Since this board has just become a bunch of monkeys in a percussion studio, let's have a thread where we can actually look forward to the season. Here are some facts:

• We were a 4-overtime game away from playing in the SEC championship last year and have basically the same schedule again this year.
• We are #6 in the country and #1 in the SEC in returning production from that team.
• We have a solidly top-ten talent roster in the country. tu and possibly LSU are the only teams likely to have a higher talent ratings than us, and neither is running away with it. On the other hand, we should have a significant talent advantage over 4-5 conference opponents (depending on where Auburn is at now).
• We have major schedule advantages against all of our toughest opponents besides LSU.
• This is year two of a new head coach, and despite our recent experience, that is supposed to mean a bump in performance, all other things being equal.
• While it doesn't affect this year per se, we have a top 3 recruiting class at a time when 80%-90% of recruits are committed to the teams they will play for next year.
• The team has been quiet this off-season. Given the experience under Jimbo, this can only be an improvement.

Cocaine is a helluva drug

Ugly said:

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Since this board has just become a bunch of monkeys in a percussion studio, let's have a thread where we can actually look forward to the season. Here are some facts:

• We were a 4-overtime game away from playing in the SEC championship last year and have basically the same schedule again this year.
• We are #6 in the country and #1 in the SEC in returning production from that team.
• We have a solidly top-ten talent roster in the country. tu and possibly LSU are the only teams likely to have a higher talent ratings than us, and neither is running away with it. On the other hand, we should have a significant talent advantage over 4-5 conference opponents (depending on where Auburn is at now).
• We have major schedule advantages against all of our toughest opponents besides LSU.
• This is year two of a new head coach, and despite our recent experience, that is supposed to mean a bump in performance, all other things being equal.
• While it doesn't affect this year per se, we have a top 3 recruiting class at a time when 80%-90% of recruits are committed to the teams they will play for next year.
• The team has been quiet this off-season. Given the experience under Jimbo, this can only be an improvement.

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Yessir… good stuff! Thanks for actually posting something positive

Counterpoint:

-We suck at big road games and always manage to lose a home game to someone we shouldn't

If this ages well, you have my utmost respect. BTHO tu!!!

Ah yes, the early July pumper thread. We're so back.
Also love how almost every single point included a caveat.

Well…you put chum in the water. Now watch all the bottom-dwelling critters race to say the most negative thing possible to refute it.

With regard to scheduling advantage , @ Notre Dame, @ Mizzou , @ LSU, @ tu. Not all that favorable in that respect. @ Arky as well.

I think there's reason for some degree of optimism but not so sure on that one.

The biggest positive indicator imo, Aggies are generally not optimistic this year. Those are the years the team seems to outperform.

Another positive , no uncertainty on the QB starter . First incompletion or Oski will change that I'm sure tho.

Maroon Dawn said:

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Counterpoint:

-We suck at big road games and always manage to lose a home game to someone we shouldn't

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I miss the days when you got scared away from the football forums.

Here's a reminder of what your pessimism achieved for us before, and I hope it'll get us there again.

https://texags.com/forums/5/topics/3236691

Justice Beaver said:

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Ah yes, the early July pumper thread. We're so back.
Also love how almost every single point included a caveat.

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Thank you, Sir

Guy12 said:

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Maroon Dawn said:

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Counterpoint:

-We suck at big road games and always manage to lose a home game to someone we shouldn't

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I miss the days when you got scared away from the football forums.

Here's a reminder of what your pessimism achieved for us before, and I hope it'll get us there again.

https://texags.com/forums/5/topics/3236691

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And what did that win accomplish?

Nothing

Because we lost to nobody Mississippi schools with a fraction of our budget

Maybe for you a big but meaningless win a year is all it takes to keep you happy and ignore the losses to bad teams that lead to another mediocre season of no hardware but it doesn't make us the winning program we want to be and lord knows there's way too many people here who would gladly go 6-6 as long as one of the wins was sip so they could talk crap to their BiL at Thanksgiving

Don't do this to yourself. We are not elite, we will not win 10 games. It will take an act of god to win 9 games. The sooner you learn to expect 8-4 or 7-5 the more fun the season is.

All I simply have to do is open the annals of college football, and look up "Texas A&M" to shut this down.

You skipped completely over qb play.

We go as far as qb takes us… and it's way too soon to know how we compare there

We are what our record says we are. 8-4 until we prove otherwise. Hopefully not 7-5.

Maroon Dawn said:

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Guy12 said:

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Maroon Dawn said:

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Counterpoint:

-We suck at big road games and always manage to lose a home game to someone we shouldn't

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I miss the days when you got scared away from the football forums.

Here's a reminder of what your pessimism achieved for us before, and I hope it'll get us there again.

https://texags.com/forums/5/topics/3236691

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And what did that win accomplish?

Nothing

Because we lost to nobody Mississippi schools with a fraction of our budget

Maybe for you a big but meaningless win a year is all it takes to keep you happy and ignore the losses to bad teams that lead to another mediocre season of no hardware but it doesn't make us the winning program we want to be and lord knows there's way too many people here who would gladly go 6-6 as long as one of the wins was sip so they could talk crap to their BiL at Thanksgiving

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It accomplished you not posting on the football forums for a while. That was more than enough for me.

How are we getting to the quarterback, do we have any proven players that will provide a consistent disruptive pass rush. Can we also plug up the gaps in the run game or contain the edge…

Cajun Ag 86 said:

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We are what our record says we are. 8-4 until we prove otherwise. Hopefully not 7-5.

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Isn't our record 0-0? I think that says you are trying to get a head start on being miserable.

Nobody ENJOYS underachievement and misery. We've all just finally learned to accept it. Took a few years after JFF, we all had high hopes we might land another once in a lifetime player right away. But I think we've settled into reality now

Been an Ag fan very long ??

The Lost said:

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You skipped completely over qb play.

We go as far as qb takes us… and it's way too soon to know how we compare there

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Reed has at least shown he's durable. That's a big start bc Haynes, Max and Weigman always showed they were injury prone. I have seen several national guys talk about what would an A&M season look like if the QB can just play the entire year? I believe Pate being one. I'm pretty sure he said if that were to occur, it would benefit the team greatly. The last time it occurred we finished 4th. I would love to test this one out and see what might happen if it took place this season. And another thing in common with that year we finished 4th, an experienced O-line.

Reed will be ready game one. No concern of him coming off of injury and whatever took place with Weigman last year.

Second year in a new system, Reed will have improvement due to this one.

There's more but these are the obvious positives.

rgag12 said:

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Don't do this to yourself. We are not elite, we will not win 10 games. It will take an act of god to win 9 games. The sooner you learn to expect 8-4 or 7-5 the more fun the season is.

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We were literally one game away from the SEC championship game.

We bring back our top 7 O-linemen, all our RBs, and we made what looks to be a couple portal additions to upgrade the receivers. Plus, Reed is in his second year, with a 2nd year scheme, with an offense that will be tailored to his skill set instead of Weigman's skill set. It's hard to see a scenario where the offense isn't a significant improvement from last year, barring QB injury.

Ugly said:

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Since this board has just become a bunch of monkeys in a percussion studio, let's have a thread where we can actually look forward to the season. Here are some facts:

• We were a 4-overtime game away from playing in the SEC championship last year and have basically the same schedule again this year.
• We are #6 in the country and #1 in the SEC in returning production from that team.
• We have a solidly top-ten talent roster in the country. tu and possibly LSU are the only teams likely to have a higher talent ratings than us, and neither is running away with it. On the other hand, we should have a significant talent advantage over 4-5 conference opponents (depending on where Auburn is at now).
• We have major schedule advantages against all of our toughest opponents besides LSU.
• This is year two of a new head coach, and despite our recent experience, that is supposed to mean a bump in performance, all other things being equal.
• While it doesn't affect this year per se, we have a top 3 recruiting class at a time when 80%-90% of recruits are committed to the teams they will play for next year.
• The team has been quiet this off-season. Given the experience under Jimbo, this can only be an improvement.

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Sir, this is Texas A&M we're talking about here.

halfastros81 said:

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With regard to scheduling advantage , @ Notre Dame, @ Mizzou , @ LSU, @ tu. Not all that favorable in that respect. @ Arky as well.

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I will certainly agree that having our toughest games away from Kyle is rough, but when I look at scheduling advantages, I am usually talking about who we play before and after, and who they play before and after.

Notre Dame gets us after a road game to Miami (admittedly with a bye in between, because a bye in week 2 is now a thing for some reason), while we get them after two weeks of cupcakes. Plus, we get a bye after that game.

We play tu after South Carolina and then a cupcake the week before. tu plays us after Georgia and then Arkansas.

LSU we are screwed for schedule-wise. Mizzou has a scheduling advantage over us, but I don't usually consider them a top opponent. I don't consider us or Arkansas to have a scheduling advantage over each other (we play them after Auburn, Clanga, and Florida at home, and they play us after Notre Dame, bye, and at Tennessee).

Several people consider Florida a big game as well. We get that one after bye, Auburn, and Clanga, which is about as forgiving of a stretch as you can get in SEC play. Florida gets us as the third away game in a stretch of four tough games,: at LSU, at Miami, and then tu at home.

Both South Carolina and us have byes before our game, but we play at Arkansas, at LSU, and at Mizzou before returning to a home game, while south Carolina plays at LSU, Oklahoma, Alabama, and at Ole Miss. There is a decent chance that the South Carolina team we face is nothing like the one that starts the season (hopefully that is a good thing for us this year).

Auburn gets us as the second SEC away game in a row, whereas we get them after a bye (admittedly with Notre Dame before the bye).

Ugly said:

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halfastros81 said:

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With regard to scheduling advantage , @ Notre Dame, @ Mizzou , @ LSU, @ tu. Not all that favorable in that respect. @ Arky as well.

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I will certainly agree that having our toughest games away from Kyle is rough, but when I look at scheduling advantages, I am usually talking about who we play before and after, and who they play before and after.

Notre Dame gets us after a road game to Miami (admittedly with a bye in between, because a bye in week 2 is now a thing for some reason), while we get them after two weeks of cupcakes. Plus, we get a bye after that game.

We play tu after South Carolina and then a cupcake the week before. tu plays us after Georgia and then Arkansas.

LSU we are screwed for schedule-wise. Mizzou has a scheduling advantage over us, but I don't usually consider them a top opponent. I don't consider us or Arkansas to have a scheduling advantage over each other (we play them after Auburn, Clanga, and Florida at home, and they play us after Notre Dame, bye, and at Tennessee).

Several people consider Florida a big game as well. We get that one after bye, Auburn, and Clanga, which is about as forgiving of a stretch as you can get in SEC play. Florida gets us as the third away game in a stretch of four tough games,: at LSU, at Miami, and then tu at home.

Both South Carolina and us have byes before our game, but we play at Arkansas, at LSU, and at Mizzou before returning to a home game, while south Carolina plays at LSU, Oklahoma, Alabama, and at Ole Miss. There is a decent chance that the South Carolina team we face is nothing like the one that starts the season (hopefully that is a good thing for us this year).

Auburn gets us as the second SEC away game in a row, whereas we get them after a bye (admittedly with Notre Dame before the bye).

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Most of your analysis is correct, but we play at Missouri on 11/8 before playing South Carolina at home on 11/15. South Carolina has a bye week before playing us. The only game in which both our opponent and us are coming off a bye week is the road game at Missouri. Missouri plays back-to-back road games at Auburn and Vanderbilt before their bye week, but we will be playing our 3rd SEC road game in 4 weeks with back-to-back road games at Arkansas and LSU before the bye week. That means Missouri has home field and scheduling advantages over us.

Florida ended last season with 4 consecutive wins because they played only one true road game in that stretch: home wins over LSU and Ole Miss, a road win at Florida State, and a bowl win over Tulane. Florida has struggled in true road games over the last 4 years. Florida is 4-13 (3-11 SEC) in true Power 4 road games since 2021, 0-4 (0-4 SEC) in Dan Mullen's final season and 4-9 (3-7 SEC) under Billy Napier. Billy Napier is good for exactly one SEC road win each year; 5-7 (2-6 SEC) Texas A&M in 2022, 5-7 (3-5 SEC) South Carolina in 2023, and 2-10 (0-8 SEC) Mississippi State in 2024. His other road win came against 2-10 (1-7 ACC) Florida State in 2024. None of those 4 teams finished better than 5-7.

Florida has a bye week between their road game at Miami on 9/20 and home game against Texas on 10/4, but it's still a brutal 4-game stretch against LSU (away), Miami (away), Texas (home), and Texas A&M (away) in 5 weeks. In contrast, we will be playing our 3rd straight home game and should be coming off an easy win over Mississippi State. That means we will have home field and scheduling advantages over Florida.

I think South Carolina will be our toughest home game. South Carolina went 4-1 in road games last year with wins over Kentucky, Oklahoma, Vanderbilt, and Clemson and a loss to Alabama. We will be coming off a tough road game at Missouri, and South Carolina will be coming off a bye week. While we will play road games at Arkansas, LSU, and Missouri before returning home, South Carolina will be playing a tough 4-game stretch against LSU (away), Oklahoma (home), Alabama (home), and Ole Miss (away) before their 2nd bye week. Also, we are 5-0 in home games against South Carolina, including the last 3 home wins by 13+ points each.

I think we have a floor of 7-5 (6-1 home and 1-4 away) and a ceiling of 10-2 (7-0 home and 3-2 away), and I am predicting 9-3 (7-0 home and 2-3 away) with losses to Notre Dame, LSU, and Texas. But I won't be surprised if we lose those 3 big road games against top 10 teams and 1 or 2 additional games against Florida (home), Arkansas (away), Missouri (away), or South Carolina (home). If we go 8-4 (5-3 SEC) with at least one November SEC win, I hope we win our bowl game to finish 9-4 (5-3 SEC), which would be a much better finish than ending last season with 4 consecutive losses to Power 4 opponents.

Bottom line… your'e gonna have to win some tough road games and play well in back to back weeks several x to compete for an SEC championship and that kinda applies to everyone. Seems to me we are overdue for a relatively injury free year but that's neither here nor there , just wishful thinking on my part.

Florida's scheduling last yr and this yr… brutal

Our schedule is very unbalanced with 3 straight SEC home games against Auburn on 9/27, Mississippi State on 10/4, and Florida on 10/11 before a stretch of 3 SEC road games against Arkansas on 10/18, LSU on 10/25, 2nd bye week, and Missouri on 11/8 in a span of 4 weeks. With that schedule, I think we have a floor of 7-5 (6-1 home and 1-4 away) and a ceiling of 10-2 (7-0 home and 3-2 away) with likely road losses at LSU and Texas. The toss-up games against Notre Dame (away), Florida (home), Arkansas (away), Missouri (away), and South Carolina (home), will make or break our season.

I am predicting 9-3 (7-0 home and 2-3 away) with losses to Notre Dame, LSU, and Texas. But I won't be surprised if we lose those 3 big road games against top 10 teams and 1 or 2 additional games against Florida (home), Arkansas (away), Missouri (away), or South Carolina (home). If we go 8-4 (5-3 SEC) with at least one November SEC win, I hope we win our bowl game to finish 9-4 (5-3 SEC), which would be a much better finish than ending last season with 4 consecutive losses to Power 4 opponents. That is my minimum expectation for Elko's 2nd season.

dixichkn said:

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Nobody ENJOYS underachievement and misery. We've all just finally learned to accept it. Took a few years after JFF, we all had high hopes we might land another once in a lifetime player right away. But I think we've settled into reality now

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That's true but you were probably pessimistic in 2012 before Manziel has his breakout season. I don't think anyone who is honest with themselves predicted that magic to happen. I know the national media predicted us to get a beating.

Talented QB - check
Stable of really good RBs - check
Most speed we've had at WRs in many years - check
O-line/D-line - check
LB & Secondary - ???

Ugly said:

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We were a 4-overtime game away from playing in the SEC championship last year and have basically the same schedule again this year.

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I had a really hard time with this loss, knowing it would be the first time my dad and I would be in Atlanta after being a part of the 12th Man for 3 years and hoping to end on a good note zip year. I already pre-purchased the student section tickets and seeing it get refunded was like a double-reminder we were that close. Auburn just couldn't let it go I guess.

Zmart39 said:

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Ugly said:

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We were a 4-overtime game away from playing in the SEC championship last year and have basically the same schedule again this year.

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I had a really hard time with this loss, knowing it would be the first time my dad and I would be in Atlanta after being a part of the 12th Man for 3 years and hoping to end on a good note zip year. I already pre-purchased the student section tickets and seeing it get refunded was like a double-reminder we were that close. Auburn just couldn't let it go I guess.

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We just wouldn't take it when we had the chance. The coaching in the second half of the season was poor and Elko even acknowledged it. I believe that (coaching) is the most key element of success this year. They've surprised me with recruiting so maybe they'll do the same on gameday this season.

Sterling82 said:

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Zmart39 said:

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Ugly said:

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We were a 4-overtime game away from playing in the SEC championship last year and have basically the same schedule again this year.

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I had a really hard time with this loss, knowing it would be the first time my dad and I would be in Atlanta after being a part of the 12th Man for 3 years and hoping to end on a good note zip year. I already pre-purchased the student section tickets and seeing it get refunded was like a double-reminder we were that close. Auburn just couldn't let it go I guess.

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We just wouldn't take it when we had the chance. The coaching in the second half of the season was poor and Elko even acknowledged it. I believe that (coaching) is the most key element of success this year. They've surprised me with recruiting so maybe they'll do the same on gameday this season.

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I share the same optimism that this year that Elko's coaching, with the addition of some high caliber transfers and commits, will put our team in a solid spot for this season. I worry the most about our away LSU, Notre Dame, and t.u. games. Hoping for a good year of football.

Sidenote, watching us lose to USC in Vegas was also a tough loss, especially with that being how we end the season, although it seemed Elko wasn't taking the last game as serious. Elko's been very vocal about his change for this season, still. Marcel's gunning for a top SEC QB spot, but this season will be a true test to how much work he's putting in over the summer right now.