Lol. Bloviating f***it.
quote:
You have my permission to dream big with the 2016 Texas Longhorns.
Go ahead.
As the resident brake-tapper on Orangebloods, I've been dealing cold water to Texas fans since I gave Garrett Gilbert and the 2010 Longhorns the benefit of the doubt in nightmarish fashion.
Since then, there's been a whole lot of realism (sometimes passed off as pessimism) when it comes to any kind of prediction for the Texas football program. When Texas fans have bathed in the sunshine of 9-3 prognostications, I'm the one over the last five years who handed them a towel in the form of possible seven-wins (or less) season reminders.
So, I feel like when I tell you it's ok to give into the sunshine pumping, it's coming from a place you can trust that doesn't give into going ga-ga over any kind of burnt orange success with the ease of a sixth grader falling in love with the girl sitting next to him in history class. After two weeks of college football action, there are two incredibly important truths as it relates to the ability of this team to win a trophy or two.
These Longhorns are pretty damn good and the conference they play in is not.
It's that simple.
After wins over Notre Dame and UTEP, the Longhorns have dangerous units in every phase of the game with some of the best young, emerging talent in the entire country and, oh yeah, a quarterback who is reminding people of a young Colt McCoy.
Meanwhile, the Big 12 looks like a conference that should lose its spot at the big boy table. Already this season, Oklahoma, TCU, Oklahoma State and Texas Tech have taken Ls from the likes of Houston, Arkansas, Central Michigan and Arizona State, respectively. Frankly, I'm willing to give the Sooners the benefit of the doubt, but the rest of these teams all look like rubbish. In what was supposed to be a quiet week in college football because of the lack of quality match-ups, but the Cowboys and Horned Frogs found a way to be the only teams in the country to fall out of both polls after home losses to unranked teams.
I don't know if this Texas team truly has championship chops, but outside of possibly the Sooners, I don't know that there's a team left on the schedule that's as good as the team I've watched the last two weeks at DKR.
It's two weeks into the season, but I don't see any reason why this team won't be playing for important things late in the season. Like almost every team in the country not named Alabama, this is a group that might be an injury or two away from trouble, but based on what we've seen thus far, there's no reason to cringe at the thought of thinking big.
Perhaps the stars aren't aligning, but it sure seems like I can see Orion's Belt from here.
You have my permission to dream big.
~Ketch
