swung moment in our favor and who knows what happens after. Or how many times did TA miss wide open guys that would have given us a big first down because TA was locking in on receivers. I believe our talent level is not as bad as many of you make it sound. Nate Gerry's one of the most loved guys in husker nation and no one questions his talent or toughness but he had a terrible game yesterday and he alone could have made a big difference. And let's be honest, he's had some catastrophic bad games here.

And honestly if we would have played Iowa earlier in the season we'd had beaten them. Something happened to this team's chemistry or confidence that is beyond our knowing. The team we saw yesterday was not the same team we saw go toe to toe with Wisconsin in Madison. IMO Iowa is a poor man's Wisconsin. That program will NEVER be great but it will always fight hard and always be a tough out.

Riley has too make a few staff adjustments. Firing Bruce Read has to be done. He won't fire Banker, I can guarantee that. I also think coach Cav needs some help coaching the O-line. He's never proven to be a great coach. Just because MT liked him, means nothing. History shows a different story.

 

[Hockey81!]

If this is what fans say after 9-3, imagine the boards for ND, Texas, Oregon, Georgia, LSU, Stanford.

 

[MikeRileyGBR]

I have been reading on here from some that you can't blame our coaches for yesterday's debacle because the issue is we lack talent at key positions. Blame Pelini.

We have also been told on here over and over that Ferentz is a joke.

So I am confused. If you look at Iowa's recruiting rankings they have been well below ours over the past five years. So if we have the better coaches and the better talent, then why did they kick the **** out of us yesterday?

I am not buying it. Our defense looked pathetic yesterday against a VERY average offense. Big play after big play. Two of their longest plays from scrimmage all year. More points scored on us than they did against Illinois. And please don't tell me how weak our defensive ends are. That whole defense looked flat-out stupid yesterday. What I saw was a poorly coached defense. Piss poor. Cosgrove poor.

My take? We have, just as DiNardo said, a soft PAC 12 type team. I also think our line coaches (especially offensive line) need a serious look in the mirror. We are not tough or physical. And as much as Bray seemed to work miracles last year with our depleted linebackers, his backers this year have been horrible.

This is not the Nebraska football I remember. That style of football is apparently dead.

Technically, iowa's offense is below average.

 

[Redscarlet]

Technically, iowa's offense is below average.

That's why our defense took 2 steps back yesterday. I know their running game improve at season's end but we made them look like one of the best rushing teams in the country yesterday...

 

[Salaunese2]

Running the ball hasn't been Iowa'a problem. Throwing the ball has

 

[RealHusker]

... But if TA is the problem, why in the world is he still starting?...

I'm sure your question is rhetorical and you know the answer to this question, and the answer is the problem.

Armstrong is a well-below average QB for the system Riley/Langsdorf are running - or at least want to run. At well-below average, Armstrong is still likely the best option. That Ryker Fyfe is the top back-up AND you could make an argument that maybe he was a better option is also part of the problem.

NU's QB recruiting gets a D- for the past 15+ years. Perhaps the two best QB's we've recruited in that time were baseball players that never played a down at NU (Carl Crawford and Bubba Starling).

I think we can look at the presumed QB depth chart next year and begin to feel better about that position.

 

[cmhawks99]

Too be fair and completely direct, this is the same stuff that gets said on every board for every losing team on every Saturday all fall. Ours, yours, Oregons, Texas, etc....All you have to so is change the names.