Where I Come From: Expectations For The 2010 Oklahoma Football Season
by ccmachine on Jul 12, 2010 1:18 AM CDT
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We spent last week wrapped in great conversation about past seasons and past heros but now its time to look ahead a bit. Today's topic of conversation is expectations. What should we realistically expect from our 2010 Oklahoma Sooners? I'm expecting history to repeat itself. You know, it is an even year and over the last decade (2000,2002,2004,2006,2008,????) that has meant the year of the Sooners.
Defensively
With Jeremy Beal and Frank Alexander on the ends I'm expecting Oklahoma to lead the Big 12 in sacks. These two guys could very well end up being the best defensive end tandem in the conference and when Venables decides to send the blitz its sure to make things interesting.
Even with replacing two starters at linebacker I'm expecting Oklahoma to have the top rushing defense in the Big 12. Last season the Sooners were third in the conference in rush defense but with the insertion of Tom Wort andRonnell Lewis along side two-time leading tackler Travis Lewis, seeing improvement shouldn't be a stretch.
I expect the secondary to struggle initially. Brian Jackson and Dominique Franks are gone and it could take Demontre Hurst and Jonathan Nelson a bit to adjust. Throw in a new starter at strong safety and you've got three out of four starters being replaced from last season. With Florida State coming up in the second week of the season they're going to get an early test.
Offensively
I'm expecting improvement from the offensive line. This is a must in order for the 2010 season to have any measure of success. You know it, I know it, opposing defenses know it and most importantly the guys who'll be in the trenches for Oklahoma know it. They've had a year to sit on the disappointment and frustration from last season. There's no way this unit isn't improved in 2010.
I'm expecting a career year from DeMarco Murray. He's as healthy as he's been since the start of his freshman year and he'll be the work horse/feature back in 2010.
I'm expecting a great season from Landry Jones. He's not prepping to go into the season as the backup this year. He's going in as the starter. He's got a year under his belt and keep in mind that the only Sooner quarterback to have a better freshman season than Jones was a guy named Sam Bradford.
Special Teams
I expect Ryan Broyles and Mossis Madu to be spectacular on both punt and kickoff returns. In turn I expect Oklahoma's return defense to be as stout as what we saw last year.
Tress Way was very good last season as a punter and can only get better through off-season workouts. I expect him to have another stellar season.
I expect Oklahoma to select one place kicker and stick with him. Right now Patrick O'Hara has the nod on the latest depth chart but whoever goes into the season as #1 needs to be the guy all season long.
Overall
I believe that this is a season where a 10-2 regular season will win the Big 12 South and call me a homer but I still like the South over the North. A Big 12 championship would put Oklahoma back into a BCS bowl game and most likely a Top 10 finish in the final rankings. That's where I expect Oklahoma to be and with a few breaks here or there we could easily see something even greater.
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Great overview of position expectations CC
I fully agree.
My person expectations for the season:
I expect OU to run the table in the regular season.
Seriously. As I look at our schedule right now, we are better than any team we have on there, except for Texas who is equal, but they will be having a new starting QB. As seen in last years game, and in games past, the OU/Texas game is not like other games. It helps to have an experienced QB…and guess which team has the most experience QB?
Sure OU lost a lot of players to the NFL and high draft picks. Many outsiders would assume that the guys behind aren’t as good. They’d be wrong. In many ways this team will have more talent and depth than last year’s team.
Air Force? Please. Size restrictions for the military alone mean OU will beat them in the 4th quarter
Florida St: Has a good club. They had a great recruiting class. But those players are freshmen and shouldn’t play much this year. This game is in Norman. The rematch in Tallahassee in a couple of years, will be tougher. Tthis year, FSU is not going to beat OU in Norman.
At Cincinnati? They lost their starting QB, granted their back up played a lot and is very good too. They also lost their head coach. Again, tough match up, but OU should be favored to win.
The Big 12? Our North teams are @Iowa St, @ Missouri and Colorado. CU maybe the worst team in the Big 12. Both Iowa St and Missouri are good, and they are road games, but they are not OU level quality.
Tech? Does anyone know what offense they are going to run? Losing Leach and they lost a lot of their identity. OU wins
@ OSU? They lost everyone from last year’s team OU Wins
Baylor? hell, it’s Baylor. Granted they get that good QB back this year.
@ aTm? Ok, this one could be the 2nd toughest game. They have a great defense, and their offense came together at the end of the year, plus it’s at Kyle Field which maybe the toughest stadium to play at in the conference. BUT can you really say that A&M is better than OU?
We run the regular season table, and then beat Nebraska in the Big 12 Championship game, cause that’s what OU does. We win Big 12 championships and we beat Nebraska at the end of seasons.
Then I think we get shut out of the BCS, which will have this thinking: “Oh, it’s Oklahoma again, ummmm…..Let’s take anyone BUT Oklahoma. OH! Let’s give it to Boise St this year, so we (the NCAA) can pretend the BCS works for everyone” They will play the winner of Ohio St and Iowa. (I don’t think anyone goes through the SEC undefeated this year)
Colorado Rockies correspondent at My Team Rivals (www.mtrmedia.com/rockies) and my own site Rockies Reporter (www.rockiesreporter.wordpress.com) and one of the top Rockies writers at the Bleacher Report.
I mostly agree with you
On paper, we should win every single game. A&M’s defense didn’t put up much of a fight last year, and Jerrod Johnson threw an unbelievable amount of passes out of bounds. Still, things can change season to season. It definitely would be nice to start another decade with a national championship.
by KratosWasASooner on Jul 12, 2010 6:01 PM CDT up reply actions
You lost all credibility by stating that A&M has a great defense.
Sports is man's joke on God, You see, God says to man, 'I've created a universe where it seems like everything matters, where you'll have to grapple with life and death and in the end you'll die anyway, and it won't really matter.' So man says to God, 'Oh, yeah? Within your universe we're going to create a sub-universe called sports, one that absolutely doesn't matter, and we'll follow everything that happens in it as if it were life and death.'" - Sam Kellerman
They did last year
Colorado Rockies correspondent at My Team Rivals (www.mtrmedia.com/rockies) and my own site Rockies Reporter (www.rockiesreporter.wordpress.com) and one of the top Rockies writers at the Bleacher Report.
I guess you don't remember
them giving up 60 plus points to OU and K-ST, giving up 49 to Texas, I believe it was 47 to Arkansas and 35 to Colorado.
Sports is man's joke on God, You see, God says to man, 'I've created a universe where it seems like everything matters, where you'll have to grapple with life and death and in the end you'll die anyway, and it won't really matter.' So man says to God, 'Oh, yeah? Within your universe we're going to create a sub-universe called sports, one that absolutely doesn't matter, and we'll follow everything that happens in it as if it were life and death.'" - Sam Kellerman
SO...
I went to the Big 12. Looked up stats
A&M is dead last in scoring D. And Total yardage in the Big 12 in 2009.
LINK
Seriously where did I get they had a good D?
Colorado Rockies correspondent at My Team Rivals (www.mtrmedia.com/rockies) and my own site Rockies Reporter (www.rockiesreporter.wordpress.com) and one of the top Rockies writers at the Bleacher Report.
My take
Just imagine the idea of Beal, Alexander, McFarland and they drop The Hammer down to rush end, I just got chills. We should absolutely terrorize QBs this year and I SINCERELY hope we see more defensive schemes like the one from the texass game last year rather than just the status quo defenses we tend to fall back into at times.
I’m more optimistic about our secondary and I don’t think Nelson will struggle in the slightest. He started for a majority of last year and everything I’ve read says he’s staying at safety (at least initially) so he won’t have to start at a new position.
Definitely not as big a fan as Madu on kickoffs. I really hope that’s one of the changes we see this year as he just brought nothing to the return game last year and had a terrible fumble in Dallas that sticks out in my mind.
As for kicker, who the heck knows. It absolutely baffles me as to why we cannot seem to recruit a top notch kicker. At a program like OU, there is no reason why we should be entertaining multiple walk on guys on a yearly basis or relying on a guy who can barely reach the 15 yard line on kickoffs. Totally unacceptable, I mean how many games did our freaking kickers cost us last year? BYU, Miami, texass, Nebraska?!?
As for our record, I like the way you think Hawk! With our non-con, if we get by texass there is no way you convince me we aren’t ranked #1 in the country. We have several difficult games on our schedule, but there is no reason (barring injuries) to think we can’t run the table.
"We call him The Hammer." - Bob Stoops on Ronnell Lewis
I think we'll be better than everyone on our schedule.
But I’ll be surprised if we don’t drop one somewhere on the road. I do believe OU will get Texas and it might be by a pretty large margin. I predict a Big XII title, Fiesta Bowl, and if things fall right, BCS title game.
No reason to expect OU to do anything other than win the big 12. Period. That’s what we do. I expect A&M to be toughest game. All Landry has to do is manage the game. Our offense is ridiculously better than the aggie defense.
by OU JJ on Jul 13, 2010 11:51 AM CDT via mobile up reply actions
I think we will be favored in all our games
even if its by a small margin. The FSU game will be tough, but at home I think we’ll take em. Maybe we will win all those close games this year with a little more experience. The game should slow down for Landry and he’ll see the field better/make better decisions. If the line performs decent teams will have to respect our running game and that will open up what I think will be a very potent passing attack. With Broyles, Reynolds and Miller there’s big play potential all over the field. Add Caleb, maybe Kenny and rising freshman Stills and you have plenty of depth. Then the short passing game with Murry and hopefully Brennen Clay (I think he’s gonna be special). That’s a lot of options for an opponent to defend. Our defense should keep us in any game and will probably give the O a short field on a regular basis. I can’t wait for the season to start. Boomer!!
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