Tell me what you see?

[Stallion]

actually I don't think that's true-SMU will not have a single 4 year Senior on Defense from that original 2015 Class next year

We signed 8 Defensive Recruits and 1 Defensive Blue shirt in Morris' first class. One never played due to injury (Corbett), one moved to TE (Kaufman), 1 was an academic casualty that went JUCO(M. Scott), and I think all the rest have redshirted so I don't think SMU's Defense will have any 4th year Seniors from Morris' 1st class in 2015. Morris' certainly should share in the responsibility for the imbalance but he needed more scholarships for Offense because the transition from Run N Shoot to Spread requires TEs, taller boundary receivers and a different type of Offensive Lineman. Here's the List from 2015. Morris really did leave Malone out to dry though with that recruiting strategy. This should capsulize some of the reasons we are really struggling defensively

https://smu.rivals.com/commitments/football/2015

[Pony81]

CM is the best coach we've had since DP, and
he is the most energetic recruiter and
best representative to alum's and the wider SMU / Dallas community we've had
BUT
I believe CM thought he had an 8 win team that would be competitive in every game. I think he was surprised to lose to UH. He was counting on this year being the year when he got the big pop and he would be courted by mid tier P5 schools.
To see Herman and likely Norvell (whom he coached with at Tulsa) get quality P5 jobs must be discouraging. Add to that he has a good friend in Van Malone that isn't getting results on D..... forcing a tough decision.
He must have been hoping an Arkansas would come calling, he could get a big raise, his staff would get a big raise and he could shed Malone for a seasoned DC (as I'm sure a mid tier P5 would require)
Yeah, CM looks dejected that his team looks so bad when he thought he had something.

[smitty329]

sounds smart-seems like you understand the business world-you don't understand much about what it takes for a total rebuild in college football. 24 months? It takes 3-4 years before you can rebuild what no one disputes was one of the least talented and worst offenses AND defenses in the Country. It probably is going to take 5 years to win Championships/Top 25. You rebuild in College Football from the ground up by recruiting. You don't get to find 85 replacements from Day 1. We had about 1 month to get 18-then 25 the next year and 25 more this year--you redshirt as many as you can and also have to develop them in a Strength and Conditioning program. When those kids are Redshirt Sophomores or Juniors you BEGIN to see result. From that foundation and beginning signs of progress you can attract higher rated recruits that can take the program to the Championship level. That's what smart people in the College Football world understand. SMU would have fired Ron Meyer under your scenario because he didn't even get to a Bowl until year 5 and wasn't able to get the players he needed to win Championships until his 4th recruiting class. The good news is that you get 3 credit hours of CLE for attending this Coaching Rebuild 1.0 seminar-hopefully SMU fans are learning something

The seminar was nice - i didn't get the pamphlets relevant to the SMU situation (DP, JJ mess, recruiting competition, administrative support, community support, etc.) that would convince me the snake oil you're selling - that has apparently and historically worked at other programs - will work in our situation. On the contrary, there is some proven research that contradicts what you prescribe in your seminar (see UCF 2 year turnaround - it's not the people it's the motivation/leadership) and an indication that what you are proposing cannot work for our situation - see the Desoto QB that was a nine iron away from our campus that opted to go a full golf tournament away to TCU and won his first start as a true freshman, the brewers, etc.

Let me know when you are ready to take the masters class in creating incentives for leadership to achieve expected outcomes - if you would like to pre-read a case study for the program specific to collegiate athletics, see SMU Basketball.

[Stallion]

Pretty dumb comparisons

UCF was not a total rebuild-check their historic recruiting classes-their current roster is the highest composite talent rating of any school in the AAC. UCF was beating Baylor in the 2014 Fiesta Bowl a few years ago

https://247sports.com/Season/2017-Footb ... erence=AAC

Shawn Robinson was one of the Top QBs in the nation with about 30 offers including ALL the top programs in the Country (Alabama, Clemson, OU, USC, Mich, Texas, A&M etc-just about every school in the Top 10). So you are going to make a straight faced argument that G5 SMU coming off 2 wins at the time the 2017 Class was being recruited should have out-recruited those P5 schools for Robinson. That's crazy nonsense and any rational person knows it. You want to come off your drug induced high and come back to reality now?

Congrats you just proved yourself to know nothing about the topic of College Football-but your not alone-there seems to be hordes of SMU fans that know much about the topic

[SoCal_Pony]

actually I don't think that's true-SMU will not have a single 4 year Senior on Defense from that original 2015 Class next year

Ha, I said 'players' and not 'defensive' players because I couldn't think of one.

Still, I am also of the opinion that this was more of a 6 or 7-year rebuild than a 4 or 5-year one.

[Stallion]

We are already a Top 10 Offense so the only possible [deleted] is on the Defensive side of the ball

actually No. 9 in the Country in Total yards. Had 28 First Downs and 45 points against the No. 16 team in Country, Division winner and possible BCS Bowl representative. Only UCLA with 48 points scored more against Memphis this year. Averaging 33.5 in our LOSSES in 3rd year against quality teams

[JasonB]

As someone who predicted 7-8 wins, I'll say this:

* The offense is ahead of schedule
* The defense is way behind schedule.

You are right, UCF is not a valid comparison. The cupboard wasn't bare.

Comparing it to Temple is, however.

Comparing it to our own offense is.

Hell comparing it to the defensive performances put in this year by Baylor is.

It is okay for us to say that we aren't seeing the forward progress in the defense that we wanted to. That should be clear to everybody.

You don't need 4 years to turn a defense in the right direction. At some point it is trending forward, or it isn't. I think the overwhelming sentiment is that it isn't trending forward enough in year three.

[gostangs]

Well if we beat Tulane we will finish where I thought we would also, but its hard to pinpoint why it feels disappointing. Maybe its the body language from staff and key players. Wins fix things, so we beat Tulane and head to a bowl and that might change the mood.

Chad may need to get over his thought this was his launch season- that is probably a bummer as he sees others make the jump. He has a couple more years here at least in my view.

Memphis seemed like a rebuild that took much less time also by the way, so there are other places that bounce back pretty soon. I just think he hasn't found the guy to run HIS offense yet and that is taking its toll. You can talk about the focus on offense recruits in 1st two years but that is a staff decision that feels like a mistake.

Also Navy is not a team that should have beaten us this year. To me that is the disappointment, as well as the Houston game. Feels like we should have had them both. Excitement level would be off the chart.

On the encouraging side - losses have all been relatively close (late Memphis game exception) so the improvement is obvious. Im afraid we move backwards next year with two very tough OOC and an improving AAC. Love Chad though and hope what he might think of as a stepping stone he eventually starts realizing could be a damn good place to go long term, and I am optimistic about our program. Just hope they show more grit at home on Saturday.

[One Trick Pony]

I recommend snorkeling in the Bahamas for a week

[ALEX LIFESON]

https://sportsday.dallasnews.com/colleg ... mu-memphis

Check out Adam grossbards video.

[longbuzzer]

Hey Alex. You wrote, "This whole defense, needs an enema."

After yesterday's game, don't you think the defense is a little sore for this kind of treatment?

[ALEX LIFESON]

Like I said in my initial post, most of us felt seven wins would be accepted and expected this year, beat Tulane and we hit that number. My question was, looking at our coaches, players and hardcore fans, there seems to be some major disappointments. Was it just the Optics? We have heard for 2 years, that 2017 was going to be the year the party started, looking at our coaches and players, they look like they are at a funeral, instead of a party. We are the hardcore fans on this fansite, we are the one's trying to sell potential fans, that we are right on track. But gauging by the thousands of empty seats at Ford Stadium, there aren't many people buying what we are selling.

[mustangxc]

The major disappointment is because we hav lost 3 consecutive games after starting the season 6-2. While everyone predicted 7/8 wins on paper and expected to lose against those 3 teams it is very different to put 3 Ls on paper as opposed to actually feel the sting of 3 consecutive losses. If our schedule had been a little more balanced this year our fans would have remained more grounded and would be satisfied with a 7-5 season.

[Stallion]

The consensus of football "experts" was actually 6-7 wins and 5th place in West Division. SMU fans may have had higher exectations

[mustangxc]

So we agree that 7 wins was the general consensus. That was certainly my expectation, but keep in mind that 7 wins does not include beating any teams that we were not expected to beat. Last year we beat an excellent Houston team and this year there is no win comparable to that victory. I think that has a lot to do with the disappointment of our fans.