There is an article in today's Daily Star sports section entitled "3 reasons why Cats reeling, regressing late in the season" which could also be written about our Sun Devils this year...
1) Injury Factor...both teams have had significant injuries to key players, most notably at the all important QB position...you can throw UCLA into that mix as well and is a key reason that the Devils, Cats and Bruins sit at the bottom of the PAC South...
2) More Give Than Take...that refers to the all important turnover margin category where UCLA is 9th in the PAC at -2, ASU 10th at -3 and AU 12th at -8...
Not surprisingly, Wash is 1st at +13, Wazzu is 2nd at +10, Utah 3rd at +9 and Colo 4th at +7...
3) Lack of Development...this is hard to measure due to its subjectivity but there are many ASU fans that would point to this category and relate it directly to coaching or lack thereof...
My take is that it would be hard to be critical of QB development, for example, when Wilkins, White and Perkins have been injured...Perkins before the season began, Manny since the USC game and White injured during the UCLA game that was his only start...
We've also lost a couple of OL, had banged up RBs and WRs, injured LBs and lots of injuries in the secondary as well...
How realistic is it to rate lack of development under these circumstances..??
I think it is easy to conclude that if you lose your starting QB that your offense will suffer significantly, as a result, as shown by what has happened at ASU, AU and UCLA...
I also think there is great irony in the fact that ASU has preached and practiced about creating turnovers this season but to no real avail compared to most other teams in the conference...
I also don't think that has much to do with Rugby Style tackling (that Wash uses very successfully), with our scheme or coaching very much, either...
Being a Talent Is Destiny guy, I just don't think we have enough talent on defense to make things happen the way we would want...
Additionally, as I've said before, I don't think our coaches have adapted the defensive scheme as much as they probably should have given the defensive personnel limitations or that every player has been "coached up" all that successfully...
However, I also think that if Manny had not been injured that we well might have another 2-3 wins this season, even given another poor defense this year...
Hopefully, we will have enough returning starters this Thursday when we play another solid Utah team to win the game...
Go Devils!!!
1) Injury Factor...both teams have had significant injuries to key players, most notably at the all important QB position...you can throw UCLA into that mix as well and is a key reason that the Devils, Cats and Bruins sit at the bottom of the PAC South...
2) More Give Than Take...that refers to the all important turnover margin category where UCLA is 9th in the PAC at -2, ASU 10th at -3 and AU 12th at -8...
Not surprisingly, Wash is 1st at +13, Wazzu is 2nd at +10, Utah 3rd at +9 and Colo 4th at +7...
3) Lack of Development...this is hard to measure due to its subjectivity but there are many ASU fans that would point to this category and relate it directly to coaching or lack thereof...
My take is that it would be hard to be critical of QB development, for example, when Wilkins, White and Perkins have been injured...Perkins before the season began, Manny since the USC game and White injured during the UCLA game that was his only start...
We've also lost a couple of OL, had banged up RBs and WRs, injured LBs and lots of injuries in the secondary as well...
How realistic is it to rate lack of development under these circumstances..??
I think it is easy to conclude that if you lose your starting QB that your offense will suffer significantly, as a result, as shown by what has happened at ASU, AU and UCLA...
I also think there is great irony in the fact that ASU has preached and practiced about creating turnovers this season but to no real avail compared to most other teams in the conference...
I also don't think that has much to do with Rugby Style tackling (that Wash uses very successfully), with our scheme or coaching very much, either...
Being a Talent Is Destiny guy, I just don't think we have enough talent on defense to make things happen the way we would want...
Additionally, as I've said before, I don't think our coaches have adapted the defensive scheme as much as they probably should have given the defensive personnel limitations or that every player has been "coached up" all that successfully...
However, I also think that if Manny had not been injured that we well might have another 2-3 wins this season, even given another poor defense this year...
Hopefully, we will have enough returning starters this Thursday when we play another solid Utah team to win the game...
Go Devils!!!
