There was an interesting set of posts over at CGB about how many games the Bears will win in 2010 and they got feedback from everyone asking what they thought the percentage chance that the Bears win each game from a bunch of people. End result was that the consensus was 8-4 with a likely loss to USC, 50-50 shot at Oregon, Oregon State, Arizona and UW (slightly better than that for UW, but close enough), accounting for 2 losses, and us likely losing to one of ASU, UCLA, Stanford or Nevada (i.e. a 75% chance of beating each). That more or less get’s one 8-4.

That felt about right to me. Then just because I was trying to escape the pile of work in front of me I watched both the Stanford and Arizona highlights that Danzig and crew put together and I think I’m a lot more optimistic on this season. Let me break it down:

I’ll concede the loss to USC and the 50/50 on both Oregon and Arizona. That gets us two losses. But here’s what I can say with confidence is NOT going to happen, in order of my confidence:

1. We’re not going to lose to ASU in Berkeley. No way, no how. That team has nothing of note to build on and things just look ugly for the “getting too tired” Erickson. Looks like 2007 was his last hurrah and even that was a heavily schedule aided hurrah.
2. We’re not going to lose to UCLA in Berkeley. 95% sure of that. We beat them in Pasadena last year to break the curse and they haven’t beat us in Berkeley going back a LONG ways, even including some Holmoe time. Add to that history that they’ve only got slightly more going for them than ASU and it’s just not going to happen.
3. UW is the most over appreciated team in the conference and the reason is that they beat Cal at the end of the season. If they had lost that game, nobody would think them any better than UCLA or ASU. But they beat Cal in a game the Bears never showed up for. That’s there entire resume minus beating a WAY over confident USC who was without their QB early in the season and Arizona having players who’s shoes shoot the ball 15 feet in the air. By the time they get to Berkeley after Thanksgiving having been beaten down with their tough road schedule and still having no hope of bowl eligibility, the Bears will handle them easily, particularly after the cautionary tale of 2009. Call me 90% confident of that win.

So that leaves Stanford, Nevada and Oregon State. To be fair, I could see the Bears losing two of those, but in the end I don’t think it’s going to happen. A loss to OSU is the most likely but something says to me that the OSU run of over-achieving has ended and the Bears will be hungry. Nevada is likely over-feared by Bear fans, which is a good thing, but the Bears notoriously do well during the non-conference games. That leaves only Stanford, which I think 7-1 vs. 1-2 speaks volumes for. Stanford is my #2 for most over-ranked team in the conference. Everyone will be onto their shtick in 2010 and Toby was more important than people realize. Luck won’t be so lucky in 2010.

So from my vantage point, they lose one of those three games, not two, and this is a 9-3 team, with upsides to 10-2 and 8-4 being the floor of acceptability.

Going back to the Stanford and Arizona videos. I really believe that Vereen is a better running back for the Cal system than Best. Best was spectacular, but he didn’t “grind it out”, which is what Tedford wants from his run game. I think the O-Line responded better to Vereen than they did to Best, not because they didn’t like Best (Best was dearly loved by the whole team), but because Vereen was the sort of back that got their testosterone pumping. His style had them hitting harder and playing harder. And that helped Riley too on the passing downs. That’s what I saw in those videos and I think it’s the key to 2010.

Add that to a new defensive scheme that won’t hang our secondary out to dry and a number of the weaker areas of the last couple years having a bit more experience on them, and I’m more optimistic than most.

So if we’re going to do an over/under for the 2010 season and 8-4 is the benchmark, put my money firmly on the over side. I don’t have delusions of a Rose Bowl run (OK, maybe in that part of me that’s truly delusional), but I do think this Cal Bear team is better than people think.

I thought as a Cal fan I had seen some huge non-conference eggs laid, but Oregon takes the cake. Tennessee ‘06? Maryland ‘08? Air Force ‘02? All were noble efforts compared to Oregon today. ZERO 1st downs in the 1st half? Only one TD? Remarkably bad performance.

But mark my words. Just as Cal went on to win 7 straight after Tennessee ‘06, don’t count Oregon out yet. This could be a huge motivator for them. There’s still talent on this team and we’re about to find out if Chip Kelly knows how to be a head coach.

One final thing… I think what LeGarrette Blount, Oregon’s running back did at the end of the game was completely inexcusable. That was not some off-hand punch, that was a hard, completely intentional punt that was just BARELY provoked. Completely unacceptable. Then he can’t even get himself under control after that and lets the ribbing from the fans get so under his skin it took at gang of staff to hold him back, and not just for a few seconds, for MINUTES!?!

Blount should be suspended by the NCAA for at least a few games and I think Chip Kelly should seriously consider kicking him off the team permanently. What does everyone else think (answer the poll)?

UPDATE on 9-4-09 at 2:45 PM: Blount has been suspended for the season. He’ll get to practice with the team and participate in team activities, but won’t be able to dress/play. I think that’s a sufficient penalty. It might be a mistake to let a cancerous person stay around the team, but the penalty is reasonable. It shows the University doesn’t take this lightly.

OK, before I get too deep into this, I’d better start with a disclaimer: I suspect there was many a year when Stanford was getting the shaft in this agreement. That said…

I read this article about revenue sharing for the Big Game and it really bugged me.

Turns out Cal and Stanford equally share the revenue from every Big Game, both home and away.

It’s not even the smaller stadium part that bugs me, it’s the number of fans. So in 2005, when there were 50k Cal fans and 35k Standford fans in the old Stanford stadium, Stanford got half the money!?! And the next year when there were 55k Cal fans and 15k Stanford fans in Memorial Stadium, Stanford STILL got half!?!

It’s one thing when a stadium doesn’t hold many people and that’s the limitation on how much revenue one can bring in, at least then the school that is benefitting is living under their own limitations the rest of the season. But it’s something else entirely when one school brings at least two-thirds of the fans every year and only gets half the money. Heck, if anything, I think the arrangement is more fair with the smaller Stanford stadium when they’re at least bringing 35k to Cal’s 15k when the game is in Palo Alto.

In any case… no big deal, just thought it was worth a quick rant.

Ragnarok over at The California Golden blogs has a good post about turnovers and winning percentage. Everything he says, minus a portion of his conclusion, is dead on accurate. There’s no better way to lose a game than turning of the ball and no better way to win a game that protecting it well. But Ragnarok makes a conclusion from it that I wouldn’t (the part in bold):

Still, despite the last two games, Cal still leads the Pac-10 with 18 turnovers recovered and a +7 turnover margin, and their 11 turnovers given up is tied for the fewest in the conference with Oregon, Arizona State, and Stanford. (Really? Stanford leads the conference in something?) This should give us hope going forward that Cal remains a team that is both able to take care of the ball on offense and create takeaways on defense. If this is indeed the case, I like the Bears chances to win Pac-10 games down the stretch (especially against USC, which has coughed up the ball 17 times this season and has a -4 turnover margin).

To be clear about what I’m saying, I completely agree that I think Cal has a big upside in that it has a history of taking care of the football and if they can get back to that trend, the Bears have a great shot at absolutely dominanting the majority of their remaining games. What I don’t agree about is that USC is vulnerable because of their past bad turnover performance.

While I completely understand his perspective, the way I see it, the teams with a high turnover ratio are the ones to fear, not the ones to be confident about. In my view of the world turnovers are mistakes more than 90% of the time, instead of being induced by good defenses (although there is no doubt that the best defenses find a way to force them) or even overall weakness of the team making the mistakes. Mistakes can be corrected much easier than an undersized offensive line or poor conditioning. Running backs can be taught to better hold onto the ball. Quarterbacks can be taught to avoid bad throwing situations. It’s much harder to tell a player to “run faster!” As such, a team that has losses because of turnovers is a team that if they clean up their act may have the potential to be VERY strong.

As evidence of this I present to you a quote from my Rivals Oregon State preview:

The other meaningful statistic is the 3.8 turnovers per game the Beavers are giving up. Of course this statistic is a bad one for Oregon State fans, but it should also be a warning to Bears fans that Oregon State could be playing a lot better football without the mistakes. In Oregon State’s other blowout loss outside of UCLA, a non-conference romp by Cincinnati, Oregon State turned the ball over 9 times including 6 interceptions, a fumble and two special teams mistakes including a blocked punt for a touchdown.

There is no question that Oregon State will be unable to win this game if they continue to make mistakes like they did against Cincinnati. However, if they can reduce those mistakes, something that can be more easily fixed in practice than an undersized offensive line or a slow set of defensive backs, the Beavers might just have a shot at upsetting the Bears.

We all know how that turned out…

So for me, when I see that ASU hasn’t turned the ball over much and is winning their games that says to me that they’re more vulnerable than their final results indicate… they’re a few mistakes away from some big upsets but when USC has a horrible turnover ratio it says to me that this a VERY dangerous team if they can get their act together. Said another way, USC is a couple of turnovers away from being undefeated and #1 in the country. That makes me really nervous come November 10th.

Thanks for the birthday present, Jim Harbaugh. And I didn’t get you anything.

I was reading the various articles on the upcoming matchup and I saw that Tennessee is actually going to use the no-huddle pretty much all day versus Cal. I had seen in previous articles that they were toying with using it as far back as spring practice but I had never thought they were going to convert the whole offense to it.

Perhaps this is all a bluff or over-emphasis of a much smaller change but if Tennessee ever starts busting out the no-huddle, us Cal fans need to consider it a life-changingly important moment to scream at the top of our lungs. I’m not talking the regular “Ooooooooooo” and stuff. I’m talking that deep bowel voice combined with ear piercing wail that we managed to generate versus Oregon last October.

Listen, it’s no secret that SEC fans in general and Tennessee fans in particular think us Cal fans are weak. Saturday we have a chance to prove them wrong. Bring your A-Game voice.