Wild, Wild, West - A Lookback at the 1977 Pac-8 Race (Featuring Cards for the UCLA Bruins for SOM College Football)

 

 Frank Jordan's 38-yarder ended the 1977 Pac-8 race and UCLA's season, 29-27

Dropbox link for 1977 UCLA Bruins Cards for Strat-O-Matic College Football

Link to Other SOM CFB Content on this Blog

The 1977 Pac-8 wasn’t supposed to be very close. Coach John Robinson’s USC Trojans had finished the previous year at 11-1, had beaten Michigan in the Rose Bowl, and finished ranked #2 in the country behind the undefeated Pitt Panthers.  The 1978 USC Trojans would also finish 11-1, also beat Michigan in the Rose Bowl, and would tie for a split National Championship with the Alabama Crimson Tide.  All three teams from all three seasons were loaded with NFL level talent, and yet this year, 1977, USC could only play the role of spoiler in the wacky Pac-8.

 

A staple play in USC's scheme, Student Body Right.

USC featured QB Rob Hertel, also the Trojan baseball team’s second baseman, RB Charles White, who carried on the tradition of USC tailbacks, and WR Randy Simrin, who at this stage of his career had already surpassed some of Lynn Swann’s receiving records. But Notre Dame would don Green Jerseys in South Bend facing the #5 Trojans, and more importantly they would expose USC’s special teams by faking a FG attempt for a first down (and one play later a touchdown), blocking a punt, and running a muffed extra point in for two. A terminal malaise set in after that, and USC would drop 2 of their next three in-conference games, opening the door for several newcomers. 

Some losses can be awfully difficult to bounce back from 

Of the rest, UCLA had shared the conference in 1975 with Cal, and had finished 9-2-1 in 1976 under first year coach Terry Donahue, but they were seen as at least a year away in 1977.  UCLA did have a lot of talent, with RBs Theotis Brown and James Owens, OL Bruce Davis and Max Montoya, LBs Jerry Robinson and Manu Tuiasosopo, and Kenny Easley in the secondary.  Mike White’s Cal team seemed to be next best bet. Cal had only finished 5-6 the previous year in an injury-marred effort, but had finished 8-3 in 1975 and seemed poised to regain a Bowl bid. Cal featured QB Charlie Young, RB Paul Jones, and WRs Jesse Freitas and Jesse Thompson, along with Kicker Jim Breech. Even back then, before ’81 and The Catch and the wins in Super Bowls in 1981, 1984 and 1988 in the NFL, everyone seemed to know what Bill Walsh would be capable of at Stanford.  He had come to college football to coach after having been a very successful passing game assistant with the Cincinnati Bengals, and he had top-tier talent available to him in passer Guy Benjamin, WR James Lofton, and HB Darrin Nelson.  They did not have a lot of depth nor did they play a lot of defense, But Walsh promised to make Stanford games interesting by filling the sky with footballs.       

 

The last team on the list was the Washington Huskies.  The Huskies had finished 6-5 in 1975 and 5-6 in 1976, and they hadn’t won a Rose Bowl since 1960, but opposing coaches knew they could move the ball with the best teams in the conference. Not much was expected of them, and a 1-3 start in non-conference games did not inspire confidence in Seattle.  Meanwhile USC and Stanford were undefeated at the top of the conference at 2-0 and 1-0 respectively. 

 

Pac-8 Conference Records, by Week

On October 8, Washington won their conference opener while Stanford topped UCLA in a 32-29 barnburner in Stanford Stadium to knock them back to 2-3 overall. Cal had come into the weekend ranked 17th and 4-0, but got upset at Martin Stadium in Pullman by Washington State, 17-14. This left three leaders, Washington, Stanford, and USC, who at this point had only lost one game by one point to Alabama.  A week later, Washington did not play gracious hosts to Stanford, whipping them 45-21 to make it a two-horse race. 

Or so we thought.  

USC suffered their Green Jersey beat down on October 22, the same weekend UCLA beat Cal at the Coliseum 21-19 and effectively ended their conference hopes, even though they were 5-2 overall.  It was a shocking fall for a team that had been ranked 15th in the country.  The next weekend the Golden Bears took out their frustrations on the hapless Trojans up in Berkeley. Still reeling from their caning at the hands of The Jeweled Shillelagh, USC dropped a close one 17-14 to the Bears and when UCLA beat the Huskies 20-12 at the LA Coliseum four teams could look at the Sunday papers on October 30th tied for the lead with only one loss in the Pac-8.  

A week later, on November 5th, Washington definitively ended Cal’s glimmering hopes 50-31 up in Berkeley, and by now the rest of the conference knew they were in trouble.  Still, USC regrouped and beat Stanford 49-0 to make it a three-horse race, USC, UCLA, and Washington. This set up the big showdown up in Husky Stadium between the Trojans and the Huskies, which the Huskies dominated 28-10.  The Huskies had now won five of six to tie them with their co-leader UCLA, but their problem was their lone Pac-8 loss was to the Bruins.  They needed help to stop UCLA. 

Terry Donnelly was poised to do something special at UCLA.  But rivalry games are funny, sometimes the lesser team, the team with their backs up against the wall, is like a cockroach- it’s not what they can carry away, it’s what they might fall into, and ruin. 

Stanford won their last conference game over reeling Cal 21-3, and at 8-3 they were poised to claim a Sun Bowl berth. For Washington, a USC win would give the Huskies the sole one loss PAC-8 record and the Rose Bowl, denying the Bruins a Bowl, while the Bruins would go to the Rose Bowl with a win, possibly denying USC a bowl berth altogether. Everything was at stake in that last game. 

And Washington won the 1977 Pac-8 title because USC made sure UCLA didn’t claim it. If the Bruins could have taken down USC, they would have earned a spot in the 1978 Rose Bowl against Michigan. Donahue and UCLA might have gained an even firmer foothold in Los Angeles, changing the trajectory of this series in the late 1970s. But it was not to be.  Even with four losses, USC was able to ruin the Bruins’ season.  (This game is available on YouTube and it is a classic back and forth matchup between these teams.  It looks like UCLA is going to win a heartbreaker but the USC pulls off one last drive.)

USC kicker Frank Jordan made a number of huge kicks in his career at USC. He made a last-second field goal in 1978 to beat Notre Dame and keep the Trojans on course for a national championship.

But on a late November day one year earlier — inside the very same Los Angeles Coliseum — Jordan booted UCLA out of the Granddaddy, and gifted a four-loss Washington team with a ticket to Pasadena. Jordan hit a 38-yard field goal with two seconds left to give the Trojans more than a 29-27 rivalry win over UCLA; it also made sure that USC remained in charge of this rivalry, and that Donahue’s ascendancy would have to wait. The victory also carried USC into its bowl game, a Bluebonnet Bowl blowout of Texas A&M, which reset the Trojans’ outlook for 1978.  UCLA did not make a bowl in 1977, and they would have to wait until the next year, and the Fiesta Bowl.  Washington changed their trajectory, as they made their first of fourteen bowls under coach Don James, culminating eventually in the 1991 National Championship.

UCLA (7-4)

Offense (Split-Back Veer) – The heart of the Bruin offense is their strong running game.  UCLA averages 4.3 yds/carry led primarily by the LHB combination of James Owens and Freeman McNeil.  This duo contributes over 1,300 yards at a 5.2 average per clip, along with 7 TDs.  RHB Theotis Brown and Glen Cannon kick in another 877 yards for a 4.7 average and 6 TDs.  The QBs, Rick Bashore and Steve Bukich, grind it out for a 2.4-yard average (3.9 yds after sack adjustments) and 6 TDs.  The Bruin passing attack is not awe-inspiring, but it is functional with a 51.1% completion percentage and 14 yds/reception. The main deep threat at wide-out is FL Homer Butler who averages 22.8 yds/catch and leads the team with 4 TDs.  

Defense (3-4) – UCLA’s 3-4 defense highlights 3 notable All-Americans—DT Manu Tuiasosopo, FS Kenny Easley and LB Jerry Robinson (consensus All-American).  The Bruins are tough against the run, only allowing 3.2 yds/carry (3.6 after sack adjustments), but they occasionally struggle vs. the pass.  The Bruins allow a 56% completion percentage for opposing QBs and the UCLA front three is sometimes challenged in sustaining a consistent pass rush, resulting in only 23 sacks on the year.  On a positive note, the UCLA defense intercepted 15 passes and averaged over 19 yards per return with 3 “pick sixes.”

Special Teams/Intangibles – PK Frank Corral is a “50-50” kicker who connected on 13 of 27 attempts.  He will drive coaches crazy when the Bruins are in scoring position because he is so erratic.  The Bruin return teams don’t provide a lot of value either as they only average 16.2 on kick returns and 3.8 on punt returns.  On the punt coverage side, UCLA only allows 6.1 yds/return but do give up a “long gain” opportunity. 

Fred Bobberts, Albuquerque, NM, Original Date of Publication 9/11/2022

Cards by Chris Stewart, Republished with Permission

Team Specific Interceptions for SOM NFL (Design Notes from V10) - Pt.1

(Since this came up again this year, more than a dozen years after the option was introduced, I figure I owe you all at least the original design intent of the feature. I realize this does not make everyone happy but gamers can usually draw their own conclusions based on the reasoning.)

Team Specific Interceptions for SOM NFL (Notes for V10)

Sunday, November 1, 2009 5:32:36 PM

Editorial, Tools

(Copyright The Strat-O-Matic Game Co, June 12th, 2010, all rights reserved)

OTHER SOM PRO FOOTBALL POSTS:

SOM PRO FOOTBALL LINKS

This what team interceptions look like, with the size of the bubble indicating the relative number of automatic interceptions a team should get. That SOM bubble is what the stock rule provides.  

Okay, well, the other shoe fell. Now you see why my time was constrained. I had to research and quantify and try to distribute and modify int results for almost a thousand teams, and like every other thing I do, this was done entirely by hand. So it was like another season in terms of time, and yes, it stopped me from attempting something else this year, although there were other factors.  

Well enough of that- how these models work of course is somewhat dependent on what you do as a coach. The model assumes you will not elect to return every int (because all teams still have that fumble on 11). It still depends on the flat pass return ints that the standard chart has. Because older seasons have more flat ints, and these become TDs more readily, there are subtle changes to the model as you go farther back, and ints become more frequent.  

Smokey Joe hit the target right on, a TD is not worth as much as you might think in terms of yardage, that was what he contributed earlier that broke this wide open. A long return on a team's card, while visually appealing, is not as valuable as its nominal total. The reason why is that a longer return number has a better chance of turning into a TD from more places on the field, and of course, that pesky end zone gets in the way and shortens the return when this happens. 

A reasonable but not perfect model is 10*log(yardage)^2.5 which looks like this:

Nominal      Observed (what it’s actually worth in a replay)

5                     4

10                   10

15                   15

20                   19

25                   23

30                   27

40                   32

50                   38

60                   42

75                   48

100.                57

That's base ten log.

The marginal value of another yard on a return will decline as the return gets longer. This model is good to about 3% of observed. The idea that it is log limited makes sense to me, since the boundary condition of of where the int occurs can be modeled on field position after the int, and the impact on length is skewed, and not normally distributed. It is a geometric (hyperbolic) model with powers greater than one in the expression. 

(Think prob*likely return length, the value is initially small, then becomes progressively greater farther down the field, then compresses again at the far end of the field.)  

The goal of each team's distribution was to model as best I could:

1)The team's yardage per return;

2)The team's chance to "house" a return, based partly on the predicted or expected results from its yardages, and based on real life. 

3)The actual yards found in a team's record, and the “chunkiness” or distribution of a type of returns, that is if roughly a quarter of returns were 28 yards

there is likely to be 7 or 8 chances for that length of return;

4) The CMs can and do kneel on returns; this will add arbitrary “0 yard” returns to the simulated effort;

5) Where I can, the teams longest return is on the chart.  99 yards is the max in this framework. 

What this means is if a team had a high average and few TDs, you can expect that the TDs it would get would come from its yardages. But if a team had a higher TD percentage than its yards per return or distribution would normally account for, I might use the power of the automatic TD to get this team closer to its goal, and the league closer to its goal.

Based on the team's distribution of gains, if it looked like they returned nearly every return, they were going to get that type of chart, chunky returns get chunky charts.

These are the primary constraints. I could not balance all of them perfectly for all teams. But I did get them to work well, especially at the league level, where you can see the results develop in as few as four replays. Individual teams, of course, take longer to test.  

There are a few assumptions and limitations- 

1) I mentioned the fact not all returns are considered to actually be returned- there is some flex in the model for this, but in general I used the CM's logic. Remember- kneed returns usually count for a big zero for their teams, so if the charts look a tad high, they are, because they account for this. 

Of course, now that coaches can see returning ints if you are in charge of '04 Baltimore is like having Rick Upchurch get TWO trys sequentially to roll a 1982 punt return on his card, this decision-making ruleset may not always be realistic. Teams may try more returns in human managed games.

2) The game is limited to 99 yards for the chart, so about a dozen or so teams with 100+ yard returns have 99s instead and this has been incorporated into their model. This is a PC constraint we have to live with. Cards - n -dice guys, though, could sub that yardage back for feel (Ed Reed will be happy.)  

3) Obviously throw more or less flat and you can change your opponent's results. One thing this might do is make coaches more circumspect about using flat passes to kill the clock with a lead, which I like. 

The goal of course was to see if we could get teams to exhibit that 600 yard return season if they did so, or be limited to their 100-200 yards if they did not. By and large this system is an improvement by quite a bit over the stock system, and since I argued for years that it would not be useful to even try this, I can only say one thing-

I was wrong.

Fred

Kicking up a Storm in The Southwest Conference (Cards for the 1977 Texas Longhorns for Strat-O-Matic College Football)

 

 Russell Erxleben, 1977

Dropbox link for the 1977 Texas Longhorns for Start-O-Matic College Football

A Lookback at the Time When Kickers Were Legends

(Note that Arkansas (Orange Bowl) and Texas A&M (Bluebonnet Bowl) are already published here)

Link to Other SOM CFB Content on this Blog

Texas had Earl Campbell, but some people believed that the most potent weapon in burnt orange was the tall dude with the three shoes and the Martian surname Erxleben. Actually, the name is German, and Russell Erxleben did not have three feet. On his left foot he wore a regular white football shoe, and on his right, depending on the situation, a regular shoe for punting, or a square-toed one for place-kicking, both of which he did exceedingly well.

On an October Saturday in 1977 in Austin's packed Memorial Stadium, Texas beat 13th-ranked Texas Tech 26-0 and took another giant step toward the Cotton Bowl. Campbell rushed for 116 yards against a defense keyed to stop him; the defense, aided by a holding penalty in the second quarter and the fact that injured Tech Quarterback Rodney Allison was in for only four plays, got itself a shutout. 

And Erxleben, trotting into the game for just 15 plays, was devastating.

He punted five times for a 44-yard average. Two of his six kickoffs landed beyond the end zone. With Texas leading 7-0 near the end of the first half, a Longhorn drive stalled on the Tech 44. Coach Fred Akers sent in Erxleben wearing the placekicking shoe. In the first quarter he had missed a 56-yard field goal into the wind. This time he had the wind with him, and he kicked it through the goalposts from 60 yards away.

It seemed as if a fellow who can kick 60-yard field goals should be allowed to mail in his extra points, but Erxleben blew the try after Texas' second TD. He made up for it with a 35-yard field goal late in the fourth quarter.  "You know what that guy does to you?" asked Oklahoma Assistant Coach Larry Lacewell, whose Sooners lost to Texas 13-6 as Erxleben made good on attempts of 64 and 58 yards. "He puts you in a goal-line defense on the 50-yard line."  

  Tony Franklin, 1977

Meanwhile, over in College Station, Texas A&M's Tony Franklin was helping the Aggies beat SMU 38-21 by kicking a 54-yard field goal and five PATs (he had not missed an extra point this season). Like Erxleben, Franklin was a junior, but he used only one shoe; his kicking foot he kept bare.

And against Rice, Steve Little of Arkansas, a sidewinder, kicked field goals of 52, 44 and 29 yards, punted three times for an average of 52.3 yards, and six of his seven kickoffs could not be returned as the Razorbacks won 30-7. Little was a senior and the three field goals brought his career total to 46, just five makes short of the NCAA record, which he later set with 53.

 Steve Little, 1977

Just another typical Saturday in the Southwest Conference, where between 1976 and 1977 had produced the five longest field goals in modern NCAA history.  This era is enshrined in history, as the tees they kicked off were outlawed in 1989.  But in Texas and Arkansas in 1977 "being in field-goal range" meant a team had stepped off its bus outside the stadium. It was such a competitive league for kickers that Texas Tech's Bill Adams, who made 47-and 52-yard field goals against Rice, and Baylor's Robert Bledsoe, who had a 47-yarder against SMU, were considered mere chip-shot specialists.

It was the barefoot booter, Franklin, who in 1976 boomed the opening shot in the long-range barrage. Against Baylor, on a wet field with about a six-mph wind at his back, the Aggie sophomore followed his usual routine. He stared at the maroon spot painted on his white, hard-rubber tee. The holder placed the ball straight up on the tee with the laces facing the goalposts, and Franklin, approaching from the left side like a soccer sidewinder, kicked it through from 64 yards away, an NCAA record. But not for long. A while later Franklin kicked one from 65 yards out. 

All told, Franklin made 17 of 26 field-goal attempts last year and 30 of 32 extra points to rank second in scoring in the SWC. In 1977 he hit on 16 more three-pointers, including four in the final quarter against Texas Tech to give the Aggies a 33-17 come-from-behind win. He had also kicked a 76-yarder in practice.

In the summer Texas' Erxleben, a good friend of Franklin's, ran three or four miles before work and again after work every day, training to top Franklin's distance record. As he ran, he kept repeating to himself, "I'm going to get Tony this year. I'm going to run and run until it hurts so bad, but I'm going to get him."  Get him he did early in 1977, against Rice. With the score 54-7 in the third period and the ball on Texas' 49, Coach Fred Akers called for the punting team, but Erxleben persuaded him to try a howitzer-range field goal. Erxleben took off his punting shoe and put on his square-toed placekicking shoe (the toe is tied up slightly to give his kicks more loft). He wanted to get a two-yard margin over Franklin, so he moved the tee one yard farther back than usual, to 67 yards. The ball sailed "dead through the middle" with the help of an eight-mph wind.

Two weeks later it was Little's turn. Against Texas, with a 20-mph wind to his back in the second quarter, he put his size-seven shoe and all his body whip and hip rotation into a kick from his 43 and made it, to tie Erxleben's record. That prompted Erxleben to send a note to Franklin: "Don't you think it's your turn to kick a 67-yarder? Remember, no farther!"

For his part when he was a sophomore Tony Franklin kicked a city-record 51-yard field goal. The record was broken two years later with a 52-yarder by the star kicker at rival Eastern Hills High School, a German immigrant named Uwe von Schamann, who now was Oklahoma's field-goal specialist in 1977.  "Von Schamann didn't kick anything farther than that during the year, and I didn't either," says Franklin. "Then in the playoffs our teams met. On the fourth play of the game I twisted my right ankle and kept it in an ice bucket. Right before halftime the coach said, 'Well, it's fourth down and we've got a little wind, you want to try it?'  I said, 'Yes, sir, it's probably the last time I'll have a chance to get my record back.' "

With a sore ankle, Franklin went out and kicked a field goal from 58 yards, not only surpassing von Schamann but setting a state record as well. The Texas high school field-goal record is now 62 yards, held by Russell Wheatley from Odessa. "Tony could have kicked 60-yarders in high school," says one of the coaches at Arlington Heights. "Every Thursday at the end of workouts we'd finish up with field goals, and Tony would kick 50-and 60-yarders. It really gave the team a big lift to see the ball go through."  

All three college kickers needed to make adjustments when they reached the pros. Without the placekicking tee, they lost between 10 and 15 yards on their kicks. "It's just like hitting a golf ball," said Kansas City Chiefs Scout Tommy O'Boyle. "You can hit it a lot farther off a tee than off the ground." They also aimed at a smaller target. College goal-posts are 23'4" wide (they were widened about five feet in 1959), while in the NFL they are only 18'6" apart. Erxleben, along with all the other straight-ahead kickers, was not able to tie up his toe or wear a square-toed shoe; he was successful as a punter but not as a kicker.  Franklin was the only kicker to see extended success in the NFL.

Probably the most important rule difference, however, was that in the NFL in this era, after a failed field-goal attempt, the ball came back to the line of scrimmage, thus discouraging long tries until the final seconds of a game. In college the ball comes out to the 20, and thus missed 60-yarders are the same as long punts—with the exception of coffin corner kicks.

Fred Bobberts, Initial Date of Publication 9/4/2022 (Reprinted with Permission)

Special Thanks to Chris Stewart