jikespingleton said:
bear2be2 said:
jikespingleton said:
bear2be2 said:
blackie said:
RD2WINAGNBEAR86 said:
Stefano DiMera said:
Probably the 5th time you've posted that.
Never met a male so focused on tampons.
No need to be pissy. It was just a joke. Baylor Football is 8-4 and should certainly accept their participation trophy. Life is good.
Its not about participation trophies. It is about 15 extra practices, recruiting narrative, and general perception of the program.
Both our 2013 championship team and our 2019 Sugar Bowl team benefitted greatly from the boost they got off "mediocre" bowl wins.
How did they benefit greatly and which specific bowl wins are you referring to?
If what you claim is true, then wouldn't we have been hurt greatly by the loss to UCF in the Fiesta bowl in 2013 and the loss to Georgia in 2019? Seems to me that we did just fine in 2014 and in 2021 after Covid and CDA got his feet wet.
It wasn't just the bowl game in 2012 and 2018. It was the momentum those bowl wins preserved/continued.
In 2012, we rallied from a 4-5 start (1-5 in Big 12 play) to win our last four games with a lopsided bowl win over UCLA.
In 2018, we bounced back from four losses in five games -- the last a really tough one to a bad TCU team -- to earn a bowl berth with a unexpected win over Tech and continued that momentum with an impressive bowl win over a solid Vandy team.
In both cases, teams that many had concluded were mediocre or worse finished the season playing good football -- not unlike our team this year.
That stuff matters. Momentum and confidence are a huge deal in college football.
I think you are putting far too much value on the bowl games (and presumably the 2-3 weeks of practices they come with).
A bowl game is a drop in the bucket compared to the amount of time spent lifting weights, conditioning and working with your teammates throughout the year. Strength can be built throughout the year, but cohesiveness and game-ready skills are build during the summer and through the playing season. I guess some would argue spring practice counts, too. My point is that those months and months of practice and playing games (May-Nov) are what builds teams - not a bowl game.
Momentum as related to how a team plays, can only be gained while the team is playing. Once the season (or bowl game) is over, they won't play another team for 8-9 months.
Whatever playing momentum that was had in the prior season evaporates quickly after the last game is played. New momentum has to be built. It's not magically transferred from a prior season.
What you have, in effect, just said is that experience doesn't matter in college football, which could not be further from the truth. In fact, in leagues where no one is recruiting blue chip freshmen, nothing matters more.
The experience gained one season 100 percent feeds into the next. We saw that early this season when we couldn't win a close game to save our lives. Now that we've learned to win games, that won't be a hurdle we have to clear early next season. Our returning leaders will enter the 2025 campaign with that skill (yes, winning is a skill), and it will help us in the foundational part of next season.
Is it a guarantee of success? No. Nothing is. But our history with experienced, confident teams is pretty damn good. And I'll happily take our chances with one next season.