There's always an upside(s). May be easier to get tickets and social distance at games for the rest of the season? May be able to get younger players more experience than we would otherwise (though coaches on the hot seat are not likely to further decrease chances of winning now)? Cal's opponents may overlook our favorite team and we might be able to sneak a win? Recruits who stay committed will be people not afraid of a challenge. Finally, Cal will lose its reputation as a football factory that doesn't care about academics?
Unrelated question: how did Ron Gould go from playing and coaching defensive backs to running backs?
Interesting that Chip Kelly wasn't at least an honorable mention for the hot seat. His salary is almost double what Wilcox is getting and he hasn't necessarily turned things around in year five either.
I actually had no issue with Wilcox going for it on 4th and 14, even though I knew there was a low-percentage for a 1st down. I happened to be in the stands during pregame warmups and saw the FG unit mishandle the snap on consecutive plays (I remind you, this was in warmups!), and the snap was even worse after our lone TD. Perhaps Wilcox had visions (nightmares!) of a bad snap being picked up by WSU and taken to the house.
I often wonder what traffic looks like on fan sites during down seasons. I would assume it is down but hate/shit posting helps keep Facebook popular and profitable so maybe it isn’t as bad as I would assume.
Our numbers take a massive dive when Cal is bad. Sometimes there's a real brief bump after a really horrible loss when people feel like venting, but on he whole losses just lead fans to tune out, for which I hardly blame them.
Cal fans: One addition to my previous post. If Wilcox is gone after this season, the DC at Arizona State (Antonio Pierce) would be a good hire. The Sun Devils are playing great defense and he is an awesome recruiter.
Wasnt Pierce the central figure in all of the crap that went down? I remember reading that Edwards was basically letting Pierce run the show, in terms of both recruiting strategy and personnel decisions on the coaching staff, and he (Pierce) created such a hostile environment it's the reason the coaches that he forced out were willing to come forward.
Nick: Good suggestion to do something non-Cal Football related during the bye week. I'm going to golf and surf. I think that we all (players, coaches, fans) need a break. One thing that I absolutely cannot figure out is why we seem so cursed. Yes, I know that we are Cal and this is what we do on a regular basis year in and year out but please hear me out. Justin Wilcox is a good coach. He has built or been part of good defenses at every stop in his coaching career. He is also very likeable. He preaches accountability, his players don't get in trouble and they graduate (which, despite my love for Jeff Tedford, is something that he did not do and it almost landed us on probation). I just don't understand why things are going completely sideways this season. Furthermore, I don't believe all of that baloney about "lack of institutional and fan support". Cal ponied up over $500 million to renovate Memorial and add first class facilities and if you watched the 'Furd-Oregon game last Saturday, their stadium was half-full and that didn't stop them from upsetting the Ducks. Great defenses and good (not great) QB play is what wins football games and Wilcox is building a program around that philosophy. Even if things go completely south this season, I'm willing to give him one more chance to turn things around next season. Finally, if we really want to get better and stick it to one of our rivals at the same time, get the 'Root back from Oregon NOW! Double his existing salary, give him free housing, have him carried around Berkeley on a litter supported by super-models, whatever it takes because in my humble opinion, our biggest drop-off this season has been on defense and it is no coincidence that it started as soon as the Ducks stole him from us. GO BEARS!
Hell, it's my job to try to make sense of things, and while I hardly expected Pac-12 contention this year, I didn't really envision the program bottoming out, which is now on the table. Go figure!
One good thing about the pain of Cal football over the last decade or so is that I've gotten really good at compartmentalizing. I used to be unable to read or see any football after a Cal loss, especially ones like this. Now? I don't give a shit. I promptly file what happened to the back of my head and start thinking about other things.
It's kind of sad that Cal football has become about everything but the game to me these days. If we win it's just an added bonus, but I don't expect it one bit.
It's great and all to think about firing Wilcox, but honestly I have zero confidence that the next coach will be any good. After all this AD hired Mark Fox for MBB. I fully expect another lackluster hire.
Yep, I got to the "filing away" phase late in the third quarter of the WSU fiasco. Still positive though but hopefully not in the usual irritable manner regarding execution malpractice or post loss angst. Will see how that goes.
* Long snaps are fine in practice, but not during a game.
* D-backs and O-line suddenly forget their fundamentals and make bad mistakes during games.
* Garbers throws one-hoppers at crucial moments.
* Team plays well in practice but badly in games when it matters.
* Game goes to hell after a fluke result of a blocked punt. I remember thinking "will they get over this setback?" and unfortunately the answer was no.
* A fumble on a flea-flicker?
A saw a couple of shots of the sideline during the WSU game. There seemed to be no energy, players just standing there, nervous, seemingly waiting for something to go wrong. And Wilcox limping around with his teeth clenched and a sour look on his face.
Tedford came into a similar situation in '02 with a strong message of teamwork and immediately fixed the underperformance. Harbaugh came in to furd with "relentless positivity unknown to mankind". Carroll went to SC and was relentlessly upbeat and energetic.
I think it can be turned around if the players relax, play loose, and start having fun. Otherwise it's just going to get worse, a feel-bad death spiral. I like Wilcox, and maybe he can do it, but I'm afraid he's not that kind of guy, and what we are seeing is the classic "groups eventually adopt the personality of their leader".
COVID effect? I don't know if anyone else has mentioned this anywhere, but I wonder if or how much the pandemic has affected our team? Yeah I know everyone else is also dealing with it, but I just wonder if it has affected the psyche of our players. These certainly are normal times...STILL...and many people have been directly or personally affected by Covid. From staying at home to full-time online classes for over a whole year to having loved ones or friends dying, etc. That's maybe one factor that I would add into whatever happens this year.
Yeah, this one was a real head scratcher, to put it generously. 7 days after our offense seemed to show some promise of breaking out, we got constant pressure, sacks, and TFLs without any reaction to it. No quick slants, crosses, outs or anything to just get the ball out of Garbers' hands so he wouldn't be sacked yet again! It sadly looked like a game from the very dark Holmoe years. :(
You didn’t miss anything, I went to a friends house a got BBQ after the first half and he offered to put the second half on for me to watch. I told him I wanted to have a good time so don’t bother putting the game on.
I've never asked that the Cal Bear football team be Alabama, or even Oregon ("Leland Stanford Junior College"? Really?
However, why can that team not have been Oregon State, or BYU, even once in the past half century? Apparently UC is too woke for football.
I'm done expecting anything resembling effort from this team. "Finish The Job"? Well if "the job" was to lose what little fan base this team had, they've done a stellar job. Maybe BYU should have replaced Cal in the Pac 12 instead of going to the Big 12. That Utes vs BYU rivalry would have more significance.
I remember when Wilcox at least won the games we were favored to win. Vegas had us -7.5 and we lost by double digits. The troubling trend of the first team to 21 wins in the Wilcox era also continues.
We are also 2-7 in our last 9 games and 1-6 against the Pac 12.
Yeah, I like being aggressive and going for it on 4th down but 4th and 14 with our offense isn’t being aggressive and smart, especially when in FG range. If we make the FG we are down 9-14 I believe, which would be helpful since we missed the extra point on TD so this would have eliminated the need to go for 2 points just to tie the game.
What can we do to prevent him from having a Tommy Vardell game.
There's always an upside(s). May be easier to get tickets and social distance at games for the rest of the season? May be able to get younger players more experience than we would otherwise (though coaches on the hot seat are not likely to further decrease chances of winning now)? Cal's opponents may overlook our favorite team and we might be able to sneak a win? Recruits who stay committed will be people not afraid of a challenge. Finally, Cal will lose its reputation as a football factory that doesn't care about academics?
Unrelated question: how did Ron Gould go from playing and coaching defensive backs to running backs?
Ha ha ha! Reminds me of Life of Brian..."Always look on the bright siiide of life..." after he is literally crucified! :)
Not on the hot seat yet but he does get an honorable mention amongst the candidates...
https://dknation.draftkings.com/2021/10/3/22706558/college-football-week-5-coaching-hot-seat-manny-diaz-scott-frost-mike-norvell-dino-babers
Interesting that Chip Kelly wasn't at least an honorable mention for the hot seat. His salary is almost double what Wilcox is getting and he hasn't necessarily turned things around in year five either.
I actually had no issue with Wilcox going for it on 4th and 14, even though I knew there was a low-percentage for a 1st down. I happened to be in the stands during pregame warmups and saw the FG unit mishandle the snap on consecutive plays (I remind you, this was in warmups!), and the snap was even worse after our lone TD. Perhaps Wilcox had visions (nightmares!) of a bad snap being picked up by WSU and taken to the house.
Can't we just find some guys at Cal who played HS football and can snap the ball? Have open try-outs.
This situation can't be good for W4California subscriptions
Nope! But if it would help get Cal a Pac-12 title I'd delete the entire website in a second
We started this site two weeks before a national lockdown and the indefinite cancellation of all sports. We've seen worse.
THERES ALWAYS WORSE
Indeed, the men's basketball season starts next month.
Like Polish history "and then it got worse"
We’re just here to have fun
I often wonder what traffic looks like on fan sites during down seasons. I would assume it is down but hate/shit posting helps keep Facebook popular and profitable so maybe it isn’t as bad as I would assume.
Our numbers take a massive dive when Cal is bad. Sometimes there's a real brief bump after a really horrible loss when people feel like venting, but on he whole losses just lead fans to tune out, for which I hardly blame them.
Cal fans: One addition to my previous post. If Wilcox is gone after this season, the DC at Arizona State (Antonio Pierce) would be a good hire. The Sun Devils are playing great defense and he is an awesome recruiter.
You don't think we can lure the SMU coach out of Texas?
Ha,ha,ha!!!! That's a good one.
He might be a bit too controversial of a hire due to their potential/alleged recruiting violations.
Wasnt Pierce the central figure in all of the crap that went down? I remember reading that Edwards was basically letting Pierce run the show, in terms of both recruiting strategy and personnel decisions on the coaching staff, and he (Pierce) created such a hostile environment it's the reason the coaches that he forced out were willing to come forward.
Good point.
He is a Cal (sorta) alum but he graduated from San Diego State.
Nick: Good suggestion to do something non-Cal Football related during the bye week. I'm going to golf and surf. I think that we all (players, coaches, fans) need a break. One thing that I absolutely cannot figure out is why we seem so cursed. Yes, I know that we are Cal and this is what we do on a regular basis year in and year out but please hear me out. Justin Wilcox is a good coach. He has built or been part of good defenses at every stop in his coaching career. He is also very likeable. He preaches accountability, his players don't get in trouble and they graduate (which, despite my love for Jeff Tedford, is something that he did not do and it almost landed us on probation). I just don't understand why things are going completely sideways this season. Furthermore, I don't believe all of that baloney about "lack of institutional and fan support". Cal ponied up over $500 million to renovate Memorial and add first class facilities and if you watched the 'Furd-Oregon game last Saturday, their stadium was half-full and that didn't stop them from upsetting the Ducks. Great defenses and good (not great) QB play is what wins football games and Wilcox is building a program around that philosophy. Even if things go completely south this season, I'm willing to give him one more chance to turn things around next season. Finally, if we really want to get better and stick it to one of our rivals at the same time, get the 'Root back from Oregon NOW! Double his existing salary, give him free housing, have him carried around Berkeley on a litter supported by super-models, whatever it takes because in my humble opinion, our biggest drop-off this season has been on defense and it is no coincidence that it started as soon as the Ducks stole him from us. GO BEARS!
Hell, it's my job to try to make sense of things, and while I hardly expected Pac-12 contention this year, I didn't really envision the program bottoming out, which is now on the table. Go figure!
One good thing about the pain of Cal football over the last decade or so is that I've gotten really good at compartmentalizing. I used to be unable to read or see any football after a Cal loss, especially ones like this. Now? I don't give a shit. I promptly file what happened to the back of my head and start thinking about other things.
It's kind of sad that Cal football has become about everything but the game to me these days. If we win it's just an added bonus, but I don't expect it one bit.
It's great and all to think about firing Wilcox, but honestly I have zero confidence that the next coach will be any good. After all this AD hired Mark Fox for MBB. I fully expect another lackluster hire.
Yep, I got to the "filing away" phase late in the third quarter of the WSU fiasco. Still positive though but hopefully not in the usual irritable manner regarding execution malpractice or post loss angst. Will see how that goes.
Something about this team is broken:
* Long snaps are fine in practice, but not during a game.
* D-backs and O-line suddenly forget their fundamentals and make bad mistakes during games.
* Garbers throws one-hoppers at crucial moments.
* Team plays well in practice but badly in games when it matters.
* Game goes to hell after a fluke result of a blocked punt. I remember thinking "will they get over this setback?" and unfortunately the answer was no.
* A fumble on a flea-flicker?
A saw a couple of shots of the sideline during the WSU game. There seemed to be no energy, players just standing there, nervous, seemingly waiting for something to go wrong. And Wilcox limping around with his teeth clenched and a sour look on his face.
Tedford came into a similar situation in '02 with a strong message of teamwork and immediately fixed the underperformance. Harbaugh came in to furd with "relentless positivity unknown to mankind". Carroll went to SC and was relentlessly upbeat and energetic.
I think it can be turned around if the players relax, play loose, and start having fun. Otherwise it's just going to get worse, a feel-bad death spiral. I like Wilcox, and maybe he can do it, but I'm afraid he's not that kind of guy, and what we are seeing is the classic "groups eventually adopt the personality of their leader".
COVID effect? I don't know if anyone else has mentioned this anywhere, but I wonder if or how much the pandemic has affected our team? Yeah I know everyone else is also dealing with it, but I just wonder if it has affected the psyche of our players. These certainly are normal times...STILL...and many people have been directly or personally affected by Covid. From staying at home to full-time online classes for over a whole year to having loved ones or friends dying, etc. That's maybe one factor that I would add into whatever happens this year.
The human in me totally agrees and is sympathetic.
The analyst in me isn’t sympathetic because that technically applies to ALL college athletics and heck the whole damn world.
That flea flicker was so hilariously bad. It didn't get me angry unlike the dumb toss to the outside on a 3rd and short.
Yeah, this one was a real head scratcher, to put it generously. 7 days after our offense seemed to show some promise of breaking out, we got constant pressure, sacks, and TFLs without any reaction to it. No quick slants, crosses, outs or anything to just get the ball out of Garbers' hands so he wouldn't be sacked yet again! It sadly looked like a game from the very dark Holmoe years. :(
That's how the game felt to me. We went Full Holmoe.
I did not watch this game, and deleted from my DVR. A microcosm of the season
You didn’t miss anything, I went to a friends house a got BBQ after the first half and he offered to put the second half on for me to watch. I told him I wanted to have a good time so don’t bother putting the game on.
My thoughts? We stink!
I've never asked that the Cal Bear football team be Alabama, or even Oregon ("Leland Stanford Junior College"? Really?
However, why can that team not have been Oregon State, or BYU, even once in the past half century? Apparently UC is too woke for football.
I'm done expecting anything resembling effort from this team. "Finish The Job"? Well if "the job" was to lose what little fan base this team had, they've done a stellar job. Maybe BYU should have replaced Cal in the Pac 12 instead of going to the Big 12. That Utes vs BYU rivalry would have more significance.
GO RAIDERS!
I remember when Wilcox at least won the games we were favored to win. Vegas had us -7.5 and we lost by double digits. The troubling trend of the first team to 21 wins in the Wilcox era also continues.
We are also 2-7 in our last 9 games and 1-6 against the Pac 12.
Yeah, I like being aggressive and going for it on 4th down but 4th and 14 with our offense isn’t being aggressive and smart, especially when in FG range. If we make the FG we are down 9-14 I believe, which would be helpful since we missed the extra point on TD so this would have eliminated the need to go for 2 points just to tie the game.
Sad faced Bear.
I really want Wilcox to succeed, but...
I do too, but this last game was just too incoherent and poorly played to make any sense of it.