Texas Pregamer: Notre Dame

Welcome Home

Like the cute girl in your Intro to Comms class, the offseason has convinced you that life is meaningless and you made a terrible mistake picking a major based on gender ratio. Yes, the anguish of offseason has a way of turning 8 months into the length of time since the Bills last won the Super Bowl. That’s right, it’s so long I invoked the Bills Time Measurement (BTM, not a sandwich). Well, rejoice football fans because we’re back baby. For those of you waking from your cryogenic sleep, welcome! The sickness will wear off momentarily. Or you can get down with it, your choice. Regardless, here is a quick summary of the offseason:

Texas did not lose its bowl game

Fenves was already heading to Tulsa

Sterlin Gilbert hired

Matt Mattox gives the O-line the hug they always wanted

ERRRRRRRRRRBODY

Malik joined Periscope

ERRRRRRRBODY part deux (aka Ursus Flatulus)

Shane Buechele hatches from his cocoon in Belmont

Patrick Hudson bench presses the new Bevo

The Texas Pregamer returns

That’s it - you’re all caught up. It’s going to be a hell of a season. If you’ve been reading every morsel of offseason drivel like we have, you know you can expect a team that ‘looks like a million bucks’ and that is really good at ping pong. It’s all I ever wanted. It’s all I ever needed. Yeaaaah. We’ve got the ‘cruits, we’ve got the chemistry. Now let’s get the wins. Hook ‘em.

Spotlight:

There still hasn't been a press release or official announcement. No one knows who it will be. It really looks like they seem to be waiting for game day. Even Kurt Bohls' questions go unanswered. However, we gotchu.

Full candidate list for BEVO XV:

News Desk

Hot off the presses, random news stories with lots of research behind them:

• Several Notre Dame players had their recent gun charges reduced by South Bend PD when the alleged ringleader, a Ms. Kekua, disappeared without a trace.
• Football recruits report the fact that Charlie Strong is ‘real' as a key factor in his recruiting success. Charlie Strong agrees, noting the shift from being a figment of imagination to a real person has been essential to his process.
  
• Longhorn DT Chris Daniels expanded on his comments from recruiting season, "Seriously, don't let Coach Strong on your couch. He stayed for three weeks. We had to bring him a bucket. He lived off old Cheetos he found in between the cushions."
• South Bend Mayor Malietau Louis held a banquet this weekend celebrating the unrivaled growth of local industry this year. Union reps for Phishing Enterprises Inc. and Catfish Indiana Co., as well as 3 Nigerian Princes, were in attendance we swear.
• Arlington residents continue to mortgage their emotions on the hope that Arlington-native Shane Buechele's rising star will help convince people that Arlington isn't just "one giant parking lot of stagnating disappointment."
• New Longhorn OC Sterlin Gilbert responded to a question with a folksy answer. After leaving to change their pants, reporters in attendance filed stories containing 30% content, 70% arguments about the difference between a drawl and a twang.
  

And now for some gripping, click-worthy "journalism" on the story we’ve spent the entire offseason researching. A Texas Pregamer exclusive:

Three years ago when Charlie Strong first stepped onto the 40 Acres, he came with a simple plan: clean up the program, get the kids to believe in themselves, and always button the top button of your staff polo shirt.

However, it seems that airtight sartorial plan has come somewhat...unbuttoned. There appears to be a coup developing in the locker room. A button schism. Observe:

Four of the five new coaching hires are taking a stand; a stand against the sanctity of top button-ness by not buttoning their top button. Look at those traitors. Charlie gives them a job--a purpose--and this is how they repay him? All it took was one historically bad offensive season, and BOOM everyone is suddenly Magnum PI. Where are the standards? The lone holdout in the new class? OG Charlie Williams.

This is riveting, page turning, potential award-winning stuff here, folks --the kind of journalism that can only be made more compelling with a fivethirtyeight-ish graphical breakdown.

On a lighter note, this year's Button Courage Award goes to Pat Moorer’s top button. Hang in there buddy.

Better Know A Roster:

• Equanimeous St. Brown (WR, SO) - I try to avoid repeating the same names (especially with teams we play consecutive years), but I can’t stress to you how perfect a name this is. It’s as if your job was being in charge of decorating the outside of Kyle Field and were contemplating how to fill all that space near the 1939 National Championship in 2012. It’s the perfect name to start every Pregamer for the rest of eternity. A reminder: his full name is Equanimeous Tristan Imhotep J. St. Brown, not to be confused with his younger brothers: Osiris Adrian Amen- Ra J. St. Brown and Amon-Ra Julian Heru J. St. Brown.

• Alex Bars (OL, JR) - We are starting off the year with a very strong contender for best "white kid in the suburbs" rap name.

• Torii Hunter Jr. (WR, SR) - The son of longtime standout mother Katrina Hunter.

• Jesse Bongiovi (CB, SR) - Got beat on play-action and he's to blame; he gives pass defense a bad name.

• Trevor Brosco, Hugh Crance, Keenan Centlivre, Ryder Garnsey, Edwin Glazener, Kyle Trolley, Parker Boudreaux, Brooks Tyrrell - Two of these are Notre Dame football players. The rest are honest-to-Touchdown Jesus Notre Dame Lax players. Good luck.

• Micah Dew-Treadway (DL, SO) and Ryan Kilander (DL, JR) - If you combine two of the Pregamer staff writers’ names with a popular soft drink and the greatest depiction of a mythological Scottish Immortal clansman… Oh...you just want a joke? "Kilander? I hardly knew her" [Both Naz and Jack Stone break the 4th wall and smirk at the camera] #NightOfOuttakes

• Kier Murphy (LB, SO) - Don’t the Sooners have bigger, Todd Herman sized things to concern themselves with than sending this kid to play for the Irish?

  

• Lincoln Feist (DL, SO) - 1,2, 3, 4 tell me if you’ve heard this joke before. Oh, you big Mushaboom lineman, you were named after not only some Broken Indie Social Scene, but one from Canada? If it ain’t poutine, Ryan Reynolds, Levon Helm or Justin Trudeau, it sucks.

• Chris Finke (WR, SO) and Liam Eichenberg (OL, FR) - Finke is Eichenberg? Eichenberg is Finke. (Also hope he isn’t cursed with Chris Weinke’s hairline)

• Alizé Jones (TE, SO) - Never one to be a follower, Jones blazed his own path by being ruled ineligible for this game due to academics rather than marijuana or illegal firearms.

• Logan Plantz (OL, SO), Drew Recker (S, SR) - I won’t even lie, I love topically-applicable player names. And anti-inflammatory rash creams, fwiw.

• Mick Assaf (WR, FR)- Although just a freshman, the walk-on already holds the impressive distinction of being the whitest looking person at Notre Dame. The dude is Mick As Fuuuuu.

• Montgomery VanGorder (QB, JR) - A third string quarterback, but first string fake ID name.

• Grant Hammann (WR, JR) - He stood up from his Ikea "Jerker" computer table and knew it was time. He climbed into his vintage Chevy Nova that he bought off that guy in Mexico, still thinking "sucker" every time he put the key into the ignition. He was headed to the airport, the trip the culmination of months of meticulous planning. He knew it would be a success, how could it not? It had been a hit at the Iowa Comic Con, the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, the Texas State Fair. This was his chance to make a name for himself--or rather make a name for his superhero alter-ego. This was his time to take the world by storm, starting with the cash-laden Middle East. Eat your heart out Abu Dhabi...meet HAMMANN!

AN(ST)AGRAM

If you rearrange Brian Kelly’s name, you get "Blarney Ilk." The Blarney Stone is the scourge of Ireland, a troglodytic tradition that is the Irish equivalent of St. Patty’s day. It’s manufactured and it’s awful (hence...Notre Dame). If that doesn’t confirm that the illuminati want Notre Dame to win sheeple, I don’t know what will open your eyes. Other gems include:

Bark Yellin

- Which is a pretty apt descriptor of his coaching methodologies.

"Nearby Kill" "Barn Likely"

- These 2 clues would make a for a watchable plot for a Clue remake.

A Belly Rink

- A subtle reminder that Charlie Weis is still getting paid. He has one more paycheck outstanding to bring his total to almost $19 million paid from Notre Dame. He hasn't coached there since 2009.

Ray Ban Kill

All In Kerby

Rankly Bile

- A great summation of the myth of Notre Dame as some "bigger than football" entity.

Offseason is all about taking an honest look at your flaws and growing from it. So starting this year, we are turning over a new leaf and finally getting on this whole social media bandwagon.

So first things first, we started "following" Charlie Strong. For those of you out there that don’t know what following means, we’d like to express that following someone on twitter is a figurative and not literal thing. We’re still not allowed near Bellmont since the ‘09 Rudy’s BBQ incident.

Anyways. Lucky for us, coach strong is super easy to find on Twitter. He has a ton of followers, and really keeps it up to date. Color us impressed. I don’t know why people are always dumping on poor Chuck about his people skills. His tweets are both informative and straight fire.

See? This is the kind of head games we need our coach throwing out there the week before a game. I love the willingness to get out there and really take it to the other guy. But it’s not all about the smack, social media is all about breaking news on what’s going on inside that locker room too.

Thankfully someone had already asked Coach the question everyone wants to know the answer to - who’s starting at QB this week? Swoops? Buchele?

Christmas Giles? Ok. that’s a bit strange. Also, I thought he changed that whole last name thingy. But that’s why he’s the coach and we’re just blossoming social media experts.

How are the players? Ready for kickoff?

Good to hear Poonatron is keeping his weight up. High carb, high impact our italian grandma always said.

Anything else on your mind, coach?

Sad to hear it. I guess they never really recovered from the Lucky Charm bust of ‘08. Glad to see Charlie is getting the word out there. #GreenLivesMatter

Well that’s it for this week's Social Media check-in with our very real and not a parody account coach Charlie Strong. Tune in next time where we figure out how that kid at our work keeps getting people to bring them lunch in Uberz.

Predictions:

TejasChaos: Pre-kickoff, Charlie announces Swoopes to WR , Buchele to scatback, and Merrick to Olympic Hurdles. All seems lost when smoke fills the tunnel. No Pa, it can’t be…. Good God that's the Undertaker's music! Texas by a choke slam.

VY Pump Fake: Add one part ERRRRRBODY to one part #TeamTopButton, stir in the 100th year of BEVO and serve in a chilled glass of Charlie Strong Year 3. I call this cocktail the 9 win season. Texas wins by 1.

ColtMcConaughey: In the first quarter, Bevo XV will stare off into the distance, solemnly considering whether he chose this life, or this life was chosen for him.

- In the second quarter, Malik Jefferson will empty his cleats on the sideline and uncover two facemasks and the right guard’s pinky.

- In the third quarter, a freshman geology major will reach puberty while watching the pom squad dance to Wabash Cannonball.

- In the fourth quarter, Tyrone Swoopes takes a knee, the clock expires and a small group of the top recruits in the 2017 class carry Charlie Strong off the field, which is unorthodox but appreciated.

Kyle Carpenter: Notre Dame varsity athletes don’t win letters, they are "awarded Monograms"...That’s a completely real thing. You then become a part of the "Monogram Club," which sounds like something the 6 worst white guys in the office would name their GroupMe thread. Texas wins the first of 5 straight before heading into the crucial rivalry game against Iowa State.

Parting Shot: