With all due respect to Biscuit, I feel an intense need to take the meme he’s helping progress through our world with the post below and smash it into a billion pieces. If it were a living, breathing thing, this meme, I’d take it out back and shoot it. Many times. There’s nothing “magical” about what’s happened to this squad in 2 losses to start the 2011 season; Not even dark magic. And, obviously, fans tend to default to explanations involving insulted totems, disastisfied deities, or moping muses when surprisingly disappointing results are derived from the efforts of their favorite teams because in a way, it pacifies the fans. But the problem with allowing the fanbase to believe in perversely amused imps actually interfering with the success of the Irish is that the meme eventually (and fairly quickly) leaks out beyond the borders of a fan-nation, and before you know it the entire world actually believes your favorite team really is “doomed,” whether you really believed it or were just joking all along. But mysticism and luck have absolutely nothing to do with either the 17 penalties or 10 heart-breaking turn-overs. Instead, all of these miscues stem from very fundamental, very correctable mistakes.

The first massive blunder was made due to a mistake coaches preach against from pee-wee leagues on up. And before I discuss it further, I want to delve into a bit of totally un-qualified pop-psychology for a moment. Quite a few of the mistakes that have lead to turnovers for the Irish are mistakes that indicate to this frustrated fan of the Four Horsemen that the team doesn’t really know how to deal with success. And no, I’m not talking about some fragile team group-psyche that causes sheer panic every time something good happens. I’m talking about the simple mistake of letting a little bit of hubris get the best of you at the worst possible time: when you’re really starting to cruise. It’s a bit like when golfers start to rush through putts in a good round, or teens getting into fender benders just a mile from home because they really think they’ve got a handle on things and know the way they’re going. So few on this Irish squad have experienced real, lasting success. So who could blame them for thinking the good times are really starting to roll when in reality, things have just barely nudged in a positive direction?

And that’s it. That’s my pop-psyche thinking summed up. Apologies to the fully trained and qualified among you who now have a deeper understanding of my total lack of qualifications to try and understand the human brain.

Ahem…

Exhibit 1: The Jonas Gray fumble.

The Irish have just started the 2011 season by taking the ball at their 20 and driving right down USF’s throat to the 1 yard line. It was about a 4 minute drive for 79 yards, and it was about as methodical and dominating as we’ve seen the Irish in years. Largely on the back of starting RB Cierre Wood, the Irish are poised on 3rd and Goal from the 1 to score the first touchdown of the season and really kick off the 2011 Irish campaign for BCS consideration. However Cierre got knocked around a bit on the previous play, so in comes backup Jonas Gray, and sure enough, looking to establish an attitude and a theme for 2011, Kelly and Co. call Gray’s number.







But the problem, as you can see above, is that the USF defense makes a few better individual efforts in the trenches on 3rd down, and the ND “jumbo package” fails to appropriately block the play. The even bigger problem, of course, is that Jonas is running a power-running play within the trenches of the offensive and defensive fronts, and he’s only got one hand on the ball. So even though he makes a best effort to wrap the ball up with both arms once contact is made, it’s too late. The defender has and arm making good contact with the ball and the leverage to rip the ball out of Jonas’ hands. Completely basic stuff – stuff both Jonas and the USF defender have been coached on for years, but the USF defender was applying what he’s been coached to do for years while Gray was playing fast and loose.

Exhibit 2: The Crist Interception

Sure, the Bulls are up 13-0 on the Irish, but there’s still more than 12 minutes to play in the 2nd quarter, and the Irish are starting to get on a real tear, looking to cap off a 10 play, nearly 4 minute drive with a TD from the USF 7. Now, I could be wrong, but Crist sure looks to me like he not only made a poor throw to Riddick on this play, but he also failed to really attack the designed target of the left flank. To me, it appears that the Irish coaching staff had set up a read where Crist could see if Floyd got doubled up in the end zone, and if he did, check down to a wide open receiver beneath Floyd’s route, otherwise, throw it up and let Floyd do what he does best.







Note the 2 Irish receivers in the background of that pic. Floyd, next to the 2 USF DBs who chose to double him, and Wood (I believe) near where his route ended, underneath all the action around Floyd. Wood sure looks all alone there. And based on Kelly’s reaction after this play, I’m guessing Crist didn’t do much at all like Kelly had drawn up.



Exhibit 3: The Riddick Fumbled Punt Return

This one, I think, had less to do with hubris and a lot to do with lack of comfort. Right before the punt went off, NBC caught a glimpse of Riddick shrugging his shoulders at the sideline, as if he didn’t even know or understand what return had been called. Add to that the very noticeable body-language while the ball is in flight, Riddick clearly looks uncomfortable in trying to field the ball, and then this:







Yeah. You can’t catch a punt from your knees. I mean, you could, but if you are trying to do so, it’s because you miss-judged the flight of the ball. And as we all saw in the Michigan game, Riddick has since been alleviated of the opportunity to miss-judge punts.

Exhibit 4: The first Rees Interception

3rd quarter, down by 16 freakish points, and really starting to move the offense with new QB Tommy Rees. Here come the Irish now! Boink!







Oops. Caught not looking. I’m not entirely sure of what happened here, as clearly the play is designed to cross up and tangle the defenders with either Floyd or TJ Jones, springing one or the other free. But weirdly I think TJ felt “confident” that he was just a decoy on this play, and he’d better just try and not get his head knocked off crossing the middle like that. Rees, and Kelly, felt different. Rees expected his receiver, after breaking into his route, to be both looking and prepared to catch the ball. Kelly expected Jones to play football the same way he’s probably been coached to run that route for 10 years.

Exhibit 5: The 2nd Rees Interception (and this one’s on him).

This one probably has a lot less to do with hubris getting in the way of fundamentals and more to do with Rees pushing too hard to get the ball to his best play-maker to make a play in a dire situation. The Irish are down 10 with about 4 minutes to go in the game, and are facing a 2nd and 6 from deep in their own territory. The Irish need to cover ground and score and they need to do it now. So Tommy tries to make something happen in a way he shouldn’t have tried.







He throws back into the teeth of the defense, across his body. He had to leave his feet to do it because at the same time he’d been rolling to his right to avoid a collapsing pocket. Even your mother knows not to throw a ball across your body back into the teeth of the defense. Sure, here he was making a fairly shallow throw back across his body, but it was still breaking a fundamental rule of the passing game, one your mother remembers your pee wee coach yelling at you for breaking lo those many decades ago.

Okay, so we’re done with 5 of the 10 turnovers the Irish have commited in the first 2 games of the season. Everyone having a good time? Yeah? Good! Let’s move on!

For the Michigan game, one thing I think I really prove in the next 4 exhibits is that the video player for ESPN/ABC over the internet really sucks compared to the NBC player. Way to go, broadcasting partner! But I digress…

Exhibit 6: Rees’ First Interception

Rees has certainly displayed one thing in the 1.5 games he’s played this season: pre-snap, he sees it all. He’s doing an excellent job of checking into run plays as needed, and he has a keen eye for finding a mismatch. And I think Tommy knows that. Because I think Rees spotted a 1-on-1 opportunity with Floyd pre-snap of this play, and locked right down on it.







Of course in doing that, he left himself open to the crazy-Ivan pulled by Michigan’s safety, which left Eiffert open in “OMFG I’m Open” land, but Rees entirely failed to see it. In fact, this play, Rees’ previous INT above, and the next Rees interception serve as plenty of evidence to me that Kelly’s probably gonna re-think calling bootleg passes to the right for young Tommy anytime soon. Sometimes there’s a clear coaching opportunity in a mistake, and here, the coaching opportunity is to get to not call this sort of play anymore. Rees doesn’t seem to see things real well while moving to his right. PS – Expect a lot of back-side pressure D from Sparta this weekend.

Exhibit 7: Rees’ 2nd Interception (yeah, not on him, but on him)

Coach Kelly has already expressed that the real reason this play blew up is because a receiver (presumably not Rees’ target, Floyd) mistook the play for another and ran an improper route. And when you watch it in action knowing this detail, it’s pretty obvious that Kelly probably didn’t draw up a play that attempted to bunch 15 Michigan defenders within arm’s reach of the primary passing target. Still, again, Rees is moving to his right, on a play that would be the unfortunate end to a nearly 60 yard, 9 play drive that moments before looked like it could put the game nearly out of reach for the ineffectual Wolverines. And Tommy tries to zip one into this morass.







Again, Tommy’s moving right, and the guy who picks him off is moving against the grain of the direction of the pass. He’s missing something visually on these throws. (And so are you. Sorry for the lousy image quality. Suck it, ESPN/ABC.)

Exhibit 8 Cierre’s Fumble

It’s funny, because Cierre’s fumble in a lot of ways mirrors Gray’s fumble from the week before. Both came in a series after the previous ball carrier had ripped off a significantly large chunk of yardage. And both came as the result of a failure to follow fundamental ball-securing techniques.







What you can’t see there (again, thanks ESPN!) is that Cierre is doing 2 really baffling things: 1) he’s holding the ball with 1 hand while among a jumble of massive offensive linemen and 2) he actually jumped up in the air just before fumbling the ball. Yeah! He left his feet! From behind the line of scrimmage! On 1st and 10 at the Michigan 30! Yeah! I have no idea why he did that either! But I’ll bet the coaches will talk to him about it.

Exhibit 9: The Worst Fumble EVAR







It’s actually funny, because until I watched a replay of the game, I’d remembered this as a much quicker attempt at a pass. I forgot that Tommy actually takes a drop on this play and then throws it, so the cause of the fumble is even more mysterious than simply “bad QB/Center exchange resulted in poor handling of a pass.” That might still be the case, but given he had a drop, he probably had a chance to adjust the ball in his hand. It didn’t look like he was struggling to rotate it to get it in good position. And so I’m left with just one possible explanation here that doesn’t involve magic: Physics. Yep, he failed to have the appropriate traction on the ball while moving his arm in the direction of the intended target, and so the ball continued in its original path in the opposite direction of the throw.

Bummer.

Well, that’s it. I hope you enjoyed this little excursion down memory lane as much as I did…

What?

What’s that?

Oh, you want me to talk about the 10th turnover? The one everyone’s forgotten about? Nah. It was on the final kickoff of the Michigan game, and the ball was mishandled while the Irish were desperate to find some magical way to score on the return with just 2 seconds left. But as we’ve already demonstrated 9 different times, magic’s got nothing to do with football.

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