Comments on: Football: Top of the morning to you

By: Daniel

Daniel — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 07:35:21 +0000

I woke up at 5 am to condition for wrestling even thought I hate mornings because the sport required it. Would I have gone to wrestle at a different high school if they offered evening practice?
Sure if I had the option. Once I got to Cal & had the option, I scheduled exactly 1 class earler than 9 AM in 4 years. I only made it to that class because the gorgeous blonde prof talked about sex and god all morning.

Recruits have the option.

By: rollonubears

rollonubears — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 20:51:08 +0000

i admire that optimism

By: DesertBear

DesertBear — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 08:42:24 +0000

I’m flummoxed by these comments.

Practicing in the mornings has NOTHING to do with preparing for comparable game situations. Read JO’s post where he says, “The Bears will now practice in the morning, leaving players the afternoons to go to class and work on their academics. That will also give players more free time in the evening.” This is the reason, and the sole reason, Tedford has made this change. Stop the over-analysis!

This is teaching these kids to manage their time and become responsible adults. Heck, I wake up at 6am every morning to work out before school (or work) and I’m just motivated to stay in shape…not to proudly represent Cal in its quest to end a significant Rose Bowl drought.

Good on Tedford for this decision.

By: Dan

Dan — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 20:04:20 +0000

To Milo- You kind of make my point. Tedford is already running a clean and tight ship, and the APR rating have been steadily improving. It seems he’s already done a great job in this area, the Cal players seem to be pretty solid and mature guys already in this sense. This seems a bit drastic and risky – maybe not warranted. Again, we’ll see. There are certainly some potential risks, and time, not speculation, will tell.

I could see Chip Kelly doing something like this at Oregon given all the problems going on there but it’s not what jumps out to me at Cal to move the program ahead. It almost smacks of treating the players more like children.

I still think the biggest thing Tedford can do is on him- don’t play so predictably and conservatively. Our Pac 10 oppponents that have good coaching staffs now gameplan and execute very well against ours. I think, in my opinion, is that he should open things up, play faster and more aggressively in all 3 phases of the game, and the players will rise up and respond. That’s on Tedford.

Clancy Pendergrast has talked a good game so far, we’ll see if he opens it up. I think he will, at least more than what we saw last year. We’ll see if Tedford has Ludwig do the same with the offense. For all the changes I hear him talk about and implement the past few years, none have seemed to make a major difference. The performance has been pretty flat the past 3 seasons. We beat the bad teams, go .500 against the pretty good teams, and get HAMMERED by the top teams.

The more I think about it, I am very cautiously hoping for the best case scenario.

By: milo

milo — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 19:11:22 +0000

@Dan, sure there’s rarely an early start like Maryland but there’s often 12:30 p.m. (PT) games so I still see morning practice as beneficial.

From a time management perspective I think Tedford is right…more time to take care of business. Example: if a kid is lagging in school, he has the afternoon and evenings to catch up uninterrupted by practice.

I don’t think there will be much drop off in recruits or increase in late night partying. Tedford’s academic game plan has been very successful and he runs not only a clean and responsible program. The APR ratings show this.

Go Bears!

By: rollonubears

rollonubears — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 18:27:56 +0000

dan, my thoughts exactly. these are college kids. also, some of them may not have come here if they knew this is how it would be. my thought is that overall this will be a good thing, but we’re probably going to end up with some suspensions internally for “violating team rules” or maybe even a transfer or 2 as a result of this. kids gotta have fun and party a little. and sleep is so important for athletes. additionally, they may be so tired after practice, that they blow off their studies in favor of “me time.” this is not the army.

By: Dan

Dan — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 16:31:02 +0000

Very good idea conceptually- many of the potential benefits are spelled out here in earlier posts. But, and there is always a but, we’ll see how the players respond.

Kids tend toIf they think they are immortal, and could be tempted to burn the candle at both ends. Let’s hope that this is not the case, that they will become very mature and disciplined about this. If they do, there could be tremendous benefits from this. Even a team leader like Mike Mohamed sounds less than enthusiastic.

One retort to Milo- it is very rare we have an early start, i.e., the Maryland game 2 seasons ago- in fact, when is there another one of those on the schedule? What is way more common are night games out west- are we tired late in night games here, as the game conclude near the players bedtime? Something to consider.

Also, I wonder if this becomes a recruiting deterrent. Getting up that early is not very desireable to high school kids. Perhaps this will appeal to the right kind of recruit we want in hear at Cal.

Overall, this is not common at other Pac 10/college football programs. It is more common in college basketball programs.

JO- can you give us a recap of which Pac 10 teams practice in the AM in season? Thanks…Go Bears!

By: Bears

Bears — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 22:32:35 +0000

Love it.
Practicing early and taking Sunday off is good for our players.
This is a smart move. As long as the players are disciplined so they get to bed early enough to recharge their batteries. No drinking/late nights during season. For the best teams college football is a lifestyle because they place ball and class as priority #1.
This move makes it essential that the right priorities are being followed by the team. Guys who go out and party late night instead of sleeping and recovering will be easily picked out and won’t make it. They won’t be able to function/compete in the moring, they will be weeded out fast.
The program will be very different, efficient and better because of these moves.
Go Bears!

By: GC

GC — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 16:14:04 +0000

Sounds good to me.

By: abe

abe — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 06:34:52 +0000

’bout freakin’ time, i might add. the best time for any type of discipline based activity is at day break for nothing else teaches discipline more than waking up early in the morning itself. air is crisp so is the mind and the necessary focus for a more efficient absorption of the days lesson(s)is easier to achieve. moreover nice to see Tedford continuing to refine his method of running a college football program. after all lets not forget that this is his first head coaching job period, bcs or no bcs. despite the tremendous success he has had already, testament to this talent, he is clearly working himself into that elite bcs HC level.