It's time to see what Weis is made of

[solo]

I think Weis has done a good job. We've been ranked nearly his entire tenure. 2 BCS bowls. His winning percentage I believe ranks 3rd or 4th all time for ND coaches with just 2 years under their belt. Recruiting is going well. By most indicators, he has the ND program heading in the right direction.

However, any coach can look good when he has a first round draft choice at QB. Just ask Chuck Amato. But with BQ gone, as well as much of the offense and all of the skill positions, next year could be tough. Now, not only do Michigan and USC look like mismatches, but teams like Penn State and UCLA and maybe even Purdue suddenly look more formidable. If he wins 10 games next year, I will be ready to slap on the genius label like many others already have.

 

[Vince Young]

Solo, I think you're right. 2007 will show us a lot about Charlie, but I believe he'll rise to the challenge.

 

[jboxer562]

we'll see

 

[nd1]

I think Weis has done a good job. We've been ranked nearly his entire tenure. 2 BCS bowls. His winning percentage I believe ranks 3rd or 4th all time for ND coaches with just 2 years under their belt. Recruiting is going well. By most indicators, he has the ND program heading in the right direction.

However, any coach can look good when he has a first round draft choice at QB. Just ask Chuck Amato. But with BQ gone, as well as much of the offense and all of the skill positions, next year could be tough. Now, not only do Michigan and USC look like mismatches, but teams like Penn State and UCLA and maybe even Purdue suddenly look more formidable. If he wins 10 games next year, I will be ready to slap on the genius label like many others already have.

I agree 100 percent but the offense is going to have to be great anymore because I believe the defense will be alot better, so thats going to help take pressure off the offense. next year wil be tough but I think we can win around 9 games or so.

 

[johnnd05]

I agree with you, Solo, though frankly nine wins (well, ten if you count the bowl game) is enough for me to attach the "genius" tag, given next year's schedule.

 

[irish4life99]

I think Weis has done a good job. We've been ranked nearly his entire tenure. 2 BCS bowls. His winning percentage I believe ranks 3rd or 4th all time for ND coaches with just 2 years under their belt. Recruiting is going well. By most indicators, he has the ND program heading in the right direction.

However, any coach can look good when he has a first round draft choice at QB. Just ask Chuck Amato. But with BQ gone, as well as much of the offense and all of the skill positions, next year could be tough. Now, not only do Michigan and USC look like mismatches, but teams like Penn State and UCLA and maybe even Purdue suddenly look more formidable. If he wins 10 games next year, I will be ready to slap on the genius label like many others already have.

I have to agree with you there Solo. This is where the rubber hits the road. I'm ok if we win 8. If Weis pulls out ten I would estatic.

 

[ND4life]

I have to agree with you there Solo. This is where the rubber hits the road. I'm ok if we win 8. If Weis pulls out ten I would estatic.

i know this is ND and the expectations are always gonna be high, but ill definitely be happy with 8 wins next year. considering the fact we are gonna be soooooo young on the field.

Also, as long as recruiting goes as good as it has the past 2 years (maybe a lil better for the defensive side), we'll be in the hunt for 10 wins every season in the near future. were just gonna have to be patient.

GOOD LUCK CW, go irish!!!

 

[irish4life99]

Considering the Jr, and Sr class are basicially empty my expectations for next year are not that great. Ty did not bring in a very good Sr class, and bailed on those kids in the Jr class.

 

[NDOM]

Notre Dame will be just fine next year people trust me. Charlie knows what he's doing and with the new defensive coordinator (Corwin Brown) I STRONGLY believe we will go 9-3 in the regular season and finally win a bowl game. I just hope we dont go to a bcs because we arent that good YET to compete in those kinda games. Here's a game by game breakdown of what I think will happen.

9/1/07 Georgia Tech. Win 37-21 (No Reggie Ball or Calvin Johnson and alot of their defense is gone as well)

9/8/07 @Penn State. Win 29-20 (Linebacker university is gone and theyre young on the offense and defense)

9/15/07 @Michigan. Loss 23-37 (Michigans loses Lamar Woodley and Allen Branch and Leon Hall but the offense returns intack) May even be closer than that.

9/22/07 Michigan State. Win 42-27 (New Coach and questions on both sides of the ball plus Charlie Weis said he wont lose to MSU anymore)

9/29/07 @Purdue. Win 35-31 (Purdue will be a surprise I think in the big ten and they always have explosive offense. close game but a win)

10/6/07 @Ucla. Toss up (Ucla is a tough place to play and they dont lose hardly anyone and they have a tough defense) Maybe a win But I say a loss.

10/13/07 Boston College. Win 32-21 (Finally we get Boston College. The Catholic Bowl. I hope we beat the living shit out of them. God I HATE Boston College.)

10/20/07 Southern Cal. Loss 23-42 (Yep. Its another ass kicking from the trojans. This year was supposed to be a "rebuilding" Year and good lord look what they did)

11/03/07 Navy. BLOWOUT 49-23 (Come on people its Navy. We will NEVER lose to them and we get 2 weeks to prepare for that Goddamn option)

11/10/07 Air Force. BLOWOUT 53-27 (Another Option team but its still Air Force and I just dont see us losing to Air Force anymore)

11/17/07 Duke. BLOWOUT 45-17 (Duke???? Maybe they could beat us in basketball but come on. Duke Football?????)

11/24/07 @Stanford Win 32-27 (This is going to be closer than the experts think. Stanford will surprise some teams in the pac-10 I think and make us Irish fans bite our nails the whole game)

 

[weisbankaccount]

You have ND averaging 36 points per game next year.....thats a lot of points!!

 

[ACamp1900]

I guess one can say that Weis made Brady the first round pick that he is... anyway, I can't blame Charlie if we win 4-6 games next year... look at the depth... there is none and the little we have is made of Freshman and Sophmores... what can you do? I'm not worried though, Charlie's won my confidence... I expect 7-9 winish type year...

 

[Indydomer]

9/1/07 Georgia Tech. Win 37-21 (No Reggie Ball or Calvin Johnson and alot of their defense is gone as well)

9/8/07 @Penn State. Win 29-20 (Linebacker university is gone and theyre young on the offense and defense)

9/15/07 @Michigan. Loss 23-37 (Michigans loses Lamar Woodley and Allen Branch and Leon Hall but the offense returns intack) May even be closer than that.

9/22/07 Michigan State. Win 42-27 (New Coach and questions on both sides of the ball plus Charlie Weis said he wont lose to MSU anymore)

9/29/07 @Purdue. Win 35-31 (Purdue will be a surprise I think in the big ten and they always have explosive offense. close game but a win)

10/6/07 @Ucla. Toss up (Ucla is a tough place to play and they dont lose hardly anyone and they have a tough defense) Maybe a win But I say a loss.

10/13/07 Boston College. Win 32-21 (Finally we get Boston College. The Catholic Bowl. I hope we beat the living shit out of them. God I HATE Boston College.)

10/20/07 Southern Cal. Loss 23-42 (Yep. Its another ass kicking from the trojans. This year was supposed to be a "rebuilding" Year and good lord look what they did)

11/03/07 Navy. BLOWOUT 49-23 (Come on people its Navy. We will NEVER lose to them and we get 2 weeks to prepare for that Goddamn option)

11/10/07 Air Force. BLOWOUT 53-27 (Another Option team but its still Air Force and I just dont see us losing to Air Force anymore)

11/17/07 Duke. BLOWOUT 45-17 (Duke???? Maybe they could beat us in basketball but come on. Duke Football?????)

11/24/07 @Stanford Win 32-27 (This is going to be closer than the experts think. Stanford will surprise some teams in the pac-10 I think and make us Irish fans bite our nails the whole game)

great post man. Next year could be better than anyone thinks. Im am more excited about next year than I was about this year. It is going to be fun to see all the young talent no matter what. And the way brey is recruiting and has the team playing we could be a duke type basketball team within the next five years. All ND sports are on the rise. Bring it on baby, we can do it all!!!

 

[solo]

I guess one can say that Weis made Brady the first round pick that he is... anyway, I can't blame Charlie if we win 4-6 games next year... look at the depth... there is none and the little we have is made of Freshman and Sophmores... what can you do? I'm not worried though, Charlie's won my confidence... I expect 7-9 winish type year...

Well, if he is a good coach, he should be able to win with less talent. So anything less than a 7 win season will be a huge disappointment in my opinion. His first recruiting class, as small as it was will be juniors and his first truly excellent class will be sophomores. If they are as talented as advertised, they should be able to see the field over the less talented upper classmen.

C'mon man...raise the bar. This is ND not Purdue. Expect more, expect excellence. At ND a 6 win season is NEVER acceptable.

 

[ACamp1900]

Well, if he is a good coach, he should be able to win with less talent. So anything less than a 7 win season will be a huge disappointment in my opinion. His first recruiting class, as small as it was will be juniors and his first truly excellent class will be sophomores. If they are as talented as advertised, they should be able to see the field over the less talented upper classmen.

C'mon man...raise the bar. This is ND not Purdue. Expect more, expect excellence. At ND a 6 win season is NEVER acceptable.

Well I think it's fair to say that Weis HAS won with less talent who thought we were a BCS team last year... the schedule it tuff at the start next year when our young guns will be needing some time... and it's not his recruiting class he took over as coach when the class was pretty much set in stone... the problem agina is the depth, look at our roster... other than WR and QB and OT we have no depth anywhere... one injury to the interior and we are screwed... Weis is working with a cold hand next year... my opinon is if we win 7-8 he's done well, anything more he's done GREAT... Also, as far as the expectations not becoming ND thing... I was one of the biggest ND to the gator bowol guys here before the bowls were set, I got beat up for that pretty good... how'd that turn out?? Would we all like a shot at the Orange, Feista or Gator Bowls now??? and Weis did raise the bar, but realistically you can't expect the parting of the red sea with the roster we have, too young and not deep enough

 

[solo]

Well I think it's fair to say that Weis HAS won with less talent who thought we were a BCS team last year... the schedule it tuff at the start next year when our young guns will be needing some time... and it's not his recruiting class he took over as coach when the class was pretty much set in stone... the problem agina is the depth, look at our roster... other than WR and QB and OT we have no depth anywhere... one injury to the interior and we are screwed... Weis is working with a cold hand next year... my opinon is if we win 7-8 he's done well, anything more he's done GREAT... Also, as far as the expectations not becoming ND thing... I was one of the biggest ND to the gator bowol guys here before the bowls were set, I got beat up for that pretty good... how'd that turn out?? Would we all like a shot at the Orange, Feista or Gator Bowls now??? and Weis did raise the bar, but realistically you can't expect the parting of the red sea with the roster we have, too young and not deep enough

Personally, I think that we will have equal if not better talent than the following: GT, Mich State (new coach), Purdue, navy, Air Force, Duke, Stanford (new coach). That's 7 games that Weis should win.

And you've got ot think that we should be able to beat at least one of the following: Penn State, Michigan, USC, UCLA, BC (new coach).

So in my opinion, a 7 win season is the bare bones minimum expectation. That would mean that Weis is doing what is expected of any coach, nothing more. A 7 win season would be an average coaching job.

An 8 win season means he is doing a little better than average.

A 9 win season is a good coaching job. This would mean that we would need to beat a team that has more talent than us.

10 wins is an excellent coaching job. That means we everyone we should and we beat a team with mroe talent than us. And isn't that the mark of excellent coaching? A great coach will beat you with his team. Trade teams, then beat you with yours.

 

[ACamp1900]

I understand your logic, don't really disagree with it much EXCEPT for that we are SO young... and not deep... as I said despite matchups... one key injury to center or guard and our line is TKO... and with our youth I wouldn't under estimate those we are supposed to beat... espec GT, Purdue and MSu (a new coach should Help in this case) I'm always hoping believe me... but I learned in recent years to be realistic... so we'll see... I think a new DC COULD be the big difference... if our young offense comes together and our D is much improved I will stand right by your statements... but I am personally not sure that will happen, espec. early in the season... so I don't feel it's fair to judge Weis just yet... he's doing a great job with the most important part of CFB and that's recruiting... so 0-12 or 12-0... either way

GO IRISH!!

 

[Indydomer]

I hope we win 9 or 10 but I will take 8. Not 7. But we will be very young. This is charlie's time to shine. It will be a telling year.

 

[ACamp1900]

Personally EITHER way... I'm looking for 2008 on to start really grading Charlie... if he doesn't deliver then... well... I'm not really worried about that personally

 

[Indydomer]

totally agree.

 

[Junkhead]

I'm not expecting much, 7 wins would not surprise me. With 7 new starters on offense, who knows. I'd love to be wrong and have the offense light it up, but I have no idea about the QBs at this point.

 

[Timugen]

I think we'll do better than many expect. I also think we'll be playing much different football on offense than people have become accustomed to under CW/BQ. We are going to have a young, but MONSTROUS offensive line. Marching through that line will be Thomas, Aldridge, Prince, and possibly Allen. Our QB, whoever it may be, will be inexperienced, but should have enough talent to compensate so that they're "good enough" to get the job done. To me, the real X-factor will be whether the QB is just "good enough" or somebody steps up and surprises the hell out of people.

Either way, I think we're gonna be a ball-control, shove-it-down-their-throat offense, and I think we'll be successfull at it despite our youth.

[Edit]: As for D, well....anything is better than this year, and Brown looks like a great hire to develop those young players.

 

[Satans Little Helper]

Considering the Jr, and Sr class are basicially empty my expectations for next year are not that great. Ty did not bring in a very good Sr class, and bailed on those kids in the Jr class.

now I4L99, you know we have lots of talent in the upcoming senior class! LOL!
Anastasio, Brockington, Bruton Vernaglia. come on on man! Plus we have so many 5th years coming back.

Just pre-empting, thats all.

 

[weisbankaccount]

Either way, I think we're gonna be a ball-control, shove-it-down-their-throat offense, and I think we'll be successfull at it despite our youth.

I disagree completely with this. many people think Jones will be the QB because he can escape the pass rush that will be put on the exploit the young O-line.

Next year will likely be a spread offense as much as possible with a lot of quick hitting passes and some spread option as well.

 

[KingAdrock99]

Either way, I think we're gonna be a ball-control, shove-it-down-their-throat offense, and I think we'll be successfull at it despite our youth.

I disagree completely with this. many people think Jones will be the QB because he can escape the pass rush that will be put on the exploit the young O-line.

Next year will likely be a spread offense as much as possible with a lot of quick hitting passes and some spread option as well.

I disagree with your disagreement. I don't think we're going to go all out running but with the backs we have here, I think we're going to keep it closer to the vest. With a brand new QB, you essentially have to to be consistent. Weis is a good coach because he gets his players to play consistent football. We never lose to teams we should beat and that's been his hallmark. Bad coaches let games to lesser teams slip away and that's never happened. I'm looking for us to play solid and consistent next year, beat all the teams we should and hopefully pull out a few that we shouldn't, biding our time for the next year or two.

 

[southbendkid]

I refuse to beleive our O-line and overall deffense is going to be much worse than last year. I'm optimistic about our running game improving and i'm sure our wide receivers and quarterebacks won't be as good as last year, but how good they our exactly is a big question mark. That being said I think that how good we do compared to last year is totally up to the wide receivers and how much CW can groom our quarterbacks.

 

[Timugen]

One thing we can count on:

For anyone who has listened to CW re:2007, he, unlike all the fans, does not view it as a "rebuilding" year. He is not giving himself, nor does he want the players to have, any built-in excuses for not winning. He's going to be going into every game expecting to win and will have his team (no matter how young and inexperienced they may be) in the same mindset. May not sound like much, but that can be the difference in a lot of games. Combine that with the general raw talent upgrade (speed, anyone?) he'll have on his young team, and I'd say we're in a position to surprise the hell out of quite a few people.

(Not to mention, we'll have an OL the size of Mount Rushmore, which is pretty difficult to discount, no matter how inexperienced they may be.)

 

[solo]

One thing we can count on:

For anyone who has listened to CW re:2007, he, unlike all the fans, does not view it as a "rebuilding" year. He is not giving himself, nor does he want the players to have, any built-in excuses for not winning. He's going to be going into every game expecting to win and will have his team (no matter how young and inexperienced they may be) in the same mindset. May not sound like much, but that can be the difference in a lot of games. Combine that with the general raw talent upgrade (speed, anyone?) he'll have on his young team, and I'd say we're in a position to surprise the hell out of quite a few people.

(Not to mention, we'll have an OL the size of Mount Rushmore, which is pretty difficult to discount, no matter how inexperienced they may be.)

Sure, this is the image he portrays in public. This is the message he sends to the media and to the team. He is their leader and he is expected to say this. he would dumb to say otherwise. Should he just go tell the media that it's gonna be a tough year? Do you know how much perceptions impact rankings? It would be ranking suicide to admit that it's a rebuilding year. It would also give the team an excuse to lose. What possible advantage exists for Weis and for ND for him to publicly admit that it's a rebuilding year even if he believes it?

Again...sometimes coaches have to use coach speak. Deep down, at some level, you gotta think he knows it gonna bea tough year.

 

[FleaFlicker]

Sure, this is the image he portrays in public. This is the message he sends to the media and to the team. He is their leader and he is expected to say this. he would dumb to say otherwise. Should he just go tell the media that it's gonna be a tough year? Do you know how much perceptions impact rankings? It would be ranking suicide to admit that it's a rebuilding year. It would also give the team an excuse to lose. What possible advantage exists for Weis and for ND for him to publicly admit that it's a rebuilding year even if he believes it?

Again...sometimes coaches have to use coach speak. Deep down, at some level, you gotta think he knows it gonna bea tough year.

Of course he does, but I would see plenty of coaches making excuses at this point, or at some point next season, if they are losing some tough games. Weis won't do that. He's of a different cut, just like he isn't like Saban - who says he isn't going anywhere then leaves the next day.

And thank God that Weis is like this and not an excuse maker. When your HC makes excuses for losses, players start making excuses for losses. When you players are making excuses, they aren't giving their best effort, they aren't expecting to win... and that alone will be the difference of winning or losing a few games next year.

You guys realize we EASILY could have had 5 losses this year, right? Imagine a few things don't go our way in the MSU and UCLA games, we would have been 8-5, or 9-4 if we won our bowl game. Confidence and composure won us two games last year, and if Weis keeps instilling that attitude in his players, we will keep winning games like that.

 

[Timugen]

Of course he does, but I would see plenty of coaches making excuses at this point, or at some point next season, if they are losing some tough games. Weis won't do that. He's of a different cut, just like he isn't like Saban - who says he isn't going anywhere then leaves the next day.

And thank God that Weis is like this and not an excuse maker. When your HC makes excuses for losses, players start making excuses for losses. When you players are making excuses, they aren't giving their best effort, they aren't expecting to win... and that alone will be the difference of winning or losing a few games next year.

You guys realize we EASILY could have had 5 losses this year, right? Imagine a few things don't go our way in the MSU and UCLA games, we would have been 8-5, or 9-4 if we won our bowl game. Confidence and composure won us two games last year, and if Weis keeps instilling that attitude in his players, we will keep winning games like that.

yeah, what he said....

 

[ACamp1900]

I disagree with your disagreement.

got to love message boards...lol