beelzebear;842526678 said:

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I motion that the conversation move towards "women you almost had, could smell and almost taste but just missed out and you're a weirdo weenie forever but you could have, should have and would have".

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I once shared a passing moment with Jennifer Aniston on the street between the commissary and Stage 5 on the WB lot in 1995. I was doing Space Jam, she was doing some small TV show at the time, forget the name. I sometimes think fondly of that moment, what might have been, if only I had maintained control of my vocal cords. And my bowels.


Rashaan Salaam

BearsWiin;842526736 said:

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Rashaan Salaam

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I once slept at the house of Rashaan's "host family" that he lived with in Solano Beach (in a house on the cliffs overlooking the ocean...) that allowed him to play 8-man football at La Jolla County Day. Weird situation. If only I was as talented as he was.

Vandalus;842526750 said:

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I once slept at the house of Rashaan's "host family" that he lived with in Solano Beach (in a house on the cliffs overlooking the ocean...) that allowed him to play 8-man football at La Jolla County Day. Weird situation. If only I was as talented as he was.

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Why was it a weird situation? Were the sheets not clean?

Vandalus;842526750 said:

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I once slept at the house of Rashaan's "host family" that he lived with in Solano Beach (in a house on the cliffs overlooking the ocean...) that allowed him to play 8-man football at La Jolla County Day. Weird situation. If only I was as talented as he was.

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I ran into Bobby Knight in a restaurant as I was driving up to move into the dorms in August of 1984(true story). To this day I hold myself responsible for not selling Cal to him. I could have ended the Kuchen era a bit earlier...One of us could have been hit be a chair along the way!!!

Speaking of Rashaan Salaam, didn't most of the his Cal recruiting class walk when Snyder left for ASU? If you want to cry over missed recruits cry over that class and that entire situation. We would have gone to the Rose Bowl the next year or one of the years soon after with Snyder, the returning players and that recruiting class.

BearsWiin;842526736 said:

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I once shared a passing moment with Jennifer Aniston on the street between the commissary and Stage 5 on the WB lot in 1995. I was doing Space Jam, she was doing some small TV show at the time, forget the name. I sometimes think fondly of that moment, what might have been, if only I had maintained control of my vocal cords. And my bowels.


Rashaan Salaam

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beeasyed;842526676 said:

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guys we let get away
DL cassius marsh [ucla]
DL tashon smallwood
DL/TE austin hooper
DL takk mckinley [ucla]
DL arik armstead
DB jaeel wadood [ucla]
DB koa farmer
DB tyler foreman [ucla]
DB nathan meadors [ucla]
DB shaq thompson
ATH marquise lee [usc]
WR robert woods [usc]
WR daniel imatorbhebhe [usc]
OL bobby keenan
OL kolton miller [ucla]
OL davis perrott
RB nick wilson
RB terrell newby
RB dj foster
QB jake browning
QB brady white
QB johnny capra


guys we should've had more traction w/
DL matt dickerson [ucla]
DL eddie vanderdoes [ucla]
DL nico falah [usc]
LB dj calhoun [usc]
LB michael hutchings [usc]
DB isaiah langley [usc]
DB kevin king
RB byron marshall
OL jack dreyer
OL dru samia
+ every DB we offered in 2013
+ every top OL we offered in 2012
+ every (all) OT we offered in 2015

that's not including guys who liked us, but only as a backup (Meeks, Buncom) or guys we pushed out (Egu, Lealao), or guys we replaced/didn't care about (Payton, Walker)

while WR is of little concern to us, and while he is too cocky, Payton being called a "middling receiver" by Cal fans is amusing... 67 rec, 954 yds, 7 TDs last season on a pretty talented team...

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wasn't there a WR from El Cerrito (Harvey?) that got away or are we not including defections related to academics?
If we are, we should probably include the 2 safeties (Dismuke and Thompson) this year.

And what about guys like Scarlett, Garrett Hughes, Gabe King, Ragin III who were here, played and then defected somewhere else or left football from lack of interest?

It's those losses (guys we had and then left) that hurt the most imo.

We also missed on QB Tom Brady.

still looking back ...

going4roses;842526765 said:

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still looking back ...

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Yeah, well 1959 was a long azz time ago.

burritos;842526658 said:

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We missed on DJ Williams.

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Greatest 'almost Cal' ever. At least for football.

Well maybe him and Tom Brady.

Dbearson;842526709 said:

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I totally forgot about brady

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Ken Dorsey.

Well, we can brag to the whole world about Wurster Hall, home of Cal's Architecture Dept, one of the ugliest buildings on campus.

The Biggest one EVER!

In my day, OJ Simpson out of CCSF. IMO, the best RB I ever saw to this day. It was down to us and USC. We lost, and it broke my heart, until, well you know when, everybody in the world needed to disown him. Looking back, I think we won in the long run.

82gradDLSdad;842526757 said:

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Speaking of Rashaan Salaam, didn't most of the his Cal recruiting class walk when Snyder left for ASU? If you want to cry over missed recruits cry over that class and that entire situation. We would have gone to the Rose Bowl the next year or one of the years soon after with Snyder, the returning players and that recruiting class.

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Many many years ago I saw the list of players who were supposed to come to Cal to play for Snyder in that 1992 recruiting class. Salaam won the Heisman, obviously, but IIRC at least five others went on to have NFL careers. Bockrath is still a four-letter-word in the BearsWiin household.

Bear_Elegance;842526774 said:

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Ken Dorsey.

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how about this name out of pinole high, Gino Torreta

NYCGOBEARS;842526751 said:

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Why was it a weird situation? Were the sheets not clean?

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It was weird because I was staying there with my teammate who I had gone to middle school with down in La Mesa/spring Valley area. I had moved up to Torrey Pines and he was going to Helix for our first three years of HS. Our senior year he decided to transfer to TP, and since we knew each other and I lived close to him, I would pick him up in the morning and we would do the 45 minute commute up to Del Mar and back.

After about a month or so he wound up getting a place to stay near school and only needed a ride a few nights a week. One night for some random reason I spent the night there at the house and met the family he was living with. He was the consensus #1 RB in SD our senior year so there were a lot of rumors about the circumstances of the transfer...

Anyway, I wound up staying at this house with this super rich random white older couple in a multi million dollar house. His bedroom had a huge sliding glass door onto a balcony that overlooked the pacific. For two kids who grew up with less fortunate means and had to avoid gang violence and affiliations on a daily basis, it was a surreal setting to be sure.

The coincidence that they were hosting my inner city friend who happened to be a star running back, and they just so happened to have also hosted Rashaan Salam a few years prior was never openly discussed. I have no idea who they were and how the whole thing got set up, but it was certainly interesting.

Vandalus;842526811 said:

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It was weird because I was staying there with my teammate who I had gone to middle school with down in La Mesa/spring Valley area. I had moved up to Torrey Pines and he was going to Helix for our first three years of HS. Our senior year he decided to transfer to TP, and since we knew each other and I lived close to him, I would pick him up in the morning and we would do the 45 minute commute up to Del Mar and back.

After about a month or so he wound up getting a place to stay near school and only needed a ride a few nights a week. One night for some random reason I spent the night there at the house and met the family he was living with. He was the consensus #1 RB in SD our senior year so there were a lot of rumors about the circumstances of the transfer...

Anyway, I wound up staying at this house with this super rich random white older couple in a multi million dollar house. His bedroom had a huge sliding glass door onto a balcony that overlooked the pacific. For two kids who grew up with less fortunate means and had to avoid gang violence and affiliations on a daily basis, it was a surreal setting to be sure.

The coincidence that they were hosting my inner city friend who happened to be a star running back, and they just so happened to have also hosted Rashaan Salam a few years prior was never openly discussed. I have no idea who they were and how the whole thing got set up, but it was certainly interesting.

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Ahhh... They were The Blind Side before The Blind Side in a much better neighborhood.

CalBearJim;842526779 said:

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The Biggest one EVER!

In my day, OJ Simpson out of CCSF. IMO, the best RB I ever saw to this day. It was down to us and USC. We lost, and it broke my heart, until, well you know when, everybody in the world needed to disown him. Looking back, I think we won in the long run.

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He would have killed the program.

NYCGOBEARS;842526813 said:

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Ahhh... They were The Blind Side before The Blind Side in a much better neighborhood.

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Exactly!

Scooby Wright.

kelly09;842526838 said:

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Scooby Wright.

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Dylan Wynn ugh...

There was an article in the local paper entitled, Could This Have Been Cal?. It was written just before Snyder's ASU team played in the Rose Bowl and it listed all the guys on that team that were lined up to come to Cal before Snyder got Bockrathed. Of course, besides the players ASU was full of ex-Cal assistant coaches. Who knows maybe we would have messed it up another way. It sucks having only sour grapes to suck on.

BearsWiin;842526794 said:

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Many many years ago I saw the list of players who were supposed to come to Cal to play for Snyder in that 1992 recruiting class. Salaam won the Heisman, obviously, but IIRC at least five others went on to have NFL careers. Bockrath is still a four-letter-word in the BearsWiin household.

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82gradDLSdad;842526846 said:

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There was an article in the local paper entitled, Could This Have Been Cal?. It was written just before Snyder's ASU team played in the Rose Bowl and it listed all the guys on that team that were lined up to come to Cal before Snyder got Bockrathed. Of course, besides the players ASU was full of ex-Cal assistant coaches. Who knows maybe we would have messed it up another way. It sucks having only sour grapes to suck on.

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IIRC, ASU did nearly double his salary, from $350K to $650K. So unless we were willing to match or come close to that, Snyder may have left anyway. Plus I recall it was rumored that he didn't much care for the lousy facilities and the academic restrictions/expectations at Cal, so he may have been looking to go somewhere else even if it wasn't ASU. We'll never know how that would have turned out; we only know how it did turn out.

6bear6;842526655 said:

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Just wondered how everyone felt about the recruits who dazzled us, tempted us, flirted and then wound up going elsewhere. In the recent past, there was the CalGang of 2012. The disciples of Tosh - the Toshites. A few names - Hoffpauir wound up across the Bay sliding his hand across Luke's face last year; Payton is receiving in Westwood; Shaq is now on to the NFL; Shittu, who cares; Arik Armstead played for Chip in Eugene; and, Ellis McCarthy, a Bruin. There may have been another one or two.

The question is what did we lose? Everyone probably agrees that Thompson was the biggest loss. Hoffpauir, played a fairly decent safety for the Cardinal. Armstead didn't impress me given his size, his heritage and the hype surrounding him coming out of high school. Not sure he was THAT BIG a loss. As MB revealed, Shittu engaged in some unbecoming conduct on his recruiting trip and gave us a clear signal he was trouble-coming. Payton is middle-of-the-road wideout. I don't think he's on the level with Harris, Lawler, Treggs, Davis or even Harper, last season. McCarthy's dad apparently had directed his kid to go to UCLA. He also directed his kid to leave some eligibility and declare for the NFL. I don't know whether he was drafted, but the word from Westwood was he was less than terrific as a player.

All in all, we could have used some defensive help from this class. The results speak for themselves. The others, not so sure we lost all that much.

Can you recall others who we almost had, but joined another school. In the end, they weren't worth the aggravation.

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Certainly a fun exercise..but nothing compares to the class Snyder was about to bring in before Cal lost him. It included a Heisman Trophy winner for goodness sake! The losses that year makes all of the rest of this dust...

And the phone calls to the AD asking for Snyder's resignation after the debacle of the his last Big Game. Lots of casual Cal football fans were there to see the team lose its composure, get hit with 4(?) unsportsmanlike penalties, and generally offend fans with Miami Hurricane-like behavior. Adding that to the salary and facilities and Snyder was probably convinced we weren't ready for big time football.

oski003;842526732 said:

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Every non Cal fan in the world thinks Payton would start over most if not all of the above named receivers. Armstead impressed me. Somehow, he was a top twenty pick by an NFL team. Meanwhile, we started an over achieving DT who was a 5'10 walkon. I'd say not getting Armstead impacted us.

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The Bruins had one primary receiver, we had five. I doubt you speak for every non Cal fan.

6bear6;842527411 said:

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The Bruins had one primary receiver, we had five. I doubt you speak for every non Cal fan.

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really?

- Payton (67) and Fuller (59) had similar #s of catches. fuller's the tough possession guy, their go-to slot guy
- their top 4 guys accounted for ~68% of their total passing yards; payton himself accounted for 28%. Cal's top 4 counts for 62%
- duarte (true soph) 540 yds, 19.3 yds per catch, 4 TDs
- massington (true frosh), 367 yds, 14.7 yds per catch, 3 TDs

lol. "one primary receiver", "middle-of-the-road wideout"...

payton is a diva ... and the main go to Wr on their team his numbers do not amaze me

Vandalus;842526701 said:

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Dirk Novitsky.

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Yeah basketball has many more:
Bill Russell
KC Jones
Bill Walton
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
Hakeem Olajuwon
LeBron James
Dirk Nowitsky
Aaron Gordon
Eddie House

Should we talk about all the girls that we should have asked out, as well? A thread chock full of what could have beens. Masochistic, but kind of fun.

beeasyed;842527438 said:

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really?

- Payton (67) and Fuller (59) had similar #s of catches. fuller's the tough possession guy, their go-to slot guy
- their top 4 guys accounted for ~68% of their total passing yards; payton himself accounted for 28%. Cal's top 4 counts for 62%
- duarte (true soph) 540 yds, 19.3 yds per catch, 4 TDs
- massington (true frosh), 367 yds, 14.7 yds per catch, 3 TDs

lol. "one primary receiver", "middle-of-the-road wideout"...

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I see you ran over to the UCLA stat chart. Good for you.
Would you trade our wide outs for theirs? Would you trade Lawler or Treggs for theirs? I wouldn't.

well we got lawler after payton decommitted. id rather have lawler. id rather have both, but if i had to choose, i think lawler is better

Owa

gobears725;842527618 said:

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well we got lawler after payton decommitted. id rather have lawler. id rather have both, but if i had to choose, i think lawler is better

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WR Payton flips to UW end of Jan
WR Walker flips to UCLA end of Jan

WR Lawler commits to Cal Feb 1
+ Bennett, Fletcher, Ford

lol.