1. Perspective

Late, short, and sweet with the blog this week. This week was busier than Christian McCaffrey’s feet. Apologies to those loyal readers who might have needed just one more diversion in the middle of their work week. How many readers are there, you ask? Usually on any given week about 50 people, but when the link gets posted to other Cardinal sports sites or forums that number spikes up to around 1,000. I’ll lay a large bet that this week’s write-up is posted nowhere as it is more likely to make you feel like you took a wrong turn down a dead-end street in an abandoned development somewhere near the Salton Sea. Smells like dead fish? You’re welcome.

Speaking of numbers, Stanford now has a 75% win percentage, and they play 75% of their remaining games at home. That all sounds pretty good. People are starting to compare us to Ohio State last year, which seems a bit too optimistic. Way too early. Although who knows, is Chryst the baller that is Cardale Jones? Maybe. There are some similarities with the run game coming around. Nobody could stop Elliot, and McCaffrey is trying to develop that kind of dominance. He can’t run over people, but he is super shifty, always decisive, and has a very underrated stiff arm to shake people off. Last week I called for him to lead the nation in all-purpose yards. He rose to the challenge: 303 all-purpose yards against Oregon State. He’s going to need more punt and kick return yards though if he is going to take the title.

There were a lot of potential turning points in this game. Some turnovers that swayed momemtum, missed catches (Rector), amazing catches that shouldn’t have happened (Rector). Ultimately, the big plays and breaks evened out, and the better team won. On the road after a battle against USC, it was a very nice win for Stanford.

2. Up Next: Arizona (3-1)

Blake Martinez had 9 tackles against OSU, as well as some solid rushes on the passer on 3rd down. He was initially snubbed by Mike Stoops in his prep days in Tuscon, and ended up committing to Stanford. Look for a big game by Martinez.

The defense will be key in this game. I’m not saying they have to play perfect for us to win. I’m just saying it will be interesting to watch. Oregon State used some tempo and some read option, and at times we looked slow when trying to stop the run game. Arizona will be trying to run in all directions, from all positions, especially quarterback. Expect us to do what we did in the second half of the last couple of games: more pressure up front and more run game support. I’ll take our chances in the secondary if we can shut down the run game.

On the other side of the ball, Arizona is only 65^th in the nation in run defense, and they will be missing at least one key player. I would expect to see more of the ground and pound, punctuated by the occasional shot downfield.

My favorite play that we have, however, is with McCaffrey in the slot with a lot of other receivers. It puts him in single coverage, and he can juke left or right. This play hit for 38 yards last Saturday. They’ve never used this more than once per game… Shaw seems very focused on using these plays as surprising outliers rather than regulars. But I wouldn’t mind seeing that play-call bumped up from 1 to 2 per game.

3. Next Week:

Expect a long, discursively cogent, bravely humble, and blindingly astute blog post replete with lots of stats analysis and a full top-25 breakdown.