Ball State Post-Game Thread

[Luckylucci]

Notes I made that I haven’t mentioned. I’d have to rewatch them all to make sure but I had 5 blatant holds by BSU OL that weren’t called. And I only started to note it after I saw how bad one was on Kareem. It was as if they just decided they weren’t going to call that.

 

[Greenore]

I feel like every time we play these rinky-dink teams (Ball St, UMass, etc) they come out with fast passing attacks and take advantage of our corners playing so far off the ball. We get burned for it, and it allows them to negate our pass rush. Now, later in the game we did start playing up on the corners and it helped...but you'd think we would have started doing more of that early. Knock them around on the line of scrimmage to throw off the routes, that usually buys your Front 7 some time to get to the QB and rattle him. I can't be the only one that's noticed it.

That just screams "Navy" to me. Maybe too slow in adjusting?

Cheers and Go Irish!!

 

[NDVirginia19]

Man today was just a flat day. Even the fans were still hungover from Michigan. Just a pretty awful environment in the stadium and even tailgating to be honest. Nobody seemed excited for the game really. Hoping this was an anomaly. I think it was Pete Sampson who said it, but this felt like a Spring Game level of intensity.

Surprisingly enough, the analysts on Fox just said, "This was a good win,"


If its any consolation, I think we just beat the eventual MAC champions. Mike Neu called a good game, and their Quarterback is a playmaker

 

[loomis41973]

Horrible. BW and the OL
Terrible. Special teams, RB's and coaching

Good. Defense

What a sandwich i just watched.

I would rather play either other QB and eat the loses this year. BW is not and will never be the answer.

 

[Irishize]

Here’s the trend I see w/ ND under BK & pretty much every season since 1996:

Come out flat after big win (lots of teams are guilty of this...it’s natural but it can bite you if the opponent is decent)

Play down to the competition. Despite ND’s lack of NCs, they are still a red letter game on most opponents schedules. Again...18-22 y/o’s can’t get up for EVERY game but w/ ND it’s pretty consistent. NOTE: Last year was one of the better ones as ND only did this once...vs Navy...on Senior Day...which leads me to my next point.

ND always comes out flat on Senior Day. That’s ok if they’re facing WF or Syracuse or Navy...but thanks to Jack Swarbrick’s brilliance...it’s against FSU this season.

ND always comes out flat during mid-terms or whatever they refer to that week of semester (or quarter) exams.

ND, at least lately, has hit a wall in November and struggled vs all opponents.

Can any of the above be fixed? If so, how?

 

[loomis41973]

I can't believe there's not a "Brandon Wimbush is the worst collegiate passer of all-time" thread yet

There should be...he can't even hit the sideline when needed.

 

[GATTACA!]

I feel like every time we play these rinky-dink teams (Ball St, UMass, etc) they come out with fast passing attacks and take advantage of our corners playing so far off the ball. We get burned for it, and it allows them to negate our pass rush. Now, later in the game we did start playing up on the corners and it helped...but you'd think we would have started doing more of that early. Knock them around on the line of scrimmage to throw off the routes, that usually buys your Front 7 some time to get to the QB and rattle him. I can't be the only one that's noticed it.

Yes it drives me nuts. Especially against a team like Ball State it's not going to take much time for our pass rush to get home. We completely negate it ourselves by playing such soft coverage on the outside. As soon as we started pressing them they became completely stagnate.

 

[BeatSC]

Very little positive to report.......sorry

Polish needs to be assigned as recruiting coordinator and get out of the way for a new special teams coach.

Newsome should be ashamed to be a captain and punt like that.

Wimbush, a lot has been said and I really thought with all this mechanics work in the offseason we might be getting something better. Most of the focus was on improving his completion %. While we got that extra 7% ,and traded it in for more sacks and ints and almost no rushing yards. This equals a step back. NFW can u tell me that Book doesn’t put more points on the board in this game and UM. I’m good with getting Wimbush some reps at RB. BTW Avery is a bust.

We need Dexter back yesterday. Whatever he did it can’t be worse than what Urban did and he was only benched for 3 games.

Chip Long ain’t all that. So far liking what Elko has done. Shane Simon blew it. Drue is not making an impact in his new gig. He should drop 10 and go back to rover. He’s not getting drafted.....just too small.

Coney looked good and so did Kareem. D plays Diaco like pad on receivers and gave up way too many routes at the sticks.

Really thought I could kick back and enjoy this game but Kelly, Long and BW took a 34 point favorite to the last possessions. Even Charlie could d better than this.

 

[ND88]

One positive: Elliot was great today. He was all over the place. Good for him.

 

[Luckylucci]

WR and TEs were open a plenty. It's not all on the OL..

Agreed, but it certainly plays a part. So does some dropped passes. So does some extremely poor effort from WR/TE’s on certain routes. Poor recognition of the zone defense. Poor play calling or limitations on offensive play calls. It all mattered. On offense, very few players played well. Tony Jones Jr. (for example) had a decent day but took a 5yd loss, in the red zone, on a run that should’ve been no gain or 1 yard. That all matters. It all adds up to what we saw.

My whole point with this is, this was a bad effort by all on offense. Not just Wimbush. He’s just an easy target because it doesn’t take a lot of effort to blame the QB.

 

[GATTACA!]

Very little positive to report.......sorry

Polish needs to be assigned as recruiting coordinator and get out of the way for a new special teams coach.

Newsome should be ashamed to be a captain and punt like that.

Wimbush, a lot has been said and I really thought with all this mechanics work in the offseason we might be getting something better. Most of the focus was on improving his completion %. While we got that extra 7% ,and traded it in for more sacks and ints and almost no rushing yards. This equals a step back. NFW can u tell me that Book doesn’t put more points on the board in this game and UM. I’m good with getting Wimbush some reps at RB. BTW Avery is a bust.

We need Dexter back yesterday. Whatever he did it can’t be worse than what Urban did and he was only benched for 3 games.

Chip Long ain’t all that. So far liking what Elko has done. Shane Simon blew it. Drue is not making an impact in his new gig. He should drop 10 and go back to rover. He’s not getting drafted.....just too small.

Coney looked good and so did Kareem. D plays Diaco like pad on receivers and gave up way too many routes at the sticks.

Really thought I could kick back and enjoy this game but Kelly, Long and BW took a 34 point favorite to the last possessions. Even Charlie could d better than this.

Should we tell him?

 

[Irish YJ]

Even Kansas blew out their MAC opponent...

I think I need to go curl up in a ball and take an old man nap before the AZSt/MichSt game...


/

 

[NDRock]

I feel like every time we play these rinky-dink teams (Ball St, UMass, etc) they come out with fast passing attacks and take advantage of our corners playing so far off the ball. We get burned for it, and it allows them to negate our pass rush. Now, later in the game we did start playing up on the corners and it helped...but you'd think we would have started doing more of that early. Knock them around on the line of scrimmage to throw off the routes, that usually buys your Front 7 some time to get to the QB and rattle him. I can't be the only one that's noticed it.

We did. I was happy that we adjusted after the first drive. Seems like in years past we stuck with that shit.

 

[SonofOahu]

Y'all ready to join me on the island of Morose Meh-ism? Come on over, the water's warm and I have cigars and alcohol!

 

[BabyIrish]

Here’s the trend I see w/ ND under BK & pretty much every season since 1996:

Come out flat after big win (lots of teams are guilty of this...it’s natural but it can bite you if the opponent is decent)

Play down to the competition. Despite ND’s lack of NCs, they are still a red letter game on most opponents schedules. Again...18-22 y/o’s can’t get up for EVERY game but w/ ND it’s pretty consistent. NOTE: Last year was one of the better ones as ND only did this once...vs Navy...on Senior Day...which leads me to my next point.

ND always comes out flat on Senior Day. That’s ok if they’re facing WF or Syracuse or Navy...but thanks to Jack Swarbrick’s brilliance...it’s against FSU this season.

ND always comes out flat during mid-terms or whatever they refer to that week of semester (or quarter) exams.

ND, at least lately, has hit a wall in November and struggled vs all opponents.

Can any of the above be fixed? If so, how?

We killed Temple and Miami Oh last year. Umass the year before.
Stadium was dead, team was flat. Glad we got out of it with a w.
I expect we’ll be much better next week.

 

[Meatloaf]

Hainsey and Wimbush are terrible. Neg rep me if you like, terrible game for both.

SO BRAVE

 

[NDBoiler]

https://www.trulyspikedsparkling.com

Don’t know if they sell them in your area but they’re a spiked sparkling water. I warn you the flavor is very light and almost non existent. If you’re not on a diet or watching your carbs just stick with beer you’ll be much happier. However , for me who wants to drop a few pounds but still needing some booze to make it through the game they’re a godsend. 5% alcohol and if you drink them quickly (and it’s a bad habit but take a few dips of chew in between) you can get a hell of a buzz. God knows we needed it this week.

LOL I just thought you were drunk and had a typo. Didn’t realize they actually existed.

 

[Irish YJ]

Agreed, but it certainly plays a part. So does some dropped passes. So does some extremely poor effort from WR/TE’s on certain routes. Poor recognition of the zone defense. Poor play calling or limitations on offensive play calls. It all mattered. On offense, very few players played well. Tony Jones Jr. (for example) had a decent day but took a 5yd loss, in the red zone, on a run that should’ve been no gain or 1 yard. That all matters. It all adds up to what we saw.

My whole point with this is, this was a bad effort by all on offense. Not just Wimbush. He’s just an easy target because it doesn’t take a lot of effort to blame the QB.

Agree the O sucked ballz. I hold the QB to a higher standard though to lead and make easy plays to wide open guys. Just like I hold BK responsible for prep. BW has to be bigger, and needs to kick some ass when his guys are sucking. It's hard for him to do that when he is sucking too.

I'm giving him a pass (I feel like I've done this too much over the last xx months), but if he struggles at Vandy, I'm all in on the Book/PJ train.

 

[NEIIrish]

Very little positive to report.......sorry

Polish needs to be assigned as recruiting coordinator and get out of the way for a new special teams coach.

Newsome should be ashamed to be a captain and punt like that.

Wimbush, a lot has been said and I really thought with all this mechanics work in the offseason we might be getting something better. Most of the focus was on improving his completion %. While we got that extra 7% ,and traded it in for more sacks and ints and almost no rushing yards. This equals a step back. NFW can u tell me that Book doesn’t put more points on the board in this game and UM. I’m good with getting Wimbush some reps at RB. BTW Avery is a bust.

We need Dexter back yesterday. Whatever he did it can’t be worse than what Urban did and he was only benched for 3 games.

Chip Long ain’t all that. So far liking what Elko has done. Shane Simon blew it. Drue is not making an impact in his new gig. He should drop 10 and go back to rover. He’s not getting drafted.....just too small.

Coney looked good and so did Kareem. D plays Diaco like pad on receivers and gave up way too many routes at the sticks.

Really thought I could kick back and enjoy this game but Kelly, Long and BW took a 34 point favorite to the last possessions. Even Charlie could d better than this.

News flash, Mike Elko coaches at ATM.

E

 

[Irish YJ]

Y'all ready to join me on the island of Morose Meh-ism? Come on over, the water's warm and I have cigars and alcohol!

Meh.. I'm already on Delta's website.. sucks I lost my Platinum priv...

 

[SouthSideChiDomer]

Thinking bigger picture here, if our offensive line continues to struggle against pressure we might have to go with Book just so he can run a quick hitting RPO based offense.

BW might be better in the option run game but the short throws that might be needed to neutralize teams getting quick pressure are probably the worst part of BW's game, not to mention it sounds like he isn't great at picking the correct option between the run and the pass.

Taking BW out could hurt the run game, especially with a weak o-line, but teams that run effective RPO offenses tend to have decent run games if just because they only run when the numbers are in their favor.

All that said, if the line starts to bounce back then this is basically a moot point.

 

[stlnd01]

The defense looked as you'd expect a good defense should against a MAC team. Yes, Ball State's QB didn't suck and they put together a nice first drive because we were giving their WR too much cushion. Then we adjusted, played tight, started getting pressure and Ball State really didn't do much the rest of the game until the field goal drives late. Agree that the D weren't as awesome as last week, but they were fine.

Wimbush certainly had some struggles but also made some nice throws. I do think he looks better than last year. Fewer complete misses. For what that's worth. I think they must have just ordered him not to run in the first half. I get protecting the guy so he doesn't get beat up, but that seems to take away his feel for the game. He looked like a different QB in our first possession of the second half. Didn't last though. I guess I'd let Brandon be Brandon and know you have Book if he gets hurt.

Nice to see Boykin make so many catches. That dude's gonna play on Sunday. Hopefully Kmet is OK. Jafar Armstrong is fine but we need Dex back there.

Offensive line needs some work, fast.

Va. Tech game could be rough if the offense doesn't improve generally.

 

[Greenore]

Y'all ready to join me on the island of Morose Meh-ism? Come on over, the water's warm and I have cigars and alcohol!

February Baby!! High blood pressure, hypertension, insomnia.

No greater place than Maui to relax and forget about everything... except the Lahaina Grill, Merriman's and Gerard's. If you haven't done it, give it serious consideration for at least mental health reasons.

Cheers and Go Irish!!

 

[GATTACA!]

The defense looked as you'd expect a good defense should against a MAC team. Yes, Ball State's QB didn't suck and they put together a nice first drive because we were giving their WR too much cushion. Then we adjusted, played tight, started getting pressure and Ball State really didn't do much the rest of the game until the field goal drives late. Agree that the D weren't as awesome as last week, but they were fine.

Wimbush certainly had some struggles but also made some nice throws. I do think he looks better than last year. Fewer complete misses. For what that's worth. I think they must have just ordered him not to run in the first half. I get protecting the guy so he doesn't get beat up, but that seems to take away his feel for the game. He looked like a different QB in our first possession of the second half. Didn't last though. I guess I'd let Brandon be Brandon and know you have Book if he gets hurt.

Nice to see Boykin make so many catches. That dude's gonna play on Sunday. Hopefully Kmet is OK. Jafar Armstrong is fine but we need Dex back there.

Offensive line needs some work, fast.

Va. Tech game could be rough if the offense doesn't improve generally.

I think protecting him was part of it, but also I think they wanted to see him sit back and pass because his legs wont be viable against really good defenses. They probably don't want him to get in the habit of using them to bail him out any time his first read isn't open.

 

[ThePiombino]

About as deflating of a win as I can remember. BW is just never going to be who we hoped he would be, so why won't the staff call plays to his strengths rather than trying to force a square peg into a round hole? Frustrating.

 

[Luckylucci]

About as deflating of a win as I can remember. BW is just never going to be who we hoped he would be, so why won't the staff call plays to his strengths rather than trying to force a square peg into a round hole? Frustrating.

This is more frustrating to me than anything he does. They clearly took part of the game out of the playbook. In turn, it clearly affects his overall game.

 

[T-Boone]

Julian Love credited with 4 PDs. He is probably leading the country in that stat again.

 

[Old Man Mike]

Unpopular opinions:

a). 2-0 and feeling good.

b). Brandon needs to sit but Coach won't because he doesn't want to kill his spirit. A more win-regardless coach would have sat him some at least already.

c). OLine was not ready for the three man front with chaotic blitzing. Most of the pass down misses were on Brandon not stepping in a timely manner (there is NOTHING particularly "timely" about Brandon, he just does not react well to the moment.) Also, many of the blocking misses were on the RB either not seeing it or not being strong enough at the collision. This OLine should however not be called upon to execute ordinary pulling plays vs a team which is aggressively trying to charge uphill. ... just not quick enough for that, and frankly last year's wasn't either.

d). D was just fine. One good first series by BSU and then a strategic adjustment --- heck even Flutie saw that. And even VTs Bud Foster often has to meditate on the opponent's first drive before adjusting. Lea is OK.

e). I'm a meaner person than Coach Kelly and would bench Brandon for Ian in the next game. All of a sudden quicker delivery on slants and hitches would markedly improve the look of OLine pass blocking especially on the edges --- that's how the pros negate the rush.

f). I'm of the opinion that the rushing would improve not regress with Book. Why? Looser linebacker play and therefore less in the box. OLine wouldn't have to depend on TEs and WRs making as many blocks. But this team has no Adams nor Prosise nor anyone who can suddenly go 60 yards. We had sorts of plays stuffed last year, but tossing in 60 yard gashes now and then makes the stats look pretty good.

g). Bring on Vanderbilt --- this latest mediocrity is probably exactly what the guys needed short of an actual loss ... so it's a good thing. Embarrassed, no longer reading press clippings but still undefeated.

 

[Valpodoc85]

Was at the game:
1.jeff Quinn is Vangorder 2.0
2.coaching staff has no confidence in the short game for Wimbush
3.gotta let Wimbush run to bolster his confidence (was it me or had Kelly told him no running in the first half)
4.Lea coach a real vanilla game
5.ST ride the short bus to school
6.we were more prey than predator

 

[BeatSC]

News flash, Mike Elko coaches at ATM.

E

Ooops, spellcheck changed it from Lea to Elmo same with Polian to Polish