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Post by aztech on Nov 2, 2024 11:56:00 GMT -8
We're not bashing for the sake of bashing. We see what we see. Lewis simply wasn't a good hire. How is it some other MW programs made excellent hires this off season and SDSU's was rather tepid Jeff Choate and Bronco were excellent hires. Those programs are already showing improvement. 3-4 is a mirage of FCS level wins. Outside of the QB, this team performs like the last two squads have. Penalties, mistakes, and mental errors. The only difference is the Coaching Staff. Personally, Wickers two FB hires were mediocre at best. Perhaps AdlT should have used a hiring or consulting firm for the this Coach. JD got a Trumpian bargain when he bought into the flash and glitz of AztecFast UNM's wins are against New Mexico St, AFA and USU. They lost at home to Montana St. Not sure what it is to brag about UNR. They did beat Oregon St at home but their only other victories are against Troy and Eastern Washington and they haven't won a MWC game. They do play AFA at home in a couple of weeks so they are unlikely to go winless in the MWC. We had 5 penalties yesterday. The game was lost on the LOS where we were outmatched. We need to bring in better talent and more depth on both lines. I would say that JD's hire of Hoke was a bad hire but he may have just been looking for a short term guy to have the job until we got into the PAC. Hoke lacked energy and really appeared to have retired on the job. The book is out on Lewis and I am willing to give him at least two full recruiting classes before making a decision on whether or not he is right for the job. He wasn't hired until the end of November and the only member of the previous staff to stay on was Lindley. Wicker lucked out when he promoted Dutch who had a shaky start, but stuck with him. So Lews' team better show some promise next year or we're screwed. Wicker overpaid him just like he did with Hoke. It'll be a dope move if we have to buy him out from the funds MLS will be paying us for playing in the Snap Dragon. Pretty sure that money needs to be used for other purposes. |
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Post by sdsu2000 on Nov 2, 2024 12:11:42 GMT -8
I’m ready for Lewis to get fired. I really liked what he was doing before the season started. He seemed like he was doing a great job recruiting. But it’s become apparent his play calling and choice for who gets play time is not at the level which it needs to be. It’s like when Hecklinski became OC. A couple games in and it was obvious it wasn’t going g to work out. At this point we are just hoping Lewis can figure things out but that normally leads to failure.
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Post by jp92grad on Nov 2, 2024 12:11:51 GMT -8
This whole thing of comparing coaches from yesteryear to todays coaches and games is hard to do. There are all kinds of different issues that are in completely different areas now.
-Recruiting system
-NIL
-Transfer Portal
-Social Media
-Declining Participation
-Injury concerns
-Funding discrepancies within the Division and Conferences
Does this make one easier or harder, that is the question.
The game is evolving in soo many different directions now in that coaches are now seeing everything running at hyper speed and coaching is soo much more then just the X's and O's
Do todays coaches do things better or worse, hard to say it's just DIFFERENT
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Post by aztecmusician on Nov 2, 2024 18:28:46 GMT -8
Sean Lewis should have at least 3 seasons before his coaching seat begins to warm. Is he the second coming of Don Coryell? No. I’m convinced however, he has a system which is capable of producing winning seasons.
In his first season (with the possible exception of Boise St.) his teams have played hard and a bowl game is still possible. This team was poised for the coup de grasse vs Wash St. (a late int derailed that)
Every true Aztec fan should support our team and its first year head coach 100%!
Failure to do so could mean another painful slide into mediocrity.
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Post by LostAztec on Nov 2, 2024 18:33:44 GMT -8
Failure to do so could mean another painful slide into mediocrity. We have been mediocre and bordering on pedestrian for three seasons now. How long should the fanbase be patient ? |
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Post by aztecdan8 on Nov 3, 2024 9:40:48 GMT -8
I do remember when Pat Hill was hired at Fresno. His first year was terrible. I remember when we played them I thought wow he is a terrible coach. But in the years after he proved to be pretty darn good. So it is really hard to judge the first year of a coach. If he comes to a team that has pretty good talent he can do ok his first year. If he comes to a team with little talent it may take a couple of years to build it up. Remember Lewis is coming into a team that was 4-8 last year. And now with the portal it is even harder. I remember in 2002 when Cal hired a coach named Jeff Tedford to replace Tom Holmoe who went 1-10 in 2001. Tedford's first team went 7-5 on 02, 8-6 in 03, 10-2 in 04. He had several more great seasons in ensuing seasons. As someone who followed Cal closely during the Tedford years - season tickets close - he would faceplant late in his tenure as he changed the type of athlete he recruited ... the 4 and 5 stars that passed on SC, UCLA, UW. But he was instantly successful and brought back and lit up a checked out, apathetic Cal fanbase in year 1. Fast forward 20+ years ... I remember UNLV hired this new coach Barry Odom in 23 and he went 9-5 and is currently 6-2 in year 2 after UNLV football went 5-7, 2-10, 0-6 the 3 previous seasons. 🤔 There are scores of similar examples all over the country just over the past 10-15 years. Look at SMU these days. Look at Boise with almost every new coaching hire. When you hire the right coach, you usually know it right away, or at least pretty early. You at least know he MIGHT be the guy because you start seeing clear signs of inprovement in some aspects, as opposed to seeing no improvement in ANY area/phase of the game. I'm not 100% sure Lewis was a bad hire, but I've gone from 50-50 to start the season to at least 90% sure this won't work. By "work" I mean eventually (soon) be as good in football as we've been in basketball. Win more conference championships than any other program in the conference and in some years being one of the 2-3 best non-P4 programs with legit shot to make the playoff. If Lewis is "THAT GUY", I think we should have already seen things that make us say "wow, this is starting to look really good". Maybe not record-wise, but in various/most areas of the team. We aren't seeing anything IMO. To be clear, I don't think perpetual 6 to 8 win seasons are "success". I think some ... many? ... on here think that would be just fine. 6 to 8 win seasons aren't coming close to filling up Snaodragon and electrifying the fanbase, casual fans, open minded sports fans that don't currently care much about Aztec football and all current and future alumni. Just my .02. The good news it'll all play out and we will see. The bad news ... there ain't time to screw around and acccept mediocrity or worse if we want to actually have a football program down the road. While I realize that no matter how bad the rest of this season goes ... say we lose every remaining game ... Lewis isn't getting fired. He probably shouldn't be. But he'd would at many schools that actually prioritize football. |
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Post by Den60 on Nov 3, 2024 9:41:13 GMT -8
Sean Lewis should have at least 3 seasons before his coaching seat begins to warm. Is he the second coming of Don Coryell? No. I’m convinced however, he has a system which is capable of producing winning seasons. In his first season (with the possible exception of Boise St.) his teams have played hard and a bowl game is still possible. This team was poised for the coup de grasse vs Wash St. (a late int derailed that) Every true Aztec fan should support our team and its first year head coach 100%! Failure to do so could mean another painful slide into mediocrity. I didn't see the team not play hard against BSU, they were just outmatched, especially along the lines. They certainly didn't give up despite it being a blowout. |
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Post by Den60 on Nov 3, 2024 9:43:24 GMT -8
Failure to do so could mean another painful slide into mediocrity. We have been mediocre and bordering on pedestrian for three seasons now. How long should the fanbase be patient ? We "fired" Hoke last year and brought in an entirely new coaching staff. And I will say this team was bad last year. Played with no emotion until after it was decided Hoke would not be back. |
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Post by AzTex on Nov 3, 2024 10:03:26 GMT -8
Sean Lewis should have at least 3 seasons before his coaching seat begins to warm. Is he the second coming of Don Coryell? No. I’m convinced however, he has a system which is capable of producing winning seasons. In his first season (with the possible exception of Boise St.) his teams have played hard and a bowl game is still possible. This team was poised for the coup de grasse vs Wash St. (a late int derailed that) Every true Aztec fan should support our team and its first year head coach 100%! Failure to do so could mean another painful slide into mediocrity. they were just outmatched, especially along the lines. They certainly didn't give up despite it being a blowout. Agreed. What I saw was a replay of the basketball game on Wednesday with the football team playing the part of San Marcos. A gap in talent not effort. |
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Post by aztecmusician on Nov 3, 2024 14:44:13 GMT -8
Sean Lewis should have at least 3 seasons before his coaching seat begins to warm. Is he the second coming of Don Coryell? No. I’m convinced however, he has a system which is capable of producing winning seasons. In his first season (with the possible exception of Boise St.) his teams have played hard and a bowl game is still possible. This team was poised for the coup de grasse vs Wash St. (a late int derailed that) Every true Aztec fan should support our team and its first year head coach 100%! Failure to do so could mean another painful slide into mediocrity. I didn't see the team not play hard against BSU, they were just outmatched, especially along the lines. They certainly didn't give up despite it being a blowout. In his postgame presser, Coach Lewis was not happy with the effort AND blamed himself and the staff for not preparing the team to be successful. |
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Post by docmm on Nov 3, 2024 15:09:07 GMT -8
He has said those same tired cliche's after every loss.
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Post by pbnative on Nov 3, 2024 15:52:16 GMT -8
Boise has borderline P4 tallent and a NFL caliber OC/former NFL head coach.
Lewis staff are mostly MAC level coaches and several starters this staff brought in are challenged playing in the MW or very young.
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Post by zurac315 on Nov 3, 2024 17:49:55 GMT -8
He has said those same tired cliche's after every loss. The same as almost all coaches say. I don't know why these press conferences happen at all. It is the same everywhere. And coaches almost never say what will actually be done to fix anything. |
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Post by aztecmusician on Nov 3, 2024 18:07:36 GMT -8
Right now the Offensive Line is banged up and frankly not all that talented. Rocky’s teams usually featured a great line for Pumphrey, Penny, Muema and Hillman to run through.
Cooper gets blasted every game, I’m impressed with his toughness.
Fortunately, the portal can fix almost any weakness in a season or two.
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Post by ramrodd23 on Nov 3, 2024 19:41:21 GMT -8
Right now the Offensive Line is banged up and frankly not all that talented. Rocky’s teams usually featured a great line for Pumphrey, Penny, Muema and Hillman to run through. Cooper gets blasted every game, I’m impressed with his toughness. Fortunately, the portal can fix almost any weakness in a season or two. Yet Rocky OL could run block in the I formation. But pass blocking is another subject. Exact opposite when Ricky switched to a run spread. The portal can fix some things. RB is one. But getting quality OL in the portal is going to be really hard to get. Same as DL. Every college football team is looking at those positions. |
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Post by FULL_MONTY on Nov 3, 2024 19:48:51 GMT -8
Boise has borderline P4 tallent and a NFL caliber OC/former NFL head coach. Lewis staff are mostly MAC level coaches and several starters this staff brought in are challenged playing in the MW or very young. They have the best back in the country, one that forced State to sell out on the run at the expense of the pass. We need better Backers and DL on defense. And we need better O linemen on offense. |
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Post by myownwords on Nov 4, 2024 12:00:09 GMT -8
I do remember when Pat Hill was hired at Fresno. His first year was terrible. I remember when we played them I thought wow he is a terrible coach. But in the years after he proved to be pretty darn good. So it is really hard to judge the first year of a coach. If he comes to a team that has pretty good talent he can do ok his first year. If he comes to a team with little talent it may take a couple of years to build it up. Remember Lewis is coming into a team that was 4-8 last year. And now with the portal it is even harder. I remember in 2002 when Cal hired a coach named Jeff Tedford to replace Tom Holmoe who went 1-10 in 2001. Tedford's first team went 7-5 on 02, 8-6 in 03, 10-2 in 04. He had several more great seasons in ensuing seasons. As someone who followed Cal closely during the Tedford years - season tickets close - he would faceplant late in his tenure as he changed the type of athlete he recruited ... the 4 and 5 stars that passed on SC, UCLA, UW. But he was instantly successful and brought back and lit up a checked out, apathetic Cal fanbase in year 1. Fast forward 20+ years ... I remember UNLV hired this new coach Barry Odom in 23 and he went 9-5 and is currently 6-2 in year 2 after UNLV football went 5-7, 2-10, 0-6 the 3 previous seasons. 🤔 There are scores of similar examples all over the country just over the past 10-15 years. Look at SMU these days. Look at Boise with almost every new coaching hire. When you hire the right coach, you usually know it right away, or at least pretty early. You at least know he MIGHT be the guy because you start seeing clear signs of inprovement in some aspects, as opposed to seeing no improvement in ANY area/phase of the game. I'm not 100% sure Lewis was a bad hire, but I've gone from 50-50 to start the season to at least 90% sure this won't work. By "work" I mean eventually (soon) be as good in football as we've been in basketball. Win more conference championships than any other program in the conference and in some years being one of the 2-3 best non-P4 programs with legit shot to make the playoff. If Lewis is "THAT GUY", I think we should have already seen things that make us say "wow, this is starting to look really good". Maybe not record-wise, but in various/most areas of the team. We aren't seeing anything IMO. To be clear, I don't think perpetual 6 to 8 win seasons are "success". I think some ... many? ... on here think that would be just fine. 6 to 8 win seasons aren't coming close to filling up Snaodragon and electrifying the fanbase, casual fans, open minded sports fans that don't currently care much about Aztec football and all current and future alumni. Just my .02. The good news it'll all play out and we will see. The bad news ... there ain't time to screw around and acccept mediocrity or worse if we want to actually have a football program down the road. While I realize that no matter how bad the rest of this season goes ... say we lose every remaining game ... Lewis isn't getting fired. He probably shouldn't be. But he'd would at many schools that actually prioritize football. You corralled all of my Brownian Motion thoughts about this football "team", untangling and elucidating them much better than I. The only variance is that I was 90% sure Lewis was THE GUY, but now am struggling to refrain from immersing AztecMesa in odious obloquy against him, and THE leadership. |
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Post by docmm on Nov 4, 2024 13:08:08 GMT -8
NY Times put out their weekly rankings of all 134 D-1 Football teams. After the Boise State game, the Aztecs dropped from $115 to #118.
Just to show you how incredibly bad the MWC is in FB, here are their rankings:
#131 Air Force
#127 Utah State
#122 Wyoming
#119 Nevada
#118 SDSU
#112 New Mexico
#107 Hawaii
#84 SJSU
#83 Col State
#78 Fresno State
#29 UNLV
#12 Boise State
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Post by zurac315 on Nov 4, 2024 13:08:31 GMT -8
I do remember when Pat Hill was hired at Fresno. His first year was terrible. I remember when we played them I thought wow he is a terrible coach. But in the years after he proved to be pretty darn good. So it is really hard to judge the first year of a coach. If he comes to a team that has pretty good talent he can do ok his first year. If he comes to a team with little talent it may take a couple of years to build it up. Remember Lewis is coming into a team that was 4-8 last year. And now with the portal it is even harder. I remember in 2002 when Cal hired a coach named Jeff Tedford to replace Tom Holmoe who went 1-10 in 2001. Tedford's first team went 7-5 on 02, 8-6 in 03, 10-2 in 04. He had several more great seasons in ensuing seasons. As someone who followed Cal closely during the Tedford years - season tickets close - he would faceplant late in his tenure as he changed the type of athlete he recruited ... the 4 and 5 stars that passed on SC, UCLA, UW. But he was instantly successful and brought back and lit up a checked out, apathetic Cal fanbase in year 1. Fast forward 20+ years ... I remember UNLV hired this new coach Barry Odom in 23 and he went 9-5 and is currently 6-2 in year 2 after UNLV football went 5-7, 2-10, 0-6 the 3 previous seasons. 🤔 There are scores of similar examples all over the country just over the past 10-15 years. Look at SMU these days. Look at Boise with almost every new coaching hire. When you hire the right coach, you usually know it right away, or at least pretty early. You at least know he MIGHT be the guy because you start seeing clear signs of inprovement in some aspects, as opposed to seeing no improvement in ANY area/phase of the game. I'm not 100% sure Lewis was a bad hire, but I've gone from 50-50 to start the season to at least 90% sure this won't work. By "work" I mean eventually (soon) be as good in football as we've been in basketball. Win more conference championships than any other program in the conference and in some years being one of the 2-3 best non-P4 programs with legit shot to make the playoff. If Lewis is "THAT GUY", I think we should have already seen things that make us say "wow, this is starting to look really good". Maybe not record-wise, but in various/most areas of the team. We aren't seeing anything IMO. To be clear, I don't think perpetual 6 to 8 win seasons are "success". I think some ... many? ... on here think that would be just fine. 6 to 8 win seasons aren't coming close to filling up Snaodragon and electrifying the fanbase, casual fans, open minded sports fans that don't currently care much about Aztec football and all current and future alumni. Just my .02. The good news it'll all play out and we will see. The bad news ... there ain't time to screw around and acccept mediocrity or worse if we want to actually have a football program down the road. While I realize that no matter how bad the rest of this season goes ... say we lose every remaining game ... Lewis isn't getting fired. He probably shouldn't be. But he'd would at many schools that actually prioritize football. Our football program will NEVER be what the basketball program has been. |
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Post by pbnative on Nov 4, 2024 17:48:05 GMT -8
Boise has borderline P4 tallent and a NFL caliber OC/former NFL head coach. Lewis staff are mostly MAC level coaches and several starters this staff brought in are challenged playing in the MW or very young. They have the best back in the country, one that forced State to sell out on the run at the expense of the pass. We need better Backers and DL on defense. And we need better O linemen on offense. No arguments from me on any of those points. Boise is definitely top 15 playoff worthy. SDSU DL took a major step back under Hoke, and the OL was shaky even before guts jumped in the Portal. |
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