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Curiosity Kills the cat

M

mtgrizrule

Well-known member
I have a question regarding the Cats. Please be honest if possible.

Why is it, every year before the season starts, many of us write off msWho?

As much as it pains many of us, they've been damn good the last decade. Yet, every year, many GRIZ fans think they'll plummet and not be a conference title contender. Why is that?

If I take out my GRIZ Fandom, from an analytical point of view, it's difficult to HONESTLY not consider them among Big Sky elite and a national title contender. After all, they've been having great results for awhile now.

Do we not give them credit, just because they're our hated in state rival? Or do we honestly believe they're going to suddenly just fall off?

I'm not talking just this year, but the last several years. I get it, when a team has a few years of success. There's still a lot to proof. To me, they've more than proven themselves as a true Top 5 FCS program.

As for this season, I honestly feel they'll be a few notches below what they were last season. However, I still expect them to be a top 10 FCS team and make a strong playoff run.

The last decade, unfortunately they've had many of us eating crow. I know, I'm tired of crow. Hate them as much as we want, but does that hatred somewhat blind us?

Who honestly thinks theyll be worse than a Big Sky title contender this year? Based on long term on field results, I'll be surprised if they're not a conference title contender this year. Yes, I'd love to be wrong on this.

Thoughts, opinions, analysis?
 
They’re a good team. They were a great team with Mellott. They’ll be a good team without him. You don’t suddenly lose the Walter Payton Award winner at the most important position on a football team and not go a little backwards. They will have a good defense and can still run the ball. That combo is always a good one in football.
 
I think it's going to be really interesting to watch the Cats this year. What will their offense do without Tommy Mellott? It's obvious that they built their offense around him for the last 4 years so now what? IMO TM Is a unique player and can't really be replaced. Will they have a decent-to-good quarterback who can get behind their traditionally strong o-line and get some stuff done?

I think until some of these questions get answered We just don't even know how to evaluate them. In the last 4 years they've also had some ebbs and flows - just like the Griz really. They've seemed to play out of this world at times and then come to WaGriz and they look completely out of their depth. Plus they've had a lot of change this year. They graduated or lost to the transfer portal a number of really good players and they had significant staff turnover. Maybe they could still be in the top three or four, but it's honestly really hard to say. The first couple of weeks will tell a lot about how the Cats are going to look for the year.

But honestly, I think a lot of it is just a general Griz sentiment that the bobcats suck! LOL
 
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KJB said:
It's true when non partisan football fans and analysts talk about the tops fcs programs. It's North dakota state, South Dakota State, Montana state in that order.
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Which gets under Griz fans skin because a) they probably feel the Griz are getting shortchanged and
b) The cats have a lot to prove after losing a significant portion of their production
c) Many Griz fans hate the bobcats and don't want them to succeed no matter what
 
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I also think people don't really know how to evaluate teams in this day and age. It used to be based on how good they were last year and how many players they carried over. But that's all gone by the wayside with NIL and the portal etc etc. As Bobby has said on more than one occasion, you're building a team from scratch every year. And how a team did last year may not factor much into how they will do this year.
 
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They’re gonna have a good team. Will they be anywhere close to as good as they were last year? Probably not but they’re still gonna likely get a top 8 seed short of something disastrous happening. They’d have to start 0-2 and then lose at NAU for that to happen, which I don’t think it will.

Week 2 against SDSU will be a big measuring stick game for them. They’ll be a slight home favorite but if they destroy the Jacks then I’d say they’re legit. If it’s a close win that likely means they’re just a rung below NDSU, and if they lose then perhaps it could be a little bit of a struggle this year.

All this to say they’re still gonna be pretty good but there’s ways to exploit them this year. Attack that young and thin secondary. Teams that can throw the ball at a high clip have the potential to be successful against them.

We’ll see how good they look in two weeks!
 
Teams with a good OL & DL will always have a high floor, and at minimum, they have that.

I’d say they’re a guarantee at a top 10 team, and that’s mostly because once you get out of the top 5, the rest are pretty mediocre for what a top 10 team should be. It doesn’t mean what it used to.
 
mtgrizrule said:
I have a question regarding the Cats. Please be honest if possible.

Why is it, every year before the season starts, many of us write off msWho?

As much as it pains many of us, they've been damn good the last decade. Yet, every year, many GRIZ fans think they'll plummet and not be a conference title contender. Why is that?

If I take out my GRIZ Fandom, from an analytical point of view, it's difficult to HONESTLY not consider them among Big Sky elite and a national title contender. After all, they've been having great results for awhile now.

Do we not give them credit, just because they're our hated in state rival? Or do we honestly believe they're going to suddenly just fall off?

I'm not talking just this year, but the last several years. I get it, when a team has a few years of success. There's still a lot to proof. To me, they've more than proven themselves as a true Top 5 FCS program.

As for this season, I honestly feel they'll be a few notches below what they were last season. However, I still expect them to be a top 10 FCS team and make a strong playoff run.

The last decade, unfortunately they've had many of us eating crow. I know, I'm tired of crow. Hate them as much as we want, but does that hatred somewhat blind us?

Who honestly thinks theyll be worse than a Big Sky title contender this year? Based on long term on field results, I'll be surprised if they're not a conference title contender this year. Yes, I'd love to be wrong on this.

Thoughts, opinions, analysis?
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Imagine actually thinking like this.
 
HookedonGriz said:
They’re a good team. They were a great team with Mellott. They’ll be a good team without him. You don’t suddenly lose the Walter Payton Award winner at the most important position on a football team and not go a little backwards. They will have a good defense and can still run the ball. That combo is always a good one in football.
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True, but they will go backwards. Mellott is a huge loss and irreplaceable. Who's the QB going to be? I don't know. The Stanford kid had a few starts and must be pretty good. I think they lost alot and didn't replace spots in the portal. Will they have a top D? Grebe is gone. Who will be in the secondary? I doubt their D will be great, but haven't been looking at it. How far can the OL and a bunch of good backs take them? The run game will likely be good, but it won't be as explosive without Mellott to explode and attract attention on every play to allow the backs to explode.

Yes, of course, they are top 10. So are the Griz.

Besides just the rivalry and some of the grief some Griz fans will throw at them, the other reason/problem is that some Cat fans always think their team is better than it is. That's what gets me, and why I like to go at them. As I said last year, the Cats were not good enough to beat all the Dakota schools. I took some grief for that, but I was right. Going to Frisco was great for them, but they still didn't win or beat all the Dakota schools that they played.

Without Mellott, the Cats wouldn't have gone as far. They wouldn't have back to beat NMS in the second half. They wouldn't have kept close in second half in Frisco. He was special. He's gone.

The conference doesn't seem to be full of powerhouses. As always, I pick the Griz over the Cats.
 
PTGrizzly said:
Teams with a good OL & DL will always have a high floor, and at minimum, they have that.

I’d say they’re a guarantee at a top 10 team, and that’s mostly because once you get out of the top 5, the rest are pretty mediocre for what a top 10 team should be. It doesn’t mean what it used to.
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You are also describing the Griz.
 
KJB said:
It's true when non partisan football fans and analysts talk about the tops fcs programs. It's North dakota state, South Dakota State, Montana state in that order.
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I don't agree with that. That's from people who don't understand football or follow FCS teams closely. An AI level of analysis.
 
mthoopsfan said:
I don't agree with that. That's from people who don't understand football or follow FCS teams closely. An AI level of analysis.
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Well like I said earlier, I think they're stuck in the old ways. Which means looking at the previous year's results, who they retained etc and basing it off of that. The problem with that is that other teams have brought in tons of transfers that may or may not make waves, and one team's potential can change greatly from year to year just because of the transfer portal.

And of course they're also basing all their prognostications on preseason polls which as we all know in the end means virtually nothing.
 
Da Boyz Mom said:
Well like I said earlier, I think they're stuck in the old ways. Which means looking at the previous year's results, who they retained etc and basing it off of that. The problem with that is that other teams have brought in tons of transfers that may or may not make waves, and one team's potential can change greatly from year to year just because of the transfer portal.

And of course they're also basing all their prognostications on preseason polls which as we all know in the end means virtually nothing.
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I assume you think Sac State will be very good then?
 
The analysis makes me think about how most EGRIZ think about oldngrizzly. Way smarter than most people think and hated as much or more. Kinda like the cats, I got the credentials. :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO:
 
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