Last year was a very good season. We only saw good games. No cupcakes. And we almost made the CFP with the selection committee chair saying if we had one more win we were in.

Bunk Moreland said:

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with Haynes this team is 5-0 and looking at 9-3 as a floor and 11-1 as a ceiling for the regular season. Even with the OL flaws and WR inconsistencies.

Now I think 7-5 looks more likely but you never know...could still find a way to 8-4.

And yes, 2020 was always the year when Jimbo started...we knew we'd have the senior leadership in his 3rd year and it would have been great to have seen a normal season with cupcakes, Bama toward the back-end of the schedule and not 2nd, etc.

But things happened so no sense going back over that.

---

This

Bunk Moreland said:

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with Haynes this team is 5-0 and looking at 9-3 as a floor and 11-1 as a ceiling for the regular season. Even with the OL flaws and WR inconsistencies.

Now I think 7-5 looks more likely but you never know...could still find a way to 8-4.

And yes, 2020 was always the year when Jimbo started...we knew we'd have the senior leadership in his 3rd year and it would have been great to have seen a normal season with cupcakes, Bama toward the back-end of the schedule and not 2nd, etc.

But things happened so no sense going back over that.

---

Really? Even w/ the way other SEC teams are playing? I think Haynes maybe beats one of arky or MSU but not both. Bama and ole miss are losses even if Mond was back. Auburn, LSU...

We shot ourselves in the foot over and over vs Arky. Haynes hits the wide open guys and runs for a lot of first downs on his own. We beat Arky by 10+ with him.

Saturday night was an abomination yet the Ags still should have won the game. It's not like we're getting dominated. The frustrating part is how easily we should have won both imo.

Next year is our next year
Last year is our last year
This year is our this year


Hope this helps.

NoahAg said:

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Bunk Moreland said:

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with Haynes this team is 5-0 and looking at 9-3 as a floor and 11-1 as a ceiling for the regular season. Even with the OL flaws and WR inconsistencies.

Now I think 7-5 looks more likely but you never know...could still find a way to 8-4.

And yes, 2020 was always the year when Jimbo started...we knew we'd have the senior leadership in his 3rd year and it would have been great to have seen a normal season with cupcakes, Bama toward the back-end of the schedule and not 2nd, etc.

But things happened so no sense going back over that.

---

Really? Even w/ the way other SEC teams are playing? I think Haynes maybe beats one of arky or MSU but not both. Bama and ole miss are losses even if Mond was back. Auburn, LSU...

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We almost won both of those games. So, I agree that with King, win both.

I am afraid we over over-romanticizing King as we always do "the other QB," but I think he gets us a win in both, here's why...

Both teams were rushing 3. If you only rush 3, King will take his yards on the ground every time. Arkansas was keeping 2 LBs kind of high in the box in a spot that they can defend our slant routes we love to run, but also converge and destroy Calzada if he tries to run. The difference is that when Calzada could've only ran for 2 yards, King can get 4. 3 times 4 is 12 and that's a first down. Now when they start to spy and bring 4, it opens up the secondary for King to hit open WRs. That brings us to the passing game.

I am quite sure King is a better passer, too, and not just because he beat Calzada for the job. Just in terms of throwing ability, what I have seen from King and Calzada, they're very very similar but Calzada has a much stronger arm. Calzada also, however, is not a cool cucumber under the bright lights, his success in spring games and practices is NOT translating to the bigtime. On the other hand, King is one composed baddie in the pocket because he KNOWS the offense. We saw how he was a coach on the field in high school and we've heard the stories of him charting plays and studying like crazy off the field. on top of King actually making it to his 2nd progression (which we need him to make it to 3rd and checkdown more), King doesn't miss as many open receivers. Additionally, when King sees a defender playing the inside of a receiver who is going to throw break to the sideline, King is way more likely to throw that ball just as a receiver breaks because he knows what's up, Will Rogers did an incredible job of this on Saturday, credit to him! Calzada lacks that decision making. He only throws once the separation is developed, and then it's too late. This is why Calzada's best passes are coming off of RPOs that he keeps, because He is forced to throw IMMEDIATELY when he pulls the ball out to avoid linemen getting downfield. Or recall the diving catch Spiller made in Colorado for a first down. It was a lil zig route, and Zach threw BEFORE Spiller cut back to the sideline. If Calzada would just say, "ah heck it, the receiver has a step and is about to break *that* way, here it comes," and throw a step sooner, he would do much better.

Again, let's not get TOO high on "the other guy," but even with Calzada, I think better play calling wins us those 2 games, and I think if we had King, the addition of the talent and getting to stick to our gameplan since midAugust gets us to 5-0, and we are shooting for working hard to go somewhere along 10-3 this year.

Cassius said:

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Last year the competition was not good.

Vandy (0-9), MSU (4-7), Arky (3-7), SCAR (2-8), TN, (3-7), LSU (5-5)



We beat a bunch of very bad teams.

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Those records are not indicative of the quality of teams. Remember they all played an all sec schedule as well. The true indicator was the bowl record of the sec which was dominant. To say we played an all sec schedule and it was bad is not accurate. A 3-7 ole miss team beat the number 11 team in the nation. The sec went like 9-2 in bowl games and took home the natty. I guranteee you the vast majority of these teams have winning records if they played non conference.

Last year record was misleading

Florida was a quality win but outside that really nothing

Auburn was only other team we beat with a winning record and they finished 6-5 and fired their coach

Vandy, South Carolina, Tennesse, Arkansas we're absolutely terrible

And who cares anymore about bowl records?
Players don't even care so don't use that as a measuring stick.
UNC had most their top players sit out the bowl game.
Just as Florida did and OU beat them by 35 points in the Cotton bowl

Last years record was misleading

Cassius said:

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Last year the competition was not good.

Vandy (0-9), MSU (4-7), Arky (3-7), SCAR (2-8), TN, (3-7), LSU (5-5)

We beat a bunch of very bad teams.

---

You do realize that every time one of those teams lost, year, another one won.

And A&M, UF, UGA, and bama went a combined like 32-2 against the other 10 teams in the SEC... we dished out over 3 losses on average to the other 10 SEC schools. Dude, that means that to having a winning record, they had to go 6-3 the rest of the way, but they were all pretty evenly matched so they all went about 4-3 or 3-4 against each other...

In a normal season all these teams have 3 more wins against cupcakes and maybe they win their 1 game against another P5 school like we did Colorado this year/, Vandy would have been 2-10, MSU would be 7-5, Arky would be 7-5 (if they beat texas again), Scar would be 5-7 (sucks to play UGA, UF, and clemson every year), Tenn would be 7-5 (sucks to play UGA, UF, and Bama every year), LSU would ne 9-3.

Take the win total that these teams had, and tack on 3 or 4 more wins for the 3 or 4 conference games they get to play instead of having to play at least 3 games against a combo of A&M, Bama, UF, and UGA. When 4 teams hand out as many losses as we did and you don't get your OOC games in, everyone is gonna look bad.

NoahAg said:

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Something that occurred to me over the weekend. We perennially joke about "next year," but I think most of us missed the fact that last year was our "next year." Returning 4-year QB (greatly under appreciated), solid O-line and RBs. 10-1 record and a great bowl win.

Maybe b/c of covid and the shortened season and many fans thinking we got "screwed" out of a playoff spot we didn't appreciate how good last season was. Last year's Bama game effectively was our playoff game.

On paper this season shouldn't be that surprising (except for our still underperforming WRs and TEs). We knew o-line would be a huge question mark. We should have known QB was a question mark. So many people thought that Haynes would step right in and be better than Mond. Of course you can't predict a season ending injury, but in the small sample of Haynes that we saw, there was nothing to show that we would have done much better against arkansas or MSU.

Yes, I still think Haynes is better than Zach but we should have seen that this was a rebuilding year, maybe 8-4. W/ Zach, 6-6.

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Cool. So you're saying we don't have a program we have the chance to be punchy every few years.


If so, why are we paying $100 million for that?

Aggie said:

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Last year record was misleading

Florida was a quality win but outside that really nothing

Auburn was only other team we beat with a winning record and they finished 6-5 and fired their coach

Vandy, South Carolina, Tennesse, Arkansas we're absolutely terrible

And who cares anymore about bowl records?
Players don't even care so don't use that as a measuring stick.
UNC had most their top players sit out the bowl game.
Just as Florida did and OU beat them by 35 points in the Cotton bowl

Last years record was misleading

---

To say our record was misleading is discounting just how good we were. We had a really good team last year. 2020 Ags >>>> 2021 Ags. I agree w/ us not getting a playoff spot, but our top 5 finish was legit. We were that good.

Aggie said:

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Last year record was misleading

Florida was a quality win but outside that really nothing

Auburn was only other team we beat with a winning record and they finished 6-5 and fired their coach

Vandy, South Carolina, Tennesse, Arkansas we're absolutely terrible

And who cares anymore about bowl records?
Players don't even care so don't use that as a measuring stick.
UNC had most their top players sit out the bowl game.
Just as Florida did and OU beat them by 35 points in the Cotton bowl

Last years record was misleading

---

How can teams have winning records when the top 4 teams go like 32-2 or something against the other 10 teams. Everyone basically started the year 0-3 and had a slugfest against each other.

And amid the slugfest, every time one of the teams in focus won, one lost.

Don't use "records" to measure last year when none of those SEC schools got there 3 cupcakes and a winnable game against another P5 school. Because they get those games in a normal year

houstonaggie76 said:

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NoahAg said:

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Something that occurred to me over the weekend. We perennially joke about "next year," but I think most of us missed the fact that last year was our "next year." Returning 4-year QB (greatly under appreciated), solid O-line and RBs. 10-1 record and a great bowl win.

Maybe b/c of covid and the shortened season and many fans thinking we got "screwed" out of a playoff spot we didn't appreciate how good last season was. Last year's Bama game effectively was our playoff game.

On paper this season shouldn't be that surprising (except for our still underperforming WRs and TEs). We knew o-line would be a huge question mark. We should have known QB was a question mark. So many people thought that Haynes would step right in and be better than Mond. Of course you can't predict a season ending injury, but in the small sample of Haynes that we saw, there was nothing to show that we would have done much better against arkansas or MSU.

Yes, I still think Haynes is better than Zach but we should have seen that this was a rebuilding year, maybe 8-4. W/ Zach, 6-6.

---

Cool. So you're saying we don't have a program we have the chance to be punchy every few years.


If so, why are we paying $100 million for that?

---

You don't just get to be like UGA because you had 1 season like them. We still have to rebuild. We are headed in the right direction to NOT have to rebuild every year like UGA does, but it takes more time. We are 3 scholarship QBs short of where we were a year ago, and lost 4 on the OL. And Even UGA would be looking at a 10 win season if they lost all we did. Only Bama would keep on rolling after losing the core of the offense and then having a transfer QB and an injury

Alpha Texan said:

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Aggie said:

---

Last year record was misleading

Florida was a quality win but outside that really nothing

Auburn was only other team we beat with a winning record and they finished 6-5 and fired their coach

Vandy, South Carolina, Tennesse, Arkansas we're absolutely terrible

And who cares anymore about bowl records?
Players don't even care so don't use that as a measuring stick.
UNC had most their top players sit out the bowl game.
Just as Florida did and OU beat them by 35 points in the Cotton bowl

Last years record was misleading

---

How can teams have winning records when the top 4 teams go like 32-2 or something against the other 10 teams. Everyone basically started the year 0-3 and had a slugfest against each other.

And amid the slugfest, every time one of the teams in focus won, one lost.

Don't use "records" to measure last year when none of those SEC schools got there 3 cupcakes and a winnable game against another P5 school. Because they get those games in a normal year

---

Exactly. 68 of scheduled 70 SEC games were played. Alabama (10-0), Texas A&M (8-1), Florida (8-2), Georgia (7-2), and Auburn (6-4) went a combined 39-9. That leaves only 29 wins remaining, and the rest of the SEC went 29-59. Because none of the SEC Schools got to play their 3 cupcake games and a winnable game against a nonconference Power 5 school, the SEC teams appear weaker than usual. For these reasons, we can't use win-loss records from last season to measure our strength of schedule. Even if these SEC teams were down, we won 6 SEC games by 11+ points, including four road games against Mississippi State, South Carolina, Auburn, and Tennessee. Not only did we finish 8-1 in SEC games, but we significantly improved our margin of victory in these wins.

Detmersdislocatedshoulder said:

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Cassius said:

---

Last year the competition was not good.

Vandy (0-9), MSU (4-7), Arky (3-7), SCAR (2-8), TN, (3-7), LSU (5-5)



We beat a bunch of very bad teams.

---

Those records are not indicative of the quality of teams. Remember they all played an all sec schedule as well. The true indicator was the bowl record of the sec which was dominant. To say we played an all sec schedule and it was bad is not accurate. A 3-7 ole miss team beat the number 11 team in the nation. The sec went like 9-2 in bowl games and took home the natty. I guranteee you the vast majority of these teams have winning records if they played non conference.

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That's a good point.

NoahAg said:

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Bunk Moreland said:

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with Haynes this team is 5-0 and looking at 9-3 as a floor and 11-1 as a ceiling for the regular season. Even with the OL flaws and WR inconsistencies.

Now I think 7-5 looks more likely but you never know...could still find a way to 8-4.

And yes, 2020 was always the year when Jimbo started...we knew we'd have the senior leadership in his 3rd year and it would have been great to have seen a normal season with cupcakes, Bama toward the back-end of the schedule and not 2nd, etc.

But things happened so no sense going back over that.

---

Really? Even w/ the way other SEC teams are playing? I think Haynes maybe beats one of arky or MSU but not both. Bama and ole miss are losses even if Mond was back. Auburn, LSU...

---

We were within a score of Arky in the middle of the 3rd and had won the TOP battle to that point. A slight improvement in decision-making and much improved mobility from the QB and we win that game going away. Most people talking about that game gloss over that point. Same thing with MSU - we'd have put up a heck of a lot more than 22 points with Haynes.

I'm not saying Haynes is the second coming of JFF, but even in the limited sample size of his first career start, he played pretty good football. 2 of those interceptions were honestly not on him.

Alpha Texan said:

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Aggie said:

---

Last year record was misleading

Florida was a quality win but outside that really nothing

Auburn was only other team we beat with a winning record and they finished 6-5 and fired their coach

Vandy, South Carolina, Tennesse, Arkansas we're absolutely terrible

And who cares anymore about bowl records?
Players don't even care so don't use that as a measuring stick.
UNC had most their top players sit out the bowl game.
Just as Florida did and OU beat them by 35 points in the Cotton bowl

Last years record was misleading

---

How can teams have winning records when the top 4 teams go like 32-2 or something against the other 10 teams. Everyone basically started the year 0-3 and had a slugfest against each other.

And amid the slugfest, every time one of the teams in focus won, one lost.

Don't use "records" to measure last year when none of those SEC schools got there 3 cupcakes and a winnable game against another P5 school. Because they get those games in a normal year

---

That's just not a good argument. If the top 4 teams are outstanding and the rest are complete garbage, its the same outcome. You cant infer that the rest of the conference was good but just beating up on each other and splitting. We split against FL and Bama.

The better argument is the bowl game, as detmer pointed out.

I generally agree with the sentiment of the OP. I still think that Haynes' competitive nature and athleticism along with our defense would have given us a chance against Bama this year playing them at Kyle Field, but we'll never know now, and yes, this should be seen as a rebuilding year now.

To take a phrase from Mack Brown, Bama's bought a house in the college football playoff neighborhood. That's where we want to be, but you can't buy a house there overnight. It takes time. We rented a place close by last year. Jimbo gives us as good a chance to buy space in that neighborhood as anyone else out there, so we keep moving forward. We'll still have ups and downs, but our highs should be higher and our lows should be higher as well.

We're barking up the same tree. I'm saying that if we played OOC games, we would look a lot better. He's saying that when you look at the bowl games (OOC games), we look a lot better.

If ever there was a year for an asterisk have to be after a team's wins, it was last season.

And here we are, with countless millions still oblivious to the scamdemic.

Aggie said:

---

Last year record was misleading

Florida was a quality win but outside that really nothing

Auburn was only other team we beat with a winning record and they finished 6-5 and fired their coach

Vandy, South Carolina, Tennesse, Arkansas we're absolutely terrible

And who cares anymore about bowl records?
Players don't even care so don't use that as a measuring stick.
UNC had most their top players sit out the bowl game.
Just as Florida did and OU beat them by 35 points in the Cotton bowl

Last years record was misleading

---

I think you missed the point of last season. Because of the SEC we had football. And we only played other SEC teams until the Orange Bowl. There were no cupcakes. It was raw, unadulterated SEC football. No fake Ws.

It's why we joined this conference.

Next year will be this year next year

EliteZags said:

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Next year will be this year next year

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"We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future."

If. You gotta love it. If we had Manziel at quarterback, last year's offensive line, Evans, Reynolds and Kirk wide, and our current running backs we would be favored to win it all.

But we have what we have. The questions is, what do we do with it?

Aggie said:

---

Last year record was misleading

Florida was a quality win but outside that really nothing

Auburn was only other team we beat with a winning record and they finished 6-5 and fired their coach

Vandy, South Carolina, Tennesse, Arkansas we're absolutely terrible

And who cares anymore about bowl records?
Players don't even care so don't use that as a measuring stick.
UNC had most their top players sit out the bowl game.
Just as Florida did and OU beat them by 35 points in the Cotton bowl

Last years record was misleading

---

I don't know why people keep saying this. If we don't play an all sec schedule, then lsu is probably 8-4 or 9-3, auburn is 9-3, Arkansas is 6-6 at worst, etc. Florida was the only team to hang with Bama last year and we took them down. We were a good team last year. Not championship caliber, but one step under it.

In the eyes of texag *connoisseurs, when you get your ass kicked a few times to start the season after the coach doesn't properly prepare the "nil lovin $tudent athletes" it becomes a free-pass and the sunshine hive changes the narrative and starts calling the elite defense and talented skill position offense a "Rebuilding Year Team" as if that covers everything and now we can go back to relaxing and accepting the loses like this weekend and last weekend and the weekend before that.

We are rebuilding, I'm so glad that we can wait until the next year(s) in perpetuity.

Cool.


*Note: the term connoisseurs while difficult to spell, identifies the expertise of the population on matters of taste and style for football and can be used interchangeably with the alternative spelling spp 'kind-o-sewers'.

Well now next year is our next year