Jinks Presser: The Right Way

So today's presser...

Doege is day to day and questionable for Saturday.  The injury is not season-ending, but Doege has "a lot of football" left in his life and he won't play if he isn't 100%.  Morgan should start on Saturday.

Apparently, only because no one else is available.  This was the biggest part of the presser...

When asked about how you coached a player to not check from a run into a pass and a pick six that loses you the game, he said you do it by not playing if he does.

He then said:  that's why Doege was in there and if we had another guy who was ready to play, he would have been in.

I'll just leave that right here.

Cam Jefferies is questionable also and won't play unless he is 100%.

There was a lot of talk about Clint Stephens playing well.  He also noted that the injury let them get Darius Wortham into the lineup and he played well.

You will also continue to see Grant Loy in specialized sets.

The rest of the interesting stuff all dealt with the future of the program.  Jinks is in a "stay the course" mode, which is fine.  I don't think he has much option.  I'm not sure he's stayed the course as much as he thinks....we've gone from Air Raid to a running identity to...well, something else in the first 5 games this year.

He says the roster is better than last year, when the injury to Jefferies would have been "catastrophic."

Note:  worst start in 29 years is apparently not a catastrophe.

The fact that we rallied and took the lead against Akron shows the grown of the program, since we were down 20-6 at one point.  We need to finish games, which is actually an old Clawson refrain.  (More on that in a second).

Someone in the media prefaced a question by saying Jinks has had "a ton of success in your coaching career"

Nominations are closed for the suck-up question of the year at BG pressers.  That's also a wow.  I mean, he's had some success.  A ton?  I don't think so.  Nick Saban has had "a ton" of success.  Doyt Perry had a "ton" of success.  Mike Jinks has had "some success."  And no success here.

The question was whether a similar thing had happened inside this "ton" of success.

Coach said it had.  He had taken some jobs which were "rebuilding" jobs, like this one.  He noted that in HS you had one-year contracts and they "want you out just as bad."

He finished with this..."we will continue to build this thing the right way."

So, the last coach we had who talked that way was Dave Clawson.  And he did.  He built a program that won two MAC titles in three years and could have won three if Matt Johnson hadn't been injured. 

And look, he followed a similar route.  He had an OK year in his first year (though in a bowl game) and then an awful second year before things started to slowly turn around.  In year three he preached that BG had to "close the deal."

All those things sound familiar.  But saying we will "do the right thing" doesn't make Mike Jinks into Dave Clawson.  In fact, it didn't make Dave Clawson into Dave Clawson....actually doing it did.

Also, Mike Jinks took over a defending champion and Dave Clawson was only here because the previous coach tanked the program.  You knew he was going to need to rebuild, that's what he was brought in to do.

Anyway, Jinks urged us to stay the course.  I'll be in my seats long after he's gone, whether that's with success or failure.  The only choice a fan has is to walk away and that isn't happening.  For me.