I'd put Jacksin and Hansen as the sloggers now, Jackson maybe the 15-20 carries guy, especially on a single drive. He seems to do well with some time to get rhythm.
Jackson is slippery and Hansen a bull downhill.
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Is this years' team better than we thought?
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I'd put Jacksin and Hansen as the sloggers now, Jackson maybe the 15-20 carries guy, especially on a single drive. He seems to do well with some time to get rhythm.
Jackson is slippery and Hansen a bull downhill.
Houston will give one more measurement of how good this team is. Fritz is a very good coach who will has his guys amped to take down a ranked team. If we win handily there, that boosts my confidence a notch, but does not cause me to go full koolaid!
If we have Sama, Jackson and Hansen sharing the load and our run game is effective I think that is a win. So much easier to absorb one of your backs missing time because he is dinged up when you have other backs getting just as many carries and also being effective. Would also like to see a misdirection with the tailback and give it to Klotz on occasion. An occasional fullback carry forces defenses to play honest at the line of scrimmage.
If you’re comparing or thinking he’s Breece 2.0 then you’re going to be disappointed. Breece was an all time back and is probably the 2nd best running back in the world right now behind Christian McCaffrey.
It is insane to compare Abu to Breece.
Minny/Fleck haven't had a really big win since 2019 when they beat #4 Penn State. Other than that all of their ranked wins are against fringe top 25 teams minus beating #14 Wisconsin back in 21. Kirk's resume isn't much better...
You built a strawman of ISU fans who said this schedule was tough. Most fans acknowledged that the schedule was easy. It was more difficult than some of the other contenders in the Big 12, but you aren't breaking any news saying it wasn't a tough schedule.
...what happens in the Big 12 Championship?
And then after that?
You had me riveted, don't stop the story there!
Which is why I explicitly said he wasn't going to be that. I'm not sure, though, where this idea that Breece was some sort of yard grinding power back came from because that was never what made him great. He had adequate strength and ability when needed but that's not what he was...ever. He operated with very much the same style as Sama in that they want to elude and get to space. There's a reason the Jets went out and got Braelon Allen who is truly and one-cut downhill runner. The attributes of Breece and Sama are very much similar in that they are elusive and have home run capability with elite hands out of the backfield. That isn't to mean those attributes are equal in quality. That's to say they want to do the same things. Also, Breece operated with one of the best QBs in the NFL right now which is a distinct advantage, especially compared to what Sama was doing last year. The idea that he's somehow on the cusp of being replaced after 1 game against Iowa and 12 carries against poor teams is just ridiculous.
I think people forget Breece got alot of the same criticism that Sama is getting now. There were alot of times where you just wanted him to hit the hole and grind out that 3-4 gain where he danced around instead. But on the plays where you got him in open space, he was unstoppable. Agreed Sama isn't near the same level as Breece right now, but their styles are similar. You take the good with the bad and know you are never far from something explosive.
Breece has the power when he needs it but his real danger is the open field. He's smart enough to know he doesn't need to damage his body with a high hit count. He runs through arm tackles all the time though.
I think under the hood the numbers are a lot more positive for the offensive line.
Game On Paper has a lot of great stats, but they have a couple of run game stats that I think are useful for OL play evaluation. They have "Stuff Rate," which is percentage of runs for zero or fewer yards, and "Offensive Line Yards," which uses a formula that basically gives the offensive line varying levels of credit for various lengths of runs. For example, the OL is given no extra credit once a running back gets beyond 10 yards, because it's assumed that OL helped get them to 10 yards, but probably didn't do much to turn it from a 10 yard run into a 50 yard run. It's not a perfect formula, but it's useful.
So far this season, Iowa State's run game has been stuffed in 11.6% of carries, vs. last season's first three games at 24% (and 25% for all of 2023). For offensive line yards, Iowa State is at 2 OL yards per carry this season, vs. 1.4 for last season's first three games (1.51 for all of 2023).
In terms of percentiles, the offensive stuff rate is in the 78th percentile so far this year vs. 1st percentile for all of last season, while offensive line yards are in the 74th percentile vs. 6th percentile for all of last season.
It seems like there's progress with the offensive line. It's just been that the running backs haven't really been able to turn the 2-4 yard runs into 7-15 yard runs much this season. Though they did a better job with that against Arkansas State.
Due to me having no clue what the playoff picture would look like, I will refrain from giving my predictions.
I'm not sure why everyone's so worried about WV either. They've not been impressive at all so far. Their QB is tiny (not typical P4 size) which makes finding throwing lanes really difficult. They look average at best to me in all phases.
After watching KState a couple of times so far, I agree with you on them too. I'm confident we'll beat them. Their D is really suspect IMO. And BYU really exposed that.
Not to worry, some fans will want Lee to start by mid-season.
And they might be right, I don't know. Lee has great potential.
Due to me having no clue what the playoff picture would look like, I will refrain from giving my predictions.
Big 12 championship = **** yeah!
No playoff prediction =
It's a huge game to be sure, but we could lose that one and then win out. Each team is built a little different, and you just never know.
