Well, ignoring the almost irrelevant comments about how [regardless of the thread topic] we're going to lose horribly again without hope of recovery for the next decade [yeh, exaggerating but some of that is tedious, pal, and how many "v-bucks" one wins is pretty teenager-ish], here's what I think I know from playing and coaching on teams: Losing ALWAYS affects you if you're worth a damn as a competitor. But all teams are not alike. Some teams are full of strong leaders. Losses of any kind get those guys raging, and motivating their colleagues. I fear that we don't have that sort of leadership yet. Notice what Kelly has said in his past two interviews: he is going to "push" Manti out there [vis-a-vis leadership]. Kelly IS WORRIED about leadership. He is desperately trying to push Manti to assume the role even though he's just a sophomore [a tough thing for him, and God bless him, I don't think that it's naturally in his personality to get in others' faces]. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------The point is that bad losses only "work" if you have a situation where the Staff doesn't know what's happening [and I don't believe that for a second], or you have powerful personalities to lead but a team functioning well below it's potential. OK, we seem to be functioning below our potential, but do we have the personalities to raise the masses up?? Teams that do not have this may sit around after such losses staring at one another and actually get worse. Emotions often lead to motivation play-after-play, and that leads to wins and/or losses. We've got coaches. We've got talent. Do we have leaders?? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------As this season has gone forward, I have wondered if this isn't one of the bigger burdens that Notre Dame carries around as far as winning football games is concerned. We have too many nice, civilized guys. That's great for off the field, but I'd take a whole set of Dr. Jekylls and Mr. Hydes. [Forgive me Lord].
