The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly: Has the Worm Turned?

The Buffs beat Wyoming and all is good again, right? 

Right?

Wrong. 

In conversations with individuals inside the Wyoming program before and after the game it was apparent that they knew they didn’t even have a puncher’s chance Saturday night. And in all honesty, at no point during that 60 minutes did one person inside the stadium think the outcome was ever in doubt. It was a great opportunity for the Buffs to reset themselves. But has the worm definitively turned for this team? 

Spoiler: Nope.

On to the recap…

The Good

Kaidon Salter got himself straight. Sure, it was against a defense that’s a step slower than every team they’ll play the rest of the year, but renewed confidence was achieved. He made good decisions on his reads, threw catchable pass on time, and even ran the ball with a tad more aggressiveness.

How was this possible you may ask? Well, with more play calling input coming from additional coaches, we suddenly determined bubble screens are better left to high school playbooks, passing on 1^st down is not against the rules, and it’s okay to draw up plays where your QB throws downfield further than 12 yards. Go figure.

The Bad

Our RB room.

Everyone is in some state of hurt, only one back is trusted to catch balls even though it was a large part of our offensive install in August and our best back was coached up at an FCS school. Welch looks slow, Taylor needs 8-10 more touches a game, Rice is hurt, and it looks like Hayden took his bag and his new Ford Bronco, drove up the canyon and peaced the hell out. 

“Paging Dr. Offerdahl. Paging soon-to-be Dr. Charlie Offerdahl. You are needed in Dal Ward, stat.”

The Ugly

If you thought our offensive backfield had issues, let me introduce you to our defensive backfield. We went from the verge of becoming the new DBU to fielding a back 5 that has trouble defending teams where passing is an afterthought in their offensive scheme.

– Finnseth is the token “legacy guy” who has earned unwarranted playing time by channeling his inner Offerdahl and getting in front of the Well Off cameras consistently.

– Hodge and McKinney read too many media previews and are not the man-to-man defenders the staff think they are. 

– Parks and Yates were FCS level backfillers the day they stepped on campus and that hasn’t changed.

– RJ Johnson started solidly, but like half our team, is hurt.

– Stoutmire waited a full 2 years for his shot then promptly said, “Nah, screw it. I’m phoning it in.” 

– And finally, our best DB by far was kept out of the lineup for 2 games for no clear reason. Anyone else think Byard could’ve been a game changer against Georgia Tech’s offense? 

So….

Where does this leave our beloved Buffs this week against a tougher and better coached opponent?

1)      Screw the run game. Time to go back to slingin’ the rock. Salter says he wants to show what he can do as a passer? Hell yeah, dial up 45 passes this week. But throw to everybody – WRs, RBs and TEs, even that slack jawed manager that watches over Prime’s sideline shitter. Roll that dude out there and see what YAC he can generate.

2)      Run a Robber Zone on D. Walk Byard up and let him play Robber. BYU runs a ton of multiple TE sets. This allows us to present an 8 man front against the run, bring blitzers from everywhere and don’t let Bachmeier get to his 2^nd and 3^rd read. Light that fool the fvck up!

3)      Make this a gold brick game. They embarrassed us last year. The staff should be preaching this every day this week. They should be showing Alamo Bowl game film on a 24/7 loop. Show them the post-game interviews where the BYU coaches and players basically laughed at how soft and predictable we were. Ignite a righteous hatred and tell players it’s okay if things get nasty. Go out and Bitch slap these cultist soakers.

Deeds not Words, 

Commander out.

…………………If you want to waste 5 more minutes before getting back to work, may we interest you in the following post?

Unverified Veracity Looks at 5 Questions – Including is there a Big Time Silent Commitment?, How Good is Salter Really?, and is CU as Good as it Looked Against Wyoming?