Head Coaches. Love 'em and hate 'em.

Breaking news on Masoli's knee. His status is day-to-day.

[If you didn't get it, that's the joke around Eugene, except it's no joke. Chip Kelly has two injury statuses. Either you're "out", or you're "day-to-day". But word is, Masoli is getting as many reps as Nate Costa with the first team. They both are in the mindset of preparing to start; although Masoli apparently looked pretty good for a Monday.

Following is a link to a video from the Oregonian -- Monday's press conference with Coach Chip Kelly. Immediately after Boise State, callers and bloggers were raging about Kelly's inexperience. Today, as evidenced in the video, it's all smiles and laughter. He can do no wrong.

http://blog.oregonlive.com/behindducksbeat/2009/10/coach_chip_kelly_on_the_bye_we.html

Aggressive? Compared to what?

Washington fans, on the other hand, have been very critical of their new coach after that loss to ASU. As a proud, self-respecting Duck, I thought I might as well pile on.
Here's an excerpt from a story about Washington Coach Steve Sarkisian by the Seattle Times' Jerry Brewer . In this, Sark -- as the kids up there like to call him -- is trying to explain some of the poor coaching decisions ultimately leading to their overachieving effort to lose that game at ASU.

"I thought I tried too hard at times," Sarkisian said after three days of reflection. Immediately after the game Saturday, he blamed himself. That's admirable, but a lot of coaches do that. On Monday, he did something rarer.
He explained himself.
Expounding about trying too hard, he first referenced Jake Locker's red-zone interception in the second quarter. Sarkisian was upset with himself for calling another pass play right after Locker had an interception negated because of a penalty.
"We have been very aggressive in the red zone, and we will continue to be," Sarkisian said. "But I felt at that time, when a quarterback throws an interception [which was negated], you can take some of the burden off him and possibly run the ball there and not try to force the issue."


Say what? You've been very aggressive in the red zone? OK. I guess there's one way to check that out. Let's review the stats. First of all I'm assuming a desire, or goal, of being aggressive in the red zone is just that: Goals. You're trying to score touchdowns. Let's look at Washington's red zone-to-touchdown ratio and see how its working out for them compared to a few other teams.

Oregon has been in the red zone 22 times this season and scored 15 touchdowns for a rate of 62%. Is that good? Well USC and ASU are tied with 14 TD's out of 24 red zone trips for 58%. So who leads the league? Ah, you guessed it: OREGON STATE. 17 out of 24 for a whopping 71%.
Where's Washington? A mediocre 12 TD's out of 23 reddies for just 52%.

So what does he mean, "We've been very aggressive . . ." ? I came across a spider on my patio once, all kinds of markings on his body -- looked like gang graffiti. He was bearing these huge fangs at me, raising his front legs as if he was trying to reach up and pull me down nose-to-nose with him. Very aggressive . . . right up til the time I stepped on him.

Washington can be as aggressive as they want. But like ASU, Oregon is going to pounce the moment the Dawgs are stupidly aggressive.

Steve Sarkisian

Can you believe this Sark is only 35 years old? Who in their right mind would hire a man so young with no previous head coaching experience to try to rebuild a Pac-10 football team from it's lowest point in school history? I mean how many years do they think they can stick with this guy and put up with bonehead coaching decisions while he "grows and matures". How long will that take, five, 10, 15 years? Who's going to wait around that long?


No one. That's who. I can't think of any other team that hired someone this young and inexperienced and had any kind of success with it . . .

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Rich Brooks was given his first head coaching assignment at Oregon at age of 36. Sixteen short years later, Ducks carried him off the field as Pac-10 Champions.








Oh ya, that guy. Well, good luck to you Dawgs. Maybe we'll see you back in the Rose Bowl around 2025.] --kb