Rakes Report #193: Cowboy, change your ways today, or with us you will ride - tryin' to catch the Devil's herd across these endless skies (The Marshall Review)

If you were forwarded this email and would like to sign up to receive future editions, you can do so here.

~optional musical accompaniment~

1) When you lose at home as a three-score favorite to a Sun Belt team, most of the discussion understandably revolves around assigning blame. As a basic rule, everything good or bad goes back to the head coach, who has control over the roster and assistants and has the win or loss go next to their name in the all-time book, so Marcus Freeman bears the brunt. There’s obviously more nuance to it than that. Tommy Rees is to blame for the 0-2 start, because his offense hasn’t performed in two games. Al Golden is also to blame, albeit less so, but it’s really bad when your defense has given up two (2) 90+ yard touchdown drives in the fourth quarter and accrued zero (0) turnovers. Most of the players could have also performed better so they get some blame in a general sense, but that filters up to their coaches, so that’s more blame for Freeman, Rees and Golden.

Since this is Year One for Freeman, you get to blame the previous coach for roster construction, so we thankfully can also curse Brian Kelly some more for the issues at wide receiver and any other deficiency you’d like. One thing that’s inarguable is nobody was better at taking a good but flawed roster assembled by Brian Kelly and winning a ton of games with it than Brian Kelly. We are in a situation where Freeman now has that roster but doesn’t quite know how to handle it, as if Kelly sold him a used car you really have to know how to drive without giving him the full rundown. “Make sure you go straight from second to fourth gear when you’re shifting because third will stall it out. Oh, and you have to pump the lever to pop the gas panel exactly four times, but pause a half second before the final one. Anyway, good luck.”

If you want to win a lot of games in college football you have to be able to roll with different styles — shootouts, rock fights, days when one side of the ball is doing well but the other is useless, afternoons when the ball just isn’t bouncing your way and it seems like the fates are conspiring against you, nights when Joe Tessitore shows up to do commentary. You have to manage emotions week-to-week and day-to-day, and make sure your team is focused when it’s a hangover home opener against a (very good) Group of 5 team that some folks have been warning you about all offseason. Freeman and his staff have a lot to learn about their team and they need to expedite their education or his freshman campaign could get real squirrely real quick.

2) I defended Rees after Ohio State because I genuinely did not know what else he could have done in that situation and no one was offering alternatives. The problem this time around seemed more obvious, which is that Freeman and Rees have said they both want to have a run-first offense except they have an offensive line that for whatever reason cannot run block. Throwing Audric Estime straight into the line twice and failing to convert was malpractice. Where was Chris Tyree for the entire first half?* Why aren’t you just getting the ball out to your athletes in space and putting the onus on Marshall’s athletes to consistently make plays, which they struggled to do at times against Michael Mayer and Lorenzo Styles? Why not more bootlegs, or RPOs, or play-action? Can Tyler Buchner not throw screens? The offense was also trying to run up-tempo but then wouldn’t have the call in quickly enough to really press it, so it was sort of play-acting at being aggressive without having all the details down. I appreciated the attempts at deep shots, but the inability to connect was brutal. Most importantly: Please stop calling runs on second and long I am literally begging you.

* Last month, running back coach Deland McCullough compared Tyree to Clyde Edwards-Helaire. On Saturday after the game, Freeman said of the junior, "We'll go and evaluate those five reps that he got the ball and see how he graded and what he did. Chris Tyree's a guy where I have no hesitation in making sure he gets the ball in his hands. And so, if we have to find ways to do that and be creative in getting the ball in his hands more often, then we've got to do it." What is happening!? This is Kelly saying it would be nice if Aaron Lynch and Stephon Tuitt were on the field more early in 2011. You get to decide that!

If Jeff Quinn was still coaching this line, the commentary on it would be hazardous material. Andrew Kristofic and Joe Alt played quite well down the stretch last year, Jarrett Patterson is really good, Zeke Correll was capable of doing this job back in December 2020, Blake Fisher was an out-of-the-box starter at tackle and Josh Lugg has contributed over the course of his career. How is it performing this poorly? There are also a bunch of blue-chip guys on the bench whom 95% of the rosters in college football would love to have yet there doesn’t seem to be depth. Against the Buckeyes, it seemed more like confusion and miscommunication, but on Saturday they were often physically overmatched by the Herd.

(Late addition on Sunday evening: No formal word on Buchner’s injury, but it seems like we should prepare for at least some starts from Drew Pyne, which means we’re another injury from Steve Angeli. I have no idea what an offense that is limited at wide receiver, can’t run the ball up the middle and doesn’t have an elite quarterback running threat might look like. Doesn’t seem ideal?)

3) I miss Kyren Williams.

4) The offense has borne the brunt of scorn but what in the world is happening with the defense? The one thing that seemed like a sure thing coming into the season was “The front seven will be physical and establish a baseline of competency for the whole operation.” No forced turnovers in two games! And they haven’t even been particularly close to one that I can recall off the top of my head. Outside of the corners, particularly TaRiq Bracy, and a couple plays from Brandon Joseph, who would you say is playing really well? Maybe Jack Kiser and Howard Cross? I am genuinely befuddled by what’s going on with the defensive line, which helped drive the Irish to finish 12th in sacks last year, brought nearly everyone back and has barely had an impact on the season, getting ground to bits by Marshall over the course of the afternoon.

We’ve talked a lot about how the relationship between the offense and defense is symbiotic, and how one really lagging can put so much stress on the other it snaps under the pressure of trying to keep up, as we saw in 2016. I think we’re in a situation where both sides are doing nothing to help the other and there’s zero cumulative spark. Could the defense get the offense a short field, once? Could the offense build any sort of lead to let the defense key on the pass?  (You’re doing great, Jon Sot. And Blake Grupe remains one-for-one on the season.)

Are there strength and conditioning issues? Everyone in and around the program has spoken so highly of Matt Balis and his staying in December was a huge win but I would not say the Irish looked particularly/collectively strong or fast or conditioned on Saturday.

5) I will admit to allowing myself to feel okay about the situation early in the fourth. The Irish had taken the lead with Buchner’s legs, Tyree and the tight ends, then the defense forced a quick punt and the Irish had the ball at midfield. Then Patterson was called for a false start, the offense punted and the defense blew an opportunity for a three-and-out by allowing the Herd to convert a third-and-nine from deep in their own territory. So many opportunities for killshots in that sequence and none were delivered, which is the story of this season (although, again, Sot pinned Marshall at their six to start the drive so credit to him). The defense also couldn’t force a punt at the end of the first half when the offense had just scored their first touchdown and was feeling good, instead allowing a 12-play, 74-yard drive and a field goal. Abysmal situational football.

6) Abbreviated Winning Is Hard/Schadenfreude Round-Up: Notre Dame wasn’t the only Top 10 team to lose at home to a three-score Sun Belt favorite, as my beloved Appalachian State Mountaineers went into College Station and defeated Texas A&M. (The Aggies scored a single offensive touchdown.) Sun Belt member Georgia Southern won at Nebraska* as a three-score underdog but Nebraska wasn’t in the Top 10 because they lost earlier this year to Northwestern, who lost at home to Duke on Saturday. Wisconsin lost at home as a three-score favorite to Washington State. Alabama should have lost to Texas. It was overall a fun and silly Saturday of football that unfortunately had the pall of an Irish loss cast over it.

* Scott Frost — seen as a near sure-fire hire — was let go on Sunday. If Nebraska had waited a few weeks, his buyout would have been cut in half, but he’s getting the full $15 million. I never want to hear another word about money going to the players.

7) The start to this season does feel like part of a psychological experiment on Notre Dame fans. For the last five years, they were treated to exceeding competency, well above 115ish FBS teams but clearly behind a handful that left the program in a sort of high-end purgatory, resulting in complaints about plateauing and a desire for a different level of recruiting. The coach who wasn’t innately likable but won a bunch of games left, allowing them to elevate a replacement out of central casting: A rabid recruiter who said all the right things about its importance, a compelling speaker, literally GQ handsome, beautiful family, etc., etc…only he is now 0-3 and just blew Notre Dame’s lengthy streak in Games You Should Win in his first try. Rod Serling couldn’t have drawn this up better as a Be Careful What You Wish For lesson.

Kelly lost a number of frustrating games in his first couple seasons as coach in South Bend, but he was taking over a program that was 16-21 in the preceding three years and fundamentally broken. There were flaws on this Irish roster — a single upperclassman receiver who is tall and fast would be wondrous — but the program was in a really good place with three New Year’s Six bowls in the last four years and at least seemed prime to be strong in the trenches for Freeman’s first season. That has not been the case, to put it lightly. But here’s the thing: He’s still only coached three games, and there’s every reason to believe he’ll be able to improve at the job while improving his roster so that the ceiling for the program can still be at a championship level when it all congeals in a few years.

The issue now is that folks are more aware that the floor has the potential to be lower, which is both healthy and scary. There were times this offseason where I felt guilty because it seemed like I was in the bottom decile of Freeman enthusiasm, not because I thought he was the wrong choice — I wanted him as the coach from the night we learned Kelly was leaving — but because I couldn’t help but run through all the coaching hires that seemed great before falling apart. There are so few sure things unless the name Saban or Meyer is involved because this is all so damn hard and there were real downsides that were glossed over.

I’d vastly prefer Notre Dame be 2-0 but I do think this start has provided a bit of validation to the general ethos of this operation, which is to appreciate every single win no matter how ugly because half the teams who take the field on a given Saturday are going to leave it disappointed so if you’ve got more points than the other team when the clock hits zero you should hold your head high. There are so many ways to lose a game, so many possibilities for how an individual season can have its wheels come off, so many paths for a program to lose its way into the wilderness. Florida State won a national title in 2013, went to the playoff in 2014, slipped to 7-6 in 2017 and hasn’t had a winning season since. Even if you’re in the rarest possible air of the sport, if you blink it can go away.

While Freeman’s future could of course still involve reaching the highest highs, things are going to be an adventure in the short term because this staff will be facing myriad challenges as they try to dig out of this hole. The game with the Golden Bears is going to be an ugly, defensive grind. The trip to Chapel Hill is going to be a really stupid game because North Carolina has almost exclusively played those under Mack Brown. There’s a bye week to regroup, but then few mercies on the back eight. Should we be concerned about bowl eligibility? To be decided, which is not a conversation I expected us to be having after 54 wins over the last five years.

Notre Dame has only been out of the playoff hunt in September a single time since the new system went into effect in 2014. Hell, they’ve only gone into November with two losses twice in that time frame (2016 and 2019). This is weird, and it’s not good, but it can still be fun because it’s college football and a good excuse to talk to people you love about the dumbest sport in the world. I feel for the current students and recent alumni, who only know winning and didn’t see a loss at BYU in their first game as a student or go 3-9 in their senior year. Being built different doesn’t necessarily mean being built better but my brain is at least always ready for this.

This turnaround has to start with the defense. The offense having issues in the early going, considering a new quarterback and the lack of dudes at wide receiver, isn’t a huge surprise beyond the line play being this poor and Good Plays only being called some of the time but the defense must carry this. Freeman has defensive roots, Golden has seen so much and people can talk about roster deficiencies if they want but there’s no way this collection of talent should be so low on havoc and turnovers and so high on being unable to get off the field in key situations.

And that turnaround has to start Saturday with Cal. I did not think there was any chance I’d be in attendance for Freeman’s first win as a head coach — maybe! Still have to win!— but history works in mysterious ways. We did 4-8 together so we can survive anything - truly appreciate you reading this far after a loss. Onward, upward, take care of yourselves, take care of each other and Go Irish.

If you were forwarded this email and would like to sign up to receive future editions, you can do so here.