Why so Civil?

[ I've been scanning the blogs for Oregon and Oregon State on this, the run-up to the War for the Roses -- one of the most significant Civil Wars in its 113 year history.   What am I seeing? Lots of razzing and ribbing? Low blows? Cheap shots? Rabid rivalry rhetoric? 

Not hardly.

I checked the Beavers' 'dam' site and was stunned to find an intelligent forum made up of several Ducks and Beavers having a friendly, respectful, intellectual discussion about the strengths and weaknesses of the Ducks and how the Beavers plan to attack them.

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WHAT A BUNCH OF CRAP!!!

Where are the jokes?
How do you get a Beaver off your porch? Pay for the pizza.

Where are the pics?

This is how we've been fighting the Civil War for 113 years.

Now look at what's happened.

Take a look at what I'm reading. After Oregon's win over Arizona, the Beavs started a thread on their blog called "Hate Week". Got it? 

"HATE WEEK". (Click link for full thread.)

That seems pretty self-explanatory. Sets the table nicely, I think.
So read these "hateful" tirades. The first one starts it off from the Beaver Host:
(Beaver posts in orange. Ducks in yellow. Props to the two main posters, VD Special of Building the Dam and dvieira of Addicted to Quack)
. . . .and I think our coaching staff needs to break this game film down and do EXACTLY what Arizona did. Contain Masoli, force him to make decisions, few blitzes, play good pass defense.
And he's backed up by a couple of his goons:
Crash the defensive ends and hit Masoli on every.single.play.
ABSOLUTELY
He showed good touch sometimes. But usually his balls were wobbly and he made bad decisions.
Whoa! Pretty mean words making fun of a man's wobbly balls.  But stupid words as well when we can argue that without Malosi's decisions, the Ducks lose that game. Never fear though. Here comes a Duck to put these clowns in their place.
I know Masoli gets some crap about being a questionable passer but you really don’t want to do this given your secondary. If anyone gets past the first level, it’s a broken tackle to the house. Also, even though we prefer to run, Arizona was giving us the pass all day and we made plays, especially Maehl. Masoli’s completing almost 60% of his passes. You don’t want to isolate in the box or we’ll throw WR screens and TE curls to the sideline all day.
OH SNAP! Did I just hear a Beaver butt bone breaking? That was a vicious kick. Do the Beavs have anything in the tank after that smackdown?
Well there’s no question that your offense is dynamic. Stats don’t lie. But given the options of forcing Masoli to throw and forcing him to run, I say contain him and force to throw. Obviously its a pick-your-poison sort of deal, but I don’t think anyone could argue with saying that Masoli is a better runner than he is a thrower.
Did you catch that? Beaver bastard used the 'D' word.  Thinks he's smarter than any Duck 'cause he can slip in a little 'dynamic' bomb and get away with it.

I HATE the word 'dynamic' -- especially after I read through 10 pages of want ads and see post after post saying: "Looking for dynamic individual to fill dynamic position for dynamic company." What the hell are they talking about? 'Dynamic' is full of hidden meaning. What they're really saying is "Our company and job suck in their own special way, and we're hoping you can suck with us."

It's overused to the point of having no real definition. You ask 100 people what the word dynamic means and 60 of them will offer different meanings. Forty will have the same answer: "I don't know."

And now this rodent licker dares to call the Ducks' offense 'dynamic'.
Give it to him Duck fan . . . . .
I don’t know. To me, it’s a simple matter of playing to your strengths. Your corners haven’t had the best year and putting them on an island against a spread is tough call. Yeah, Masoli may not be able to make all of the passes, but the ones he does are always going to be high risk for you. By taking your best players and crowding the box, you have to pray that the ball is thrown badly, gets tipped or your corner makes an amazing tackle.
Obviously you follow the Beavs more than Oregon so I may be stepping a bit over the line here, [OUCH. Below the belt with some condescending patronization.]  but it seems to me that the strength of Oregon State is their Linebackers and D-Line. Let those guys make plays and use their superior ability to help out on the passing game so you don’t get burned on the edge. What Arizona did effectively was put a spy (sometimes 2) on Masoli and keyed the rest of their front on LMJ. The problem is that Masoli made great plays on the rollout. Yeah, he got stopped a few times for loss more than he normally would, but the edges were open most of the time and even when they weren’t, our receivers made plays.

[(Sigh) OK this is what I'm talking about. These guys are just having a nice, respectful, and even informative conversation about how the Beavs solve the problem of Masoli. The Beav respectfully brought Masoli up. And the Duck is trying to help him out.

Last chance. Hey Beav, the Duck did condescend you in suggesting he knew more about your own team than you. Cmon. Give him a shot. Something about his mother. Anything. LET'S GET THIS PARTY STARTED!!!!

You're not stepping over the line. You're absolutely correct
Our strength at D this year is in the front 7. And our DBs haven’t the best year. But let’s face it, neither have your receivers. Outside of Maehl, nobody has really stepped up (not to say that there isn’t talent there, they just haven’t lived up to it). I’ve seen about 5 games this year, and all I remember seeing is dropped ball after dropped ball, and Masoli making some throws that his arm strength probably doesn’t allow. He gets away with it because often times the receivers are matched up one on one, so there isn’t much need to “thread the needle.” My point is, we want to make sure we stop the run first and force Masoli to pass. That’s our best option.
Snnnnorrrrrrrrre . . . Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.....
What is this world coming to? The biggest Civil War ever is going to be the friendliest? What's with all this . . . . this maturity and niceness. Can't we all just stop getting along?

What's next, peace in the Middle East?  This has a stench of Socialism. Somehow Obama has got to be behind this.

I've got these new neighbors on our block. Beaver fans. They are the cutest young couple -- just starting out their married lives. They got their little Beaver banners and they go to all the Beaver home games on Saturday and to church on Sunday. Nice. Friendly.

And I'll tell you, after reading this stuff it almost -- ALMOST, I said -- makes me not want to TP their house and yard with green and yellow streamers after the Ducks crush their hopes and dreams Thursday night.

Oh I'm still going to do it. It's my duty as a Duck. But I'll probably refrain from the classic crap-in-a-burning-bag-and-ring-the-doorbell maneuver. Like I said, they're new neighbors. I'll save that for next year.

But fine. If the new Civil War is to civilly discuss technical strategy here, then Beavers, if you really want to crowd the line and force Masoli to throw, GO FOR IT.

Some of his or James' best runs came when all the D were against the line,  the O-line opened one hole --just one, and the ball carrier hit it perfect. And remember, you still have to know who is carrying the ball.

Take a look at this pic of the Arizona defense you speak so highly of. This was a TD. Arizona had everyone in the box. They knew it was going to be a run. Look at the AZ defender on the left. He's flying in to tackle the Duck whom he believes is the ball carrier, only to feel a little silly two seconds later.

You want Masoli to pass?  To hammer the above Duck blogger's point a little harder, I give you the names Ed Dickson, Jeff Maehl, Jamere Holland, Lavasier Tuinei, Garrett Embry, NIck Cole, Rory Cavaille, D.J. Davis, Tyrece Gaines, David Paulson -- all of these guys plus a few others have been on the receiving end of Duck passes. And they agree with you. They would love for Masoli to pass more. YOUR STRATEGY is to hope they drop too many passes.

Stopping Masoli's running and forcing him to throw is kind of like breaking Darth Vader's light sabre and forcing him to only throw heavy objects in the room at you with his mind.

But we're all friends here. So I really mean it when I say:
Good luck with that.