Originally posted by stuck in del rio:
Originally posted by sooner_mike:
You mean based off the last game you see the Sooners play? OU should just FF all their games now and not even play them, I mean according to your post here, with there being no chance that OU will be improved and all.
So what would it have took to make you happy? Personally I think some folks are just negative period. It is what it is.
I don't think I am being negative - I think I am being realistic. I'm not going to buy into the hype that is generated over spring and summer based on workouts and drills, and the idiom that 'because we recruited player X we're going to be improved'...
I want OU to win all it's games, in every sport but I know longer 'expect' it in Football, which I have for years (my first game attended was 1975, vs. Kansas). I want Bob to turn this ship around, but I don't think he can or will. I think there is something deeply wrong in the Switzer Center, and I can't put my finger on what it is, whether is the nepotism, the (until the last 2 weeks) general malaise this staff has towards recruiting, the fact that the Administration limits how competitive this staff can be by not allowing more bodies/$$$$ to be spent on recruiting (see 'compliance issues' post on Insider board)...sadly until the University realizes just how important football is to the University itself, I am not sure we can win again. Sure, we might win a Big 12 championship, but I don't think we can compete with the LSUs, Alabamas, Ohio States, etc that don't have such self-imposed restrictions...
I continue to be dismayed at why Kish is employed. I think Bob brought back the wrong Stoops brother and should have brought Mark in before he was hired at Kentucky. I don't know why anyone who gets fired as a head coach is automatically the #1 person for an opening - I mean, I know some people, ala Gary Gibbs, make better coordinators than head coaches, but Mike's been back three years now and we can't find a LBer to commit? (I know, we got 2 this year, better than last year, but how do you play a 3-4 and recruit an average of 1 LBer every year?) Bob won't fire Mike, Kish is Mike's boy, so now we've wasted 2 positions on a staff that continues to decline in developing talent...our last 5 star that committed may not ever play a down for us (still not convinced Mixon ever sees the field - if he does, kudos to him for sticking it out and enduring excessive punishment in my eyes - IMO, he should've knocked the ***** out if stories are true).
I have thought before this season - for the last 4 years or so that our decline was due to recruiting, and I still think this, but after seeing this last year I'm not so sure that only recruiting is to blame...the decision to re-kick vs OSU, the entire Baylor game plan, the performance vs Clemson...all these lead me to believe that something is not right in Norman.
I hope Bob can turn it around. I want to enjoy the pride I felt when OU named him coach. I want to remember how excited I was in 1999 when we went 7-5 and the optimism surrounding the program. I want to have a season ike 2000 all over again, where we shocked the whole world and the October to Remember (Red October, wins vs Nebraska, Kansas State, Texas A&M), we came from nowhere and put a big boot in Bobby Bowden's ***...I want Bob to return to form where he calls a fake punt from his own 23 vs. Alabama, and an injured Michael Thompson (car wreck) catches a pass and scoots 55 yards and the announcers fawn all over Bob, returning his moniker of 'Big Game Bob'. I want all that but I fear it's gone...
I am an optimist. Generally speaking. Except when it comes to the current state of this football program. I fear we will need to backslide quite a bit further before we improve, and I fear a longer backslide will set us back 5 or 6 years.
