BillySee58

Yeah someone like Arnold or Preston Stone would be great. Then after that I think Mestemaker or Jimerson would either be ready to take over or we’d know by then if they aren’t really starter caliber guys. Really hope we up our NIL game to keep Morris for another year. There should be a Chandler Morris billboard/commercial for all the local businesses that support UNT. Bill Utter Ford, Metzler’s, Ramey King Insurance, etc.

Yeah, definitely had that “bubble” feel to it early. SMU NIL saying they’d pay their entire scholarship roster like $40k per year, Duke using NIL to poach our guard commit from Angelo State just to be a depth guy over there, etc. Feels like early on there was an approach of “hey, we have the money to spend it on these guys so let’s do it” and has shifted towards a more prudent approach. Definitely normalizing to be more of an exact science and it doesn’t feel to have thrown the competitive balance very far off from where it was pre NIL.

Feels like there’s still just not all that much money going around at G5 schools. Maybe some QBs but outside of that it still seems like good HS recruiting plus landing the right portal and JUCO guys is still more relevant than being able to money whip other G5/FCS schools for all the spots up and down your roster. As long as there’s a scholarship limit at the P4 schools I just see that remaining the case at the G5 level.

https://youtu.be/3V8a4YQGr6I?si=rHQLcJYRMqkHvtXo We talk Tulsa and answer some of your questions. 4. And. One! 4. And. One! 4. And. One!

Hey, guys. We will be answering mailbag questions this week on the pod. Get them in here and we will try our best to answer them on this week’s episode.

I feel like you took the “discourse is terrible” comment personally. I just scanned through the comments plus was going off of previous comments in other threads when I made my comment. Wasn’t meant to be personal or adversarial. Who is your favorite QB isn’t even discourse.

I also agree on Rogers. I think Fine, Morris, and Rogers were/are all very good college quarterbacks and I like the conversation of evaluating their quality here because I think it is a really good discussion, as long as we are just evaluating quality. Because if the conversation is “who accomplished more as a Mean Green QB” then obviously the answer is Fine and there’s no room for discussion regarding the Chandlers. Not sure of the exact number attributable to Fine, but we were sacked 136 times in the 52 games he was on the roster. Call it 120 sacks on Fine in the 49 games he played. That’s about 2.5 sacks taken per game by Fine. And it wasn’t just because we had a bad offensive line. He held on to the ball too long at times throughout his career. Obviously he made up for it, with his performance on the drive being an example that he could get the ball out when he needed to. This year our line hasn’t exactly been the pillar of consistency in pass protection or with health. Still, Morris has been sacked just 5 times in 5 games and beyond that he just has a better feel on when to climb, when to get out, and having that internal clock to know when to get the ball out. Not to mention doing this with two of our top three outside receivers missing a lot of time. Throwing to Guyton and Bussey on the outside compared to Blair Conwright and Nick Rempert is a material factor to consider as well. And also, if we’re just evaluating quality of play, Morris has mostly faced bad defenses here but he does have a 461 yard passing performance in Waco against a highly ranked Baylor team on his resume. Again, if we’re evaluating the body of work in a Mean Green career there is no argument. But if we’re just evaluating who is the better QB, that opens up going off of all available sample. Morris’ TCU career he completed 65.5% of his passes and is right at the same number here at UNT, which leads credence that this isn’t a fluke what we have seen in just five games. He has three 400-yard passing performances in his 14 career college starts which is as many as Fine had in 48. Definitely understand the desire for more sample size to solidify any stance, even qualitative. Morris will never surpass Fine’s UNT totals. These three are all really good Mean Green QBs and they all have put together really high levels of QB play here that feel and are pretty comparable. That’s why there’s a discussion, which is subject to and absolutely allowed to change.

Sure, there’s some room for interpretation. But it’s pretty clear that if the question was something along the lines of “Who ya got as having the best legacy at QB in school history?” or anything along the lines that would involve full body of work, of course the 4-year starter is clearing the guy who has played 5 games here, or the guy who played just one season here. There is no conversation involving full body of work that could be realistically be made between Fine and the other two right now. Who is better, who you would pick between the three, who is the better QB, those kind of questions that center around quality, not quantity are the only ones that can be had between these guys at this point.

Morris is the better quarterback and everyone sees it, whether they want to admit it or not. The discourse here is terrible. Fine being here for four years or Morris being here for potentially just one is irrelevant to who is the better quarterback. Same for bowl wins. I know we really want one badly, but there are a lot of variables to winning a bowl game outside of how good the QB is. Who is better at playing the position? Fine being here for four years or being a great story doesn’t factor into that determination. Morris has him beat in terms of pocket presence, accuracy, arm strength, and ability to read a defense. We can wait to crown Morris until the season is over, but he is better as a QB than Fine. Hopefully he plays up to his ability the rest of the way, because if he doesn’t then it’ll just be a wasted opportunity for this team and program. I fully expect him to keep it up though.

According to the SRS (simple rating system) on sports reference, the 2024 team’s current rating is +3.67 which is good for 6th best in program history as it stands, behind ‘77, ‘78, ‘67, ‘66, and ‘59. I like the SRS because it gives a good approximation of where a team stands relative to the field in college football that season, with strength of schedule and margin of victory playing roles. For example, SRS does not rate the early 2000s team very favorably among the entire field of FBS teams those years, despite winning the relatively weak Sun Belt. 2017 is a similar story. Meanwhile those late 50s-70s teams were performing well against legit competition. According to SRS, this is our best team since returning to the FBS and one of only four teams with a positive SRS in that time frame. 2024 - +3.67 2013 - +3.05 2002 - +0.61 2018 - +0.58

Tulsa allowed an average of 366 yards coming into yesterday. We racked up 620, 254 over their season average against other opponents. South Alabama has averaged allowing 421 yards since we played them. We had 550, 129 over their season average against other opponents. Wyoming has averaged allowing 375 yards per game outside of when they played us. We had 534 against them, 159 over their season average against other opponents. We are an extremely large part of why these teams are ranked so low defensively. These defenses not being great doesn’t change the fact that we are exposing them in ways that other teams are not. We are outperforming their other opponents by very large amounts.

This is a simplistic outlook. Stats give us data that serve as a foundation for predicting future win/loss outcomes. If you choose not to use that data, that’s fine. Just waiting for the result to happen is cool. But to act like stats don’t serve any application and reducing to a quick, snappy statement like “stats are for dads” is just a very short-sighted approach.

I agree. Feels clear now. Ward, Conwright, and Aaron is a serviceable outside trio but not much behind them. Hopefully we can give Morris an A+ for playing without two of them for most of these last two games, but also not make him have to deal with that again.

South Alabama is a good team. If Lopez plays against Ohio, they beat them instead of losing to them by a touchdown. Then they had to play at LSU. ESPN’s matchup predictor gives South Alabama a 65% chance or better to win each of their remaining games, except at Louisiana where it’s 55%. When the season is over we’ll look back at that opener as one of our better non-conference wins in recent years. But definitely get your point. We have a good team. Bad or average teams don’t do what we just saw. We have 3 good teams left on our schedule. Hope we make those opportunities count now that we have the team to do so.

Well put. I think a lot of fans are waiting for the perfect Mean Green football team to get behind. This one isn’t perfect but they’re playing really well and have earned credit for their accomplishments and support.