jamonit;842340141 said:

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I think we are still way to young to make a bet like that. If this was 2015 I would jump all over that because we will have way more SR leadership and upperclassmen... Their is no guarantee they can get to 5 wins and I fully admit that. Are you saying by not taking my bet that you also believe their a decent chance they win over 2 games?

This would be like me saying more than 2 and you are gone for good. I don't do that because put to the sword I wouldn't get a single bet from anyone if I made that bet... Lord knows you wouldn't take it. Hell I can only get one bet as it is now. You of course won't take it. No way you would reach that close to the line of 2 wins or less which you are claiming right? You think less than 2 right? Less than 2 wins and I am gone for good and more than 2 you are gone for good. You won't take the simple bet no way you take that one... It is the same thing except I am willing to say my projection of 4-5 may be less or more. I am not screaming on every thread we will win 5 at the least kind of guy. You are a we won't win more than 2 kind of guy so back it up.

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See the thing with you Jamonit is you are making it seem like people who think we are going to win only 2 games are super negaBears who are so off. The problem is almost everyone outside of Cal + a large faction of the Cal fanbase realistically think we will win 2 games. Im a little on the optimistic side to think we can win 3-4 games but realistically, there are only 2 GAMES where I think we can win for sure.

Either way, would you not agree that anything less than 5 wins this season is an absolute failure?

Phantomfan;842340129 said:

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No, you dont understand. jamonit has been CLEAR in saying 3 wins will be a success. Negativity only comes if you think 2 wins is likely.

Bowl games are for people who dont use 3 games as the "success" mark.

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I don't think 3 wins will be a success... I think we will get at least 3 and more likely 4-5... I think 2015 is the year we will see major strides forward as we will have more proven upperclassmen playing unlike we did last year and unlike we have this year. We have something like 8 or 9 SR scholarship players TOTAL... Most teams have more in their 2 deep that we have total. That won't be the case next year. Again experience and maturity help out a huge amount when projecting football.

Cal Panda Bear;842340128 said:

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Dude, if you think we'll really BE THAT MUCH BETTER because we return more talent than other teams (which I disagree), then put your money where your mouth's at. 5+ wins, Im gone. <5 wins, you're gone.

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Only do it if he takes SonOfDykesCal with him...

Cal Panda Bear;842340143 said:

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See the thing with you Jamonit is you are making it seem like people who think we are going to win only 2 games are super negaBears who are so off. The problem is almost everyone outside of Cal + a large faction of the Cal fanbase realistically think we will win 2 games. Im a little on the optimistic side to think we can win 3-4 games but realistically, there are only 2 GAMES where I think we can win for sure.

Either way, would you not agree that anything less than 5 wins this season is an absolute failure?

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If you are a 3-4 win guy then this post isn't for you. This is for the no way we win more than 2 people. The people that think it is impossible to win more than 2 at least according to what they spew into every thread and they are going to pump that all day long. I am a 4-5 guy so in reality we aren't that far off. I don't think that makes you an optimist or me an optimist... I think with past programs all around, teams that are extremely young usually gets their butts kick. Teams that have more experience tend to do better. There are very good reasons to show that we will be more experienced by far this year assuming health. Also unlike a popular myth not every other team got better this last year. Quite a few will be worse. Does that mean we are a guarantee to win 5+ game? No of course not. In reality we are still extremely young with very few SR leadership type players. With a huge JR class I would expect this to change next year.

beeasyed;842340027 said:

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depending how he gets 6, and if he can upset a big name or two....i wouldn't be entirely opposed. as long as we don't structure it as poorly as JT's extension lol

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How about week by week?

jamonit;842340149 said:

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If you are a 3-4 win guy then this post isn't for you. This is for the no way we win more than 2 people. The people that think it is impossible to win more than 2 at least according to what they spew into every thread and they are going to pump that all day long. I am a 4-5 guy so in reality we aren't that far off. I don't think that makes you an optimist or me an optimist... I think with past programs all around, teams that are extremely young usually gets their butts kick. Teams that have more experience tend to do better. There are very good reasons to show that we will be more experienced by far this year assuming health. Also unlike a popular myth not every other team got better this last year. Quite a few will be worse. Does that mean we are a guarantee to win 5+ game? No of course not. In reality we are still extremely young with very few SR leadership type players. With a huge JR class I would expect this to change next year.

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I am neither optimistic nor pessimistic. But I am willing to write off last year as the perfect storm that it really was. And I am grateful that it at least included cleaning up our academic problems which were a greater stain on our school than any football record. So, I don't have any idea what will happen this year. But my own evaluation period starts this year, not last year.

Well, those that said we won't win more than 2 games this year are now hiding behind, "Oh, so now you think 3 wins is good?"

Nobody thinks 3 wins is good. Even most of the people who defend Sonny are on the fence about him. Another lousy season is definitely grounds for dismissal. However, I still feel he needs this season (or at least half of it) to turn it around.

Regardless, if you want these XXXXX who can't stand behind their trashing of the coaching staff, maybe you should up it to 4 wins and make the time period more fair.

2 or less wins, you are banned from posting for however long
3 wins = draw
4+ wins = those willing to take the bet are banned from posting for the same amount of time you would be

jamonit;842339965 said:

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I am so tired of the horrible negativity on this site. So many people I believe are just talking negative to just vent or cause trouble. If you truly believe we won't win more than 2 games lets make a bet. Put your negative posting where your fingers are.

If Cal wins 2 games or less I won't post for a month for every 5 takers, 2 months for every 10, 3 months for every 15, and so on.... (I am amending this to say if I can get 5 in I will do a minimum of 3 months which is needed to apparently make this not one-sided)

If Cal does win 3 or more games you can't post for the rest of the season. The second they hit their 3rd win that is it no more posting until the last game.

Here is the thing. Some of you act like you know we have no chance and last year is going to repeat itself. You don't want to see maybe why we had problems and if we have improved those. I am tired of all the people coming onto every thread and spewing this negative crap and I am willing to put my belief that we will win over 3 games on the line... So who here is so firm in their belief that we will win 2 or less games like they are claiming in every thread?

I am betting when put to the sword no one will take the bet.

GB54 is the first to take the bet... One in.

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1. Name all these people who said we couldn't win more than 2. I don't think many have said that. Now you go after the strawman and act like people won't step up like courageous you who is willing to bet we win three whole games. If you have someone specific in mind who said we wouldn't win more than 2, take it up with them specifically.

2. Sac State, CU, NW, BYU, and WSU suck. We should win those games in our sleep. Only winning 3 is unacceptable.

3. Why would I want you to stop posting? First of all, if I were petty, I'd rather you post over and over how wrong you were and how maybe people who were upset about the state of the program were good fans with a point instead of just being a-holes as you seem to believe. In reality though, this board is made by people with opinions. I have no desire to stifle your opinion. In fact, I'd like you to keep on expressing it. Maybe you should think about why you have a need to shut people up.

CalZebra2012;842340110 said:

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[u][/u]lol!!!!

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I don't think you are quite getting it. People have claimed here that we will not win more than 2 games. Jam is asking those people to back up their claims. Jam never stated that we will win more than 5 games. Got it?

So 3 wins is now the event horizon of cal football homerism?

calbear93;842340185 said:

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I don't think you are quite getting it. People have claimed here that we will not win more than 2 games. Jam is asking those people to back up their claims. Jam never stated that we will win more than 5 games. Got it?

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since that appears to be the actual issue here, it's much easier to directly address those posters. so who actually claimed that? there can't be too many.

OaktownBear;842340173 said:

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2. Sac State, CU, NW, BYU, and WSU suck. We should win those games in our sleep. Only winning 3 is unacceptable.

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BYU (18 votes) and NU (5 votes) are both in the "others receiving votes" per the preseason USA today poll. These two teams are above Oregon St (4 votes) and Arizona (1 vote), in addition to the 6 other schools in the p12 that are in the top 25 presently. To include them (BYU & NU) under the grouping of "teams that suck" and that we should beat in our sleep is a bit of a reach, no?

Unit2Sucks;842339987 said:

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As I mentioned on the insider board when you brought this up with another poster, I think it's a great bet. This formulation is pretty favorable to the naysayers because if they think we're so bad than even if they acknowledge we could get to 3 wins, they probably wouldn't expect that third win to come until BYU at which point the season is over. I would be disappointed if not a single nega accepts this bet because I think the bet will help create some drama on BI which will make things entertaining in a season where we are unlikely to get to a bowl game.

So come on negas - at least one of you must be willing to bet your participation here that we won't win 3 games.

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Are we resorting to segregation this early?

pingpong2;842340041 said:

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Now that you've tempted fate by calling Sac State a lock, I can see the football gods throwing a big fat donut into our win column.

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Florida thought Georgia Southern was a lock last year. Bears should beat Sac State but I wouldn't take any game to the bank just yet. After last season and the massive roster turnover it's impossible to judge now what Sonny is capable of producing in 2014.

holy bat dung batman.... i go to the doctor come back home to this thread very very interesting...

now one has to make a differentiation between those that just do not think we are good enough yet VS those that want 1-11 or 0-12 so bad so sonny can be fired( yes i am talking about you fill in blank_______)

its a difference ... which bear cave are you in ?

GO BEARS

OaktownBear;842340173 said:

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1. Name all these people who said we couldn't win more than 2. I don't think many have said that. Now you go after the strawman and act like people won't step up like courageous you who is willing to bet we win three whole games. If you have someone specific in mind who said we wouldn't win more than 2, take it up with them specifically.

2. Sac State, CU, NW, BYU, and WSU suck. We should win those games in our sleep. Only winning 3 is unacceptable.

3. Why would I want you to stop posting? First of all, if I were petty, I'd rather you post over and over how wrong you were and how maybe people who were upset about the state of the program were good fans with a point instead of just being a-holes as you seem to believe. In reality though, this board is made by people with opinions. I have no desire to stifle your opinion. In fact, I'd like you to keep on expressing it. Maybe you should think about why you have a need to shut people up.

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Every thread it feels like someone is bashing the fact we don't have a chance to win more than 2 games if that. I figured we would have lots of people chiming in taking the bet. It seems maybe either in my head it has been over exaggerated and I am being to sensitive to it (possible), they don't really believe that we will only win 2 games and are just venting on so many threads, Really feel like we are a 3-4 win team even though people keep saying we haven't gotten better, or a little bit all of it (probably this one)... I thought it would be interesting to just say fine if you feel so strongly about this and how bad this staff is then lets put something on it.

As for 2. I would also through AZ in that mix and Probably Washington... I would maybe take out BYU because their QB is so good at running and we haven't been good at stopping that type of attack. 3 is not good... However I think 5 or even 4 with some close losses to some of the better schools with the lack of SRs on our team would show great improvement.

As for 3. That is a great point. Really I just would love if not every thread there was an "will be worse (highly unlikely) or we won't win 2 games or the Staff sucks balls or whatever" in every thread. Getting them to stop posting would be nice for awhile, but I like your ideas. Come on here and make a thread saying how wrong you were and how you shouldn't be blind and negative or rose colored glasses positive when the signs pointed to either a good or bad season... Or only post positive posts for a month or negative posts for a month. There is a lot of good things you can agree too.

Really though all the people that have been jumping up and down saying we have no chance to win I wanted to see if they truly believed it or if they were just spouting off.

Darby;842340210 said:

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Florida thought Georgia Southern was a lock last year. Bears should beat Sac State but I wouldn't take any game to the bank just yet. After last season and the massive roster turnover it's impossible to judge now what Sonny is capable of producing in 2014.

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Exactly. We had a massive roster turnover. How do people seriously think this team got better when we lost talent, not gained?

This same team, when healthy, almost lost to Portland State last year. Beating Sac State is no lock. That is how low Cal football has gone...

Darby;842340210 said:

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Florida thought Georgia Southern was a lock last year. Bears should beat Sac State but I wouldn't take any game to the bank just yet. After last season and the massive roster turnover it's impossible to judge now what Sonny is capable of producing in 2014.

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Massive roster turnover... We lost what 6 players that played a lot last year? Bigelow was horrible, Moala and Coleman were ok, Camp sucked, Kam Jack I thought was good, Fortt (I keep forgetting about) was decent although I thought Barton was just as good.... Seriously we didn't lose that much from last year and we possibly get Avery, Jalil, Scarlett, McClure, Trevor Davis (he could be our best WR), Adcock, Allensworth, Sina (granted haven't seen much just speculation), etc that wasn't available last year. Those guys are way better than the people we lost. Not to mention we don't have a ton of FR starting especially on Off and even more especially on the OL.

Sorry forgot Hunter who played a lot and is a big loss.

Editing in your response also... What roster turn over?

Cal Panda Bear;842340213 said:

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Exactly. We had a massive roster turnover. How do people seriously think this team got better when we lost talent, not gained?

This same team, when healthy, almost lost to Portland State last year. Beating Sac State is no lock. That is how low Cal football has gone...

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jamonit;842340023 said:

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One-sided? You know how many people have said we can't and won't win more than 2 games? I risk not posting for over a year if people truly believe we won't get 3 wins with the tiered betting system. Plus lets say we do get 3 wins when is that? If it is BYU as stated by someone you didn't risk anything. So really for you to miss posting for more than a month you would have to have 3 wins before our last 4 games so 3 wins out of 8 games. Unless we get to 6 wins, make a bowl, and we win those first 3 games the max you will risk is a month or 2. I can see your point though I will put a minimum 3 months of me not posting for at least 5 takers.

Come on lets see the 2 or less crowd believe what they are posting. If you truly believe that then you would easily take the bet.

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The thing is that most people who are saying 2 wins aren't saying it out of malice but out of reason. Your offer is clearly directed at those with malice and you totally overestimate how many of those there are. You don't risk leaving the board for over a year... quit being such a drama queen.

Like I said, though. If you're really THAT confident, then how about you just not posting until that 3rd win?

jamonit;842340035 said:

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How is that realism? It is an unknown. While you can say signs point to a bad season because of how bad the previous year was... If you don't take into count the circumstances that we went through last year. The changes that have been made or improvements won't make a difference in the possibility for success of the team is not realism to me. To be realistic you can make an educated guess, but drawing conclusions of a low win total is not realism.... It is a guess that could be educated or not. Personally I see 4-5 wins this year and we could win less and we could win more. I go off of what makes success teams from year to year and look at last years young inexperienced roster that was slammed by an insane amount of injuries compared to people just looking at the 1-11 record trying to judge future success.

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How is your guess of 4-5 wins any more realistic or educated than someone else's guess of 2 wins?

freshfunk;842340223 said:

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The thing is that most people who are saying 2 wins aren't saying it out of malice but out of reason. Your offer is clearly directed at those with malice and you totally overestimate how many of those there are. You don't risk leaving the board for over a year... quit being such a drama queen.

Like I said, though. If you're really THAT confident, then how about you just not posting until that 3rd win?

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Ok if you don't post until our 10th loss... That is a deal.

freshfunk;842340227 said:

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How is your guess of 4-5 wins any more realistic or educated than someone else's guess of 2 wins?

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Well it isn't... I admit we could win only 2 games. I would hope that wouldn't happen and most likely there would more crazy injuries to help that. I think the more plausible guess is in the 4-5 range, but that is just me going off of experience compared to last year... What we lost compared to what we gain this year... and the way the schedule is setup.

What I don't do is come onto every thread and bash the staff at all costs. Have they done everything right? No... Was last season acceptable? No of course not. Have they done some good things? Yes I think so with the APR and getting rid of some players... Do I think that was a fair judgement of what this staff can do? No I don't yet. I think any coach with that young of team with that much lack of experience was doomed to fail. Maybe a stud top coach could have gotten 3 wins out of that youth movement, but that was it. Now that we have some experience I think we will play better. Now that we net positive some players this year I think we will be better. Will we be better? Only time will show... Let's wait and find out.

I kinda see two possibilities. Another 1 win shitstorm or 5-6 wins. It all depends on whether or not last year really was the provenance of injuries and Buh or if SD really is over his head. We will see. Northwestern will be very telling IMO

freshfunk;842340223 said:

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The thing is that most people who are saying 2 wins aren't saying it out of malice but out of reason. Your offer is clearly directed at those with malice and you totally overestimate how many of those there are. You don't risk leaving the board for over a year... quit being such a drama queen.

Like I said, though. If you're really THAT confident, then how about you just not posting until that 3rd win?

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My offer is for anyone that truly believes it. If you truly believe that then please take the bet or come up with something else if you TRULY believe we won't win more than 2 games. You have a better idea since you seem so set we won't win more? Or are you just throwing out words not willing to back it up.

Given the situation we're in, it feels like a fools errand to guess our exact number of wins. I'd rather put a bell curve on the probabilities. Crudely, it would look some thing like this:

10% 1 win
20% 2 wins
40% 3 wins
20% 4 wins
10% 5 wins

I think we're most likely to hit 3 wins. If we stay healthy, some guys really step up, coaches make a big difference and transfers really make an impact, then I think we have a 20% chance at 4 wins and 10% of hitting 5.

However, if we have a number of key injuries, if there's a falloff from starters to backups, if we still don't have a running game or if our defense overall is still poor, then we have a 20% chance of hitting 2 wins and a 10% chance of getting 1 win.

Therefore it wouldn't surprise me any more if we hit 4 wins than if we hit 2 wins. It also would be just as surprising if we hit 5 wins compared to getting 1 win.

freshfunk;842340235 said:

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Given the situation we're in, it feels like a fools errand to guess our exact number of wins. I'd rather put a bell curve on the probabilities. Crudely, it would look some thing like this:

10% 1 win
20% 2 wins
40% 3 wins
20% 4 wins
10% 5 wins

I think we're most likely to hit 3 wins. If we stay healthy, some guys really step up, coaches make a big difference and transfers really make an impact, then I think we have a 20% chance at 4 wins and 10% of hitting 5.

However, if we have a number of key injuries, if there's a falloff from starters to backups, if we still don't have a running game or if our defense overall is still poor, then we have a 20% chance of hitting 2 wins and a 10% chance of getting 1 win.

Therefore it wouldn't surprise me any more if we hit 4 wins than if we hit 2 wins. It also would be just as surprising if we hit 5 wins compared to getting 1 win.

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Fair enough... I would have bet money you were in the we will be worse this year camp. That is a good way to look at it.... I see 4-5 wins, but with a better chance at 3 wins than 6 and I think 7+ is just as likely as 2 or less... So I would probably go

33% 5 wins
32% 4 wins
15% 3 wins
10% 6 wins
5% 7+
5% 2-

jamonit;842340228 said:

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Ok if you don't post until our 10th loss... That is a deal.

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I'm not the one attacking straw men and trying to remove people from this board for having differing views. This is your issue not mine.

freshfunk;842340246 said:

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I'm not the one attacking straw men and trying to remove people from this board for having differing views. This is your issue not mine.

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Your comment was dumb so you got a dumb one back. Of course you won't do that just like I won't do what you said. I am not trying to remove people from this board... I am merely trying to make a friendly wager. I realize you would never take the bet don't worry.

jamonit;842340245 said:

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Fair enough... I would have bet money you were in the we will be worse this year camp. That is a good way to look at it.... I see 4-5 wins, but with a better chance at 3 wins than 6 and I think 7+ is just as likely as 2 or less... So I would probably go

33% 5 wins
32% 4 wins
15% 3 wins
10% 6 wins
5% 7+
5% 2-

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Which games do you think are most likely to comprise the 4-5 wins?

in other thread he put I think sac sate; colorado; arizona; northwestern; BYU; WSU/UW/OSU (I can't remember which order); UCLA; USC; furd; quacks (could have that wrong too)

My issue with it is the scheduling. BYU comes at the end of the year so to chalk them up as a possible win, but saying that we will only win 4 or so means that you think the team will be on a 6 or 7 game losing streak and then have the morale and mental fortitude to bounce back and beat BYU? I'm thinking....no. Ditto OSU. We need to beat WSU and or UW or UCLA or we will be on a 4 game slide or so going into that one. After the "easier" first four, the schedule kinda sets us up for failure unless Dykes REALLY knows what he's doing

moonpod;842340256 said:

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in other thread he put I think sac sate; colorado; arizona; northwestern; BYU; WSU/UW/OSU (I can't remember which order); UCLA; USC; furd; quacks (could have that wrong too)

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Ok saw his list.

My take: Only 5 (maybe 6) games are winnable. The others are most likely losses for us. So reaching 4-5 wins would mean that we win all but 1 of the winnable set which sounds really high. A 50% chance of winning these games strikes me as more reasonable (which would give us 2-3 wins).

freshfunk;842340235 said:

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Given the situation we're in, it feels like a fools errand to guess our exact number of wins. I'd rather put a bell curve on the probabilities. Crudely, it would look some thing like this:

10% 1 win
20% 2 wins
40% 3 wins
20% 4 wins
10% 5 wins

I think we're most likely to hit 3 wins. If we stay healthy, some guys really step up, coaches make a big difference and transfers really make an impact, then I think we have a 20% chance at 4 wins and 10% of hitting 5.

However, if we have a number of key injuries, if there's a falloff from starters to backups, if we still don't have a running game or if our defense overall is still poor, then we have a 20% chance of hitting 2 wins and a 10% chance of getting 1 win.

Therefore it wouldn't surprise me any more if we hit 4 wins than if we hit 2 wins. It also would be just as surprising if we hit 5 wins compared to getting 1 win.

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+1 Last season was such a clusterf*ck it's very difficult to make any sense of things. How do you measure progress when so much went wrong last year?

I'm not making any predictions this year. I do think Kaufman and a decent defense "should" add a couple of wins, and believe a fully functioning Bear Raid (not the hacked off offense we got last season) can add 1-2 games. The thing is, last season was so whacked, you can't even get a base line. Without a base line analysis, where do you start?

moonpod;842340256 said:

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in other thread he put I think sac sate; colorado; arizona; northwestern; BYU; WSU/UW/OSU (I can't remember which order); UCLA; USC; furd; quacks (could have that wrong too)

My issue with it is the scheduling. BYU comes at the end of the year so to chalk them up as a possible win, but saying that we will only win 4 or so means that you think the team will be on a 6 or 7 game losing streak and then have the morale and mental fortitude to bounce back and beat BYU? I'm thinking....no. Ditto OSU. We need to beat WSU and or UW or UCLA or we will be on a 4 game slide or so going into that one. After the "easier" first four, the schedule kinda sets us up for failure unless Dykes REALLY knows what he's doing

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I agree. Unless BYU has been destroyed by this time, I would write it off as a loss due to the demoralizing string of losses likely to precede it.

+1. And the difference here is we are forecasting a losing season...no matter what. Let the Death march begin!

very winnable are sac state (with a competent D coordinator this should NOT be an issue), colorado (macintyre lost richardson and he's awhiles away from making them truly competitive otherwise) arizona (rich rod actually had a pretty good amount of turnover) NU (I don't buy the fitz kool aide)

Schedule unfriendly but otherwise winnable are OSU (lost cooks the best offensive player in the PAC last year) and BYU (BY who?) in my mind.

the maybes are the Washington's--Peterson is reloading his offensive backfield and installing a new system and clearly had some cultural issues in the off season as well. I think he is gonna be a thorn in our side in the future, but THIS year they may be very up and down. Leach has leach, but other than that honestly not a lot of talent that "scares" anyone. But the ol pirate is crafty so...

Miracles are the LA schools, furd and the quacks