Week 2 Review - Welcome Back to Earth

Welcome back to earth.  That is about all I can say to the people who spent the last 9 months building this Auburn team up to unattainable heights.  I would like to give a special "shout-out" to the elite few who talked about how our running would be as good as Bama's and how it would be one of the best in nation and how we would not miss Ben Tate.  Welcome back to earth.  It was a hard fall even for me.  The reason I am so disappointed in Auburn's performance Thursday night was because of how poor Mississippi State played on offense.  I was convinced they were better.  Their defense was better but their offense was not.  It looked a lot like every other Mississippi State offense I have seen.  The quarterbacks threw a lot of bad passes and the wide receivers had a lot of drops.  Now Auburn's defense did play much better and actually even challenged a few receivers at the line of scrimmage but the offense they were playing was just not that good.  I will be much more excited if we can put up a couple more of these performances in the next two weeks.

The simple fact is if Auburn does not play much better than that then they are going to have a tough time.  We played good defense but every single team remaining on our schedule outside of Ole Miss, Louisiana Monroe and Chattanooga will have a better offense and better quarterback.  I still believe Dan Mullen is a good coach and he is a "Cam Newton" away from resurrecting State's offense.  It is really that simple.  The recruiting battle for Newton came down to Auburn and Mississippi State.  How much different would things be last night if Cam Newton played for Mississippi State?

THE GOOD
Auburn's defense was good.  Nick Fairley was great.  He did resemble his legendary position coach last night.  Like last week I give props to "The Rock", Tracy Rocker.  His defensive line though it drops off a lot after Fairley is the only unit on the team that has been consistent both weeks.  They get after it all the time.  The rest of the defense was better than last week but Mississippi State still had a lot of open receivers and was an easy catch away from a possible tying field goal.  However I would agree that the defense got the job done.  They will need to keep improving because as I said the road just gets harder from here.

I also have to mention Mike Dyer here.  While he did not put on the performance Marcus Lattimore did for South Carolina he continues to show flashes of being that next great Auburn running back.  With Mario Fannin possibly out due to injury Dyer will be called on to do more.  I also thought that Cam Newton did not play a great game but still made some good plays and needed help from his coach...

THE BAD
Gus Malzahn.  The offense was completely ineffective in the second half.  Going to the swing screen once to often resulted in a "pick six" that was dropped by State.  We also seemed to have problems calling plays, problems calling audibles and seemed unable to handle undisguised blitzes.  It was mess and the worst I have seen a Gus Malzahn offense play.

Another thing to note is that in consecutive weeks, teams are sniffing out some of Malzahn's favorite plays.  Last week, Auburn torched Arkansas State but the one time they tried that reverse to Terrell Zachary that resulted in so many big plays last season it resulted in a huge loss.  Then as I said earlier Malzahn went to the swing screen one too many times.  Those are two pet plays Auburn runs a lot.  I also do not understand why Auburn did not throw any quick slants against those State blitzes.

THE UGLY
Ugly is the streak that Bama is on.  They were not perfect but they were dominant in taking out Penn State.  Now Penn State appeared to be an average Big Ten team at best but they are a legitimate big time out of conference opponent.  Unfortunately it has become obvious that Bama has one of those special groups of kids.  Like Auburn in the 80s when they won three consecutive SEC titles and Florida in the 90s when they won four consecutive SEC title.  It goes beyond the coach no matter how good he is.  It is recruiting mixed with good luck and outstanding chemistry.  They have that oneness that every coach dreams about.  Steve Spurrier did not just stop coaching and recruiting at Florida from 1997 on.  He just had that special group of kids from 1993 through 1996.  I think Bama has been a nick more successful because the SEC has been down the last couple of years except for Florida with their big rivals Auburn and Tennessee both going through tough coaching transitions plus LSU starting to fade as well.

AROUND THE SEC
The biggest win of the weekend was Steve Spurrier finally beating the Dawgs at South Carolina.  I do not think he has beat Georgia at South Carolina yet, if not he has only gotten them once and lost several heart breakers.  South Carolina had to win to have a chance at the East and they did.  Like I said last week this appears to be the strongest team I have seen at South Carolina under Spurrier (and they are due into Auburn next week).  The team as a whole has improved but the they also finally have that dynamic play maker Spurrier has lacked since he has been there in former Auburn commit Marcus Lattimore.  Lattimore was the MVP as he carried South Carolina across the finish line rushing 37 times for 182 yards.  On the other sideline, Georgia played well but made some key mistakes.  It was be interesting to see where Georgia goes from here.

As I stated above, Bama dominated Penn State and in the other big out of conference game Oregon overcame a slow start to crush the Vols in Knoxville.  The honeymoon ended for Derek Dooley in the second half of this game.  I did not see it but I have heard it got very ugly.  It is obvious now that while Phil Fulmer was fading that the hiring of Lane Kiffin was one of the biggest mistakes in Tennessee football history and they are going to pay for it for awhile.  I read that they are now down to 72 scholarship players???  It is going to take some serious rebuilding to get the Vols back to the top.  Everyone else in the SEC held serve over weaker opponents.

This coming week gives us more conference matchups with the Florida going to Knoxville, Arkansas going to Athens, Mississippi State going to Baton Rouge and finally last and least Vandy heads to Oxford for a matchup of the two worst teams in the conference.  There will also still be some good out-of-conference matchups with Clemson and ESPN Gameday coming to the loveliest village on the plains.  Auburn and Clemson is a special matchup with the two schools being so similar and sharing a lot of history.  I cannot wait.  Alabama and their legion of fans will invade Duke's tiny Wallace Wade Stadium.  I hope Duke is ready because they are about to see the following a #1 SEC team.  That campus will be crimson till the game is over.  You would think Duke would coordinate a basketball series with the football series so they could flex their muscles in their sport.  Finally South Carolina and Kentucky take on a couple of cupcakes to get ready for their big week four games. 

Week 1 Review - A Star is Born

Cam Newton.  It is rare that a much hyped athletic star's performance comes even close to the hype.  Well on Saturday night in Auburn it happened.  New Auburn quarterback Cam Newton gave one of the most spectacular individual performances in Auburn history (and that is saying something).  He rushed for 171 yards which is now the top rushing performance ever by an Auburn quarterback and he also added 186 yards passing.  It was amazing to watch.

As always here at STR I use the format of "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly" to review each weeks games.  So lets get to it with the rest of the "The Good" for Auburn...

THE GOOD
Super running back recruit Michael Dyer also impressed with nearly a 100 yards rushing on just 14 carries.  Ontarrio McCalebb also had a strong game.  Most Auburn fans were wondering what was going on as starter Mario Fannin only got 3 carries.  However Fannin was the leading receiver with 65 yards and 2 touchdowns.  He did have a fumble but I thought it was a fluke play.  He got caught in an awkward position.  I still think Fannin is our best and I hope gets some more carries this week.  The offensive line looked strong as there was plenty of room to run and Newton had all day to throw on most of his attempts.  Auburn ended up with 608 yards of total offense for the night and as I predicted in my last post is well on their way to becoming the best offense statistically in Auburn history.

I have already seen Auburn's special teams getting criticized for Demond Washington's fumble in the 3rd quarter.  That was bad but I will still put the special teams in the "Good" section here.  Does anybody remember the complete train wreck Auburn's special teams were last year?  They were the worst in the history of the school in my opinion.  We literally could not catch a punt.  Last night my guy Q Carr from my hometown and current residence of Huntsville, Alabama actually caught every punt to him and made positive yardage.  That is reason enough to give the special teams kudos.  However I also have to give a shout out to my new guy, Craig Sanders.  He is wearing my favorite number, #13, and he was amazing on kick coverage making three solo stops.  You just don't see one guy dominate on kick coverage like that very much.

Finally, before I butcher the defense in the next section I also want to give credit to the "Rock", defensive line coach, Tracy Rocker.  His guys went after it hard all night.

THE BAD
First the little things.  Letting the clock run out at the end of the first half is just inexcusable.  Come on, that could lose an SEC game.  We also had a lot of stupid penalties that need to be fixed.  Finally for the offense why the heck did the coaching staff have Cam Newton out there running the ball with a 20 point lead in the fourth quarter???  I believe this game made it obvious that this team is going to go as far as Newton takes it.  We are going to risk that to get him a few more carries in the first game when it is already decided???  D-U-M-B.

Obviously Auburn's defense has some room for improvement as Arkansas State rolled up 366 total yards.  However after watching how badly coached Miami of Ohio's offense was against Florida I will give some credit to the Arkansas State coaching staff.  Their offense was very well coached.  They did not throw an interception and just played a very smart game.  With that said though the linebacker and secondary play overall was not good.  There were a few big hits and hey I am cheering for Zach Etheridge like everyone else is but you cannot give up 300 yards plus passing to Arkansas State.

Craig Stevens being suspended does not explain it either.  Even with Cam Newton's star performance and the great play by the rest of the offense the game looked a lot like Auburn last year.  The offense would go through periods of being unstoppable and look unbelievable but then they would hit a lull and the other team would make a run and our defense would seem helpless to stop them.  We did not quite see that extreme last night but you saw the outline and a better team would have made a real run.

The way Auburn plays their safeties is hard to watch.  Most of the time they play them so far back that the other team just dinks us to death.  I will never understand that philosophy.  I think you should play the other team tight and make them throw over you and hit that lower percentage long pass.  Yes you will give up some big plays but you will also get some three-and-outs.  Between our current offensive and defensive philosophies I do not think we will ever have enough depth on defense.  Speaking of moving safeties let us go to...

THE UGLY
The ugly has been four years of weak-armed immobile quarterbacks at Auburn (Brandon Cox and Chris Todd).  It has been four years of other teams bringing their safeties up and crowding us, daring us to throw over them and knowing that we could not.  Brandon Cox's deterioration killed our offenses in 2006 and 2007.  Chris Todd's weak arm reared it's ugly head many times over the last two seasons even in our higher rated offense last year.  The vertical passing is absolutely essential to any good team.  It forces a team to keep those safeties back and opens up running lanes and short passes.  We finally have a quarterback who can throw it further than I can and that is good news for Auburn.

Now you also throw in a quarterback that can run and you pose so many other problems for the opposing defense.  Even if Cam Newton was not as spectacular as he was I am still happy.  I told a friend before the season started who was a little worried about Newton that there was no way he could possibly be worse than what we have had over the last four years.  It is just icing on the cake that he looked even better than expected.

AROUND THE SEC
I did not make my traditional trip to watch the season opener in Auburn this year so I was able to watch a lot of football this weekend.  The teams that stuck out to me were South Carolina, Kentucky and Mississippi State.  It seems South Carolina opens every season now but it is usually in an ugly low scoring duel with Mississippi State.  This year they changed it up a bit and opened with another Mississippi school in Southern Miss.  Now Southern Miss is definitely not a world beater but they are a bit stronger than your usual patsy.  I thought South Carolina looked very strong and about the best I have seen them since Spurrier got there.  I thought Garcia was solid and missed a few long passes by just a yard or so.  He should start hitting those passes later in the season.  I thought Marcus Lattimore looked very good.  South Carolina also had several other big fast athletic players on offense that looked pretty good.

Kentucky may have played the toughest game of the weekend and beat Louisville on the road to spoil Charlie Strong's coaching debut.  Kentucky played a very solid game on both sides of the ball and have some big-time play makers in Derrick Locke and Randall Cobb.  Finally Mississippi State just obliterated Memphis.  Now Memphis is a very weak team but you can just see a difference in State.  I think Dan Mullen is the real deal.  I think he really has that "it" you look for in a coach.  I think this weeks game between Auburn and State is going to be a war.  Auburn fans who have counted these three teams as automatic wins this year better think twice in my opinion.

It was a typical LSU and Les Miles game in the headlining match up of the weekend.  LSU looked very talented and highly erratic in their win over a decimated North Carolina team.  Georgia and Tennessee took care of their business in their openers.  It must have been pretty cool as well for Tennessee to stomp a team who looks just like one of your old rivals.  UT-Martin's uniforms are just like Auburn except for the logo on the helmet.  I think Auburn needs a homecoming opponent that looks like Bama...

The bad in the SEC this week was Florida's offense against Miami of Ohio.  I do not think I have ever seen a top five rated SEC team unit look as bad as Florida's offense.  I watched just about this whole game and they were completely inept.  What has Florida been practicing?  It sure does not appear they have been practicing shotgun snaps as they butchered about a dozen of them in the game.  They fumbled the ball, they could not get a consistent push from their offensive line and quarterback John Brantley misfired on just about every throw over five yards.  Take away one long run and Brantley's fourth quarter desperation heave that got batted around and was miraculously caught and Florida's stats are abysmal.

Well there is no doubt what the ugly in the SEC is this week.  Ole Miss and coach Houston Nutt lost to Jacksonville State, a FCS (Division 1-AA) team from here in Alabama.  In a touch of irony Jacksonville State is coached by Jack Crowe (a former Auburn assistant under Pat Dye) who was once fired at Arkansas for losing to a Division 1-AA team (The Citadel).  Ole Miss even had a 31-10 lead at halftime.  They only scored three points in the second half and gave up 24.  What the heck is going on down in Oxford?  This loss coupled with Mississippi State's resurgence has to be a bitter pill for Ole Miss fans to swallow.  It looks to be a long season for Ole Miss BUT there is no doubt in my mind that Houston Nutt will upset somebody in the West.

Things heat up fast next week as Auburn and State kick off SEC play on Thursday night.  I expect this game to be one of the best ones in the history of the entire series.  Georgia and South Carolina meet in a huge game in Columbia.  With Florida suddenly looking vulnerable this game would be a huge boost to one of these teams hopes of winning the SEC East.  There are also a couple of huge out-of-conference tilts with Penn State coming to Bama and Oregon coming to Tennessee. 

Back in the Saddle Again

It is time to kick off another football season of blogging on the Auburn Tigers and the SEC. It has been awhile since I have posted for a variety of reasons. It has been a crazy summer, of course with three kids in the house it is always crazy. I am always trying to get organized but still haven’t quite got there yet. I have found that you have to be organized and plan some time during the week to send out a decent blog post. I did not get there this summer.

I did finish my biggest and best piece to date “Saturdays to Remember… and Forget – The Decade of the Eighties Part 1” but unfortunately I did not get it finished before practice started and now nobody will care since the offseason is over. I think I will keep it saved and work on more parts and look to release it next year.

So there you go… kids, my disorganization and a huge blog post that will not see the light of day anytime soon… that will pretty much sum up the summer of 2010 for me blog-wise.

The next question is how could I have waited this long to post? I mean the season is just about to start! Well that reason is simple when following Auburn, there is not any actual hard facts or observations to comment on. Only the football team and certain other insiders who cannot distribute their thoughts and observations know what is actually going on. All of the beat writers and blogs have no idea what is going on until the coaching staff decides to tell them.

It has just ruined the whole “preseason” for me. Fall practice just does not get me excited at all when the only thing you read about is pure speculation. I think the thing about Auburn that frustrates me the most is that they do not give out stats from scrimmages. At the very least that gives you something to talk about. I mean even the biggest control freak in the league and the guy that started no-access rules, Nick $aban, GIVES OUT STATS FROM SCRIMMAGES. At the very least that is all I ask. It is obviously not asking too much if $aban allows it. However at Auburn we are forced to try and form a picture from hearsay by the players and vague babble from the coaches. It is ludicrous. It just seems like a waste of time to try and make any conclusions based on hearsay and vague comments. There are no witnesses of the events that people are trying to draw conclusions from.  I understand the need to close off a lot of things and I have heard all the good reasons but I still think a little more access could be granted for the fans.

However there are too many Auburn sites and bloggers though to let that stop them and hey I still read some of them too. However I do not get much enjoyment of it. It has pretty much gotten to the point where football season starts on Labor Day. The days of getting excited when practice starts are over for me while the practices are made “top secret”.

With that said, I was at West Point the first week of August and I did get to watch parts of Army’s first two football practice. So at least I got to see somebody practice some football this August…

Back to Auburn, I guess it is time to make some preseason predictions. Another damper for me every year is the nauseating sunshine-pumping from the various Auburn outlets. I understand some of it but it seems to get worse every year. There just does not seem to be much difference between the way Auburn and Bama fans act now. There was a time not so long ago that Auburn fans were much more objective and realistic about their team’s chances and not the complete homers that most Bama fans are. That does not seem true anymore. A spin around the various Auburn sites and you will find that Auburn is absolutely awesome, Gene Chizik is already a certified great coach and everything is great and wonderful. Now for the record things are definitely looking up for this season but I am not quite ready to go as far as most Auburn people.

First, a comment on last year. A prevailing topic since the season ended is how great the team did last year, how much they exceeded expectations, etc… I beg to differ. I would be cast as “negative” but I predicted Auburn would go 6-6 last year and 2-4 in the SEC in the regular season. Auburn ended up going 7-5 last year and 3-5 in the SEC in the regular season. I predicted we would lose to Tennessee but I predicted we would beat Kentucky so those two games were a wash. Basically the only thing last year’s team did that I did not think they would do was beat Ole Miss. Those are the facts.

Now before we crown mean Gene the greatest coach in Auburn history and anoint Gus Malzahn as the greatest offensive coach ever I think we need to actually beat Arkansas, LSU, Georgia or Bama. I think we need to avoid three game losing streaks and three game streaks of blowing 14 point leads.

Finally let us get to the actual predictions. Looking at the schedule my first take is that we will go 1-1 vs. Clemson and South Carolina, 1-1 vs. Arkansas and LSU and 1-1 vs. Georgia and Bama and win the rest. That would put us at 9-3 and maybe headed to the Citrus or Cotton Bowls. I think if this team is a little better we improve by one game to 10-2 and it is definitely possible we could also finish at 8-4. I will go with 9-3 and 5-3 in the SEC as my official prediction.

That is a two game improvement and would include a couple of wins over the four teams that we need to beat. That would definitely be a good season and show a lot of progress. However the goal every year is to win the SEC West and get to Atlanta. I believe this is Auburn’s best chance to do that for awhile. If Auburn does not do it then it is a disappointment to me.

I will say though that Auburn fans need to enjoy this season for all it’s worth. I think it will be the best season Auburn has for awhile. Auburn has TWENTY FOUR seniors leading the team this season. This includes FOUR starters on the offensive line, two of the main defensive tackles (there are only 5 legitimate defensive tackles on the roster), the two starting defensive ends, two starting linebackers, two starting safeties, two starting kickers and the starting tailback. It will take Auburn a season or more to get back to this level due to Tommy Tuberville’s last two horrible recruiting classes. This team has a lot of seniors and a lot of freshmen and not much in between.

I predict that this offense will be the highest rated offense in Auburn history, statistically. So before the sunshine-pumpers lose their minds, I, as a “negative” fan, am predicting this. Now I do not think it will be the actual best offense in Auburn history but it will be very good and like every other “spread” offense it will run up big numbers in the three creampuff out-of-conference games. I have heard the stats from last year’s team ad nauseum. The only stats that count to me are the stats IN-conference. Auburn’s 2009 SEC offensive stats were a bit more representative of how good they were.

I will also predict that Gus Malzahn will leave Auburn after this great offensive season for a head coaching job on the backs of these seniors. This will be his most marketable moment and like I said it will be awhile before Auburn will be this good again. I think that he will especially see the lack of talent he will have to work with on the offensive line next year and beyond. I believe Trooper Taylor will be promoted to offensive coordinator. He could be a great one or not. I do not know however I would not think he would be quite as good running this style of offense as Malzahn and every rookie coordinator has a learning curve.

With all this said I will venture one more prediction that nobody will agree with. I think this will be the best season Gene Chizik will have as head coach at Auburn. I hope I am wrong on this one and the other ones but that is the way I see it.

Let me turn back to the positive though. I will give Gene Chizik and Co. full credit for two things this last offseason. These two things are amazing and hardly ever happen. One, Chizik was able to hold the entire coaching staff together and that is very rare in this modern age of college football. He also brought in a full class of 25 new players in plus 5 other players that count toward last year’s scholarship count. That is simply amazing.

I hope this monster class will be the foundation for another SEC championship for the Auburn Tigers. First however let us see what this team and these seniors can do this season. I may be “negative” at times but I love Auburn football. I am looking out my window on this opening Saturday of the 2010 season and it is absolutely beautiful. I cannot wait to watch my Auburn Tigers get started tonight. War Eagle!

Summer Begins...

Memorial Day.  A serious holiday but it is also the official start to every summer.  For our family it definitely was as we headed to Atlanta this past week and did Six Flags, a Braves game and ended with a little trip to Dave and Busters.  Six Flags was great the day after Memorial Day and not crowded at all.  My son and I did the pictured above Goliath roller coaster three times and hit just about every other coaster in the park.  They even had plenty to keep my younger kids happy.  Unfortunately the younger kids did not do quite as well the rest of the trip but it was still good. 

My son's club soccer team also finished 4th in the state in his age division in the Division II State Cup a few weeks ago as well.  I was really proud of their team.  Between soccer, end-of-school activities and this vacation I have definitely gotten side tracked on my blogging.  I finally got to sit down this morning and catch back up on the various Auburn blogs.  Here are a few takes on current events...

1. The Auburn baseball team.  It has been great seeing the baseball team win the SEC West regular season title, get to the SEC tourney and now hosting a regional.  Hopefully we can take Clemson tonight and move on.  My only bit of advice for Auburn coach John Pawlowski is he should have pitched his best pitcher against Bama in the first round of the SEC tournament.  He should know that if you can beat Bama in any kind of tournament Auburn fans feel like they still got something good out of it even if they did not win it (see the 1999 SEC basketball tournament).

2. The World Cup. Now that ESPN has unleashed it's full marketing strength for the World Cup, it will probably be the most watched one in American history.  Since my son is really into soccer and is really fired up about it I will probably watch more of it than I ever have.  It should be fun and may get some Olympics-type buzz but I don't see anything changing for soccer here in the USA...

3. The Big Cat Weekend and Auburn football recruiting.  I just cannot get too fired up about recruiting this time of the year.  I am glad we are apparently working hard at it since to play at a high level in the SEC you have to but it is a LONG time till Signing Day.

4. General Auburn football impressions.  I have always said that most fans are much happier with their team if they have a good offense.  That is certainly proving true as Auburn bloggers and fans appear to be completely in love with Gus Malzahn and his high octane offense.  There is no doubt that this year's offense will be the best statistically in Auburn history.  It will absolutely run it up several times and put up massive numbers.  As long as that garners around nine wins and a bowl everyone seems happy.   

I am also glad to see us have a very good offense but am not as smitten with Malzahn's defense-killing offense.  I much prefer one along the lines of our 2004 team.  People forget that offense and defense are part of one team and what one unit does effects the other.  I watched our thin defense get put in so many bad spots last year and finish as the worst defense statistically in Auburn history.  Our defense will have a little more depth this year but not much.  I just do not think you can win a championship in the SEC that way.  See Urban Meyer at Florida who did some things similar to Malzahn at Utah but won both his SEC and national championships on defense and changed his offensive philosophy to help his defense. 

5. Celtics vs. Lakers.  I love my Celts and will always remember the beat down we put on the Lakers to win the title in 2008.  However with Bynum and Artest playing this year and the Celts not quite as good as 2008 I just do not see the Celts pulling it off this year.  Man I hate the Lakers...

6. Upcoming here at STR.  I actually had been working behind the scenes at STR on my biggest post to date during the month of April.  I am working on a series looking at some of the Saturdays To Remember in Auburn football since David Housel wrote the original "Saturdays To Remember" book.  I have finished the "Decade of the Eighties Part 1" and will post it soon.  I had a lot of fun writing it and hope people have some fun reading it...

Auburn signs #1 basketball player in state of Alabama

Let me write that one more time...  "Auburn signs the #1 basketball player in state of Alabama".  This week Josh Langford, out Lee High School in Huntsville and ranked the #1 rated player in the state by the Birmingham news committed to Auburn.  Yes he might not be DeMarcus Cousins but it is still a huge signing nonetheless.  As I wrote in the post below, Auburn has been the worst program in the SEC over the last twenty years and has been a complete non-entity in basketball recruiting in the state of Alabama over the past decade.  When you put it in that context I do not think you can understate this signing.  It is just the thing Auburn and coach Barbee needed to really get things started.

Couple this signing with the new Arena and coach Barbee and I have never been this excited about Auburn basketball.  I am definitely a little more excited than most people about this signing because I live in Huntsville and I kept up with the Lee vs. Butler rivalry and their chase for the 5A state title.  Butler in Huntsville had won the last two 5A state titles before Lee and Langford finally broke through this year.  I have met Lee coach Greg Brown and other members of his staff and really thought a lot of them so I was definitely cheering hard for Lee and Langford this year.

As I just posted on another site I think this is Auburn's biggest signing since Doc Robinson but I would compare it more to signing Bryant Smith who was the heart and soul of the 1999 team.  To me Langford is more like Smith (another Huntsville product) except with more upside offensively in my opinion.  I think the signing of Smith was the first step toward the 1999 dream season and I am sure hoping the signing of Langford will be the first step toward another dream season.

I thought Kevin Scarbinsky wrote the best article on the signing.  There are several nuggets of information that can be gleaned from this article.  First, how awesome is it that Barbee was at Lee High School to see Langford the morning after his intro presser???  Finally, FINALLY Auburn hires an up-and-coming basketball coach who appears to be a good recruiter.  Auburn has never been able to maintain any consistency in recruiting with coaches who were older and on the back side of their career in Sonny Smith, Tommy Joe Eagles and Cliff Ellis.  It did not get any better when they hired a younger coach in Lebo whose strengths were not recruiting.  Maybe and hopefully Auburn has finally gotten it right.

The results of Barbee putting Langford at the top of his board and putting in that extra effort? 
"He could’ve gone and recruited anyone else in the state," Langford said. "He came here first. It was a great feeling when he did that. It made me look at Auburn a little bit harder."
How long has it been since we heard any top recruit in this state say that???  I can help you, it sure hasn't happened in the last decade.

Next we get this info from Coach Brown... 
"The Lee coach said Barbee sent a message on his first visit with his actions and his words. "He told me, ‘This kid is a priority. This kid is not getting out of Alabama,' '' Brown said. "Those were his exact words." When’s the last time an Auburn basketball coach said those words, meant them and then backed them up?"
I can answer that for you Kevin, how about never?  Auburn fans have waited and waited for a basketball coach to do this.  Quality basketball players have streamed out of this state for the last decade and most did not even consider Auburn and many said Auburn did not really recruit them.

We know this is true in this case...
""When Coach Lebo was there, he didn’t recruit me that much," Langford said. "When Coach Barbee came in, he looked at me hard."
I will admit I do not know much about big-time basketball recruiting but this is not the first time that a big-time recruit in this state has said that.  I know you have to limit and narrow your scope in recruiting to guys you think you can get but you also have to take a shot at a few of the big boys as well.  It does not appear Jeff Lebo was doing that near enough.  I have always said we have to build our team from our standard recruiting region.  The best example is the 1999 team.  Other than Mamadou, all the starters were from Alabama and Georgia.

Langford even showed us our best pitch to keep some of these guys close to home...
"It’s three hours away. In-state. Family can watch me play. Academics. Everything’s right here in the state in Auburn. So I don’t see a reason to go out."
BINGO!!!  I am sorry but that pitch does not get old and will always be effective when used correctly.  Just about every great player has friend and family that want to watch them play.  From my limited experience in youth sports I can tell you that is a fact.  Even if we cannot wrestle a DeMarcus Cousins away from the big boys we should be able to get our share of the top ten to twenty players in the state every year with that pitch.  I just love it that Barbee came in with the attitude that "this kid is not getting out of Alabama".

To top it off we get the ancillary benefit of a little shot at Bama...
""Alabama? I mean …," Langford said. And then he laughed. "I like Alabama and everything, but they weren’t on me that hard until Barbee came in. It was like Alabama decided to recruit me when Barbee came in, so I said, ‘I’ll just go with Barbee.' ''
To say that Anthony Grant has underwhelmed in his first year as Bama's coach is an understatement.  The guy did not make a big splash in recruiting like Barbee did here and was pretty much a flatliner throughout his first season in Tuscaloosa.  You can almost tell that Grant longs for his old stomping grounds in Gainesville.  Right now it sure appears that Auburn might have made the better hire but time will tell.

Finally, maybe this signing will open the doors in this part of the state for more big players...
"Langford wants to bring others with him, like 6-8 Luke Cothron, a Huntsville native who played last season at a North Carolina prep school. Recruiting insiders say Cothron may be the next Auburn signee.  "I think he’s supposed to be coming," Langford said. Then there’s Langford’s cousin, Devin Langford, a 6-6 junior at Lee, who attended Thursday’s signing.  "He’ll be even bigger" as a recruit, Brown said, adding that all of the coaches who visited recently offered scholarships to both Langfords. And don’t forget 6-1 Butler High School junior Trevor Lacey, who’s expected to be the No. 1 player in the state next year. "I’m gonna try to get Trevor, too," Josh Langford said. "
Again, as an Auburn fan and a resident of Huntsville I would sure love to see this thing snowball and Auburn get a few more of these kids.

Auburn basketball and optimism...  Those are two things that have rarely if ever been linked together.  I think it says a LOT that they are right now.

A-Day 2010 Review

Well first let me give a little blogger's note.  This post officially brings me up-to-date on the blog.  I know that not many people will be interested NOW but I finally finished my basketball posts (a month late) and they are below this post.  I feel bad about that but I do not feel bad about not having any more football posts this spring.  I think I am actually on time for once since A-Day is basically the only thing anyone has actually SEEN this spring.

I used to dread the spring sunshine pumping of the Tuberville era.  The open practices drew a lot of the hard core fans in the area and they usually posted their take in one of the various Auburn forums.  Plenty of them would make it around to me.  After you read one it seemed like Auburn would be better than the Dallas Cowboys.  Those posts used to drive me crazy.  Now I actually miss those posts.  Why?  Because at least it was an opinion based on someone actually SEEING the practice.

We now have the rigid draconian no-access rules (copied from the dictator across the state) that prevents anyone from seeing our top secret practices.  It is pathetic, it is ludicrous, it is sad.  It was never more so than last week for the last big scrimmage.  Auburn had the poor beat writers locked out and was then twittering lame comments to the fan base.  To top it off, the dictator across the state who sets the standard for lack of access allows stats to be compiled and provided to the fan base for most scrimmages but NOT at Auburn.  That is my lowest expectation and Auburn is not even providing that.  Obviously if the $abatron allows it, it cannot hurt.  Come on Auburn, at least give us some stats.

With that said it has been really sad reading all of the spring practice "reports" and especially the "analysis" based on those reports.  It is all hearsay and supposition.  It has been full of "well Coach Chizik is not talking about this guy so he must be doing bad" kind of stuff.  I have quickly lost interest in it.

That brings us to A-Day 2010.  Usually A-Day is not too exciting but again since it is now the only time anyone gets to see the team play it is a little more noteworthy.  It also gets more interesting when the team is replacing their quarterback.  That is definitely the place to start with A-Day 2010.  Here are the stats:

•Barrett Trotter completed 7-of-9 passes for 154 yards, including touchdown passes of 50 and 44 yards.
•Neil Caudle was 17-of-21 for 199 yards and had a 70-yard touchdown pass to receiver Quindarius Carr.
•Cameron Newton was 3-of-8 for 80 yards.
•Clint Moseley was 10-of-12 for 55 yards.

I watched the entire game and from my perspective Barrett Trotter looked the best.  Neil Caudle was right there with him.  However after watching how they handled the playing time it appears that Cam Newton has already won the job.  I had assumed that was already the case but was impressed with Trotter's command and Caudle's release.  Clint Moseley only came in for mop-up duty in the second half so I do not think he is at the level of the others. 

Physically Newton displayed some of his raw ability.  You could see how big he was just standing there.  You could also see his arm strength when he threw a deep pass.  Unfortunately you also saw it on a few short passes when he threw two balls way too high.  What we did not see was his running ability and that is a big part of his game.  Basically you do not bring in a kid of Newton's caliber to sit the bench.  I fully expect him to be the starter next season barring injury.  However A-Day 2010 definitely showed that he still has some things to work on.

You have to feel bad for Neil Caudle and I do.  The guy sure looks like he has some big-time ability but has just never been able to put it together good enough to get the job.  I think he will back up Newton although Barrett Trotter has to be uncomfortably close in his rearview mirror.  Trotter looked poised and aggressive from the start.  He came out firing and delivered.  I think he will back up next year if nothing happens to Newton and start in 2012. 

I also have to tip my hat to Gus Malzahn as each quarterback including Clint Moseley looked well-coached.  They all seemed to understand the offense and got the ball off quickly.  I was also very happy to see that all of them had fairly strong arms.  There were no Brandon Cox or Chris Todd weak arms in the bunch.  Thank goodness...

The running back discussion pretty much starts and ends with Mario Fannin.  He far and away looked like the best running back out there.  The offenses did not run that much anyway.  None of the other running backs did anything impressive that I saw.  The best running play outside of Fannin was Terrell Zachary on a reverse.

The wide receivers looked good as a whole and actually had the best running plays of the day on runs after they caught the ball.  Terrell Zachary took a short pass and took it to the house and Quindarious Carr from my hometown and current residence of Huntsville, Alabama made the play of the day.  Carr took a mid-range pass and put on a Bo Jackson-esque display of speed for a 70-yard touchdown.  Several defenders had great angles on Carr and he outran them.  It was a WOW play and gave Carr a well deserved game MVP award. 

The offensive line appeared to be a wall around the quarterbacks for most of the game so you have to give them a thumbs-up it appeared.  The defense was hard to comment on.  To me, they looked like a sparring partner for the offense.  They were as vanilla as it gets most of the day.  They got a few sacks but only a couple looked like real ones.  They played hard and made a lot of tackles but they also missed quite a few as well.  It was pretty hard for me to get a feel for the defense.

About the only thing that jumped out to me is that I hope Antoine Carter stays healthy.  He could have a big year.  He has had the raw ability his entire career but I sure hope he can put it all together this coming season.  Well that is about it.  As I said earlier, this or any other opinion may be way off but at least we finally got to SEE some of the 2010 Auburn Tigers.

Auburn Basketball Analysis

 

Here are the facts. Since the SEC went to divisions in 1992 Auburn has 180 regular season conference losses. That is only second to South Carolina’s 182 regular season conference losses. I believe that if you consider the fact that South Carolina has had to play Kentucky one more time than Auburn every season in that time that you have to say Auburn is the worst basketball program in the conference since the SEC went to divisions. Kentucky is BY FAR the best team in the conference since the SEC went to divisions. There is no one remotely close to their 234 regular season conference wins. The second best total is 181 wins by Florida. South Carolina has had to play them twice every year as well.

Also when you add to those facts that Auburn has also played in the Beard Eaves Mausoleum that entire time you have to say Auburn is the worst basketball program in the conference up till now. Finally though after 20 years of mostly bad to mediocre basketball Auburn is poised to really do something about it. Auburn basketball will move into the new Auburn Arena along with what appears to be a young charismatic up-and-coming head coach

The last post was about my memories, this post is about my takes on various things regarding Auburn basketball through the years and on current events, let’s get started…

THE BUILDING
Mausoleum:
1 : a usually stone building with places for entombment of the dead above ground
2 : a large gloomy building or room

I believe I can safely say using the paragraphs above as evidence that most of Auburn’s teams have been “the dead above ground” and WOW I think everyone can agree that Beard Eaves was a “large gloomy building”.

As I have stated in detail, I have seen a lot of basketball games in that dump. I also jogged in it, saw concerts in it and graduated in it. I still do not have anything good to say about it. It has always been “The Mausoleum” to me. I could not believe some of the nauseating sentimental takes I read before and after the last game against Miss St this year. I mean give me a break. The women had a few moments in there but trying to talk about all the men’s basketball memories in the mausoleum? I think I covered most of them in my last post . There just are not that many and I do not think anyone has ever walked in that tomb and said “wow what a great place to play basketball”.

A LARGE GLOOMY BUILDING… Good bye and good riddance Beard Eaves Mausoleum. I will not miss you and will feel much better when you are a PARKING LOT.

THE COACHES
Before I start I would like to establish a point of reference. Who is the best basketball coach Auburn has ever had? It is not even close. It is the man whose name is part of the sorry building I talk about above. Joel Eaves. He certainly deserved a better building to put his name on. Coach Eaves did coach in a different era of basketball but it was not like the Auburn job was any easier back then. I grade a coach on their conference record and Eaves’ conference record was spectacular. His teams went 124-75 in conference.  He still holds the record for most wins and most conference wins in Auburn history. He went 213-100 overall. He is the best pure and simple. The only other basketball coach at Auburn to compile a winning conference record has his name on the football stadium…

Sonny Smith

Sonny Smith was obviously a good coach as our greatest NCAA tournament success was under him. However as good as that tournament success was his teams never had really good regular season conference records. In fact Smith finished his career with a losing record in conference. To me as I said above that is the biggest indicator of how good a coach was.  Sonny Smith went 173-154 overall and 84-114 in conference.

Also all of his tournament success was when had Chuck Person on the team. We won the SEC title and advanced to the Sweet Sixteen in 1985 and made it to the Elite Eight in 1986 with Person. Without Person or at least an experienced Person we went out in the first round in 1983 to Richmond in Charles Barkley’s last game. We did not make it past the second round in 1987 or 1988. So you kind of have to give a lot of credit for that tournament success to Chuck Person and that squad of guys.

However you still have to give Smith credit for leading the program to five straight NCAA appearances. Our administration missed one of their best opportunities to help the basketball program after we reached the Elite Eight. I believe starting plans for a new Arena and doing various other little things could have helped the program immeasurably but of course that did not happen.

Smith, like most of our coaches, was an older coach who was on the backside of his career. He was unable to continue the grueling work needed to recruit in basketball at Auburn and the bottom fell out in 1989 with a 2-14 conference record leaving Smith scrambling to Virginia Commonwealth.

Smith’s legacy though is Charles Barkley and Chuck Person and the tournament success Auburn had. It is also about him being a great person overall and his humor and wit. Overall his tenure at Auburn was one of the better runs in Auburn’s less than stellar basketball history.

Tommy Joe Eagles

First and foremost it is still extremely sad that it has been over 15 years since Eagles passed away. I probably know his time at Auburn better than most as I was a student there during that time. Eagles had done a good job at Louisiana Tech. It seemed like a decent hire. His time at Auburn was a lot like Jeff Lebo’s. His teams played very hard but he just could not seem to get any talent especially big men.

Eagles only managed one winning season and a brief NIT appearance at Auburn. There is really not much else to say.

Cliff Ellis

Auburn had the all-time great 1999 season under Cliff Ellis. His part in that must be recognized. However other than that I think he was the most overrated coach in Auburn history. First and foremost he got us on probation twice and that is completely unacceptable to do even once. The four years before 1999 were all losing records in the conference. Ellis always covered that up by scheduling a lot of preseason cupcakes. That is why I judge the success of an Auburn basketball season by the conference record. That tells the truth. It was also why I did not want Ellis to pass Joel Eaves in overall victories because his conference record next to Eaves was not even close.  Ellis went 186-125 overall and 73-87 inconference.

Auburn have everyone coming back but one person in 2000 from the great 1999 team and managed to completely disintegrate and not even win the division after a great start. Things went quickly downhill after that and nothing else good happened other than Ellis recruiting Marquis Daniels and him leading us on that little run his senior year to the Sweet Sixteen. However that Auburn team only had an 8-8 record in conference. Auburn went right back into the tank after that and Jeff Lebo was left with things just as bad as ever.

So all-in-all it appears that 1999 was the exception and not the rule of the Cliff Ellis era. An era produced one great season and three NCAA tournament berths but one that also only had two winning conference records in 10 seasons and two NCAA probations. I guess things ended up on the positive side because we got 1999 out of it but otherwise it was a wash and the program was left in the same shape that it was when Ellis started, if not worse.

Jeff Lebo

I think everyone is in agreement on the Jeff Lebo era. He was a good guy and he got his teams to play hard but he could not recruit many good players especially big men. Lebo got to this past season with nearly nothing to show for two whole recruiting classes. I know all the reasons why it is hard to get good talent to Auburn but you at least have to find a few guys that will stick around.

THE ADMINISTRATION
Here is where the buck stops and the blame ultimately lies. The Auburn administration, leadership and power brokers are to blame for the school having the worst basketball program in the conference since the SEC went to divisions. They absolutely did NOTHING to help the program and did not even do enough to keep the program at a mediocre level. It is just shameful and actually pretty stupid to treat your second biggest revenue producer like this even at a football school.

I think the people who are now giving our AD and administration kudos for the new arena are naïve and wrong. Anyone who thinks this AD and this administration built this new arena for the good of the basketball program is blind. It is obvious that it was going to cost more long term to fix up and maintain Beard Eaves than build the new arena. It is as simple as that. It was a simple financial decision. I mean it would have been for the good of the basketball program if it would have been done about a decade earlier. Instead they waited till Beard Eaves was literally falling down.

There are also numerous other things that could have been done to help the basketball program but they were not done. It was just left out to rot and that is just what it has done till now.

THE FUTURE
Regardless of the reasons now, there is the new Auburn Arena and what appears to be a pretty good coaching hire. Maybe just maybe Auburn basketball can start a new legacy next season. I sure hope so. I also hope the Auburn administration and leadership will now make changes as well and at least give the basketball program decent support from here on out.

Auburn will never be a top basketball school but there is no reason it has to be the worst program in the conference. That is completely unacceptable. I look forward to next season and am actually excited about all aspects of an Auburn basketball team and program for like the first time… ever?