The Society of Talking Heads.....I am not for or against firing JON...I dont know enough....as for Rittenberg..what the hell does he know? Unless he can quote or source a real football expert he carries no water....but we have become hooked on non-experts saying something that hooks our emotions...in this case our frustration with NUs losing streak..we hear what we want substantiated or not and say yeh yeh...I'm an expert too!! Not me I am not an expert...and yes I am frustrated with D giving up 11 plays of 40 yards or more.....I would love to have the real scoop....which is probably a combination of all the possibilities. Whether firing JON is one of em I dont know...What I do know from simple observation in that painful loss yesterday was that the D played hard, supported each other..and as a fan that is the most important factor for me....just gravy when we get the Ws.....
Rittenberg calls out Fitz re: JON
- Thread starter Medill '03
- Start date
And now we beat ourselves with penalties on top of it all.
The way they played under Hank, bending but not breaking, playing smart and taking advantage of the other team making a mistake helped mask a lot of our shortcomings with overall talent. I think the entire staff on D needs a reset. The talent gap is real and we need a staff that can help maximize every ounce of talent we have on the roster, not further expose it.
We weren’t overmatched yesterday. We haven’t been overmatched in most of our games this season yet we still lose and look lost. The defense actually looked good in the first half yesterday. Flying around. Then the 2nd half came and we gave up our customary explosion plays and had a handful of blown coverages.
The current Gallagher, Mueller and Metz are faster than Fisher and the old Gallagher. Yet their reactions are far worse.
Sounds very honorable. Draw up a contract and agree to terms. Then when things aren't going your way, find a way to renege on your word and deal?
I think people are grasping at straws CC. I know you have a positive memory of the program and how Jango was treated. Probably, there are 20% "Fire Fitz and staff", 60% "Fire JON Keep Fitz" and 20% status quo/be patient. I think the hypothetical 80% that want SOME change are frustrated by the length of the contract while watching other schools eat (and pay) big contracts to Fire for non performance. My feeling is that Fitz WON'T Fire JON and, lacking the ability for Gragg to compel same, he needs some, any. everage to force.it
Does someone who has been reporting on college football professionally for 20 years, and on Northwestern Wildcat football for 25 years, truly have no credibility?
He’s a reporter, not a TV shouter.
He knew it huh?
You're the guy that said McCall would be retained, just 24 hours before he was fired. So, you're all of a sudden the guy who knows what Fitz is thinking all the time?
I think they hired Fitz to be the HC and run it how he sees fit. If they don't believe Fitz is the man for the job anymore, then you honor his contract and give him his payout and get someone they think would do a better job. You do recall the same people complaining while my son was here and we won the West and went to very nice Bowl games. Some people aren't happy if they don't have something to cry about. I don't think anyone is happy with this, season. Hopefully Fitz can fix the problems.. I haven't really followed college football since my son retired.. But I love Fitz for who he is and what he did for my son.
In all fairness, going to journalism school and having a professional interest in reporting on sporting news does not make you qualified to be a football coach.
It just means you are good at observing, obtaining and reporting the news.
He's really not more qualified to assess the situation than a lot of people on this board (and I am NOT counting myself in that group). He has access to other coach's opinions, I'd assume. If other Big Ten coaches are trashing O'Neil, that would be worth reporting. If its jut Rittenberg venting, he sounds like a lot of people on this board.
This is a wild statement and probably why wide swaths of the country believe that the election was stolen and that COVID vaccines are actually Bill Gates-orchestrated microchip implantations.
Aren't reporters trained to back up their stories with sources? Even honest opinion writers, have facts behind what they write.
All of your words are mumbles to me until you apologize for the “Shitcago” comments a few years ago. I respected you for raising a unique soul like Jango and sending him to Evanston, and for your unique perspective.
Chicago is a world class city that has positively contributed to humanity’s development in many ways. Make amends and we may converse positively again.
And again,,,what does he know...if he really knows something let us know how he knows it and from whom...He is just a fan like us...who makes his $ by the people who pay attention to him and he has done that well....cant argue the defense has not done very well...cant argue that JON is the coordinator....but still need evidence that anyone else would do better.....or that what he coaches or how he coaches is the culprit.....
At one point, I read a few of Rittenberg’s Daily articles from when he was a student and they were gold. Pure gold, Jerry! And I really mean that. He’s clearly had an eye for the game for decades.
I personally do not feel that I am “just a fan”. But even if you are… if you’ve watched enough football, you can tell “what good looks like”. And, also, you can tell what bad looks like.
And we have been bad on defense since Hankwitz retired. Anyone who knows Anything about football can tell that.
Keep preaching, Rittenberg!
I'll stick with my statement.
I'm guessing Adam Rittenberg knows less than many people on this board about defensive strategy in football.
And regarding election fraud, give me a break. I have a Mechanical Engineering degree from Northwestern. Logic and data guide me. I actually understand the meaning of "Scientific method." My BS detector is pretty good.
By your stated logic Lester Holt would make a great president because he has been reporting on politics for a long time and he's fairly professional.
And I don't say that to be rude. Its just directly analagous to what you are saying about Rittenberg and his football strategy expertise.
If you were really a McCormick grad then you could likely afford a Rock membership. Yet you don’t have one. So which way is it?
The hole in your argument is "football strategy." Or in this case, the absence thereof.
I get that a lot of people think O'Neil is horrible and now having an ESPN reporter indicating the same thing is great. But I don't think it matters much, other than it will annoy the hell out of Fitz.
Perhaps, annoying the hell out of Fitz is at this point is a good thing.
Thats a strange question. I have to believe the free board is more open-minded and reflects more variety of opinion. Less serious, too. I like golf but I've never considered joining a country club.
So what was your capstone course in McCormick if you truly graduated from there? You can get as technical as you want with me.
You describe the division of the fans here. Traditional sports fan want the win, want the championships. More modern sports fan root for the effort and bask when a win comes with it. When one side attacks the other, claws come out and labels get placed.
To articulate in a civil fashion why I disagree with you can boil down to one thing: money. The amount spent on football, if only to produce hard playing, good student - citizen - athletes without emphasis on winning is disproportionate and unfair to all the other student athletes. Take the billion plus spent on football (salaries, schollies, exclusive practice, workout and game day facilities, etc) and spread it around all the sports as those other kids are equally deserving.
Nobody from your side ever responds to this argument. I think it’s because you know deep down that the only justification for the extreme unbalance is the expectation of success that would also build revenue streams in sport of the spend. Problem becomes - as the program success dies off, only one big revenue stream remains - TV. And Ryan and he will die too some day. Little merch, STH, etc. The program no longer is the cash cow - though self supporting.
And it will always self support by mere presence in the B1G - win or lose. So now, with a losing program, how do you justify the ridiculous unbalance spending compared to all the other very deserving, hard working athletes at NU?
Or become the laughingstock of all college football on a national level because you made that bad deal with the devil?
Guess no good answers, have to pick a bad one, lesser of two evils is to not be under the thumb of a devil.
It janitor bit was actually a joke in response to another poster's frustration about not being able to put pressure on Fitz to make changes due to his buyout, but the reality is buyouts on coaching deals may be renegotiated for convenience of both parties. Paul Chryst was fired by Wisconsin and due more than $20+ million in buyout money, but it was negotiated down to $11 million. It may be that in lieu of being reassigned to something like "Assistant to the Athletic Director" to finish out their contract, that the fired coach is approached about reducing their buyout and making a clean break to allow them to move on to other employment or whatever. Hopefully, it does not come to that at NU and the some of changes being sought are made to move out of the football doldrums. I know Iowa fandom is going through the same thing with Kirk Ferentz and perceived intransigence to making changes coexisting with the head coach's large buyout. The fans are actually mostly loyal to a head coach who has done much for their program, but are knocking their heads that the coach is seemingly taking an 'emperor with no clothes' approach to addressing glaring weaknesses in their program.
Sorry CC but not the same people. Posters all over here are dropping their tickets, their interest, even their participation here. Lunker is a good example. Always very positive and he is now out. Nochores, super supportive, is on hiatus due to medical though in truth he would have found a way to stay if it was different. You can go up and down the free board and rock and find the supportive people dropping like flies.
The program is not OWED support of the fans any more than they owe the fans anything. It’s a mutual relationship except the program needs fans to be relevant. After repeatedly putting out bad product, bad messaging and the appearance of ego driven stubbornness - even the most diehard fans are starting to crack.
Funny, I agree with CC. Born and raised there and still open property… it has become a terrible city, county and state. Not the worst but lower than Gary.
Which I think is great. We have zero other media coverage. Now can we get a Wilbon tweet and a Greenie comment too please?
Really? How many outside people even know it as McCormick? Or know that giant square ancient building with goofy internal outdoor courtyards, hallowed halls with multiple sublevels even houses the entirety of NU engineering? This is a football board, not IDVerify.
By the by, I loved mechanics of materials, hated thermal and once found someone cooking something other than dirt in the soil mechanics lab drying oven…
do I win a prize? (I was only civ-environmental)
Sometimes things are so obvious that you don't need to be the second coming of Bill Belichick to recognize a shitshow when you see one. This one is a no-brainer.
In my day, one could have an entire auditorium in which to do all-nighters, shout memorizations and cram for the exam at 9:00am. McCormick saved me, along with the coke machine.
The thing about Rittenberg is that he has 68k followers, whereas us complainers have none or next to none. If this gets re-tweeted by Wilbon, Teddy and Greenie, now it's in front of a million people.
He's right, and we're right but nobody reads our opinions except Cappy and Lou
He's right, and we're right but nobody reads our opinions except Cappy and Lou
They sold cocaine in machines back in your day?
I suspect Fitz has his moles on this board to take the temperature.
That reminds me of the story that Bill Handel told that he passed the bar exam because, yes because, he was high on cocaine.
Why? He doesn’t care, remember? And he doesn’t need a mole to take the temperature - no media, fewer attendance, ummmm…mounting losses…. Even corbi could figure the health of the overall program at this point in time. Better question - will he do anything? It not, who cares about the temp - lifetime all powerful contract and surrounded by friends.
Isn't it true - maybe I'm just imagining this - but I always thought that Fitz strongly preferred guys who were vocals leaders on their high school teams - he liked captains, specifically, because they were very into football and showed leadership, competitiveness, things he valued. He wanted "character" players - guys he could count on.
My impression is that he relied heavily on getting those guys in the weight room and "coaching them up" on technique. Most of the time it "seemed" like he got better defensive talent - I always assumed it was because he played middle linebacker. In essence he was looking for guys that reminded him of himself or former teammates that he respected.
I'm not sure what has happened recently. Can I blame Covid for the recruiting classes?
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