I am going to write something that is dumber than my usual. In the comments of last week’s article, I expressed my concern about the Ducks getting their butts kicked against the Cougars. It was due to the loss of Justin Herbert at quarterback and how neither QB remaining had neither the skills nor the game experience to carry the Ducks …
No one in 1965 said Cassius Clay could beat Sonny Liston, the reigning World Heavyweight champion. The odds were eight to one against the challenger, but Clay trained and thought differently, knocking his opponent out with better boxing skills and tactics. He became one of the greatest fighters of all time, better known as Muhammad Ali. This Saturday our beloved Ducks play …
It’s late in 2019, and another Oregon Ducks football season has just ended. The morning has broken gray and gloomy, rain flinging itself against the glass facade of the Hatfield-Dowlin Complex as if delivering a million tiny blows from an angry sky. Willie Taggart swivels his desk chair to look out of his rain-dappled window onto the practice fields. The …
Like the crack of someone opening the first beer at a party, the new Oregon staff is perking up ears and turning heads, giving the program a “national championship vibe.” Oregon signed a top-25 recruiting class in only seven weeks, causing a positive buzz and attracting high-caliber talent. Something has changed. That change is Willie Taggart. Early on, we discovered his amazing ability to recruit, something Eugene has …
It might seem silly to talk about dynasty the Monday after a disastrous victory against California. Just as the Ducks started to look competent on both sides of the ball, Justin Herbert, Royce Freeman, and Dillon Mitchell suffered injuries. All of this coming at a time when the Ducks are already thin at quarterback (Herbert’s backup wasn’t practicing at quarterback …
Have you ever had such conflicting feelings from an Oregon football game? Such despair at all the injuries and such pride in how the defense continues to improve in perhaps one of the greatest games by a Duck offensive line – when the team really needed it. Simply put … “I am pissed at the coaches, yet I am proud of what …
Fall is both football season and back-to-school time, so let’s grade head coaches in the Pac-12. They need most of the following for success: The late great Bum Phillips said it best about top football coaches: “He can take his’n and beat yourn and take yourn and beat his’n.” The best coaches adapt and mold players into cohesive units, finding …
If only Saturday’s loss had been to USC, Stanford, or Washington — against one of the Pac-12’s better programs — I’d feel much better about things. I could say that the Ducks are a legit top-25 team, that they scratched and clawed to the bitter end against one the conference’s premier teams, and almost pulled it off. I could say …
My wife burst into the infamous FishDuck.com ManCave late Saturday night and shouted, “What was that huge THUD out there?” I told her … “That was us Oregon fans coming back to Earth.” There is no sugar-coating that game. The Ducks lost to a 1-2 team known for poor defense and are known by all to be in the bottom half of …
Duck fans interested in time-traveling to Eugene may want to skip Sept. 20, 1975. That Saturday evening, Oregon and the San Jose Spartans played the most boring game in Autzen Stadium’s 50-year history. Yes, even worse than the infamous 0-0 “Toilet Bowl” versus OSU in 1983. The latter, amidst a November monsoon, was more an exercise in survival than an …
Oregon fans are thrilled with Willie Taggart’s 3-0 non-conference debut. In the first half of each game, the Ducks have scored 42 points, and have looked like they could run the table. But their second-half offense has looked sluggish and uninspired. Where is the juice in the second half? The inferior quality of Oregon’s non-conference schedule amplifies this concern. Southern Utah and talent-starved Wyoming …
Can you adjust to the new FishDuck? The one that has transformed from a cheerleader (always) of our beloved Ducks to a publisher that has views both positive and negative about what he sees? I know it is hard, as the former is how he’s been for the majority of the six years of the site. But this new, balanced …