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ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - Printable Version

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ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - Griffins78 - 08-26-2011

Not worth watching but here's the video on ESPN Pac-12 storylines. And he dishes on ASU.

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - Farm93 - 08-26-2011

Sure, OK, but Stanford does have Luck.

And with Luck another guy on that same network said that Stanford was the best team in the conference.  Followed by ASU!

So, it is just that time of year.  Each one of these analysts needs to say something to try to stand out from the crowd.  If every ESPN analyst said the same thing then most of the guys would be let go.

At ESPN it really is about one guy.  Without Herbstreit ESPN's Saturday evening ratings would fall below those of Versus.  ::)

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - oman - 08-26-2011

.800 with Luck and .500 without him sounds about right, but I tend to play it safe. 

I want to be wrong.

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - yvonne - 08-26-2011

Remember last year when we didn't have a running game because Toby Gerhart left? me neither.

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - oman - 08-26-2011

Remember how this year four of our five offenseive linemen returned like they did the year after Toby left?

Me neither.

(Although to me the doubts are mostly on the defense.)

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - Rando - 08-27-2011

This is stupid. We have a lot of great players on our team. Quarterback is an important position, no doubt about that. It's the most important position on the field. But if Luck had graduated, we wouldn't be in "terrible" shape. We'd be using a QB with no experience, but we would have a choice between 5 or 6 pretty highly recruited QB's...Nunes, Nottingham, and Picazo are the three guys who'd likely get the shot at QB this season. One of them would likely shine through in practice and become the leader, getting the most reps.

I'm not saying that QB would do nearly as good as Luck. But our offense is run first. We have great running backs and a decent O-line. I would say we'd win at least 8 games with the best of our back up QBs starting all the games.

However, this is coming from a brobdingnagian Stanford fan who is clearly biased. I just feel like we are too talented in the other positions to not finish in the top 25 end of the season, Luck or not.

This is just a version of an old game - Redrum - 08-27-2011

Would Germany have won WWII if not ruled by a madman?

Where would Barry Bonds have finished in the career HR list if he weren't juiced?

What if the South had won at Gettysburg?

What if the refs in the Big Game '82  were competent and  had spines?

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - oman - 08-27-2011

(08-27-2011, 02:32 AM)Rando90 link Wrote:However, this is coming from a of extremely large proportions Stanford fan who is clearly biased.

My mom says I'm just big boned myself.

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - CowboyIndian - 08-27-2011

And this morning...on the Mel Kiper ESPN radio show...Phil Steele picked Stanford to be the biggest disappointment of the season. What perversion is it that makes me feel better about that than the cover of Sports Illustrated?

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - washingtonismoney - 08-27-2011

Phil Steele knows his stuff, so I take him seriously.

Still, it's kind of funny with him--two out of his nine models show Stanford going undefeated. Those are pretty good odds--20+%? That's really high, if you think about it. Nevertheless, Phil Steele knows that can't be true. I think there are a lot of people in the media who just can't quite wrap their head around the idea that Stanford's legitimately a top ten team. Sure, we've got questions, but then again everyone has questions.

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - Pastor - 08-27-2011

Redrum is right...until we play the games, it's all just blather.

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - Hank 91 - 08-27-2011

I think it takes a long time for perceptions to change. Even though Auburn had been down for a while, it didn't take long last season for people to start believing in them because, well, they're Auburn. It's the opposite with Stanford. Even as we were steam rolling people last year, whenever I reached out to an opposing blog for a preview I always got the same thing. "Yes, Stanford is doing well, but there defense looks really slow, and it will be exposed this week." Or, "Stanford's having a nice season, but we should beat them 27-24."

I know this thread is about  the professional prognosticators, but I think we're still talking about the same issue. If the Cardinal makes a run to a BCS game again this year, then performs well next year without Andrew Luck, people will be forced to change their minds. Until, then Stanford is just a nice story. They got lucky with Toby Gerhart, then lucky again with Andrew Luck, but once those guys are gone, the team will return to mediocrity.

Many of you have already mentioned this, but you can see this most obviously when people predict a drop-off for Luck because he lost all his top receivers. Most national experts are analyzing hundreds of teams, so they can only look at the surface. They see that Griff Whalen, Doug Baldwin, and Konrad Reuland have graduated, so they assume Luck will have no experienced targets. You'd think they might look at the roster and notice Chris Owusu, who could be one of the top receivers in the country this year, but they don't. Also, you'd think they'd be able to remember Coby Fleener's performance in the Orange Bowl, but it's understandable that they'd know little about Zach Ertz and nothing about Levine Toilolo. (More evidence of surface analysis: Fleener is on the Mackey watch list, but he's currently third on the Stanford depth chart.)

Here's the good news, though. A week from today none of this preseason nonsense will matter.

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - CowboyIndian - 08-27-2011

(08-27-2011, 12:32 PM)Hank 91 link Wrote:They see that Griff Whalen, Doug Baldwin, and Konrad Reuland have graduated, .

I'm guessing the above was just a slip of the keyboard, meant for Ryan, but Griff is still here and expected to contribute mightily as a Whalen-type receiver (yes, I know).

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - fullmetal - 08-27-2011

Hank--Fleener might be third on the Stanford depth chart, but no one outside of Stanford fandom seems to know that.  I'm definitely keeping an eye on Ertz and Toilolo in my college fantasy free agent pool.  It pained me to pass on Fleener, but I'm hoping Toilolo makes it back to 100% from injury, and knowing Ertz caught multiple touchdown passes in the spring game (right?) makes me think it'll be TE by committee this year.  That's good for Stanford.

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - Hank 91 - 08-27-2011

Thanks, I did mean Ryan Whalen. And yes, Ertz caught at least two touchdowns in the spring game, but Toilolo is my favorite. I can't wait to see how they use him in the red zone, forcing matchups against much smaller cornerbacks. These tight ends are going to be exciting to watch.

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - washingtonismoney - 08-27-2011

We're going to see the country's first spread offense with just tight ends, so I'm pretty darn excited for innovation alone.

Re: ESPN, Ed Cunningham says without Luck Stanford is not better than a .500 team - CowboyIndian - 08-27-2011

(08-26-2011, 10:23 PM)oman link Wrote:.800 with Luck and .500 without him sounds about right, but I tend to play it safe. 

I want to be wrong.

You win!