First, it’s common that defenses dominate in early August practices. Defense can run simple stuff. Read and react. The offense is still figuring out its timing, precision, etc. My gut reaction to hearing Rhule yesterday complain about the offense was “oh shit, here we go.” But it’s probably him working to create a sense of urgency and not get down on themselves after the resignation by ZB and a bad practice. I also think this means we can’t overestimate how the defense is playing and how it translates to week 1.
Second, I do think expectations need to be curbed. I agree with
@HerbRedman in his assessment of the talent at a macro level. We’re borderline bowl eligible. We’ve spent a bunch of years in a row not developing players. They came in as good as they were going to be. In some cases they came in the best they were going to be. The maturation of our talent is below Minny, lowa, Wiscy, etc. and that is more important than how many stars they had in HS.
I think what this all means is we’re going to be in close games this year many that will result in losses. Perhaps the difference this year is that our close games are going to be because we’re just not talented enough, yet, rather than we shot ourselves in the foot at the worst time. If we stay strong throughout we will get someone. We will beat either Wiscy or lowa while losing to Purdue or Maryland.
