Frustrated with my fellow Cal fans today
(Written by kencraw)
I’ll have my OTRH podcast up tomorrow morning, but I wanted to make a comment in the mean time:
GET A HOLD OF YOURSELVES!?!
I’m frustrated too, but what I’m seeing on the various Cal sites today is bothersome to me. Dykes made reasonable calls taking the points instead of going for it on 4th down. At the end of the game, yeah, they were surrender punts and kickoffs, but guess what, the game was ALREADY surrendered at that point. (Anybody here really think Cal was going to recover two consecutive onside kicks and score 2 TD’s with 1:50 left?)
My point is overall Dykes was reasonably aggressive. He went for it on 4th down a handful of well chosen times. Those 9 points made it so Cal was within a score in the 4th quarter. Yes, Cal would have had a much better shot at winning had a couple of those field-goals been touchdowns, but that should be blamed on bad catches, bad throws, or if someone would like to put in the effort to prove it, bad play calls on 1st through 3rd down.
Cal needed two things Saturday: Better redzone execution and a defense that could hold a tough rushing team for 4 quarters.
Dykes lack of aggressive play-calling wasn’t the problem.
November 23rd, 2015 at 7:15 pm
A lot folks were going nuts over this. I think they’re starting to calm down now.
November 24th, 2015 at 2:32 pm
I agree that people are a little out of control . . . and that the chances of scoring 2 touchdowns in 1:50 are miniscule. But, wouldn’t you agree that it’s a bad look to simply surrender?
November 24th, 2015 at 2:39 pm
Eh. Both yes and no. I was expecting an on-side kick and I definitely wouldn’t have faulted it. I probably would have gone for the on-side kick, (why not, right?) so I guess yes I agree with you.
But at the same time, I’m not going to fault him for accepting reality at that point.
November 25th, 2015 at 11:00 am
I disagree here, Ken. You can’t play like that when you are an underdog against the 11th ranked team in the country. ESPECIALLY not against your rival. You play to win, and you have to take chances. Dykes was playing to not lose by a lot. This is a pattern he has set since the Utah game. I will never forget when he punted on that 4th and short in that game and Goff hung is head in shame. Nothing Dykes has done since then has changed my mind about him and how he manages games. And the surrender stuff at the end? Just ridiculous. Set such a bad example of 18-22 year olds that it’s just ok to give up when there’s still a chance, even a slight one.
Now all this being said, I don’t think Dykes should be fired. And I’m 50/50 on giving him the extension. Why? Because i have zero faith in him being replaced by someone better. The devil you know and all that. But it’s become obvious that Dykes is probably the worst coach in the PAC 12 (I’m giving the OSU guy a pass because he’s new). He still does not have an upset victory after 3 years. O-12 against our key rivals. 0-12! I don’t know what is worse: how bad Dykes is or the fact that our program is so worthless that we couldn’t get somebody better to replace him.
Sigh. It’s going to be a very long time until we see that axe again.
November 25th, 2015 at 11:39 am
To some degree it depends which decision we’re talking about joshiemac. You could get me on board with your way of thinking with the last punt and onside kick. At that point in the game, there is very little downside other than perhaps a more lopsided score of playing aggressively.
However, the earlier decision to take the points that everyone was going off the deep end about, that I feel pretty strongly that they’re wrong. What happens if we don’t convert? Then we’re down more than one score come the 4th quarter. People don’t often enough think about the consequences of missing on a low percentage play.
The Bears were in a position to win entering the 4th quarter in part because Dykes took the points earlier in the game.