Thoughts - Week 10

[Townhallsavoy]

[djsimp]

I really don't see much made about this "fake" injury on ESPN.

[AUChizad]

Defensively, those boys better...well...just keep on keeping on.  That wasn't much different than what we've seen all year.  Washington State gashed us up the middle and threw the ball well.  LSU gashed us up the middle and then controlled the scoreboard until it hit 0:00.  Texas A&M hit big play after big play and scored 41 points on us.  Ole Miss hit some big plays and came back into it.  We went to the wire with Miss State.

Our defense isn't very good.  Some glaring holes.  Our only hope is to put the opposing offense into a situation where the quarterback has to take a second in the backfield.  We can get to him.  We can rush the passer.

Stopping the run?  The screen pass?  The slant?  The deep ball?  The post route?  The sweep?  The tight end out and up?  The dump to the flat? 

Not going to happen.

2nd in red zone defense in the SEC. 3rd in scoring defense. Don't know where we rank in turnovers, but it's gotta be up there.

[DnATL]

2nd in red zone defense in the SEC. 3rd in scoring defense. Don't know where we rank in turnovers, but it's gotta be up there.

turnover margin is about even for Auburn at +1, so they're middle-of-the-pack in the SEC
Missouri is +15 and has 17 INTs

[noxin]

Ol' Bret was giving Gus the middle finger with that swinging gate play -- no doubt about it.  Only thing I would have liked more about the fake injury would have been if ESPN panned to Gus on the sidelines and he was staring down BB and giving him the double middle finger.

Don't start no shit, won't be no shit

[Saniflush]

Don't start no shit, won't be no shit

[AUChizad]

http://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2013/11/3/5060678/auburn-arkansas-game-2013-bret-bielema

Auburn beats Arkansas, and the Bielema-Malzahn rivalry has just begun

By Steven Godfrey @38Godfrey on Nov 3 2013, 8:49a 14
Todd Van Emst, Auburn University

A native Arkansas son beat the state's current most visible employee in the home of the Hogs on Saturday. How it happened shows this feud isn't over yet.

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. -  That play wasn't a swinging gate, Bret Bielema swore. The fact it was the play the first-year Arkansas head coach alleged was somehow missing from Auburn's official game tape, sparking a week's worth of headlines in the process, was coincidental.

"Nah. You guys read too much into that," a noticeably sheepish Bielema said after the Tigers' 35-17 win on Saturday.

Auburn's similar formation is code-named Batman and is definitely not a swinging gate. Bielema said Arkansas' version, which is closer to a traditional swinging gate, is named Field Goal Buehner. It's named after Razorbacks wide receiver Brian Buehner, who threw the pass to tight end Austin Tate to convert a crucial fourth-and-three on the Auburn nine-yard-line, down 28-10 at the end of the third quarter.



Center Travis Swanson said after the game that the offense first started practicing Field Goal Buehner for the first time on Tuesday, which was a day after Bielema's public comments.

"We practiced it, but just in case the situation arose, I guess. Not because of anything in the news," Swanson said.

Some of his teammates didn't shrug off the coincidence.

"I didn't see it coming, so I know they didn't see it coming," laughed Hogs linebacker Braylon Mitchell.

Mitchell was asked if the team enjoyed seeing that particular play, what with it just happening to be a coincidence and all, of course.

"Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, Coach Bielema and Coach Malzahn being two strong-headed coaches and all, I did get a little laugh out of it, but uh, I try not to look at it that way," Mitchell said with a smile.

"It was pretty good," Malzahn admitted. "I mean, I almost called time out. I was kind of kicking myself that I didn't call time out before. It was a well-executed play."

As sure as Arkansas didn't run the exact play it accused the Tigers of hiding on film, Auburn's Anthony Swain absolutely didn't fake a sudden injury on the very next play, because that kind of bizarre gamesmanship isn't the kind Malzahn would stoop to.



"We don't tell our kids to fake," Malzahn pled after the game, reinforcing his big, bold statement from July against such chicanery.

Never mind that Swain, in 40-degree weather, seemed to suffer the world's quickest onset leg cramp in a manner that suggested sudden sniper fire rather than a muscle pull. He wasn't made available for comment afterwards.

"Yeah, I didn't see it. We didn't [fake injuries], though. We weren't doing that," Bielema said. "But you'd have to ask them."

Here's what Bielema saw (via SI):



There's never been a shortage of overnight rivalries in the SEC West. Competition naturally breeds acrimony, but this region's nasty habit of swapping scorned bedfellows exacerbates it. Ole Miss hated Auburn for taking Tommy Tuberville. Arkansas hated Ole Miss for harboring Houston Nutt. LSU will seemingly forever hate Alabama for poaching Nick Saban.

But even without having actually shared a bed, Bielema has time and again heaved a divorcee's disgust at Malzahn and Auburn since he arrived in the SEC. First it was his displeasure with the alleged unsafe conditions created by up-tempo offenses like Malzhan's, and it's evolved from there, each time with Bielema taking the initiative to jab publicly.

"There's a theory about this. At least, I've got a theory about all that," a young Arkansas booster explained before the game.

Malzahn, the Northwest Arkansas native, was twice turned down for the same Razorbacks job that was offered to Bielema without much lobbying. Both became SEC head coaches for the first time on Dec. 5 last year, and now Malzahn's Auburn is a flashy no-huddle is a BCS contender at 8-1 while Bielema is struggling to graft a run-heavy, huddle-friendly, pro-style offense onto the 3-6 remnants of Bobby Petrino's failed empire.

Entering Saturday night, the Razorbacks had scored 17 points in their last 12 quarters, including a span of nine consecutive quarters of SEC play without a touchdown. Up to that point, Auburn had scored 83 points in their previous nine quarters of conference play.

The narrative to date is of a native son shining in spite of his home state, which is still fractured when debating his real worth. Meanwhile, that bawdy Yankee the Razorbacks hired is trying to drop a 351 engine into a totaled Ford Escort, with no success as of yet.

"It's not really about all that," the booster said. "Well, shit, it might be, but I don't think that's how Bielema operates. I think he's smarter than that, until the few times when he himself thinks he's smarter than he actually is, and you get him saying all this stuff in public."

"If you come to Arkansas from the Big Ten after Petrino and you want to overhaul everything, you want to show your value as soon as possible, so you try and knock off Auburn."

But if not some kind of weird jealousy of Malzahn, the former prodigal son, why all this hate on Auburn?

"Because you probably won't knock off LSU, and you're not going to touch Alabama. You can wait out Manziel leaving Texas A&M, and in a few years you'll look good there solely on attrition. You're supposed to already be better than everyone else (Mississippi State and Ole Miss), so then there's just Auburn. You beat them bad and often, you can take that momentum and start sealing off Texas recruits from everyone else in the division except A&M and maybe LSU."

"You start beating Auburn," he concluded, "and you're already No. 3 in the West."

Whether it's envy or tact is irrelevant for now, as Arkansas seems confined to No. 7 after Saturday's loss to Auburn. Worse than just a loss, it was a game that seemed tailor-made to expose Bielema's tempo pearl-clutching as hypocrisy. Maybe, by Gus's design, it was:

    Arkansas ran 74 offensive plays compared to the Auburn hurry-up's mere 55. Wing-T offenses run more than 55 plays.
    The Hogs had three times as many pass attempts (27) as Auburn, yet finished with fewer passing yards (thanks largely in part to an 88-yard touchdown throw from Nick Marshall to Sammie Coates).
    Using Malzahn's bread-and-butter of the power-option running game, Auburn rushed for 233 yards, capped by Tre Mason's four scores, and almost always stayed in bounds and in the middle of the field, chewing clock despite losing the total time of possession by almost nine minutes.

"With as many damn receivers as Petrino tried to bring in, we should be catching the ball."

If any offense could've been accused of trying to fatigue a defense, it wasn't the Tigers -- with almost the exact same amount of called runs, they averaged two yards more per play than Arkansas in a fraction of the time, beating the Hogs' defense with ruthless efficiency, not malicious gassing.

"I'm not too sure about all that stuff he says against the spread," an elderly fan said while waiting on a parking shuttle. "But I do know that with as many damn receivers as Petrino tried to bring in here, we should be catching the ball better."

Long an ideal haven for head football coaches boasting eccentric public profiles, so far the Ozarks seem TBD on Bielema Ball. Despite chamber-of-commerce tailgating weather, turnout for Saturday's Senior Day (Arkansas' last official home game vs. Mississippi State will take place in Little Rock) was tepid at best, pocked by large, empty stretches of season-ticket parking and tailgating spots.

"There's so many positive things that are going on right now that don't pop out to people who aren't around this program. Right now it's baby steps. I wish we were sprinting, but we're walking," Bielema said.

It might be ennui or caution, but this Year One feels eerily quiet by the Razorbacks' standard of fandom. The culture that trademarked self-inflicted FOIA scandals is either anesthetized in the wake of the Nutt/Petrino decade, or so conditioned after that tumultuous run that even Bret Bielema's swinging gate can't yet stir passion.

[Townhallsavoy]

"Because you probably won't knock off LSU, and you're not going to touch Alabama. You can wait out Manziel leaving Texas A&M, and in a few years you'll look good there solely on attrition. You're supposed to already be better than everyone else (Mississippi State and Ole Miss), so then there's just Auburn. You beat them bad and often, you can take that momentum and start sealing off Texas recruits from everyone else in the division except A&M and maybe LSU."

"You start beating Auburn," he concluded, "and you're already No. 3 in the West."

So many morons in the world.

Yeah, Auburn has many more times than not (at least since my birth in 1984) been in contention late in the season for the SEC West crown, but let's assume that the best they can do is 3rd place. 

[Saniflush]

So many morons in the world.

Yeah, Auburn has many more times than not (at least since my birth in 1984) been in contention late in the season for the SEC West crown, but let's assume that the best they can do is 3rd place.

This has been an inherent problem at Arkansas.  The chest beating over 3rd.  The hope for more but do not expect it. 

I would contend that it is expected more so at AU, LSU, and the turds.

[dallaswareagle]

"Well, we have a injury timeout, two Auburn players, #5 Holland & #19 White, looks to have collided together and both players have a bone sticking out of their legs."

Something to build on. At least he hit somebody.

[Hogwally]

   The problem with the fake injury, is now anytime Malzahn has a legitimate beef about other teams doing it in the future, the response is going to be cry me a river, you guys do it too.

[WiregrassTiger]

http://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2013/11/3/5060678/auburn-arkansas-game-2013-bret-bielema

Seriously, I don't see Bulimia being in Arkansas long enough to create much of a rivalry with Malzahn. Not trying to talk smack about Hogs because God knows they've had our number since coming into the SEC. I'm just saying, I don't think he's good enough to hang.

Just because he talked smack in a press conference about us allegedly editing out a conversion play, running said play and us possibly faking an injury isn't enough to create a rivalry. The article is stretching to make this connection.

18 pt margin isn't a good start for a rivalry, imo.

[AUChizad]

http://www.al.com/auburnfootball/index.ssf/2013/11/ellis_johnson_auburn_linebacke_1.html

Ellis Johnson: Auburn linebacker Anthony Swain suffered bruised knee against Arkansas
Auburn vs. Arkansas Game Day
Auburn linebacker Anthony Swain (43) is helped off the field after an injury in the third quarter at Razorback Stadium Saturday, Nov. 2, 2013, in Fayetteville, Ark. (Julie Bennett/jbennett@al.com)
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Joel A. Erickson | jerickson@al.com By Joel A. Erickson | jerickson@al.com
Email the author | Follow on Twitter
on November 03, 2013 at 9:36 PM, updated November 03, 2013 at 9:39 PM   

AUBURN, Alabama -- Auburn linebacker Anthony Swain suffered a bruised knee against Arkansas, according to defensive coordinator Ellis Johnson, although he's expected to be able to play against Tennessee.

Swain made a tackle on the sideline at the end of the third quarter, got up, walked across the field and fell, grabbing his right knee.

Immediately after the play, ESPN broadcasters questioned whether or not Swain was faking an injury, a claim Gus Malzahn denied in his post-game press conference.

Johnson, who calls plays from the press box, wasn't watching the play in the moment.

"I'm in the press box," Johnson said. "All we're looking for, we're looking at the bench for personnel, and I did not see it."

Johnson got another look at the play on film on Sunday.

"Once I graded the film, he got rolled up over on the sideline and was slow getting up and that's all I could see," Johnson said.

Swain was at practice with bruised knee, the same injury suffered by Dee Ford late in the game. In addition, several defenders who went down with injuries during the game -- defensive end Carl Lawson, cornerbacks Chris Davis and Jonathon Mincy -- are expected back.

Johnson did say that the status of any injuries could change on Monday after the trainers have a chance to evaluate players.

"I don't think anybody's going to be out," Johnson said. "We may have some limited practice but I really don't think we'll know until we get a report tomorrow after treatments on Monday. And we'll see who's ready to go on Tuesday practicing."

Also:

@bmarcello 2 Nov

Two Auburn players said they saw LB Anthony Swain in a walking boot. Nosa Eguae says he saw him hobbling to shower.

If true, this is next-level commitment to the flop.

[AUChizad]

Given the fact that this gave no advantage to Auburn, and the fact that he's still in a boot, this is what I believe happened.

He was hurt after the play. He walked back, realized something wasn't right, then realized he couldn't get to the sideline in time.

Then he flopped.

Anyone saying Gus orchestrated this, strategically, is typical anti-Auburn media bullshit we've grown to expect. There's a difference in that and "flopping" because he was genuinely hurt and couldn't get to the sideline.

[Townhallsavoy]

Given the fact that this gave no advantage to Auburn, and the fact that he's still in a boot, this is what I believe happened.

He was hurt after the play. He walked back, realized something wasn't right, then realized he couldn't get to the sideline in time.

Then he flopped.

Anyone saying Gus orchestrated this, strategically, is typical anti-Auburn media bullshit we've grown to expect. There's a difference in that and "flopping" because he was genuinely hurt and couldn't get to the sideline.

You mean exactly what I said earlier?

[AUChizad]

You mean exactly what I said earlier?

Only less eloquently.

I'm just saying, specifically, that he did flop, i.e. fell down unnecessarily. I doubt he was just stricken with pain right away at that moment, and it was too much to bear to continue standing at that very moment. I just think he realized he fucked up and should have gotten to the sideline just a little to late, and then flopped.

[GH2001]

Espn beat it in the ground again tonight. Some Indian host (Anish) and Arbuckle were sitting there with Finebaum talking about it. Finebaum was actually the only one defending Gus saying it was not ordered. The other two clowns were just cackling about it.

[The Prowler]

So, is it Swain's knee or ankle? Someone said he was in a boot...with fur.

[RWS]

So, is it Swain's knee or ankle? Someone said he was in a boot...with fur.

Neither.

All of the players need to get on the same page with this flop thing.  I've never known somebody to wear a walking boot for a knee injury.  I've had two knee surgeries (one of which was to reattach my meniscus), and never wore a boot.  Ankles and feet?  Yes.  Knee?  lulz. 

[jmar]

So, is it Swain's knee or ankle? Someone said he was in a boot...with fur.

Very sad...I'm guessing all we can hope for is that they can keep him comfortable until there is a medical breakthrough.