What's wrong with the Big Ten, a preface

Even the most ardent of Big Ten homers are now (probably) willing to admit the conference is now on a significant downward trend. There are no more denials here; Ohio State is no longer the only one publicly shaming the conference, though we certainly did our damnedest in the last two title games. The Big Ten can no longer lord victories over SEC teams Tennessee, Arkansas, and yes, even Florida so easily over anyone, really. Not only are those games officially old hat according to the media and Scout and Rivals types - having occurred prior to the 2008 season, after all - they were close affairs that were ultimately decided by turnovers one way or the other. There was no dominance to be had, and even these victories came over teams that were 2nd or 3rd best in their conference, in relative down years for two of the programs, Tennessee and Florida. Regardless of how you approach past "big game" postseason victories, the Big Ten did not fare well - at all - in the 2008 postseason. For seemingly the third straight year, conference tin cans like Northwestern and Michigan State hung tough against teams that supposedly outmatched them athletically and schematically, only to lose late in their typical fashion. In 2007, Michigan State was in the game four quarters longer than it should have been against Boston College, and relatively evenly-matched Wisconsin and Tennessee teams traded blows until a late Volunteer pick sealed the game. In 2006, Wisconsin and Penn State pulled out squeakers against Arkansas and Tennessee respectively, before Ohio State shat the bed early and often against Florida.

Now it has come to this; a 1-6 mark in postseason play, highlighted by an Iowa rout of a truly feckless South Carolina team, and lowlighted by another Rose Bowl blowout and Ohio State getting its heart ripped out and stomped on repeatedly by the Longhorns of Texas. It was tough to watch: Wisconsin played Florida State close until an apocalyptic flurry of turnovers turned a relatively close affair into 42-13 Seminole romp. I do not need to tell you that Florida State does not have Peter Warrick and Chris "Treebeard" Weinke tossing the ball around anymore. They are bad. And their quarterback has the worst surname of any quarterback outside of "Jimmy Interception" and "Nathan Fumbledsnap": Christian Ponder. Penn State was down by three touchdowns in the blink of an eye to a USC team that is very good, but not that good. Northwestern repped itself fairly well before losing to a thoroughly slightly-above-average Missouri team. I slept through Iowa's win over South Carolina, not knowing it would be the Big Ten's only glimpse at fleeting postseason glory. Michigan State gave Georgia as much guff as it possibly could, but as I called in Dr. Saturday's liveblog, would not win if it gave up a touchdown to Georgia. It did. Three of them.

Actually, it wasn't just tough to watch. It was brutal at times. Big Ten teams, almost across the board, responded to adversity by going into a shell at which Woody Hayes and Bo Schembechler would have gawked. It was truly a sight to see in its uniformity. Wisconsin had a reasonably good shell to go into - it averaged nine yards a pop on the ground against Florida State's rather good run defense. But it doesn't mean anything if every nine yard gain is punctuated by a fumble or the next nine yard gain alternates with a wobbly, underthrown pick. Big ten quarterbacks, Brian Hoyer and Dustin Sherer chief among them, throw wobbly, underthrown picks that cause ACC quarterbacks to cover their eyes and throw themselves on the ground, prostrate and wailing with agony (from here on out this condition will be known as 16 seconds left in the Fiesta Bowl).

What the hell is wrong with the Big Ten? Why can't it get away from mentalities that have been dead and gone schematically for nearly forty years? Is the bitch mentality as ubiquitous in the conference as I will allege in the next piece? The simple answer is the obvious one: I don't know. Whatever the Big Ten lacks, it is not one of these things: speed, athleticism, athletes, or whatever the latest media meme is. If you're a division one football program, you have athletes and speed to burn. Some teams just have a ridiculous amount of it, namely Florida. The widening gap between Big Ten teams and teams from the SEC, Big XII, whatever, cannot merely be accredited to recruiting stars and a lack thereof. Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State and Wisconsin are all NFL factories. Even bad coaches at some of those schools cannot stop, or even begin to slow down, the flow of stellar athletes from Big Ten schools into the league. Ohio State stands a good chance of getting three guys drafted in the first round. Talent is not the issue, at least with the conference's typical top four. In my intense, deep and prolonged study of the current state of the Big Ten, I have identified three different problems affecting the eleven teams that make up the poorly-monikered conference: The Bitch Mentality, Dead Weight, and Cratered Expectations that may or may not have been there in the first place.

In the first section, I will discuss the Bitch Mentality, a problem plaguing the conferences' States: Michigan, Penn and Ohio. Iowa, more often than not, also suffers from a bitch mentality. We shall see as much when Iowa quarterback and former Gambino crime family police informant Ricky Stanzi can no longer simply hand off to Shonn Greene and watch him personally defile a defense. UM also used to suffer from an intense case of the bitch mentality, and for the sake of convenience, will be discussed at length in this section.

The second section will deal with Dead Weight; coaches who found early success who now cling bitterly to it in the face of losing to Western Michigan and edging out Cal Poly. As you may have guessed, Wisconsin and Illinois fall into this category.

The third and final section will deal with Cratered Expectations; something that in truth affects every Big Ten team to some extent, as fanbases are not instantly out for blood following every loss like Ohio State and its SEC kindred. It is not necessarily a problem; some fanbases are simply more civilized than the ravenous, bloodthirsty Ohio State fanbase, and probably already have a good head coach getting the most he can out of the schools feeble program. Others don't care that much about "sports", preferring to unlock all the achievements in Fable II rather than find a good football coach who does not look like a walrus. Others still have hired an "OO-RAH GO TEAM I DO COCAINE" Red Bull goomba under promises of Rose Bowls and "Minnesota footbaw". Pitiably, the remaining team has never been good at football and is having its once-proud roundball program crushed under the pudgy thumbs of a text-happy basketball coach. As you have probably noticed Northwestern, Purdue, Minnesota, and Indiana are the primary culprits in the final category.

I don't read all that much, spending my sleepless nights studying calculus and praying to various heathen gods while sacrificing small animals that I'll pass the damn class, but when I do, it's usually something history or politics-related. Thus, I've had my fill of seeing (and usually not reading) books on the rack that read "GLARING, POTENTIALLY OFFENSIVE WORD(S) IN ALLCAPS AND RED LETTERING (usually something along the lines of "liberals, degenerates, commies, bible-thumpers, terrists [sic], Talibandits, the Welsh, Ohio State fans"): What it/they is/are doing to America/the Environment/Manbearpig and what we/you/I/Cthulhu can do about it". This is not intended to be a blog version of those books. I cannot offer anything beyond general remedies for the ailments each program is suffering from, and believe me, each program has ailments in spades. This is a general overview, not a team-by-team diagnosis.

First part should be up by mid-week.

Statistical Analysis, Part 2: Texas Offense

The second in a four part statistical analysis of each unit in the Texas-Ohio State Fiesta Bowl. Part one dealt with the Buckeye defense, part two deals the 'Horns offense.

Twelve: Number on his jersey, or his real age?

Every superlative you can think of has been applied to the Texas offense, so I'm not going to waste your time: they're good. Scary good. Beat Oklahoma like a redheaded stepchild good. They are not unstoppable. No one is. Except for Florida 2008. But really, no one is. Texas has relied on its offense to carry the season, because it's defense certainly can't (or at least has not shown the ability to) pick up the slack. Part of that is attributable to ridiculous Big 12 offenses like Oklahoma, Texas Tech, and even Missouri and Kansas. Nonetheless, the defense has been subpar, especially by Will Muschamp's standards (not Muskamp, Bob "Melanoma" Davie).

Prior to the statistical analysis, I believed there are two offenses Ohio State has faced comparable to Texas: Illinois and Penn State. Ohio State struggled with the former, and performed suprisingly well against the latter. I also assumed Colt McCoy is liable to take off and run more than either of the two quarterbacks in both systems, and I don't need to remind you that Ohio State struggles against mobile quarterbacks, but I'll do it anyway. We'll see how these assumptions hold up in a minute.

I know that Google Docs sucks a wheelbarrow full of lobster-sized dicks, but bear with me so I don't have to learn anything complicated.

A key, if you need it:

APYA = Average pass yards allowed
ARYA = Average rush yards allowed

Figure out the rest for yourself.



The chart really doesn't tell you anything you shouldn't already know; more often than not, Texas' offense is housing fools. It doesn't do it in the balanced manner expected of great offenses, but it does it nonetheless. Some of the surprisingly bad/lackluster stats (UTEP, Colorado) can be attributed to the calling off of the proverbial dogs. Against Kansas, the 'Horns were up 35-7 after three. Texas A+M was a laugher almost from the start. I would not put much stock in subpar stats in most games that ended up being blowouts.

Nonetheless, there are a few key games where Texas struggled. Texas Tech is the most obvious one. For a half, Colt McCoy by his own damn self the Texas offense was kept under wraps by a smothering Texas Tech defense, which also happens to be the second-most balanced defense in the Big 12 behind Nebraska (6th vs run, 3rd vs pass). Nevertheless, Colt McCoy put the team on his back (again) and rallied Texas to a 33-32 lead. Buttergfingers in the Texas secondary and one Play of the Year of the Week later, Texas lost, but not because of any failure from the offense. Well maybe the rush offense, which was nonexistent against a unit it should have done better against. Still, the point stands: no one has truly shut down Texas for any more than a half. The offense runs in fits and starts on occassion, but Texas' fits and starts would be Nebraska '95 in the Big Ten, ACC and yeah, the SEC this year. They're that good. Not unstoppable, but definitely difficult to slow down. Even Heacock will get a bit of a pass if he gives up 30 to these guys.

My initial assumptions about Texas' offense and offenses similar to it in the Big 10 was largely correct, but I think Penn State has a far, far better running game. It isn't one guy, for starters. Okay, that's an oversimplification. Nonetheless, no team wants it quarterback to be its leading rusher unless that team is Georgia Tech. For whatever reason, Texas could not get its rushing game unstuck against some opponents (UTEP, Okie State) and obliterated others with it (Colorado, Okie). If you want to understand how hard Texas' rushing attack is to appraise, the best rushing defense nationally it faced all year was Oklahoma, and you can see above how that worked out. But against the 44th-ranked rush D of Texas Tech, it netted 80 whopping yards (almost as many yards total offense as OSU had in the '06 title game wa-hey!) In an odd coincidence, Ohio State is ranked literally just below the Sooners in rush defense, but it can be argued that the Sooners are so good against the run because they're so bad against the pass. Like, 110th in the country bad. One thing is certain: Ohio State will be the most balanced defense the Longhorns have faced, by far.

Fortunately, Ohio State's defense versus Texas' offense will be a matchup of strength on strength in the purest terms. Literally, it's Texas' downright sick passing game versus Ohio State's very good - but not great - secondary. I fully expect Malcolm Jenkins to more or less lock down Jordan Shipley. The onus is on the rest of the secondary to limit Quan Cosby et al. as best they can. I do not think Ohio State will keep McCoy under 200 yards as it did to both Mark Sanchez and Matt Flynn, for the following reasons: His name is "Colt McCoy", ARGH SOFT ZONE BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD ARGH, and I'm not convinced either Sanchez or Flynn are half the QB McCoy is.

HOWEVA (credit to MGoBlog), there is hope. Texas' lack of a consistent rushing attack from anyone other than Colt means that if the front seven does its job against the running game, the secondary may get help from the linebackers, cutting off Texas' butter ins, outs and slant routes. This is not a great downfield passing game, but neither were LSU or Florida. But both of those teams could generate a serious rushing attack when it mattered most. I'm not sure Texas can with any consistency. If Ohio State does the impossible and shuts down the Texas passing game, the rushing game simply won't be able to make up for it, due to its own deficiencies and Ohio State's typically stellar rush D.

The difference between Ohio State and every defense Texas has played is that it actually has a living, breathing secondary, something no Big 12 team seems to have. Fun fact: Colorado was the number one pass defense in the Big 12, allowing just 215 yards a game. Arkansas was 10th in the SEC allowing 208 yards per game. What does this mean? Probably bupkis. Name one reasonably good QB in the SEC not named Stafford or Tebow. Still, if you buy into the perception that Big 12 defenses are simply atrocious as a group, your viewpoint softens a little bit. Regardless of what you believe, it's hard to argue that the Buckeye defense isn't the most balanced defense the Longhorns will play all year, and provided Heacock coaches about as well as he did versus PSU, it should keep the game from becoming yet another ugly blow out. Cross your fingers.

Personally, I'm not all that optimistic. For all the progress Jim Heacock appeared to show against Penn State, he regressed against Illinois. As you saw in the last post, Illinois basically did what it wanted with the Ohio State defense in Champaign, and was killed in the end by frequent turnovers. Illinois also had a ridiculous pass offfense and a meh rush offense, and torched the Buckeyes doing both. Illinois was starting Juice "40%" Williams, people. I don't care how much he's improved, he'll always be "40%" to me. Regardless of what you think of him, he's not Colt McCoy. Daniel Dufrene is not Chris Ogbonnaya. Arrelious Benn is probably not Jordan Shipley or Quan Cosby, though Arrelious was quite limited against the Buckeyes. Still, I don't think Heacock has learned much if at all. I'll be surprised if Ohio State's defense, as good as it may seem, holds Texas under 30 points if it again deploys the same defensive game plan it did in every big game prior to the one against Penn State. Then again, maybe Heacock has some voodoo over Mack Brown, because even with Vince Young, Limas Sweed, Selvin Young et al. Texas was only able to score 25 points on Ohio State in 2005, and 7 in McCoy's first (important) start as a Longhorn. Maybe Heacock has pictures of Mack Brown making a blumpkin pie with a goat that he'll release if Mack ever beats us by more than three. Or something. The prognosis is still not good. I'll believe - hesitantly - in Heacock again if he can actually gameplan to stop this offense.

Sittin' on top of the world, part 1

The first in a three part series about - you guessed it - the last three years of Ohio State football

November 18, 2006. If you're an Ohio State fan and that date does not resonate with you in some way, you are dead to me, and the rest of the fan base. Number one versus number two, two evenly matched, excellent teams trading body blows for four quarters and the good guys emerging victorious. I was sitting there, Section 10B, row 13, seat 35, both arms raised in the air in a show of absolute joy - all my doubts, fears, and questions about the team erased with this one seemingly final triumph - as Antonio Pittman took the ball left for a first down, defiantly raising his muscular arm into the air and extending his index finger into the crisp autumn Columbus air. Only one more game to go and then we can officially call this the golden era of Ohio State football.

I was also there, couch, middle of my living room, Worthington, Ohio on January 8th, 2007, when the courage of men failed. When we forsook our friends and broke all bonds of fellowship. An hour of wolves and shattered shields when the age of men came crashing down.

Alright, it wasn't that bad. But nonetheless, the dream season came to an end with both the deadening bang of 41-14 and the whimper of David Patterson crying on the sidelines. 22 angry alligators swallowed up the Book of Dreams before the last page could be written. I bear Florida no grudges - they took advantage of our weaknesses and played to their strengths. Despite what people say about them, the Gator fans who lived in Columbus showed a lot of class with their win, even when the final score essentially demanded a heavy round of razzing for their Ohio State fan friends. I can't say I wouldn't have talked occasional shit to them had the score been reversed, though I know I would have done it facetiously.

The ensuing offseason was an odd one. 41-14 was the 4114lb gorilla in the room, taking a giant dump all over great memories from the win at Texas and Buckageddon and flinging monstrous flecks of shit at optimism for the upcoming season, which looked to be a year of heavy rebuilding before the big one in 2008.

But there was an undeniable seed planted. Whatever worked against a down Big Ten and a rebuilding Texas didn't work - like, at all - against a Florida team that struggled to put away basically everyone it played. Florida walked into Tempe and beat #1 Ohio State, with Troy, Teddy Ballgame, Gonzo, Little Animal, MJ, Alex Boone, and Beanie freaking Wells by as much as it had beaten Southern Miss (Dr. S, if you're reading this, I mean no offense). While many fans were willing to call the game a fluke, blaming it on Troy Smith and his tasty cheeseburgers, and the offensive line and their tasty baconchocolatecakecoronoarystravaganzas, and the general fact that most of the time no one gives a team a change in a game, said chance-less team comes out and after four quarters, all of the favored's team base are belong to them. Personally, I didn't know what to think. My Scout and Rivals-addled 17 year old brain called it was "a fluke", insisting that 9 times out of ten Ohio State would win that game. This is what Scout does to you, people. That is your brain on Scout. I stopped reading and contributing consistently to Scout the day after the championship game. I couldn't bring myself to stop reading and posting altogether until sometime in the next season, unfortunately.

2006 ended in disappointment. 2007 didn't have much promise, being a rebuilding year with seemingly tough games at Penn State and Michigan. If there was any time to be fatalistic about the team if not the program, this was probably it. I missed the boat. I didn't think the team would be great, but I didn't think the program was dead either. Just another 10-2 season and a BCS game, no?