September 27, 2018
DENHAM SPRINGS vs BELAIRE…,. Denham Springs HS travels to Live Oak HS Friday night, September 28. You can catch all of the action on Family Radio, 91.9 FM and on the net at JonFineProductions.com. Airtime is 6pm with Sport N Center Jackets Warm-Up, with Josh Ward, Andy Duckworth and yours truly, Jon Fine.
Brusly HS vs West Feliciana HS
Brusly hosts West Feliciana HS on Friday night and you can tune in on KBRS, 106.9 or on the net at Jon FineProductions.com… Lionel Franklin will be calling play-by-play, with Jason Manola on color commentary. Airtime 6:30pm
SULPHUR HS at Lafayette HS… Sulphur is at Lafayette tomorrow night
Listen to Bruce Merchant on play by play, with Patrick Frey on color commentary on SportsRadio, 1310AM—KEZM—Lake Charles and on the internet at KEZMonline.coM.
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BATON ROUGE AREA BROADCASTING SCHEDULE:
FRIDAY, 9/28, 6pm… Denham Springs HS Football at Live Oak HS… Family Radio, 91.9 FM and on the net at JonFineProductions.com…
Josh Ward, Andy Duckworth, Jon Fine
FRIDAY, 9/28, 6:30PM… Brusly HS vs West Feliciana HS… KBRS,106.9 FM…
Jon Fine Productions.com
Lionel Franklin and Jason Manola
SPORTSRADIO-1310-KEZM-LAKE CHARLES (AND KEZMONLINE. COM) BROADCASTS
Friday, 9/28, 6:45pm… Sulphur HS at Lafayette HS, Bruce Merchant, Patrick Frey
Monday—Friday, 10am—Noon… Pigskin Preview… Patrick Frey and Scott Holtzman
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THE WIZARDRY OF OS
Assistant Basketball Coach and Head Swimming Coach at Central High
For the first few weeks of the football season, I have been very focused on the local teams. This week let’s take a step back before taking a quick look at the Tigers and Saints.
Once again, Alabama has begun the year with extremely impressive wins over bad teams. Louisville, Ole Miss, and Arkansas State are not good. We don’t know about Texas A&M yet since their street cred was based off losing a close game at home to Clemson.
Alabama’s game against A&M was the first time I have watched Bama for more than a series. I know current conventional wisdom is that Alabama is one of the greatest teams of all time and will beat everyone by 3 touchdowns or more this year. I disagree. Alabama is a great football team. But the rest is out of control.
While their strengths are different than the recent stereotypical Alabama teams, they aren’t better than teams they have had in past years as some are speculating.
It starts with Tua. He is still a young quarterback and may develop, but how is what he is doing any different than other spread quarterbacks? The RPOs are leading to extremely easy passes being thrown into huge windows, and the receivers are doing the rest. He is not making NFL throws into tight windows. Maybe he will in the future, but he isn’t right now. To his credit, he is executing the offense beautifully, but like a college quarterback, not a pro.
Usually Bama has one great receiver, 2-3 excellent running backs, and a great offensive line. This year, the receivers and tight end are great. The rest of the offensive positions are good. I think that has people overreacting. The key to slowing Alabama down will be to limit the explosive plays. Certainly easier said than done. Defensively, Alabama is very good, but this is not one of their all-time great defenses of recent history.
Bare in mind, that I am not predicting LSU is going to beat Alabama. Bama has only 3 games on their schedule that could be competitive on paper and two are at home. The Tide will be double digit favorites in every game and at this point I would take the Tide in each game. Nevertheless, teams that make the College Football Playoff will be capable of beating Alabama.
The top teams for the playoff are obvious. Georgia is very good, but they have only two challenging games on their entire schedule, at LSU and Auburn at home. Ohio State is great, but have not played a quality schedule. Clemson is in the same boat and has the greatest room for growth of these teams. Those four teams are head and shoulders above the rest and unfortunately none of them have challenging schedules.
Where does LSU fit with these teams? Kind of like Auburn last year, LSU has many more weaknesses and is clearly not as good. But, LSU also has a great opportunity to improve over the course of the season to make me look bad right now.
At this point, the defense hasn’t been as dominant as I hoped. They have yet to put a full game together. No, the SLU game doesn’t count. The defensive line misses Chaisson and the defensive backfield is a work in progress. I thought the second group of defensive lineman would make more of an impact.
The offense is showing indications that the defense doesn’t have to be utterly dominant to win games. That is a strong statement, especially considering the status of the offensive line. When camp started in August, the starters were supposed to be Charles, Brumfield, Cushenberry/Lewis, Ingram, and Magee. Against Ole Miss, the likely starters will be Deculus, Hines, Cushenberry, Lewis, and Traore. The coaches deserve credit for handling this situation.
As for the NFL, who can figure out what is happening? The Patriots and Vikings got stomped by teams that were generally agreed to be bad. Are the Chiefs and Rams going to waltz into the Super Bowl? There is a long way to go in the NFL season before these questions can be answered.
Unfortunately, I am pretty sure though the 2018 Saints are going to be a replay of the 2014 Saints. That is a sad statement considering I wrote before the season that this team would not duplicate the 2014 team.
The defense is giving up explosive plays, huge windows for quarterbacks to carve up the secondary, poor safety play, no room for error for offense, and one forced TO in 3 games. Oh, and penalties upon penalties. The Saints pulled off a miraculous win against an injury plagued Atlanta and needed a fluke blocked punt. Every game so far has been a 50/50 game, and the wins have required the benefit of good fortune.
Shockingly, it all comes down to the secondary which is one position on the team that we all were pretty sure was going to be a strength. Lattimore was supposed to be All-Pro, Williams was supposed to make everyone forget about the end of last season, Crawley just needed to be solid, and Robinson was the answer in the slot. In actuality, Lattimore has been average, Williams and Crawley look lost, and Robinson is on injured reserve with a broken ankle.
The pull your hair out in frustration part of the situation is that the Saints drafted two defensive backs this year. Many observers had positive impressions of those players. Arthur Maulet made plays in the preseason. Now all three of those players are on other rosters, and the Saints are looking all over for someone to offer some resistance at corner.
If the coaching staff can pull a 180 at this position the Saints can have the season we all hoped. If not, the Saints are looking at 7-9 or 8-8 and another wasted season with Drew Brees because the defense was unable to perform at a competent level.
HEY REF
I was visiting with a local football coach when out of nowhere he asked me “What’s the question of the week”? I was kinda taken aback simply because I didn’t understand his question as it relates to what we’d just been talking about. So, I thought for a quick second, acting like I didn’t hear him and requested he repeat the question. He was quick to say “What’ll be important enough for you to write about it in your Hey Ref column”? At that time, to tell the truth I really didn’t have an answer because I hadn’t even given it a thought.
So he asked if I’d at least include something about how playoff teams are chosen besides on their won-lost ledger. To tell the truth (which is the only way I play it here) I was a bit confused as to why he’d ask me that. Even after a minute or two to digest the question I kinda still didn’t have any answers for him. I still don’t but I did ask him what’s behind that type of question/request. He simply stated he’d like to see the LHSAA find a way to scale back the emphasis on the points scored by a team in their wins.
He said the point differential system isn’t a fair way to evaluate and/or reward teams. He went on to say that some coaches pile it (points) on weaker teams in the hopes of gaining a playoff spot since there are always those teams on the “bubble” when the selections are made. I agreed with him without hesitation since I’ve worked games where one team just refused to let up and “call the dogs off”.
You don’t work games for as long as I have without being involved in games that need to be over much faster than a normal type of game. The game I referred to as a prime example of what we were talking about had one school up 59 – 0. As is the customary way to try and end a game a little quicker since it’s out of reach we were very slow in stopping the clock and quick to start it.
At the end of quarter number three I saw what I thought was a classy act as the school with all the points did a wholesale emptying of its bench. Kids that wouldn’t normally get to play were now on the field getting some snaps. When the opposing coach saw all the clean uniforms on the field he too emptied his bench. So I was feeling good to see both teams giving subs a shot at getting a little varsity action.
But that feeling didn’t last very long as the game clock ticked under the four minute mark. Team “A” was being shutout, the victory was sealed, many kids got some game time under their belts but the fairytale ending wasn’t to be. After a first down was made there was a fumble and all hopes of getting that goose egg off the scoreboard were dashed. Still we weren’t expecting what happened next; the only team that scored that night rushed in all their starters.
This game was played a long time before the installation of the 25 second clock. In those days the Back Judge was responsible for the 25 seconds and would raise a hand with just 10 seconds left. To a man, we as a crew didn’t want to line up for another kickoff. Maybe it was my imagination but it seemed like we played the last minute without any timing between downs. As soon as it looked like the team with 59 points was about to snap the ball there would be a flag for delay.
The game clock showed about 15 seconds to go and for sure we’d have the QB just downing the ball to end the game. Well, as it turned out there was a snap and a score which now read 65 – 0. We were all upset to see the clock at zero. I don’t think we allowed a PAT but I remember the feeling as we ran off the field that night. None of us had ever worked together as a crew before that night but that night we were a united crew.
Even though we’d done an excellent job for 47 minutes and 59 seconds it was that final tick that’s stuck in my mind. We weren’t a crew that called each week together but we were the strongest crew I’d ever worked in before that game. After we saw the first string back in the huddle trying for one last score we became a crew that didn’t want to see another six points. To this day I can’t remember anything that happened before the final few seconds ran off the clock but what did happen on that last snap has become engraved in my memory as the lowest possible thing any coach on any level can do.
So, coach, this one’s for you and to all the other coaches out there that know the meaning of sportsmanship. And maybe somebody from the LHSAA might see and understand why they should eliminate the point spread from consideration in placing teams in the playoff brackets.
Till next week…
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