Fire Holtz

[T1]

I still think y'all are confusing unprepared with inexperienced. Preparation is going to the weight room, going to practice, studying films, and learning the gameplan. Inexperienced is making mistakes, missing tackles, missing blocks, taking bad angles, falling for misdirections, being undisciplined. Most people have to learn from mistakes and are not competent from day 1. There are exceptions (Hunter Lee, Quinton Patton, Tim Rattay, etc...). Most players learn from mistakes and become better with time.

[touchdown123]

Inexperienced is making mistakes, missing tackles, missing blocks, taking bad angles, falling for misdirections, being undisciplined. Most people have to learn from mistakes and are not competent from day 1. There are exceptions (Hunter Lee, Quinton Patton, Tim Rattay, etc...). Most players learn from mistakes and become better with time.

To an extent, yes. I generally see where you are coming from. Inexperience does explain some of our dropoff, but not this much. Coaches bear some responsibility disciplining players to correctly make tackles, not falling for misdirections, holding onto the football, etc. Why do they practice? Coaches are paid not only to call plays and recruit, but teach/force/train players to execute.

I don't question we have talent and experience issues, it's just not this bad. We aren't playing as good asnere are capable. Jeez we are the worst team in the country. A decent coach coukd have won 2 games thus far with a talentless, inexperienced team.

[T1]

To an extent, yes. I generally see where you are coming from. Inexperience does explain some of our dropoff, but not this much. Coaches bear some responsibility disciplining players to correctly make tackles, not falling for misdirections, holding onto the football, etc. Why do they practice? Coaches are paid not only to call plays and recruit, but teach/force/train players to execute.

I don't question we have talent and experience issues, it's just not this bad. We aren't playing as good asnere are capable. Jeez we are the worst team in the country. A decent coach coukd have won 2 games thus far with a talentless, inexperienced team.

True. But, I look at it this way:

- NC State: ACC team on the road, we played OK and lost a couple of fumbles. Couldn't really pass the ball. Solid loss, but played OK. We can build on the passing game, right?

- Lamar: Still no passing game. Dixon gets hurt. King rushes for 180 and the defense bends but doesn't break. At this point, I realize our talent is depleted. If we can't physically dominate these guys, who can we physically dominate?

- Tulane: Dixon's out. Tulane completely sold out to stop the run and forced us to pass to beat them. We couldn't do it. Talent didn't look worse than Tulane's, but didn't look better either. Defense shut them down pretty good. I realize now that "we are Tulane."

- Kansas: We had the better team. Found a passing game and the running game worked too. Yay!!! Defense continued to improve. But, we had 2 fluke fumbles and 2 missed FGs. I put this one on the players.

- Army: Defense was physically dominated by a much smaller group. Red flags are going up again. The DL is our strongest group!! How can Army run over us like that? Offense takes another step in the right direction. We have a QB! wtf defense?

Conference play now begins..... (to be continued)

Holtz has said it over and over again and we need to start believing him: "We are a work in progress." THAT'S the truth!

[touchdown123]

I'd agree we are a work in progress. A lot of football to be played. We don't need to fire Holtz now. When we finish how I think we will finish (3-9 at best, probably 2-10), he should be fired. When that happens, I'm confident in knowing Skip isn't the guy for the job. As somebody said, cut our losses! When it happens and it will.

[techman05]

One day HCSH will say he was impressed by the way our team performed.(that seems to be his favorite statement about our opponents)

Question is will he be on the opposite sideline from us when he says it?

[Dwayne From Minden]

When you and most of your staff look down your nose at Ruston, you tend to have a much shorter leash when you can't fight your way out of a paper bag...

[Cal&Ken]

When you and most of your staff look down your nose at Ruston, you tend to have a much shorter leash when you can't fight your way out of a paper bag...

They had better embrace it quickly. After this performance, even his daddy will not be able to help him get a job as a head coach unless he turns things around.

[T1]

When you and most of your staff look down your nose at Ruston, you tend to have a much shorter leash when you can't fight your way out of a paper bag...

They are here to coach football. If not for their job, they wouldn't even pass through Ruston. Will we EVER be able to find a good coach who loves Ruston? How is Brad Laird doing over at the high school?

[T1]

I'd agree we are a work in progress. A lot of football to be played. We don't need to fire Holtz now. When we finish how I think we will finish (3-9 at best, probably 2-10), he should be fired. When that happens, I'm confident in knowing Skip isn't the guy for the job. As somebody said, cut our losses! When it happens and it will.

You just can't fire a guy who inherited this kind of team. You have to give him 2 full years at the very minimum.

[Dwayne From Minden]

They are here to coach football. If not for their job, they wouldn't even pass through Ruston. Will we EVER be able to find a good coach who loves Ruston? How is Brad Laird doing over at the high school?

Not saying you have to love it, but you can't show your disdain for it openly....

[T1]

Not saying you have to love it, but you can't show your disdain for it openly....

No, he shouldn't! But, I heard him talking up Ruston with Tim Brando. He grew up in a small town, etc....

[Dwayne From Minden]

He has no more gimmes...

I figure when we lay an egg the 19th against UNT it will really get rough -

It's not that we are losing that is the problem with me - I thought the ABSOLUTE BEST we could do was 7-5...

But the fact we look so inept in doing it - and yes even at Kansas we looked inept most of the game

No consistent improvement especially on the offensive side of the ball

People can tell when you are shipping it in or genuinely giving effort

And the lack of effort is what is getting under my skin right now

[T1]

I've seen us look this bad. We looked this bad when Dooley was here and we looked this bad in Dykes' first season. He had no game film on most of these guys and had no idea how they would play. He is not a miracle worker, but he has proven to be a decent coach at his previous jobs. I don't know about all the personality conflicts, but there is no way you fire a guy after 1 season under these conditions. If he's not happy here and doesn't want to be successful, I have no problem firing him in year 2 if there is no progress.

[PawDawg]

This is what you get when your head coach starts job hunting after one year and goes Juco heavy for two years in a row.

[Dwayne From Minden]

No we didn't look this bad playing these type teams -

We were losing to Auburn, A&M, Navy and USM (when they were USM)...

HCSkH is not an agressive coach by nature - never has been, never will be

Dooley's early team, while lacking in talent played lights out with effort and you could see they had a shot against evenly matched teams (and we were coming off a 2 win season)

Dyke's first year we fought back to 5-7 and had a chance to go bowling at 6-6

The WAC Championship season he lost heartbreakers to USM and MSU both very decent teams -

I fully expect USM to end their long streak against this team and FIU to probably beat us - we are that poorly coached right now