Just finished a 2 1/2 hour post game show with a ton of interaction and calls (some weirder than others). That tells me Mizzou fans aren't checked out on this season. Nor should you be. Some quick thoughts from me on today's game to wrap up the night and supplement the work @mitchell4d has done. I'll have the ten thoughts on the win with more in depth and analytical stuff at some point tomorrow morning.
1) You apologize for no wins this year. Should it have been by more? Maybe. Was the final score reflective of how much better Mizzou was than South Carolina? Not really. But in the end, who cares? On our watch along I said before halftime if Missouri could score--even a field goal--I didn't think it would need to score in the second half to win the game. That turned out to be true. I think the second half was a combination of things. First, it was that Missouri and Eli Drinkwitz knew it had enough points to win the game with the way the Mizzou defense and the South Carolina offense were playing. Second, Missouri wasn't sharp on offense. Third, Missouri was missing a boatload of players. This wasn't a full strength Missouri team (to be fair, it wasn't a full strength South Carolina team either). Fourth, SC changed quarterbacks and that changed the narrative a little bit. I'm sure South Carolina fans are thinking if Luke Doty had started they'd have won. Maybe that's true. But also, maybe if Luke Doty had started, Missouri was a little bit more prepared for him and Missouri wins in a similar fashion.
2) I can't stress this enough: This is a limited team. It's not a great team. But it's a team that is doing as much as it can with what it has. This is a game Missouri probably would have lost last year. It's a game Missouri might have lost for most of the last five years. It didn't lose it tonight. Football isn't a beauty contest. There is one goal: Score more than the other team. As fans (and I say this as someone who has had the same feelings during Chiefs games nine times in nine games this year) you're always wanting perfection. You want 51-3. Sometimes you get 17-10. But 17-10 counts the same as 51-3. Just think about what this team faced tonight: No backup quarterback, its two starting defensive tackles not playing, two starters on the offensive line not playing, not having enough players even to play the game according to the conference guidelines. And it won. Yes, the other team was limited too. It fired its coach and it had three of the four members of the starting secondary out and it might have started the wrong quarterback and it appeared not to care very much for the first 2 1/2 quarters. SO WHAT? Missouri scored more than the other team. That's literally the only thing that matters. There are no style points. There are wins and there are losses. This was a win. You don't feel bad for it and you don't apologize for it. You take it and you be happy with it.
3) Players that impressed me tonight:
Devin Nicholson, for this reason if nothing else
Nick Bolton. Damn it would be cool if he had another year. But I see absolutely no reason he should have another year.
Larry Rountree. No, it wasn't his best game. But he has more yards than any running back in the 130 year history of Missouri football. That ain't nothing. In ten years, if you ask somebody for a list of the five best running backs in Missouri history, most people won't mention Rountree. If you ask for ten, a lot of people won't mention him. They should. He's been fun to watch. And he's a kid who proves you don't have to have 45 offers that you tweet out. You just have to have one school that believes in you and find the right fit.
Tauskie Dove. Great catch on the touchdown. He should start the rest of the year. Not bad for a kid who wasn't wanted by anyone else and only had a spot at Mizzou because the Tigers lost a commitment and took a chance.
Keke Chism. He's struggled the first few games. Many gave up on him. He had his best game tonight.
Luke Griffin. I never noticed him. That's a good thing.
Grant McKinniss. In most cases I hate punting in opposing territory. McKinniss made it the right decision. He might have been the MVP tonight.
Martez Manuel. I knew he was a good athlete coming out of Rock Bridge. I did not think he would be this good this fast.
4) This team has overachieved already this year. The absolute minimum should be four wins (Vandy is not good). Missouri might be favored in three more games. Georgia isn't invincible. I don't think they'll finish 7-3, but 6-4 is the goal and 5-5 is an expectation. I picked them to win three this year and said anything more than that was a very good year one for Eli Drinkwitz. I'll be shocked if he doesn't win more than three. I also want to point out that he said he had screenshots of people picking them to win two games and that I was not one of those people.
5) I'll write more about this tomorrow, but this week is going to be interesting. The Barry Odom storyline is undeniable. It's going to be a motivating factor for both sides. I'm going to do every single thing in my power to talk to Barry this week and write a story. I doubt it will happen. But I'm going to try.
Just a final thought (which may be influenced by the three Boulevards, including a Tank7 tall boy, I had during the post-game show): With the way things were this year and the extremely limited access, I wanted to try a different way to cover things. We decided to invest and dive into live streaming. There have been some hiccups and there have been some times where I thought it wouldn't catch on and maybe it was a bad idea. But I was on for eight hours today and we had a lot of engagement from Mizzou fans (most of whom I assume are on this site). It's been fun for me to do things a new way. It's given me a different perspective and allowed me to be re-energized about my job in a lot of ways. Today made it worth it. We had 100 people watching the game with us. We had 150 or more for most of the postgame show and took a ton of phone calls and comments and questions (some good, some not as good, some weird as hell). But I did this to try to make it a more interactive experience and to try to offer you guys something you aren't going to get from any outlet that covers Mizzou besides us. Today was very rewarding for me. It gave me hope that this is going to work and is going to be a thing we continue. For those who took part, I thank you sincerely. For those who didn't, I hope you will give it a shot on one of the next four Saturdays. It won't be for everybody, but it's a different way to experience game day. It's fun for me and hopefully for you. It's something we can do because Mitchell Forde has taken over most of the stuff I used to do here on game day (and honestly does probably a better job of it than I did). So thanks to Mitchell and thanks to all of you. Hopefully we have opened up a new avenue for you guys to follow the Tigers while the more traditional avenue is still every bit as good as it's always been and hasn't taken away from the experience you've gotten used to over the last 17 years.
Mitchell has a full story on the front, I'm going to upload Drinkwitz's press conference tonight and we'll both have more in the morning.
1) You apologize for no wins this year. Should it have been by more? Maybe. Was the final score reflective of how much better Mizzou was than South Carolina? Not really. But in the end, who cares? On our watch along I said before halftime if Missouri could score--even a field goal--I didn't think it would need to score in the second half to win the game. That turned out to be true. I think the second half was a combination of things. First, it was that Missouri and Eli Drinkwitz knew it had enough points to win the game with the way the Mizzou defense and the South Carolina offense were playing. Second, Missouri wasn't sharp on offense. Third, Missouri was missing a boatload of players. This wasn't a full strength Missouri team (to be fair, it wasn't a full strength South Carolina team either). Fourth, SC changed quarterbacks and that changed the narrative a little bit. I'm sure South Carolina fans are thinking if Luke Doty had started they'd have won. Maybe that's true. But also, maybe if Luke Doty had started, Missouri was a little bit more prepared for him and Missouri wins in a similar fashion.
2) I can't stress this enough: This is a limited team. It's not a great team. But it's a team that is doing as much as it can with what it has. This is a game Missouri probably would have lost last year. It's a game Missouri might have lost for most of the last five years. It didn't lose it tonight. Football isn't a beauty contest. There is one goal: Score more than the other team. As fans (and I say this as someone who has had the same feelings during Chiefs games nine times in nine games this year) you're always wanting perfection. You want 51-3. Sometimes you get 17-10. But 17-10 counts the same as 51-3. Just think about what this team faced tonight: No backup quarterback, its two starting defensive tackles not playing, two starters on the offensive line not playing, not having enough players even to play the game according to the conference guidelines. And it won. Yes, the other team was limited too. It fired its coach and it had three of the four members of the starting secondary out and it might have started the wrong quarterback and it appeared not to care very much for the first 2 1/2 quarters. SO WHAT? Missouri scored more than the other team. That's literally the only thing that matters. There are no style points. There are wins and there are losses. This was a win. You don't feel bad for it and you don't apologize for it. You take it and you be happy with it.
3) Players that impressed me tonight:
Devin Nicholson, for this reason if nothing else
Nick Bolton. Damn it would be cool if he had another year. But I see absolutely no reason he should have another year.
Larry Rountree. No, it wasn't his best game. But he has more yards than any running back in the 130 year history of Missouri football. That ain't nothing. In ten years, if you ask somebody for a list of the five best running backs in Missouri history, most people won't mention Rountree. If you ask for ten, a lot of people won't mention him. They should. He's been fun to watch. And he's a kid who proves you don't have to have 45 offers that you tweet out. You just have to have one school that believes in you and find the right fit.
Tauskie Dove. Great catch on the touchdown. He should start the rest of the year. Not bad for a kid who wasn't wanted by anyone else and only had a spot at Mizzou because the Tigers lost a commitment and took a chance.
Keke Chism. He's struggled the first few games. Many gave up on him. He had his best game tonight.
Luke Griffin. I never noticed him. That's a good thing.
Grant McKinniss. In most cases I hate punting in opposing territory. McKinniss made it the right decision. He might have been the MVP tonight.
Martez Manuel. I knew he was a good athlete coming out of Rock Bridge. I did not think he would be this good this fast.
4) This team has overachieved already this year. The absolute minimum should be four wins (Vandy is not good). Missouri might be favored in three more games. Georgia isn't invincible. I don't think they'll finish 7-3, but 6-4 is the goal and 5-5 is an expectation. I picked them to win three this year and said anything more than that was a very good year one for Eli Drinkwitz. I'll be shocked if he doesn't win more than three. I also want to point out that he said he had screenshots of people picking them to win two games and that I was not one of those people.
5) I'll write more about this tomorrow, but this week is going to be interesting. The Barry Odom storyline is undeniable. It's going to be a motivating factor for both sides. I'm going to do every single thing in my power to talk to Barry this week and write a story. I doubt it will happen. But I'm going to try.
Just a final thought (which may be influenced by the three Boulevards, including a Tank7 tall boy, I had during the post-game show): With the way things were this year and the extremely limited access, I wanted to try a different way to cover things. We decided to invest and dive into live streaming. There have been some hiccups and there have been some times where I thought it wouldn't catch on and maybe it was a bad idea. But I was on for eight hours today and we had a lot of engagement from Mizzou fans (most of whom I assume are on this site). It's been fun for me to do things a new way. It's given me a different perspective and allowed me to be re-energized about my job in a lot of ways. Today made it worth it. We had 100 people watching the game with us. We had 150 or more for most of the postgame show and took a ton of phone calls and comments and questions (some good, some not as good, some weird as hell). But I did this to try to make it a more interactive experience and to try to offer you guys something you aren't going to get from any outlet that covers Mizzou besides us. Today was very rewarding for me. It gave me hope that this is going to work and is going to be a thing we continue. For those who took part, I thank you sincerely. For those who didn't, I hope you will give it a shot on one of the next four Saturdays. It won't be for everybody, but it's a different way to experience game day. It's fun for me and hopefully for you. It's something we can do because Mitchell Forde has taken over most of the stuff I used to do here on game day (and honestly does probably a better job of it than I did). So thanks to Mitchell and thanks to all of you. Hopefully we have opened up a new avenue for you guys to follow the Tigers while the more traditional avenue is still every bit as good as it's always been and hasn't taken away from the experience you've gotten used to over the last 17 years.
Mitchell has a full story on the front, I'm going to upload Drinkwitz's press conference tonight and we'll both have more in the morning.
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