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Aztecs Football…Big Game…Big Problems..

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San Diego State has upgraded its non-conference schedules. They are loading cup with PAC-12 teams in home and home series.

They beat Stanford a year ago, then lost opening day to them this season.

SDSU beat Arizona State last year, and have to play the Sun Devils, and their new head coach Herman Edwards this weekend. ASU is led by dynamiting quarterback Manny Wilkins, who threw for 308-yards last week in a Devils win over Michigan State.

Rocky Long has to play this game, and then face the start of the Mountain West Conference schedule, without his starting quarterback Christian Chapman, out with a sprained knee, and without top defensive tackle Nobel Hall, out with a dislocated wrist.

A really tough chore, as Long stood on the firing line on Tuesday to talk about his (1-1) team…

.We asked for this when we set these schedules up
.Biggest concerns I have is that ASU knows our signal system
.Denny Gonzales going there as Def Coordinator gives them inside information
.I would not allow our other assistants to go to ASU, but they took two other young coaches.
.Herman Edwards has them playing at higher emotional level this year
.His message to his team is about enthusiasm and ASU is showing it.

.Ryan Agnew been around along time in program..prepared himself to be starter-now he gets his chance
.Good athlete-different being starter-vs-coming off the bench
.He believes he will play well-has played well off the bench
.He’s prepared-he’s been here for 3-years.
.Christian Chapman could play in 4-to-6 week

.Manny Wilkens-good athlete-very strong arm
.Wilkens moves around well..gets out of trouble…makes plays with feet
.Our offensive line will be under a lot of pressure
.ASU threw for 380-against Michigan State defense
.Everybody runs spread in college ball..they have guys who catch the ball
.They will spread us sideline to sideline…they will isolate our corners
.We need to disrupt timing of QB..push people back into QB..
.Sun Devils offense equal to what Cal-Davis Webb had 2-years ago when we played them.

.Juwan Washington proved good running back even when OL not block for him
.Noble Hall-dislocated wrist-out 3-to-6 weeks.
.He’s been a difference maker since moving inside to DT-this is a big loss.

.Herman Edwards-not surprised he got back into coaching….
.When you are a coach-the lifestyle is addictive-tough to give it up
.He liked our program-our defense-called to take Danny Gonzales as Def Coor

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“NFL-Looking Back”

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Week 1 of the NFL season is in the books. Randon thoughts from here-there-everywhere.

THE STADIUM…Empty seats, 6-tarps on different parts of the stadium, lots of fans weaqring Chiefs red in the yard-doesn’t look like Team Spanos, so called ‘1st Family of Football’ has made much progress in battle for LA.

NOT SO SPECIAL…..Bolts special teams-same old disaster. Someone needs to explain to me why George Stewart is held in such high regard as the special teams coach. A mess all last year, and more of same opening day this year, responsible for another loss. Pick one…missed field goal….fumbled punt at 7-yard line…..2-kickoffs from out of end zone that never got beyond the 10-yard line…and Travis Benjamin giving ground on a punt and losing yardage.

D-FENSE…No pass rush, no Joey Bosa-Corey Liuget vs Chiefs, so this will be a challenge for a couple of more weeks. Thank goodness they play the Bills in Buffalo, where the infamous kid QB-Nathan Peterman awaits, the high pick who has thrown 7-interceptions in 4-quarters of starts in his brief career. The alternative is Wyoming rookie high draft pick Josh Allen, who struggled all preseason.

GARBAGE TIME….Yes Philip Rivers threw for (424Y) but much of that was in catch-up heave the blal down the field mode. The stats don’t mean much if you cannot win.

DROPS-DROPS…More of the same. 3rd year wide out Tyrell Williams drops a 34-yard wide open TD pass. Benjamin has two, both wide open, go off his fingers. Same old-same old like last year.

ALL EVERYTHING…Melvin Gordon is so good. A (166-yard) all purpose day catch and run. He might wind up with Le’Veon Bell type numbers, some 300-plus touches this year.

DO EVERYTHING…Adam Ekeler is pretty dynamic. Run tough inside…catch balls and make lots of yards. A bigger version of Danny Woodhead, a tougher version on Ronnie Harmon. What a find.

MIA OFFENSE…Antonio Gates caught a couple of passes, but not for much yardage. The down the field dynamic they had a year ago, with Hunter Henry and Gates is gone, which means those 75-receptions from last fall, will have to be caught by someone else. Mike Williams and the tandem at running back.

BIG MIKE….We know what Keenan Allen can do, but was suprised not more targets for last year’s first round pick Mike Williams. He has to become the strong number 2-guy on the Rivers pass route tree.

TOP PICK-FINE PLAYER….Derwin James was lots of places making plays in his first game. Size-speed-toughness. Got beat once, came back and made up space in a big pass deflection in the end zone, and a cross the field sprint to go get a ball carrier.

WAITING…Uchenna Nwosu, the ex-USC Trojan, had a good preseason, really active, but disappeared in the KC opener-no big plays. The guy he’s trying to take a job from, LB-Kyle Emanuel, was seen out there on the field, as fullback Mike Cox leaked out an caught a huge back-breaking touchdown pass in the game.

DINGED UP…Joe Barksdale didn’t get thru the 2nd quarter, leaving with a knee injury. The teaqm will have to rush to get Forrest Lamp ready to play at guard, so journeyman Mike Schofield, can move to right tackle in emergency. Always wondered if they would miss veteran warrior Matt Slauson or former starter Spencer Pulley, both let go in the offseason. Guess we’ll find out soon enough if anyone else gets hurt.

BEST IN THE BUSINESS…Impressed with the power display at center from Mike Pouncey, the ex-Miami Dophins. Passed blocked well, ran block some, but you could tell what a diference in demeanour in that offensive front. :

NEW LOOK…The Chargers went back to their first ever logo, from their AFL-season in Los Angeles, using a shield, a Charger horse, and a lightning bolt as the logo at midfield. Looked good, but it was an AFL like crowd too, just (25,000) or so they had for opening day.

DID YOU KNOW…Chargers have only 7-home games this year at Stub Hub Center. 1-home game becomes the international game in London. And they’ve lost a critical home game they could have won with the Chiefs loss.

DID YOU ALSO KNOW….Charges have now lost 9-times in a row to Kansas City?

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“A Road Trip-Memory of a Life-In Death”

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The baseball pennant races were in high gear.

It was the opening weekend of the college football season.

It was NFL roster cutdown week and the start of the NFL season.

I couldn’t stay here, I had to go.

It was not really a vacation I took this past week from my website, and my freelance interviews with various stations I do.

It was a pilgrimage I had considered taking for more than a year, and it came about very quickly.

I owed it to myself, to my family, to my loved ones lost in military service.

I went to France, to visit Normandie, walk the D-Day Beaches at Omaha and Utah, reflect on life, my deceased father, and my uncles, who all served in World War II.

it was tearful, emotional, reflective. It was a salute to the courage they all showed during that entire 5-year war, and most especially those who landed June 6th 1944 and fought to free Europe and the world from tyranny over the final months of a terrible global conflict.

Below is the letter I wrote to my two sons, the night I came off a nearly 10-hour stay at that historic sight.

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Spent the entire day at Normandie….

Most emotional-moving experience of my life…thought about my Dad in New Caledonia-Wake-Neumaier-Fiji…Vincent-paratrooper…Nick at Anzio…..Joe as a medic in Philippines…Phil in the Pacific…Jack in a foxhole in the Pacific…Smitty in B-17s over Germany…Vito in North Africa tank corps….Lawson as a communications specialist on a ship……our other uncles who died on Bataan…Regensburg…Battle of Bulge.

1-woman in our group, from North Carolina, her uncle died on Omaha Beach….they accompanied her to his graveside at the Beach….so classy.

We were also taken to the headstones of the ‘Bedford Boys’….if you remember 18-soldiers from Bedford, Virginia, died in the first hour of the Omaha beach landing…all from the same home town…Bedford is where the D-Day memorial was built just outside Roanoke, Virginia

They do a ceremony at 12-noon each day…played ‘Taps’…very moving…Each cross with the soldiers name-home state-day they died. We wept.

The hard to believe story of how they had just a 4-hour window to land troops at low tide-secure the beach and then begin the drive to move inland and unload the ships, build the mulberry bridges, sink the cement kasons…survive the gun shellings, and then the horrific weather that followed later that week.

The soldiers got to the bluffs, after landing at 6-30am…they got atop by 11am….at Point-du-Hoc, they took 90% casualties, but climbed the cliffs in 25-minutes to secure and knock out the gun sights shelliing Omaha and Utah.

The dichotomy….on this site….3,200 casualties just on D-Day……can you imagine the shore batteries attacking the beach….the smoke….the carnage….the bodies…the blood….the chaos…..that was the sound that day.

Then imagine today…ultimate silence-reverence-respect…no one talked…no one laughed….just complete silence with all of us looking at the 3500-crosses in the cemetery…

The American Cemetery cloaked in reverence. The German cemetary with 8,000-buried…no white crosses, just a black stone on each gravesite-with no identification.. ..Almost a symbol of good-vs-bad.

Being here flashes into your mind.

‘Freedom is not Free’….and you think of he courage of all those men to fight their way across the 450-yards of beaches under withering fire from the bluffs and hillsides, those who made their way up the draws, thru the hedgerows, to scale Point-du-Hoc, to put out the 88’s who were shelling the beaches and the landing crafts.

Indeed the Greatest Generation. I walked that beach-what an amazing symbol of courage.

What an experience.

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I am back, and am posting all things sports on my website for your viewing now.

Lots to cover with the opening of the NFL season, college football, the baseball pennant races, and everything else..

Sports is important, always has been in my life and career. But what I experienced in France has made me feel different.

What an honor to be part of the next generation, brought into this world by the ‘Greatest Generation’, all those courageous men buried at the US-Cemetary at Normandie..

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“San Diego State Football–Are You Paying Attention”

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The Aztecs kickoff the football season Friday.

They’ve done everything you’d want in a growing football program, except one thing.

History will tell us of the phenomenal run by Don Coryell, the architect of the modern day passing game in college and NFL football.

It’s fabulous when you look at the roll call of great quarterbacks San Diego State had in that era. Dennis Shaw, Brian Sipe, Rod Dowhower, Craig Penrose, Jesse Frietas and more.

The Aztec Bowl rocked and the stands were filled with fans when they moved to San Diego-Jack Murphy Stadium.

The 1990s brought us the Marshall Faulk era, when playing Division 1-teams became the norm. Billy Blanton, David Lowrey, Ryan Lindley, Kevin O’Connell, Todd Santos and Dan McGwire put on passing shows, and crowds of 50,000 came to see SDSU.

This decade has brought us old school football, and lots of wins. Rocky Long’s passion and personality have brought success back to Montezuma Mesa. Running downhill football, with a punch you in the mouth defense, has led to a (69-24) run, that has included lots of highs, and spectacular players.

This era of Red & Black has been colored by the talents of Donnell Pumphrey and Rashaad Penny, NCAA rushing leaders and record setters.

The legacy is dynamic. Air Coryell football became ‘Linebackers R Us’ to what has become ‘Running Back U’.

It’s been great to see, but few are seeing it.

In a city and county of 3.5M, with more than 110,000-alums living here, the passion and crowd support is anemic.

This year, the Aztecs season ticket count has dropped off again, down to around 13,000. Average attendance last year, was a shade over 25,000-paid, despite one of the best home schedules in school history.

10-win seasons are the norm, bowl games, that used to be far and few between, are now an every December happening. And yet the community is not turned on, and for the most part ignores the product on the field, the hard work by the staff, and the accomplishment of the quality facilities up on campus.

I’ve covered this team,and broadcast its games too, during both good and bad. I don’t understand why SDSU is ignored by its faithful, and now even by the jilted Chargers fans, who haven’t rallied around, nor embraced quality.

Maybe it’s the Mountain West Conference affiliation

Maybe we live in a community of transplants, who identify with the Pac 12, or the Big 10, of the Big 12 or ACC.

Maybe it’s a malaise left over from the horrible treatment of the Spanos family towards the football fans who so loyally gave to the Chargers.

Maybe it’s the fault of a struggling San Diego State athletic department, behind the power curve in how to promote its own product, its two Heisman Trophy candidates, or how to sell tickets in the community.

Maybe it’s the media, where the opening season press conference had just two TV stations out of 7-in the market show up, only this ex-radio host and the 1-newspaper in town.

You could understand down years, disappointing years, from the end of the Al Luginbill era-thru-Tom Craft and Ted Tollner. You knew there would be erosion with the disaster that was Chuck Long. That was then-this is now and this is damn good.

Rocky Long and the Aztecs have done everything right. Win games, win bowl games, become a power in the conference punching Boise State in the mouth, and winning games against Pac 12-schools at home and on the road.

Is it the community? Is it the alums? Is it the university itself?

San Diego State football deserves better than it has gotten recently.

They’ve done everything you’d want a football team to do, except get fan support.

I’m paying attention, why aren’t you?

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and fto

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“San Diego State Football–Are You Paying Attention”

-0-

The Aztecs kickoff the football season Friday.

They’ve done everything you’d want in a growing football program, except one thing.

History will tell us of the phenomenal run by Don Coryell, the architect of the modern day passing game in college and NFL football.

It’s fabulous when you look at the roll call of great quarterbacks San Diego State had in that era. Dennis Shaw, Brian Sipe, Rod Dowhower, Craig Penrose, Jesse Frietas and more.

The Aztec Bowl rocked and the stands were filled with fans when they moved to San Diego-Jack Murphy Stadium.

The 1990s brought us the Marshall Faulk era, when playing Division 1-teams became the norm. Billy Blanton, David Lowrey, Ryan Lindley, Kevin O’Connell, Todd Santos and Dan McGwire put on passing shows, and crowds of 50,000 came to see SDSU.

This decade has brought us old school football, and lots of wins. Rocky Long’s passion and personality have brought success back to Montezuma Mesa. Running downhill football, with a punch you in the mouth defense, has led to a (69-24) run, that has included lots of highs, and spectacular players.

This era of Red & Black has been colored by the talents of Donnell Humphrey and Rashaad Penny, NCAA rushing leaders and record setters.

The legacy is dynamic. Air Coryell football became ‘Linebackers R Us’ to what has become ‘Running Back U’.

It’s been great to see, but few are seeing it.

In a city and county of 3.5M, with more than 110,000-alums living here, the passion and crowd support is anemic.

This year, the Aztecs season ticket count has dropped off again, down to around 13,000. Average attendance last year, was a shade over 25,000-paid, despite one of the best home schedules in school history.

10-win seasons are the norm, bowl games, that used to be far and few between, are now an every December happening. And yet the community is not turned on, and for the most part ignores the product on the field, the hard work by the staff, and the accomplishment of the quality facilities up on campus.

I’ve covered this team,and broadcast its games too, during both good and bad. I don’t understand why SDSU is ignored by its faithful, and now even by the jilted Chargers fans, who haven’t rallied around, nor embraced quality.

Maybe it’s the Mountain West Conference affiliation

Maybe we live in a community of transplants, who identify with the Pac 12, or the Big 10, of the Big 12 or ACC.

Maybe it’s a malaise left over from the horrible treatment of the Spanos family towards the football fans who so loyally gave to the Chargers.

Maybe it’s the fault of a struggling San Diego State athletic department, behind the power curve in how to promote its own product, its two Heisman Trophy candidates, or how to sell tickets in the community.

Maybe it’s the media, where the opening season press conference had just two TV stations out of 7-in the market show up, only this ex-radio host and the 1-newspaper in town.

You could understand back then, during the down years, the disappointing years, the struggles with Tom Craft or Ted Tollner, the disaster that was Chuck Long, but that was then-this is now and this is pretty damn good.

Rocky Long and the Aztecs have done everything right. Win games, win bowl games, become a power in the conference punching Boise State in the mouth, and winning games against Pac 12-schools at home and on the road.

Is it the community? Is it the alums? Is it the university itself?

San Diego State football deserves better than it has gotten recently.

They’ve done everything you’d want a football team to do, except get fan support.

I’m paying attention, why aren’t you?

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and fto