Breaking News

The Sentinel says today that an announcement is expected that BG will play OSU on Oct 7, 2006.

The Lions are on the clock...

Mlive notes from Killer on Stoney and Wojo

Outspoken Killer...

Killer WDFN Notes: From 10-6 to 6-10
For the record, Tom Kowalski was planning on making one prediction and sticking to it the entire season regardless of how events played out on the field. He picked 10 wins, and I believe he even used the phrase "They should be at least 10-6."

That was before massive embarrassment on national television, losing to the Rams on Monday Night Football 37-13. On Tuesday he came into our chat, and on Stoney and Wojo on Sports Radio 1130 Detroit to change his prediction and apologize. Here are the WDFN notes.

• "I have to apologize to everyone who I confused and baffled by saying how good this team looked. All the speed and talent. None of it's true."


• "They should be 10-6, and if not heads should roll."


• Went through the tape later, and it was worse than it appeared from the press box.


• They were brutal in the trenches, and with the Bears, Panthers coming up it won't even be a fair fight.


• People in this (Lions HQ) building are stunned.


• These D-Linemen went nowhere. "They were manhandled"


• We knew this O-Line wasn't dominant. We've known that for a couple of years, but they tried counters and traps -- but run blitzes reduce what they have.


• The passing game is throw it up to a WR running one-on-one. "There's no rhyme or reason for this thing." The offense is to see a guy with one defender, heave it, and hope.


• Wojo: For recording purposes, we need your pick. Killer: "You can start the tape recorders now, this team is going to be 6-10."


• If Bulger, Holt, Jackson and Bruce were out there the whole time they'd put up 60 points.


• It's both coaching and players, but you have to lay this on Mariucci's doorstep. "I've never seen a team more ill-equipped." They were so high for this game, what would have happened if they weren't up?


• You can't lay this one on Harrington. If your QB has no time he'll never do well.


• "There's always next year." ... "I hate this downtime before the draft."


• He says they need to do something gimmicky, like 4 WR sets to avoid blitzes. Yes, you admit you're beaten, but it's better than being humiliated.


• Stoney: The Detroit Lions are on the clock.

Lions Cuts Made....Go Home People...no news here

Perhaps Timmy Chang getting cut was a surprise. On the other hand, I am glad Chip Cox got cut, because he is a douchbag. Hope you picked up that OU degree.

Now, the Lions site says we have 72 players. It also says we had to be at 65 by 4:00, and doesn't act like there is a problem that 72 is actually higher than 65. Perhaps there are some double-secret exemptions.

Anderson, Adam	P	6-0	190	24	6/28/81	R	Western Michigan	Grand Rapids, Mich.	FA '05
Carberry, Kevin	DT	6-4	282	22	5/19/83	R	Ohio	Oak Lawn, Ill.	FA '05
Chang, Timmy	QB	6-1	207	23	10/9/81	R	Hawaii	Honolulu, Hawaii	FA '05
Cox, Chip	S	5-9	190	22	6/24/83	R	Ohio	Ohio	FA '05
Curry, Kentrell	S	6-1	202	24	5/11/81	1	Georgia	Toccoa, Ga.	FA '04
Echols, Michael	CB	5-10	188	26	10/13/78	3	Wisconsin	Youngstown, Ohio	PS (Min) '04
Eldridge, Nigel	LB	6-1	224	23	3/14/82	R	Alabama-Birmingham	Montgomery, Ala.	FA '05
Hanoian, Greg	FB	6-2	250	23	12/9/81	R	Syracuse	Providence, R.I.	FA '05
Jackson, Howard	RB	5-10	165	22	9/24/82	R	Texas El-Paso	Freeport, Texas	FA '05
Jasmin, Marcus	DT	6-5	325	22	11/15/82	R	Texas A&M	New Orleans, La.	FA '05
Killeen, Ryan	K	5-11	185	22	7/11/83	R	Southern California	Norco, Calif.	FA '05
Newton, Levi	G	6-4	310	22	6/30/83	R	South Florida	Jacksonville, Fla.	FA '05
Proctor, Cory	G	6-4	312	22	10/18/82	R	Montana	Missoula, Mont.	FA '05
Savoy, Steve	WR	5-11	191	23	2/27/82	R	Utah	Washington D.C.	FA '05
Swift, Justin	TE	6-3	258	30	8/14/75	5	Kansas State	Overland Park, Kan.	FA '05

Lions Blow Chunks, Suck Suckety Suck Suck

I was all set to let loose with a nice critique of our progress in the game tonight, part of the road to respectability. Yet, we totally and completely stunk. That Redzone series was an abomination, and that might have been the game's high point.

Can we cut like 85 guys tomorrow and start over? Is the 65 roster limit a ceiling or a floor?

Update: Mooch says it was "alarming." No kidding.

Afterward, Mariucci called it "alarming. We've got a lot of work to do. That's stating the obvious. There's no excuse for a game like this."

After Mariucci addressed the team following the game, none of the veterans stood up to speak their mind about what had just happened on the field. Lions veteran backup quarterback Jeff Garcia admits he was a little surprised.

Killer is chatting right now on Mlive, in a veritable hornet's nest. Most of the attention is on Joey, but he got no protection last night at all. None.

That's not a .500 team. Maybe things will change, but that's not a .500 team based on last night. It might even be a 4 win team.

Check back at 4 for news on the cuts, which will not include nearly enough players.

Update II: Here's the Killer chat transcript. He's pretty blunt:

FIRST OF ALL, I'D LIKE TO ISSUE AN APOLOGY ... I BOUGHT INTO THE NONSENSE ... THIS TEAM IS HEADED FOR 5-11, NOT 6-10 [he actually meant his 10-6 prediction] ... I LOST SIGHT OF ONE OF THE GAME'S ESSENTIALS ... THEY'RE WON AND LOST IN THE TRENCHES AND THE LIONS ARE VERY SOFT THERE ... SO, PLEASE ACCEPT MY APOLOGY FOR BUILDING FALSE HOPES ...

Reds strong second-half continues

The beats goes on for the Reds, who have blown through Washington and Pittsburgh with five wins in six attempts. Things are really rolling along. Milton pitched well last night, and Hudson pitched well today, and in both cases, the offense eventually kicked in, and we picked up the wins. We go again tomorrow in a daytimer @ Pitt to try and take a four game sweep from the Bucs.

Junior has a 14-game hitting streak, and continues to fend off rumors that he will be traded. Now, however, a little test comes. After Monday, we have Houston and Atlanta on the road...these are good teams playing for the post-season. It will be a nice barometer that will indicate whether we are close to putting enough power together to compete next season.

Now, as for tracking our goals:

3rd place: Very much in play. We are only 1.5 games behind the Brewers. We have seven games left with Milwaukee and three with the Cubs, so we have an opportunity to put ourselves into third place on the field. Given how this season started, that would be a remarkable accomplishment.

.500 overall--We are 62-68, six games under. We would have to go 19-13 on the way home to finish .500 overall. Tough, but not impossible.

.500 after the break--We re 26-15 after the break. With 32 games left, that makes 73 total. We only have to win 11 of our remaining 32 games to reach this mark. It would be a significant accomplishment, as well.

Leading the NL after the break--At 26-15, we have the best record in the NL, by a 1/2 game over the Cardinals. We have plenty of games left with them. There are stil a number of teams in our neighborhood, so this one will probably end up being a stretch.

Equalling last year's record: We won 76 a year ago. 14 wins in our last 32 would get us there. I have to believe we will make this.

Wisconsin game notes out

The game notes for Wisconsin are out, and as always the depth chart is the most interesting. The primary news is that major changes are showing up in the secondary. The look is much younger, and some shifting went on.

At the start of fall practice, here was the alignment at CB.

Mayberry (Sr) Jordan (Sr)
Johnson (r-Jr) Nicholson (5Sr)

Today, the corners look like this:

Jordan (Sr) Smith (Fr.)
Johnson (r-Jr) Lewis (Fr)

Now, the safeties. At the start it was:

Crumpler (5 Sr) Dozier (r-Fr)
Perry (r-So) Waldron (r-Fr)

Today, the look like this:

Mayberry (Sr) Perry (r-So)
Dozier (r-Fr) Nicholson (5-Sr)

So, Mayberry and Nicholson are moved to Safety, and Perry is moved back into his starting role, which he had sort of relinquished while he worked on his academic issues. And taking their place at corner are two true freshmen. Coach had talked well about Antonio Smith, who is from Miami FL, and is supposed to be quick.

First question--are all the guys who moved out healthy? I'm glad for the competition, and I'm glad to see us not reflexively redshirting all true freshmen. On the other hand, it leaves us very young at corner. Let's see what our new DC can do.

I like Perry, and I'm glad to see him in the lineup. It will be interesting to see how Mayberry adapts to safety. Of course, with today's multi-receiver threats, it seems like the safeties can end up in pass coverage like corners a lot.

On offense, there's been a little movement. At center, Jonathan Culp has beaten out John Lanning to start. Coaches had been foreshadowing that for a while. More interesting is receiver. I think everyone had assumed Brandon Jones and Derrick Lett were the next generation. We hadn't seen much out of them in games, but we had real depth at receiver already. So we didn't know, but we assumed they could play, perhaps mixed with a little trepediation. And when fall practice started, they were in the mix, as was Kenneth Brantley.

In the meantime, Brantley is injured, and Marques Parks and Corey Partridge, both R-Fr, have slipped into the first string. Partridge has been awesome in the spring game and scrimmages I have seen (he's in the Magner mold), so I'm excited about that. I don't know too much about Parks. He's from McDonald, PA, which is south of Pittsburgh. I do love getting players from that part of the country. They are football players. He wasn't especially honored in HS, but you can't always tell from that.

We need to be deep at receiver, so let's hope this is a case of Partridge and Parks moving up past Lett and Jones, and not Lett and Jones sinking down below Partridge and Parks.

I spent a little time look at the distribution of the classes among the 53 players listed on the depth chart. Here's what I found:

5 years: 11
4 years: 16
3 years: 11
2 years: 12
1 year: 3

I've never looked at this before, so I can't tell, but it seems like that's a more even distribution than you might find in other situations. On the other hand, more than half (27 or 53) of the players are in their fourth or fifth year. Then, 26 of the 53 are in their second and third years.

Clearly, that class that is now in its fourth year was an absolute doozy. That was the last UM class to enroll here. The pressure will be on those next two classes to carry the tradition forward. We haven't been hurt by graduation yet during the Meyer/Brandon era, but next year could be a challenge. And with it being the first non-UM team, people could start to talk.

Jr and Harang lead Reds past Pirates in deluge

Another nice win on the road for the Reds, who continue to play very well in the second half. As much as anything, it was great to see how much fun they were having out there. Hopefully, that will be infectious and foreshadow a resurgance next year. I think this club could content with a little pitching in 2006.