Bennett

[football_fan]

nothing new here, but just wanted to express by extreme disappointment with coach bennett's coaching decisions this year.

i personally thought that his decision not to even give bartel a shot at qb until they were something like 0-7 (including the 45-0 halftime osu game) was the worst coaching move i've ever seen. that was until this past weekend when he out did himself again, this time in the kicking game. How can you not even give the backup a chance when your fieldgoal kicker has missed 4 extra points in 13 trys (you shouldnt miss that many in 4 years). not to mention he's not in fieldgoal range until you have the ball on or inside the 15 yardline (what a joke). Is it really true that bennett gave this guy a scholarship without even seeing him kick once? all i know is there is no way the backup could do any worse, and there is no excuse in waiting until the next to last game to give him a shot.

i do like the fact that bennett has more fire than cavan, (who didnt even bother to wear a headset on the sideline) but thats not gonna do a whole lot of good if he doesnt know how to coach.

[Charleston Pony]

Bennett will be a much better coach when he has a more talented group of players who have been around long enough to have gotten comfortable in his system. I agree he should have given more players a look this year (not at the expense of losing any of those redshirts), but it certainly appears he's well on his way to bringing in the most promising class we've seen since the death penalty. Remember, good players make coaches good.

[fbdad]

Bennett has a group of "good players" who never saw the field. These include not only scholarship players but guys that walked on two and three years ago who give it there all.I'm tired of hearing how a great recruiting class is going to turn this program around. That recruiting class won't be productive for two to three years. Then it will be on a limited basis based on statistics.Whats your excuse for the next two years. Do we continue to ignore the talent already on the team???By posting statements that clearly intimate that there's no talent/depth on the present squad just builds more on a [deleted] poor morale situation with the team. Keep up the good work!!!

[Charleston Pony]

Whoa, FB...I never said we didn't have any good players on this team. To suggest we don't have depth problems, though, is ignoring the fact that we came into this season without a QB who had ever taken a snap at the I-A level; that we had 10 of the 18 OL in our 2-deep who had never played a down at this level, etc, etc, etc...

I agree with those who say Bennett appears to be stuck on giving certain guys every opportunity to grow into their positions, when it is clear he should be giving others a chance. Time will tell how many quality guys we have on the current roster. Not many guys are going to come right in and impact a I-A program as true frosh, but the fact is that Bennett is getting commitments (assuming they hold) from players who appear to be a lot more highly regarded coming out of H.S. (evidenced by their other scholarship offers) than previous coaches. If he does that year after year, this program will be much mmore successful than it has been in the post death penalty era and Bennett will reap the rewards as he will suddenly be considered a coaching genius.

I will always maintain the guy with the best players will win 80-90% of the time and that great players make coaches great.

[smudad]

We were quick to jump on Cavan when he seemed to change personnel without seemingly giving the incumbent a complete chance. I'll give Bennett the benefit of the doubt that he wanted Wallis to have a full chance to take control of the offense. Having finally given Bartel a chance to play, I just wish they would open things up a bit and 'let them play'. It has become cliche, but let's have them try to win a game instead of trying not to lose it. And kicking....yech! Clean house. Bring in a specialist coach. It'll win some games.

[Bergermeister]

Phil Bennett is a good coach. There are a lot of good players on the team but hardly any good, Division I players. He will turn it around but he is not a miracle worker. We have very little team speed or size. We still do not have the quarterback that will establish SMU as a winner. It's a tough, tough job that not many would have. SMU is fortunate to have Phil. He's the head coach and he deserves a chance with his own recruits. Those two QBs are GREAT guys, terrific competitors, good sons, brothers, students and friends. BUT, they are not the calibur QB we've got to have to WIN. We get Rhett Bomar from Grand Prairie, WE WIN.

[PerunaPunch]

We already have the #27 ranked Pro Style QB in the nation committed in Meeks (also #67 overall in the state) and the #26 ranked dual threat QB in the nation committed in Phillips.

Gee, what more do you want?

Unless James Battle is ready to sign on the dotted line, I say we're well set at QB... And I'm as giddy as a Tri Delt about the whole situation!!

[PonyFan]

Wer Tri Delts particularly giddy when you went to school? (When were you in school, by the way - just curious)

[Pony_Fan]

I'll have to agree with Football Fan on the original post. There is absolutely NO EXCUSE to not let someone else kick. Extra points should be missed maybe 1 out of 40 or so...ridiculous. Don't tell me he can't try out other players. His judgement is lacking on this and Bartel. If he can't do this now, why would his decisions get any better with other players. I don't care if they arent "his players"..he can't evaluate what he has already. Also, why is the D so bad this year compared to last year? We were #1 in the WAC in D right? Wasn't he a def coordinator?

[PK]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Pony_Fan:
<B>I'll have to agree with Football Fan on the original post. There is absolutely NO EXCUSE to not let someone else kick. Extra points should be missed maybe 1 out of 40 or so...ridiculous. Don't tell me he can't try out other players. His judgement is lacking on this and Bartel. If he can't do this now, why would his decisions get any better with other players. I don't care if they arent "his players"..he can't evaluate what he has already. Also, why is the D so bad this year compared to last year? We were #1 in the WAC in D right? Wasn't he a def coordinator?</B></font><HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I was at a function yesterday morning where Bennett discussed the state of the program, so to speak, and he talked about recruiting and where we are in each of the team areas...including kicking.

The coaches keep a chart of how each kicker is doing in practice and use that to determine who the starter is. He stated that he is about ready to throw the charts away. He also pointed out that the kicking game includes more than just the kicker. The ball has to be snapped properly and the holder has to get the ball down properly. Someone asked about the possiblity of getting a player from the soccer team to kick and he stated that that is a possibility that has been discussed.

As far as Bartel is concerned, even Bartel admits that he was not ready early on in the season. He would have played in the Hawaii game except for breaking a team rule which caused him to not be at the Hawaii game. As the Nevada game showed, our offensive problems are not just confined to the QB situation...there were a ton of dropped passes in that game.

As to why is the D so bad, how about the loss of Birdwell, Aldridge and Pratt from last year's line. How about the fact that our biggest D-lineman is only 260 and the next largest is 240. We are not able to put enough pressure on the opposing QB which makes it tougher on our DB's. How about looking at the size of our DB's...most of them are 6'-0" or less defending against WR's 6" taller. Actually, our D is over achieving considering the size of our line. We actually held up pretty well against Nevada's offense which not many other teams have been able to do.

The fact of the matter is that all of these kids are working their tails off and in some cases playing over their heads. Save for some stupid errors and some of the worst officiating I've ever wittnessed we very well could have won more of the games than we did.

[PerunaPunch]

Amen PK!!

I went to SMU (occasionally anyway) from Spring '86 through December '89 -- a Death Penalty baby you might say.

I was a SigEp prior to the first great expulsion, and graduated with a BA in Advertising Mgmt.

[Otto]

"How about the fact that our biggest D-lineman is only 260 and...."

Isn't Lute Croy in the 290-295 range?

[PK]

My mistake, you're right...Lute is in that range. The next one after him is Adami at 257 and then it is down hill from there.

[football_fan]

Wow PK, if a lot of our players are playing "over their head" then i guess it really doesnt matter what bennett does b/c these guys really have no business playing d1a football. if you have to play "over your head" in order to go 1-9 in the wac conf. then maybe we need to step back and take a serious look at the whole program. i mean these teams we are losing to are truly the bottom of the d1a barrel, and we're not even competitive with them.

How is it possible that in the last 15 or so years sence returning from the death penalty our program has literally gone nowhere. personally i blame cavan, not to mention copeland who kept him around long after eveyone knew he needed to go. Hell, didnt he even give cavan a raise the year before he fired him. i guess copeland and bennett are both bad judges of talent.

[PerunaPunch]

Who posted the link to the photo of Don Stansbury jumping up/over/on some lineman? I've been looking all over, but can't find it. Somebody please re-post that, and I think you'll clearly see...

What it is to be "playing over your head"... Giving away 6 inches and 70 lbs. to your opponent is the definition of playing over your head.

I think Don's a stud. I sure wouldn't want to have to block him, and I'm sure he has gobs of talent. But at any Big 12 school he'd be plying linebacker (in another couple of years) or he'd be practicing and bulking up for DE over the next few years.

At SMU, he have to play him NOW at DE because he gives us playmaking ability. Lack of depth and maturity is what PK is talking about. If these guys sucked, we wouldn't keep hearing how oppressed opponents were with our guy's effort.

There's talent all over the field. You see it in Rutledge's returns, Bartel's arm, Hampton's hands and Kincade's stats. But face it, most 19-year-olds just aren't going to be as developed as 22-year-olds.

We have talent and playmakers, but we don't have depth. We don't have size. And there's a huge dropoff in talent once you get past the top 20 or so guys. Teams like UT have 300 pounders 3-deep all along their offensive line.