It’s Western Carolina game week … finally! So what better way to kick it off then by making fun our Opening Day opponents with some Pack the Caption action. Fire away!
Hell yeah!!! I pull for a team that wears purple!
You're looking at the '93 & '94 Busy Bees Daycare hot potato champion ... still got it!
The N&O reported yesterday that NC State may not sell out football season tickets this year for the first time since 2000. That’s very disappointing for me because I love a loud, sold out Carter-Finley on Fall Saturdays. The only thing better than that is a loud, sold out Carter-Finley on Fall Thursday nights. I thought it was odd that a few weeks ago you could get half priced tickets for the Western Carolina and Boston College games on Groupon. It all makes sense now. We’ve still sold more football season tickets than any other school in the state and that’s coming off of 4 straight losing seasons so bravo Wolfpack Nation!
In other Wolfpack news, yesterday evening team tri-captain Jarvis Williams suggested that the State-Carolina game is “not a rivalry game anymore” in an interview on Raleigh’s 99.9 The Fan. In my best Chris Berman, Tom Jackson, Keyshawn Johnson, Chris Carter, and Mike Ditka impersonation I have this to say in response … C’mon Man! I understand this is just trash talking, and don’t get me wrong I love to talk trash, but statements like this irritate the crap out of me. I hate this stat, but Carolina does lead the all-time series with a 63-30-6 record so we have no room to talk. Even if a miracle we were to happen and we won the next 100 games in this series, I would still consider this a rivalry and want to beat the Tarheels brains in every time we play … and words come nowhere near describing how happy a man I’d be! I hate the Tarheels so much that, I no longer allow anybody wearing Tarheel gear to enter my house and if I’m at somebody’s house and they bring me a drink in a Tarheel cup I will not drink it. Those and many other things are what make rivalries so great and State-Carolina will definitely always be one.
Speaking of the boys in pansy blue, all summer I’ve purposely avoided talking about the snowball that is called the UNC “investigation.” I did mention it in passing in my 2010 predictions writeup, but this is a NC State blog and I refuse to write more about UNC than I do about my own team. Sadly that’s not been the case for several other NC State blogs out there. I just think all State fans out there celebrating this need to be cautious … karma’s a bitch. I’ve already given this topic way too much time, but in light of tonight’s press conference I might have to redo my 2010 predictions. Although, the Vegas underdog in the State-Carolina game has won the game straight up 9 of the past 13 meetings so I’m not really sure if this is good news or not.
Enough of that talk, the countdown to the season opener is now in the single digits! I’m so excited, I could wet my pants!
I’ve been doing mock draft after mock draft in preparation for my fantasy football league draft which is this Sunday. It’s a 12 team league with at least 8 of the guys huge NC State fans and/or alums. I mention this because I’m embarrassed to say that I didn’t prepare at all for my college fantasy football draft which was this past Sunday. It was pushed back a whole week and I only got maybe an hour of prep in for it.
I thought I knew college football and would be good to go. I grabbed my Phil Steele magazine as a guide and printed off a top 200 list from the internet. I looked through the list, compared it to who Phil Steele likes, and added in a few guys that i really like to come up with players to target. Then the draft started and I was overwhelmed and intimidated by the whole process. I was the “lucky” guy to get the 12th and last pick . Yeah, I’m going to complain about it and make excuses. If TOB can do it why can’t I, right?
Anyway, the studs like Case Keenum, Zach Collaros, Jacquizz Rodgers, Jordan Todman, Jerrod Johnson, and LaMichael James were all gone. Russell Wilson was also drafted, maybe a tad early, but it was a State fan and he made sure he’d have double reasons to cheer on the Pack this season. I’m not gonna knock on him for that. Heck I hope he wins the league because that would be great news for Wolfpack Nation. So with my back-to-back selections I took RB Donald Buckram (UTEP) and WR Michael Floyd (Notre Dame). I like both guys so I was pretty happy with those picks, but after that I don’t know what happened.
I think I might have ended up with a last place team. My biggest mistake was waiting too long to draft a QB. Then to make matters worse it was announced late Sunday night that my #1 QB Steven Sheffield (Texas Tech) had lost the starting job to Taylor Potts so I’ve already had to drop the former for the latter and wasted my #1 waiver order spot in the process. Oh well, this is my first go at this so I was expecting a learning curve just didn’t think it would be this steep. Anyway, here’s the 18 Roman Candles roster:
Starters:
QB John Brantley (Florida)
RB Anthony Allen (Georgia Tech)
RB Donald Buckram (UTEP)
RB Alexander Robinson (Iowa St.)
WR Michael Floyd (Notre Dame)
WR Damarius Johnson (Tulsa)
WR Scotty McKnight (Colorado)
TE Kyle Rudolph (Notre Dame)
K Matt Hogan (Houston)
DST Rutgers
Bench:
QB Taylor Potts (Texas Tech)
RB Jamie Harper (Clemson)
RB Jermaine Thomas (FSU)
WR Patrick Edwards (Houston)
WR Alexander Torres (Texas Tech)
WR Ryan Whalen (Stanford)
I have no clue if that’s a good roster or a bad one, but reading through it just seems like a crappy one. And I couldn’t work in a Wolfpacker either. Absolutely terrible draft strategy! At least I stayed true to myself and didn’t draft any Tarheels either. Even with the bad draft I think I had, I have heard the waiver wire is the most important part of the league. I will definitely be monitoring it closely all season. My two goals are to not finish last and to beat my buddy Nick when we go head-to-head. I’ll be pulling out all the stops to make sure those goals are met so, Nick … you’ve been warned.
I won’t give weekly reports on this league, unless I’m just creaming everybody, but i do plan to keep you updated a few times throughout the season. Not that anybody cares, but heck it’s my blog and I’m gonna do what a want so there. If you don’t like that it’s not too late to have a DFCF college fantasy football league. It’d be fun to interact with my readers some and the updates could be great for some trash talking so if you’re interested send me an email (dfcf99 at gmail dot com) or hit me up on the Twitter.
I’ve been looking at this for a week now agonizing over how I see the 2010 NC State Football season playing out. I’ve always been the eternal optimist when it comes to NC State Football. Exhibit A – I thought there was no way we would win less than 8 games last year. I’ve been burned like that way too much over the past few years so this year I made myself look harder at everything.
A month ago I would have told you we’d be lucky to win 3 games. It’s not that I don’t think we have the talent, it’s more I don’t have much faith in this coaching staff and our schedule is absolutely brutal. Last year with 8 home games and an offense that averaged 30.3 ppg we only managed 5 wins. This year we only have 6 home games (TOB’s road record at State is 4-11 overall; 1-9 in games outside of NC), our ACC cross-division games are all tough, and none of the 3 BCS non-conference games are gimmes. I’ve warmed up a little from 3 wins, but unlike last year now I think everything would have to fall in place perfectly for us to win even 7 games. What a difference a year makes.
Anyway, my game by game predictions are below:
Western Carolina — TOB is 0-3 in season openers since arriving at State, but that streak should end this year. We are 5-0 all time against WCU with an average score of 48-11. This year should be a lot of the same. Prediction: Win
@ Central Florida — TOB is also 0-3 in road season openers since arriving at State and that streak will be a lot tougher to end than everybody thinks. UCF was 8-5 last year including a St. Petersburg Bowl loss to Rutgers. They return 15 starters (including stud DE Bruce Miller the reigning C-USA Defensive POY) and are expected to contend for the C-USA title. This game will tell us a lot about the season. If we can get to 2-0 we could be looking at a bowl game, but if we lose it could be another sub .500 season for TOB in year #4. Prediction: Loss
Cincinnati — The reigning Big East champs will not be able to match their 12-1 record from last year after losing HC Brian Kelly, QB Tony Pike, and WR Mardy Gilyard. They do return a lot of firepower on offense in QB Zach Collaros, RB Isaiah Pead, and WR Armon Binns so they can still contend in a wide open Big East race. It’s a short week for both teams and under the Prime Time lights so it’ll be a game where both teams hope to make a statement. TOB’s career ESPN Thursday Night record is 1-7, but I’m bucking the trend here. Prediction: Win
@ Georgia Tech — We are 3-10 all time in Atlanta (1-7 in last 8 dating back to 1990). Everybody knows how prolific Tech’s running attack has been since Paul Johnson took over. With reigning 1st Team All-ACC QB Joshua Nesbitt returning to run the triple-option offense it will be just as strong as last year. This one will probably be a blow out. Prediction: Loss
Virginia Tech — Frank Beamer is at the top of the class when it comes to ACC coaches. His Hokies have won 10 or more games 11 of the past 15 years (including the last 6 in a row). They’re ranked in the top 10 in both the AP (10) and USA Today (6) preseason polls and many consider them National Champion contenders. I think that’s crazy talk, but with QB Tyrod Taylor and RB Ryan Williams leading the way you never know. Last year’s game in Blacksburg was a blowout, but with only 4 returning starters on defense for the Hokies I think this one will be close. Prediction: Loss
Boston College — Under Chuck Amato we always had success against his former team (4-3 vs. FSU), but TOB has found it very tough sledding against BC with an 0-3 record and an average losing margin of 19.7 points. BC has one of the best O-lines in the ACC and with the return of LB Mark Herzlich could have one of the best LB corps in the NCAA. Add to that RB Montel Harris (264 yds and 5 TDs last year against us) and this should be another blowout, but I have a gut feeling on this one. Prediction: Win
@ East Carolina — Only 8 returning starters (2 on defense) so this is a very inexperienced Pirates team in Ruffin McNeill’s first year. McNeill plans to install the same spread pass happy offense from Texas Tech and the Pirates do return their top two WRs in Dwayne Harris and Darryl Freeney so if they can find a competent QB they should be able to score some points. This is a game where the Pack is the better team and must take care of business. Prediction: Win
Florida State — Last year’s game was fun to watch with the teams combining for 87 points and 1093 total yards of offense. Jimbo Fisher takes over for the legendary Bobby Bowden so there is a little bit of uncertainty with the Noles. FSU is once again the media’s pick to win the ACC Atlantic Division. With Heisman hopeful QB Christian Ponder, one of the best O-lines in the country, and an improved defense you can see why the media loves them. This could be a replay of last year and if so TOB’s Thursday Night struggles will continue. Prediction: Loss
@ Clemson — The Tigers have absolutely dominated the Textile Bowl with 8 wins in the last 10 meetings. The reigning ACC Atlantic Champs lose All-World RB C.J. Spiller, but they are so athletic up and down the lineup I think they could surprise everybody and repeat. That is if Dabo Swinney can actually coach which is still up for debate in my opinion. Regardless I think he gets the best of TOB in Death Valley. Prediction: Loss
Wake Forest — After losing Riley Skinner, best QB in Wake history and a perennial thorn in the side of the Wolfpack, the Demon Deacons are switching their offense back to the option. This does not appear to be a very good team, but the option will give everybody fits and help Wake hang around in games they probably shouldn’t. Jim Grobe is a great coach, but this is a home game and we are the better team so this is a game that you absolutely cannot lose. Prediction: Win
@ North Carolina — Before the whole Agent Scandal I thought the Tarheels could contend for the ACC title. Please don’t shoot! At least I take some joy in helping to put the jinx on them. Anyway, until the NCAA investigation is complete it’s hard to project how this team will do, but I think the damage has been done. I now see this team being a huge bust which would be sweet music to Wolfpack Nation’s ears. All the upperclassmen who spurned the NFL Draft to return did so for two reasons … to make a BCS bowl and to beat NC State. That first dream will be over well before Halloween so when we make the drive over to Chapel Hill we will definitely get their full attention. TOB’s 3-0 honeymoon sadly comes to an end. Prediction: Loss
@ Maryland — The Terps are strong at RB, WR, LB, and Special Teams but pretty weak everywhere else. Last year we tried our hardest to give this game away but finally did prevail. The Terps have won 7 of the last 10 in this series. I think the Pack has the better team, but a possible bowl trip on the line and the Terps playing to send the Fridge out with a win in what could be his final game at Maryland doesn’t give me a good feeling. Prediction: Loss
So I said we could win as few as 3 and as many as 7 games. I admit I totally copped out by taking the middle and predicting a 5-7 overall record. I think it’ll be worse, but I just can’t bring myself to actually publish anything worse than that so the optimism is still there just not nearly as strong as it use to be. I hope TOB & Co. prove me wrong and make it to a bowl, but I just don’t see it happening this year with this schedule. Feel free to comment with your predictions and tell me how smart or stupid you think I am.
Last year I attended every State football game for the first time ever (missed one game in both 2002 and 2003 and two games in 2004). It was fairly easy with 8 home games and only 4 road games. Since I missed the 2008 Papajohns.com Bowl my consecutive games attended streak is currently at 12. I’m no Dewey Corn (yet), but it’s still fun to be there every week living and dying with the Pack and good Lord willing I’ll be there for all 12 (13?) again this year. It will be a lot tougher to pull off with 6 road games and 2 of the 6 home games being on Thursday nights, but I’m still young with no kids so I can do stuff like this. Not that it’s going to change when I do have kids, I just thought that sounded good. On top of that is that fact that I don’t get to see Mrs. DFCF too much since she’s busy doing that whole Doctor thing so I need something to keep me occupied.
Heck I’m even adding in trips to Knoxville, Tennessee on September 18 to watch the Vols-Gators, to Boone on October 30 to see App St.-Furman, and then my shortest trip of the season to Bank of America Stadium here in Charlotte for the ACC Championship Game. There’s even been some talk with some of my buddies here in Charlotte about a trip to Morgantown, West Virginia but I have my doubts that one will happen. If it does happen it would have to be October 23 vs. Syracuse for it to fit in my schedule. Regardless it’s going to be a busy fall for me, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. And speaking of road trips that brings me to the final thing I have planned for the website this season.
It’s going to be called “Road Trippin’ w/ DFCF.” Of course I’ll have stories like in the past, but with my spiffy new iPhone 4 I plan to add some video too. That is if I can edit it down to a PG-13 level. Mama DFCF is one of my loyal readers so I don’t want to embarrass her too much more than I already do. I’m also going to hit up and review some of the local food staples at each school so if you have suggestions let me know. This next idea came up while thinking about some of my past road trip experiences and the vast majority seemed to always involve me and my buddies getting into it with UNC fans no matter where we were. No kidding, those pathetic bandwagon fans are everywhere. So my goal this year is to find somebody at all of our away games wearing UNC gear and get their picture.
So I may be crazy trying to do all that stuff so I may have to skip a few here and there, but this last one I’m giving myself no choice. Last year I went to all the away games with no tickets because my brother could hook me up and leave me tickets at the gate. This year I’m going to all the away games with no tickets again only now I don’t have my brother to rely on so I’ll have to scalp, barter, sell my body … whatever it takes to get tickets. I’ve done my fair share of scalping in the past so I’m not worried about not getting tickets for a game. Let’s face it we are not Texas, Ohio State, USC, etc. so there will be plenty of tickets to be had. Heck I could have got 100 free tickets to the game at FSU last year as there were people every where that couldn’t give away their tickets. And scalping is a heck of a rush so it should be fun. I’m going to make this into a game to see where I can get the best tickets for the cheapest price. If nothing else it’ll be interesting to see how this plays out.
So Saturday was Media/Meet the Pack Day. Go here to see the N&O photo gallery … there’s a few funny pics in there. Not much news from Media Day other than TOB saying, “We have enough weapons, I believe, offensively and defensively to have a winning season and get to a bowl game.” I hope he knows what he’s talking about. Of course he followed that statement with “injuries could change that” which is fastly becoming his calling card here at State. This is year four so I guess he still needs time to build up the depth chart? If the depth chart is still thin why are we still kicking guys off the team?
Speaking of that Denzelle Good was added to the growing list of guys (Donald Bowens, DeAndre Morgan, Dominique Ellis, Jimmual Simmons, and Chris Ward just to name a few) TOB has kicked to the curb. A few probably deservedly so, but as many or more for little to no reason at all. I could elaborate, but I’ll just leave it at that. Good had a lot of promise coming out of high school being one of the most talked about players at the 2008 Shrine Bowl so I had high hopes for him. In other attrition news, Morgan Alexander was forced to leave the team due to bad grades. He was very impressive last year on the scout team and a player even the coaches had raved about so of course I was excited to see what he could do in the Red & White. Oh well I can still play with him on NCAA Football 11. These losses won’t be felt this year, but it does weaken the depth chart down the road.
While everybody was at Meet the Pack Day I was helping Mrs. DFCF get some stuff done around the house. With only two more weekends left after this one before the season starts and all my Saturdays are booked up she knew to take advantage of the day. While I was finishing my honey-do list I was thinking about Wolfpack Football … shocker! I wanted to finalize my plans for the website too. It might be a little audacious but here’s what I have planned for the season:
There’s one other thing, but I need a whole write-up to do it justice so check back later in the week. Of course I’ll have my random rants, crazy stories, self deprecation, and such but I wanted to have something for my readers to depend on every week (kinda like a Wolfpack Football information crack if you will). The countdown is under 20 days. Woohoo! Bring on some football!
For the newest “Pack the Caption” (photo by Ethan Hyman, News & Observer) I’m placing one on a tee for you. Swing away!
Say hello to my little friend!
So this year I was asked to be in a college fantasy football league. Being the college football “expert” that I am this was a no-brainer. I’ve been playing regular fantasy football since my freshman year at State (’99) so I know the ins and outs of how that works. Well I like to think I do anyways. I’m usually competitive, but I’ve only won my league one freaking time. I’m still bitter about the three times I won the regular season to only get bounced in the playoffs so don’t get me started about that.
So this will be my maiden voyage into college fantasy football. I’ve been doing my research over the past few days since our draft is Sunday night, but I still have no idea of what strategy to use. I probably won’t end up with any State players since half the league is State grads, but I can say that I will definitely not be drafting any Tarheels. That is unless I get an all expenses paid trip to Marvin Austin’s next party at Club LIV. I’m not ashamed to admit that I can be bought for the right price.
I mulled over my team name for several hours. Obviously I wanted to have an NC State related name and I also wanted to show some homage to the history of NC State football. Here’s some of the ones I thought of that didn’t make the cut:
I could go on and on and on coming up with team names (leave your best fantasy team name ideas in the comments). It was a lot of fun doing that, but I had to settle on one so my college fantasy football team name is … 18 Roman Candles. Roman Gabriel was the first Pack player to have his jersey retired and he was the first person to put NC State football on the map so it was a pretty easy choice. I’ll post my roster after Sunday’s draft so everybody can make fun of my selections. I’ll also update how my season’s going a few times during the year (or weekly if I’m dominating the league). I’d be willing to start a DFCF league if enough people are interested send me an email (dfcf99 at gmail dot com).
The Pack held their first scrimmage on Monday and the stats that were released sure as heck don’t give me a warm fuzzy feeling inside. Check ‘em out for yourself:
I know you can’t put too much stock into these stats because they were working on a lot of situational stuff, but you also can’t totally ignore them. We all know how bad the defense is so this doesn’t seem to bode too well for the offense, especially the offensive line and the running backs. With a running back tandem recently dubbed “Sonic Boom” one would expect more than 1.6 yards per carry average. Wait, we have a running back tandem that has a nickname?
Surely there’s been other running back tandems with this nickname, but it’s catchy and I’ve never heard it before so I’ll give a solid B grade for creativity. For execution, however, it’s more like a D-. Two guys that have combined for 72 carries, 276 yards, and 3 TDs so far in their collegiate careers don’t really deserve a nickname. I’ll cut Washington (Sonic) and Underwood (Boom) some slack since it was Audi Augustin that came up with the nickname, but what about Tony Creecy, Brandon Barnes, and Mustafa Greene? I got it … Mach, 9, and Hyper respectively for a sick running back quintuple called “Mach 9 Hyper Sonic Boom.” Now that sounds pretty kickass I must say.
In other news from today’s scrimmage Nate Irving was held out for precautionary reasons and Russell Wilson looked very rusty. The second part is something that has gone largely ignored so far this preseason. Russell has proven how good a quarterback he is and what he means to the NC State football team, but he hasn’t done any football related activities in the last 8 months (sorry, throwing the football around with your baseball teammates before a game doesn’t count) so of course he’s going to be rusty. I have faith that the rust will be gone by the start of the season and if it lingers for the Western Carolina game it really won’t matter, but if it’s still around on Sept. 11 then that turns a toss-up game against UCF into a very loseable proposition.
Finally, I don’t talk too much about recruiting around here because, frankly, there’s rarely anything exciting to talk about and that’s a huge problem. TOB just doesn’t seem to relate well to high school kids in the South and thus his recruiting has declined every year since he got here. You cannot build a successful program with nothing but “sleepers” and “diamonds in the rough” but that seems to be his strategy. Well if you thought NC State recruiting couldn’t get any worse than it has been the past 2 years … guess again. Damn!
The ACC has announced the 2010 ACC Football Legends class and our representative is the great Ted Brown. The best running back in NC State and ACC history finally gets his due. He joins previous Wolfpack legends Roman Gabriel (2005), Jim Ritcher (2006), Dennis Byrd (2007), Bill Yoest (2008), and Willie Burden (2009) to get this honor. One word comes to mind when I think of Ted Brown … STUD! He set the ACC career rushing record in 1978 and it still stands to this day some 32 years later. Ted Brown made the #23 cool way before that ‘Air Whatever’ guy did at that school with the ugly color blue. His #23 is without a doubt one of the eight retired jerseys that you can see on display at Carter-Finley
Here’s what the ACC media release had to say about Ted:
“Ted Brown (1975-78) is the only player in ACC history to be named to the first-team All-ACC Football team for four consecutive seasons (1975-78). He ended his career in 1978 ranked 4th on the NCAA’s all-time rushing list and he still is the leading rusher in ACC history, having accumulated 4,602 yards. He scored an ACC-record 49 rushing touchdowns and holds NC State school records for most yards in a season (1,350), most touchdowns (51) and longest run from scrimmage (95 yards vs. Syracuse in 1977). Named a consensus All-America in 1978, he was a first-round draft choice of the Minnesota Vikings. The 16th player selected in the 1979 NFL Draft, Brown ran for 4,546 yards and 53 touchdowns in an eight-year career in the National Football League. He was named to the ACC’s 50th Anniversary Football Team in 2003. Originally a native of High Point, N.C., he now lives in Apple Valley, Minn.”
Wolfpack Nation already knew you were an ACC football legend, now it’s been made official. The 2010 ACC Football Legends class will be recognized at the 2010 ACC Football Championship Game here in Charlotte on December 4th. I should be there so I’ll definitely give Mr. Brown a standing ovation for all he’s meant to the NC State football program. #23 … you da man! Congrats!
