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closetojumping

Burnt Ends
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Everything posted by closetojumping

  1. Hahahahahaha. HOLY FUCKING SHIT!!!
  2. I couldn't remember the right word and knew that Surly would correct it for me. You ask for a miracle, I give you Saint Tacky.
  3. On XM 84 today, they were covering the Big 10 Media Days and they played clips of Petitti's speech. It was insightful, particularly since he doesn't speak publicly much. They seem resolute on eventually getting their way. Someone should post the clip if they can find it. Separately, on Finebaum today, he was talking with one of his regular reporters who covers CFB. I can't remember which, but they talked relatively extensively about the SEC position regarding the 8 versus 9 game schedules. They confirmed that ESPN has recently told Sankey and the SEC leadership that they'll pay them more money to put the 9th game on the schedule. It sounded as if the money would not be chump change and it would far outweigh the loss of an additional home game every other year for each team. I know we've discussed this previously, and articles have been posted on it, but it was good to hear that this hasn't cooled off from ESPN's end. They both went on to agree that there is no longer a justifiable position from the SEC end to stay at 8 games after expansion. The momentum is with 9 games. Sankey wants 9 games, and said as much multiple times last week. Then Finebaum gave the ol'innuendo maneuver that "the most powerful programs within the conference want 9 games". He talked about brand damage being done actively right now to the league from all college media angles and the perceptions of other conference fanbases viewing the SEC as cowards. Then they talked about not being in the CFP finals the last two years, with Texas being their only hope last year and converting 4th and 13 to get to the semis. "The noise gets even louder if an SEC team isn't in the finals or winning it this coming January." For Finebaum to be talking like this to his audience, he's been given guidance that he probably should be doing so. I know Texas is worried about the ever-present notion that they're heavy-handed with their partners, but the perception of being pussies, or weak, in the eyes of everyone else in the space is not something they're jazzed about having associated to their brand. Being considered weak or cowardly is untenable compared to being considered a meanie. Alabama is at least one of the other giants that is in the same boat. I don't think this gets solved for 2026, but I do think the 8 conference game argument is losing both credibility and momentum. The easiest path for that to disappear is for Sankey to come to the agreement with the Big 10 on whichever playoff set-up the Big 10 wants.
  4. I paid $425 and got deferred adjudication. I was mistaken earlier in that it was 57 in a 35, not 57 in a 30. Made a pretty big difference for me.
  5. You guys should be taking all of this to the private board before we're discovered and those damned kids ruin our plot.
  6. I was erroneous in my recap after reading up on the sooner OL outlook for this season. Because of futility and so many injuries, I'd forgotten that both Howland and Ozeata finished 2024 starting on the OL for 5-6 games. They're now coming off of injuries and missed the spring, so neither one is assured to be starting again, but for the posterity of the recap on this thread, should I or anyone else go back again later and review, I wanted to point mistake out.
  7. Spoilered below is the Sooners Illustrated preview on the OL. Remember, OU's OL sucked last year, leading the country in allowing 50 sacks. They were hurt up and down the line all season long, but I'm sure having the defense go full contact and teeing off on them for more than half the season didn't play role. Highlights: -Ozeata (LG) and Howland (LT) finished the year in 2024 as starters, but each had to have surgery on torn labrums in the shoulder, and missed the spring. They're each being challenged for the 1st team role. Luckily, good OL play doesn't involve shoulder health and strength. -Nwaiwu was penalized for more stupid shit than anyone else on their team last year and he was regularly buttfucked by SEC DLs throughout the year. He's still penciled in to start at RG. -They have multiple guys who will either start or be 2nd team that transferred in from far lesser programs (Simmons - Western Carolina, 2 Stanford OLs, Nwaiwu from NT two years ago, Everett from App State in 2023). That's not how you build a quality OL. There may be the occasional diamond in the rough from some of those places, but Bedenbaugh isn't hitting a bullseye on 5 guys being better than what he could have actually recruited. -Due to the shoddy depth of quality talent by lazy recruiting and depending upon the portal, they're also touting the utilization of true freshman Fasusi and Fodje, early, in the rotation. Folks who cover recruiting view both guys as quality talents in the long term, but neither guy should be starting or playing much in the rotation as true freshmen. -One of the interesting battles between Nagy and Venables that we're going to witness early on is within the OL ranks. Bedenbaugh talks to these reporters offline and he's telling folks that Everett is his center. Meanwhile, Nagy went out and bought the C from Stanford, Maikkula, and he's telling people that that guy is the starter. I cannot fucking wait to see how that sorts itself.
  8. I may be misremembering, but I also think it was a 2 for 1. I actually really like the strategy of scheduling 2 for 1s with programs located in fun destinations. Tulane, UCF (probably wouldn't do a 2 for 1 and I know people loathe Orlando, but those of us with kids could make it work), SDSU, UNLV, probably some others. The indefensible part is Philadelphia. Of every big city I've been to in the US, which is most of them, Philly is far and away the place I least enjoy visiting. Maybe that's because I was dealing with a couple of nasty people at Comcast as part of most trips, but, yeah, fuck that place.
  9. We can all laugh, but I have successfully argued my way out of three separate speeding tickets in my life without the help of a lawyer. One of them involved a Houston cop named Matt Davis. You can look up what that shitheeled ratfuck was doing and got busted for after me, and apparently numerous other people, complained about him and a news station did an investigative expose on him. Separately, this one dude wrote blatantly wrong details down on the ticket that I was able to dispute with, you know, objective facts that I printed out and showed to the judge after the guy tried to act like he was recounting things correctly (he was lying). The judge literally dismissed it while I was handing him shit. That little dude was talking shit to me under his breath as I walking out. Today, I am not disputing anything. Hoping the lawyer can get me deferred adjudication or something that keeps things out of the insurance rate math.
  10. I need to have this one go away. I’ve got a … volatile history and I would prefer not to impact my insurance rates further.
  11. I have to go to court today for going 57 in a 30, so this traffic talk is hitting close to home.
  12. Here’s the season preview for TE. It reads like a position preview for Texas from the Charlie Strong years. There are no highlights for me to bullet out because the entire breakdown is lowlight after lowlight. It’s wonderful.
  13. Any regulars on the board "knew", but the confirmation is helpful and explanatory. It also can now get picked up within media circles and perhaps get more negative discussion about Georgia brewing.
  14. Spoilered below is the RB preview. Highlights: -They really expect healthy, 2023-version of Ott. They paid good money for that version. We should fully expect Venables to be very gentle with Ott when practices open. -Tatum is a fumbling machine that ended up in Murray's doghouse. -After years of touting Barnes as a future star, they're now lauding him for being nice about handing over the starting role to Ott.
  15. Here's the WRs preview. Mateer apparently thinks their WR room is "so deep". Uh huh. Highlights: -Neither Gibson is cleared medically to be on the field. -They're expecting "big things" from the McNeese guy who put up middling stats in FCS, Sategna, the meh transfer from Arkansas, and Elijah Thomas, a true freshman. -Somehow Deon Burks is still regarded by everyone as a major threat.
  16. Sooners Illustrated is now posting their position previews. I am a fan of their content creators from the perspective that they're thoughtful and thorough on the subject matter. Spoilered below is the QB preview, which is probably overdone, but whatever, it's July.
  17. Chace Calicut is apparently a piece of human shit: https://www.fox26houston.com/news/2-houston-area-teens-accused-violent-driving-incident-involving-classmates.amp Solid pick-up for UGa.
  18. That was spawned mostly out of desperate hope. Unlike scouts and coaches for the Arizona Cardinals, many of us had seen Hayden Conner attempt to run block. Given how little we saw Neto last season, I assume he’s genuinely terrible.
  19. Offset language usually incorporates the notion of like-for-like. Get another coaching job? Offset. Go become a chef? No offset. I'm guessing standard coaching offset language would not account for the guy getting work in the media.
  20. I've mentioned this before, but I guess I will keep pointing it out - it's really weird how the media continues to insinuate that there is something inappropriate going on with booster driven NIL. They never fucking covered it when it was a bag game and explicitly forbidden. Someone would bring it up on a fan call-in or something of that ilk and then the talking heads would mock it as absurd or imply that is was minor and everyone did it. Now that a bunch of rich, mostly white dudes want to transfer some of their wealth, overtly, to a bunch of young, often lower middle class trending towards poor, mostly minority people, well, something sinister is happening. It's damned near a fucking constant when NIL comes up that there are bad things being done with it.
  21. I feel like I'm being personally trolled with the McJaggerson plugs.
  22. Anybody know how to call a fair catch? Or have a link that explains all of the buttons in each phase? The “controls” area on the game are fine but deliver zero nuance and they don’t even show special teams instructions.
  23. Another thing that fascinates me about OU heading into the 2025 season is that they brought Kevin Wilson in to help "manage the program". This guy was despised at Indiana and Tulsa. He represents the meatheadiest part of the Stoops era and the okies absolutely love him. They talk about him likes he's a great addition and great guy. He comes across as toxic and clueless. You take Wilson, Schmidt, and Venables running practices together and it seems pretty fucking obvious that they're going to have more injuries this season. Venables loves to have his defense beat the shit out of the offense from day one through the bowl practices (if they qualify). Yet, every season, OU and the media are stunned by the spate of injuries and "bad luck" that befalls OU during the season. I was listening to Dvoracek (OU homer), Nowkhah (OU honk), Jacob Hester and Chris Doering (blindest Florida/SEC honk to have ever lived) talk about OU being sneaky good this year during the SEC Media Days last week. Nowkhah started reeling off the WR names we know here and spoke about them as being a strength of the team and that "they would have been last year without the bad luck with injuries". Burks put up great numbers against Temple and overall averaged less then 9 ypc. Jayden Gibson can't stay healthy and is still recovering from a torn up knee that he hurt again in the spring. The other Gibson just got out of his boot from a fractured lower leg. Everyone else is from FCS or a complete unknown. If that's a team strength, boy, don't even show me your weaknesses. Is anyone going to be shocked when there are more injuries in the WR room by this time in September? The easiest unit to hurt through physically violent practices run by a defensively-oriented idiot is the WR group.
  24. I wrote the review below right after signing day for this class in Feb of 2023. At the time, they finished as the 4th ranked class in the country and okies were hailing Venables as the next great OU coach. These guys should be going into their 3rd year with the program. If you read my notes in bold italics after each player, you'll see where they are now. For the TL;DR crowd, this class makes Tom Herman blush. The lack of production and attrition levels are hilarious. Here you go: OU took a top heavy class, with what is considered real firepower at the top and a bunch of lowly ranked headscratchers at the middle and bottom. It's not nearly as Texas heavy as their classes have been historically, taking only 5 from the state, 3 of whom are from Denton and that might as well be in Oklahoma. Venables has issues with his roster. They had a bunch of transfers out, so they took 13 transfers in, and signed 26 guys. Okies here and elsewhere seem to believe that the transfers they lost needed to go, and the ones they brought in immediately improve their whole team. I've seen the same sentiment with this class. That said, as one of my buddies involved with CFB for a living told me, "Ol'Brent must think he's going to be at OU for a good long while, because there is going to need to be a lot of development in that class. A LOT of development." In all, OU signed 1 QB, 2 TBs, 2 WRs (maybe a 3rd, depending upon where an ATH winds up), 1 TE, 2 Ts, 3 IOLs. For those keeping score at home, that's likely 11 of the 26 signees for the offense. 4 of the OLs are flat out projects, as is the TE. On defense, they signed 2 Edge, 3 DTs (all projects), 4 LBs, at least 3 of whom are projects and 2 are total unknowns, 1 Nickel who thinks he's a CB, 1 juco CB, 1 ATH that is a better WR than CB but given Venables' proclivities and the dearth of CBs in this class, will probably be a CB, and then 4 fucking safeties, 2 of whom could wind up being stars and the other 2 loaded with yeast and flour. That's 15 recruits out of 26 for the D. Strong balance there, Brent. On the recruits: Jackson Arnold (QB): A typical overranked Denton Guyer QB who is undersized, not particularly fast and criticized for not being very inventive to make up for his size, but OU wanted him and, hey, they produce Heisman trophy winning QBs, so he shot up the rankings. OU fans think he's the savior, and gurus compare him to Baker Mayfield because ... of course. Also, he has the smirk of a fratboy date rapist who gets away with it because his parents can afford good lawyers. This is the perfect OU QB recruit. Several friends not involved with the rankings but involved with the space think he's way overranked. transferred to Auburn after being benched during the 2024 season and looking generally terrible, as some of us predicted. PJ Adebawore (Edge): A camp circuit favorite with a giant wingspan for his size. Stood out at the UA game in drills. Has the potential to be the best OU pass rusher since I don't even know. I would take him over every Edge Texas has taken in the last two classes. dude had 4 tackles and a sack in garbage time of the SCar game. He played in 2 games in 2024 while healthy, both in garbage time losses. Another 5 star bust for Venables in Norman. Peyton Bowen (S): A standout at safety with excellent speed and athleticism. A known ballhawk and playmaker. He's also a head case who knew for the better part of 6 months that he wasn't actually going to sign with Notre Dame while lying to them the entire time and sniffing around OU and ATM repeatedly. Takes the money and runs to Oregon before his mother intervened and made him sign with OU, because a deal is a deal. We'll see how he handles the Bradley Buzzcut treatment once on campus. He seems to have a super strong backbone. He's still at OU and a starter, but not nearly the playmaker everyone expected him to be. He's also the weaker of the Bowen brothers, which no one predicted. Sam Omosigho (LB): This guy is an explosive athlete with a big wingspan for his size. He's considered a project. He's from Texas, yet most Texas schools weren't involved with his recruitment, including Texas and ATM. I don't know if that means he wasn't interested or they know shit that no one else does. He was an excellent receiver and he put up big numbers on both sides of the ball. He finished highly ranked and yet most folks on this board know dick-all about the guy. He was a better WR than LB in HS. Productive semi-starter at LB for OU and will likely be the best LB on the OU team this season. Makari Vickers (S): If you haven't seen his film, think of Kramer at the kid karate classes on Seinfeld. He's another playmaker at safety and is an excellent tackler with good size. He won't be 18 until the summer. He wasn't as heavily recruited as I would have figured in his region, although all of the big boys nearby offered except Miami. Transferred before last year to play for Neon Deion at CU. Jaquaize Pettaway (WR): He's a very fast, slightly-built WR with spotty hands. He'll never add a bunch of weight with his frame. He chose OU over Texas and he fits the sooner personality profile perfectly. By that, I mean he's apparently a cocky asshole that mixes like oil with water when it comes to hanging out with good kids who will graduate. Johntay Cook didn't like the guy and he liked everybody. I cheer against all sooners, but I'll be actively cheering against this dude. Transferred after toiling in irrelevance for OU. At ECU now. Cayden Green (T/IOL): In the classic sense of the way OU teaches their OL - to hold like motherfuckers and dare refs to call it more than once in a game - this guy could be their GOAT when it is all said and done. In his film, he lays down with more small, fat white boys than the Omega Mu's. He's undersized, so to speak, to be considered a terrific LT prospect. He's 6'4" and his wingspan is small for his size. I assume he'll get looks at RT and may be eventually moved inside. Transferred after one season to Missouri before 2024. Jacobe Johnson (ATH): He'd be big for corner and would be a project there, but has everything else. He's already a good WR. He comes into the class at the same age as the sophomores on the roster. He's ranked really high in the consensus rankings because ESPN loves the guy, so, caveat emptor. I wasn't blown away by his film. The offensive highlights consist of him winning a bunch of jump balls against smaller DBs. The defensive highlights consist of him being soft in press and recovering to make plays on the ball. Dude is still a tweener who they moved from DB to WR out of desperation during last season, yet he played sparingly. He's currently buried on their depth chart again at CB. Lewis Carter (LB): He hits like a ton of fucking bricks, so you have to like that. He's not particularly fast or big. He was lightly recruited or ignored by most recruiting powers in the southeast. OU landed the guy over UCF and to a lesser degree a Harsin-led Auburn and Butterteeth's NIL-less UNC. He didn't make camps. He's got an inflated ranking because OU basically took the guy and he's from Florida. I can see no other reason for his rating after watching the film and asking around. Transferred back to the state of Florida and on the roster at UCF. Kendal Dolby (CB, Juco): There are operational leaders for international terror organizations with more photographs and information available on the Internet about them than this guy. His film footage consists of jump ball picks, running in the wrong direction in pass coverage, multiple helmet headshots against defenseless receivers and a bunch of arm tackles, all shown from roughly two miles away by drone footage. It's hilariously dark shit as an opposing fan. Either OU stole an unknown gem here or he's cannon fodder as they try to find answers on defense. He was productive as the "Cheetah", their LB/NB hybrid, until a bad injury last season. He's allegedly back to full health and likely the starter there again. A good find and evaluation by Venables, it seems. Derrick Leblanc (DL): Can play DE or DT. Flashed early in high school, got a lot of attention, and then didn't progress further as he aged. UF and Miami stayed on him, many other schools fell off. He's not super athletic and isn't strong against the run. Also, he looks like he's part of a zombie apocalypse in recruiting headshots. Transferred out almost as quickly as he arrived. Also back in Florida at UCF. Jasiah Wagoner (Nickel): Some say OU recruited him as a CB when other schools told him he was a nickel. He'll be a nickel, or we'll be happy to see him at CB. He's not incredibly fast. His size is mediocre. He's quick and was an offensive standout in HS as well. In the early Stoops era, the right kind of this type used to irritate the shit out of everyone. In the late Riley/early Venables era, we love seeing this type of guy on the field as they've been weak spots. It will be interesting to see which way this one ultimately leans. Transferred after the 2023 season. On the roster at Cal. Daylan Smothers (TB): He's a small but tough runner that numerous regional (NC area) offensive powers were in on. Has good hands. He's not bread, but he's not the normal top 100 TB that OU usually lands. This is the kind of guy who is really good for NC State but doesn't make the depth chart for UF or NC. It's funny I mentioned NC State, because he transferred to NC State after the 2023 season. Keyon Brown (WR): Tall but slow WR out of Florida. Jeff Lebby is recruiting on offense as though he's still at UCF. This guy is bread that no one locally wanted. OU had to fend off a fierce push from ... Nebraska to keep this guy. Transferred before the 2023 season even happened. To a Juco. Daeh I-Have-A-Good-Older-Brother-That-Plays-Edge-And-Will-Transfer-To-Your-School-If-You-Take-Me McCullough (S): This guy played HS ball in South Bend and Notre Dame didn't offer. He wasn't nationally ranked by a single service. His older brother transferred in from Indiana after putting up good numbers there. Transferred to Louisville after the 2023 season. Logan Howland (T): This guy is lowly ranked out of NJ and he didn't do the camp circuit. He's very tall and will need to add good weight. Beyond OU, he officially visited Michigan, Iowa, and Miami. Guys who know what they're doing on the OL were all over this guy. He chose to go to the school with the worst recent development history for OLs among the four (if you consider Cristobal back through Oregon). Competing for PT in the OL room at OU. Joshua Bates (G): The fat kid from the movie "The Sandlot" should have garnered more attention for his fame if nothing else. OU was the only school of any FBS merit to recruit the guy, so they saw something they liked or he's Bedenbough's love child and he owed his mom a favor. Left OU after the 2024 season and transferred to SMU. Kalib Hicks (TB): He's plain as grits. Average size, decent moves, no burst, no breakaway speed, put up decent numbers for a Texas powerhouse program. His nickname should be "Vanilla". Transferred after the 2024 to Oklahoma State. Phil Picciotti (LB): His film looks like a set of snippets from Lattimer in practices from The Program. If he stays on the roids, maybe he can provide help at Mike someday. He has the lateral quickness of a dairy cow. His film includes a lot of plays where he runs full speed ahead and attempts to simply run directly through another human being or two, irrespective of whether they possess the ball. He played for IMG and was ignored by the regional powers, instead being pursued by deep north Big 10 teams and the okies. This is the kind of meathead that a guy like Venables takes and calls "our kind of guy" simply because he saw him beat up four junior kids at once behind the school when the okies showed up to visit. Transferred after the 2024 to UCF. Ashton Sanders (DT): He's built like a fire hydrant and might be 6'0" on his tippy toes, but he's listed at 6'1". OU needs bodies in the middle on defense and they had to beat out Cal and a coachless Wisconsin to land him. He was mostly ignored locally. He's The Human Buttplug for a defense, clogging up the insides of the defense if he can get fat enough. Transferred after the 2024 season to UCLA. Heath Ozaeta (IOL): Bedenbough has a penchant for recruiting some aggie-looking motherfuckers. This guy's the gingeriest ginger who has ever gingered. Also known as The Human Hand Grenade because if he visits your school, he scatters other interested recruits far and wide from wherever he's standing and causes the school he's visiting to immediately back off of his recruitment. He visited 5 schools officially, and none of them pushed for him after his official. OU landed him by default since he was clearly a personality fit for their campus after he tried to fit in everywhere but there on his officials. Competing for PT in the OL room at OU. Taylor Wein (Edge): OU is the only school this guy visited, and they got on him late. Looking at his film, they didn't get on him late because of that footage. This is another take in which Venables and his staff are going to show everyone their prowess as a scouting group by finding this hidden star in obscurity, or they're not nearly as smart as they think they are. He's big, for whatever that's worth. I doubt he plays the key pass rushing role on the outside, but probably more of a strongside guy, if he ever plays. Fighting for garbage time snaps deep on the depth chart in OU's Edge room. Kade McIntyre (TE): OU beat out KSU and Iowa for a TE, so it's hard to knock the take. He's another developmental guy who chose the worst school for development out of his options. Brand means a lot, clearly. He's going to have to put on a lot of weight to be an in-line guy, but no one can run a potent roid process like Jerry Schmidt. On a terrible, untalented roster of TE bread, this guy is still there, at the back of the room of 8 OU TEs. Erik "Sourdough" McCarty (S): A fourth safety in the class, from Oklahoma backwaters. Enjoy the fresh smell of rising dough. Transferred after the 2024 season to Emporia State. Markus "Pumpernickel" Strong (DL): Another mystery take from Florida, OU beat USF and Troy for his services. If this guy sees the field anytime soon, OU fans are probably lighting their cigarettes at that point, because they've already been fucked. Currently buried on the depth chart at DT for OU. Taylor VonBreadenHeim (LB): Rivals and ESPN didn't even have this guy in their databases. 247 and On3 ranked him late because they apparently owed Brent Venables a favor, or he threatened to violently rape some of their employees after hosting them on an employee getaway church revival weekend on his Norman property. This guy could be some sort of Gotch Yarbrough test that the services and OU are failing, because I'm not completely sure he exists. Fighting for garbage time snaps deep on the depth chart in OU's LB room. ******* So, yeah, that's how you actively destroy a blue blood. Recruit a shit ton of guys that no one else wants, including highly rated guys with red flags, and then tout the class with enthusiasm to anyone who will listen because you think you're some sort of savant and then watch as that collapses within two years of signing it. The funniest part of this class, to me, is that Venables allowed the Arnold camp to bully him into running off Dylan Gabriel after the 2023 season. -15 out of 26 signees are already gone. -3 out of 26 will start for OU in the 2025 season. -8 backups, 2 on the OL who could see the field, the rest are either sleepers still asleep or highly ranked busts -1 5 star bust transfer -1 5 star bust playing 3rd string I think Tom Herman's worst class was better than this one by a wide margin. None of the guys remaining on the roster project as high draft picks. Maybe things go that direction for the LB or Bowen, but they'd have to really have big seasons.
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