Hello Followers. Hope you are doing great.
Today, I wanted to take a few moments to take you through a litany of thoughts that have been flowing in and out of my brain since last Saturday’s stunning defeat to the Mighty Vikings from Portland State University.
To begin, I wanted to provide a bit of a qualifier to my call for Mike Leach’s head on Saturday night. And the reason for that qualifier is as follows:
If someone had told me at the start of the start of the season that WSU would go 5-7, I would have told you that there was NO WAY IN HELL that Mike Leach would lose his job.
So, when you look at the Pac-12’s abysmal showing in Week 1, it still is quite possible for WSU to make its way to 2-1 in non-conference and then find 3 conference victories somewhere along the way. And if that happens, then the Portland State loss will mean little in the grand scheme of things (other than keeping us out of our second bowl in three years, of course).
And so, as I noted on twitter on Sunday morning, in order to have any type of shot at getting to a respectable 5-7 mark this year, we simply must find our way to 2-1 in non-league play. And because I am a math wizard, I know that, by extension, our game against Rutgers this Saturday represents THE pivotal game of Mike Leach’s tenure at WSU.
Looking Forward
The Rutgers game is pivotal for Mike Leach and his tenure at WSU for a couple of reasons. First, on the outcomes side of the ledger, it’s hard to find a realistic path to even 3 wins if we find ourselves 0-2 for the second year in a row. Then, on the process side of the ledger, the quality of our performance on Saturday will go a long way to helping us understand whether Mike Leach can still motivate his football team. Meaning, if we go and get our doors blown off by a bottom tier B1G team on Saturday, then one has to wonder whether Leach has, in fact, become WSU’s version of Tyrone Willingham.
And man-oh-man, if it is, I sure hope Moos doesn’t stand by and allow that to happen.
So, if we lose to Rutgers this Saturday, then all eyes go to the Wyoming game—especially the number of folks we have in the stands at Martin Stadium. Because after the Wyoming game, the next two contests are road games @CAL and @Oregon that look like certain losses. Meaning, lose this weekend at Rutgers then we figure to be no better than 1-4 when Oregon State comes to town in mid-October. And if we enter that game at 1-4 or 0-5, then who would come? How could we keep recruiting going in the supposed “right direction?”
Recruiting
One of the key rationales behind the Leach hire was recruiting. The theory was that by getting a big name coach with a high octane offense, we’d get the kind of athletes we need to put consistently put folks in the stands. And while Leach’s success in recruiting along the lines is absolutely undeniable, I’m not sure that a convincing case can be made that he has been that much better than Wulff at recruiting other key positions.
Mind you, because Wulff gained some of his better talent late, we have seen them develop under Mike Leach’s watch. And by extension, we have not seen all of Mike Leach’s recruits realize their full potential. But let’s list the top recruits at each position group and size em up, shall we?:
Quarterback
Wulff Leach
Halliday Falk
Tuel Bender
Grade: Obviously incomplete, but I’d give the nod to Wulff here, wouldn’t you?
Running Back
Wulff Leach
Galvin Caldwell
Winston Morrow
Mason Wicks
Mitz Harrington
Grade: Incomplete, but gotta give the nod to Leach here because of what Wicks has shown us. But keep in mind that Galvin’s physicality at WR was one of the things that make the Air Raid go the past two years–especially those bubble screens.
Receivers
Wulff Leach
Wilson Mayle
K. Williams Cracraft
Williams Marks
I. Myers Lewis
Barton Priester
Grade: Incomplete again, but at this point, I give the nod to Wulff even thought I think that River Cracraft may still emerge as one of the greatest to ever play at Washington State (I think that Marquess Wilson remains in that discussion even if folks still resent him–and Priester’s hype makes him an interesting guy to watch).
Offensive Lineman
Wulff Leach
Elliot Bosch Riley Sorenson
John Fullington Joe Dahl
Matt Goetz Middleton
David Gonzalez Madison
Gunnar Ecklund O’Connell
Grade: As 2014 showed us, its hard to grade O-Lineman until they’re upperclassmen. Anyhow, Leach wins this one going away because of bodies and depth, but when I compare individual names???….
Kicking Game
Wulff Leach
Yep Nope
DEFENSE
Defensive Line
Wulff Leach
Travis Long Guata
Xavier Cooper Destiny
Toni Pole McLennan
Brandon Rankin Ekuale/Hercules
Grade: Leach wins at this position here hands down because of depth—Wulff was only able to field a couple of decent D-Lineman at one time and the rest were not prepared for “big time” college football. But when you look at star power—the best players on this board are Wulff guys, IMO
Linebacker
Wulff Leach
Mizell Pelluer
Kaufusi Luvu
Hoffman-Ellis Palacio
Monroe Allison
Grade: Potentially incomplete because of youth. At the same time, when you look at this list only Hoffman Ellis, Palacio, and Allison made it to their senior year. So, while character issues can be raised with Mizell, I give this position to Paul Wulff and his staff. And frankly, even though Leach’s tenure has featured Wulff recruits at LB, I have yet to see our LBs look as good under Leach as the ones we saw in Year 4 under Wulff. And its not even close.
Secondary
Wulff Leach
Bucannon Hameed
Locker Tailalulu
Horton Brown
Justin White
Grade: Still incomplete because we don’t know what kinds of players these young corners and safeties (I see you, Mr. Dotson) are going to turn into. But when I look at this list, the tie goes to Bucannon. We have NOT improved at this position since Wulff left the program.
SUMMARY:
Those of us who know football (and I am not sure I belong in that “us” category) know that winning football teams have great line play and depth at nearly all positions. And to that point, Leach seems to have stocked the Cupboard full of linemen in a way that Wulff could never have dreamed of doing. But when you look at the top of the four year “depth chart” at each position, it’s really hard to make a case that Leach has recruited better than Wulff. And if your star power isn’t qualitatively better than the guy you replaced, then why should your win-loss record be any different?
Over Promising and Under-Delivering
Okay, so I buried the lead. But really, from 2008-2011 was there anything more annoying/maddening than Paul Wulff’s annual “We’re going to be so much better” talk during the off-season followed by the obligatory “What you’re seeing is the development of a young football team” crap when we were 1-9?
And truly, while the results have been marginally better thus far under Leach, what has really changed in that regard? Because each year we’re still hearing about how much better this year’s team is than the one that preceded it, how much stronger we are, how much more together we are, how much more focused and “bought in” we are. And then, every year we get the “we’re trying to mimic in games what we do in practice” or “we’re one of the youngest teams in the country and we’re breaking in so many new players,” blah, blah, blah.
And it’s that constant over-promising and under-delivering CRAP that is making guys in the blog-o-sphere want to see some heads roll.
Because frankly folks, I am sick and tired of hearing about Geronimo and Roadrunners, sick and tired of NOT hearing about injuries when guys like Nick Saban offer instant injury reports to their fans, and overall, I’m just plain sick and tired.
So, with that all said, do you think that it’s possible for the Washington State Cougars to go out and beat the snot out of Rutgers on Saturday so I can finally enjoy my hobby instead of spending precious waking hours feeling bad about my team and school?
That’s all the time I’ve got for today.
All for now. Go Cougs.
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
