I did a brief scan of the various Bear blogs out there and they remind me a lot of Allbuffers. You'd think they would be happy after beating the snot out of UC Davis, but there were was a lot of tempered optimisim out there. Here's what I found out:
QB Kevin Riley completed 70% of his passes, but not everyone is that thrilled. Apparently he had some bad incompletions, and he's burned the fans in the past so they're a bit skeptical. Guess it's tough following all those NFL first rounders.
Fans seemed to like their D. Their previous coordinator Gregory moved on to Boise State (fired or forced out???). He had an Okruh "bend don't break" philosophy, but the new guy is more aggressive. They use a base 3-4 with lots of blitzing. The D line and linebackers are the strength of the team. This will be a challenge for the Buffs, as I don't think we've played all that well versus blitzing teams.
The area for greatest concern for them is the offensive line. Apparently, the line didn't dominate UC Davis, and the holes weren't there for the backs. Pass protection was ok. The running backs were also not spectacular, but solid group (again, tough to follow Jahvid Best). This may be the best area of hope for the buffs. We've been pretty stout on the run and can hopefully turn Cal into a one dimensional team.
Unfortunatey, the one dimension might be pretty good. The Bears have three speedy wideouts and the fans are drooling over the frosh receiver that's titled in this thread (Keenan Allen). Big test ahead for our secondary and not good that our starting nickel (Orms) is out.
Finally, it seems like their special teams have sucked balls like ours in recent years. Not sure, but it appears that they had the good sense to send their sorry special teams coach packing at the end of last year. Last year kickoffs were short and returnable, with bad coverage. Sound familiar?
Overall, the media consensus was a 7th place finish for Cal in the Pac 10. This is a team that got drilled by USC, Oregon, Oregon State, and Utah last year, and then sent several players to the NFL. A good team, yes, but not the unbeatable team that some would have you believe. However, given the Buffs recent road woes (how many years until we lose the word "recent"?), it's hard to see any victories away from Folsom right now, but I'd love to shake that monkey this weekend.