The SEC Forum at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

We don't have a lot of traffic, such that most teams aren't even represented here.....what a shame, this place used to be buzzing with inter-conference hostility.  

Still, for those of us left keeping the light on.....how do you assess your team's season?

Particularly curious how OAM rates Napier's first year.  I'm generally of the opinion that a coach should get carte blanche and an automatic pass in year 1, although that's not the world we live in today.  I was in favor of LSU giving Napier a shot but of course that didn't happen.  Wondering how Gators view the season and what they see going forward.  

I know we have Tennessee fans here...if they can just be lured out of their checker-board hiding.  Do Vols see this as a great year of resurgence or does the losses and injury to HH put a damper on it?  Or both?  

UGA, I guess, kind of held serve from last year, which is, by definition, all you can ask for.  I guess.  Who knows what fans expect now.  

Bama nation seems to be very disappointed with this year.  They still won 10 games with a realistic shot of making the playoffs.  

A&M obviously disappointed this year, but for now the roster is loaded and it has to be said this year is an anomaly in Jimbo's career.  How's the outlook going forward?  I heard fans around here saying there were going to be a bunch of transfers out of the program....does that change now with ending the season on a high note?  

Here's I see LSU's regular season:  Despite the disappointing and frustrating (and predictable) finale, I think it has to be viewed as overall very positive.  Picked to finish 5th in the west, Kelly managed to cobble together makeshift pieces from the transfer portal and keep a team with 20 less scholarship players than every other team in the conference from going .500 again, and took advantage of a down Bama year to sneak a division title out of the season.  The positives are he's recruiting well so far, and it could be that this was the least deep/talented team he'll have, so maybe they build on this for an upward trajectory.  The negatives are the way they lost the Tennessee game (not that they lost, just how they looked doing it) and obviously the A&M game.  Even though the Aggies have a deeper and more talented roster, Kelly and his staff were badly outcoached in that game.  I didn't pay enough attention to him at Notre Dame, but word is those teams frequently lost baffling games they shouldn't for the same reason....randomly poorly coached games.  Winning the FSU opener would've given us a 10 win season, but I'm not too down about that since FSU had already played a game (I'll go to my grave thinking we probably win that game if we'd already played) and Kelly was trying to herd cattle stampeding in all the wrong directions at that point (I'm talking about the culture mess that O left).  

There nothing here that assures me LSU will be a regular contender for the conference and playoffs, but there's reasons to be optimistic.  I trust that he can build the roster back up.  I'm not as sure he can avoid a couple head-scratching losses with random terrible coaching weeks.  It'll be better than Orgeron, which I guess is at least part of the point of hiring him.  

I feel you.

What's the consensus on what exactly happened in that SCar game?  I see they stuck it to Clemson too, so looks like the Gamecocks had something cooking down the stretch.  

I think USCe caught fire late, Rattler obviously, and the Vols just hit a buzz saw, so did Clemson.  Rattler might not look that good in a bowl, or next season of course.  The Vols had a suspect secondary all year.

Interesting you say that.  

After the Alabama/LSU game, there was a part of me that felt like tiger fans may one day look back at that game as a changing of the guard moment.  Rationale being that this team has so few scholly players and is held together with duct tape, he has a good record as a coach and if he recruits well, this may be one of the worst tiger teams he fields....while on the other side we know Alabama's run has to end some day and their season this year could be what the beginning of that looks like.  And yeah, I totally get that LSU won by stealing a do-or-die moment where the other team doesn't get the chance to respond, and they did it because they knew their chances in OT weren't good.  

Fast-forward a few weeks and that part of me wonders if it's just wishful thinking.  I can forgive the Arkansas showing, everybody knew that was a classic hangover game, and half the team was playing with the flu.  Ok, they sucked, move on.  But the A&M game was something else.  QB regressing to every bad habit of his career nadir, defense that completely forgot you have to fit the run gaps and spent the entire game forgetting their tackling technique that has served them so well....maybe it's hard to comprehend what a mess Kelly is truly dealing with, but on the surface the whole thing looked like a crap coaching job, from the HC to the coordinators to the position coaches.    

Back to the Alabama game, I don't understand some of what was happening in that one.  For all but 2 games (FSU, A&M) our front 7 played really well, I get that....but Bryce Young had some throws that were not under duress that hit dead spots in the field and I was just like "What just happened?"  He wasn't getting pressured, who even knows how well the receivers were covered because the ball didn't go anywhere near them.  Truly baffling.  On the other side of the ball Bama came in with an idea that didn't work and never adjusted.  Their defense didn't really do anything to confuse or overwhelm our young line and indecisive QB.  They just lined up and said "our guys are better than yours".....except they weren't.  Arkansas and A&M, on the other hand, stunted, sent exotic blitzes, and generally kept our noobs confused.  If Alabama had started something similar, LSU almost certainly doesn't score as many points.   

And given all that, who knows how optimistic we're supposed to be. 

I reckon if either TCU or USC loses, they'll put Bama in.  It's a certainty if they both lose.  

1/10 is my rating. Losing to App State is never acceptable, even if they finish 12-0 ( they didn’t. They finished 6-6). Of our losses, I think 6 were by 4 points. We were in most until very late, but couldn’t close. 

The 1 of the 1/10 is for beating LSU. That was nice, given our recent lack of success against them in conference games. 

Schedule for 23 looks much better, Bama and Auburn at home, much more experienced team. 

I hadn’t thought of the 3/5, just more about the 3/10 ratio. Last years loss still really stings, that LSU team played spoiler. 

As far as the portal, a few players have been hitting, but most were backups who never see the field anyways. No news of major contributors yet. There are a couple of players who are debating staying who are JRs, and maybe a SR or two that will take advantage of the free covid year.