Post spring ball comments
I don't think we've learned all that much during this spring ball season. Obviously Cal has solved it's QB problem, even though we don't really know who that exact person is at the moment. The offense in general looks more cohesive, but still lacks the ability to 'take over' a game. Many feel that once Bigelow returns that will change, but I really don't see it. This offensive line will not 'take control' of the LOS. Something that Stanfurd seems to do recently. The defense seems ok, and it appears that the front 7 are pretty good. We really won't know if that is true because all we've seen so far is the strongest defensive unit go against the weakest unit (OL) on the entire Cal team. Then there is the question about numbers. Cal couldn't even play 4 qtrs because of the lack of personnel. Do we really expect to bolster this team effectively with incoming frosh? It's easy to point the finger at injuries an' all but that's going to happen during the regular season as well.
A comment from a family friend that is a former player that watched the B&G game was that Cal now has a QB, but in his words'it's going to be a long season'. He predicts 4-8. I'm a bit more optimistic so I'm guessing more like 5-7 and with luck Cal may go 7-5. Not earth shaking but Cal is on the road back. It's just a longer road than most of us want.

GoCal1;842106169 said:

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Post spring ball comments
I don't think we've learned all that much during this spring ball season. Obviously Cal has solved it's QB problem, even though we don't really know who that exact person is at the moment. The offense in general looks more cohesive, but still lacks the ability to 'take over' a game. Many feel that once Bigelow returns that will change, but I really don't see it. This offensive line will not 'take control' of the LOS. Something that Stanfurd seems to do recently. The defense seems ok, and it appears that the front 7 are pretty good. We really won't know if that is true because all we've seen so far is the strongest defensive unit go against the weakest unit (OL) on the entire Cal team. Then there is the question about numbers. Cal couldn't even play 4 qtrs because of the lack of personnel. Do we really expect to bolster this team effectively with incoming frosh? It's easy to point the finger at injuries an' all but that's going to happen during the regular season as well.
A comment from a family friend that is a former player that watched the B&G game was that Cal now has a QB, but in his words'it's going to be a long season'. He predicts 4-8. I'm a bit more optimistic so I'm guessing more like 5-7 and with luck Cal may go 7-5. Not earth shaking but Cal is on the road back. It's just a longer road than most of us want.

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The holes in this team are evident.

The Bears will not quit.

:gobears:

The O-line is still obviously a work in progress. I don't believe all our issues at QB are solved either, but if we can get some consistency out of that position it'd be a step further. Whoever starts hasn't taken a snap at the D1 level, and whoever backs him up hasn't either. We need someone to get comfortable in a hurry, and if they're running for their lives I imagine we'll be seeing a lot of passes that remind us of old QBs. We're razor thin at DB also which is very scary since its something teams will plan on attacking I believe.

I do believe that SonnyD and crew will be more creative and plan around the lack of pass protection with quicker plays/reads and hopefully we can keep the D offbalance enough to open up some running. I'm not so concerned with the record as I am with how we get there. Moral victories in year 10 of a program don't exist, but I think at year 1 of a new system we might have to rely on a few of those to get us through the year.

Too many guys were hurt. So, we can't tell yet. But, it does point out the depth issue. Frosh not likely to help, though last year's frosh group could contribute. Need to heal up though for certain, and make sure the injuries are not due to conditioning routines. Once a starter is named at QB, or even if two are, at some point the confidence will emerge and leadership will also. Could come from defensive standouts and competence, too. Certainly Bigelow Lasco McCain others can step up and the coaches seem smart enough to figure it out such that we can be more than competitive, though I also agree based on what we have seen we need people to step up and get that toughness, culture of winning and just plain knowing we are good AND will win.

GoCal1;842106169 said:

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Post spring ball comments
I don't think we've learned all that much during this spring ball season. Obviously Cal has solved it's QB problem, even though we don't really know who that exact person is at the moment. The offense in general looks more cohesive, but still lacks the ability to 'take over' a game. Many feel that once Bigelow returns that will change, but I really don't see it. This offensive line will not 'take control' of the LOS. Something that Stanfurd seems to do recently. The defense seems ok, and it appears that the front 7 are pretty good. We really won't know if that is true because all we've seen so far is the strongest defensive unit go against the weakest unit (OL) on the entire Cal team. Then there is the question about numbers. Cal couldn't even play 4 qtrs because of the lack of personnel. Do we really expect to bolster this team effectively with incoming frosh? It's easy to point the finger at injuries an' all but that's going to happen during the regular season as well.
A comment from a family friend that is a former player that watched the B&G game was that Cal now has a QB, but in his words'it's going to be a long season'. He predicts 4-8. I'm a bit more optimistic so I'm guessing more like 5-7 and with luck Cal may go 7-5. Not earth shaking but Cal is on the road back. It's just a longer road than most of us want.

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5-7 love your optimism and thats not a road back to anything. asking this team to make a bowl is not too much.

I'd expect 5-7 from Tedford.

tommie317;842106449 said:

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I'd expect 5-7 from Tedford.

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If you believe that you haven't learned much. Even so, that's not saying much. This team and staff is in a transition. Tedford would not have been. Remember that Bridgford would likely be QBing behind a porous OL. So far Bridgford is 0-3 in such circumstances. Where does Bridgford get 5 victories with from our 2013 schedule? Under Tedford I'd expect about the same as last year or possibly 4-8. The difference is that many of the 8 losses would be blowouts. I doubt we will get blown out next year by anyone other than Oregon.

Another reason folks are "pessimistic" is the schedule. I don't expect Cal to be good enough to upset a top 25 team next year. Cal could be facing 8 such teams next year. Although not all of them will reach the preseason top 25.
Northwestern
Ohio St.
@Oregon
USC
@Washington
Oregon St.
@UCLA
@Stanford

It is possible we could knock off one of these, but it is equally possible that we could lose to Arizona, WSU or @ Colorado.

tommie317;842106449 said:

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I'd expect 5-7 from Tedford.

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Really? Does BigBucks have another HC gig?

GoCal1;842106169 said:

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Post spring ball comments
I don't think we've learned all that much during this spring ball season. Obviously Cal has solved it's QB problem, even though we don't really know who that exact person is at the moment. The offense in general looks more cohesive, but still lacks the ability to 'take over' a game. Many feel that once Bigelow returns that will change, but I really don't see it. This offensive line will not 'take control' of the LOS. Something that Stanfurd seems to do recently. The defense seems ok, and it appears that the front 7 are pretty good. We really won't know if that is true because all we've seen so far is the strongest defensive unit go against the weakest unit (OL) on the entire Cal team. Then there is the question about numbers. Cal couldn't even play 4 qtrs because of the lack of personnel. Do we really expect to bolster this team effectively with incoming frosh? It's easy to point the finger at injuries an' all but that's going to happen during the regular season as well.
A comment from a family friend that is a former player that watched the B&G game was that Cal now has a QB, but in his words'it's going to be a long season'. He predicts 4-8. I'm a bit more optimistic so I'm guessing more like 5-7 and with luck Cal may go 7-5. Not earth shaking but Cal is on the road back. It's just a longer road than most of us want.

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I agree with your assessment although I hope I'm wrong.

The team is so plagued with injuries, a factor the Tedford did mention last year. Everybody is discovering that Dykes is not "god" after all.

Dykes does have a simpler offense system that allows all QBs, new and seasoned, a chance to shine, and Goff is taking advantage of that. What remains to be seen is whether this system is "sophisticated" enough to win against the superior Pac-12 teams. I hope that it does. I like the fact that (1) it's simpler so hopefully stupid mistakes are reduced, and (2) it's faster so the opponent defenses get worn down faster.

I also think that Dykes this year is better than Tedford last year just because he got to assemble his coaching staff from scratch, and his assistants seem more hungry and more cohesive with each other. Tedford had that advantage in the beginning but when he got successful and staff began to depart, it's harder to re-assemble a coaching staff that actually like each other. I think other schools had the same problem, like PC at USC later years.

we have 8 win talent. im not going to back off that and lower my expectations. oregon is the only team in the league that has someone as explosive as bigelow. we also have a lot of talent at the WR and actually have decent talent on the oline, just our most talented guys are young. qb should be better and hopefully we'll actually use rodgers this year. our front 7 is strong and at least our 2 deep in the secondary is strong, but they need to stay healthy.
this team by all means should not roll over to anyone, top 25 or not. theres good talent and enough good talent to win now.

GoCal1;842106169 said:

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Post spring ball comments
I don't think we've learned all that much during this spring ball season. Obviously Cal has solved it's QB problem, even though we don't really know who that exact person is at the moment. The offense in general looks more cohesive, but still lacks the ability to 'take over' a game. Many feel that once Bigelow returns that will change, but I really don't see it. This offensive line will not 'take control' of the LOS. Something that Stanfurd seems to do recently. The defense seems ok, and it appears that the front 7 are pretty good. We really won't know if that is true because all we've seen so far is the strongest defensive unit go against the weakest unit (OL) on the entire Cal team. Then there is the question about numbers. Cal couldn't even play 4 qtrs because of the lack of personnel. Do we really expect to bolster this team effectively with incoming frosh? It's easy to point the finger at injuries an' all but that's going to happen during the regular season as well.
A comment from a family friend that is a former player that watched the B&G game was that Cal now has a QB, but in his words'it's going to be a long season'. He predicts 4-8. I'm a bit more optimistic so I'm guessing more like 5-7 and with luck Cal may go 7-5. Not earth shaking but Cal is on the road back. It's just a longer road than most of us want.

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Disappointing in the wake of what Mora pulled off at UCLA...

Lets see..... None of the qbs have taken a snap in a real game yet and they will only improve over time. We were without our best te, best wr and two best rbs. And people are making predictions based on the spring game?

ducky23;842106723 said:

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Lets see..... None of the qbs have taken a snap in a real game yet and they will only improve over time. We were without our best te, best wr and two best rbs. And people are making predictions based on the spring game?

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The sky is falling. The sky is falling! The sky is falling!

Fire Sonny! All is lost!

So it looks like Tedford had a good reason for not opening practices.
He was not worried about other coaches; he was worried about the BearInsider posters.

:facepalm:cry::headbangork:

To avoid any confusion..... I agree with Ducky

Actually we don't have 8 win talent on the OL. If Cal did have a good OL I could see 7-10 wins, but as it stands now this is the weak point on this team. All I could see this spring is 1 P12 quality lineman at this point. That's not to say some may step forward but this unit needs time and I don't think 5 months is going to do it. As for my point of view, I'm not trying to be optimistic or pessimistic...just realistic. It's actually a lot easier to replace a QB than a group of 9 rotational players that need lots more work (assuming any amount of work can even fix a particular problem)

I think we have 4 win talent on the o line. I'm cautiously optimistic about Dykes and there's enough talent on the rest of the roster so I think 6 wins is reasonable.

GoCal1;842106169 said:

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Cal couldn't even play 4 qtrs because of the lack of personnel. Do we really expect to bolster this team effectively with incoming frosh? It's easy to point the finger at injuries an' all but that's going to happen during the regular season as well.

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The problem was that we had 3 linebackers go down at the beginning of the practice and then the entire defense was left with 3 LBs to play against the offense (Sonny said this last night at the event in OC). It's kind of unreasonable to expect those 3 to play the entire 1.5 hours with no plays/possessions off. LB is our deepest position and there is no point in pushing an injury in spring ball anyway.

Your comment is a huge over exaggeration and lacks perspective.

Urso27;842106836 said:

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The problem was that we had 3 linebackers go down at the beginning of the practice and then the entire defense was left with 3 LBs to play against the offense (Sonny said this last night at the event in OC). It's kind of unreasonable to expect those 3 to play the entire 1.5 hours with no plays/possessions off. LB is our deepest position and there is no point in pushing an injury in spring ball anyway.

Your comment is a huge over exaggeration and lacks perspective.

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I think if Dykes really wanted to play a full spring game, he could have moved Camporeale and Kragen to LB temporarily. I think the real reason he changed the scrimmage was because he was concerned about further injury and to allow folks time to get to the Cal BB game. He needed an excuse to tell the media since it was being televised.

I don't know how folks can assess that the QB position will be better from watching practice. We never saw Maynard in practice. The only real comparison is the 2 spring games. I see very little difference in QB play between last year's and this year's spring game.

The difference at QB this year will largely depend on skills that won't be known until Cal plays real games. A quarterback has to be able to make plays when no play is immediately available. Many of the QBs that beat Cal last year did it largely by making plays after avoiding a rush or by throwing very accurate passes into coverage. IOW they did it by beating a good Cal D. And they did it by doing that consistently for most of 4 quarters. I have no idea if any of our QBs are at that level yet. I trust that, with game experience, they will get there.

I like Hinder's instincts avoiding pressure but he resorts to the run too quickly, failing to make plays downfield while moving out of the pocket.

Kline does all things well some of the time, but virtually nothing well all of the time.

Goff could be the guy, if he adds weight and shows he can withstand getting hit by Pac-12 D-linemen and blitzing LBs.

In any case, I hope no QB transfers because we are going to need our back-ups after the starters get knocked around and need a rest. That is my assessment of the quality of our OL. Even if our OL improves a good deal by September, they will still be vulnerable to the defensive talent they will be facing.

gobears725;842106447 said:

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5-7 love your optimism and thats not a road back to anything. asking this team to make a bowl is not too much.

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Dykes is a good coach but he's not a miracle worker. He took over a 4-8 team at LaTech and made them a 5-7 team in his first year. Then he improved to 8-4 and 9-3, a nice improvement. I think we're kidding ourselves though if we expect the type of turnaround that gets us to a bowl game in our first year. Would love to be wrong about that but I se something around .500 or a win shy of it.

heartofthebear;842106670 said:

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If you believe that you haven't learned much. Even so, that's not saying much. This team and staff is in a transition. Tedford would not have been. Remember that Bridgford would likely be QBing behind a porous OL. So far Bridgford is 0-3 in such circumstances. Where does Bridgford get 5 victories with from our 2013 schedule? Under Tedford I'd expect about the same as last year or possibly 4-8. The difference is that many of the 8 losses would be blowouts. I doubt we will get blown out next year by anyone other than Oregon.

Another reason folks are "pessimistic" is the schedule. I don't expect Cal to be good enough to upset a top 25 team next year. Cal could be facing 8 such teams next year. Although not all of them will reach the preseason top 25.
Northwestern
Ohio St.
@Oregon
USC
@Washington
Oregon St.
@UCLA
@Stanford

It is possible we could knock off one of these, but it is equally possible that we could lose to Arizona, WSU or @ Colorado.

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I say 5-7 and you call me out and counter with 4-8? Lets not go out on a limb here

This thread gives a lot of credibility to the "don't open practices" crowd. The reason it looks like the sky is falling is because it's SPRING PRACTICE.

Yes, things look ugly out there. That's because you're watching sausage being made on the field. If everything was running perfectly and Dykes didn't have a lot of work to do, one would have to ask why we hired a new coach in the first place.

Are we going to have some depth issues next season? Yes. Are there any Pac 12 teams out there who don't have some depth issues next season? Maybe Oregon and Furd. Is the overall talent considerably better or worse than the rest of the Pac 12? Likely a cut below Oregon, Furd and SC, a cut above a couple teams and pretty much even with the rest.

So basically, like every other coach, Dykes is going to have to balance his team's strengths and weaknesses and put together the most effective gameplan given what tools he has at his disposal. We saw a lot of weaknesses on display in the spring, as one would expect. Spring is about installing the system and evaluating personnel, it's not about showcasing your "A Game."

The difference is we didn't see this process when JT was coach and this is Dykes' first season here. The team we see in the fall won't look very much like the team we saw at the spring game. It's far too early to predict next season.

BeachyBear;842106984 said:

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This thread gives a lot of credibility to the "don't open practices" crowd. The reason it looks like the sky is falling is because it's SPRING PRACTICE.

Yes, things look ugly out there. That's because you're watching sausage being made on the field. If everything was running perfectly and Dykes didn't have a lot of work to do, one would have to ask why we hired a new coach in the first place.

Are we going to have some depth issues next season? Yes. Are there any Pac 12 teams out there who don't have some depth issues next season? Maybe Oregon and Furd. Is the overall talent considerably better or worse than the rest of the Pac 12? Likely a cut below Oregon, Furd and SC, a cut above a couple teams and pretty much even with the rest.

So basically, like every other coach, Dykes is going to have to balance his team's strengths and weaknesses and put together the most effective gameplan given what tools he has at his disposal. We saw a lot of weaknesses on display in the spring, as one would expect. Spring is about installing the system and evaluating personnel, it's not about showcasing your "A Game."

The difference is we didn't see this process when JT was coach and this is Dykes' first season here. The team we see in the fall won't look very much like the team we saw at the spring game. It's far too early to predict next season.

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only with JT sometimes it felt like the opposite, the team we saw in the spring game is the team i wanted to see in the fall