Bear Down Wildcats

ChooChooCat wrote:There's 3 options currently on the table:

1. Mazzone returns, Tate transfers
2. Tate returns, Mazzone retires or leaves
3. Both are gone

You forgot option 4. Both come back and Mazzone is given full autonomy on QB decisions.

What up chief?

Assuming what we heard about Tate's health pre-wsu game is correct, then this upcoming game against assu should really be telling.

Does he have the get-up-and-go back to near last season's pre-injury level?

PieceOfMeat wrote:Assuming what we heard about Tate's health pre-wsu game is correct, then this upcoming game against assu should really be telling.

Does he have the get-up-and-go back to near last season's pre-injury level?

No, because he doesn't want to run and thinks he is a good enough passer to make up for it.

PieceOfMeat wrote:Assuming what we heard about Tate's health pre-wsu game is correct, then this upcoming game against assu should really be telling.

Does he have the get-up-and-go back to near last season's pre-injury level?

I saw a couple runs in the Wazzu game that showed his speed is back. Looks like he only wants to run out of bounds now though, never heading up between the hashes like he did in that epic game at CU last year.

Tate has long ball tunnel vision. He would rather throw a contested 30-40 yarder than the wide open outlet. There are a handful of the above type of situations that Tate misses. If tate could learn how to check down he would be doing so much better. It wouldn’t surprise me if Tate moved on.

Tate definitely caused problems in this offense with his inability to stand in the pocket and make basic reads. That’s why I am willing to give Mazzone a pass this year.

OSUCat wrote:

Tate has long ball tunnel vision. He would rather throw a contested 30-40 yarder than the wide open outlet. There are a handful of the above type of situations that Tate misses. If tate could learn how to check down he would be doing so much better. It wouldn’t surprise me if Tate moved on.

Even worse than that play is the 2nd down before the attempted FG at the end. He had so much open space that he was staring right at. He would have easily picked up 10+ yards, for a first down, and a chip shot field goal.

UALoco wrote:

You guys should check out the cfb thread on reddit about this tweet. Half the teams wanting him and half shitting on sumlin thinking hes gonna be 2017 tate at some other school. No way he'd be transferring to be the same low IQ passer trying to vault himself to the nfl as a qb...

Hell, it doesn't matter. If Tate is the one trying to brand himself as an NFL passer then I don't want him here. If Sumlin and Mazzone are the idiots who shackled his legs, I don't want them here, but since Sumlin at least will still be here, Tate won't do us much good anyway.

If it's the latter, I hope Tate goes somewhere where they will utilize his talents and I wish him all the best. If it's the former, then good riddance.

I read the free Wildcat Authority article on the Tate/Mazzone struggle and it doesn't completely add up to me. So at the beginning of the year Tate was ridiculed by I guess Mazzone for running (in practice I presume because it never happened in any game) but later in the season the staff practically begged him to run and he still didn't. I could see him not running in the beginning of the year as directed but then as soon as they said run why didn't it happen? You don't just lose your natural instincts in less than a year unless you want to. Either way, it doesn't sound like it was the best situation in the QB room this year and it would be in everyone's best interest if Tate moves on.

DrWildcat wrote:I read the free Wildcat Authority article on the Tate/Mazzone struggle and it doesn't completely add up to me. So at the beginning of the year Tate was ridiculed by I guess Mazzone for running (in practice I presume because it never happened in any game) but later in the season the staff practically begged him to run and he still didn't. I could see him not running in the beginning of the year as directed but then as soon as they said run why didn't it happen? You don't just lose your natural instincts in less than a year unless you want to. Either way, it doesn't sound like it was the best situation in the QB room this year and it would be in everyone's best interest if Tate moves on.

I read the same article and am now leaning more towards fuck mazzone. Bring Rod Smith back and keep Tate.
That is if we have to keep Sumlin.

blackjacker wrote:

DrWildcat wrote:I read the free Wildcat Authority article on the Tate/Mazzone struggle and it doesn't completely add up to me. So at the beginning of the year Tate was ridiculed by I guess Mazzone for running (in practice I presume because it never happened in any game) but later in the season the staff practically begged him to run and he still didn't. I could see him not running in the beginning of the year as directed but then as soon as they said run why didn't it happen? You don't just lose your natural instincts in less than a year unless you want to. Either way, it doesn't sound like it was the best situation in the QB room this year and it would be in everyone's best interest if Tate moves on.

I read the same article and am now leaning more towards fuck mazzone. Bring Rod Smith back and keep Tate.
That is if we have to keep Sumlin.

I really really hope I'm wrong about tate and it's the staff's fault. If he transfers I guess we would find out real quick.

The more I hear, the worse I feel about dumping on Tate and the more I think Sumlin and Mazzone should be the ones transferring ........to unemployment.

All of the 2017 accolades stemmed from his tremendous athleticism, not so much from his arm. I don’t care what anyone says, no fucking way this was all on our coaching staff. We all saw the open holes prior to getting hurt. What athlete wouldn’t take that opportunity to tuck it & run when presented knowing he destroyed defenses just a year ago...

I don’t see it. Sure, work on the passing game, but keep the NFL scouts intrigued by your God given gift.

Wish him well and appreciate the excitement he instilled into our program if this is true.

Sid wrote:All of the 2017 accolades stemmed from his tremendous athleticism, not so much from his arm. I don’t care what anyone says, no fucking way this was all on our coaching staff. We all saw the open holes prior to getting hurt. What athlete wouldn’t take that opportunity to tuck it & run when presented knowing he destroyed defenses just a year ago...

Maybe one who got ridiculed by his coach for doing so in practice?

I don't know the whole truth, but I know enough to be longing for the day Sumlin is our ex coach.

blackjacker wrote:

Sid wrote:All of the 2017 accolades stemmed from his tremendous athleticism, not so much from his arm. I don’t care what anyone says, no fucking way this was all on our coaching staff. We all saw the open holes prior to getting hurt. What athlete wouldn’t take that opportunity to tuck it & run when presented knowing he destroyed defenses just a year ago...

Maybe one who got ridiculed by his coach for doing so in practice?

I don't know the whole truth, but I know enough to be longing for the day Sumlin is our ex coach.

Tough to ridicule a guy or even bench him for that matter that ends up as Pac 12 player of the week. You take wins anyway you can get them. Just win baby!

I have a hard time believing the ridicule part. Honestly that whole thing sounds like a puff piece where the sources are all Tate's camp. That wouldn't be too far out of character either.

I figure Tate didn't like the way he was ridiculed and made it a point not to run, just to spite Mazzonne. He seems like a stubborn kid...but that is what made him come to AZ after no one would give him a chance at QB...coaches need to know how to speak to kids to get the best out of them. He's a kid, he's not going to be the adult in the room. This is 100% on the coaches, not knowing what they were dealing with.

Fire Mazzone.

Fuck it. I don't guess we will ever know why Tate stopped running. Fuck all, get rid of Sumlin Mazzone, Yates and Tate if he wants to leave and start all over. Fuck it fuck fuck fuck it.

blackjacker wrote:Fuck it. I don't guess we will ever know why Tate stopped running. Fuck all, get rid of Sumlin Mazzone, Yates and Tate if he wants to leave and start all over. Fuck it fuck fuck fuck it.

yep, who knows. fuck RR for fucking around and letting this go to shit.

Tate was perfect for Rich Rod's offense - I think RR was the only person that recruited him for QB because he knew he could run him all the time.

When the new regime took over they tried to make him something he wasn't and it didn't work. There is some blame on Tate as well because he probably wants a shot at QB in the NFL and wanted to improve his passing game, but he was successful at running - you don't try to fix something that isn't broken.

Ken Niumatalolo would have been better for Tate, but Tate didn't want that...

UALoco wrote:

blackjacker wrote:Fuck it. I don't guess we will ever know why Tate stopped running. Fuck all, get rid of Sumlin Mazzone, Yates and Tate if he wants to leave and start all over. Fuck it fuck fuck fuck it.

yep, who knows. fuck RR for fucking around and letting this go to shit.

Except those were lies

PHXCATS wrote:

UALoco wrote:

blackjacker wrote:Fuck it. I don't guess we will ever know why Tate stopped running. Fuck all, get rid of Sumlin Mazzone, Yates and Tate if he wants to leave and start all over. Fuck it fuck fuck fuck it.

yep, who knows. fuck RR for fucking around and letting this go to shit.

Except those were lies

I'm no moralist but I think RR should have been more careful

Scheers take:

https://247sports.com/college/arizona/A ... 125407601/" target="_blank

Would he be a grad transfer, or he’s seriously willing to sit out a year?

It sucks to think one minute that Tate is a punk who let the team and Wildcat Nation down because of delusions of grandeur and the next think I should curse the moron coaches for destroying the poor kids career.

Wish we could learn the whole truth.

ByJoveByJingle wrote:Would he be a grad transfer, or he’s seriously willing to sit out a year?

Saw on some website, maybe azdesertstorm that Tate is a superb student and could go the grad transfer route after the summer but that is all speculation.

But looking at the student directory, he is a dual major

TATE, KHALIL NA'IM student
tatekhalil@email.arizona.edu" target="_blank
Undergraduate - College of Soc & Behav Sci - Information Science & eSociety
Undergraduate - College of Soc & Behav Sci - Communication



My bet is on the NFL.

Merkin wrote:

ByJoveByJingle wrote:Would he be a grad transfer, or he’s seriously willing to sit out a year?

Saw on some website, maybe azdesertstorm that Tate is a superb student and could go the grad transfer route after the summer but that is all speculation.

But looking at the student directory, he is a dual major

TATE, KHALIL NA'IM student
tatekhalil@email.arizona.edu" target="_blank" target="_blank
Undergraduate - College of Soc & Behav Sci - Information Science & eSociety
Undergraduate - College of Soc & Behav Sci - Communication



My bet is on the NFL.

Rumor is Illinois. Makes a lot of sense if he wants a fresh start & to remain in school. Rod Smith and a graduating starting quarterback. Who really knows what’s going to happen? Gives us something to talk about though....

I REALLY hope Khalil stays. He's a great athlete, good student, and a good guy. Extremely valuable to our program and if he stays healthy and learns to find the open guy, and run when called for, he will be, like last year, one of the best QB's in the nation and should definitely start ahead of Gunnel.

If Sumlin wants to keep Gunnel, keeping Mazzone might be a requirement. Early signing period opens Dec. 20.

Shit, this sucks. Best scenario is for Khalil to commit to staying with us and keep Gunnel.

Maybe we should start a Khalil appreciation thread.

Horrible, HORRIBLE teammate is what I've heard all season

It'd be the dumbest thing in the world to keep both Tate and Mazzone. One or the other or neither, those are the only options.

Jefe wrote:Horrible, HORRIBLE teammate is what I've heard all season

From what I have read (maybe here?) the QB meetings were not that pleasant due to Tate.

Tates got to go. He isn't worth the trouble.

I had also heard Doyle was pretty outspoken. He never played one snap even though he had,4 games to get some game time. Have to wonder about his future

If Tate wants to go to the NFL as a QB, using a redshirt year in a different program would actually be the best thing for him.

But he will be able to grad transfer, and probably should. If you would rather lose games to spite a coach, then I'm not interested. Even if the coach overstepped, at the end of the day, coach is the coach. Similar to the Ed Oliver jacket thing a couple weeks ago. Even if you disagree, the coach is the coach (with obvious exceptions for the bullshit in Maryland, which is categorically different).

Jefe wrote:Horrible, HORRIBLE teammate is what I've heard all season

He's the starting QB and 10x better the next option, STFU and make him happy.

UALoco wrote:

Jefe wrote:Horrible, HORRIBLE teammate is what I've heard all season

He's the starting QB and 10x better the next option, STFU and make him happy.

If you've ever been apart of any sort of team or more importantly, coached, you would never say that.

I guess I am in the minority where I hope Tate is the starting qb next year. If Tate transfers, the Cats will surely finish last in the Pac-12 South. Let Grunnell get his feet wet next year behind Tate. I also hope Mazzone is not here next year.

Irish27 wrote:I guess I am in the minority where I hope Tate is the starting qb next year. If Tate transfers, the Cats will surely finish last in the Pac-12 South. Let Grunnell get his feet wet next year behind Tate. I also hope Mazzone is not here next year.

I want Tate back and starting also. If he does transfer and start then I'll be a fan of that team for the sesson too, besides Arizona of course.

The Tate experiment is a failed one. He is 6-10 as a starter in the last 16 games. He is 2-6 on the road as a starter. He makes terrible decisions and he was the one who refused to run when Mazzone implemented designed runs and told him to take the running lane if it's open. No quarterback can be successful in a pro style offense if they cannot read a defense before the snap. If they cannot go through progressions correctly and ignore the middle of the field that quarterback will also fail. If the quarterback doesn't know the playbook that quarterback will also fail. The experiment is over.

Tatanka wrote:The Tate experiment is a failed one. He is 6-10 as a starter in the last 16 games. He is 2-6 on the road as a starter. He makes terrible decisions and he was the one who refused to run when Mazzone implemented designed runs and told him to take the running lane if it's open. No quarterback can be successful in a pro style offense if they cannot read a defense before the snap. If they cannot go through progressions correctly and ignore the middle of the field that quarterback will also fail. If the quarterback doesn't know the playbook that quarterback will also fail. The experiment is over.

And you hit the nail on the head. I have heard so much crap about the coaches but no one wants to talk about the real elephant in the room and his name is Tate.

tgrumpy2 wrote:

Tatanka wrote:The Tate experiment is a failed one. He is 6-10 as a starter in the last 16 games. He is 2-6 on the road as a starter. He makes terrible decisions and he was the one who refused to run when Mazzone implemented designed runs and told him to take the running lane if it's open. No quarterback can be successful in a pro style offense if they cannot read a defense before the snap. If they cannot go through progressions correctly and ignore the middle of the field that quarterback will also fail. If the quarterback doesn't know the playbook that quarterback will also fail. The experiment is over.

And you hit the nail on the head. I have heard so much crap about the coaches but no one wants to talk about the real elephant in the room and his name is Tate.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and pencil you guys in as "not a fan of Tate."

Tatanka wrote:The Tate experiment is a failed one. He is 6-10 as a starter in the last 16 games. He is 2-6 on the road as a starter. He makes terrible decisions and he was the one who refused to run when Mazzone implemented designed runs and told him to take the running lane if it's open. No quarterback can be successful in a pro style offense if they cannot read a defense before the snap. If they cannot go through progressions correctly and ignore the middle of the field that quarterback will also fail. If the quarterback doesn't know the playbook that quarterback will also fail. The experiment is over.

You should've just kept the Chief handle

This Tate, Sumlin and Mazzone BS is not rocket science to figure out. Blame can be spread equally between Sumlin, Mazzone and Tate.

Tate has been aloof and ill tempered for as long as I can remember and he never looks engaged with anything when he's on the sideline. He has never struck me as a leader or projected that type of demeanor, just a showman who either celebrates or pouts. Having said that, none of that makes Tate a bad Qb, or a bad person or a bad teammate in it self but is a concern.

This is not a dump on Tate, because the Mazzone/Sumlin and Tate combo just didn't click this year because in truth we all believed that Tate was special, and he is in many ways, but if the truth be told he is a very average passing and decision making qb and lacks real qb intangible skills to take the next step at this point in his development. He may become a fabulous qb yet or he may be in his waning days as a qb. He dosen't appear, at this stage of the game to have the maturity or leadership skills, or inter-reflection for criticism and feedback or questioning.

Tate has made tons of utterly bone headed and mind numbing plays that were so obviously ill advised that even the average fan with average football knowledge was left wondering........"why in hell did he just do that".

It almost appeared to me that he was doing crap just to spite some authority figure.

Sumlin and Mazzone deserve equal blame for any missteps because they call the plays and the shots. Tate deserves some leeway because of the much talked about injury and his youth, but when Tate was acting out careless antics and went completely off the range with respect to positive football plays that benefit the team to boneheaded and ill advised plays his butt should have met the bench.

From my advantage point the coaches should shoulder most of the blame because they didn't adjust to Tate's maturity issues very well or his lack of quality defensive scheme reads or unwillingness to be accountable from the most important player on the field.

All in all I hate to see Tate leave when the going gets tough. He ott to step up and prove to the world and the team next year that he is far better than he is perceived or finished the year. A battle between Tate, Gunnel and Doyle next year would likely be a competition for the ages at the UofA. Whoever comes out of that next year as the starter would likely be one bad MF'r as a qb and bode very well for the team.

In closing, no one is running Khalil Tate off. If he leaves it will be because he left of his own accord. If he does that, the real loser in my opinion is Tate. Dumb advisors, lack of responsibility, immaturity issues along with a healthy heaping of emotions will have done it.

A lot of stupid shit like fire Sumlin and Mazzone are being thrown around and none of it is sticking to the wall.

Cooler heads need to prevail and work this out. If it's not meant to be so be it. Next year I'll be right there cheering on the next man up for my Wildcats.

No one person is bigger than the team!

btfd16 wrote:

Tatanka wrote:The Tate experiment is a failed one. He is 6-10 as a starter in the last 16 games. He is 2-6 on the road as a starter. He makes terrible decisions and he was the one who refused to run when Mazzone implemented designed runs and told him to take the running lane if it's open. No quarterback can be successful in a pro style offense if they cannot read a defense before the snap. If they cannot go through progressions correctly and ignore the middle of the field that quarterback will also fail. If the quarterback doesn't know the playbook that quarterback will also fail. The experiment is over.

You should've just kept the Chief handle

Yeah but then he couldn't have made a show about leaving

Great post Gladiator.

Chicat wrote:Great post Gladiator.

Thanks Chi, I appreciate the kind words!

Like most of life, the situation defies a simple explanation. I agree, Gladiator Cat . . . all parties deserve blame, if not equal blame. But the coaches are the ones here for the long term, not Tate—even if he doesn’t transfer. So my concern is about the coaching behavior/decisions, not with Tate’s flakiness.