[yvonne]

There are at least three possibilities for what we saw Friday night:

• Possibility One: This team is a good team that had a bad game. It happens all the time with San Jose State. Stanford players, particularly the new players who don't understand the psychology and history of this game, come in expecting it to be easy. They expect to mail in the score. Meanwhile, the San Jose State team, which includes players who grew up in the area in the shadow of Stanford and Kal teams, come in hoping to knock off the big boys with the great facilities and the reputation. They play their best game and sometimes pull the upset. Stanford may perform less than expected against other teams, as well. For example, Stanford often plays less than expected following a particularly emotional victory, such as the What's your deal game in 2009.
  
• Possibility Two: This team is a young team that will have growing pains, but will be strong toward the end of the season. We've seen this, as well. A shaky team starts out slowly but gains confidence and fixes problems along the way. The Aloha Bowl team lost a narrow game to a bad Arizona team early in the season. In 1992, Stanford lost a first game to Texas A&M before becoming a dominant team that finished in the top 10 and soundly defeated Penn State in the Blockbuster Bowl.  The 1996 Sun Bowl, the most lopsided in Stanford history followed a season that started 2-5 and 1-3 in Pac-10.
  
• Possibility Three: This team is MUCH worse than prognosticators predicted. This, too, has happened before. Prognosticators tend to predict finishes based largely on the previous season's finish. Many publications predicted Stanford would finish well in 1993 because it had done well in 1992 and because Walsh was the head coach; however, it lost 10 defensive starters and struggled. Stanford may not be a good team until the highly-touted recruits mature into full Div. I FBS level players.

I'm sure there are other possibilities, but those are the three that come to mind today. Which do people suspect it is? Why?

[yvonne]

There are at least three possibilities for what we saw Friday night:

• Possibility One: This team is a good team that had a bad game. It happens all the time with San Jose State. Stanford players, particularly the new players who don't understand the psychology and history of this game, come in expecting it to be easy. They expect to mail in the score. Meanwhile, the San Jose State team, which includes players who grew up in the area in the shadow of Stanford and Kal teams, come in hoping to knock off the big boys with the great facilities and the reputation. They play their best game and sometimes pull the upset. Stanford may perform less than expected against other teams, as well. For example, Stanford often plays less than expected following a particularly emotional victory, such as the What's your deal game in 2009.
  
• Possibility Two: This team is a young team that will have growing pains, but will be strong toward the end of the season. We've seen this, as well. A shaky team starts out slowly but gains confidence and fixes problems along the way. The Aloha Bowl team lost a narrow game to a bad Arizona team early in the season. In 1992, Stanford lost a first game to Texas A&M before becoming a dominant team that finished in the top 10 and soundly defeated Penn State in the Blockbuster Bowl.  The 1996 Sun Bowl, the most lopsided in Stanford history followed a season that started 2-5 and 1-3 in Pac-10.
  
• Possibility Three: This team is MUCH worse than prognosticators predicted. This, too, has happened before. Prognosticators tend to predict finishes based largely on the previous season's finish. Many publications predicted Stanford would finish well in 1993 because it had done well in 1992 and because Walsh was the head coach; however, it lost 10 defensive starters and struggled. Stanford may not be a good team until the highly-touted recruits mature into full Div. I FBS level players.

I'm sure there are other possibilities, but those are the three that come to mind today. Which do people suspect it is? Why?

[pcgoode]

I think it is a combination of 1 and 2, plus not having Skov. The front seven of the D didn't seem to be playing with much tenacity and thus wasn't very impressive until the fourth quarter, when they seemed to come together. I really think we'll see considerable improvement for the defense and offense if we can get this group to try and dominate on every down - leads to less pressure on the srcondary, better field position, more possessions for the offense etc. If they don't, we won't have a good season.

The new starters hopefully learned a lot in this game, and should continue to improve vs Duke. I'm hoping we start seeing the O line gel sometime in the second half. If they don't, the game vs USC will be painful.

BTW, apparently Dion Bailey left the game vs Hawaii on crutches.

[pcgoode]

I think it is a combination of 1 and 2, plus not having Skov. The front seven of the D didn't seem to be playing with much tenacity and thus wasn't very impressive until the fourth quarter, when they seemed to come together. I really think we'll see considerable improvement for the defense and offense if we can get this group to try and dominate on every down - leads to less pressure on the srcondary, better field position, more possessions for the offense etc. If they don't, we won't have a good season.

The new starters hopefully learned a lot in this game, and should continue to improve vs Duke. I'm hoping we start seeing the O line gel sometime in the second half. If they don't, the game vs USC will be painful.

BTW, apparently Dion Bailey left the game vs Hawaii on crutches.

[washingtonismoney]

I think it is a combination of 1 and 2, plus not having Skov.

Think Hewitt being out also had a negative effect, albeit not a brobdingnagian one. Some of those run blocking issues might have been better with our top fullback (and his versatility might have prompted better/more creative playcalling).

[washingtonismoney]

I think it is a combination of 1 and 2, plus not having Skov.

Think Hewitt being out also had a negative effect, albeit not a brobdingnagian one. Some of those run blocking issues might have been better with our top fullback (and his versatility might have prompted better/more creative playcalling).

[97fan]

I suspect it's mostly a combination of possibilities #1 and #2.

I think the offensive line, in particular, will improve a lot over the course of the season. I wasn't able to see much of Friday's game, but it sounds like the o-line is just not very good right now. As young guys get more experience, and the group gets more playing time as a unit, they should improve. This is an old story in college football--and one of the most predictable parts of the game. Offensive lines improve as the players get more experience together.

I also expect the young secondary to improve as the season progresses.

The fact that Stanford went up 14-0 and dominated the first quarter would seem to lend credence to the idea that they took their foot off the gas pedal against a team they figured they could beat easily.

That said, I do think that if Stanford gets poor or mediocre QB play this season, your possibility #3 is also in play.

[97fan]

I suspect it's mostly a combination of possibilities #1 and #2.

I think the offensive line, in particular, will improve a lot over the course of the season. I wasn't able to see much of Friday's game, but it sounds like the o-line is just not very good right now. As young guys get more experience, and the group gets more playing time as a unit, they should improve. This is an old story in college football--and one of the most predictable parts of the game. Offensive lines improve as the players get more experience together.

I also expect the young secondary to improve as the season progresses.

The fact that Stanford went up 14-0 and dominated the first quarter would seem to lend credence to the idea that they took their foot off the gas pedal against a team they figured they could beat easily.

That said, I do think that if Stanford gets poor or mediocre QB play this season, your possibility #3 is also in play.

[stan01]

Getting Andrus Peat on the O-line will help.  Here is why he was only used in the field goal blocking unit:  "Can't wait til I get this cast off my hand so I can get back to my old self."

[stan01]

Getting Andrus Peat on the O-line will help.  Here is why he was only used in the field goal blocking unit:  "Can't wait til I get this cast off my hand so I can get back to my old self."

[washingtonismoney]

Certainly fits in with the rest of the information we have.

David Shaw, being the former NFL guy he is, probably had an aneurysm contemplating this reveal. Head coaches will not rest until they are able to control information itself.

[washingtonismoney]

Certainly fits in with the rest of the information we have.

David Shaw, being the former NFL guy he is, probably had an aneurysm contemplating this reveal. Head coaches will not rest until they are able to control information itself.

[Farm93]

Getting Andrus Peat on the O-line will help.  Here is why he was only used in the field goal blocking unit:  "Can't wait til I get this cast off my hand so I can get back to my old self."

I definitely noticed the cast on the hand during the game.  I thought that was an unlucky thing for a freshman.  Did not really think too much about it impacting his OL opportunity, but that would be logical enough. Hope he gets that cast off before the UW game.

FWIW - I would pick #2 and #3.  Luckily for Stanford, the Pac-12 looks like a bad conference so 7-9 wins is still in the realm of possibilities.

[Farm93]

Getting Andrus Peat on the O-line will help.  Here is why he was only used in the field goal blocking unit:  "Can't wait til I get this cast off my hand so I can get back to my old self."

I definitely noticed the cast on the hand during the game.  I thought that was an unlucky thing for a freshman.  Did not really think too much about it impacting his OL opportunity, but that would be logical enough. Hope he gets that cast off before the UW game.

FWIW - I would pick #2 and #3.  Luckily for Stanford, the Pac-12 looks like a bad conference so 7-9 wins is still in the realm of possibilities.

[washingtonismoney]

Realized that I hadn't addressed central premise of thread. If I had to guess, I think #2 is most likely, but with such a limited dataset, it's hard to tell. The schedule-makers didn't do us a favor by putting the Trojans so early, but after being anti-early-bye, I'm now a bit more ambivalent about it (if it is, in fact, #2).

[washingtonismoney]

Realized that I hadn't addressed central premise of thread. If I had to guess, I think #2 is most likely, but with such a limited dataset, it's hard to tell. The schedule-makers didn't do us a favor by putting the Trojans so early, but after being anti-early-bye, I'm now a bit more ambivalent about it (if it is, in fact, #2).

[scorecard]

I'm going to go with option #2.  It is a young team and things will get better, just a matter of how fast this will happen.  What I hope is that Shaw was just giving some of the older guys a shot due to seniority and as a reward for time served in the program, but really knows that we have to get the talent on the field sooner rather than later.  We have more young outstanding talent and depth across the board than I can remember, but they need playing time and experience.  I am hoping that it is like USC last year who barely squeaked by Minnesota early in the year, but then became one of the best teams in the nation by the end of the year.  Next year I expect we will be an upper echelon team again, but I am hoping that this happens in time for the guys with one year left like Chase Thomas or Stepfan Taylor (and maybe guys like Skov or Ertz who could leave with remaining eligibility).  If on the other hand, we have a down year AND the young guys don't play much, I worry about what this would do to our recruiting momentum.  I can already hear the negative recruiting pitches from other schools ("see, you won't get to play right away if these 5 star guys didn't", "you know it was just Luck and Harbaugh that got them to the BCS, it's back to the old Stanford now").  The worst part about the SJS game in my view was that if we had a comfortable lead, then we could have put in some of the young guys for more game experience.  Unfortunately, my hopes for the USC game have dropped tremendously, especially given the play of our secondary and o-line against SJS.  So I am saving my hopes for the Oregon game down the road (although this game is probably an even worse matchup for us), and payback for the last 2 years where they cost us a shot at the national title, as well as likely costing Luck the Voldemort. 

[scorecard]

I'm going to go with option #2.  It is a young team and things will get better, just a matter of how fast this will happen.  What I hope is that Shaw was just giving some of the older guys a shot due to seniority and as a reward for time served in the program, but really knows that we have to get the talent on the field sooner rather than later.  We have more young outstanding talent and depth across the board than I can remember, but they need playing time and experience.  I am hoping that it is like USC last year who barely squeaked by Minnesota early in the year, but then became one of the best teams in the nation by the end of the year.  Next year I expect we will be an upper echelon team again, but I am hoping that this happens in time for the guys with one year left like Chase Thomas or Stepfan Taylor (and maybe guys like Skov or Ertz who could leave with remaining eligibility).  If on the other hand, we have a down year AND the young guys don't play much, I worry about what this would do to our recruiting momentum.  I can already hear the negative recruiting pitches from other schools ("see, you won't get to play right away if these 5 star guys didn't", "you know it was just Luck and Harbaugh that got them to the BCS, it's back to the old Stanford now").  The worst part about the SJS game in my view was that if we had a comfortable lead, then we could have put in some of the young guys for more game experience.  Unfortunately, my hopes for the USC game have dropped tremendously, especially given the play of our secondary and o-line against SJS.  So I am saving my hopes for the Oregon game down the road (although this game is probably an even worse matchup for us), and payback for the last 2 years where they cost us a shot at the national title, as well as likely costing Luck the Voldemort. 

[JohnR34231]

Not to nitpick here, but IIRC people expected 1993 to be a building year, because we lost so many players off the outstanding 1992 team.
I don't think anyone anticipated 4-7, but I don't think we were expected to do particularly well.  Probably a better example is 1997 when we had most of the top players coming back from the 1996 Sun Bowl blowout and many expected us to contend for the Rose Bowl. We started out 4-1 with the last victory being a buttwhipping of USB, and then everything went downhill from there with 5 straight losses.

[JohnR34231]

Not to nitpick here, but IIRC people expected 1993 to be a building year, because we lost so many players off the outstanding 1992 team.
I don't think anyone anticipated 4-7, but I don't think we were expected to do particularly well.  Probably a better example is 1997 when we had most of the top players coming back from the 1996 Sun Bowl blowout and many expected us to contend for the Rose Bowl. We started out 4-1 with the last victory being a buttwhipping of USB, and then everything went downhill from there with 5 straight losses.

[yvonne]

Not to nitpick here, but IIRC people expected 1993 to be a building year, because we lost so many players off the outstanding 1992 team.
I don't think anyone anticipated 4-7, but I don't think we were expected to do particularly well.  Probably a better example is 1997 when we had most of the top players coming back from the 1996 Sun Bowl blowout and many expected us to contend for the Rose Bowl. We started out 4-1 with the last victory being a buttwhipping of USB, and then everything went downhill from there with 5 straight losses.

You may be right that no one expected 4-7, but publications were still predicting we'd finish near the top of the conference, just not tied for first. I remember being shocked when I talked informally to a coach I knew at the time and he said he thought we might win six games.

No. 1 is a red herring. It's true we've sometimes overlooked San Jose State in the midst of otherwise successful seasons. But nobody overlooks an opening game. The only time in all history that we've lost to San Jose State in an opener, 1998, we weren't overlooking them, we just sucked. We finished that season 3-8.

The smaller point of whether we overlooked San Jose State may or may not be true. The greater point, that good teams can have bad games, remains. I can think of a season in which we stunk up the first game AND lost to San Jose State. I wouldn't mind the season ending at that bowl.

[yvonne]

Not to nitpick here, but IIRC people expected 1993 to be a building year, because we lost so many players off the outstanding 1992 team.
I don't think anyone anticipated 4-7, but I don't think we were expected to do particularly well.  Probably a better example is 1997 when we had most of the top players coming back from the 1996 Sun Bowl blowout and many expected us to contend for the Rose Bowl. We started out 4-1 with the last victory being a buttwhipping of USB, and then everything went downhill from there with 5 straight losses.

You may be right that no one expected 4-7, but publications were still predicting we'd finish near the top of the conference, just not tied for first. I remember being shocked when I talked informally to a coach I knew at the time and he said he thought we might win six games.

No. 1 is a red herring. It's true we've sometimes overlooked San Jose State in the midst of otherwise successful seasons. But nobody overlooks an opening game. The only time in all history that we've lost to San Jose State in an opener, 1998, we weren't overlooking them, we just sucked. We finished that season 3-8.

The smaller point of whether we overlooked San Jose State may or may not be true. The greater point, that good teams can have bad games, remains. I can think of a season in which we stunk up the first game AND lost to San Jose State. I wouldn't mind the season ending at that bowl.

[JohnR34231]

Given who we lost after 1992, anyone who picked us to finish near the top of the conference was smoking something, at least IMO. What I recall was most people thinking it was going to be a rebuilding year.

But I guess that there may have been enough people out there who thought Bill Walsh was such a miracle worker he could take just about anyone and win with them.

[JohnR34231]

Given who we lost after 1992, anyone who picked us to finish near the top of the conference was smoking something, at least IMO. What I recall was most people thinking it was going to be a rebuilding year.

But I guess that there may have been enough people out there who thought Bill Walsh was such a miracle worker he could take just about anyone and win with them.

[teejers1]

Possibility four:  this team is plenty talented enough to win 9 games but is not being "coached up" to maximize results on the field.  I don't want to believe this, and it is still early in the season.  But at minimum, it is ludicrous to leave this off your possiblity matrix. 

[teejers1]

Possibility four:  this team is plenty talented enough to win 9 games but is not being "coached up" to maximize results on the field.  I don't want to believe this, and it is still early in the season.  But at minimum, it is ludicrous to leave this off your possiblity matrix. 

[fullmetal]

Mitigating factor related to what garvin just said: We probably got SJSU's best game of the season, or at least something close to it.  They always come out looking to beat Stanford.  Stanford underperformed, and SJSU played out of their minds (cf 4th-and-1 stop).  But week 1 is done now, and the lessons have hopefully been learned.  (Like how to not let a smaller front seven control the point of attack?).

[fullmetal]

Mitigating factor related to what garvin just said: We probably got SJSU's best game of the season, or at least something close to it.  They always come out looking to beat Stanford.  Stanford underperformed, and SJSU played out of their minds (cf 4th-and-1 stop).  But week 1 is done now, and the lessons have hopefully been learned.  (Like how to not let a smaller front seven control the point of attack?).

[JohnR34231]

Mitigating factor related to what garvin just said: We probably got SJSU's best game of the season, or at least something close to it.  They always come out looking to beat Stanford.  Stanford underperformed, and SJSU played out of their minds (cf 4th-and-1 stop).  But week 1 is done now, and the lessons have hopefully been learned.  (Like how to not let a smaller front seven control the point of attack?).

That is usually the knee-jerk excuse when Stanford loses to SJS. Sometimes it's valid, sometimes it isn't. Hopefully this is going to be one of those years where it is.

[JohnR34231]

Mitigating factor related to what garvin just said: We probably got SJSU's best game of the season, or at least something close to it.  They always come out looking to beat Stanford.  Stanford underperformed, and SJSU played out of their minds (cf 4th-and-1 stop).  But week 1 is done now, and the lessons have hopefully been learned.  (Like how to not let a smaller front seven control the point of attack?).

That is usually the knee-jerk excuse when Stanford loses to SJS. Sometimes it's valid, sometimes it isn't. Hopefully this is going to be one of those years where it is.

[Nan3cy]

[quote author=fullmetal link=topic=6350.msg46986#msg46986 date=1346736275]
Mitigating factor related to what garvin just said: We probably got SJSU's best game of the season, or at least something close to it.  They always come out looking to beat Stanford.  Stanford underperformed, and SJSU played out of their minds (cf 4th-and-1 stop).  But week 1 is done now, and the lessons have hopefully been learned.  (Like how to not let a smaller front seven control the point of attack?).

That is usually the knee-jerk excuse when Stanford loses to SJS. Sometimes it's valid, sometimes it isn't. Hopefully this is going to be one of those years where it is.
[/quote]

While it isn't always true that Stanford gets SJSU's best game, it is somewhat entertaining (in a rueful sort of way) to reflect that Stanford's last two Rose Bowl teams lost to the Spartans.

[Nan3cy]

[quote author=fullmetal link=topic=6350.msg46986#msg46986 date=1346736275]
Mitigating factor related to what garvin just said: We probably got SJSU's best game of the season, or at least something close to it.  They always come out looking to beat Stanford.  Stanford underperformed, and SJSU played out of their minds (cf 4th-and-1 stop).  But week 1 is done now, and the lessons have hopefully been learned.  (Like how to not let a smaller front seven control the point of attack?).

That is usually the knee-jerk excuse when Stanford loses to SJS. Sometimes it's valid, sometimes it isn't. Hopefully this is going to be one of those years where it is.
[/quote]

While it isn't always true that Stanford gets SJSU's best game, it is somewhat entertaining (in a rueful sort of way) to reflect that Stanford's last two Rose Bowl teams lost to the Spartans.

[FarmBoy]

While it isn't always true that Stanford gets SJSU's best game, it is somewhat entertaining (in a rueful sort of way) to reflect that Stanford's last two Rose Bowl teams lost to the Spartans.

I'd venture half the members of the board were formulating their arguments of similarity between the current team and previous RB participants as the game grew bleaker and bleaker on Friday. New QB replacing the top player in college from year before, losing to San Jose... Well, at least I was. The other half were probably developing their thesis on how Shaw is the second coming of T.eevens/H.arris and that disaster and irrelevance looms.

While I was pretty depressed Friday night, I'm growing more and more optimistic as Saturday approaches. Absent any new information, I've convinced myself that the OLine will gel, Nunes will be more confident and help the offense coalesce, and Skov will whip the front-7 into shape. I don't yet have an unsubstantiated reason to believe the secondary will improve, but I'm sure by Friday I'll have a great rationale why the performance against SJSU has prepared that unit to dominate the rest of the season! 

[FarmBoy]

While it isn't always true that Stanford gets SJSU's best game, it is somewhat entertaining (in a rueful sort of way) to reflect that Stanford's last two Rose Bowl teams lost to the Spartans.

I'd venture half the members of the board were formulating their arguments of similarity between the current team and previous RB participants as the game grew bleaker and bleaker on Friday. New QB replacing the top player in college from year before, losing to San Jose... Well, at least I was. The other half were probably developing their thesis on how Shaw is the second coming of T.eevens/H.arris and that disaster and irrelevance looms.

While I was pretty depressed Friday night, I'm growing more and more optimistic as Saturday approaches. Absent any new information, I've convinced myself that the OLine will gel, Nunes will be more confident and help the offense coalesce, and Skov will whip the front-7 into shape. I don't yet have an unsubstantiated reason to believe the secondary will improve, but I'm sure by Friday I'll have a great rationale why the performance against SJSU has prepared that unit to dominate the rest of the season!