Pelini right on Twitter ban

When Nebraska wide receiver Brandon Kinnie told an Omaha based sports radio show (Unsportsmanlike Conduct) on Wednesday that head coach Bo Pelini has banned Nebraska football players from using Twitter in the coming weeks, I could only think of one thing.


When I was a 22-year old college kid at the University of Nebraska, our idea of text messaging or tweeting was passing a note in class or sliding it underneath someone’s door.

That time frame Kinnie is referring to happens to coincide with the two-week break Nebraska has remaining before the Capital One Bowl on Jan. 2 against South Carolina.

Pelini’s actions came just a few days after a rough Sunday, Dec. 11 for Nebraska. In a 36-hour span, three Huskers were cited for various crimes.

Junior defensive end Eric Martin and junior fullback Collin McDermott were cited for leaving the scene of an accident in separate offenses. Senior center Mike Caputo was cited on the suspicion of DUI.

Pelini has not made any comments about any of the crimes or the Twitter ban.

While the ban from Twitter will not likely affect the Huskers’ play negatively, it surely will lessen the connection some fans feel with certain players but that can’t be at all bad because it's too easy to say something you shouldn’t have said. Once it's out there it's out there. Teenage kids say a lot of things without thinking them through completely. Heck, there’s plenty of 50-year olds that say things without thinking them through.

The way the world works twitter isn't much different then calling up reporters, a team has enough trouble controlling the message without trying to deal with what players say. As much as I don’t agree with everything as far as how Pelini controls the message I understand, it is how any big time organization works.
This is not a heavy handed move by Pelini, although some may interpret it that way. This is a difficult problem. Twitter is a distraction, and I am 100 percent behind Pelini taking this stance on it. Players’ general awareness about tweeting is absurdly low.

The cynics would say that Pelini is old school in the mold of Woody Hayes or Bear Bryant and that such a move would negatively effect recruiting. Part of that cynicism stems from the at time brusque relationship Pelini has had with members of the local media that covers the team regularly. Keep in mind, another root of the fans angst toward Pelini is that he has yet to name a defensive coordinator in the wake losing older brother Carl Pelini, who was recently named the head coach at Florida Atlantic. Though Bo Pelini has said that he has a pretty good idea of what he’s going to do. I can interperet that message in one of two ways. The first is “name the damn replacement and move on” or “the deal is not done until the ink is on the paper.”

OK, I can do without Pelini’s secrecy on injuries but the twitter ban I completely support. There are so many ways twitter will just make people look bad. Twitter is great for college kids...if you're not under the microscope like that. Unfortunately, they are.

The argument of banning twitter while preparing for a bowl game being a bad move is a very weak argument. Let’s face it, last season Nebraska laid a big, fat egg in its 19-7 Holiday Bowl loss to Washington. They need to be focused.

Plus, if recruits care more about twitter than playing football, there's another program down the road.
Personally I think twitter is a total waste. If you have friends you need to say something to, text or call them. If you don't have anything worth sharing with a specific friend, what makes you think anyone else cares? And if you're following the twitters of people you don't really know, you probably need to get a life.

Reflecting on Year One in Big Ten

One commonly believed notion why No. 20 Nebraska had a more inconsistent season than its 9-3 record would suggest is that the team made a conference from the Big 12 to the Big Ten.


With that change came new opponents for which to prepare which then adds to the learning curve. However, the same thing could be said in reverse as well. This was the first time that Big Ten clubs had to prepare for the Huskers.

Nebraska, like everyone else, will know of its bowl game destination Sunday. The most rumored candidates are either the Capital One or Outback Bowl. The rumored opponents are from the SEC: South Carolina, Arkansas and Georgia. The Huskers are likely to be an underdog no matter whom they face but that’s another discussion for Sunday. The scenarios mostly come down to what happens in the SEC (LSU vs. Georgia) and Big Ten (Michigan vs. Wisconsin) title games. I’m not going to go into what has to happen because I’d be better off trying to explain Einstein’s Theory of Relativity.

As I look back on this year, however, I guess I wanted more. I really wanted to see the Huskers play in the inaugural B1G Conference but it just didn’t happen. I thought the team would finish 10-2 with a chance to accomplish that goal but I didn’t count on losing to Northwestern at home (28-25). Strange is a good word to sum up the Huskers first season in the Big Ten.
It didn’t take long to figure out that this wasn’t the Blackshirts we have come to expect on Saturdays under a Bo Pelini coached team. By the time the final seconds drained the clock on the Washington game (which Nebraska won 51-38); it was obvious that the Huskers were in for a roller coaster ride this season defensively. Pass rush or lack thereof most of the season was tough to watch. Linebacker play improved as the season went on, especially from Will Compton. The secondary seemed to improve as well especially if you have the Michigan game erased from your memory.

The coaches have mandated that quarterback Taylor Martinez become more of a game manger but I simply do not buy the notion of that approach hindering his ability to make the big plays we were accustomed to seeing early in 2010. Seriously, is there anything in Tim Beck’s playbook that says, “OK, Taylor gain ten yards and if you see open field just go down. When Martinez got blasted with a series of leg injuries beginning against Missouri last year, he lost a step off of his 10 yard burst. Some would point to his increased penchant for sliding or running out of bounds to preserve his health as the biggest reason for the coaches encouraging more of a “game manager” (whatever the hell that means) approach.

At which point I say, have you seen the backup quarterbacks led by Brion Carnes? Backups are backups for a reason. They are not ready. Some would say, get the backup more playing time in games already decided. That’s fine but where were those games? True, Carnes could have gotten a few snaps in Nebraska’s 45-17 loss at Michigan. However, he did get snaps against UT-Chattanooga (40-7 win), Minnesota (41-14) and Wisconsin (48-17 loss). If I’m not mistaken, those were the only games Nebraska played this year where the game was not somewhat in doubt going into the fourth quarter.
The most disturbing thing is that for as amazing as Rex Burkhead’s season was, you have three true freshmen (Ameer Abdullah, Aaron Green and Braylon Heard) have wasted seasons. None of them carried the ball over 40 times this season.
Looking ahead to next year, I think wide receivers Quincey Enuwa and Kenny Bell will be better. With Brandon Kinnie graduating, maybe Enuwa can be a bigger part of the team’s plans. I felt like Kinnie was on the brink of being a star and then he would vanish for stretches during the season. Without question I think the 2012 offense will be the best of the Pelini era.
I am anxious to watch the young talent on offense continue to develop. Defense will be interesting to say the least. There will be three huge holes to fill and Nebraska is going to need some young guns to step up and improve their games greatly. I still see the defense as a work in progress in this new conference. I don’t think they have the beef up front to control games and they are going to have to find some linebackers to contribute very quickly. The secondary should be better across the board but losing Alfonso Dennard is going to hurt. I think next year’s growing pains on defense will continue and it will take time before we can hope to have a dominant defense again.

Husker loss leaves questions, not answers

No way to pretty this one up, no matter how hard you try. No. 16 Nebraska had a chance to keep its BCS bowl game hopes alive with a win at No. 20 Michigan in a matchup of 8-2 teams Saturday.


Instead, the Huskers turned in a clunker and lost 45-17 to Michigan in Ann Arbor. When a team loses that badly, no one deserves a free pass. However, it was the Husker special teams that were their ultimate undoing. Nebraska trailed 17-10 at halftime and received the second half kickoff. Kenny Bell, however, fumbled and Michigan recovered at the Husker 33. That turnover was turned into a touchdown. One possession later, Nebraska punt Brett Maher drops the snap on an unforced error. Michigan blocked the punt and recovered a midfield. The Wolverines later converted a fake field goal into a first down and later a touchdown.

Nebraska had closed the gap to 31-17 early in the fourth quarter, got a three and out to force a punt. The Huskers then committed a roughing the punter infraction that Michigan turned into a touchdown.

If you eliminate those special teams gaffes, sure, the Huskers still lose 24-17 but they would have at minimum given themselves a chance to win.

However, special teams were not the only culprit.

Defensively, Nebraska gave up just 3.9 yards per carry but also allowed 414 yards of total offense and 8 of 18 third down conversions. The Wolverines also ran 79 plays to Nebraska’s 53.

On offense, Nebraska committed three turnovers and gained 254 yards of total offense but even that total is inflated because 54 came on one play, a 54-yard touchdown from Taylor Martinez to Brandon Kinnie.

Statistical battles aside, the loss was disturbing for other reasons. Yes, Michigan is a good ballclub but they are not great. Losing to the Wolverines is one thing. Looking like you don’t even belong on the same field is another, especially considering that Nebraska needed to win this game to keep alive to win the Legends Division.

Four years ago, Nebraska fans and media lauded the hiring of Bo Pelini as the choice to replace Bill Callahan. While Pelini is a significant upgrade over Callahan, it’s games like Saturday that leave more questions than answers. How can the team look so dialed in while beating Michigan State and Penn State but look so inexplicably ill-prepared against Wisconsin, Northwestern and Michigan. The blame for that lies squarely at the feet of Pelini and staff.

When units come out flat and unfocused like the Huskers’ special teams did today, one has to question the coaches’ abilities to get players in the right mindset to execute.

Pelini has stated many times after the Cornhuskers lost that the team did not execute. I think the coaching staff is not executing as well. This coaching staff has a hard time getting the team ready for big games. Last year in the revenge game against Texas, Nebraska came out flat. The team came out flat against Washington in the Holiday Bowl last year, and twice this year in games against Northwestern and Michigan. I blame that on the coaches.

Options would be good

I remember reading a story http://nebraska.statepaper.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2011/03/08/4d77073d39a21


several months ago by Sam McKewon (former NebraskaStatePaper reporter who has since joined the Omaha World Herald in covering Nebraska football) about the fundamental difference in the passing philosophy of former offensive coordinator Shawn Watson as opposed to the concepts of since named OC Tim Beck.


For starters, I have great respect for McKewon’s work. He is a former cohort of mine from the mid-1990s at the Daily Nebraskan. I thought he was a bright young man then and think the same of him now. Well, he’s not so young now but you get the point.


One thing that I don’t think the Huskers have ever done (at least in recent memory) is give their wide receivers option routes. If Brandon Kinnie had the ability to break his slant route to a slant and go during the last fourth down of the Big12 title game, it could potentially been an easy first down.


I know the West Coast Offense cynics would say the WCO based on option routes but Nebraska has not run a true version since BC. However, it should also be noted that the last team that ran a pure form of the WCO was Bill Walsh’s San Francisco 49ers.

The biggest problem the last couple of years with Nebraska’s offense was the fact that you had at was the parts of the WCO mashed together with power running schemes, then last year which became largely an offense of “watch Taylor Martinez run the zone read.”


Anyway back to the original point of running patterns that feature option routes? Yes, it requires a savvy quarterback to know what route the wide receiver is going to choose based on the defensive look. The last Husker QBs that ran the WCO were Zac Taylor and Joe Ganz but it never appeared even in those days that wide receivers were ever given that degree of freedom.


In order to execute option routes, the quarterback has to have an understanding of the different route options that his intended receiver has, and also has to have a sense of which one he will take depending on the defense. So if you take that aforementioned fourth down pass in the Big 12 title game as an example, ideally the quarterback would see that Kinnie’s DB is playing tight press coverage to take away the slant or hitch, so he would anticipate that Kinnie would instead break the route into a fly pattern and hit him in stride as he passes the defender. Instead, what happened was Kinnie ran a slant, got jammed, and Martinez threw it towards him anyway even though there was no way in hell the ball was going to be caught.


Most people who gripe about playcalling and the offense late last season don’t realize that Martinez couldn’t operate any sort of offense that required decision making in the passing game. That makes you a one-route offense with no chance for audible. That makes you extremely easy to defend. The ability to spot a rush and flip out a short pass to an outlet receiver was gone. No screens to slow down the rush. No running threat from the quarterback that kept defenses honest earlier in the season.


Hopefully Martinez can develop enough to operate a competent collegiate attack this season. If not, don’t expect too much. Option routes are not exactly brain surgery. High school teams all over the country run spread offenses with option routes.

JUCO transfers are not junko transfers

There are many arguments that will get a Nebraska football fan’s blood going. Too many to list.

One that recently crossed my mind was how Husker fans, well at least as a broad generalization; tend to have an aversion to recruiting JUCO transfers. Cynics will point to the Bill Snyder era (the first one) at Kansas State along with the Bill Callahan era at Nebraska. Under Bo Pelini, the Huskers have scaled back their emphasis on recruiting JUCO transfers.

This blog entry should not be confused with endorsing a recruiting class full of JUCO transfers but in listening to some people you would think JUCO transfers came with a birth defect.

Yes, they do come with a risk. However, it should also be pointed out that Mike Rozier was a JUCO transfer and went on to become a Heisman Trophy winner. Terrell Farley was also a JUCO transfer and was a key member of the 1995 National Championship Husker team. Granted, Nebraska’s defense had other tremendously talented players (i.e. The Peter Bros., Grant Wistrom, Jared Tomich, and Mike Booker to name a few) but Farley generated numerous big plays. Zac Taylor was also a JUCO transfer and one could argue that his play at quarterback kept the Callahan era from being a complete disaster. Taylor was the Big 12 Offensive Player of the Year in 2006.

The 2009 Huskers will have at least two JUCO transfers that will play a role in the team’s success, quarterback Zac Lee and wide receiver Brandon Kinnie. Lee is the starter while Kinnie will likely see time because they are playing positions of need.

In general, I think certain people disdain JUCO transfers (Nebraska fans included) with such an elitist mentality for much the wrong reason because there are more reasons than "just" academics why a kid winds up at a JC.For one thing, as much as we Husker fans love the walk-on program, the bottom line is that kids are not as patient anymore about waiting their turn. Since I cover primarily high school sports, I have seen many kids who were the star on their high school team become hell bent on moving out of their hometown because they want something new. Because they were so much more talented than their high school peers, they didn't really have to work hard for their success. Then, they get to college and realize too late that they have to work much harder for their success. The next thing you know, they're back at their hometown JC but not because they couldn't cut the mustard academically. Plus, we live in an instant gratification world more than ever. The fact is, kids like an Adam Ickes, Todd Peterson or a Ben Eisenhart, who might be willing to forgo scholarships and early playing time elsewhere to wait their turn are fewer and further between than even 15 years ago.I also think that while relying heavily on JUCO transfers can be a risk, they often tend to have a better work ethic than your four and five star recruits from the high school ranks. Why? Nobody handed them anything and they are less likely to take what they have for granted because they have a shorter window of opportunity to prove themselves than a high school kid. Therefore, they push those four and five star recruits in practice to become better ballplayers – similar to the walk-ons. Granted, a JUCO transfer from outside Nebraska might not have Husker football woven into their blood but they tend to have the same work ethic as a walk-on.

To become a great team like what we all hope Nebraska aspires to become again, it's a balancing act. You obviously want five-star recruits but you also need hard-nosed walk-ons and JUCO transfers with talent and intangibles like Taylor.In addition, there are plenty of kids who might have been decent enough students in high school but perhaps lacked a little maturity off the field. For those kids, a JUCO situation is in their best interest. This aspect is also prevalent in non-athletes too. After all, take the kid who graduated from high school with barely enough credits and put him or her next to one who graduated with honors. Often times, they wind up in the same place. The first of which might begin their academic career at a JC and the other at a highly regarded four-year school. The latter of which might be the anointed one but winds out either back at his hometown JC or flunking out of school because he or she partied their life away.

I know I'm rambling like crazy but the same thing can apply in athletics too. Look at former Notre Dame quarterback Ron Pawlus, he was the anointed one out of high school and look what happened. Look at Taylor, he failed at Wake Forest and went to a JUCO before coming to Nebraska. Granted, Taylor has not become the next Joe Montana or John Elway but all I know is this – I want that guy on my team not just for his ability (which I think is pretty good but not great) but for his intangibles. Plus, Pawlus never had a job that ended requiring Sunday work.