Archive for UCLA
Pac-10 Scoring Trends, 2004-2008
(Scoring offense is points scored by the team, scoring defense refers to points given up, just to avoid any confusion. This is not a competition between how many touchdowns Jahvid Best or Syd’Quan Thompson would score, although that would be sick.) WOOOOOOOOO! Graphs baby graphs! There are some immediate trends you can notice. The powerful […]
UCLA Observations
The Bad Drops and pass protection. The former may improve, but so far it isn’t trending that way. I was particularly disappointed to see Morrah continue to drop catchable balls. We know from experience that he has great hands– may they reappear during the rest of the season. Pass protection is less likely to improve. We’ve been plagued by injuries on the line all season, […]
How to Watch UCLA-California: Game Thread
In all likelihood I’ll be at the game tomorrow, so no liveblog this time. And real life has interfered with blogging, so there will be a slower set of posts for the next few weeks. Alaska and Hawaii are getting #1 Texas vs. #6 Oklahoma State and I am terribly envious of them. Good for […]
Walk the Line: What Vegas Thinks About Cal and the Pac-10
I have a gambling problem. Not a gambling addiction (other than one bad incident that I deserved, I’ve been fairly frugal with my betting habits). No, my problem is that I’m no good at gambling. I.e. I lose a lot of money. I seem to have terrible patterns at predicting who will win and even […]
How Cal Lost in The Rose Bowl, Part IV
Click to read Part I, Part II, and Part III of the Rose Bowl series. And now, for the last part in our series, we move onto the crucial play, the Verner interception return. Here Cal has Hawkins and Jackson lined up to the top, and two running backs, fullback lined up on the weak […]
How Cal Lost in The Rose Bowl, Part III
Click to read Part I and Part II of the Rose Bowl series. As the game progressed, DeWayne Walker seemed to take into account the adjustments Cal was making to his UCLA defense. Here you can see him revert from the Cover 4 and go back to the Cover 2. In a Cover 2 set, […]
Jinx Removing
In my everyday life I’m a cold, secular rationalist. But I am superstitious about exactly one thing: sports. In my mind, part of what makes being a fan fun is suspending your disbelief and allowing the conceit that what you do, as a spectator, might have a small impact on outcomes. Of course, since football […]
Outsmarting the Enemy (Three Fake Handoff, Cal at UCLA)
Last week we went over attacking the Cover 2 scheme, which is to look for the mismatch on the field (read where the safeties will bite to) and to attack where the safeties aren’t in a position to make a play on the ball or the receiver. Today’s post is a little more of a […]
The Noodles at Cal (Wonderlic Scores)
(This is 90% Danzig, with some great data; my small contribution is the Analysis section after the scores and before the sources) I was catching up on my RSS feed yesterday and I came across a report that Mario Manningham of Michigan scored a ‘6’ on his Wonderlic IQ test. A fricking ‘6’?? I thought […]
Can Cal Win State?
Does anyone else suspect that the Coach Taylor character on Friday Night Lights (awesome show, great job) is at least partially based on our beloved Coach Jeff Tedford? Consider the evidence: He’s a handsome, 40-something offensive mastermind, known as a quarterbacks guru, runs a pro-style offense with west coast elements, achieves early success as a […]
