Addicted To Quack: FanPosts

My $0.02

Jake — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 22:37:09 -0000

It's not often that I'll come over here to write something. In fact, I can't even say that I read this blog everyday. It may sound rude of me to not support a colleague, but quite frankly, I could care less what is said about Oregon State on this blog. This is a rivalry. Trash talking is part of rivalries. But it's gotten to the point that I need to say something.

Addicted to Quack and Building the Dam are different communities. We're fans of different schools. And our schools are rivals.

Addicted to Quack is the giant tailgate party for Duck fans. Building the Dam is the tailgater for Beaver fans. While some things that CV3000 have written may have been over the top or crossed the line, it's nothing that you wouldn't hear on gameday in Corvallis or Eugene.

CV3000 is one of the most knowledgeable people on Oregon State football that I know. He's already demonstrated that on BtD. What he can take away from a game or a practice eclipses what I could on my own, which is why he has and will make a good addition to BtD.

Every fan and blogger is different. Every blogger chooses the way they want to present themselves to their community. If CV3000 wants to take some jabs, I don't see a problem with that. At the end of the day, this is football. There are many things more important than football. Many things.

"Bragging rights" is a term that comes up frequently when fans refer to rivalries. Right now, Oregon State has the bragging rights. Had Oregon spiked the ball to stop the clock at the end of the fourth quarter and given their FG unit time to line up, this would be a completely different story.

We have the bragging rights this year. There is now way to deny that. When the Beavers and Ducks meet at Reser on November 29, bragging rights will again be on the line.

Myself and CV3000 definitely have different styles. And the addition of CV3000 to Building the Dam has definitely shaken things up. I realize this, but still stand behind my decision to add CV3000 to the mix.

Look forward to reading the comments. Hope I made myself clear. Call me out if I didn't.

--jake (www.buildingthedam.com)

Not a Hoax

DuckPhan08 — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 21:58:10 -0000

Not a hoax

It's not a hoax as I'm sure most of you know. Spoke with someone close to the athletic dept and it doesn't look good.

Better now than in in the middle of the season. Maybe we'll get lucky and it wont be to serious.

Roper's got 9 days to prepare so hopefully he'll be ready. Not a good way to start off the year.

Go Ducks

No more BtD talk

butthol — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 02:58:01 -0000

Look, lately, there's been a lot of hissy fits (myself thoroughly included) over the writing over at BtD. The Beaver trolls haven't been around in a week or more, so this is the only thing Beav related that's been getting in our heads. And I think it should've stopped by now.

We've been noticing more and more, the simply rude and uncalled for animosity from writers such as CV3000, and the subsequent agreeing or encouraging from others. I have been especially riled up and have moseyed over to BtD to give him a piece of my mind a few times (once I felt I crossed the line, apologized almost immediately by replying to myself, and he fired back one more impolite jab.) You've also probably seen me, sometimes Joe, MIcDuck, et al. letting off some steam about the BtD writing over here. I apologize for this too.

Look now, this is just blogging. The Beavers themselves we don't have a problem with, but their seemingly 8-year-old bloggers get our tits in a knot? Come on guys. We want this place clean. Not stooped to their level. BtD may be a chute-de-crap, but that shouldn't concern us. We do our thing, they hate our thing. The little brother parallel has been drawn so many times I think it's getting nearer to infant sister. Premature infant sister.

I have long wondered how the likes of Mr. CV3000 could possibly be highly regarded on a blog, but hey, why do humans have appendixes? Well, to have appendectomies of course!

The reason I posted this is so we can get all of this out of our system. No more "ZOMGZZ!! LOOK @ WUT BtD SEZ BOUT US 2DAY!!" That just, as has been said, fuels the fire, fans the flames, frosts their cupcake, chalks another up for Fonzie, what have you. This is a Ducks blog. They are a Beavers anti-Ducks blog now, it seems. And you know what? Let them go ahead and do that. Stewing in their own pool of loathing and tantrums only hurts them, and it only hurts them more if we don't bat an eye.

So, for the sake of blogger integrity, don't give them the time of day. Make them nothing more than a Beaver in primal scream therapy trying to get a Duck to listen.

I will continue to post at BtD, but with this, my pointless posts of frustration and pissiness will be no more. All of you may go over and post there, and observe what happens there, but it will more than likely end up in frustration, confusion, and pity. See: noxious gases not recommended for inhalation.

Luke Jackson a Blazer?

Addicted to Quack — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 18:41:31 -0000

He'll get a shot.

He's been invited to preseason camp with the Blazers, and there's one potential spot open on the roster. He's had a rough go with injuries but, like Joey, its been long enough that you have to start thinking he's just really not that good at the next level. I really hope Luke proves us wrong, because he's my favorite Duck ever (my son is named Luke, after all).

Make it happen, Luke. I love Brandon Roy, but his Huskyism does need some counterbalance.

I need some local advice.

DuckinNC — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 02:10:29 -0000

This post is going out to the locals i.e. those who live in Eugene, Portland and surrounding areas. I am coming out for the BSU game with two other friends and I need some info on hotels. I have heard that the Bronco faithful travel well. I need to find us a hotel in or around Eugene(Springfield, Santa Clara) that isn't gonna cost me an arm and leg. We would like to keep it to $75 a night MAX.

Please if anyone can make any suggestions for a specific hotel or a decent place that might fall in those price parameters and locales I would be greatly appreciative.

Stevens ---> Center, again

butthol — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 21:57:37 -0000

Moseley reports Hamani Stevens was practicing at Center again today.

I, for one, really like this A LOT. With our O-line basically rebuilding in '09 (which we can expect to be, christ, a dropoff year. Beaver trolls get preemptive fodder here), we get Stevens a tiny head start in adjusting to college level D-lines.

Another thing, I'm noticing a pattern in quality guys we're bringing in. I mean, quality people. Not just players. JJ, Blount, WT3 (although cocky, he's good team captain material next year), now Stevens, and many more. Stevens was fully willing to move to DE to add depth, as the team needed it. Never reluctant, you gotta love the willingness and commitment. Model citizens and good teammates does a family-like-team make.

Your thoughts?

If we get bored of talking about Stevens, an alternative is a venting session about the bootcamp that is Daily Doubles on a high school football team. Or your favorite LOLcat image. Any preference?

New Oregon Football Torrents

jtlight — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 21:20:48 -0000

Two more Oregon games are now online:

The Washington State game is now up. As is the Washington game.

Here is the current list of games available:
Houston (cut)
Michigan (cut and PAL, which won't play on a normal TV)
Fresno State (cut)
Stanford (cut)
California
WSU
Washington
USC
Sun Bowl - USF

If anyone has the entire ASU and OSU games on DVD, or any other old games on DVD, those would be greatly appreciated. All games listed as cut are not online at the moment, though I can put them up by request. They are in divx format and have in between each play cut out, so the game becomes about one hour long.

By the Numbers; Pac-10 Red Zone Defense

JShufelt — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 19:42:29 -0000

So to help with the down time, I figured I would crunch a few numbers on a rarely used, but extremely telling statistics. Many duck fans don't like Nick Allotti's defensive schemes. While Bellotti often calls it "Bend but don't break defense", apparently Allotti doesn't care for that title.

Call it whatever you want, it definitely doesn't match what old typical Big-12 teams would call a "Good Defense". Ted Miller touched in this a bit in his mail bag earlier this week. 7th in the Pac-10 isn't great, but I could care less if we were 10th in the Pac-10. In my opinion, the best gauge of defensive effectivity is when it gets cornered into their own Red Zone. Suddenly, Oregon doesn't look too bad.

As you can see, the two Oregon teams tied for giving up the least red zone TD, but our in-state bragging right friends enjoy the cake for the least points allowed overall.

While USC allowed less scoring opportunities than Oregon, Oregon still allowed 6 less total points on the year. Across the town, UCLA, despite giving a shutout, gave up 23 TDs in the red zone. Arizona State fared alright, more or less being the middle of the Pac-10, separating the great defensive red zone performances, from... the rest. California really got hurt in the red zone, and they'll be looking to make some improvements here as they almost gave up twice as many red zone points (255 not including PAT) as Oregon (138) and Oregon State (129) on the year.

But this still isn't a great gauge of defensive efficiency, for that, we'll have to compare these numbers to the number of times a defense had to make a stand in the Red Zone.

About the biggest anomaly that jumps out is that out of 37 Red Zone stands, Arizona State allowed a team to score 33 times. A few other things that are note worthy is how the Golden Bears had to take a defensive red zone stand nearly 20% more than any other team. Ouch! But there is one more thing that is a bit more subtle in there too. The Ducks had to make a defensive stand in their own twenty-yard line 42 times. When we relate these two statistics together, we get a very interesting story to tell.

As you can see, Oregon's defense had a pretty steller Red Zone Efficiency. Bend, but don't break indeed. OSU and even Stanford deserve some props for their efforts too. Considering how many times California got pushed back, I don't think they really did too bad. They have a few Red Zone kinks to iron out for '08, as does Arizona State, who statistically collapsed when they got in the red zone.

Washington State, Arizona, UCLA gave up a TD over 60% of the time as well.

As a Duck fan, I can't say I'm disappointed with this. Despite Allotti's protest over it, Oregon really demonstrated a Bend but Don't Break defense that works.

But the leader on the defensive side is wanting to quiet some of the people that like to point out Oregon's defense was 7th last year.

"We were bend but don't break," safety Patrick Chung said. "We're trying not to bend this year." - Rivals.com

I honestly don't think it matters if we give up a lot of yards. Preventing points is what matter the most.

I know that these numbers do not factor in all TD allowed, like big plays of 20+, but there is no good way I can do that without going into every box score of each Pac-10 game. That's something I don't feel like doing right now

Dixon

joelor — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 17:29:10 -0000

Did anyone besides me watch Dixon play the fourth quarter of the Steelers-Bills preseason game last night?

Dixon went 6/15, and led the Steelers in rushing. His completion percentage would have been better, but for 2-3 dropped passes by third-string receivers. Frankly, he looked a good bit better than Leftwich did out there, bringing Pittsburgh within 3 on a 47-yard touchdown run (shown below) and almost engineering a game-tying/winning drive but for poor clock management.

Check it out here.

So the Secondary wants a nickname?

hazmat5793 — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 06:43:09 -0000

A while back on "Duck Feed," the goducks.com blog, Andy McNamara reported that Patrick Chung wanted a nickname the Ducks' secondary. He proceeded to request fan suggestions. Today, Chung, Byrd, and Thurmond narrowed the names down to four. The Flock, Autzen Air Patrol, The D-Boyz, and The Fog. Autzen Air Patrol is out in front with about 44% of the online vote of the four names.

I suggested the name "The PICK Crew." Any more good ideas from the people of ATQ?

Brody Wilkins

DuckinNC — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 20:54:23 -0000

I saw this kid play in the East/West Shriners game the other day and I must say I am pulling for the kid. He played 8 man football in HS and was the QB/K anything they needed. He ran all over and around the other kids in the all star game. Like I said he was a QB in HS but they have him listed as a WR(I guess that is where he can best get a shot on the field seeing as how we have 5 QB's)). He walked on and I hope he not only makes and stays with the team but I hope we hear somethings from him a few years down the road.

Just my 2 cents worth.

Also while I have this post open, has anyone heard what is going on with televising the games this year. I live in NC and the only way I got games last year was thru FSN or ESPN gameplan. Unless they were national games I had to order the package on a weekly basis. I was thinking of getting the whole year because it is cheaper then buying 7 weekends. I am not going to get it if they are not going to show Ducks' games. Anyone got any info?

Attention Chicago Ducks

DavisDuck — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 16:05:16 -0000

I wrote about Witt's Bar & Grill last week in my "The Story of Witt's" FanPost, but it seems I spoke too soon. The Chicago chapter of the Oregon alumni association is changing the venue for our football watch parties. The manager at Witt's has moved to a new bar in the same neighborhood, "Rocks". He invited the Oregon crowd to make Rocks the new "Oregon bar" in town, and he pledged to continue taking good care of us. (Meanwhile, Witt's stopped flying the Oregon flag outside and is flying an Iowa Hawkeyes flag instead.)

Rocks is similar in size and layout to Witt's. It is on a side street, so the parking situation is a nice improvement from Witt's. Rocks has a great selection of beers and liquors, and good food too. They have 8 TVs. It's a 10-minute (or less) walk from the Diversey Brown Line stop, and bus stops on Ashland, Lincoln, and Diversey.

Rocks Lincoln Park
1301 W. Schubert Ave.
Chicago, IL 60614

Map:
maps.google.com/maps?f=q&h...013711&z=16

Rocks website:
www.rockslincolnpark.com/

Hope to see everyone at Rocks on August 30th!

3rd Pac-10 QB injured in a week (UCLA'a Olson)

Trail Ducker — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 01:54:47 -0000

So now UCLA's Ben Olson continues the string of Pac-10 team's QBs getting injured before a game has even started. This injury sounds the worst yet as Olson will be out 8 weeks and there is a chance of surgery. UCLA can not catch a break! Patrick Cowan (the QB that replaced Olson when he got injured last season) was set to be their number 1 QB going into the season, but will now miss the whole season after having surgery from hurting his knee in spring practice

Here's The Link to the ESPN article:

Link

Practice recaps will end

butthol — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 20:00:39 -0000

First off, I'll be gone a week or so as I mentioned earlier.

But, I have been contacted this morning by an anonymous other blogger who has told me a number of things that I shouldn't have mentioned in my practice writeup posts, and that is totally on me. I put in some things that, as (funny as may sound) media, I should not have, and that was a bad mistake on my part. There are things I didn't know were rather confidential to the team and to others.

Great thanks though to the other who saw over these and put in a word to me, trying to help me keep my nose clean out here. For that, great great thanks to this person.

So, thus, I'll stop with the practice recaps. Sorry guys.

The Story of Witt's

DavisDuck — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 16:49:20 -0000

I moved to Chicago in the summer of 2004. Coincidentally, a month after I arrived I received an e-mail from the Alumni Association. The note went to Chicago-area Ducks in an effort to establish a Chicago chapter of the UOAA. I went to that initial meeting and there were 8 people there. We agreed that finding a place to watch Ducks Football was the top priority.

We settled on a bar called "Joe's", a massive warehouse of a sports bar with 100+ TVs. The manager at Joe's gave us the VIP room for our first game vs. Indiana (though we had to share it with the Hoosiers crowd). I nearly jumped off a bridge into the nearby Chicago River at halftime, but otherwise had a good time with about 20 other Ducks. But after that first game, we were out of the VIP room and into the back corner, with the crappy small TV and no audio. We had 10-20 people show up each week that season, and around the same numbers in 2005.

In 2006, our intrepid leader Drew was contacted by the manager of a neighborhood bar called Witt's. The owner had just remodeled the place and put in new TVs, and he was looking for a couple of college teams to "adopt". He wanted teams that did not already have a dedicated “home” in Chicago (ruling out Illinois, Notre Dame, Ohio State, etc.), so he picked Purdue from the Big 10 and contacted their alumni chapter. He also wanted a Pac 10 team to get the afternoon crowd (West Coast games start a few hours later than Big 10 games), and after some research he learned that there are 500+ Oregon alums in Chicagoland. He also knew we had a strong football program, so he reached out to Drew and invited him to bring the Ducks to Witt's.

That first game in 2006 against Stanford, I wandered into the bar and was shocked to see a crowd of 30+ quacker backers on hand, and the Ducks game on 4 different screens with surround-sound audio. WAAAAAAY better situation than the dark corners of Joe's. The Ducks started that season on fire, and the crowds got bigger every week. We probably had 50+ folks pack that place for the wild Oklahoma game. Drew brought a big green OREGON flag and it now hangs outside Witt's. They also play an MP3 of "Mighty Oregon" after touchdowns and victories.

Last year we kept up the momentum, attracting 30-50 Oregon fans to Witt's for every game until the season unraveled. We only had about 15 people for the UCLA and Oregon State games and the Sun Bowl. Hopefully this year will be a packed house for every game (saying a prayer that ESPN Gameplan gets the broadcast rights) of a 13-0 season (hey, why not?).

I dropped by Witt's for a Ducks basketball game a few months ago, and I noticed some new remodeling including a big sign that features the "O" logo painted above the beer list. Also new booths, and a new beer cooler behind the bar. I guess they made so much coin off the Duck fans that they could afford to fix up the place even more!

In short, we've gone from 8 people in the dark corner of Joe's with fuzzy picture and no sound, to 50 people in a nice new bar with good food and drink, the Ducks game on several TVs and full audio, and the flag flying outside and the fight song playing inside. Needless to say, we love Witt's!

Final thought: Given that we share Witt's with the Purdue crowd, we REALLY need Oregon to knock off the Boilermakers on September 13 so we can have bragging rights for the rest of the season.

http://www.wittschicago.com/pictures.htm

Day 3, Starters again

butthol — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 03:20:23 -0000

Noon today I went to go see the starters again. Some friends decided to come too, one of which the Defensive End on the Freshman Team I play on. Not to embarrass him or anything, but he has an overbearingly conspicuous mancrush on Nick Reed.

There was, disappointingly, a lot less to observe today, so sorry if this one's a bit of a bore.

I was watching a lot of the QBs, of course, but most excitingly, I got to see 2 no-huddle series (plural?) with Costa and Roper alternating at the helm. They were running no-huddle, getting the check offs from Chip et al., and running plays at a brisk pace. Brisker than our usual offense, and that is saying something. No matter what the gain on the play, it seemed, every following down they would advance the line of scrimmage 10 yards. I do not know if a gain of >10 yards would result in awarding those earned yards, or if they would've been relegated to 10 yards beyond the previous line of scrimmage.
At this, they weren't very good. Lots of incompletions (funny, spell check does not recognize this word. The fuck?) and 2-3 yard running plays. Very sobering to watch, really brought me down to earth about the offense. Now, I'm not sure how seriously I should take this though... these were again minimal contact drills, players just in basic shells... so I don't know what sort of grain of salt I should take this with. Rock, Kosher, Bath, Baconsalt, Cyprus? Any thoughts?
There was one carry from I think 20 yards out by Andre Crenshaw that went for 6. He took what looked like a sweep-turned-HB dive play to the house, bouncing off maybe 3 defenders without getting grasped, therefore a legitimate TD run. Again, this was just a rough little 11-on-11 that had one nice carry. Today, that's the only real bright play I saw. Defense won this convincingly I would say, if not for the question mark of effort and the seriousness put into it by the offense.
Costa (I think) dropped back once and fired a high bullet to Maehl, who was on a short curl route, that went through his and the covering DB's hands incomplete. Maehl had to sky for this ball, leading me to coin the ever-so-clever nickname of "AirMaehl." Did you see what I did there? The guy next to me liked it too. Er maybe it was a sympathy chuckle. Whatever. I thought it was good.
The aforementioned young aspiring Defensive End really wanted to watch the D-line drills (particularly our darling Nick. He asked me if I'd give him 5 bucks to run onto the field and give Nick a hug. I said no - goddammit, self in retrospect. I'm really having problems with my few-hours-ago-self lately.) It was D-line versus O-line, but usually only one center and two guards beside him. Center would snap it towards a blue block in the backfield (the proverbial QB), and the DE or DT would be the only to rush. It was basically 1-on-1s with a Center and another Guard nearby, but not helping out. Nick Reed, needless, was beasting it. He was the only D-lineman executing spin moves, I noticed. Dunno why others didn't use it, his were definitely working. Will Tukuafu v. Max Unger was a battle royale I tell you. Unger ultimately won, but they both were going at it with great intensity. Tukuafu was on a tear into the backfield, but Unger kept him at bay as best you can expect from an O-lineman. The O-line was awesome, and the D-line, although top-heavy, needs depth. But hey, that's what Mr. Stevens is now there for right?

Anyway, sorry that it's not much today. This will also be the last one for a little over a week, I'm off to Portland, then Seattle, then Orcas Island, I'll be back around Thursday next week.

Today was another hot one, but the breezes helped. The players seemed to be getting a special amount of water today, as it should be.

I also waved to Morgan Flint early on, he recognized me, and when the kickers and punters were alone on the other side of the field, I went over and talked to him. He told me they have to get up at 6:30 every morning and have their team breakfast, get out on the field at around 8:30. I didn't ask him what occupies the 3 1/2 hours before starters practice. I suppose scrabble? Boggle? Cribbage? Any thoughts?

Bellotti third best Pac-10 Coach and Autzen number 9

pointguard10 — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 18:39:46 -0000

Ted Miller went in depth about ranking the Pac-10 coaches from top to bottom.

I agree with him that Pete Carrol is the obvious choice for the number one coach in the Pac-10. I personally don't have much respect for Dennis Erickson because of how bad of job he did for the 49ers. As far as college goes he picks up a good amount of wins every year. I just don't see how he is better than Bellotti maybe that is just my bias. Bellotti is third followed by Tedford from Cal and then Riley at OSU. I also know about Rick Neuheisel's at UW, but I don't see him making a impact that quickly at UCLA. USC has all the recruiting power down in Southern California and the rest of the country.

Ted Miller wrote another article about MIke Stoops and Ty Willingham being on the hot seat in the Pac-10. I think Stoops is done after this yer unless he puts together a nice bowl run. I don't think Willingam has to make it to a bowl game this year for him to keep his job. UW starts the season with UO, BYU and Oklahoma. I believe the Huskies will start 0 and 3 but if those games are close and UW gets within a game of making a bowl game I think UW will give Willingham one more year at least. Just my opinion though.

I just came across this because I have no life other than surf the web about Oregon. Autzen is ranked #9 amonst toughest places to play. Michigan is 8. What the hell? Michigan should not even be mentioned in the top 10 after what happened last year.

My productivity at work has fallen off a cliff

DavisDuck — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 17:15:59 -0000

TO: Accounting Dept.

FROM: DavisDuck

RE: Request for new job code

===============================

Please open a new job code so that I can correctly charge my time.

Title is Addicted to Quack

This is an internal cost center.

As of August 4, please adjust my timesheet to reflect 2.0 hours per day to this code. FY09 budget projections should allow for up to 15.0 hours per week between now and December. In addition, please allow expenses toward this code of up to $1,000 for "meals/beverages" and "transportation".

Practice Day 2: Starters

butthol — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 04:24:58 -0000

Went to practice again today. This time it was at noon, when the starters and 1 and 2-deeps work. Whee! I got to meet very many players, such as JJ, Roper (talked to as we were leaving the field for about 4 minutes), Jerome Boyd, J-Will, Morgan Flint, Nick Reed, and dum dum dum dum dum dum dum dum CHIP KELLY WOOOO!! Chip was awesome. So friendly and outgoing, I talked to him for about 35 seconds because he had to leave, but he seemed to want to continue the conversation some other time... wishful thinking? ;) He asked me my name, where I go to school, and when I replied South, he asked me if I'd be trying to sway Charles Siddoway and Bo Lokombo to Oregon. I told him I'll be getting him a recruiting violation, and he laughed his ass off, gave me a pat on the back, and told me to come again tomorrow so we could talk. The fiber of my being was thoroughly shaked!

QBs: Costa, Roper

RBs: JJ, Crenshaw, (NO Blount sighting today, he moved to the evening slot with the newcomers for some reason. Damn.)

WR: J-Will, Pflu, Maehl, Drew Davis, Rory Cavaille, among others

TE: Dickson, Malachi Lewis, (did not see Ryan Larkin, he might've been there though.)

And of course the entire Defense and complete O-line. Hamani Stevens was practicing in the evening with the D-line

I got in about a half an hour late, so I don't know what I missed to begin with.
Hung out with Rob Moseley and other sports writers the entire time. They, ironically, talk about football itself very minimally. Other topics include: their college classes, players' personalities, and other more R-rated things. Sorry for blowing your cover, Rob.
Costa's knee looked 110%. Both him and Roper were wearing braces on their lefts. Roper was doing mostly pass plays. One play I noticed was basically the focus of the practice today, for the QBs, was a zone read with a bubble screen on the outside, the kind of thing we've seen West Virginia do, but we haven't introduced yet (save for the Sun Bowl.)
I saw Costa doing some reads, and he was giving the ball off most of the time, the one time I did see him keep it though, he BURST up the field for a huge gain. Now, in all fairness, these are minimal contact drills, no pads, no takedowns, no laying out. Just, grab the ball carrier and stop his momentum. Costa took it up the field about 20-25 yards untouched until some DBs caught up with him. His knee looked strong and comfortable in the dash, seemed really encouraging to me.
In accuracy drills, Costa's throws were confident and often accurate. Roper looked just as good. Costa especially was pocketing one after another in the middle net. Comparable to Masoli's performance yesterday.
One funny thing that Chip did, while they were doing this accuracy drill, the D-line unit walked by. Nate takes the snap, Chip yells something like "Hit Sonny!" or "Sunny's open!" or something, and he promptly nail Sonny Harris in the chest. It was funny as hell to me and the other watchers, and it looked like Chip had a good laugh at it too. Harris and the rest kept walking, knowing it was just in good fun. Good stress relief for Costa, Roper, and even Chip. Thought that was pretty cool of him.
JJ is funny as hell. When they started kickoff and punt return drills, JJ was on the coverage team. He, along with 6 or 7 other players, were bumrushing the sole returner from maybe 30-40 yards away. Once, he let out a LOUD Rebel yell that gave everyone a good laugh. According to Rob and some of the other guys, JJ and Patrick Chung have assumed the roles of team captains and spiritual leaders, especially JJ. Says they listen to him, and he's really motivating, while Patrick Chung, although respected, often scares the living shit out of them. Not sure if many people know about his necessary anger management. Nonetheless, I love Patrick Chung and JJ all the same. Great kids.
LeGarrette Blount, also according to Rob, is a character. Always laughing and smiling and happy. I can tell from pictures, but Rob confirmed that he's really merged in well. I like this kid. He's also up to 240 lbs. Picture being the lone DB in the open field, seeing about 6'2", 240 lbs. trucking down the field with the ball, ready to just blow you over. This guy is a force of nature, and I was pissed that I haven't the need for the witness protection program, in seeing him, yet >:(
We have the ultimate crop of young talent at DB this year. WT3, Byrd, Willie Glasper, Marvin Johnson, TJ Ward, Pat Chung, and many more. They're all so young too, save for Chung of course.
Nate Costa threw one interception, a jumping, very athletic play by a DB, I didn't quite see who exactly. I thought it was Byrd, but I'm really not sure. It was definitely a pick-six, but it was less of a bad throw and more of a nice pick. Guy had to get vertical for it. Costa was on a rollout, and although I would consider it a fairly bad read, it's rare to see such an athletic play. It was a lot like the pick Brady Leaf threw in the '05 Holiday Bowl, though this was on a rollout to the left, which is admittedly an incredibly tough throw. I don't blame Nate for trying it, it wasn't like a forced ball by any means.
The focus I noticed today, in the passing game, was on both the aforementioned bubble screen play, and out patterns. Roper seemed pretty good at timing these out patterns, and even in tight coverage, the receivers would most often come up with it. Rory Cavaille especially was good at these.

Now, I just gotta indulge here, and tell you guys all about my day meeting the dudes! I had to wait a good 2-2 1/2 hours to get to em, but it was well worth the wait. After practice finished, the first to come over was Bellotti, who immediately started taking questions from a bunch of reporters and bloggers, excluding Rob, who had moved onto others by then. I stood directly to the side of Bellotti for 5 minutes, listening to his interviews, and I might've even gotten on the video of him, not sure though.

Next, Chip and Nate were walking towards us, talking to eachother. I just couldn't pass up, so I went over and introduced myself to Chip, shook his hand, and started that short but fantastic conversation. I had already met Nate, as you know, so I passed up on bugging him today.

After Chip moved on, I turned around, and saw Justin Roper getting interviewed by John Hunt. They were talking about Todd Doxey, and Justin was describing the helmet decal they designed en memorium. Roper is a great kid. So friendly and willing to give information, he even drew up a rough sketch of the decal for Hunt. Roper's an architecture major, apparently. At least, that's what I got from Hunt.

After Hunt was done with him, I said "Mr. Roper!" and shook his hand. Stupid in retrospect, all I said to him after that was "...shit... you really are tall." He chuckled and said "Yeah... I guess that's a good thing?" We started walking off the field together, as I asked him about being a QB for the Ducks (another stupid question after further review), and about his spring game performance. He told me a lot about things, such as, the spin move in that one play was totally not planned, and he said he really didn't realize he did it until there was talk about it. I also asked him about how he feels about Chris Harper and his throwing mechanics, and he said he had no worries about it, and that the coaches will fix Chris. He said this with such confidence that I trust his wisdom about it.

After we parted, and I unlocked my bike, I shook Jerome Boyd's hand, didn't have time to talk with him because he was kinda with his family, at least they looked like it. Nearby him was Nick Reed. I saw him maybe 3 times, but everytime, he was with someone or talking to someone so I felt I better not bug him. He has grown sexy mutton chops though, must say.

I started riding my bike home when I saw Morgan Flint, 3rd string placekicker, walking around the Cas to the locker room in the back. I was on my bike, and I just said "Hey... Morgan Flint?" He said yeah. I told him I was a placekicker, and asked about his range and mindset in kicking. We thereon had a really awesome discussion about kicking, and the kicking camps he's been to that he could really recommend. About this time, a girl came by, flirting with him and asking if he did good and if he kicked a field goal for her. He said no. She stuck her tongue out and went into the Cas center. We were still outside, and I kinda chuckled with him and called him quite the romantic. We had a good laugh, and we both had to split, but it was a nice few minutes with him. I learned a lot from him (his range, he told me quite humbly, is 55 effing yards! I told him 40, and he asked me what year I am, and I told him I'm a frosh. He said that was impressive for a frosh kicker, and that I should start going to camps after sophomore year, because they won't take freshmen seriously there. I took his word for it.)

That's about it for today, it was quite the day. I had endless possibilities for meeting whoever, but there was only so much time. About 5 hours of bike riding from my house in southeast Eugene, to Autzen, to my mom's office, back to my house, and down to South where I had to get to a team physical soon after for the South athletics, and I couldn't substitute meeting awesome young athletes and getting advice from some of my favorite players for getting felt up by older doctors by necessity. What a day this was. Well worth the sunburn and head stroke though!

College Gameday Live - House of Loud

MIcDuck — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 20:00:55 -0000

College Gameday Live just reported that Oregon has changed the name of Autzen to the House of Loud. The ESPN panel got a real good laugh out of that. Even going as far as to say Ohio State has changed the stadium name to the Shoe of Horse. Whoever created that terrible name should be banned from all U of O sporting events. They are making the U of O look like a bunch of clowns. Idiots

Go Ducks