FanHouse BillDoba

The Seattle Times put the Washington State University football program in the cross-hairs on Sunday, reporting on an array of mistakes by players over the last 18 months. 25 arrests in 18 months is a troubling sign, no matter the coach or the program.

Some of it was your run-of-the-mill incidents that occur at campuses across the country. You know, underage drinking, marijuana possession, assault. Not to excuse the behavior, but pretty standard stuff for 18-22 year-olds. But some of it was, well, a little odd. For example, standout defensive end/linebacker Andy Mattingly attacked a five-foot-ten soccer player. With a frying pan. And the soccer player? He had a butter knife to try and fend off the 6-4, 245-pounder who notched 91 tackles and eight sacks as a true sophomore last season. Predictably, the soccer player took the worst of it, suffering a two-inch gash and was "bleeding profusely" according to the police report. As the old saying goes, never bring a butter knife to a frying pan fight.

All that said, the vast majority of these assorted misdeeds happened under the previous coaching regime of Bill Doba. Doba was relieved of his duties in December after a modest 30-29 record. But the real issues surrounding Doba and his coaching staff appears to be what was, or wasn't, happening off the field.

"WSU is a hard school to go to, man," [ex-DB Courtney] Williams says. "You ain't got nothin' to do but get drunk and smoke weed, and not go to class because you're too tired from doing what you're doing."

"Because of the Internet and all the negative stuff, we have some kids we have offered and I think they want to commit but they want to wait and see if the Internet is going to fire me," Doba said Tuesday.

The Cougars are the only Pac-10 team without a commitment, according to recruiting Web sites.

Doba has become a target for unhappy Cougars fans who use Web sites and message boards to unleash their frustration. There even is a Web site dedicated to getting him fired.

"When you're battling with offensive linemen and trying to get in there, the quick hands help get them off you," Andy said. "And it also helps in the aggressiveness and toughness aspect when you're getting hit in the face and stuff."

The 2007 season has been a titanic disaster for WSU. Now 2-5 after a 53-7 embarrassment of epic proportions at Oregon, WSU takes the week off to try and regroup. But not only are the natives restless, even the media is starting to sound the alarms that this should be the end of the Bill Doba reign in Pullman.

First it was Howie Stalwick, freelance journalist who covers WSU for various publications, saying that with WSU sinking every week and no real end in sight, the end is near. Then WSU alum and P-I writer Jim Moore added on yesterday, alluding to how you can basically feel it in the air, that Doba's run out of time and most likely it will end upon the completion of the season.

Maybe the most damaging of all was Bud Withers of the Seattle Times writing last week about the disastrous recruiting under Bill Doba's watch. How bad has it been? Basically Doba and staff have whiffed on over 50% of the players they signed on letter-of-intent day from 2003 - 2005. What I mean by whiff is that over 50% of the players who signed on the dotted line aren't even in the program anymore. Poor recruiting has led to a shaky position in regards to depth, where many backups are far too young, inexperienced and just not very good Pac-10 level players. WSU is traditionally a thin program anyway, but when the recruiting is this bad, it's almost impossible to compete with the power programs in the Pac-10.

Bill Doba's WSU defense had a big improvement last week vs. Arizona State. They held the Sun Devils to 23 points, and the game came down to a final missed field goal before the whole thing as decided. The Cougar D played fast and aggressive, and it appeared that Doba finally decided to cut the youngsters loose and see what kind of damage they could do. Andy Mattingly, the 6-4, 230lb true sophomore linebacker with the quickness of a safety, had the game of his life, with 17 tackles, four sacks and five tackles for loss, the latter of which tied a school record.

So it looked like the defense finally turned the corner. But alas, things seem like they might be going in reverse this week. Doba did something he hasn't done all year last week, and that was blitz repeatedly, well over 50% of the time according to Mattingly. But this week will be different, for the opponent in Oregon will dictate the defensive approach. And that, overall, is not a good thing. The success against ASU, while encouraging to see the defense get after it, might have been a bit of a mirage. ASU employs the one-back offense under Dennis Erickson, and the WSU program has basically been running the same offense since the late 1980's. So they knew what they were doing to see last week, and, bottom line, they knew they could blitz.

This week? Not so much. Oregon, with Dennis Dixon at QB, loves to spread you out and dissect you with the quick passing game. Blitzing is pretty much out of the question, as Dixon and his receivers would be able to do whatever they want against an approach like that. Take away the pass? No problem for Oregon, just hand it to RB Jonathan Stewart and watch him get seven-plus yards per carry, which is what he's averaging right now as the top running back in the conference. To make matters worse, the last offense WSU saw like this on the road was against Arizona, and we know what happened there - over 500 yards of total offense and 48 points in a blowout in Tucson. Willie Tuitama threw for five TD's, and a true frosh running back named Nicholas Grigsby had 186 yards in his first-ever start. Uh-oh.

And finally, speaking of Andy Mattingly, how does Bill Doba reward his young rising linebacker for a major breakout game against an unbeaten opponent? By removing him from the starting lineup, that's how. Kendrick Dunn is back this week after missing the ASU game with an injury, so Doba is giving the JC transfer his job back, even though Mattingly might have had the best game at linebacker for WSU since Will Derting roamed the Palouse. WSU is a 17-18 point underdog, and sure, this season has seen it's share of craziness. I guess if Stanford can waltz into the LA Coliseum and beat USC, then anything can happen in the Pac-10. But add it all up, it could be a long, rough afternoon in Eugune for Doba's defense.

Through the first five games of 2007, it's hard to find a defense that's played much worse than WSU. Last in the Pac-10 in scoring defense, total defense, and passing defense among the major categories, a program that used to pride itself on playing fast and aggressive has turned into a passive group lacking experience and, most of all, confidence.

It's gotten so bad, this defense ranked "in the hundreds" among the nation's teams, that even the few productive players on defense are going to be replaced. Newcomers Alfonso Jackson and Kendrick Dunn, two of the top tacklers on the team, are both out this week after suffering injuries last week vs. Arizona. So changes are in fact coming for this beleagured group, but sadly, it's not really even by choice. At least four new starters will be in the lineup Saturday when WSU hosts ASU. Among the new starters is junior defensive tackle A'i Ahmu (pictured), a player who's battled stress fractures in his foot for the last year. Ahmu will start in place of senior Aaron Johnson. But at least Ahmu has a few starts under his belt, even if it is just a few. The rest of the new faces, led by safeties Christian Bass, Xavier Hicks and linebacker Andy Mattingly, will all be making their starting debuts this weekend.

But the seeds of what we are seeing today were planted last year, when the WSU defense lost so many productive players. The Cougars lost five of their top seven tacklers from 2006, including all-conference safety Eric Frampton and all-conference defensive end Mkristo Bruce. They even lost starting corner Tyron Brackenridge, who was last seen scoring a touchdown for the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday. In other words, this defense was already a thin, inexperienced unit before they ever lined up for the 2007 season. When you look at everything as a whole, the results thus far aren't exactly a shock. But what it does show is that WSU has come up short in terms of recruiting defensive talent. A lot of painful lessons are surely on the horizon when you realize that ASU, Oregon, and Cal, along with their athletic, dynamic offenses, are still on the schedule. In other words, if you can fathom it, it's probably going to get worse before it gets better.