Elephant in the room...

Ouch.

Can only improve from here. At least now they have live tackled. Onward and upward!
 
From a COVID standpoint, I’m not sure why it’s prohibited to tackle your teammates in practice but ok to tackle folks from another team and state.
I think that Coach Ken wanted to avoid a breakout from training so that he could start the season at full strength. It clearly, was not
the best move as the team did not appear ready.
 
Stopped watching at half...but heard the comment about no live tackling. Can't fault the reasoning -- I think everything that Navy has done in addressing COVID has been using the "abundance of caution" approach. That said, Navy was unprepared and overmatched. A good warm up and lesson -- there is only one game that counts. BEAT ARMY ! .
 
Well, got that out of the way. Now they hopefully can work on tackling, way too many missed tackles last night. It was hard to watch. I finished the game, couldn't let go of my faith in Coach's 4th quarter stats, but it was difficult to finish it.
 
I still don't get it (re state rules). They live tackled in Maryland last night. What is the difference between live tackling with each other the day prior?

I wonder at some point which would have been better. Tackling and maybe having to cancel the game b/c people test positive. Or being totally unprepared for the game? Oh wait. . . I know this one. Canceling the game would have meant loss of revenue.
 
Tough game to watch. Hopefully they can adjust practices and continue to keep everyone safe. Be curious how we adjust from here and see how the QB race shakes out too. But then again, you can stick any QB back there, but if you can’t keep provide any time for them it doesn’t matter. Coach Ken is a solid coach, they will adjust and hopefully we see a much better Navy team next game.
 
I'm curious if practices were always intended to be non-tackle. Meaning, are they going to tackle NOW to prepare for the next game? Or, will they maintain the course, and practice tackle free.

I'm of the opinion, if you aren't going to practice full-on, then don't play. From a safety standpoint, they will get injured. They were painfully unprepared physically. Not saying they would have won, but they couldn't tackle! And no wonder, not practicing that physical (and mental reading element, too) piece. It's impossible, and dangerous, to play football games without conditioning the physical piece.

It will be interesting!
 
it was Coach Ken's call. he decided to limit the risk of losing players if someone tested positive. it wasn't mandated. he thought it was the best way to get to the games without losing half the team. i suppose in hindsight he might be rethinking his plan, they looked so unprepared.

he never had the first offense and first defense playing each other. his logic was to keep them separate so losses would be limited in case some of them tested positive.

as a result, he had the first O practicing against the 2nd D, and vice versa. and he never had any live scrimmaging or hitting. probably not the best way to prepare for high level D1 football - probably a good thing that ND cancelled

he talked all about it in a newspaper article last month.

i guess we can call that a failed experiment

 
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In response to a question about his missteps, Thomas Edison once said,
“I have not failed 10,000 times—I've successfully found 10,000 ways that will not work.”


Thankfully, Coach Ken won't get 9,999 more chances to solve this particular problem. That misstep was spectacular enough for everyone, I think.
 
The key will be what Coach does starting today. The team has to forget about last night and move forward. I hope for the morale of the team he starts to let them hit each other. I'm sure those guys would rather lose giving it their best shot. Otherwise when we play the teams up north and out west, it will be ugly.
The only less bad news was the plebes had to do 3 pushups. Just imagine if they had to do that for BYU.
 
What do the plebes typically have to do if Navy loses? And did they do it last night/today?
 
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