• last year
Transcript
00:00 Welcome to the Kairicker Chronicles, the people show.
00:11 Checking the pulse of Husker Nation brought to you by DPS Concrete Construction.
00:15 Check them out at dpsconstruction.net.
00:18 Ladies and gentlemen, this is a show that's the update on my thoughts on the current state
00:22 of Nebraska football, a program.
00:24 Now real quick, had I told you before the season that nine games in, Nebraska would
00:30 be five and four.
00:31 Yes, I know how yesterday's game went against Michigan State.
00:35 But I told you before the season, nine games in, we're going to be five and four with three
00:39 games left.
00:40 In other words, we've got three opportunities against three very beatable opponents to become
00:45 bowl eligible.
00:47 If you would have taken that before the season had I told you that, then as always, smash
00:51 the like button.
00:52 Real quick, my wife was like, I don't know if this is the best time to do this show right
00:56 next to that Michigan State game.
00:58 Here's the deal.
00:59 I'm only going to talk about that game for a minute and then we're going to move on.
01:01 Okay.
01:02 I had planned to do this show before the season ever started, kind of like I always do preseason
01:07 predictions and I always do mid-season grades.
01:11 We have three games left.
01:12 We're in the fourth quarter of the season.
01:13 I always plan to do pretty much every year if you followed me, okay, I always kind of
01:18 do the last quarter of the season where we are, current update on my thoughts on the
01:22 Nebraska football program.
01:24 So this is the show I plan to do for a while.
01:26 Okay, so this is, first of all, my thoughts on the final thoughts on the Michigan State
01:29 game.
01:30 Second of all, looking back at the first nine games of the season.
01:33 Second of all, where are we at right here, right now in this moment in time.
01:36 Last but certainly not least, look what's ahead and going forward.
01:40 The last quarter, last three games, the fourth quarter of this Nebraska football season.
01:45 Now, final thoughts on Michigan State.
01:46 There's really only two things I'm going to talk about.
01:48 The quarterback situation because I hear people talking about, "Oh, maybe we need to look
01:52 at a new quarterback, give a new quarterback an opportunity."
01:55 I'm about earning it each and every week, first and foremost.
01:57 Every week in practice, every week in games.
02:00 I've always been that way.
02:01 I have not changed.
02:02 Now, my thoughts on the quarterback situation going into our next game versus Maryland,
02:06 the Turtles, alright.
02:08 No disrespect, but in my opinion, Jeff Sims is just not a realistic quarterback option.
02:12 Okay, Chubba Purdy, we saw him last year.
02:14 We saw what happened.
02:16 We saw the drop-off from Casey Thompson to Purdy.
02:18 Now, he's a young guy.
02:19 It's a year later.
02:20 Maybe he's a lot better.
02:21 I don't know.
02:22 But here's what I'll tell you.
02:23 He's third string on the depth chart right now and there must be a reason for it.
02:27 Okay, now, Heinrich Harburg.
02:31 He has to address his throwing motion.
02:32 I've talked about it before.
02:34 Okay, he's got to get that fixed if he wants to continue to play quarterback going forward.
02:38 He has other tools.
02:39 Okay, he runs really well if we're going to be a running team, option team going forward.
02:43 Hey, that suits him, but you've got to be able to throw the ball a little bit better.
02:46 Okay, he's got to address that at some point.
02:48 He does need help from the guys around him as well.
02:51 Okay, and a lot of them are young players.
02:53 We've had 89 million injuries this year.
02:55 We know that.
02:56 We're reaching to third and fourth on the depth chart in some spots.
02:59 Okay, but he does need some help from the guys around him because we're not, as I pointed
03:03 out in my gut reaction video on Saturday, we are not running in an incredibly complicated
03:08 scheme on offense.
03:09 Alright, I will say this.
03:10 When it comes to Harburg, I can't help but root for him for multiple reasons.
03:15 Being a Nebraska kid, a Nebraska guy, clearly means more to him to play for the Huskers.
03:19 Okay, his home state team, it still means something to him.
03:22 It doesn't to every Nebraska kid anymore.
03:25 But at least Harburg fights, scratches, claws, and battles for everything.
03:31 It ain't always art on the football field.
03:33 It ain't always pretty to look at it.
03:36 But he's our best option, and I can at least get behind a guy who's willing to do that.
03:43 Because not everybody is.
03:44 Alright, final thoughts on the quarterback situation.
03:47 Matt Ruhl has done a lot of things right in the preseason, getting ready for this season,
03:52 throughout the season.
03:53 Alright, our defense is better, our tackling is better, our run game is better than it
03:58 has been in recent years.
03:59 We're more physical more often than not than we've been.
04:02 We've won more close games, not all of them, but we've won more close games this year than
04:07 in recent memory.
04:08 Games we would typically lose.
04:11 But his biggest mistake, and I say this with all due respect in the world, I know what
04:17 it's like to be criticized.
04:18 I know what it's like to be shown love from the media.
04:21 I know what it's like to be on both sides.
04:22 There's no microphone in front of me right now, but I know what it's like to be on both
04:24 sides of the microphone.
04:26 So I say this with nothing but love and honesty.
04:29 The biggest mistake he made this year was choosing the wrong quarterback from the transfer
04:33 portal to be our quarterback for this Nebraska football season.
04:37 Okay, much love to Jeff Sims, even more love to Heinrich Harburg.
04:41 And maybe Chubba Purdy is better, I don't know, but maybe not.
04:45 I'm just gonna say it.
04:49 It lands however it lands, I guess, on whoever's watching this show.
04:53 I wonder how many more games we would have won this year with Casey Thompson, and I like
04:59 Logan Smothers a lot, if either or both of them were still here, how many more games
05:04 we would have won this year.
05:06 Just gonna put it out there.
05:08 Let the backlash begin.
05:10 Last thing before we move forward.
05:13 And I put this out on Twitter and Facebook, okay, again I'm recording this on a Sunday
05:18 but I put it out earlier today.
05:21 Go give me a follow on social media, #GPlug.
05:23 Final thought on the Michigan State game, then I'm moving on.
05:25 Do we seriously not have someone who can catch a punt and at least try to return it?
05:30 Most special teams coaches just want a first down, and I put in parentheses 10 yards on
05:35 average per return.
05:36 At least that's been my experience in the special teams meetings I was a part of.
05:40 Also making smart decisions on when to catch the punt and let it go is obviously key too.
05:45 Alright, onward and upward to the last three games of the season.
05:49 Okay, we're moving on now.
05:51 We're gonna move on backwards before we go to present, then we go forward.
05:54 The first nine games of the year.
05:55 At one point, okay, actually before this season, at one point Nebraska was 4-16 during their
06:02 last 20 game stretch, at one point earlier this year I should say.
06:05 Okay, 4-16, I think it was like after the Colorado game, I'd have to go back and double
06:10 check, we were 4-16 during our previous 20 games at that point in time.
06:14 Think about that.
06:15 Before this year, the Huskers were 15-29 over their last four seasons.
06:20 Think about that.
06:21 Okay, we have the worst winning percentage in the Big Ten Conference in one score games
06:26 over the past five years.
06:29 We haven't had a winning season since 2016, haven't seriously been in the Big Ten West
06:33 title conversations since 2012.
06:35 Alright, let me speak on that for just a second because Wisconsin lost Saturday, Minnesota
06:40 lost Saturday, Iowa won, but we're really still deep in the thick of the heart of the
06:44 Big Ten West title conversation.
06:46 Here's my thoughts on that.
06:48 Until we become bowl eligible, I will not speak on that again because we need to become
06:52 bowl eligible first.
06:55 If we don't have, again I'm just being raw today, if we don't hand the ball to Anthony
07:02 Grant late in the game against Minnesota, a guy who's known for fumbling, we beat Minnesota.
07:11 I can't help but wonder.
07:13 Alright, if KC Thompson or Logan Smothers are still here on the team, if we probably
07:18 not only beat maybe Minnesota but also Michigan State, okay, and maybe if Heinrich Harburg
07:25 starts versus Minnesota, maybe we win that game.
07:28 And I'm not making excuses, but I said I was going to go backwards before I went to now
07:32 and forwards, and that's all I'm doing.
07:34 We lost.
07:35 They scored more points than we did.
07:38 And I've shown Matt Ruhle nothing but love, but you also got to counterbalance it.
07:43 Hey, I didn't love some of those other decisions, okay?
07:46 To be fair, both sides of the spectrum here.
07:49 Okay, now again, nothing but love and respect to Harburg.
07:53 He needs help.
07:54 He needs help.
07:55 The injuries have been crazy this year, as I pointed out earlier.
07:59 Bottom line, Matt Ruhle has done a lot of good things this year, but the two decisions
08:02 he did not get right, hand of the ball to Anthony Grant after he criticized him for
08:06 fumbling in practice and the quarterback decision, which I already addressed earlier.
08:12 Okay, now real quick, as you all know, this show is brought to you by DPS Concrete Construction.
08:17 They're your local concrete experts.
08:19 Check them out as always at DPSConstruction.net.
08:22 Now before this season, had I said, "Hey, after nine games, we're going to be 5-4 and
08:29 winning a fair amount of types of games that we normally lose and be in one game from bowl
08:33 eligibility," okay, and these are rhetorical questions, but if you want to answer in the
08:37 comments below, you can, would you have said, "Yes, I'll take it"?
08:41 Before the season, had I said, "We're going to be playing with our third-string quarterback,
08:44 fourth-string running back," okay, in other words, Gabe Irvin, Ramiro Johnson, and Anthony
08:48 Grant are all not starting, and we'd be 5-4 after nine games with three games left in
08:53 the year, would you have said, "Yes, I'll take it"?
08:55 Sixty percent of our own line is out.
08:57 Would you have taken a 5-4 record knowing that?
09:01 We have one of the best rush defenses in the country and one of the better overall defenses
09:06 in the country as well.
09:08 Top 25 type defense, top 10 type rush defense, towards the top of the Big Ten overall in
09:14 rush defense, would you have taken that before the season?
09:18 If I had told you, "It's going to be ugly football.
09:21 It's going to be hard to watch at times.
09:23 We're going to be beating teams that aren't great in a bad division.
09:27 In a quarter of the football season being left, we'd only need one game, one win I
09:33 should say, one more win to become bowl eligible," would you have said, "Yes, I'll take that,"
09:38 had I told you all that before the season?
09:40 Okay, I know I would have.
09:42 I hope that all makes sense.
09:46 All right, where are we now?
09:48 We have a good defense.
09:49 We typically run the ball well on offense, typically.
09:53 We have a lot of young talent.
09:55 That's obvious.
09:56 We're really young, especially on offense, but even on defense.
09:59 We have a lot of young talent.
10:01 We're decent on special teams.
10:02 Tristan Alvano is finding his stride.
10:04 That kid's going to be special by the time he's done.
10:07 We've got to get better at the punt returns.
10:09 Addressed that earlier.
10:10 We don't throw the ball well.
10:12 We don't take care of the ball.
10:14 We're not good enough to overcome either one of those things against really good opponents.
10:18 We have a long way to go.
10:20 The bottom line, where we're at in year one under Matt Ruhle, everything I've said to
10:26 this point, right here, right now, the state of the program right now, I'll take it.
10:31 Me personally, I'll take it.
10:35 Success for me, this year I've been very clear, since the day Matt Ruhle was hired, going
10:40 to a bowl game.
10:41 It's pretty much that simple for me.
10:43 Where we're at now in the state of the program and looking ahead, if we make a bowl game,
10:49 I'll consider this a successful season.
10:52 Anything beyond that is icing on the cake.
10:55 In my opinion, anything less than that is a failure.
10:58 Especially at this point, where we've got three games to win one more game to become
11:02 bowl eligible.
11:03 And yes, there are things beyond that that we can accomplish, but I'm not speaking on
11:06 any of that until we win another ball game.
11:09 Now, I will say this.
11:10 It sure would be nice to beat Iowa again and do it this time in Lincoln.
11:16 Even if the score, I don't care if it's a baseball score, 3-2, 2-0, or whatever.
11:20 My dad always told me, as I've shared on this program before, all you've got to do is score
11:24 one more point than the opponent.
11:27 That sure would be nice on Black Friday.
11:29 Now bottom line, I think we're in a good spot, comparatively speaking, as a program.
11:35 We're not where we want to be, but we're headed where we want to go, in my opinion.
11:41 It could be a bumpy ride, but Husker fans, let's enjoy this journey together.
11:47 All right, here are my three questions.
11:51 Hit me up in the comments below, let me know your thoughts.
11:54 First, our offense is not good.
11:57 Here's my question.
11:59 Do you cut Marcus Satterfield any slack due to the amount of injuries that we've had on
12:06 offense?
12:07 My next question is, do you think there should be any concern about our strength and conditioning
12:11 program?
12:12 I only ask because of all the injuries that have happened so far this year.
12:15 Number three, are you happy with the current state of the Husker football program?
12:19 All right, ladies and gentlemen, as always, check out CarrikerChronicles.com.
12:24 It's where all your hopes and dreams can come true.
12:27 I will say this, I don't really ever plug my YouTube channel.
12:31 I don't think I have this entire season.
12:34 So if you want to hit that subscribe button on the YouTube channel, I'd sure appreciate
12:39 it.
12:40 I love interacting and talking with the people.
12:43 I truly love doing this show.
12:45 I truly love Husker football.
12:47 Let me know your thoughts in the comments below, ladies and gentlemen.
12:51 And until next time, Husker Nation, Go Big Red.
12:55 And always remember to Dope Out!
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