My feeble thoughts: A). we've all been saying that the only really bad thing which could happen was an injury to Crist [everybody from coaching staff to national commentators to the rational people on this board have consistently said this]. Well, the only bad thing happened at least for a half. We lost that half, not surprisingly, but by almost any measure won the half that we had him. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------B). whether Crist was injured or not: it's entirely NOT the point. The point is that he was experiencing some serious sounding problems and that made it NO LONGER HIS OR KELLY'S choice whether to play him. For the Lord's sake, get off the idea that either Crist is chicken [a completely preposterous idea] or that it was somehow Kelly's fault for not playing him. Crist played the whole game vs Purdue, do we think that he was afraid of Michigan? And he played his ass off in the second half when they let him back in---obviously with orders NOT to run and take more hits. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------C). Kelly's controversial decisions were all attempts at winning the football game under seriously undermanned or time-pressed and trailing conditions. He rolled dice, yes, but he played to win and to create some "juice" in the players. I've got no problems with his calls and won't second guess him. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------D). Kelly first went with "talent" to replace Crist. It's not his fault that the young man [Rees] was like a deer-in-the-headlights in this sudden injection into severe pressure. I believe that Crist's loss affected the whole team's psyche for a while---afterall, they too have been hearing all camp that it is really only Crist standing between us and mediocrity [at least until Kelly can get in more hours with the freshmen]. After he sensed Rees' unsteadiness, he reacted quickly to go with the older person in hopes of at least station-keeping until he could hopefully get his general back.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------E). Despite Robinson's heroics, the defense WAS good, and kept us in the game, shutting out Robinson until we actually took the lead [sometimes I think that some of the commentators here weren't watching the game or have horribly short-term memories]. The D-line was pretty good and Calabreese was great. There were some good plays by other LBs too. DBs weren't NFL spectacular, and Gray had a tough day with bad turf and slippage, but we kept them contained with the exception of two pass plays [as to the passing attack]. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- F). the O-line wasn't as solid as against Purdue but it had a lot of decent moments and Allen made up for it by heroic smashmouth running. Sadly Wood was a real disappointment today but I think it was because his "turns" came mostly just after the psychological let-downs from the Crist injury. If Crist himself could have just been there to RUN it , we would have been practically unstoppable---heck, even Nate lumbered for several gains. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------G). So, Crist threw some ridiculously high balls [and so did Montana]. Well, they're not perfect yet. Note on the flip side however that we think that this meant to us that our receivers were open and even for scores. We had receiver drops. I believe that everyone was shook up by the Crist thing and it affected everything to some degree. Maybe we found out that a lot of our guys aren't emotional tough guys even though they are elite talents. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------H). we're where we thought we were: we're damn good when all of us are available. And the main guy has to be a healthy Crist. That's what we thought all along. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------I). Hammond should be shot, or at least "pied", everytime he jumps out of his seat when the other guys get a first down. He even called three of them when they had obviously not even made them. Well, that is "normal" too.