2008 NCAA Football Thread

[Badger]

Possibly, not likely though.

[Fran]

It wasn't likely back in 2004; and that team and coach was crap.

This team will be better

(I know I'm looking back a ways, but hey, it's valid)

[E. Nygma]

I dont see it either, MSU will improve and eventually they'll get back to 8-9-10 wins. But they are going to struggle to beat the better teams in the Big 10, that includes Wisconsin.

[Fran]

Oh, I agree with that. I'm not saying that MSU will be a BCS team next year, but it is a possibility in 2-3 years.

I want eight wins next year, I think it can happen. The team was literally so close to being 12-0, if they could just finish a game and play sixty minutes of football, that would have happened.

[E. Nygma]

Originally Posted by Fran

Oh, I agree with that. I'm not saying that MSU will be a BCS team next year, but it is a possibility in 2-3 years.

I want eight wins next year, I think it can happen. The team was literally so close to being 12-0, if they could just finish a game and play sixty minutes of football, that would have happened.

Well they've had that problem for several years. No need to mention that MSU-ND game a few years ago.

[Fran]

I actually have confidence in this coach, though.

I had a feeling that ND would win that game in 2006, even though we were beating the hell out of them.

[Badger]

Originally Posted by Fran

It wasn't likely back in 2004; and that team and coach was crap.

This team will be better

(I know I'm looking back a ways, but hey, it's valid)

That is certainly a swing game for both teams. The play like they did in Madison and the Badgers will lose.

[Fran]

Yeah, that is a "make-or-break" type game.

[Immortalfire]

Steve Slaton declares for draft... http://sports.yahoo.com/ncaaf/news;_...v=ap&type=lgns

[E. Nygma]

no surprise there, although if Slaton had come back WVU would march right through to the BCS game.

[Fran]

I keep getting a Bobby Williams vibe from WVU's hiring of Stewart.

[Immortalfire]

Darren McFadden declares for draft.. http://sports.yahoo.com/ncaaf/news;_...v=ap&type=lgns

[E. Nygma]

again, no surprise.

McFadden is by far the best RB declaring and will be rewarded because of it.

[Fran]

McFadden is raw talent.

[Mister J]

McFadden brings that wood.

[StorminNorman]

Originally Posted by E. Nygma

no surprise there, although if Slaton had come back WVU would march right through to the BCS game.

...

...

...hardly.

Was there a running back in the country more overrated than Slaton?

[Byrd Man]

Originally Posted by StorminNorman

Was there a running back in the country more overrated than Slaton?

Thomas Brown?

[Badger]

Originally Posted by E. Nygma

no surprise there, although if Slaton had come back WVU would march right through to the BCS game.

Do you try to make off-the-wall statements or does it just come naturally?

[E. Nygma]

Originally Posted by Badger

Do you try to make off-the-wall statements or does it just come naturally?

why, you dont think Steve Slaton, Patt White and the Sophmore Noel Devine could carry a team that ALMOST went to the title game there next year? Even without Rodriguez.....

[Excel]

Based on what I have seen, I would take Jonathan Stewart from Oregon ahead of McFadden if your looking for a straight up running back. 25 pounds bigger and more compact then DMC but only .06 slower in his 40.

Originally Posted by StorminNorman

Was there a running back in the country more overrated than Slaton?

Nope. Slaton earned his buzz with his amazing season last year, but this year he sucked. He may have gotten carried away with his success last year; he aint run-dmc.

why, you dont think Steve Slaton, Patt White and the Sophmore Noel Devine could carry a team that ALMOST went to the title game there next year? Even without Rodriguez.....

Slaton would be so ineffective next year it would even be funny. Noel Devine is my pick for the Heisman next season.

[Fran]

Javon Ringer right here

[E. Nygma]

Originally Posted by Excel

Based on what I have seen, I would take Jonathan Stewart from Oregon ahead of McFadden if your looking for a straight up running back. 25 pounds bigger and more compact then DMC but only .06 slower in his 40.



Nope. Slaton earned his buzz with his amazing season last year, but this year he sucked. He may have gotten carried away with his success last year; he aint run-dmc.



Slaton would be so ineffective next year it would even be funny. Noel Devine is my pick for the Heisman next season.

Slaton and Devine would split enough carries that the WVU would be UNSTOPPABLE. I agree that Slaton isn't a feature back, if that's what you're saying.

Devine wont win the Heisman, as good as he's looked in the limited time he's seen, i dont think we should be quick to crown him just yet. Dont forget before Tim Tebow a Sophomore never won the Heisman, i fail to see Sophmores winning it back to back.

[LegendaryCaleb]

Originally Posted by E. Nygma

I dont see it either, MSU will improve and eventually they'll get back to 8-9-10 wins. But they are going to struggle to beat the better teams in the Big 10, that includes Wisconsin.

totally agree.

[Excel]

Originally Posted by E. Nygma

Slaton and Devine would split enough carries that the WVU would be UNSTOPPABLE. I agree that Slaton isn't a feature back, if that's what you're saying.

Devine wont win the Heisman, as good as he's looked in the limited time he's seen, i dont think we should be quick to crown him just yet. Dont forget before Tim Tebow a Sophomore never won the Heisman, i fail to see Sophmores winning it back to back.

Noels too quick; he is as uncontianable as they come...his ypc will drop from 9 to 7 but hell get near 300 carries. Heisman here we come!

[Fran]

Good Lord, Dick Rod.

Report: WVU player files went missing after Rodriguez took U-M job

West Virginia University said Tuesday it will investigate the disappearance of player and football program files found to be missing from the former office of ex-Mountaineers coach Rich Rodriguez.

Paperwork detailing every player on West Virginia's roster, as well as the program's activities over the past seven years, went missing between Rodriguez's resignation as coach to take over at Michigan and the team's return from the Fiesta Bowl, the Charleston (W.Va.) Gazette reported.

Mike Brown, agent for Rich Rodriguez, said Tuesday night that many of the claims made by a West Virginia athletic department source in the article are false.

After returning to work about a week ago, the staff at WVU's Puskar Center found that most of the files that had been stored in Rodriguez's office, as well as the players' strength and conditioning files in the weight room, were gone, the Gazette reported.

"It's unbelievable. Everything is gone, like it never existed,'' a source within the athletic department, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told the Gazette. "Good, bad or indifferent, we don't have a record of anything that has happened.''

Brown said that the school wouldn't need Rodriguez's copies of strength and conditioning files.

"The head coach and each assistant coach received hard copies of the strength progress," he said. "So I would think coach [Bill] Stewart and others would have those, too."

According to the source, the missing files include all of the players' personal files, which encompass contact information, scholarship money awarded, class attendance records and personal conduct records, the Gazette reported.

"If a player spoke to a school or did public service, we don't have a record of it,'' the source said, according to the newspaper. "If he broke a rule or missed class, we don't have a record of that, either. We don't have anything. All the good things these kids have done over the years, there's nothing -- not a picture of somebody speaking to a class, nothing. Why would somebody do that?''

Brown refuted that account.

"[Rodriguez] did not keep records for every player and academic records for the players are certainly on file at the school," he said

According to the report, multiple sources said several people in the Puskar Center reported seeing Rodriguez and at least one of his assistants, video coordinator Dusty Rutledge, in Rodriguez's private office shredding paperwork on Dec. 18 -- the day he returned from Ann Arbor after being named Michigan's new head coach. Those who say they witnessed the action said they either paid it no mind or did not know what was being destroyed, according to the report.

Brown said any files that are missing would be personal to Rodriguez.

"It is common knowledge that when a coach leaves a program certain items of a personal nature would always be discarded," he said.

WVU assistant athletic director Mike Fragale, reached by The Associated Press on Tuesday, declined to say what's in the files. He said the athletic department won't have any further comment until its investigation is finished.

West Virginia and Rodriguez are in the midst of a messy legal battle over his departure from Morgantown. The university is trying to recover $4 million from Rodriguez for leaving with six years remaining on his contract. Rodriguez, in turn, said West Virginia breached the contract by not fulfilling all of its terms of the deal.