Brian Bennett: Don't give up on Jerry Kill yet.

BleedGopher

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per ESPN's mailbag:

Jeff from Minneapolis writes: With what looks like an 0-8 conference season or at best 1-7, Minnesota continues to be a doormat in the Big Ten and has been for 5 decades. Would Northern Illinois or even NDSU be suitable replacements? Indiana has a proud basketball program in the Big Ten so even though they struggle at FB, they are top notch in the other major sport.

Brian Bennett: Wow, that's some doom and gloom up in the Twin Cities. Has winter already hit there? The loss to Iowa was very disappointing in how it played out, but that was one game. Don't give up on Jerry Kill yet.

http://espn.go.com/blog/bigten/post/_/id/85402/big-ten-wednesday-mailbag-9

Go Gophers!!
 

Making the Gophers a contender is obviously a daunting task. It's Jerry's turn to try. It's really, really hard, given the limitations of the program. One of the biggest challenges is just changing the culture. Top-notch recruits might be swayed by programs with loftier history. The climate in Minneapolis is less appealing than some other areas of the country. The fan base isn't nearly as large or supportive as other big time programs. Jerry knew all that before he took this job, and faced similar challenges in previous stops. He and his staff will coach 'em up and you'll be proud to be a Gopher fan. I just hope when it's all said and done that Gopher fans give back to Killer half as much as he gives you.
 

Jeff clearly doesn't have any idea what the B1G is all about. It's more than just football.
 

per ESPN's mailbag:

Jeff from Minneapolis writes: With what looks like an 0-8 conference season or at best 1-7, Minnesota continues to be a doormat in the Big Ten and has been for 5 decades. Would Northern Illinois or even NDSU be suitable replacements? Indiana has a proud basketball program in the Big Ten so even though they struggle at FB, they are top notch in the other major sport.

Brian Bennett: Wow, that's some doom and gloom up in the Twin Cities. Has winter already hit there? The loss to Iowa was very disappointing in how it played out, but that was one game. Don't give up on Jerry Kill yet.

http://espn.go.com/blog/bigten/post/_/id/85402/big-ten-wednesday-mailbag-9

Go Gophers!!

Some troll sends a "the Gophers are so awful" post and Bennett is always happy to print it. Bleed, 90%+ you're spot on. Wish we didn't give the d-bag time over here to.
 

Jeff from Minneapolis doesn't sound like a fun person to be around
 


'Jeff from Minneapolis' is on there often and is alwas putting down the Gophers.
 

Honestly, who are these morons who write this crap? Yes, we're not good at football, so let's leave the B1G.
 


Anyone who had any journalistic integrity would read that question and click delete. Anyone that suggests removing a charter member of one of the top conferences in the country despite having never done so in it's history doesn't deserve the time of day.
 



Anyone who had any journalistic integrity would read that question and click delete. Anyone that suggests removing a charter member of one of the top conferences in the country despite having never done so in it's history doesn't deserve the time of day.

No kidding. It's ridiculous Bennett even posted that question and answered it. "Has Winter already hit up there?". How original.
 

Bennett never comes to Minnesota in the winter time because he has water on the brain and when it freezes, things slip his mind.
 

No kidding. It's ridiculous Bennett even posted that question and answered it. "Has Winter already hit up there?". How original.

Also, it's pretty obvious that it's a troll because what self-professed fan would even suggest removing them from their own conference?
 

Also, it's pretty obvious that it's a troll because what self-professed fan would even suggest removing them from their own conference?

Or suggest NDSU or NIU as replacements. Mr.Bigelow is right, the bleep gets questions posted way to often. It's the only time a "F-YOU" Bennett comes to my mind.
 





No kidding. It's ridiculous Bennett even posted that question and answered it. "Has Winter already hit up there?". How original.

+1 It's a common enough tactic, pick trollish letters to respond to, so you can say "I'm not saying it, I'm just responding..."
 

Making the Gophers a contender is obviously a daunting task. It's Jerry's turn to try. It's really, really hard, given the limitations of the program. One of the biggest challenges is just changing the culture. Top-notch recruits might be swayed by programs with loftier history. The climate in Minneapolis is less appealing than some other areas of the country. The fan base isn't nearly as large or supportive as other big time programs. Jerry knew all that before he took this job, and faced similar challenges in previous stops. He and his staff will coach 'em up and you'll be proud to be a Gopher fan. I just hope when it's all said and done that Gopher fans give back to Killer half as much as he gives you.

Thanks for giving Jerry all the excuses he needs to explain away failure. Oh it's so awful here. No one wants to come. Quit whining! Either he does his job and starts winning Big Ten games or he gets the hell out of here. And talking about being a contender is ridiculous. We're a long way from average, and that's where Mr. Kill and company should get us first. Win 4 Big Ten games a year for 3 straight years and then we can be average. I don't even want to guess how many years we are from that happening...
 

Thanks for giving Jerry all the excuses he needs to explain away failure. Oh it's so awful here. No one wants to come. Quit whining! Either he does his job and starts winning Big Ten games or he gets the hell out of here. And talking about being a contender is ridiculous. We're a long way from average, and that's where Mr. Kill and company should get us first. Win 4 Big Ten games a year for 3 straight years and then we can be average. I don't even want to guess how many years we are from that happening...

You're kinda allover the place here. On the one hand you say Kill needs to win or get out, but you also acknowledge Minnesota's a long way from contending. If you keep firing coaches you'll just have a revolving door of coaches, continuous failure and a program that keeps going in circles. mason got ten years, if Kill's winning 6-7 games a year he should get at least the same amount of time as Mason
 

per ESPN's mailbag:

Jeff from Minneapolis writes: With what looks like an 0-8 conference season or at best 1-7, Minnesota continues to be a doormat in the Big Ten and has been for 5 decades. Would Northern Illinois or even NDSU be suitable replacements? Indiana has a proud basketball program in the Big Ten so even though they struggle at FB, they are top notch in the other major sport.

Brian Bennett: Wow, that's some doom and gloom up in the Twin Cities. Has winter already hit there? The loss to Iowa was very disappointing in how it played out, but that was one game. Don't give up on Jerry Kill yet.

http://espn.go.com/blog/bigten/post/_/id/85402/big-ten-wednesday-mailbag-9

Go Gophers!!

Wisconsin or Iowa fan. Without a doubt.
 

Wisconsin or Iowa fan. Without a doubt.

I was thinking NDAC fan, especially since he mentioned them in the question. Does anyone even know that NDAC exists aside from their own fans (and alumni:)).
 

Wisconsin or Iowa fan. Without a doubt.

Now that you mention it, I think he is one of those. I do recall some of his ?'s since he is a frequent commentator when they B1G blog guys put the 'mailbags' out.
 

Two games made Kill & Co. look really inept: New Mexico State in '11 and Iowa this year. They came back from the NMS debacle and hopefully, they'll come back from Iowa. If not, it will be a brutal season.
 


^ last year was a lot worse. I think the difference is that this time the game was at home and expectations were running high which made the fall harder to take.
 

Don't you think they looked worse last year against Iowa?

Yes, but I think he meant inept in terms of getting outcoached or underperforming vs expectations, rather than just looking bad (otherwise 58-0 @ Mich would be on the list as well). It's still debatable, but I think this game made Kill look worse as it was home and the talent disparity was supposed to have lessened since last year
 


Yes, but I think he meant inept in terms of getting outcoached or underperforming vs expectations, rather than just looking bad (otherwise 58-0 @ Mich would be on the list as well). It's still debatable, but I think this game made Kill look worse as it was home and the talent disparity was supposed to have lessened since last year[/QUO

Who owns the "expectations" you refer to? Last year's loss at iowa city was uglier in most every way. Personally, I was expecting iowa to be very tough up front and they were...on offense and defense. That is JUST what a running team does NOT want to see. Some people around here have some very unrealistic expectations, I fear.
 

Who owns the "expectations" you refer to? Last year's loss at iowa city was uglier in most every way. Personally, I was expecting iowa to be very tough up front and they were...on offense and defense. That is JUST what a running team does NOT want to see. Some people around here have some very unrealistic expectations, I fear.

There were certainly uglier parts last year. However, last year we gained 299 yards on the road against Iowa, this year it was down to 165. That is horrendous. As for unrealistic expectations, I don't think expecting an offense to get to 200 yards at home is unrealistic.
 

Who owns the "expectations" you refer to? Last year's loss at iowa city was uglier in most every way. Personally, I was expecting iowa to be very tough up front and they were...on offense and defense. That is JUST what a running team does NOT want to see. Some people around here have some very unrealistic expectations, I fear.

Well, last year we were +6 and lost by 18....underperformed by 12. This year we were +2.5 and lost by 16....underperformed by 13.5.

I dont necessarily think ATS is the best measure of overperformance or underperformance, but if I give you a qualitative answer you'll babble on for 4-5 pages so I wanted some numbers behind it
 

Making the Gophers a contender is obviously a daunting task. It's Jerry's turn to try. It's really, really hard, given the limitations of the program. One of the biggest challenges is just changing the culture. Top-notch recruits might be swayed by programs with loftier history. The climate in Minneapolis is less appealing than some other areas of the country. The fan base isn't nearly as large or supportive as other big time programs. Jerry knew all that before he took this job, and faced similar challenges in previous stops. He and his staff will coach 'em up and you'll be proud to be a Gopher fan. I just hope when it's all said and done that Gopher fans give back to Killer half as much as he gives you.

Seriously?
You are making it sound like Jerry reluctantly was talked into this job, in reality he couldn't have jumped into this gig any faster. He tendered his resignation less than 24 hours after NIU last regular season game (a conference title loss btw) and jumped ship for the big city lights and big conference paycheck. Another poster a few days ago nailed it when he referred to Kill and his staff as a bunch of plucky upstarts that have hit the big time. I mean gosh,he tripled his salary to come here!

He faced no similar challenges at previous stops either. When he took the NIU job, it was only open because their coach was retiring. They'd had 7 winning seasons in a row (prior to the year before Kill got there) and when he got the job Kill spoke about keeping the legacy of the guy he was replacing going. The guy he replaced was on the selection search committee, not unceremoniously fired mid-season. So no, its not at all rational to say Kill "rebuilt" NIU or faced similar challenges there to what he is facing here. This is uncharted territory for Kill, why isn't it OK to admit that? Maybe he does awesome, maybe he's over-matched (which is what its looking like to me) but there is Not a historical equity to point at to show Kill's done this before so let's be patient.

He's in his third year now, when will we start seeing evidence of coached up players? When will we see Brewster level success in the conference? When should we expect Mason era competitiveness?

Maturi hired Kill because he's got a compelling personal life story and was, generally speaking, big on good academic results for his teams. Remember who hired Kill, and why. An incompetent fool hired a guy he liked. This wasn't a hire by a major college athletics power broker. Kill is probably producing exactly what Maturi was hoping/expecting him to produce. Kill is getting paid less than Brewster was, which is really shocking when you really stop to think about it. If you want the lowest paid coach in the conference, I guess maybe you should expect the worst coaching?
 




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