He is a dead man walking. When he was being interviewed as the half ended, my wife saw it, as a person that didn't care about the interview. She is a high end corporate recruiter. She said there is a guy that does not want the job.
I don't have time to read all of War and Peace here, but I'd just like to say that I agree with those who feel Jackson V isn't the answer. His scrambling talents are not elite enough to overcome the bad habits we saw all preseason (like throwing downfield while backpedaling? sheesh) and bad instincts (repeatedly finding an empty spot on the field to throw the ball to - can't have been the receiver's fault all of those times). In spite of how stagnant the offense looked early under Finley, and the apparent spark provided by Jackson's entry into the game, I feel our best chance to win would have been to let Finley find his comfort zone and eventually/actually hit those open receivers that Spavital's offense provided in the 2nd half.
Could not say it any better. Jackson is not a confident or competent passer -- he looks confused in the pocket and starts running backwards almost immediately. That said, the play calling did not fit for the defense. Auburn just stacked the box and dared our mediocre o-line and RBs to beat them. What about some slants/medium depth crossing routes where Jerimiah can use his size to get some easy-ish yards and keep the LBs honest.
Jackson isn't the answer. He's too short to throw over the middle and inaccurate on deep patterns. The run game has to be more imaginative. Dive strong and dive weak aren't going to get it and that's the bulk of what I saw. The defense played great. but NO OFFENSE!
Btw..what's amazing in these pressers is no reporters ever call or ask about out the obvious coaching mistakes...they're always so scared and or in sympathy mode in the pressers as JW does his sad/angry face and canned answers...I find that fascinating. For example no one I don't thin yesterday asked about why did we not use our other backs and why was the run play calling so flat and obvious (up the middle w Ott). One would think that would be a logical and fair question, no?
Our red zone offense under Wilcox is already tragic, but if kicking a field goal is no longer an option, then you’re just adding to the challenge of scoring points consistently.
Dogshit refereeing and a brutal td taken off the board, and yet none of that matters if we have even marginally proficient special teams play. Absolutely unacceptable in year 7 of Wilcox.
Additionally, possibly the biggest indictment of Wilcox is the inability to recruit and develop a qb. Year 7 and we are relying on a position battle between two transfers. Even with the kicking gaffes, we still had a chance with a wide open receiver and Jackson couldn’t connect. Need to watch the recording, but it was the last drive, safety bit down, corner was beat, throw needed to go to the inside, Jackson overthrew the receiver to the outside. Should have been an easy td from my vantage point. I’m very tired of seeing some of our fans make excuses about refereeing when we just so consistently beat ourselves.
A question I have for someone who might be more well versed in offensive scheme: our last offensive play we were on the left hash, motioned the receiver on the right, and I think ended up with three receivers on the short side of the field. I had an overwhelming sense of doom, and sure enough, Jackson threw into traffic and it was picked. I noticed this formation a bunch last game too, and it just seems like a great way to end up with the qb forcing the ball into traffic. Am I missing something? I thought the whole point of the spread was to open up passing lanes?
Spread can happen from a variety of formations doesnt mean you need 5 wide spaced out. Its about creating space for a specific part of the field you want to attack. Hence why they say your throwing into a space/time vs reading a receiver break. Ill need to watch the play, but in essence with trips that way youre forcing the D to shift over to create more space on the field side rather than boundary, but if they dont then you have a numerical advantage on that side of the field. As a good friend told me. Football is all about numbers. You just need to be able to count to make the right decision.
"Possibly the biggest indictment of Wilcox is the inability to recruit and develop a QB. Year 7 and we are relying on a position battle between two transfers."… The modern game has damn good coaches playing true freshman & transfers young and old. Working the transfer portal is its own kind of recruiting – which we saw Deion Sanders do damn well this year – so our coaches RECRUITED Sam Jackson V, and then RECRUITED Ben Finley to provide depth (which paid off well at North Texas). Now Spav, who DEVELOPED pretty darn good QBs in his career, is DEVELOPING Sam (and was developing him through camp).
I understand the frustration with Wilcox but, as I and others have pointed out, he isn't the only guy involved here. The administration hasn't done him any favors and didn't help get the quality of assistant coaches he needed, and has been beyond underwhelming in terms of getting the attendance & hype that can help bring in Oregon-level recruits. The collapse in 2020 with Covid restrictions – and the related roster defections & hit to our program's momentum – should put a big old asterisk next to "Year 7" of building a program. The 2020 existential circumstances brought the program to about where it was at the end of the Dykes era, and there was little if anything Wilcox could have done to stop it. He even stuck around to try to slow what bleeding he could.
As for talking about the refs… This was always going to be a close game (pundits disagreed about the outcome, FPI and SP+ disagreed about the outcome) and we were the underdogs. With reasonable officiating AND with both the bizarro playcalling and kicking failures, we would have won this game. I would LOVE if we had a coach who could overcome that level of bad calls against the Auburn team we saw yesterday (itself ranked in the top 25 by both computers), with a roster that's half new (in an "upgraded" way) playing its second game together, but that didn't happen yesterday.
Onward. Invite your friends to one of the conference games and tell them to be loud, because fan apathy and a lack of home-field advantage also haven't been doing Wilcox any favors.
Same old excuses. We’re on offensive coordinator #3 under Wilcox and the player development at qb has been non-existent. Maybe it will fiiiiinally be different with spav, but last night was not inspiring. We can make excuse after excuse after excuse after excuse after excuse for why it’s not working, but we’re 7 years in and it’s still not working. No asterisks, everyone dealt with Covid. Bad kicking game? Who’s responsible for recruiting kickers. Shit the long one he made got wiped off the board cuz of a hold. When’s the last time you saw a hold on a field goal attempt? I’m sorry but the coaches get the blame for recruiting failures and breakdowns in execution. I desperately want Wilcox to succeed, I love him as a person and want more than anything for him to do well here. But it’s not working.
As for fan apathy, it’s been a decade+ of just bad football. Us masochists will still be there, but the environment is going to be driven by the casual fans showing up to fill the stadium. The Wilcox rock fights are not entertaining football. Believe me, I’ve screamed for years about student apathy, but after last night, I’m starting to get it. Unless you’ve been doing this your whole life (I was two weeks old for my first game), why are you showing up for this shit?
Not sure if I can really take this comment seriously if you are saying everybody else dealt with covid when the actual responses of the schools , conferences, and city/ county public health departments were vastly different. Other conferences had more complete seasons and no other school was dealing with rules as strict as existed in the city of Berkeley.
And there has regularly been reporting about Wilcox being unhappy with the administration because of their lack of money for assistant coaches. Do you think that doesn't matter at all?
The administration has been incredibly patient with a coach who hasn’t produced a winning conference record. This is his 3rd reboot of the offense. Baldwin and Musgrave were his preferred hires, same with Spav. The admin didn’t pick his OC, Wilcox did. Not many schools would allow a coach to go 6 years without a winning conference record and only 2 overall winning records and 3 offensive reboots and give them a large and unearned extension.
Actually I’m pretty sure I read he wanted Spav to stay in 2017 when he first got hired but he wanted to go and try being a head coach. Baldwin was not his preferred choice.
I believe that to be true as well but when it was clear that Spav didn’t want to stay, it seemed that Baldwin was his next choice. I actually thought the Baldwin hire was a very good one as he was a successful OC and HC at the FCS level with EWU
"The administration has been incredibly patient with a coach who hasn’t produced a winning conference record."
Herein lies the problem, from admin perspective, winning is not the important thing, rather the admin prizes a politically correct, obedient, and mindful head coach that does not argue or quibble with admin.
Wilcox is a good guy, but that may be part of the problem.
Exactly this. It is a catch 22. Just as much as the “administration” supposedly hinders Wilcox, Wilcox also benefits from it by getting more time to try to win and the benefit of the doubt because he “gets Cal” and says all the right things.
Spav was his preferred first hire and he asked him to stay on from 2016 to 2017, but Spav had other ideas. As for the other guys being his "preferred hires," they certainly weren't his #1 picks. He should have ditched Musgrave earlier, though.
I’ll admit, I liked the Baldwin hire. I thought he was going to be great. While Spav might have been 1A, I believe Baldwin was 1B.
I don’t recall any reports of Wilcox really wanting anyone besides Musgrave. Regardless he stuck with Musgrave and Angus far too long.
Furthermore, we have 3 OCs and all them seem to have the same issue, with the only constant being Wilcox. If Dykes doesn’t care about defense, Wilcox certainly doesn’t seem to care about offense.
Tedford had the same complaints about admin… yeah they suck. But for the most part, he was able to do more with less. The city was a PITA with Covid, but our own writers here had pretty strong opinions on the program being too loosey goosey with the protocol when they knew what the consequences could be. So for a second, I’ll entertain the perspective of Wilcox being a victim of extenuating circumstances and outside forces… my question is, for how many more years do we make those excuses? Cuz frankly, I wasn’t overly impressed with auburn. Idaho absolutely dusted Nevada on road yesterday. So I’m playing the ‘where do the wins come from’ game and it’s looking bleak. Maybe there’s a massive turnaround, auburn turns out to be an sec power this year, and everything looks rosey, but I am just not seeing it.
Make which excuses? What's the benchmark for when we can't "make excuses" anymore? If the refs hose us in a game that we otherwise would have won, I think it's fair to call out those refs whether that game is part of a 1 win or a 12 win season. I think administrative incompetence at different schools, lack of support for the revenue sports (with advertising to bring in fans, good PR/social media, salaries for assistant coaches), academic standards for recruits, and so on can explain a lot about differences in win totals between teams… That's why we've seen so many coaches have vastly different levels of success at different schools, and why we saw Oregon offer Wilcox the job despite his performance at Cal.
I have plenty of criticisms of Wilcox. I think it's fine to have plenty of criticisms of Wilcox. But too many fans place too much at his feet, and catastrophize close losses to good teams with calls for his head, when what makes a football team is more than just one dude (and when that one dude can only do so much to affect the outcome of an individual game).
There are no more excuses. You can't blame the admin for losses that squarely on the coaches. The kids are fine. Plenty of talent. They lacked some discipline and were coached poorly - playcalling last nite lost the game along with field goals. That's it. It wasn't admin covid or anything else.
Listening to wilcox for 7yrs in pressers after these ridiculous losses, it's so clear to me he does not know what to do and how to fix these problems. It's always the same bshit answers..."we gotta do better, it's on the players and coaches blah blah. No brass tacks on tactics to improve. No ownership to say we fucked up the play calling. We didn't use our receivers or other backs enuf. Etc..no real plan on what to do to improve...just the same we didn't get it done speech.
The refs made a disastrously bad call, but there were somewhere around 55 minutes of football after that. If any one of like five different things went right, we win that game. But none of them did. The head coach is ultimately responsible, and I’m to the point of just being done with what amount to moral victories in year seven. Again, maybe he turns this all around and I look like a dumbass, and frankly, nothing would make me happier. But I just don’t see it happening. So how much longer do we allow it to go on? How many years in a row of losing conference records do we tolerate?
On the topic of oregon, that offer seemed like an offer that wasn’t really an offer. You make an offer to a head coach but effectively don’t give him full control over how his program runs? Yeah I don’t know about that. The Wilcox offer seemed to be made to appease the vocal players, but they ended up getting the right guy. But what do I know…
I'm sure there's a "Fire Saban" movement percolating in Tuscaloosa. It's the nature of the beast and, honestly, I do not think Prime could make a lasting difference in our results.
Why do so many other teams have their OC's in the PRESS BOX surrounded by several assistants, an OPEN play book in front of them, headphones to tell the sideline what play to call because they can see the WHOLE FIELD as plays develop and detect weaknesses, or future open targets for a QB? And why is Spav, our OC on the sideline chatting away while our O line is getting abused and Ott is getting (maybe) three yards a pop, two of which he muscles on his own? Anybody got an answer?
I've always wondered about this too. I think OCs belong in the booth, and it's like some kind of statement to show they are really engaged by being on the sideline.. so maybe well intentioned but not smart in my book. If i recall correctly, in the dreadful last days of Musgrave he started appearing on the sidelines to show how serious they were about turning things around, and my first thought was if you suck in the booth you're going to be even worse on the sideline where you cant even see whats happening.
Fuck it, I'm taking this as not quite a moral victory but just a bullshit loss that we frankly would have won with even close to decent refereeing. Many Auburn fans agreed online and on the BART ride home. The short field that gave Auburn its first score was due to a bad fumble call, zebras negated the pick six, and other calls killed drives. We needed a perfect kicking night AND/OR more offense to overcome a good Auburn defense AND some crazy biased calls... But we didn't. This to me is much more on bad juju than on the coaches, and it sucks that we have historically bad juju.
Still, Jackson was so much fun to watch in person and the defense was great too. We'll pull some upsets this year and are still a borderline bowl team even with 7 ranked teams on our schedule. As for computers, we dropped 3 spots in FPI to 33rd (Auburn also dropped 3 spots to 25th) and 5 in SP+ to 54th (Auburn dropped 6 to 24th). FPI has us going 5.9-6.1: we're favored outright per FPI in 4 games and dogs in 6 (all the ranked teams except WSU), and UCLA is our best opportunity for an upset (42%) to go bowling. Our chances with the rest range from 19.6% (UO) to 38.4% (OSU)... far better than the three single-digit chances FPI gave us in the preseason (UW/UO/USC).
The bad part is the Auburn loss harmed any buzz we've been building, and affected momentum for attendance and donations. Hopefully a couple/few upsets help... early with OSU or UW would be great.
OH WELL, LETS SEE: LUCK CERTAINLY ABANDONED LUCKHURST, JAKSON DID OK WITH SHORT PASSES BUT THERE WERE NO LONG ONES WORTH NOTICING, THE PLAY CALLING SURE LACKED ANYTHING OF VALUE---ESPECIALLY WHEN THAT SPLIT FORMATION FIZZED THAT FAILED MISERABLY., SOMEONE FORGOT THERE USED TO BE SCREEN PASSES THAT WORKED IN THE GOOD OLD DAYS, AND AND THERE WAS LITTLE OR NO DECEPTION TO VIEW IN TRYING TO GET RUNS. OTT DID THE BEST HE COULD WITHOUT MUCH SUPPORT UP FRONT. ITS JUST ANOTHER "OH WELL"AGAIN. AUBURN'S RUN AND PAS DEFENSE WAS ENVIABLE THEY WERE A BIT TOO TOUGH
TO EVEN TRY TO GET SOME MORE PRODUCTIVE PASSING DONE WHICH WE REALLY NEEDED TO ENGENDER A GOOD CHANCE TO WIN FOR OUR BEARS. GERBEAR GERBEAR
Archon: You aren't kidding. I think that he is a great coach. His players graduate, he understands the culture in Berkeley and his teams play AWESOME defense. But he is also extremely unlucky (or is it something else?). He has lost 12 out of 19 games by SEVEN POINTS OR LESS!!!!!! I swear to god it seems as though we are cursed! Auburn is about as perfect a chance as you can get to make a statement and all we did was fall flat (that was such a frustrating game to watch). I really hope that he can turn the Bears around and succeed but if not, it may be time to cut our losses and give someone else a chance. Finally, I do think that Ott is going to be fine but would someone tell him to STOP LEAPING OVER DEFENDERS!!!!!!!!! You may make one highlight reel but you really take your life into your hands when you do stuff like that.
I will say this, the wilting in the second half is a historically Cal thing.
Thinking back to the 70s, I, for one, knew that in, say, 85% of games, if Cal was not up by two to three scores, then we were at-risk of losing.
My suspicion is our historic lack of depth and general attraction of a 3 star and lower recruits, because, well, come-here-to-play-but-only-if-you're-ready-to-endure-intellectual-snobbery-and-disdainful-graduate-assistants-and-an-aging-brand-that-seems-to-fire-successful-coaches. Just a suspicion. So, by my suspicion, our starters, typically, can't be subbed out to keep fresh horses and, by the fourth quarter, our starters are spent.
Bowlesman: I guy in my gym played for Cal in the 1960s and, to your point, he said that when it came to Cal Football (even then); "Close loses were our specialty". Like you said, it doesn't seem like much has changed. Sigh........
It's because good coaches are the exception, not the rule at Cal.
(coaches since Pappy Waldorf who retired after the 1956 season)
GOOD COACHES - had a winning record (above 0.500 winning percentage)
Mike White (1972-1977), 35-30-1, 0.538
Bruce Snyder (1987-1991), 29-24-4, 0.544
Jeff Tedford (2002-2012), 82-57, 0.590
MEDIOCRE COACHES (ranging from 0.400 to 0.500 winning percentage)
Ray Willsey (1964-1971), 40-42-1, 0.488
Keith Gilbertson (1992-1995), 20-26-0, 0.435
Steve Mariucci (1996), 6-6, 0.500
Justin Wilcox (2017-??), 30-36, 0.455
LESS THAN MEDIOCRE COACHES (below 0.400 winning percentage)
Pete Elliott (1957-1959), 10-21-0, 0.323
Marv Levy (1960-1963), 8-29-3, 0.238
Roger Theder (1978-1981), 17-28-0, 0.378
Joe Kapp (1982-1986), 20-34-1, 0.373
Tom Holmoe (1997-2001), 12-39-0, 0.235
Sonny Dykes (2013-2016), 19-30, 0.388
As I've said multiple times before, this is indicative of indifference at the campus leadership positions. Given the current financial conditions of the Athletic Department, and the recent demise of the Pac-12, having a GOOD head football coach becomes even more critical to the health of the department and the sponsored non-revenue sports programs.
Absolutely agree this is on campus leadership. They are perfectly fine with use loitering in the .500 range.
The pretentious, intellectual snobbery sees athletics, especially the popular sports, as the varying inversely to academic achievement and reputation. Harvard professor Howard Gardner identified 8 intelligences, amongst which was existential and kinetic. I suspect both of which are higher in individuals who compete in sports.
So, they need a wake up call.
How about a campaign encouraging donors to give to NIL, instead of academic departments? Do this until they place equal value on athletics.
The thing is, I believe you will see an improvement in both academics and athletics.
He is a dead man walking. When he was being interviewed as the half ended, my wife saw it, as a person that didn't care about the interview. She is a high end corporate recruiter. She said there is a guy that does not want the job.
I don't have time to read all of War and Peace here, but I'd just like to say that I agree with those who feel Jackson V isn't the answer. His scrambling talents are not elite enough to overcome the bad habits we saw all preseason (like throwing downfield while backpedaling? sheesh) and bad instincts (repeatedly finding an empty spot on the field to throw the ball to - can't have been the receiver's fault all of those times). In spite of how stagnant the offense looked early under Finley, and the apparent spark provided by Jackson's entry into the game, I feel our best chance to win would have been to let Finley find his comfort zone and eventually/actually hit those open receivers that Spavital's offense provided in the 2nd half.
Could not say it any better. Jackson is not a confident or competent passer -- he looks confused in the pocket and starts running backwards almost immediately. That said, the play calling did not fit for the defense. Auburn just stacked the box and dared our mediocre o-line and RBs to beat them. What about some slants/medium depth crossing routes where Jerimiah can use his size to get some easy-ish yards and keep the LBs honest.
Successful college football in the modern age must have a dual threat QB.
Not that I agree with this blanket statement, but if so, then let's go get one.
Cal history teaches us that the quickest way to get the admin to get rid of a coach is for that coach to get us ranked and on a winning track.
Problem solved.
So, you're saying we're stuck with Wilcox for a while yet. Right?
It's a conundrum, considering that if he was suddenly having a Tedford level of success, then we wouldn't want him gone.
Jackson isn't the answer. He's too short to throw over the middle and inaccurate on deep patterns. The run game has to be more imaginative. Dive strong and dive weak aren't going to get it and that's the bulk of what I saw. The defense played great. but NO OFFENSE!
Blame the coaches fr not finding a QB in the portal. But, really, how can you blame them for last night?
The QB play was off the chart bad. Finely was flat-not terrible. But Jackson ? He can run but he is not a quarterback. and probably never will be.
His passing made Ayob look good.
Going to be a painful season.
Btw..what's amazing in these pressers is no reporters ever call or ask about out the obvious coaching mistakes...they're always so scared and or in sympathy mode in the pressers as JW does his sad/angry face and canned answers...I find that fascinating. For example no one I don't thin yesterday asked about why did we not use our other backs and why was the run play calling so flat and obvious (up the middle w Ott). One would think that would be a logical and fair question, no?
We… did use our other backs. We used all but 1 that are available…
Hardly tho.
We didn't use Thomas, right?
Our red zone offense under Wilcox is already tragic, but if kicking a field goal is no longer an option, then you’re just adding to the challenge of scoring points consistently.
Dogshit refereeing and a brutal td taken off the board, and yet none of that matters if we have even marginally proficient special teams play. Absolutely unacceptable in year 7 of Wilcox.
Additionally, possibly the biggest indictment of Wilcox is the inability to recruit and develop a qb. Year 7 and we are relying on a position battle between two transfers. Even with the kicking gaffes, we still had a chance with a wide open receiver and Jackson couldn’t connect. Need to watch the recording, but it was the last drive, safety bit down, corner was beat, throw needed to go to the inside, Jackson overthrew the receiver to the outside. Should have been an easy td from my vantage point. I’m very tired of seeing some of our fans make excuses about refereeing when we just so consistently beat ourselves.
A question I have for someone who might be more well versed in offensive scheme: our last offensive play we were on the left hash, motioned the receiver on the right, and I think ended up with three receivers on the short side of the field. I had an overwhelming sense of doom, and sure enough, Jackson threw into traffic and it was picked. I noticed this formation a bunch last game too, and it just seems like a great way to end up with the qb forcing the ball into traffic. Am I missing something? I thought the whole point of the spread was to open up passing lanes?
Spread can happen from a variety of formations doesnt mean you need 5 wide spaced out. Its about creating space for a specific part of the field you want to attack. Hence why they say your throwing into a space/time vs reading a receiver break. Ill need to watch the play, but in essence with trips that way youre forcing the D to shift over to create more space on the field side rather than boundary, but if they dont then you have a numerical advantage on that side of the field. As a good friend told me. Football is all about numbers. You just need to be able to count to make the right decision.
Interesting, thanks so much for responding!
Hope that helps answer your question!
"Possibly the biggest indictment of Wilcox is the inability to recruit and develop a QB. Year 7 and we are relying on a position battle between two transfers."… The modern game has damn good coaches playing true freshman & transfers young and old. Working the transfer portal is its own kind of recruiting – which we saw Deion Sanders do damn well this year – so our coaches RECRUITED Sam Jackson V, and then RECRUITED Ben Finley to provide depth (which paid off well at North Texas). Now Spav, who DEVELOPED pretty darn good QBs in his career, is DEVELOPING Sam (and was developing him through camp).
I understand the frustration with Wilcox but, as I and others have pointed out, he isn't the only guy involved here. The administration hasn't done him any favors and didn't help get the quality of assistant coaches he needed, and has been beyond underwhelming in terms of getting the attendance & hype that can help bring in Oregon-level recruits. The collapse in 2020 with Covid restrictions – and the related roster defections & hit to our program's momentum – should put a big old asterisk next to "Year 7" of building a program. The 2020 existential circumstances brought the program to about where it was at the end of the Dykes era, and there was little if anything Wilcox could have done to stop it. He even stuck around to try to slow what bleeding he could.
As for talking about the refs… This was always going to be a close game (pundits disagreed about the outcome, FPI and SP+ disagreed about the outcome) and we were the underdogs. With reasonable officiating AND with both the bizarro playcalling and kicking failures, we would have won this game. I would LOVE if we had a coach who could overcome that level of bad calls against the Auburn team we saw yesterday (itself ranked in the top 25 by both computers), with a roster that's half new (in an "upgraded" way) playing its second game together, but that didn't happen yesterday.
Onward. Invite your friends to one of the conference games and tell them to be loud, because fan apathy and a lack of home-field advantage also haven't been doing Wilcox any favors.
Same old excuses. We’re on offensive coordinator #3 under Wilcox and the player development at qb has been non-existent. Maybe it will fiiiiinally be different with spav, but last night was not inspiring. We can make excuse after excuse after excuse after excuse after excuse for why it’s not working, but we’re 7 years in and it’s still not working. No asterisks, everyone dealt with Covid. Bad kicking game? Who’s responsible for recruiting kickers. Shit the long one he made got wiped off the board cuz of a hold. When’s the last time you saw a hold on a field goal attempt? I’m sorry but the coaches get the blame for recruiting failures and breakdowns in execution. I desperately want Wilcox to succeed, I love him as a person and want more than anything for him to do well here. But it’s not working.
As for fan apathy, it’s been a decade+ of just bad football. Us masochists will still be there, but the environment is going to be driven by the casual fans showing up to fill the stadium. The Wilcox rock fights are not entertaining football. Believe me, I’ve screamed for years about student apathy, but after last night, I’m starting to get it. Unless you’ve been doing this your whole life (I was two weeks old for my first game), why are you showing up for this shit?
Not sure if I can really take this comment seriously if you are saying everybody else dealt with covid when the actual responses of the schools , conferences, and city/ county public health departments were vastly different. Other conferences had more complete seasons and no other school was dealing with rules as strict as existed in the city of Berkeley.
And there has regularly been reporting about Wilcox being unhappy with the administration because of their lack of money for assistant coaches. Do you think that doesn't matter at all?
The administration has been incredibly patient with a coach who hasn’t produced a winning conference record. This is his 3rd reboot of the offense. Baldwin and Musgrave were his preferred hires, same with Spav. The admin didn’t pick his OC, Wilcox did. Not many schools would allow a coach to go 6 years without a winning conference record and only 2 overall winning records and 3 offensive reboots and give them a large and unearned extension.
The level of “patience” the administration has had with Wilcox, a coach with a losing record is pretty much unprecedented in the modern era.
"Patience" or apathy or is it calculated neglect?
Actually I’m pretty sure I read he wanted Spav to stay in 2017 when he first got hired but he wanted to go and try being a head coach. Baldwin was not his preferred choice.
I believe that to be true as well but when it was clear that Spav didn’t want to stay, it seemed that Baldwin was his next choice. I actually thought the Baldwin hire was a very good one as he was a successful OC and HC at the FCS level with EWU
"The administration has been incredibly patient with a coach who hasn’t produced a winning conference record."
Herein lies the problem, from admin perspective, winning is not the important thing, rather the admin prizes a politically correct, obedient, and mindful head coach that does not argue or quibble with admin.
Wilcox is a good guy, but that may be part of the problem.
Exactly this. It is a catch 22. Just as much as the “administration” supposedly hinders Wilcox, Wilcox also benefits from it by getting more time to try to win and the benefit of the doubt because he “gets Cal” and says all the right things.
Spav was his preferred first hire and he asked him to stay on from 2016 to 2017, but Spav had other ideas. As for the other guys being his "preferred hires," they certainly weren't his #1 picks. He should have ditched Musgrave earlier, though.
I’ll admit, I liked the Baldwin hire. I thought he was going to be great. While Spav might have been 1A, I believe Baldwin was 1B.
I don’t recall any reports of Wilcox really wanting anyone besides Musgrave. Regardless he stuck with Musgrave and Angus far too long.
Furthermore, we have 3 OCs and all them seem to have the same issue, with the only constant being Wilcox. If Dykes doesn’t care about defense, Wilcox certainly doesn’t seem to care about offense.
Tedford had the same complaints about admin… yeah they suck. But for the most part, he was able to do more with less. The city was a PITA with Covid, but our own writers here had pretty strong opinions on the program being too loosey goosey with the protocol when they knew what the consequences could be. So for a second, I’ll entertain the perspective of Wilcox being a victim of extenuating circumstances and outside forces… my question is, for how many more years do we make those excuses? Cuz frankly, I wasn’t overly impressed with auburn. Idaho absolutely dusted Nevada on road yesterday. So I’m playing the ‘where do the wins come from’ game and it’s looking bleak. Maybe there’s a massive turnaround, auburn turns out to be an sec power this year, and everything looks rosey, but I am just not seeing it.
Make which excuses? What's the benchmark for when we can't "make excuses" anymore? If the refs hose us in a game that we otherwise would have won, I think it's fair to call out those refs whether that game is part of a 1 win or a 12 win season. I think administrative incompetence at different schools, lack of support for the revenue sports (with advertising to bring in fans, good PR/social media, salaries for assistant coaches), academic standards for recruits, and so on can explain a lot about differences in win totals between teams… That's why we've seen so many coaches have vastly different levels of success at different schools, and why we saw Oregon offer Wilcox the job despite his performance at Cal.
I have plenty of criticisms of Wilcox. I think it's fine to have plenty of criticisms of Wilcox. But too many fans place too much at his feet, and catastrophize close losses to good teams with calls for his head, when what makes a football team is more than just one dude (and when that one dude can only do so much to affect the outcome of an individual game).
There are no more excuses. You can't blame the admin for losses that squarely on the coaches. The kids are fine. Plenty of talent. They lacked some discipline and were coached poorly - playcalling last nite lost the game along with field goals. That's it. It wasn't admin covid or anything else.
Listening to wilcox for 7yrs in pressers after these ridiculous losses, it's so clear to me he does not know what to do and how to fix these problems. It's always the same bshit answers..."we gotta do better, it's on the players and coaches blah blah. No brass tacks on tactics to improve. No ownership to say we fucked up the play calling. We didn't use our receivers or other backs enuf. Etc..no real plan on what to do to improve...just the same we didn't get it done speech.
The refs made a disastrously bad call, but there were somewhere around 55 minutes of football after that. If any one of like five different things went right, we win that game. But none of them did. The head coach is ultimately responsible, and I’m to the point of just being done with what amount to moral victories in year seven. Again, maybe he turns this all around and I look like a dumbass, and frankly, nothing would make me happier. But I just don’t see it happening. So how much longer do we allow it to go on? How many years in a row of losing conference records do we tolerate?
On the topic of oregon, that offer seemed like an offer that wasn’t really an offer. You make an offer to a head coach but effectively don’t give him full control over how his program runs? Yeah I don’t know about that. The Wilcox offer seemed to be made to appease the vocal players, but they ended up getting the right guy. But what do I know…
I'm sure there's a "Fire Saban" movement percolating in Tuscaloosa. It's the nature of the beast and, honestly, I do not think Prime could make a lasting difference in our results.
Agreed but it took a while (and a lot of nudging the Athletics Dept) to get here
Last night's game was like a dream where you have a gun, the bad guy is coming for you, but the gun just won't fire.
I think the last interception was a Hail Mary/50:50 ball.
I think that was the end of first half.
Correct
Nope, we had 4th and 14 from their 18.
Why do so many other teams have their OC's in the PRESS BOX surrounded by several assistants, an OPEN play book in front of them, headphones to tell the sideline what play to call because they can see the WHOLE FIELD as plays develop and detect weaknesses, or future open targets for a QB? And why is Spav, our OC on the sideline chatting away while our O line is getting abused and Ott is getting (maybe) three yards a pop, two of which he muscles on his own? Anybody got an answer?
I've always wondered about this too. I think OCs belong in the booth, and it's like some kind of statement to show they are really engaged by being on the sideline.. so maybe well intentioned but not smart in my book. If i recall correctly, in the dreadful last days of Musgrave he started appearing on the sidelines to show how serious they were about turning things around, and my first thought was if you suck in the booth you're going to be even worse on the sideline where you cant even see whats happening.
It might be because he's also QB coach and wants to be able to talk directly with the QBs, give them advice on technique, etc. in between drives
But then he wasn't talking to QBs much during the game. I thought about that too and watched him. He was in black, right?
Not sure, I sit behind the student section and couldn't really see what the coaches were doing . Maybe I'll catch it when I watch the replay
Fuck it, I'm taking this as not quite a moral victory but just a bullshit loss that we frankly would have won with even close to decent refereeing. Many Auburn fans agreed online and on the BART ride home. The short field that gave Auburn its first score was due to a bad fumble call, zebras negated the pick six, and other calls killed drives. We needed a perfect kicking night AND/OR more offense to overcome a good Auburn defense AND some crazy biased calls... But we didn't. This to me is much more on bad juju than on the coaches, and it sucks that we have historically bad juju.
Still, Jackson was so much fun to watch in person and the defense was great too. We'll pull some upsets this year and are still a borderline bowl team even with 7 ranked teams on our schedule. As for computers, we dropped 3 spots in FPI to 33rd (Auburn also dropped 3 spots to 25th) and 5 in SP+ to 54th (Auburn dropped 6 to 24th). FPI has us going 5.9-6.1: we're favored outright per FPI in 4 games and dogs in 6 (all the ranked teams except WSU), and UCLA is our best opportunity for an upset (42%) to go bowling. Our chances with the rest range from 19.6% (UO) to 38.4% (OSU)... far better than the three single-digit chances FPI gave us in the preseason (UW/UO/USC).
The bad part is the Auburn loss harmed any buzz we've been building, and affected momentum for attendance and donations. Hopefully a couple/few upsets help... early with OSU or UW would be great.
can'tstanditcan'tstanditcan'tstanditcan'tstandit...damnitdamnitdamnitdamnit DAMN IT!!!
Thought the 8th amendment protected us from cruel and unusual punishment
Try being from San Diego.
At least Giant fans have witnessed 3 WS titles over the last 15 years. That is not torture.
Welp, after 50 years of torture.
We, too, are due. It's been over 60 years.
Oh, you think darkness is the Giants ally. But the Giants merely adopted the dark; Cal was born in it, moulded by it.
Love it when Furd leans into the robber baron heritage. Like the train whistle after TDs.
OH WELL, LETS SEE: LUCK CERTAINLY ABANDONED LUCKHURST, JAKSON DID OK WITH SHORT PASSES BUT THERE WERE NO LONG ONES WORTH NOTICING, THE PLAY CALLING SURE LACKED ANYTHING OF VALUE---ESPECIALLY WHEN THAT SPLIT FORMATION FIZZED THAT FAILED MISERABLY., SOMEONE FORGOT THERE USED TO BE SCREEN PASSES THAT WORKED IN THE GOOD OLD DAYS, AND AND THERE WAS LITTLE OR NO DECEPTION TO VIEW IN TRYING TO GET RUNS. OTT DID THE BEST HE COULD WITHOUT MUCH SUPPORT UP FRONT. ITS JUST ANOTHER "OH WELL"AGAIN. AUBURN'S RUN AND PAS DEFENSE WAS ENVIABLE THEY WERE A BIT TOO TOUGH
TO EVEN TRY TO GET SOME MORE PRODUCTIVE PASSING DONE WHICH WE REALLY NEEDED TO ENGENDER A GOOD CHANCE TO WIN FOR OUR BEARS. GERBEAR GERBEAR
Just noticed that we were four of eighteen on third down. A stat that speaks for itself.
Wilcox looked like he was about to punch through a wall during that presser.
Wilcox is either an extremely unlucky coach or something structurally just isn’t working
Archon: You aren't kidding. I think that he is a great coach. His players graduate, he understands the culture in Berkeley and his teams play AWESOME defense. But he is also extremely unlucky (or is it something else?). He has lost 12 out of 19 games by SEVEN POINTS OR LESS!!!!!! I swear to god it seems as though we are cursed! Auburn is about as perfect a chance as you can get to make a statement and all we did was fall flat (that was such a frustrating game to watch). I really hope that he can turn the Bears around and succeed but if not, it may be time to cut our losses and give someone else a chance. Finally, I do think that Ott is going to be fine but would someone tell him to STOP LEAPING OVER DEFENDERS!!!!!!!!! You may make one highlight reel but you really take your life into your hands when you do stuff like that.
Well said, Avi.
I will say this, the wilting in the second half is a historically Cal thing.
Thinking back to the 70s, I, for one, knew that in, say, 85% of games, if Cal was not up by two to three scores, then we were at-risk of losing.
My suspicion is our historic lack of depth and general attraction of a 3 star and lower recruits, because, well, come-here-to-play-but-only-if-you're-ready-to-endure-intellectual-snobbery-and-disdainful-graduate-assistants-and-an-aging-brand-that-seems-to-fire-successful-coaches. Just a suspicion. So, by my suspicion, our starters, typically, can't be subbed out to keep fresh horses and, by the fourth quarter, our starters are spent.
Maybe I am wrong, but this dovetailing, late game failing is typiCAL©️BobR49 and a historic reality going back decades before this present crisis.
Bowlesman: I guy in my gym played for Cal in the 1960s and, to your point, he said that when it came to Cal Football (even then); "Close loses were our specialty". Like you said, it doesn't seem like much has changed. Sigh........
Yep. Now, if only we knew why.
It's because good coaches are the exception, not the rule at Cal.
(coaches since Pappy Waldorf who retired after the 1956 season)
GOOD COACHES - had a winning record (above 0.500 winning percentage)
Mike White (1972-1977), 35-30-1, 0.538
Bruce Snyder (1987-1991), 29-24-4, 0.544
Jeff Tedford (2002-2012), 82-57, 0.590
MEDIOCRE COACHES (ranging from 0.400 to 0.500 winning percentage)
Ray Willsey (1964-1971), 40-42-1, 0.488
Keith Gilbertson (1992-1995), 20-26-0, 0.435
Steve Mariucci (1996), 6-6, 0.500
Justin Wilcox (2017-??), 30-36, 0.455
LESS THAN MEDIOCRE COACHES (below 0.400 winning percentage)
Pete Elliott (1957-1959), 10-21-0, 0.323
Marv Levy (1960-1963), 8-29-3, 0.238
Roger Theder (1978-1981), 17-28-0, 0.378
Joe Kapp (1982-1986), 20-34-1, 0.373
Tom Holmoe (1997-2001), 12-39-0, 0.235
Sonny Dykes (2013-2016), 19-30, 0.388
As I've said multiple times before, this is indicative of indifference at the campus leadership positions. Given the current financial conditions of the Athletic Department, and the recent demise of the Pac-12, having a GOOD head football coach becomes even more critical to the health of the department and the sponsored non-revenue sports programs.
To use a euphemism, Cal is skating on thin ice.
Tedford, too, got hobbled for his players' APR.
Absolutely agree this is on campus leadership. They are perfectly fine with use loitering in the .500 range.
The pretentious, intellectual snobbery sees athletics, especially the popular sports, as the varying inversely to academic achievement and reputation. Harvard professor Howard Gardner identified 8 intelligences, amongst which was existential and kinetic. I suspect both of which are higher in individuals who compete in sports.
So, they need a wake up call.
How about a campaign encouraging donors to give to NIL, instead of academic departments? Do this until they place equal value on athletics.
The thing is, I believe you will see an improvement in both academics and athletics.
The records shown for each coach are those compiled at Cal, and nowhere else.