Bison06

Hmm, you’re right. I’ll have to look through other press conferences from earlier maybe. I definitely heard coach klieman address it before Saturday, I just can’t remember when. I’ll keep looking.

I’ll look.

I’m not sure what timeline you’re working off, but it was first addressed as far as I know the day before the game by coach klieman at the press conference. I don’t remember his exact words, but he definitely brought it up and was very clear as to why he didn’t make the trip.

Obviously, I hope this is the case, some of the rumors I’ve heard from more than one person suggest it may not be so simple as that. But you know how the rumor mill can be. Until the official story comes out, I’m going to give the benefit of the doubt.

Our discourse yesterday(between you and me) has nothing to do with this topic. You are confusing me with another poster. our discussion was about injuries.

Rumor mill is churning with lots of stories right now, hard to know what’s true, but your sources are saying similar things to mine.

You’re not wrong on any of that, technically. It is a fact that FCS football is a true second tier, but in my mind this is only the case due to the unique nature of NCAA Football and it’s “official” tier system. Every other sport has a heirarchy just the same as NCAA football, but it’s “unofficial”. Technically, Rice has an equal chance to win the College Football Playoff as Clemson, but do they really? There is an unofficial split between P5 and G5, but since they technically play for the same championship they “play the same level of football” Those of us who follow FCS football are simply arguing that in terms of quality of play and brand recognition, FCS teams at the top and the G5 are the same.

This debate seems to come up every year, where do the top teams in FCS rank in comparison to the FBS. My take isn’t based only on NDSU. Any given year, the FCS final four, in my mind, are similarly competitive to any team ranked outside of the top 25 in FBS, some years maybe slightly higher for the best FCS teams. There is evidence to back this up if you look back at the teams top FCS squads beat the years they win the FCS championship. There are exceptions of course, but that’s about where they would end up most years I believe. I understand your point, but it’s much more complicated than the top FCS being, by definition, only the 132nd best football team in the country. Brand matters in college athletics, and there is far more overlap between all levels of football in both quality of play and brand equity than you are willing to concede it seems. Using a non-NDSU team to illustrate my point: Who is more well known to the average football fan? Mount Union(division III) or Charlotte University(FBS). Outside of die-hard fans, you’d hear a lot of “didn’t realize Charlotte has a team”

I agree, as was Dudzik if you look back. In defense of both of them, our defense is designed to funnel most running plays to the safety so if they miss a tackle the play is going to go big.

I'm a broken record here it seems, but the parallels to '13/'14 are everywhere in this offseason. Grimsley took over for Dudzik and everyone said the same thing. Grimsley took a minute to step in as a freshman, but overall did well. I feel confident Tutsie will be the next great safety at NDSU. Klieman spoke more highly of him than any player I can think of in recent memory.

Foles has been the QB on an eagles team that has won some big games, yes. Has he played well when he has stepped in for Wentz? Some games yes very good, some games they won in spite of his performance. Even the last game, sure he lead a game winning drive, but I wouldn’t say he played particularly well in that game. His stats certainly don’t paint an incredible picture. Wins are certainly what matters at the end of a game, but there is no way to know how last season plays out if Carson doesn’t get hurt. Maybe he continues playing at an mvp level and they win the Super Bowl anyway, we’ll never know. I’m not sure about saying Foles is better in Philly’s system, I’m gonna disagree there.

You’re arguing both sides here. You were saying earlier that if a player is truly injured they will sit out(Wentz). But now you are saying that you and I both played injured. Which narrative are you going with here?

Example: broke my hand badly in a college game in ‘04. Came to the sideline for an evaluation, yep it’s broke. Coach comes over and asks the trainer if I can make it worse by playing, nope. Played the rest of the game, scheduled for season ending surgery on Monday.

You know how many guys have surgery the week and month following the season? The standard for playing in the nfl many times isn’t are you injured. It’s are you better at whatever percentage you are at than the backup and will you make it significantly worse by playing

You and I clearly live in different realities as it pertains to football injuries.

You may be right, I haven’t read that. Though a stress fracture seems unlikely to go that long undiagnosed. Something must have happened to make it symptomatic more recently.

Trainers work for the team, not the players. Many players have filed grievances with the league over these situations. Just because the trainers and doctors say you can play, doesn’t make it true. He’s clearly been hurt all year if you’ve been watching.

Injuries count for every team and affect every team. I’ve never said different.

Are we taking into account that the man had a broken back for much of this season and is/was less than a year away from reconstructive knee surgery? When healthy last year Wentz was an MVP candidate. Maybe he’ll be banged up his whole career and that’ll be the book on him. But I’m not sure how someone can argue that he isn’t a great QB when he’s healthy.

You make good points. His opportunities to prove himself so far have been hampered by unfortunate injuries. Hopefully that won’t be the story of his career.

I was very impressed with EWU, more than I expected to be. Some of those early penalties really hurt them, hard to know if those big plays happen without the penalties being committed sometimes, but without the penalties they had the NDSU defense on its heels. Not an easy feat.

Sitting in my home as I type. The internet is so magical.

What’s your definition of a troll?

I guess time will tell, you may very well be correct. Out of curiosity, did you predict the same in 2013?

I don’t disagree that to win a championship often some things have to fall your way, but NDSU hasn’t exactly been immune from the types of challenges other teams have faced, I would argue they have just handled them better. Winning championships in two separate seasons where the head coach and much of the staff are working for two universities’ interests is a pretty unique challenge to overcome. The Klieman transition seemed to go infinitely smoother than the Bohl transition.