The Catholic Diaries (DIII ODAC) Topic

I just took over Catholic in DIII ODAC as a rebuild project.

Here are some highlights of how bad of shape they are in:
  1. 2 Human coaches over the last 10 seasons for a total of 6 seasons
  2. Last human coach had a 5 pack and looks to have abandoned the team from the start
  3. Combined Human coach record 6 out of last 10 seasons: 3-75
  4. 3 consecutive 0-13 seasons up to this point
  5. Record over the last 5 seasons: 3-62
  6. Record over the last 10 seasons: 21-109
  7. Last winning season #29 8-5 SimAI Coached, currently on season #38
Roster Status:
  1. Every single current player on roster is Sim AC Recruited
  2. No practice plan set so all attributes of Sim AC recruited players has decreased (except for WE and Tech, maybe he set practice time on TECH)
  3. On current roster, every single Sim AC recruited player has dropped in GD rating every season
  4. Last season's highest rated player (GDReports): Soph. OL with at rating of 39.07, was 41.19 as a Fr.
  5. Last season's lowest rated player (GDReports): Jr. QB with a rating of 9.92, was 13.94 as a Fr.
WIS Rank
  1. Last 2 consectutive seasons ranked at WIS# 228 (dead last in DIII)
  2. Highest WIS ranking in last 5 seasons: #140 (Human coach, Season #33)
  3. Higest WIS ranking in last 10 seasons: #87 (SimAI Coach, Season #29)
GD Reports data:
  1. GDReports rank last season(#37): 228 Team rank (last place) with 24.16 team average
  2. GGreports team rank last 5 seasons: 228, 228, 228, 226, 223
  3. GDReports Recruit class last season: #227 with an average of 24.48
  4. GDReports recruit class last 5 seasons: 227, 222, 228, 222, 158
  5. Last season's team rating by positions: F's across the board
  6. Last season's offensive and defensive ratings: F's across the board
This is going to be a long, drawn out rebuild. It will probably take at least 7-8 seasons to become competitive on an average level. One of the pluses that will help, is that my recruit class size is 25 (after cutting 3 frosh) for this first season. So half of the team will be my players (average vision, average recruits) early on and far and above the level of talent on the current roster. 
9/5/2012 10:23 AM
Season 38 (my first season) at Catholic - recruiting update

I filled all 25 spots on my roster, staying within 180 mi radius, and not battling except the last couple cycles when I went after a couple higher (for my vision) players that had SimAI on them. I'll save the ratings of the players until after GDReports drops them but here is a breakdown of what I picked up:

QB - 1
RB - 3
WR - 1
TE - 1
OL - 5
DL - 4
LB - 4
DB - 4
K - 1
P - 1

in retrospect, I probably should have picked up one more WR at the very least but I got carried away and only got 1. I can field a bare bones team of my own recruits in each starting position now. Thats pretty good, except that I don't have any replacements or backups who are not Sim AC recruited and worth a plug.

I know you guys see me taking a K and P are wondering why, here is my rational behind it. Right, wrong, or indifferent. those are skilled positions. I won't be winning much over the next several seasons, so I wanted to get someone in there that is decent and will be leaving around the time I will be able to replace them with another average player. Losing a game over a missed FG or XP (if I am lucky enough to be in that close a contest in the near future) would just suck. The current K an P on the roster are a Jr. and Sr. respectively, so it also didn't make much sense to cut upperclassmen since they will be moving through shortly, all 3 cuts I made were Frosh players last season.

I don't know how long it will take me to even out the class sizes. I have 25 incoming Freshment. Not a bad thing considering the low level of talent currently on the roster and being able to infuse half a team of higher talent but even though it worked out in this case, I don't like large classes like that. Planning the restructure of class size is going to take some doing.

I'll have:
Sr.'s - 10
Jr.'s -  8
So.'s - 7
9/5/2012 10:46 AM
Season 38 (first season) - Exhib game updates

I'm not one for waiting until freshmen report to schedule my last exhib game. I usually just schedule all 3 in one fell swoop and make sure my practice and game plans are set and then get to it.

In 3 exhib games vs 2 SimAI and 1 Human:

Went 0-3
Was out scored 172 - 3
The average spread was +62.5
I held them under the spread in 2 games ( you gotta find victories where you see them)


One of the surprising bright spots of the 3 exhib games, is that most of my current roster showed really good growth from the practices. An average of 12 points attribute increase in only 3 exhib games. That bodes well for future growth of the younger players that I will be stuck with.

After 3 exhib games:
  1. Average growth: 12 points.
  2. Lowest growth: Sr. RB with 3 points.
  3. Highest growth: (tie) So. DB's with 20 points of growth.
  4. Only 8 players with single digit growth.
  5. 7 players with over 15 points of growth.
  6. Sr.'s - 4 players in single digit growth.
  7. Jr.'s - 2 players in single digit growth.
  8. So.'s - 2 players in single digit growth.

It will be interesting to see how much of thier attributes these players recover after a full season. They will still be junk, but at least they will be improving junk. I was just surprised to see them make such large gains in a small amount of time.



9/5/2012 11:16 AM
I'm sorry man, but that team is just awful at every position. I imagine a ton of young guys are in for some playing time.
9/5/2012 8:16 PM
Looks like you have a good plan in mind kilabe . Good luck .I'll be dropping in for your progress report .
9/6/2012 10:56 AM
Posted by chaneyj2 on 9/5/2012 8:16:00 PM (view original):
I'm sorry man, but that team is just awful at every position. I imagine a ton of young guys are in for some playing time.
Recruiting was easy: freshman starts an plenty o'PT for the key recruits  I can probably keep that up until I have a roster of average players and start getting winning seasons.

in my 98 seasons, this is team is in the worst shape of any team that I can remember seeing. I'm stoked to see what I can do with it.
9/6/2012 12:36 PM
Posted by gmc_sierra on 9/6/2012 10:56:00 AM (view original):
Looks like you have a good plan in mind kilabe . Good luck .I'll be dropping in for your progress report .
thanks gmc!
9/6/2012 8:12 PM
Season One - (World Season 38) - Final Recruiting assessment.

Not terrible, but not really great either. My recruiting vision in YOST isn't the greatest but I feel like I got the best players that I could see, within 180 miles.

A class ranking of 47 for this season as compared to 227, 222, 228, 222,158 from the last 5 seasons.
This ranks in a tie for 3rd place (with season 28 SimAI recruited) for the history of the team. Best class was World  Season 13 with a human coach then World Season 26 with a SimAI Coach.

Overal Recruit Class GDReports rating 38.37 as a gauge, the 10th ranked team had an overal recruit class rating of 41.32 (17 recruits) and the top rated recruiting class came in at 45.60 (9 recruits) while the bottom of the field was 24.06.

Of the 25 scholarships I had to fill, and I filled them all, there were no 4 or 5 star recruits. Only one recruit is in the top 25 for his position and that is the punter I snagged who ranks 20th in his class position. 5 players in the top 50 ranking of their position, 9 in the top 100 ranking of their position.  

The class broke down like this:

Name Primary Rating Secondary Rating Overall Position Class Rank Class Rank
Position Position Rank Rank Overall Position
William Martinez RB 44.04 FB 35.93 4667 RB533 86 RB33
Matthew Hamilton RB 42.78 FB 39.76 5516 RB604 189 RB58
Patrick McCoy ILB 41.97 OLB 41.62 6072 ILB535 289 ILB34
Matthew Lee RB 41.7 FB 35.52 6243 RB663 330 RB84
Billy Chandler S 40.77 CB 40.48 6894 S573 531 S46
Richard Morin WR 40.42     7146 WR956 622 WR104
Robert Lewis ILB 40.1 OLB 39.85 7368 ILB631 708 ILB89
Michael Johnson DT 39.91 DE 31.99 7480 DT1361 755 DT147
Curtis Martinez DT 39.86 DE 35.28 7512 DT1367 762 DT149
Daniel Schmidt DT 39.86 DE 34.01 7513 DT1368 763 DT150
James Russell ILB 39.6 OLB 37.72 7688 ILB652 837 ILB102
Alfred Haas ILB 39.53 OLB 35.62 7744 ILB655 860 ILB104
Andre Williams OL 38.88     8138 OL1484 1048 OL111
George Brooks P 38.15     8530 P176 1258 P20
Ernest Wilcox OL 38.05     8577 OL1569 1283 OL157
Michael Barrera DT 38.02 DE 34.81 8594 DT1518 1293 DT250
Andrew Fish S 37.86 CB 32.33 8672 S714 1338 S120
Kenneth Martin S 37.62 CB 34.01 8823 S723 1429 S126
Mike Quintana S 37.42 CB 32.86 8930 S732 1504 S133
Clyde Orr TE 35.99     9561 TE549 1898 TE109
John Williamson OL 34.25     10172 OL1895 2253 OL408
Eric Cline QB 34.03     10229 QB608 2290 QB30
Kenneth Williams OL 33.09     10425 OL1931 2396 OL440
James Fuller OL 32.79     10477 OL1936 2419 OL444
Randall Lewis K 32.55     10526 K294 2445 K56


I got some good linebackers and running backs, and the basis for decent OL and DL in the upper classmen years. My QB has good speed and technique, decent GI and horrible strength, but he can develop that over the seasons. I think he'll be above average by the time he is a senior.

All of my Freshmen are starters, except for one Linebacker. running a base 43 defense and recruited 4, so thats where my much needed receiver scholarship went. It will be interesting to see how much the freshmen improve coming in and starting right away.

Overall, according to GDreports, the team holds an overall rating 34.38 (F) ranking them 226 this season after spending the last 3 consecutive seasons ranked at 228 (F), which is dead last in DIII. As a comparison, the 10th ranked team rates 52.51 (A-) and the top team rates 56.48 (A+). I'm at the bottom, but I ain't last!!!!

Each position still rates F's across the board as does the Offensive and Defensive grades.

So. Not a great class, not a good class, but an average to slightly above average but not by much class. I think that the playing time, starting, fullfilling of promises, and their growth potential on average will help this class become good players by the time they graduate.
9/11/2012 11:51 AM
Season 1 - Season opener

IT WASN"T A SHUTOUT!!!

Worcester State 57 - Catholic 3
Line: WSU -26.5

It was a drubbing for sure, but not a shutout like I experienced in 2 of 3 exhibition games. At the half I was down 20-3 and WSU scored most of their points in the 4th quarter by tacking on 24. Not surprising since I have a thin roster of average players starting. I'm sure once into the 4th, they give way to the lower subs and then we wouldn't be able to stop a Pop Warner team.

Lowlights:
  • No touchdown, only a field goal.
  • Turnovers - 7 (6 INT and 1 fumble lost)
  • Only 189 yds of offense
  • 4/19 on 3rd down conversions
  • Gave up 545 yards on Defense
  • Gave up 2 60+yard TD passes
  • Allowed a pick-6
Highlights (yes, there were a couple)
  • Recorded 2 sacks
  • Collected an INT
  • Recorded 6 Tackles for losses
  • Didn't give up any tackles for a loss
  • IT WASN"T A SHUTOUT!
So we are obviously weak on both sides of the ball with a 1 deep roster and that means we are going to get worn down even if they are able to put up a fight. I pretty much expect every game against a human coach to go like this and probably all the ones against SimAI teams. I doubt that we will win a game this season, but hopefully towards the end of the season we will have some player development in the recruits I got and some player rehab in the SimAC signed players from previous seasons that will allow up to slip by on a lower level Sim team.

With last night being the first team practice that the freshmen have had, there were no posts of growth for any of them. My SimAC signed players that I inherited still showed a strong gain in trying to rehab themselves and regain the attribute points that they lost due to the absense of a training plan from the coack of previous seasons.

Here is how the old SimAC signed players are rehabbing after only 1 game as compared to after the 3 Exhib games(updates to numbers in (RED):

1.        Average growth: 12 points. (15.6)

2.        Lowest growth: Sr. RB with 3 points. (8)

3.        Highest growth: (tie) So. DB's with 20 points of growth. (26, other db is 25)

4.        Only 8 players with single digit growth. (2)

5.        7 players with over 15 points of growth. (15)

6.        Sr.'s - 4 players in single digit growth. (2)

7.        Jr.'s - 2 players in single digit growth. (0)

8.        So.'s - 2 players in single digit growth. (0)



9/12/2012 11:40 AM
Season 1 - Game 2

IT WASN'T A SHUTOUT!!!!!!

#18 Tufts - 17
Catholic - 3
Line: Tufts -33.5

Still no touchdown but still wasn't shutout. Playing a ranked team with a human coach that has made deep playoff runs and not getting absolutely killed. Makes me think that he probably took it a little easy on me game-planning wise and got some of his younger players some PT. Tufts has 19 freshmen on their roster this season. At any rate, I beat the spread. I did tweak my own game plan and moved some players around (1 deep roster, couldn't move very many) to see if they fit the dual role positions like DT/DE a little better.


Lowlights:
  • 3 turnovers - 2 INT, 1 lost fumble
  • Only 1.9 yd average per rush
  • 5/20 on 3rd down conversions
  • QB forced to scramble 7 times and throw it away 11 times
  • Gave up 4 sacks
  • a ton of passes defended against - 10
Highlights:
  • Got 2 sacks
  • Defense held them down to only 282 yards total offense
  • Offense generated 256 yards total offense - 192 passing yards
  • Got 17 first downs
  • Forced them to punt 12 times

The next two games are against SimAI teams who have a combined 1-3 record after the first two games of the season. I may have a chance to squeak a win in there if I catch some breaks and the Cardinals play like they did today. I'm not banking on it, but I at least like to believe that there is a slim chance.
9/12/2012 3:35 PM
Season 1 - Game 3

I had a lead at the half, then was shut down..........

Sul Ross State (2-1) - 25
Catholic (0-3) - 14
Line: SRS -27.5

Like I said, I was so happy to wake up this morning and check the scores only to see me leading at the half 14-10. I broke my no TD spell by scoring 2 in the first half. The first on a 2 yd pass after driving 77 yds on 5 plays and the second time by driving 88  yds in 12 plays to have a freshman RB break loose for a 27 yard TD run. I felt pretty good about my chances and couldn't wait to see the other half of the sim........... Apparently, I forgot that golden rule of not having high expextations during a WIS sim.

I got blanked in the second half and allowed unanswered points while tossing 2 INT and missing a FG, all of which is directly attributable to spotting the sim 9 points. But I continued my trend of beating the spread and was able to score a couple TDs. The lack of depth, I believe contributed to the second half collapse where I just couldn't compete any more.

Lowlights:
  • 2 turnovers - 2 INT
  • QB forced to scramble 7 times
  • Gave up 9 sacks
  • a ton of passes defended against - 8
Highlights:

  • Defense held them to 3/13 on 3rd down conversions
  • Offense generated 235 yards total offense - 143 passing yards
  • 8/17 on 3rd down conversions
  • Got 19 first downs
  • Forced them to punt 7 times
  • Forced them to take 4 FG as opposed to letting them score 4 TD

A better team effort, hate that we blew the lead in the second half. I may have to play with the substitution settings to try and keep my freshman starters from getting worn down so much in the first half. The next game is against an 0-3 SimAI team and hopefully I can have as good a game and maybe sneak in a win.

Waking up to game 3 (2 practices in) also gave me the first glimpse of my freshman starters growth. At the first response, they look like this:

Most growth: 18 points - A freshman Starting CB who has grown in GDReports rating from 40.48 to  41.89
Least Growth: 0 points - the other freshman starting CB..... he could just be a slow starter..... or jealous of his counterpart.....
Weird. I'm looking at this CBs attributes and almost every single one has shown a one point increase but is not showing the 1 point green arrow at the end of the attribute scale. Guess I'm going to have to put in a ticket and see what they say. I'm going to stop here and check all of the other ones before posting any more.

 
9/13/2012 5:30 PM
Player Growth Error - posted under main page here:

whatifsports.com/forums/Posts.aspx
9/14/2012 1:53 PM
Season 1 - Game 4     

STOP. THE. PRESSES!!!!!!!

CUA SNAPS 3 SEASON WINLESS STREAK!

BSU (0-4) - 19
CUA (1-3) - 23
Line BSU -0.5

Guess that little tweeky tweeky I did by allowing more substitutions paid off in keeping my average players from getting too tired at the end of the game since we scored 17 points in the 4th quarter to take the win. This may very well be the only win of the season, but we'll keep trying. Keep tweeking. Keep gambling.

Lowlights:
  • 3 turnovers - 3 fumbles lost
  • 13 Penalties for 114yds
  • Gave up 6 sacks
  • low yds per rush average at 1.7
Highlights:

  • Defense held them to 3/19 on 3rd down conversions; 0 for 2 on 4th down conversions
  • Offense generated 203 yards total offense - 163 passing yards
  • Got 3 sacks
  • Got 19 first downs (again. second game in a row and only allowed 14 for them)
  • Forced them to punt 8 times
  • Forced them to take 4 FG as opposed to letting them score 4 TD

So, 3 FG and 2 TDs, making a second half comeback after being down at the half 13-6 and scoring 17 points in the 4th quarter, 10 in the final 4 minutes to take the lead and seal the deal. We're still not competitive by any means, but finally getting a win after  coaching for 4 games and breaking their three 0-fer seasons feels pretty good. Think I'm going to leave work early to celebrate!
9/14/2012 3:26 PM
Ok. a little slow on the update entries....... yeah. I don't have a really good excuse, so I'm just going to get on with it.

First, the player growth issue: I submitted a ticket to WIS and also posted on the main GD forum about it. katzphang88 and gt_deuce for giving me their insight before WIS responded and for being dead on! Thanks guys!!! The bottom line was due to his low WE and what is probably a low potential, he was not posting enough growth yet. AND... AND, there has to be over 1 point growth before it reflects in the player status window. However, as I stated that after 3 games there was ZERO represented growth in any attribute. In the 5 games since, he has posted 21 points of growth and 2 points of decreased attribute (blocking which we don't practice for DBs), with most attributes showing 2 points of improvement. Guess he just needed time to flourish.

now on to the meat of the season - Conference Play

After posting a 1-4 record in OOC play and breaking a 3 season 0-fer spell, I'm proud to announce that our record is currently...... wait for it....... wait for it.......

2-7!!!!!!!

Yes, I am completely aware that is horrible, but with what I am working with, it's fan-d@m-tastic!


9/16/12 Anderson (IN) 4-5 197 207 Sim AI 7-11  -0.5 20-17 L
9/17/12 Manchester 1-8 205 78 Sim AI 6-13  -8.5 10-16 W
9/18/12 at Washington and Lee 8-1 69 224 monkei 1-18 +17.5 13-61 L
9/19/12 Guilford 4-5 170 197 Sim AI 7-31 +2.5 24-13 L


So, you can see that I had i near miss against Anderson. This game was lost in the last 4 seconds on a FG after giving up 10 points and the lead in the 4th quarter. The interesting thing was that we were posted as half point favorites, a favored line for the first time this season, but we couldn't live up to the billing posting a negative rushing total of -17 yards, giving up 10 sacks, and only 1 turnover (INT) while passing for 247 yards.

The Manchester game, ahhhh. Sweet success. Finally another win! Took the lead in the late in the 2Q and never let it go. Only gave up one sack, posted 369 yards of offense, of which 294 were passing yards. 3 turn overs though (2FUM, INT) and 294 yards to an admittedly bad SimAI team. I know they are bad because I jumped into Yost last season to take them as they were pretty bad, before their conference mate Catholic opened up. They do have 13 stellar soph's that were recruited by a human coach though.

Washington & Lee ---- a slaughter. 4 turn overs, 5 sacks, and gave up 574 yards. I did however post 254 yards of my own and forced 3 turnovers.

Guilford - had the lead going into the 4th, then the same ole song, gave up 14 points in the last 7 min to lose. Just don't have the depth or the talent to make most games end to end. This was the case here. gave up 3 sacks, 2 INT, and 414 yards while posting only 303 yard of my own, taking 1 sack, and forcing 2 turn overs.
9/19/2012 8:49 PM
Season 1 - End of season recap

Catholic U is no longer the doormat of DIII - although posting a horrid 2-11 record for the season, we are ranked at 213 with an 86 SOS. 213 isn't good at all, but it breaks the previous 2 season streak of finishing dead last in DIII with no wins over the last 3 seasons, and actually doubling the win total over the last 4 seasons. I'm also hoping that the end of year WIS rankings after the playoffs end will provide us with a spot or 2 boost in the standings.

We played 4 human coaches who finished the regular season at a combined record of 45-7, so they weren't no slouches.
We were out scored by our human opponents by 153-25 or averaged out to 38-6 (38.25 - 6.25 actually). Brutal A$$ kickings in 2 out of 4 games.
On our losses to the SimAI teams (7), they sported a combined 46-45 record and scored us a combined 217-97 or an average of 31-14. Not good but different, as in better than vs. human coaches. 3 of those games, I was tied or ahead going into the half and just didn't have the depth to sustain a game on both sides of the ball and squeak out a win.

Of our 2 wins, the one OOC win and the one conference win came against two equally horrible SimAI teams while we had a home field advantage.
The had a combined record of 2-24 and we out scored them 39-29 or an average of 19-14. heh. That's just sad, isn't it?

On the year with our 13 games combined, here are our stats per game:
 
Avg Points scored: 13.2
Avg Points allowed: 30.7

Avg Yds gained: 259.7
Avg Yds Allowed: 407.5
 
Avg Pass Yds gained: 197.7
Avg Pass Yds allowed: 251.4

Avg Rush Yds gained: 62.0
Avg Rush Yds allowed: 156.1

Total Turnovers:
Take aways: 24 (10 INT, 14 FUM)
Give aways: 44 (25 INT, 19 FUM)
Margin: -20 (-15 INT, -5 FUM)

Sacks: 
Made: 17
Allowed: 66
Margin: -49



  
9/24/2012 12:12 PM
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