Gator (NON-)Gameday...

[DRU2012]

I WAS gonna entitle this, "A Nation of Wussies..."--I didn't, not because I don't feel its "postponement" (effectively a "CANCELLATION", in practical terms, it seems) embodies everything I despise about the times and world we live in now, but mainly because it would have smacked too much of a POLITICAL rant--and given everything else going on "out there", that's the one thing I never want this site to be part of, if I can help it. Bad enough that sort of thing has pervaded sports in general and football at the national level already.
Still, lets not forget: FOOTBALL IS PLAYED IN ALL WEATHER: There are NO "rainouts". Hell, there'd never have BEEN things like "The Ice Bowl", "the frozen tundra of Lambeau Field", etc if these PC idiots had their way before now...I sorta understand the business of suspending play for lightning--I mean, kids were KILLED before they made a rule about that (that "8 mile radius" is a typical WAY-overreaction though).
Anyway, I could go on at length about the general trend towards softening not just the way the game is played (the "no celebration" crap etc is another facet of this), but the way it influences as much as affects the supposed "societal milieu" that surrounds the game. We're supposed to just ACCEPT the assumptions underlying all these rules and decisions that are said to be just "common wisdom", "what EVERYONE agrees is true, right and proper".
BULLSHIT!!! WHO says so??? Every prognostication had the storm WELL and long past G-ville by the scheduled KO time. Most they had to do was move it to an evening start-time to give the bulk of the GATOR fan base time to drive, gather after it was past. And "they" knew it--THAT, the supposedly "dangerous drive", "all those fans on the roads..." and so on had quickly become the main argument offered for why this open-ended "postponement" was a "no brainer". Hey, how bout we leave such choices up to the fans themselves???
But that's how it is now, big part of what I'm complaining about here: Until recently, basic "rule" was you play the teams you have scheduled years in advance, on the days you scheduled them--no matter the conditions, yours or the other teams' injuries, attitudes, forces of nature or anything ELSE--barring something REALLY huge that's already happened--not fears of what "maybe could might" happen as a result of whatever a few "experts" with their own narrow axes-to-grind suddenly have some attention to grab the media-spotlight with. Folks who worry about everything that MIGHT happen can go watch a "previously-postponed" soccer game. Oh wait--they still even play THOSE in all weather...just that at the college level (relatively speaking) hardly anyone CARES...
As for us, well, it doesn't look like there'll BE a "make-up date" satisfactory to both programs...The only one looks like first Sat in Dec--and that'd make it LSU's 3rd on-the-road "tough opponent in the SEC" in a row, one week after another then another to end the season--I understand why they don't want that. But their fans' loud bluster that it was US who didn't wanna play them now, "never DID", is pure horseshit: NOW would be the best time of all for us to see them at our place--Fournette prob out, "realities" of a "new" Head Coach/"old" OC stepping up with few if any of still-extant and underlying problems on that Tigers team having been no more'n glossed over. That buzz of "rallying around" a popular OC can only carry them so far--will wear quickly thin, even crumble, the moment someone properly punches 'em in the face! And that's clearly something we need to do, LEARN to do, to SOMEONE. Like, now. This week, against that team, woulda been the perfect time...for the sake of OUR program and its future. Fact that it was, had to be part of the "plan to WIN" is/was also the case is (or woulda been) just "icing on the cake".
Real Sun Tsu, "Art of War" stuff. Sigh. But no. "PC" and what passes for "everyone agrees", in this "give everyone a ribbon for participating" world, now rules.
More's the pity.

 

[awebbf5]

Well let's cheer for the aggies

 

[DRU2012]

Well let's cheer for the aggies

Yeah (sigh). Guess it's all we got now. And "rest of the schedule" just got easier, by default. I don't like it, and ya gotta believe our players don't either, to a man. Would be a "decision killer" if we were in a race for the 4th playoff spot at the end--but I don't see us in that decision anyway, anyhow, way things have (and for now will seemimgly continue) been going--even if we DID somehow "win out" from here. Do you, does ANYONE, believe or have ANY feeling whatsoever that we are bout to rip thru the rest of our schedule? Something would have to happen, our OC's gameplanning and playcalling become more imaginative and creative, folks get and stay healthy, so far unheralded players step up all over the field on both sides of the ball, AND we get a coupla breaks (ie. Vols stumble--TWICE) in order for us to even GET to the Georgia Dome. Get there and win--THEN we'll talk about the effect of today's NONevent on our chances in the coming postseason. And control over THAT went out the window in the 2nd half vs the Vols.
For now, it's enough that it's both a violation of principle, AND a missed opportunity for possible growth and essential experience in the development of our team.
(But btw--I am NOT sorry we declined to go to their place. No way THEY get to benefit that directly.)

 

[Leakfan12]

I wished they kept the game as scheduled, how was the weather in G-Ville?

 

[Leakfan12]

http://www.espn.com/college-footbal...play-postponed-game-lsu-tigers-florida-gators

 

[DRU2012]

@awebbf5, @Leakfan12,
Have y'all been watching any of this 2nd half in the Vols/Aggie game?
Unbelievable. Despite the "generosity" of the Vols' play (6 turnovers, I think), the Aggies didn't take NEAR as much advantage they coulda/shoulda done...and despite THAT, LOOKED like they "put it away" two or THREE times--but the VOLS came all the way back, tied it with under 30 seconds left...
But now the Aggies have driven right down the field and are in position to kick the winning fieldgoal with 8 seconds left
(2nd time out to freeze him...
Play the theme for Jeopardy here...):
NO Good. Wide left.
Luckiest team I've ever seen.
But they take advantage of their breaks.
So they'll prob win this one.

 

[DRU2012]

The Vols DO win this, folks havta start seeing this the way I did from the moment they got that comeback hail-mary vs Georgia--that "fate" is playimg a bizzare role in the Vols' season.
As I said at the time, doesn't MATTER if it's "true", if there's anything to it: The Vols themselves will more'n'more buy into it, and it'll build, feed on itself. That's gotta go DOUBLE by now.
"Better be lucky than good".
Even better to be both.
Held em to an FG...Aw, C'MON Aggies. Get a TD and END this thing.

 

[DRU2012]

I don't even know why I'm watching, rooting for Aggies here...Sure, there's the dim chance a coupla Vol losses open the door for us, IF we win out in the SEC (still not sure how the missing LSU decision could affect that, tho), but I have little confidence we accomplish that, not unless our first string QB comes back and gets better gameplans from our OC, AND EVERYONE on offense brings their play up a notch.
Normally I'd be hoping BOTH these teams'd somehow lose LOL...
...And the Aggies win it on the INT, after first scoring TD in overtime.
Well, that opens the START of a crack, but someone ELSE in the conference will have to open it all the way by beating them a second time...
If only we had played and won our OWN game today, we'd have likely been FILLED with hope now. Instead, well, I'm not sure how I feel. Don't mean NUTHIN' unless we are a considerably better team than we've shown so far. If we ARE, and we do play well, win out--well then today's no-game will likely come back to haunt us. And that's the "BEST CASE" scenario...

 

[DRU2012]

Lots we could say bout the outcomes in rest of today's slate in the SEC...Will stick to just one: Anyone think there's ANYONE in the conference playing as well as Alabama? And they're clearly improving week by week.
I don't know if our Head Coach has the level of mad skill in EVERY area of coaching expertise his onetime mentor Saban has. He's got a different style--I LIKE Mac more, no doubt about it--but winning is really all that matters in the end, obviously. He's GOT to start showing the recruiting edge that brings a misbalance of talent, DEPTH of talent to Gainesville from Florida and surrounding states' prominent high school programs-- and he'll HAVE to find that "hot young hand" at OC, someone imaginitive, creative and somewhat adventurous. In fact, we know it takes top young up'n'comers at every coaching position, working together in a give'n'take with the HC in building something special--a product both of his long term plans AND his flexibly adapting to the particular skills of the key kids they bring in.
I don't know or have enough evidence to say for sure, but I suspect there are still some weaknesses overall on our staff. We sure as HELL aren't hitting our potential stride yet in gathering talent, on the field OR the sidelines. Not yet, anyway: If you go by how much share we're getting of what's coming up outta our own state alone, you KNOW we're not there yet. Not even close.
The degree to which ANY UF coach accomplishes that directly correlates with whatever success and eventual dominance on a national level we will have.

 

[Leakfan12]

I nearly had a heart attack watch UT vs A &M. Thank You A&M for being those clown though you guys nearly blew it.

 

[DRU2012]

I nearly had a heart attack watch UT vs A &M. Thank You A&M for being those clown though you guys nearly blew it.

Gonna take at least one more of those, dealt to the Vols by SOMEONE in the Conference, obviously, before the end of the schedule. JUST as "obviously", though, it's on US to capitalize, no, to take care of BUSINESS and win out ourselves for it to mean anything. This crazy season has left us a chance to redeem ourselves, to rise above all the mistakes, mediocrity and disappointment that has marked our failures in leadership, planning and play thus far--make this a team and season to be proud of after all.
No, we're not where we need to be. We've shown little evidence we're even getting closer. If any of that is truly IN us, now's the time to show it: At this point, we have to consider ourselves lucky to find we still have a chance to do so.
Talk about "a turning point". Either we really are moving in the right direction, can eventually GET there with luck, health and the steady effort to add talent and depth on the field AND sidelines--or we're just a mid-level SEC East team that loses to the big boys while managing with just enough work and just-below-top-level recruits to beat up on everyone else most of the time.
Lets be right out front here:
Either we are on track to BE one of "the big boys" once again, or we need to scrap it all and start again, moment that's feasible.
That'd be a complicated, sticky mess--and one that'd set us back 2 or 3 years to fix and get right, even "best case" scenario. But sooner we know, one way or the other, the better--and the way this team and program respond from this point forward should, at the very least, tell us a good deal about that.