The Great Collapse of 2009
by Jay Coulter on Oct 19, 2009 1:00 AM CDT
in Football
13 comments
What is it with October and collapses? Last year Wall Street and the final edition of Team Tuberville paired up to push fans to the ledges of tall buildings looking for relief from a world gone mad. This year was supposed to be the recovery, both on the field and in the wallet. I don't know about you, but I'm feeling about the same in both important areas.
Last week's loss at Arkansas was a setback. Saturday night's defeat was a game changer for first year Auburn coach Gene Chizik. Sitting here last week, I wrote about better days to come for this team. Every young team has hiccups and rides the emotional rollercoaster. What we witnessed against Kentucky was something far worse than a young team trying to find its way. Auburn football is in full meltdown today.
Beyond the surprise of losing was the way the Tiger's did it. There's no doubt Auburn's defense has problems. The secondary is making far too many tackles and the names on the backs of the jerseys are from way too many guys who played on Friday nights a year ago. But Ted Roof's defense didn't lose it for Auburn on Saturday. Holding the Wildcats to 21 points and 357 yards of offense is hardly spectacular, but plenty enough to grab a win.
How does it feel to be running back Ben Tate today? While things crumble around him, he's quietly becoming one of the most dominating backs in the SEC and America. He's now gone over the hundred yard mark in all four of Auburn's conference games, finishing Saturday with 132 yards on 31 carries. Not since the days of Cribbs and Brooks has such a great Auburn back played on such a poorly performing team.
Rumblings have already started about the arm of quarterback Chris Todd. I don't pretend to be Dr. James Andrews, but there's something very different about the strength and velocity of his throwing arm. By now you know that Chizik practically refuses to discuss injuries. Ask him about a player and he'll usually use his favorite term, "dinged up" to describe anything from a concussion to a broken back. It's unlikely we'll learn much about Todd this week leading up to LSU.
Like all quarterbacks, Todd will get the brunt of the criticism in the days ahead. But it would be foolish to stop with him. Johnny Unitas couldn't overcome eight penalties for 55 yards in the fourth quarter, including one series where Auburn went from a third-and-one at the Kentucky 43 to a third-and-11 at the Auburn 47. The ball was later turned over on downs.
Dreams of a repeat of the 1993 season are over. There will likely be no magical ending. Like last season, fans now look at the schedule trying to find that allusive sixth win that may earn Auburn a trip to Legion Field and the Pizza Bowl in late December. More than likely it comes on November 7th when the Paladins of Furman come to town to pick up their fat check.
Hoping for a win over LSU, Ole Miss, Georgia or Alabama may be futile at this point. Surprisingly, Georgia may be Auburn's best shot even though it's on the road in Athens. Unless things change drastically from Saturday night, September will likely be remembered as fool's gold.
Last Monday's headline here read, "The Best Is Still To Come." A week later I'm not so sure. Auburn travels to Baton Rouge Saturday night under the worst of circumstances. It's hard to see anything good coming out of it, but that's why they play the game.
Keep hope alive. Talk to you on Friday.
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I think the best is still to come
But… that may be a few years out after the current staff pulls in some much-needed depth.
I am glad I will be at an event this coming Saturday nigth and unable to watch the carnage in Red Stick.
Jesus Jay it ain't all doom and gloom....
I agree that we played a terrible game saturday. Between the penalties and the poor execution we beat ourselves. Kentucky gave us plenty of opportunities to get it done, we just never took advantage of their generiousity. I disagree with your idea that Todd’s arm is bothering him again. If anything it appeared to me that he had too much power in it most of the time. He was throwing high to the receivers or overthrowing the routes. Only a 2 times did he underthrow the ball and i thought that he wasn’t set well enough to deliver the ball that deep anyway. But i think his shoulder is fine(ability wise).
Just like last week i felt as though the blocking on the outsides during the bubble screens was terrible. Trott miss a few last week at arkansas and it seemed like our other receivers missed alot of them this past weekend with Kentucky. Those screens will never do anything without that blocking.
I do agree that our defensive front needs to step up more. Granted they actually did get some pressure this past weekend, but they are still missing in the run stop. That and i saw the LB’s miss their gaps alot. Your right our DB’s had way too many tackles. Hell even Bates was missing some tackles and he’s been a tackling bright spot all year.
All and all i felt like we could have won this game if we would have eliminated the penalties in the 4th quarter. Those were the drive killers and i believe the game killers as well.
Hope i’m not going to Baton Rouge this weekend for nothing but it doesn’t look good thats for sure.
No doubt....
But i don’t think his problems have been because of his shoulder bothering him. Its seems more mental than anything else.
Hey, at least I wrote my blog right after the game....
…and was still a little drunk.
Yeah, things don’t look so hot right now but I really think we can turn things around just as quickly if we can get some decent QB play from somewhere. Thats is a HUGE if, but thats the real difference the last two weeks. All of the mistakes come from feeling the pressure of HAVING to make a block, a play, a first down. The kids are gripping right now and a lot of it is because they have lost their confidence in being able to move the football. That cascades through the team on both sides of the ball. If somehow Todd can get his mojo back, we’ll be back with him.
And it doesn’t help when Gus throws an A-11 package out there on a crucial 3rd down either….you might as well scream, “I HAVE NO CONFIDENCE IN THIS TEAM GETTING A 1ST DOWN UNLESS WE TRICK THE DEFENSE”….way to go Gus. That says way more than I want to believe it does.
BUT…Its football season and my favorite time of the year… I sure don’t like to see my Tigers lose but a nice autumn day on the plains is as close to heaven as I think I’ll ever get….on earth anyway.
On what day did the Lord create Bear Bryant and couldn't he have rested on that day too?
I'd like to see some very inexperienced players start getting major playing time.
Let’s run Caudle out there some now and let him get some serious competitive reps in against quality SEC teams and in hostile SEC environments. I don’t care if Todd is hurt or not, he’s not setting the world on fire and I’d rather Caudle make some mistakes this year that will eliminate some mistakes next year.
I do not honestly think our program is any worse hands now than I did a month ago. We are at a point right now where all of our weaknesses and defencies have been brought to the forefront. Everyone knew this team would lose its steam eventually and now we have done just that. We’re right where we’re supposed to be probably and I’m ok with that. I still think this team is special and we’ll give ourselves a chance to beat someone we aren’t supposed to but we may actually come up short.
I’m a little suspicious of Malzahn at this point. I can’t believe our offense has just dropped off of a cliff. And that trick play in the 4th on 3rd and 6 was just embarssing, as Col.Angus said as well it showed a true lack of confidence from Gus. That one play bothered me most Saturday night. I could take the mistakes and missed assignments by our guys, but Malzahn should have displayed a little more confidence in his guys. Maybe he didn’t think of it as that at all and was trying to help our offense have a little fun and go for a big play but it was ill timed and uncalled for I think.
All in all, we’re going to be ok. We’ve got talent coming and you appreciate great memories fully without having been thorugh the hard times too. War Eagle!
War Eagle
It's not the end of the world
This is a real tough loss yes, but, the sun will rise again, and I think it could be as soon as next week. LSU is great on D, average on O, and average on special teams. While the odd’s aren’t in our favor, but we ALWAYS play LSU hard. And if we do pull it out next saturday night, all of a sudden our season once again would have a brand new outlook.
I would chalk up Kentucky as us looking ahead to LSU and not focusing on the task at hand. I don’t think you can write a headline like “The Collapse of 2009” when we are barely halfway through the season. It’s not how you start, it’s how you finish, and we are far from finished.
by war damn philly on Oct 19, 2009 3:31 PM CDT reply actions
Saturday night was painful.
However, absolute negativity about the team, the coaches and the program is more painful. While there are all appearances of a free fall, what is different? You don’t see the players turning on each other and you don’t really see the coaches denying the problems that are obvious…okay, for those who are convinced that Todd is injured again, the previous comment will not resonate with you. This team is still growing and changing. I almost think that if we were not 5-0 two weeks ago, the clammering about the last two losses would not be so loud. This is a shame. All of us got ahead of ourselves. We have talent on this team. They are young. We will be okay. Seriously. I still believe that we will win one game (maybe even two) that we are not supposed to. It is too early to lose faith in this young team. War Damn Eagle!
by Tiger on the mountain on Oct 19, 2009 9:00 PM CDT reply actions
Jay
You should retitle this article…
The great beating of preseason expectations of 2009
I had AU at 4-3 at this point in the season finishing at 6-6. Seems like y’all are ahead of schedule to me. The only person to predict 10-2 was Todd92.
I believe your prediction was very similar to mine…
I had us...
…..at 5-2, but the loss was a blow-out against West Virginia. I had no idea the Mountaineers would be so generous! I had Kentucky pegged as dangerous, and a must win, though. KY was the difference between a bowl, or not, in my scenario.
…..I still Auburn has a chance at Ole Miss, but honestly, I think they get us, unless the offense returns to early season form. All they have to do is run it, wear us down, and minimize Jevan Snead’s wild throws. LSU should have a break out game against our D. Georgia might be winnable, but since 2004, we’ve had a knack for making every Georgia QB look like a Heisman candidate.
…..Hey, if we beat Furman, and go to the Pizza Bowl, that’s one I can definitely attend, assuming that tickets aren’t hard to get.
I'd rather go to no bowl
than the papajohns.com bowl. That’s just degrading. And I’m sure, should we lose to the toothless nation of the western part of this state, they would have a delegation there in birmingham to greet us at Legion Field with their usual slander. Give me Shreveport, Nashville, or Memphis over that crap.
"We're at AUBURN. I think that says it all. We're going after the best in the country -- no matter when, what, where, how. That's how we're going to do it. We're going to work really hard to try to get that done every year -- including this one." -- Auburn University Head Football Coach Gene Chizik
We were right where I expected us to be...
until this past Saturday. I had us winning our first 4, going 1-1 in Knoxville and Fayetteville, then beating Kentucky. So we’ve fallen short of my expectations thus far…
"We're at AUBURN. I think that says it all. We're going after the best in the country -- no matter when, what, where, how. That's how we're going to do it. We're going to work really hard to try to get that done every year -- including this one." -- Auburn University Head Football Coach Gene Chizik
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