https://deadspin.com/a-non-exhaustive-list-of-bat****-stuff-that-happened-du-1831342193

And this game well be noted as the strangest Bowl Game in history for the reasons highlighted in the article.

Exactly the opposite of every aspect of Wilcox's persona. Welcome to Cal Football, Coach Wilcox.

Good stuff. Its nuts how some people on here think last night was not an embarrassment.

Many legit players and media people were calling last nights game one of the worst in history. ... even OLD guys thought so!

Cal will get past this quickly. No one paid/pays attention to Cal except us.

Gary Patterson? He will never ever get offered a big contract at a better school again. He probably doesn't care, but his team was as bad as ours last night, and they were a top ten team for most of a decade. He loses big.

No one will have any permanent negative affects from the type of performance either team put in. Modern media thrives on this type of stuff. We have an entire network of media outlets that make their living incisively deriding the latest "worst ever" blunder for a day or two and then forgetting it ever happened.

The only time the participants ever experience negative consequences is if they internalize any of the ridicule as their ongoing identity. I think there is zero chance that either coach does this.

Or to put it another way, anyone who thinks any non-Cal/TCU people will care about the 2018 Cheez-It Bowl three days from now are probably...wrong. (Which is good news for us, so I'll take it.)

It was a showcase for the defense
Showed how aggressive we are
If I'm a DB or LB, I would want to be on this defense

If Cal had won, you guys would say our recruits are taking notes and remembering the mighty bowl.

Bear19 said:

---

https://deadspin.com/a-non-exhaustive-list-of-bat****-stuff-that-happened-du-1831342193

And this game well be noted as the strangest Bowl Game in history for the reasons highlighted in the article.

Exactly the opposite of every aspect of Wilcox's persona. Welcome to Cal Football, Coach Wilcox.

---

Thanks for sharing. It was very funny and I had a good laugh. It's moved me past denial and anger to the bargaining stage of grief.

kjkbear said:

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Cal will get past this quickly. No one paid/pays attention to Cal except us.

Gary Patterson? He will never ever get offered a big contract at a better school again. He probably doesn't care, but his team was as bad as ours last night, and they were a top ten team for most of a decade. He loses big.

---

Agreed. No one pays attention to Cal except us and our competitors. And I'm sure they'll be gentlemanly and not use this nationally televised game against us. At least not more than 50 or 60 times. Each.

Facetiousness aside, this is a bad look for us at a time when we're rebuild our image and attract ever improving recruits - especially on offense. This game was a black eye and there's no way to sugar coat that.

GoOoOoOoOoBears! said:

---

kjkbear said:

---

Cal will get past this quickly. No one paid/pays attention to Cal except us.

Gary Patterson? He will never ever get offered a big contract at a better school again. He probably doesn't care, but his team was as bad as ours last night, and they were a top ten team for most of a decade. He loses big.

---

Agreed. No one pays attention to Cal except us and our competitors. And I'm sure they'll be gentlemanly and not use this nationally televised game against us. At least not more than 50 or 60 times. Each.

Facetiousness aside, this is a bad look for us at a time when we're rebuild our image and attract ever improving recruits - especially on offense. This game was a black eye and there's no way to sugar coat that.

---

What does this even mean? Use it against us how? If by competitors you mean our P12 peers, well the conference is coming off a 1-8 bowl season so I don't think anyone on the west coast is using bowl games against anyone. Not to mention the LA schools didn't even make a bowl game this year.

And for those who don't know: the author is a Cal alum.

socaliganbear said:

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GoOoOoOoOoBears! said:

---

kjkbear said:

---

Cal will get past this quickly. No one paid/pays attention to Cal except us.

Gary Patterson? He will never ever get offered a big contract at a better school again. He probably doesn't care, but his team was as bad as ours last night, and they were a top ten team for most of a decade. He loses big.

---

Agreed. No one pays attention to Cal except us and our competitors. And I'm sure they'll be gentlemanly and not use this nationally televised game against us. At least not more than 50 or 60 times. Each.

Facetiousness aside, this is a bad look for us at a time when we're rebuild our image and attract ever improving recruits - especially on offense. This game was a black eye and there's no way to sugar coat that.

---

What does this even mean? Use it against us how? If by competitors you mean our P12 peers, well the conference is coming off a 1-8 bowl season so I don't think anyone on the west coast is using bowl games against anyone. Not to mention the LA schools didn't even make a bowl game this year.

---

I'll answer that even thought it's unlikely that you didn't understand. We humiliated ourselves on offense. Five interceptions, complete inability to sustain drives, really poor QB play, bizzare play calling, poor half time adjustments compounded by worse in game adjustments, and one stinking score (off a short field) tying our season low for scoring after three weeks of prep. In short, we put a really bad offensive product on the field during a nationally televised game. We ended the season with a thud - underscoring our conference worst total offense, passing offense, and scoring offense.

Not exactly a fabulous advertisement to prospective recruits -- not to mention donors and casual fans. How does this performance elevate us in the eyes of teenagers who want to go to big time / upper echelon programs? Or at least respectable / up and coming programs? This was a substandard performance that reinforces the 'same old Cal' sentiment. As one poster commented, I'm damn glad that our 2019 recruits have signed their LOIs. Yesterday's game makes it harder for us to sell the program and provides plenty of fodder for opposing recruiters - at least while our current offensive staff is in place. You're considering Cal? *smirk*, Good luck showcasing your skills there, kid! If you don't see that it's because you choose not to.

Overall we definitely made progress on the season. But in a season of ups and downs we ended on a big down (two actually) and that's the momentum we're taking into the off season.

GoOoOoOoOoBears! said:

---

socaliganbear said:

---

GoOoOoOoOoBears! said:

---

kjkbear said:

---

Cal will get past this quickly. No one paid/pays attention to Cal except us.

Gary Patterson? He will never ever get offered a big contract at a better school again. He probably doesn't care, but his team was as bad as ours last night, and they were a top ten team for most of a decade. He loses big.

---

Agreed. No one pays attention to Cal except us and our competitors. And I'm sure they'll be gentlemanly and not use this nationally televised game against us. At least not more than 50 or 60 times. Each.

Facetiousness aside, this is a bad look for us at a time when we're rebuild our image and attract ever improving recruits - especially on offense. This game was a black eye and there's no way to sugar coat that.

---

What does this even mean? Use it against us how? If by competitors you mean our P12 peers, well the conference is coming off a 1-8 bowl season so I don't think anyone on the west coast is using bowl games against anyone. Not to mention the LA schools didn't even make a bowl game this year.

---

I'll answer that even thought it's unlikely that you didn't understand. We humiliated ourselves on offense. Five interceptions, complete inability to sustain drives, really poor QB play, bizzare play calling, poor half time adjustments compounded by worse in game adjustments, and one stinking score (off a short field) tying our season low for scoring after three weeks of prep. In short, we put a really bad offensive product on the field during a nationally televised game. We ended the season with a thud - underscoring our conference worst total offense, passing offense, and scoring offense.

Not exactly a fabulous advertisement to prospective recruits -- not to mention donors and casual fans. How does this performance elevate us in the eyes of teenagers who want to go to big time / upper echelon programs? Or at least respectable / up and coming programs? This was a substandard performance that reinforces the 'same old Cal' sentiment. As one poster commented, I'm damn glad that our 2019 recruits have signed their LOIs. Yesterday's game makes it harder for us to sell the program and provides plenty of fodder for opposing recruiters - at least while our current offensive staff is in place. You're considering Cal? *smirk*, Good luck showcasing your skills there, kid! If you don't see that it's because you choose not to.

Overall we definitely made progress on the season. But in a season of ups and downs we ended on a big down (two actually) and that's the momentum we're taking into the off season.

---

Absolutely nothing happened in the bowl game that recruits and other programs hadn't already seen or understood about this program. This is not some new secret weapon that's been unleashed in the pac. Even if we'd won the game in 2018 Cal fashion, oppononents could and would make the same arguments against us. Other than a blowout win, the bowl game wasn't going to change the narrative. And that outcome was, to anyone with eyes, never a possibility. It sucked, but we're the same program we were three weeks ago. And so are our flaws, just like everyone else in the pac.

In last night's offensive explosion between Baylor and Vanderbilt, the announcers couldn't stop talking about the Cheez-It Bowl. Except I don't recall them actually saying "Cal" or "TCU" - just Cheez-It Bowl - repeatedly. The announcers certainly remembered it. So, even if we want to forget - I'm not sure the media will allow it to happen. There surely will be articles about the Bowl Season that highlight Cheez-It and articles next year about "What happened last year", and then "Best Worst Bowl Game Ever" articles after that.

socaliganbear said:

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Absolutely nothing happened in the bowl game that recruits and other programs hadn't already seen or understood about this program. This is not some new secret weapon that's been unleashed in the pac. Even if we'd won the game in 2018 Cal fashion, oppononents could and would make the same arguments against us. Other than a blowout win, the bowl game wasn't going to change the narrative. And that outcome was, to anyone with eyes, never a possibility. It sucked, but we're the same program we were three weeks ago. And so are our flaws, just like everyone else in the pac.

---

Not to mention that there's always a reverse effect if someone else tries to use this against Cal on the recruiting trail: "OK, that means I'm more likely to get playing time there." It probably doesn't make the net effect positive, but it makes it less negative.

I agree that the biggest concern is opposing recruiters using the Cheez-It fiasco to scare recruits away from our offensive coaching staff. But from what I've heard from insiders, recruits are more likely to listen to warnings about a coaching staff if they've actively done bad things (like badmouthing, abusing, or unfairly cutting players) as opposed to if they just aren't successful. Most players are hopeful that they can be the ones to make unsuccessful coaches successful. So Baldwin's made strange calls benching one QB in favor of another? Whatever, says the typical QB recruit. I'm gonna be the one who he puts in the game, not the one he benches!

So while it would have been nice if we had won the Cheez-It bowl 50-0, the actual result probably doesn't set our recruiting back too much.

Bear19 said:

---

https://deadspin.com/a-non-exhaustive-list-of-bat****-stuff-that-happened-du-1831342193

And this game well be noted as the strangest Bowl Game in history for the reasons highlighted in the article.

Exactly the opposite of every aspect of Wilcox's persona. Welcome to Cal Football, Coach Wilcox.

---

Yes, it was a stinker but bowl games often are. I suspect this will fade from most memories long before next year's recruiting decisions are made.

StarsDoMatter said:

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Good stuff. Its nuts how some people on here think last night was not an embarrassment.

Many legit players and media people were calling last nights game one of the worst in history. ... even OLD guys thought so!

---

Ive seen worse. Like losing by 50 to Stanfurd.

That was as inept on both sides of the ball.

GoOoOoOoOoBears! said:

---

socaliganbear said:

---

GoOoOoOoOoBears! said:

---

kjkbear said:

---

Cal will get past this quickly. No one paid/pays attention to Cal except us.

Gary Patterson? He will never ever get offered a big contract at a better school again. He probably doesn't care, but his team was as bad as ours last night, and they were a top ten team for most of a decade. He loses big.

---

Agreed. No one pays attention to Cal except us and our competitors. And I'm sure they'll be gentlemanly and not use this nationally televised game against us. At least not more than 50 or 60 times. Each.

Facetiousness aside, this is a bad look for us at a time when we're rebuild our image and attract ever improving recruits - especially on offense. This game was a black eye and there's no way to sugar coat that.

---

What does this even mean? Use it against us how? If by competitors you mean our P12 peers, well the conference is coming off a 1-8 bowl season so I don't think anyone on the west coast is using bowl games against anyone. Not to mention the LA schools didn't even make a bowl game this year.

---

I'll answer that even thought it's unlikely that you didn't understand. We humiliated ourselves on offense. Five interceptions, complete inability to sustain drives, really poor QB play, bizzare play calling, poor half time adjustments compounded by worse in game adjustments, and one stinking score (off a short field) tying our season low for scoring after three weeks of prep. In short, we put a really bad offensive product on the field during a nationally televised game. We ended the season with a thud - underscoring our conference worst total offense, passing offense, and scoring offense.

Not exactly a fabulous advertisement to prospective recruits -- not to mention donors and casual fans. How does this performance elevate us in the eyes of teenagers who want to go to big time / upper echelon programs? Or at least respectable / up and coming programs? This was a substandard performance that reinforces the 'same old Cal' sentiment. As one poster commented, I'm damn glad that our 2019 recruits have signed their LOIs. Yesterday's game makes it harder for us to sell the program and provides plenty of fodder for opposing recruiters - at least while our current offensive staff is in place. You're considering Cal? *smirk*, Good luck showcasing your skills there, kid! If you don't see that it's because you choose not to.

Overall we definitely made progress on the season. But in a season of ups and downs we ended on a big down (two actually) and that's the momentum we're taking into the off season.

---

"Hey, come play QB for us! Have you seen the bowl game? 5 INT's by the third and 4th string. We need a new starter. You want to ride the bench, or play?"

ncbears said:

---

In last night's offensive explosion between Baylor and Vanderbilt, the announcers couldn't stop talking about the Cheez-It Bowl. Except I don't recall them actually saying "Cal" or "TCU" - just Cheez-It Bowl - repeatedly. The announcers certainly remembered it. So, even if we want to forget - I'm not sure the media will allow it to happen. There surely will be articles about the Bowl Season that highlight Cheez-It and articles next year about "What happened last year", and then "Best Worst Bowl Game Ever" articles after that.

---

This may be good. Constant mention makes Cal the mention. We control the press with our play. Whoops!! What was that message again?? Aww. Forget it.

LunchTime said:

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GoOoOoOoOoBears! said:

---

socaliganbear said:

---

GoOoOoOoOoBears! said:

---

kjkbear said:

---

Cal will get past this quickly. No one paid/pays attention to Cal except us.

Gary Patterson? He will never ever get offered a big contract at a better school again. He probably doesn't care, but his team was as bad as ours last night, and they were a top ten team for most of a decade. He loses big.

---

Agreed. No one pays attention to Cal except us and our competitors. And I'm sure they'll be gentlemanly and not use this nationally televised game against us. At least not more than 50 or 60 times. Each.

Facetiousness aside, this is a bad look for us at a time when we're rebuild our image and attract ever improving recruits - especially on offense. This game was a black eye and there's no way to sugar coat that.

---

What does this even mean? Use it against us how? If by competitors you mean our P12 peers, well the conference is coming off a 1-8 bowl season so I don't think anyone on the west coast is using bowl games against anyone. Not to mention the LA schools didn't even make a bowl game this year.

---

I'll answer that even thought it's unlikely that you didn't understand. We humiliated ourselves on offense. Five interceptions, complete inability to sustain drives, really poor QB play, bizzare play calling, poor half time adjustments compounded by worse in game adjustments, and one stinking score (off a short field) tying our season low for scoring after three weeks of prep. In short, we put a really bad offensive product on the field during a nationally televised game. We ended the season with a thud - underscoring our conference worst total offense, passing offense, and scoring offense.

Not exactly a fabulous advertisement to prospective recruits -- not to mention donors and casual fans. How does this performance elevate us in the eyes of teenagers who want to go to big time / upper echelon programs? Or at least respectable / up and coming programs? This was a substandard performance that reinforces the 'same old Cal' sentiment. As one poster commented, I'm damn glad that our 2019 recruits have signed their LOIs. Yesterday's game makes it harder for us to sell the program and provides plenty of fodder for opposing recruiters - at least while our current offensive staff is in place. You're considering Cal? *smirk*, Good luck showcasing your skills there, kid! If you don't see that it's because you choose not to.

Overall we definitely made progress on the season. But in a season of ups and downs we ended on a big down (two actually) and that's the momentum we're taking into the off season.

---

"Hey, come play QB for us! Have you seen the bowl game? 5 INT's by the third and 4th string. We need a new starter. You want to ride the bench, or play?"

---

Exactly. To paraphrase coach Leach's pitch to Minshew, "Hey, want to come play for us and lead the nation in interceptions next year?". Too soon?

BearChemist said:

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If Cal had won, you guys would say our recruits are taking notes and remembering the mighty bowl.

---

First off to the OP, that wasn't remotely an excellent recap :-) It was just some random Cal grad who's bounced around and is now writing for deadspin who stayed home to watch the game and was bitter. Fair enoiught. Oh, and he is smart enough to have the twitter handle "@redford." So I definitely give him points for that.

But in answer to this post, almost nobody would refer to this bowl other than what it was. The Cheeze-It bowl. But if they did what you said, they'd be wrong too. In fairness they'd at least be able to use it in the narrative of Cal even without an offense was able to win 3 of its last 4 games.

No one but no one will remember the specifics of this bowl other than being one of the most gloriously awful ever. They won't remember the details... They'll just remember it for that game with all the intercetions and where one of the QBs was so insistent on throwing an INT he threw 2 on illegal passes and maybe it was the game where the coach iced his own FG kicker at the end of the game and, honestly, that's about it.

As mentioned in another post, last nights discussion of it during another bowl game, where neither TCU or Cal were mentioned, sort of makes my point.

A bleep-worthy quote from deadspin article:

Quote:

---

This game was never going to be good. Two of the best defenses in the country pitted against two of the worst offenses in the country could easily have been a recipe for a boring nothingburger of a game, and while this game indisputably sucked ass, its sheer density of hilarious ****ups pushed it beyond the realm of "normal bad" into something closer to performance art.

---

Its was incredibly disappointing but not as bad as all that. Defenses were on point. Hell Ben rothleisberger threw 5 picks in a single gane record in 2017 against Jax. Muehlstein threw for 4 ints. O was trying too hard on both sides against two defenses that were ready for the big stage.

I think we don'treally understand Cal football. I mean really, we go to a Cal football game and we get three hours of standup comedy. That's hard to find in the serious world of competitive FB. I recall some of the Holme games where I could laugh, and laugh for about three hours. The JW offense is close behind Holmoe's.

socaliganbear said:

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GoOoOoOoOoBears! said:

---

socaliganbear said:

---

GoOoOoOoOoBears! said:

---

kjkbear said:

---

Cal will get past this quickly. No one paid/pays attention to Cal except us.

Gary Patterson? He will never ever get offered a big contract at a better school again. He probably doesn't care, but his team was as bad as ours last night, and they were a top ten team for most of a decade. He loses big.

---

Agreed. No one pays attention to Cal except us and our competitors. And I'm sure they'll be gentlemanly and not use this nationally televised game against us. At least not more than 50 or 60 times. Each.

Facetiousness aside, this is a bad look for us at a time when we're rebuild our image and attract ever improving recruits - especially on offense. This game was a black eye and there's no way to sugar coat that.

---

What does this even mean? Use it against us how? If by competitors you mean our P12 peers, well the conference is coming off a 1-8 bowl season so I don't think anyone on the west coast is using bowl games against anyone. Not to mention the LA schools didn't even make a bowl game this year.

---

I'll answer that even thought it's unlikely that you didn't understand. We humiliated ourselves on offense. Five interceptions, complete inability to sustain drives, really poor QB play, bizzare play calling, poor half time adjustments compounded by worse in game adjustments, and one stinking score (off a short field) tying our season low for scoring after three weeks of prep. In short, we put a really bad offensive product on the field during a nationally televised game. We ended the season with a thud - underscoring our conference worst total offense, passing offense, and scoring offense.

Not exactly a fabulous advertisement to prospective recruits -- not to mention donors and casual fans. How does this performance elevate us in the eyes of teenagers who want to go to big time / upper echelon programs? Or at least respectable / up and coming programs? This was a substandard performance that reinforces the 'same old Cal' sentiment. As one poster commented, I'm damn glad that our 2019 recruits have signed their LOIs. Yesterday's game makes it harder for us to sell the program and provides plenty of fodder for opposing recruiters - at least while our current offensive staff is in place. You're considering Cal? *smirk*, Good luck showcasing your skills there, kid! If you don't see that it's because you choose not to.

Overall we definitely made progress on the season. But in a season of ups and downs we ended on a big down (two actually) and that's the momentum we're taking into the off season.

---

Absolutely nothing happened in the bowl game that recruits and other programs hadn't already seen or understood about this program. This is not some new secret weapon that's been unleashed in the pac. Even if we'd won the game in 2018 Cal fashion, oppononents could and would make the same arguments against us. Other than a blowout win, the bowl game wasn't going to change the narrative. And that outcome was, to anyone with eyes, never a possibility. It sucked, but we're the same program we were three weeks ago. And so are our flaws, just like everyone else in the pac.

---

It was worse than a mere continuation of the same. In our own special way we managed to put a cherry on top of the turd that our offense laid in 2019. We tied our season low in scoring (7), turnovers (5), and a variety of red zone and other associated metrics. We set new season lows in interceptions (5), time of possession and rushing attempts (despite the fact our QB play was particularly poor - heaven forbid we make in game adjustments). We lost to a team that managed 28 passing yards and threw one pick to Cal for every two completions to their own players. Our performance deteriorated relative to our own unhappy baseline and we achieved this on national TV with over three weeks of preparation time. No doubt about it, we ended the season of a particularly disappointing note -- losing momentum and missing out on an 8th win.

Of course we both agree that it sucked, but I believe we are diminished relative to where we were three weeks ago. Our QB play regressed, we've potentially burned through yet another QB (Garbers) and unfortunately Forrest looked ill prepared speaking to yet another example of poor player development. We've gone from exceedingly bad to a social media laughing stock and reached the point where it's increasingly hard to spin the players as being the problem (which would be a bad look anyway for a high integrity coaching staff). As long as Baldwin, Tui & Edwards are on our staff there's little doubt that this game exacerbated opposing coaches ability to negatively recruit against Cal.

Here's hoping for a brighter 2019.

GoCal1 said:

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I think we don'treally understand Cal football. I mean really, we go to a Cal football game and we get three hours of standup comedy. That's hard to find in the serious world of competitive FB. I recall some of the Holme games where I could laugh, and laugh for about three hours. The JW offense is close behind Holmoe's.

---

Just about every furd, ucla, and usc person I know (not to mention many on the interwebz) says "I can't take Cal football or men's BB seriously". They've also commented that the Pac-12 has 10 other programs that could threaten them for titles in those two sports, and then Cal, the one program they're not worried about....because we are always a much surer bet than the rest of the conference to shoot ourselves in the foot with bad decision-making on the field/court and off. They'll often point to our insane academic restrictions on football recruiting, our hostile faculty, our indifferent leadership (which I hope is changing under Chancellor Christ) and, yes, our comically bad marketing as a case in point.

And believe it or not, there was a thread on either UC Davis' or Cal Poly's board saying they wish we hadn't invested so much in our stadium, because we'd be a much better fit in their conference (the Big West).

I'm glad this is the case. The odds against us proving these people wrong are quite steep, but it'll be amazing if we do.

510 Bear said:

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And believe it or not, there was a thread on either UC Davis' or Cal Poly's board saying they wish we hadn't invested so much in our stadium, because we'd be a much better fit in their conference (the Big West).

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That's Blueblood. If he fails to get Cal into the Mountain West Conference, getting us into the Big West is his fallback plan.