" title="Spartans Weblog">Spartans Weblog

A statistical look at Michigan State basketball, with a dash of football talk

MSU-Cal Discussion Thread

Posted by kj on Friday, August 29th, 2008

The poll results are nip and tuck, with the “why not talk some football?” crowd slightly ahead.  So we’ll give it a go.  As Mark pointed out, there’s probably not going to be a lot to talk about in the hoops realm until mid-October when practice starts.  And I note that other hoops bloggers are also succumbing to football fever.

Plus this gives me my own little mini-blog to read about MSU football–at least until GZEL gets some momentum worked up.  (Pete now owes me in perpetuity for coming up with the snappy acronym.)  I think we’ve built up a nice little community of passionate, informed Spartan fans here; we might as well take advantage of it.

So, in other words, don’t expect anything of great value from me.  It’s all on you guys.  I’ll continue to devote the majority of my limited mental powers to mulling over obscure basketball-related numbers.

I’ll also post any links of interest that I stumble upon in the midst of casting my daily blogger net for information.  Here are a few for today:

Feel free to use this thread to post your pregame and postgame thoughts.  More than likely, I won’t be offering up anything new until next Tuesday.  Game time is 8:00 on ABC.  And . . .

Go Green!

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Filed in football discussion17 responses so far

17 Responses to “MSU-Cal Discussion Thread”

  1. Daveon 29 Aug 2008 at 2:50 pm 1

    I have to vote against Ringer on kicks. He is going to have to carry more of the offensive load without Jehuu, and we don’t need to further increase that workload by putting him in dangerous situations like kick returns. Maybe he would make some great plays, but if he gets injured that will be a huge blow to the team.

  2. Dr Huxtableon 29 Aug 2008 at 4:25 pm 2

    Strongly disagree with putting Ringer on kicks. He’s definitely capable of making some highlight reel returns, but he’s the only truly experienced back we have and he’s already had injury problems. It just doesn’t make sense to me. I’m hoping that this just started as Dantonio creating some sort of smokescreen, a little bit of misinformation.

  3. Ground Zero East Lansingon 29 Aug 2008 at 5:03 pm 3

    I don’t think Ringer should be put on kicks either, just the idea of that brought up gives me flashbacks to Stanton’s knee exploding in the Alamo Bowl.

    Also, I may or may not live blog this game. Depends on how much I have to drink beforehand.

  4. Benon 29 Aug 2008 at 6:25 pm 4

    Re: Ringer on special teams. No, no, no, sweet Jesus, no, no. No.

    No.

    BTW, good news for us Chicago expatriates: ABC now says that MSU-Cal will be on here instead of Alabama-Clemson. http://www.hdsportsguide.com/n.....rage-maps/

  5. Spartan Sports Pageon 29 Aug 2008 at 6:41 pm 5

    I agree with Ground Zero. Stanton flashbacks.

    That said Thomas was critical to the teams success last year by getting us field position. I’m not certain how many games we can win without that strength.

  6. DP99on 29 Aug 2008 at 8:39 pm 6

    Unless Ringer turns into something of a poor cousin of the college Barry Sanders, I would think it’s not worth the risk return. Field position will be crucial for sure, and SSP pointed out something I didn’t even consider: how well will this year’s team do without the field position advantage last year’s team was able to get with D and Thomas…

    Love the GZEL acronymn.

  7. Benon 30 Aug 2008 at 3:40 pm 7

    I spent quite a while putting together a blog post which was heavy on anxiety and self-pity. But you know what? Screw it.

    We’re going to win today. GO GREEN, GO WHITE, LET’S GO STATE.

  8. kjon 30 Aug 2008 at 9:47 pm 8

    Thank goodness for Otis Wiley, or this one would be completely out reach.

    Beyond his performance, this game is giving me John L. Smith era flashbacks.

  9. Dr Huxtableon 30 Aug 2008 at 10:00 pm 9

    I really expected Hoyer to have improved on the accuracy. If he can’t turn it around quickly, then we are in serious trouble this season. I almost want to see State open up the 2nd with an onside, just to try and shake things up. I’m really hating Keith Nichol right about now.

  10. Benon 30 Aug 2008 at 10:08 pm 10

    That was utter garbage. And, I paused the TiVo and I’m pretty sure that the Cal DB’s toes were on the chalk on that last interception. Guh.

  11. Benon 30 Aug 2008 at 10:34 pm 11

    kj, what’s truly giving me JLS flashbacks are the penalties. We can’t beat good teams like this if we keep on bailing them out.

    We’re not out of this by any means, however. Keep on running the ball.

  12. kjon 30 Aug 2008 at 11:30 pm 12

    Well, this’ll keep us from getting caught up in the traditional early-season hype.

    One (relatively minor) defense of Hoyer: He’s been better when he’s been allowed to throw on first and second downs and get into a rhythm. Running Ringer into the line on first and second down and then expecting Hoyer to complete a long pass on third down is not a formula for success.

  13. Benon 30 Aug 2008 at 11:59 pm 13

    kj — understood, but that’s our offense. Hoyer might be better if we let him throw more often on first down, but that’d take touches away from Ringer, and that’s ultimately not good for our team, IMO.

    After this game, I feel much better about our receiving corps — Dell and Cunningham generally impressed me. I feel worse about our defense, though; throughout the 4th quarter, we knew they would be running, and that didn’t stop them from gashing our defense for 6 and 7 yards with consistency. They weren’t doing anything tricky: just a steady stream of counters, draws, and straight-aheads that our defense had no answer for until it was really too late.

    Ultimately, I think Hoyer is going to be our team’s major inhibition. His performance was somewhere between mediocre and poor, and his problems were both of the physical and decision-making varieties. Disappointing.

  14. Benon 31 Aug 2008 at 12:34 am 14

    And by “inhibition,” I mean “inhibitor.” I’m tired.

  15. Ground Zero East Lansingon 31 Aug 2008 at 10:24 am 15

    Well, I was going to write something brief about this game, and then more than 600 words came out. Find it here:

    Cal – The Aftermath

  16. Ground Zero East Lansingon 31 Aug 2008 at 10:25 am 16

    Whoops, forgot to close a tag. It’s here:

    Cal – The Aftermath

  17. kjon 01 Sep 2008 at 10:08 am 17

    Ben, I understand that Dantonio’s going to run a fairly conservative offense, but:

    1) Even when things are going well, you’re not going to give Ringer the ball 35 times, so you’ve got to mix things up. And when they’re not going well, Ringer’s not going to be able to dance his way through 8 guys in the box on a consistent basis.

    2) Hoyer looked pretty good throwing the ball deep (at least compared to throwing the ball short), and our two top receiving threats are clearly big play guys (Dell, Cunningham). We don’t have a tight end or small receiver at this point who’s going to convert a lot of third downs going across the middle.

    I think you need a few more play option passes early in the game on first and second down to keep defenses honest.