By Kevin Lonnquist
Publisher
Welcome to another edition of Single-Digit Flashback. Playing off Baylor’s new and popular tradition of awarding numbers 0-9 to those deserving players who have become leaders on the team, I’m coming up with the 10 takeaways from the Bears’ previously played game that could be either good or not so much.
There also could be something related to recruiting or something else to either share.
With Baylor coming off a bye week and hopes of playing homecoming this coming Saturday against No. 7 Oklahoma State, it’s time to lend some perspective.
>When WWHT went on hiatus so did the RJB. But the RJB realized it was time to return given the huge music industry loss last week.
When Eddie Van Halen lost his cancer fight – mixed together with a pretty hard self-destructive lifestyle – at age 65 it was the 1980s generation kids moment that marked the time. For those older or younger, you knew who he was but were possibly indifferent and not as attached as we were.
Yet Van Halen was the driving force to a band that became one of the iconic groups in Rock and Roll history. Born in The Netherlands, he and his family moved to the United States at age 7. He immersed himself in music and as a teen-ager, he and his brother Alex formed the band mixed with rival members of the opposing high school. The front man was the ever wild David Lee Roth.
Van Halen has been recognized as one of the most talented guitarists ever. Wherever there is a list for those, Eddie is somewhere in the Top 10. He also branched out doing the famous solo for Michael Jackson’s “Beat it”.
For pop culture’s sake, Van Halen’s 1984 album was their most successful. Many like the RJB consider “Jump” to be the signature song of the 1980s. That doesn’t mean it was the group’s best.
To bid farewell to one the most talented who came through this era, the RJB makes two selections. With apologies to a few wearing the cloth, sometimes you just have to make a hard choice because of the title because the sound was the essence of who he was.
UPDATE 7:10 PM: I'm told there is a team meeting on Sunday evening. Obviously, this is going to be about the status of playing Saturday's game against OSU. Usually, when there is a team meeting, that's not good. Also, hearing there were more positive cases when tests were conducted and results came back on Sunday. The last time Baylor had one of these was right before the La Tech game got canceled. We'll let you know what we hear.
>0. So we know Baylor didn’t practice on Saturday and as of this writing, Sunday’s practice was a bit up in the air (UPDATE: Bears were not expected to practice Sunday and the next practice is pretty much considered TBD). Not practicing or being limited in practice isn’t a tell-tale sign of whether this Homecoming matchup with Oklahoma State is going to happen.
But I would think that if something isn’t more definite about Baylor’s side by Monday, the school is likely going to have to postpone this game until Dec. 12. Remember, Baylor’s next bye on Nov. 21 doesn’t match up with Oklahoma State as the Cowboys are playing at Oklahoma.
As I referenced earlier in the week, the biggest challenge is that the coaching staff got hit with positive COVID-19 tests. I’ve seen talk where it was all of the coaches. I’ve seen talk where there were six coaches. I’ve seen talk where there were as many as eight.
At this point, it really doesn’t matter. If you take the six at face value as the truth, that’s more than half of you staff. You have 10 full-time assistants. And yes, the support staff is numerous. But then the continuity is disrupted and the communication is different and the message could be a bit off line.
Couple the positives along with the contact tracing and this becomes a lot of hurdles for Baylor to clear just to try and play this. I’m not saying they can’t do it. But that’s why the program shut everything down on Thursday to try and get out in front of this as best as it could. The last time this team practiced was Wednesday.
All I can tell you is to keep your fingers crossed but know the obstacles that it faces.
>1. If you remember when we were talking about the poor tackling in the game because of how practices were limited in the amount of contact that would be allowed, you’re seeing it week in and week out this year. You’re also seeing it in all levels of the game – high school, college and pro.
Angles are poor, alignments are off, fundamentals are suffering. There are examples where the defense is good. Baylor has been solid. Georgia looks good. Clemson appears fine. But I think it depends on how each coach approached it in fall camp.
Alabama has talent. We know that. But when Ole Miss is scorching it for 600+ yards and 48 points, that’s really weird. When defending national champ LSU can’t stop anyone, that’s really weird. When a celebrated DC in Florida’s Todd Grantham is watching the Gators get gouged, that’s really weird.
It can improve over the course of the season where coaches have to make adjustments to what they have to do and still be mindful of protocols. It’s a challenge beyond any others faced. But I think this is the season we’re going to have. Offense’s will flourish. The lack of spring really hurt defenses. Maybe the overall takeaway is just be thankful that everybody is doing whatever is necessary to get this season played.
>2. Texas and Oklahoma, the two flagship programs in the Big 12 played one of the most exciting but also one of the worst games of the day on Saturday.
Both of those schools reminded us why the Big 12 will not have a candidate for the college football playoff. The number of mistakes each team made and just the mediocre style of play had to make your stomach turn.
TCU head coach Gary Patterson complained last week on the Big 12 Coaches Call that he felt the conference was getting slighted because the downfall of those two schools hurts the reputation of the conference. Well, that’s fine that he’s taking up for his own.
But let me ask the masses the following: If Alabama and Georgia were average, what would the SEC’s reputation be? If Ohio State and Penn State were average, what would the Big Ten’s reputation be? If Clemson was average, what would the ACC’s reputation be? Why does the PAC 12 have a bad reputation? Well, USC isn’t very good. And Washington has fallen off.
The reality is in the game is that your blue bloods are called blue bloods for a reason. They set the standard by which all are measured. And when your team gets ready to play them, the pomp and circumstance leading up to it is far different than when you’re playing South Carolina or Texas Tech or UCLA.
The game is better when the blue bloods are really good.
>3. I kind of roll my eyes when TV or radio guys or even college coaches talk about how they had to simplify things on defense and offense in order to help their teams play better. And then that’s why that team turned around and played better. It's become a throwaway line that no one understands.
But let's try it. Did that mean the coaches gave them too much information to begin with? What that could mean – and I know there are coaches on here who read this – is that maybe some plays were altered so there weren’t as many moving parts and defensive schemes were adjusted.
Maybe I’m too jaded but my version of simplification is that the game comes down to a QB reading his progressions and making the throw with the desired matchup, the offensive line executing its blocks and the running back seeing the hole and hitting. It also comes down to the defense reading the keys on the coverage and filling gaps when there is one.
Be that as it may, if there’s one player where it needs to be simplified, it’s QB Charlie Brewer. He needs to relax and be himself and play the game the way he knows how to.
>4. I’ve tried to watch as much college football as I can, so I’ll admit I’m not 100 on this. But when I watched TCU play Kansas State Saturday in its ridiculous uniforms, I thought, “You know, we haven’t seen the bizarre alternative uniform combinations too much this season.’’
It appears the traditional looks are back? Iowa State went all black for Oklahoma last week in Ames but from what I have seen, I think a lot of schools are saying – and it could be a budgetary thing this year with COVID-19 that they don’t have the money to pay for them right now – this fad may have seen its end.
Watching Texas-OU, Arkansas-Auburn, Alabama-Ole Miss, Tennessee-Georgia, UNC-Virginia Tech and Miami-Clemson in their classic looks was pretty nice.
Now, those rules may not apply to Oregon when it returns next month or to Minnesota which returns in two weeks. But for now, the college game at least is better on the eyes.
>5. Speaking of this weekend, I saw three players who were either ticketed or leaning toward coming to Baylor this year who went elsewhere: Ole Miss tight end Kenny Yeboah, Auburn right guard Brandon Council and Miami defensive end Quincy Roche.
To be succinct these three could have been huge for this roster. I saw Yeboah, a Temple grad transfer, for the first time Saturday against Alabama. Great athlete. Great weapon at tight end because he can run. Beyond his 68-yard TD reception where the Tide blew a coverage as the safety was late and then tried for the pick, Yeboah showed his value when he climbed the ladder on Ole Miss’ first TD, a 6-yard grab. He could have been a game changer. Remember, he tweeted in late December he was coming to Baylor. Then Matt Rhule left and Yeboah went to Oxford.
Council, the grad transfer from Akron, has been an immediate help for the Tigers starting in the first three games. He was all but coming to Waco until Auburn made the late run and poof, he was gone. Then there’s Roche, the grad transfer from Temple. Baylor was in the race for him. The staff felt like it had a pretty good chance. But he was another loss when Rhule left. He’s started all four games for the Hurricanes.
What might have been.
>6. When watching the Alabama-Ole Miss game with the great duo of Sean McDonough and Todd Blackledge, they told the story that when Lane Kiffin came to Ole Miss from Florida Atlantic, he was looking for an offensive coordinator. Kiffin then talked with Kendall Briles, who was leaving Florida State for Arkansas to join Sam Pittman, and took Briles word to look at his brother in-law Jeff Lebby who was at Central Florida.
The hire has been great so far. Kiffin and Lebby have an offense that has scored 35 against Florida, 42 at Kentucky and 48 against Alabama and averaging 573 yards per game. Kiffin went on to say he inherited some pretty good talent when he arrived in Oxford.
Regardless of how it burned to the ground with Lebby and Briles, they are finding their own path. Also, Briles had done a pretty job with new QB Felipe Franks with the Razorbacks.
>7. LSU will always have talent. It just will. But the start its off to for 2020 – 1-2 for the first time since 1994 – has been a product of horrendous defense. There’s a chicken and egg theory of did the loss of DC Dave Aranda to Baylor really hurt that much or was it the fact that LSU lost so many players to the draft that it was bound to have this kind of season?
Obviously, the standards are really high in Baton Rouge. Aranda wasn’t the highest paid coordinator in college football because LSU felt like it. The program valued his knowledge and approach to the game.
There’s always an adjustment period programs have to make to new coaches. Food for thought.
>8. Usually another sign of an explosive passing attack is what your receivers are averaging per catch. The line of explosiveness is about 14. Baylor’s top receivers in Tyquan Thornton, Josh Fleeks and RJ Sneed are averaging 9.0, 9.0 and 11.2 yards per catch. That’s not stretching the defense. There have been the concerns that Aranda alluded to about not getting separation.
The answer could be route running, the playbook or just being more physical. But those numbers have to come up with those three in a big way. Consider Fleeks’ 34-yard game-tying TD at West Virginia RAISED that average.
>9. So you know I’m a fan of Geico commercials, but this one from Progressive is pretty good. How many times have we sworn that we would never turn into our parents and we do? We have met the enemy and it is us.
****
Now, some note from other sports from Baylor…
> No. 2 Baylor volleyball (5-1) took care of Oklahoma (0-4) Friday night at the Ferrell Center, sweeping the Sooners 25-16, 25-14, 25-16.
BU took advantage of OU’s miscues throughout the match and held the Sooners to just a .030 attack percentage on the night. Senior Yossiana Pressley led all players with 18 kills and junior Shanel Bramschreiber totaled a career-high 20 digs for the Bears.
Baylor (5-1) hits the road for two matches at Texas Tech (3-3) on Oct. 16 and 17 in Lubbock. Both contests are set to begin at 6 p.m. CT and will be shown on Big 12 Now on ESPN+.
> Coming into Friday night’s contest, No. 5 Kansas had not allowed a goal all season. That changed 20 minutes into the match when freshman Mackenzie Anthony intercepted a pass from outside the box and finished to the far post to give the Bears (1-1-3) an early lead that they would not relinquish as Baylor topped the Jayhawks, 2-0 under the lights at Betty Lou Mays Field.
> Baylor women’s golf took home its second-consecutive team title, and Gurleen Kaur won her second-straight individual championship on Sunday afternoon at the Betsy Rawls Longhorn Invitational. The Bears carded 14-under 274 in Sunday’s final round to finish at 22-under 842, while Kaur shot 6-under 66 to finish at 13-under 203.
Baylor (-22) claimed an 11-shot victory atop the eight-team field at University of Texas Golf Club, its second consecutive tournament win by 42 combined strokes. BU finished in front of tournament-host Texas (-11), Oklahoma (-8), Iowa State (+9), TCU (+13), North Texas (+15), Texas Tech (+23) and Kansas (+27).
Let’s make it a great week!
Publisher
Welcome to another edition of Single-Digit Flashback. Playing off Baylor’s new and popular tradition of awarding numbers 0-9 to those deserving players who have become leaders on the team, I’m coming up with the 10 takeaways from the Bears’ previously played game that could be either good or not so much.
There also could be something related to recruiting or something else to either share.
With Baylor coming off a bye week and hopes of playing homecoming this coming Saturday against No. 7 Oklahoma State, it’s time to lend some perspective.
>When WWHT went on hiatus so did the RJB. But the RJB realized it was time to return given the huge music industry loss last week.
When Eddie Van Halen lost his cancer fight – mixed together with a pretty hard self-destructive lifestyle – at age 65 it was the 1980s generation kids moment that marked the time. For those older or younger, you knew who he was but were possibly indifferent and not as attached as we were.
Yet Van Halen was the driving force to a band that became one of the iconic groups in Rock and Roll history. Born in The Netherlands, he and his family moved to the United States at age 7. He immersed himself in music and as a teen-ager, he and his brother Alex formed the band mixed with rival members of the opposing high school. The front man was the ever wild David Lee Roth.
Van Halen has been recognized as one of the most talented guitarists ever. Wherever there is a list for those, Eddie is somewhere in the Top 10. He also branched out doing the famous solo for Michael Jackson’s “Beat it”.
For pop culture’s sake, Van Halen’s 1984 album was their most successful. Many like the RJB consider “Jump” to be the signature song of the 1980s. That doesn’t mean it was the group’s best.
To bid farewell to one the most talented who came through this era, the RJB makes two selections. With apologies to a few wearing the cloth, sometimes you just have to make a hard choice because of the title because the sound was the essence of who he was.
UPDATE 7:10 PM: I'm told there is a team meeting on Sunday evening. Obviously, this is going to be about the status of playing Saturday's game against OSU. Usually, when there is a team meeting, that's not good. Also, hearing there were more positive cases when tests were conducted and results came back on Sunday. The last time Baylor had one of these was right before the La Tech game got canceled. We'll let you know what we hear.
>0. So we know Baylor didn’t practice on Saturday and as of this writing, Sunday’s practice was a bit up in the air (UPDATE: Bears were not expected to practice Sunday and the next practice is pretty much considered TBD). Not practicing or being limited in practice isn’t a tell-tale sign of whether this Homecoming matchup with Oklahoma State is going to happen.
But I would think that if something isn’t more definite about Baylor’s side by Monday, the school is likely going to have to postpone this game until Dec. 12. Remember, Baylor’s next bye on Nov. 21 doesn’t match up with Oklahoma State as the Cowboys are playing at Oklahoma.
As I referenced earlier in the week, the biggest challenge is that the coaching staff got hit with positive COVID-19 tests. I’ve seen talk where it was all of the coaches. I’ve seen talk where there were six coaches. I’ve seen talk where there were as many as eight.
At this point, it really doesn’t matter. If you take the six at face value as the truth, that’s more than half of you staff. You have 10 full-time assistants. And yes, the support staff is numerous. But then the continuity is disrupted and the communication is different and the message could be a bit off line.
Couple the positives along with the contact tracing and this becomes a lot of hurdles for Baylor to clear just to try and play this. I’m not saying they can’t do it. But that’s why the program shut everything down on Thursday to try and get out in front of this as best as it could. The last time this team practiced was Wednesday.
All I can tell you is to keep your fingers crossed but know the obstacles that it faces.
>1. If you remember when we were talking about the poor tackling in the game because of how practices were limited in the amount of contact that would be allowed, you’re seeing it week in and week out this year. You’re also seeing it in all levels of the game – high school, college and pro.
Angles are poor, alignments are off, fundamentals are suffering. There are examples where the defense is good. Baylor has been solid. Georgia looks good. Clemson appears fine. But I think it depends on how each coach approached it in fall camp.
Alabama has talent. We know that. But when Ole Miss is scorching it for 600+ yards and 48 points, that’s really weird. When defending national champ LSU can’t stop anyone, that’s really weird. When a celebrated DC in Florida’s Todd Grantham is watching the Gators get gouged, that’s really weird.
It can improve over the course of the season where coaches have to make adjustments to what they have to do and still be mindful of protocols. It’s a challenge beyond any others faced. But I think this is the season we’re going to have. Offense’s will flourish. The lack of spring really hurt defenses. Maybe the overall takeaway is just be thankful that everybody is doing whatever is necessary to get this season played.
>2. Texas and Oklahoma, the two flagship programs in the Big 12 played one of the most exciting but also one of the worst games of the day on Saturday.
Both of those schools reminded us why the Big 12 will not have a candidate for the college football playoff. The number of mistakes each team made and just the mediocre style of play had to make your stomach turn.
TCU head coach Gary Patterson complained last week on the Big 12 Coaches Call that he felt the conference was getting slighted because the downfall of those two schools hurts the reputation of the conference. Well, that’s fine that he’s taking up for his own.
But let me ask the masses the following: If Alabama and Georgia were average, what would the SEC’s reputation be? If Ohio State and Penn State were average, what would the Big Ten’s reputation be? If Clemson was average, what would the ACC’s reputation be? Why does the PAC 12 have a bad reputation? Well, USC isn’t very good. And Washington has fallen off.
The reality is in the game is that your blue bloods are called blue bloods for a reason. They set the standard by which all are measured. And when your team gets ready to play them, the pomp and circumstance leading up to it is far different than when you’re playing South Carolina or Texas Tech or UCLA.
The game is better when the blue bloods are really good.
>3. I kind of roll my eyes when TV or radio guys or even college coaches talk about how they had to simplify things on defense and offense in order to help their teams play better. And then that’s why that team turned around and played better. It's become a throwaway line that no one understands.
But let's try it. Did that mean the coaches gave them too much information to begin with? What that could mean – and I know there are coaches on here who read this – is that maybe some plays were altered so there weren’t as many moving parts and defensive schemes were adjusted.
Maybe I’m too jaded but my version of simplification is that the game comes down to a QB reading his progressions and making the throw with the desired matchup, the offensive line executing its blocks and the running back seeing the hole and hitting. It also comes down to the defense reading the keys on the coverage and filling gaps when there is one.
Be that as it may, if there’s one player where it needs to be simplified, it’s QB Charlie Brewer. He needs to relax and be himself and play the game the way he knows how to.
>4. I’ve tried to watch as much college football as I can, so I’ll admit I’m not 100 on this. But when I watched TCU play Kansas State Saturday in its ridiculous uniforms, I thought, “You know, we haven’t seen the bizarre alternative uniform combinations too much this season.’’
It appears the traditional looks are back? Iowa State went all black for Oklahoma last week in Ames but from what I have seen, I think a lot of schools are saying – and it could be a budgetary thing this year with COVID-19 that they don’t have the money to pay for them right now – this fad may have seen its end.
Watching Texas-OU, Arkansas-Auburn, Alabama-Ole Miss, Tennessee-Georgia, UNC-Virginia Tech and Miami-Clemson in their classic looks was pretty nice.
Now, those rules may not apply to Oregon when it returns next month or to Minnesota which returns in two weeks. But for now, the college game at least is better on the eyes.
>5. Speaking of this weekend, I saw three players who were either ticketed or leaning toward coming to Baylor this year who went elsewhere: Ole Miss tight end Kenny Yeboah, Auburn right guard Brandon Council and Miami defensive end Quincy Roche.
To be succinct these three could have been huge for this roster. I saw Yeboah, a Temple grad transfer, for the first time Saturday against Alabama. Great athlete. Great weapon at tight end because he can run. Beyond his 68-yard TD reception where the Tide blew a coverage as the safety was late and then tried for the pick, Yeboah showed his value when he climbed the ladder on Ole Miss’ first TD, a 6-yard grab. He could have been a game changer. Remember, he tweeted in late December he was coming to Baylor. Then Matt Rhule left and Yeboah went to Oxford.
Council, the grad transfer from Akron, has been an immediate help for the Tigers starting in the first three games. He was all but coming to Waco until Auburn made the late run and poof, he was gone. Then there’s Roche, the grad transfer from Temple. Baylor was in the race for him. The staff felt like it had a pretty good chance. But he was another loss when Rhule left. He’s started all four games for the Hurricanes.
What might have been.
>6. When watching the Alabama-Ole Miss game with the great duo of Sean McDonough and Todd Blackledge, they told the story that when Lane Kiffin came to Ole Miss from Florida Atlantic, he was looking for an offensive coordinator. Kiffin then talked with Kendall Briles, who was leaving Florida State for Arkansas to join Sam Pittman, and took Briles word to look at his brother in-law Jeff Lebby who was at Central Florida.
The hire has been great so far. Kiffin and Lebby have an offense that has scored 35 against Florida, 42 at Kentucky and 48 against Alabama and averaging 573 yards per game. Kiffin went on to say he inherited some pretty good talent when he arrived in Oxford.
Regardless of how it burned to the ground with Lebby and Briles, they are finding their own path. Also, Briles had done a pretty job with new QB Felipe Franks with the Razorbacks.
>7. LSU will always have talent. It just will. But the start its off to for 2020 – 1-2 for the first time since 1994 – has been a product of horrendous defense. There’s a chicken and egg theory of did the loss of DC Dave Aranda to Baylor really hurt that much or was it the fact that LSU lost so many players to the draft that it was bound to have this kind of season?
Obviously, the standards are really high in Baton Rouge. Aranda wasn’t the highest paid coordinator in college football because LSU felt like it. The program valued his knowledge and approach to the game.
There’s always an adjustment period programs have to make to new coaches. Food for thought.
>8. Usually another sign of an explosive passing attack is what your receivers are averaging per catch. The line of explosiveness is about 14. Baylor’s top receivers in Tyquan Thornton, Josh Fleeks and RJ Sneed are averaging 9.0, 9.0 and 11.2 yards per catch. That’s not stretching the defense. There have been the concerns that Aranda alluded to about not getting separation.
The answer could be route running, the playbook or just being more physical. But those numbers have to come up with those three in a big way. Consider Fleeks’ 34-yard game-tying TD at West Virginia RAISED that average.
>9. So you know I’m a fan of Geico commercials, but this one from Progressive is pretty good. How many times have we sworn that we would never turn into our parents and we do? We have met the enemy and it is us.
****
Now, some note from other sports from Baylor…
> No. 2 Baylor volleyball (5-1) took care of Oklahoma (0-4) Friday night at the Ferrell Center, sweeping the Sooners 25-16, 25-14, 25-16.
BU took advantage of OU’s miscues throughout the match and held the Sooners to just a .030 attack percentage on the night. Senior Yossiana Pressley led all players with 18 kills and junior Shanel Bramschreiber totaled a career-high 20 digs for the Bears.
Baylor (5-1) hits the road for two matches at Texas Tech (3-3) on Oct. 16 and 17 in Lubbock. Both contests are set to begin at 6 p.m. CT and will be shown on Big 12 Now on ESPN+.
> Coming into Friday night’s contest, No. 5 Kansas had not allowed a goal all season. That changed 20 minutes into the match when freshman Mackenzie Anthony intercepted a pass from outside the box and finished to the far post to give the Bears (1-1-3) an early lead that they would not relinquish as Baylor topped the Jayhawks, 2-0 under the lights at Betty Lou Mays Field.
> Baylor women’s golf took home its second-consecutive team title, and Gurleen Kaur won her second-straight individual championship on Sunday afternoon at the Betsy Rawls Longhorn Invitational. The Bears carded 14-under 274 in Sunday’s final round to finish at 22-under 842, while Kaur shot 6-under 66 to finish at 13-under 203.
Baylor (-22) claimed an 11-shot victory atop the eight-team field at University of Texas Golf Club, its second consecutive tournament win by 42 combined strokes. BU finished in front of tournament-host Texas (-11), Oklahoma (-8), Iowa State (+9), TCU (+13), North Texas (+15), Texas Tech (+23) and Kansas (+27).
Let’s make it a great week!
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