1. Troy Taylor is going to take Stanford back to national relevance?
2. David Bailey will be Stanford’s next 1st Round NFL Draft pick?
3. Josh Karty will win the Lou Groza Award?
4. Stanford will will win more games this season than the experts predicted?
5. Stanford will not finish last in the P12’s curtain closing season?
6. You won’t be able to predict most plays Stanford will run On O & D anymore?
7. Gaethan Bernadel is not as good as expected?
8. Ryan Butler is better than expected?
9. Ben Yorosek will be playing on Sundays next year?
10. Ashton Daniels will be a 3- year starter?
11. This is a well-coached team?
After one game, I feel my belief that Stanford was being underrated is warranted. Coaching makes a big difference and I don’t think people appreciate how Troy Taylor’s record at SacState indicates how good he is as a coach. Teams with a pass rush always have to be taken seriously. Stanford has some very good Edge rushers that bad teams typically don’t have. They as a group weren’t as dominant as I expected, but Bailey was better than expected, so net as good as I suspected. And OMG was that the best QB debut I’ve seen since Luck. TT clearly understands how to run a QB-friendly college offense. I always felt when a pass was called under Shaw it was a referendum on the offense. Taylor mixed all kinds of QB tasks into the equation so it wasn’t so binary. Just felt Stanford was running an offense rather than calling individual plays like I felt with Shaw teams, even good ones.
Hawaii put on a pretty impressive showing other than the fact they couldn’t run the ball at all, and their crushing penalties. I’m not going to expect a victory over Southern Cal, but I feel confident Stanford will hold its own and not embarrass itself, at least relative to expectations. I‘m not making any season record prediction but I think everyone needs to expect more wins than they were imagining to be most likely based on being influenced by expert pessimism and the sour taste left over from the Shaw era.
One of my assumptions was we would see players that we thought to be not very good show more than thought possible. I come away from watching the Hawaii game feeling like most of the guys who played were new or not real experienced. The only guys that I knew of playing before but not well, were Sinclair and Gilman, maybe Humphries. All played better than I can ever remember. Anthony Franklin was also better than I thought he could be. Phillips and Moi didn’t have the impact I’d want to see, but they weren‘t pushed around either.
I admittedly stopped caring about Stanford football last year, so my assessment may not match those who did follow closely, but I have to think everyone saw improvements across the board and a team not as weak as they assumed going into the 2023 season.
2. David Bailey will be Stanford’s next 1st Round NFL Draft pick?
3. Josh Karty will win the Lou Groza Award?
4. Stanford will will win more games this season than the experts predicted?
5. Stanford will not finish last in the P12’s curtain closing season?
6. You won’t be able to predict most plays Stanford will run On O & D anymore?
7. Gaethan Bernadel is not as good as expected?
8. Ryan Butler is better than expected?
9. Ben Yorosek will be playing on Sundays next year?
10. Ashton Daniels will be a 3- year starter?
11. This is a well-coached team?
After one game, I feel my belief that Stanford was being underrated is warranted. Coaching makes a big difference and I don’t think people appreciate how Troy Taylor’s record at SacState indicates how good he is as a coach. Teams with a pass rush always have to be taken seriously. Stanford has some very good Edge rushers that bad teams typically don’t have. They as a group weren’t as dominant as I expected, but Bailey was better than expected, so net as good as I suspected. And OMG was that the best QB debut I’ve seen since Luck. TT clearly understands how to run a QB-friendly college offense. I always felt when a pass was called under Shaw it was a referendum on the offense. Taylor mixed all kinds of QB tasks into the equation so it wasn’t so binary. Just felt Stanford was running an offense rather than calling individual plays like I felt with Shaw teams, even good ones.
Hawaii put on a pretty impressive showing other than the fact they couldn’t run the ball at all, and their crushing penalties. I’m not going to expect a victory over Southern Cal, but I feel confident Stanford will hold its own and not embarrass itself, at least relative to expectations. I‘m not making any season record prediction but I think everyone needs to expect more wins than they were imagining to be most likely based on being influenced by expert pessimism and the sour taste left over from the Shaw era.
One of my assumptions was we would see players that we thought to be not very good show more than thought possible. I come away from watching the Hawaii game feeling like most of the guys who played were new or not real experienced. The only guys that I knew of playing before but not well, were Sinclair and Gilman, maybe Humphries. All played better than I can ever remember. Anthony Franklin was also better than I thought he could be. Phillips and Moi didn’t have the impact I’d want to see, but they weren‘t pushed around either.
I admittedly stopped caring about Stanford football last year, so my assessment may not match those who did follow closely, but I have to think everyone saw improvements across the board and a team not as weak as they assumed going into the 2023 season.
