STrib: QB Leidner did his job for Gophers, then crushed his thumb

[BleedGopher]

per Joe:

He made several throws under duress and got his left (non-throwing) thumb crushed on a hit between two defenders in the third quarter, requiring medical attention on the sideline.

He put a glove on his left hand, stayed in the game and finished 26-for-40 for 301 yards and a *touchdown, *setting career highs for completions and yardage. His two interceptions both came late in desperation time.

“Everybody’s been critical of Mitch and certainly me, and that’s part of it when you’re the head coach and the quarterback,” Kill said. “He screwed up his opposite hand, and there was no way you’re going to take him out of the game.

“He played well enough for us to win the game. It wasn’t Mitch. He did everything he could.”

The bye week will give Leidner and his teammates extra time to get ready for the Oct. 31 Michigan game.

“I’m sure I’d be fine to go next Saturday if I had to,” Leidner said. “But these bye weeks are crucial to the team and being able to get your body back and recover. We’ll be able to put this loss behind us and continue to prepare and get better and give Michigan all we’ve got.”

http://www.startribune.com/qb-leidner-did-his-job-for-gophers-then-crushed-his-thumb/333735101/

Go Gophers!!

 

[justthefacts]

There are several of these threads and none of them have replies. Might I make a humble suggestion that you create one post game media mentions thread and post all the links in it?

 

[Iceland12]

• Kill did not detail what injuries starting linebackers Cody Poock and De’Vondre Campbell might be facing. Poock didn’t play, and Campbell played only on special teams before entering at linebacker in the second half. Kill said defensive end Alex Keith broke a hand during warm-ups and couldn’t play.

• KJ Maye had career highs with 11 receptions for 94 yards and added a 7-yard touchdown run. “We look at him as being one of our most explosive players on offense,” Leidner said.

 

[Iceland12]

per Joe:

He made several throws under duress and got his left (non-throwing) thumb crushed on a hit between two defenders in the third quarter, requiring medical attention on the sideline.

He put a glove on his left hand, stayed in the game and finished 26-for-40 for 301 yards and a *touchdown, *setting career highs for completions and yardage. His two interceptions both came late in desperation time.

“Everybody’s been critical of Mitch and certainly me, and that’s part of it when you’re the head coach and the quarterback,” Kill said. “He screwed up his opposite hand, and there was no way you’re going to take him out of the game.

“He played well enough for us to win the game. It wasn’t Mitch. He did everything he could.”

The bye week will give Leidner and his teammates extra time to get ready for the Oct. 31 Michigan game.

“I’m sure I’d be fine to go next Saturday if I had to,” Leidner said. “But these bye weeks are crucial to the team and being able to get your body back and recover. We’ll be able to put this loss behind us and continue to prepare and get better and give Michigan all we’ve got.”

http://www.startribune.com/qb-leidner-did-his-job-for-gophers-then-crushed-his-thumb/333735101/

Go Gophers!!

Coach Jerry Kill had said the Gophers were “banged up at running back” *coming into the game.

Afterward he said, “As far as injuries, things like that, it had no effect. It was just hard sledding in there. [Nebraska] made it very tough.”

But Leidner did take advantage of Nebraska’s porous pass defense. He completed his first 10 passes. By halftime, he was 16-for-17 for 156 yards.

“He played well enough for us to win the game. It wasn’t Mitch. He did everything he could.”

He certainly did.

 

[Pompous Elitist]

Mitch had a great game. The INTs at the end notwithstanding/understandable considering the circumstances. Even Limegrover surprised me, going against tendencies for most of the game. We were playing behind, had to throw the ball and we did with a lot of success. With some help from the defense they were playing well enough to put up a lot of points yesterday.

Nobody should be criticizing Mitch too harshly. He did his best out there.

 

[cjbfbp]

“He played well enough for us to win the game.”

I agree that he played very well, but technically he didn't play well enough to win the game. He would have had to have thrown for 400+ yards to win this game, had close to an 80% completion rate, and would have needed the green light to throw 50 or more passes instead of the 40 he threw.

The coaches came out with the right offensive strategy in this game, but after Leidner completed all ten of his first ten passes for about 96 yards they refused to stick with it and insisted on trying to get the running game going and once again wasted first half possessions doing so. For sure Leidner was bound to have diminishing returns per pass after those first 10 but the team was getting virtually nothing on its rushing attempts.

 

[Unregistered User]

I agree that he played very well, but technically he didn't play well enough to win the game. He would have had to have been almost perfect to win this game and he would have needed the green light to throw 50 or more passes instead of the 40 he threw.

Right. Because you expect him to play defense too, apparently.

He individually played well enough for the team to win.

 

[cjbfbp]

Right. Because you expect him to play defense too, apparently.

He individually played well enough for the team to win.

You missed my point. I wasn't criticizing him at all. In order to put enough points to win this game, he would have had to have been allowed to do more than he did.

 

[bottlebass]

You missed my point. I wasn't criticizing him at all. In order to put enough points to win this game, he would have had to have been allowed to do more than he did.

If you hadn't watched the game, knowing what we knew about the gophers and the huskers going into the game and someone told you the gophers had scored 25 points and had thrown for over 300 yards and made you guess whether the gophers won or lost every single person would pick the gophers won. Mitch played well enough for us to win the game. Our defense did not.

 

[cjbfbp]

If you hadn't watched the game, knowing what we knew about the gophers and the huskers going into the game and someone told you the gophers had scored 25 points and had thrown for over 300 yards and made you guess whether the gophers won or lost every single person would pick the gophers won. Mitch played well enough for us to win the game. Our defense did not.

Again, you missed my point as well (people on this board are pretty bad at detecting nuance or remarks of an indirect nature). There was no criticism about Leidner at all in my words. I thought he did a fine job. He just needed to do an even better job but he wasn't allowed to try to do that until it was too late. Leidner quite possibly could have thrown for 400+ yards yesterday but he wasn't given enough opportunities to do that because passing the ball on 75% or more of the plays from scrimmage is not "who we are." I wish we had coaches who were less concerned about team identity and sticking with plans and more concerned about whatever is working or not working in the immediate circumstances of each game. Perhaps the run game could have opened up in the second half if the coaches had stuck with the passing game more in the first half.

 

[Some guy]

If you hadn't watched the game, knowing what we knew about the gophers and the huskers going into the game and someone told you the gophers had scored 25 points and had thrown for over 300 yards and made you guess whether the gophers won or lost every single person would pick the gophers won. Mitch played well enough for us to win the game. Our defense did not.

If you said 300 yards passing I would say the gophers win.
If you had said 25 points it would be very much in question. That is usually right on the border between a win and a loss. They scored 24 and 23 the last two meetings. 25 doesn't make it clear cut.

 

[hungan1]

They should have stuck to passing first, and once in a while break a rush.

 

[station19]

Probably ML's best passing game in his career. Played well.

Got beat up on line(s) of scrimmage.

Not the defense we've been accustomed to watching. Too many injuries.

 

[cjbfbp]

They should have stuck to passing first, and once in a while break a rush.

Exactly! Let's look at some empty first half possessions here:

2nd possession: Leidner pass for 8 yards; run for 1 yard; run for 1 yard loss; punt

3rd possession: Leidner pass for 6 yards; run for 3 yards and a fumble

4th possession: Leidner pass for 11 yards; Leidner pass for 6 yards; run for 2 yards; pass for one yard; punt

6th possession: Leidner pass for 6 yards; Leidner pass for 7 yards; pass for 2 yard loss; penalty; run for 4 yards; run for 5 yards, punt

What you see here is a pretty good completion rate on passing with a couple of passes that were too conservative to go anywhere. All of the rushing attempts were either unproductive or just insufficient for what they needed at the time. On the first half touchdowns, Leidner had a pass for 31 yards and two passes of 24 yards each. It's easy to criticize something after the fact but my guess is that there were medium to long passing plays available other than on the touchdown drives and attempting those would have been better than most of those rushing attempts.