Temple football: Reading the clues

In a perfect world, a couple of things would have happened that seemed to not happen for Temple football over both the last few months or the last 15 practices.

First the months part.

In a perfect world, no player from one program could move to another program where a former coach earns a paycheck. Things are not perfect in that regard because Rutgers’ defensive coordinator Fran Brown probably had a hand in luring three Temple starters to Piscataway.

You can catch more Temple football on Youtube Thursday night.

He was here when they were here and now they are there.

Tampering?

Possibly, but we will never know.

An NCAA rule the prohibits such specific transfers would remove all doubt but this world is far from perfect.

There are clues in that story and we will allow you to come to your own conclusions.

Closer to home, though, there are other clues to be concerned about.

That’s either a touchdown or pass interference

It was my hope that D’Wan “Duece” Mathis would separate himself from backup Re-al Mitchell in the quarterback battle, but it seems like from every quote from Rod Carey and offensive coordinator Mike Uremovich that the two are neck-and-neck.

That’s not good.

I have nothing against Mitchell but we’ve seen enough from Mitchell last year to determine that’s he’s not an AAC-level starter. In over 40 years of watching Temple quarterbacks, I’ve never seen one with stats as poor as Mitchell’s in his first year improve significantly in his next year. His sample is large enough.

To quote the great Bill Parcells, you are what your record says you are.

To me, Mitchell is Vaughn Charlton, Chester Stewart and Mike McGann wrapped up into one quarterback.

Mathis should be closer to Adam DiMichele, Brian Broomell or P.J. Walker.

If he’s roughly about as good as Mitchell, that’s problematic.

Now there’s another way to look at this and I pray this is the case: Not wanting to discourage Mitchell or further deplete the quarterback room, they are telling this to Mitchell to keep him hungry and Mathis has really separated himself from everyone else. In other words, they better be lying their asses off.

Or somebody’s in trouble and, unfortunately, it’s not Fran Brown.

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4 thoughts on “Temple football: Reading the clues

  1. …I’ve seen a few TU fans harping on Coach Brown/RU and the transfers and can’t help but shake my head a bit. I’m not saying some different situations are impossible, but I think TU had 15 players transfer/grad transfer over the past 6 months, with this site outlining multiple concerns with Carey and staff, including a parent of one of the transfer players tweeting a comment about Carey appearing to favor people with NIU connections…is it really that surprising that players within the TU program weren’t happy and started looking at their options? Does anyone really think that the guys in the program were completely oblivious to all of these factors?

    Joe P.

  2. …and it terms of the QB ‘battle’ in I’d say it’s all coachspeak; I’ve seen it before (in public the coaches say it’s ‘too close to call’ but at practice they know full well who the starter is going to be).

    Joe P.

    • Mathis is the starter for 2021 version of the old NIU offense. He won’t last three games. Why? He is frail and fragile. Think of a taller, slower, weaker, skinnier Lamar Jackson. And, he floats the football…, his balls look like they are traveling in slow motion.

      Mitchell is just a good kid w/G5 minus arm strength and accuracy.

      Bottomline: TUFB is in trouble at the QB position.
      1. Accuracy – Mathis and Mitchell don’t have it.
      2. Arm Strength – both at the G5 bottom half level.
      3. Leadership and Poise – works in progress.
      4. Mechanics – flawed. Russo has better mechanics even w/those feet in quicksand.

      Rutgers 31
      Temple 13

      With improved vision and lower body mechanics, Russo has the raw talent to potentially play on Sundays. Mathis and Mitchell do not. They are practicing hard just to start games at the G5 level.

      • I think a running quarterback exposes himself to targeting and, from Rutgers’ perspective, it probably would be worth the 15 yards and disqualification to take him out in the first half … that’s how far the dropoff is from one to two. It’s unsportsmanlike and despicable but I would not put it past Fran Brown.

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