[Goose]

Well Stanford has lost a starting LB (Barton) for the season and has not seen the starting nickelback (Alexander) and backup LB (Branch) in weeks.  Next Man Up.

Correct. Injuries are part of football, and every team has them. Some are worse than others.

[quote author=Goose link=topic=17715.msg206818#msg206818 date=1508185173]
[quote author=OutsiderFan link=topic=17715.msg206817#msg206817 date=1508185014]
Funny, I don't think UW had any asterisks put next to their Stanford win last year, when Stanford was missing both starting CBs, McCaffery was banged up, and we all now believe AT Hall wasn't healthy either.

Very True. But we aren't them.
[/quote]

And? It doesn't matter. None of it matters. Stanford's path to a NY6 bowl is very, very, very simple:

1) Win the conference.

That's it. There's no plan B. We were 9-3 last year and saw what that got us. If we lose another conference game we'll have fun rooting for maybe the Holiday bowl.

[/quote]
Yes, it matters. It doesn't matter to the NY6 bowl choices. You don't get style points unless you are Alabama (or maybe ND). However, that isn't the only reason Stanford plays football. I would much prefer, and I think the team would much prefer, to beat UW when they are more or less at full strength. I would prefer that at least partially to spare me the comments (both on this board and elsewhere) about the 2016 game, where people say something like "Well, if our corners weren't hurt, and CMac was full strength, things may (or would have been) different." We will never know. We will not know because those players were injured. I wish they hadn't been. Maybe lots of things would have been different (who knows), but for sure there wouldn't be speculation that the result was somehow devalued by injuries. We ourselves often seem to put an asterisk on that ass-kicking. The words are "Next man up" are followed by "but ...". I would prefer that UW fans could not do the same. A pure" victory that cant be denied or explained away is much more satisfying.

[Goose]

Well Stanford has lost a starting LB (Barton) for the season and has not seen the starting nickelback (Alexander) and backup LB (Branch) in weeks.  Next Man Up.

Correct. Injuries are part of football, and every team has them. Some are worse than others.

[quote author=Goose link=topic=17715.msg206818#msg206818 date=1508185173]
[quote author=OutsiderFan link=topic=17715.msg206817#msg206817 date=1508185014]
Funny, I don't think UW had any asterisks put next to their Stanford win last year, when Stanford was missing both starting CBs, McCaffery was banged up, and we all now believe AT Hall wasn't healthy either.

Very True. But we aren't them.
[/quote]

And? It doesn't matter. None of it matters. Stanford's path to a NY6 bowl is very, very, very simple:

1) Win the conference.

That's it. There's no plan B. We were 9-3 last year and saw what that got us. If we lose another conference game we'll have fun rooting for maybe the Holiday bowl.

[/quote]
Yes, it matters. It doesn't matter to the NY6 bowl choices. You don't get style points unless you are Alabama (or maybe ND). However, that isn't the only reason Stanford plays football. I would much prefer, and I think the team would much prefer, to beat UW when they are more or less at full strength. I would prefer that at least partially to spare me the comments (both on this board and elsewhere) about the 2016 game, where people say something like "Well, if our corners weren't hurt, and CMac was full strength, things may (or would have been) different." We will never know. We will not know because those players were injured. I wish they hadn't been. Maybe lots of things would have been different (who knows), but for sure there wouldn't be speculation that the result was somehow devalued by injuries. We ourselves often seem to put an asterisk on that ass-kicking. The words are "Next man up" are followed by "but ...". I would prefer that UW fans could not do the same. A pure" victory that cant be denied or explained away is much more satisfying.