The Bodda Getta

nm

Maybe I'm forgetting but I think every loss was by 7 points or less except the blowout at the end.

True - but that's because in 2008, the players never gave up, even when it appeared at times that the coaching staff had.

And that's the difference. The number of empty seats in the third picture is merely a symptom.

2008 FOOTBALL SCHEDULE
RECORD: 5-7
DATE OPPONENT
8-30-08 LOUISIANA-MONROE WON 34-0
9-6-08 SOUTHERN MISS WON 27-13
9-13-08 at Mississippi State WON 3-2
9-20-08 LOUISIANA STATE LOST 21-26
9-27-08 TENNESSEE WON 14-12
10-4-08 at Vanderbilt LOST 13-14
10-11-08 ARKANSAS LOST 22-25
10-23-08 at West Virginia (Thur.) LOST 17-34
11-1-08 at Mississippi LOST 7-17
11-8-08 TENNESSEE-MARTIN WON 37-20
11-15-08 GEORGIA LOST 13-17
11-29-08 at Alabama LOST 0-36

2008 was worse because we were supposed to be a top 10 team that year.

I'm not trying to make excuses for our team this year. We are bad. Our offense is impotent, a little better since JW's taken over but, overall, inept and impotent. If someone scores 14 on us we're likely out of the game. Our defense looked like it was coming around against lsu but has collapsed ever since. I would like to know what happened during that off week but we've looked outmatched ever since except for nms.

However, there is a huge difference between 2008 and 2012. The 2008 was ranked in the top 10 preseason and was ranked #9 the day we lost to lsu. We were still ranked #13 when we lost to a ranked vandy team at their place, then lost 5 of the next 6.

We all knew 2012 was going to be a rebuilding year, with a new OC and DC bringing in new schemes and the majority of players having either 1 year of experience or none. We had very few senior leaders and, although we didn't know it at the time, no QB ready to execute our offense. Our new OC had one year of OC experience where he ran a predominately run-based attack and his HC was an experienced OC so he probably got a lot of assistance from him. He had no experience as an OC running a pro set offense, installing it, practicing it, game planning it, calling plays or making in game adjustments with it.

Most on this board were predicting 7-8 wins with a few hoping for 9 or 10. If we had realized our predicament on offense and known beforehand the level of competition we were going to face every week we probably all would have been hoping for 6 wins. Why?

After the al game we will have played 5 of the top 11 teams in the country as of the current ranking polls. In addition, msst was undefeated until losing 3 in a row to al, tamu and lsu. As a matter of fact, the 8 teams to whom we have lost, have lost a total of 25 games. 19 of those losses were to teams in the current top 10. Include al as the 9th loss in that and it's 20 of 26. The other 6 losses were all to teams having a winning record (avg about 7-3) except for ole miss who is 5-5. Even La Mon is 6-4. Before the season started nobody believed AU was a top 10 team this year. It follows that at best, we should be 5-5 with the msst being a tossup played at their field.

So instead of being 6-6 or 5-7 we'll probably end up at 3-9. Any way you slice it we are bad. The worst I've ever seen. I'm disappointed most because we seem to be worse offensively, defensively and we seem to have taken a huge step backwards, defensively, since the lsu game. I really believed this team would show significant improvement over the course of the season. Something happened after the lsu game and we haven't been the same team since.

This year has been a horrible disappointment.
2008 was worse because we were supposed to be a top 10 team that year. QED

It may have been the right thing to keep TT, but I'd rather have our 2010 NC and a new coaching staff next year.

No doubt both are awful years, both ironically due in large part to inept handling of coaching changes during the off season. My opinion that 2008 was worse is based solely on the fact that much more was expected from that team. No doubt that 2012 is the worse of the two teams. I think we've lost to 6 quality teams, 5 in the top 11. Clemson is #11 with 1 loss to #10 FSU in Tallahassee. Ms st has 3 losses but only to top 10 teams - al, lsu and tamu. om and vandy are better than usual and ark is worse, 1 of only 2 teams we've played this year with a losing record.

The 2008 team played 5 teams with losing records, 3 of them SEC teams and our 2 SEC wins plus one of our SEC losses were to those 3 teams. The only team we beat that year that had a winning record was S. Ms at 7-6. We played and lost to 2 top 10 teams, al at #6 and ga at #10 or 13 depending on the poll.

Margin of losses is another subject entirely. Our defense hasn't been the same since the '08 season. Hard to believe our HC since then is the same guy as the DC of our '02, '03 and '04 teams. My biggest shock and disappointment this year is that our defense didn't turn a corner in the lsu game. After the lsu game I would've bet money that our defense, at least would be tougher and showing signs of significant improvement in every game after that. Instead they tanked. Again, hard to believe the Auburn team that played against clemson and lsu was the same one that played against tamu and ga. It's a mystery but the wheels really fell off after the lsu game.