The Good, The Bad, and The Rockfights: Cal at Oregon State

This week in The Bad, The Worse, and The Eye Bleach...

Candidates line up to interview for the Cal offensive coordinator position

The PFF grades that underlie this series of pieces are often released with impressive haste. I usually check the grades on Sunday morning and they are always ready for every category. The lone exception is special teams, which do not seem to be posted until Monday. Although the single special teams grade encompasses a wide variety of efforts—kick coverage, punting, returning, kickoffs, kicking, etc.—the special teams unit usually sees no more than a minute of clock time in the game. Although it ought to be relatively low effort to produce the special teams grades (certainly in comparison to something like coverage, tackling, or pass/run blocking), we usually go without those grades. And it’s just as well this week, as special teams surrendered a punt return touchdown that extinguished the hopes of even the most optimistic of Cal fans. The Rule of 21 is a cruel inevitability for Wilcox’s Cal teams, and that punt gave Oregon State that critical 21st point. With an offense that failed to find the end zone and a defense that was largely ineffective, we do not need yet another category to tell us how poorly the Bears played in Reser, once again (side note: if Cal manages to get a Big Ten invitation, how nice would it be not to have to play in Corvallis or Tucson any more?).