Santoro: Hey, Pack football, what’s the rush?

Sports Fodder:

Why, exactly, is the Nevada Wolf Pack football team starting its season on Aug. 24, the earliest debut in the history of Pack football?

What’s the rush? Half the players on the roster don’t even know each other’s names yet after last season’s housecleaning. After going 4-20 the last two seasons combined under coach Ken Wilson, one would think the Wolf Pack would want as many practice days as possible to get ready for the 2024 season.

New Wolf Pack coach Jeff Choate, though, now has less than 100 days to prepare for his first season opener at Nevada on Aug. 24 against SMU.

The Wolf Pack has started just 10 seasons in the month of August in its 128-year history. The earliest the Pack has started a season before this year was two seasons ago with a 23-12 win on Aug. 27, 2022, at New Mexico State. The other nine August debuts all came on either Aug. 30 or Aug. 31.

How ridiculous is an Aug. 24 start for a college football season? It is so goofy the NCAA doesn’t even know what to call it. They came up with the brilliant idea of calling the weekend “Week Zero.” Is it the start of the season or not? Do the games even count?

That 2022 season debut, by the way, was Wilson’s first game as Pack head coach. Brian Polian is the only other head coach (other than Choate and Wilson) to debut at Nevada with an August game. Polian’s Pack went to UCLA on Aug. 31, 2013, and lost 58-20. After Wilson beat New Mexico State in his debut, by the way, he would lose 20 of his next 23 games and is now coaching linebackers at TCU.

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The first game the Pack ever played in August was Aug. 30, 1986, a 49-3 victory over Cal State Fullerton at Mackay Stadium.

A crowd of 13,062 saw quarterback Eric Beavers complete 16-of-21 passes for 316 yards and four touchdowns in less than three full quarters. Charvez Foger ran for 114 yards and two scores. The 1986 Pack would go on to win its first 13 games, eventually falling to Georgia Southern at Mackay Stadium in the Division I-AA playoffs for coach Chris Ault.

So, yes, maybe Choate has a method to his madness by throwing his Pack into the deep end of the pool against SMU before they learn how to swim on Aug. 24. The month of August has actually been more than kind to the Pack, especially at Mackay Stadium, as visiting teams are not at all prepared or in shape yet so early in the season for the Reno altitude.

Yes, there was that loss to UCLA, a 45-13 loss at Colorado State in 1997 and a 31-7 drubbing at Washington State in 2002. But all those games came on the road.

The other seven August dates, six of which were at Mackay Stadium, turned out to be Wolf Pack wins. The best was a dramatic 34-31 win over Purdue on Aug. 30, 2019, as the Boilermakers wilted in the Nevada summer and the altitude late in the fourth quarter.

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Northern Nevada lost a great friend this week with the passing of former Oakland Raiders great Jim Otto.

Otto, who used to visit this region often for various events after retiring from the NFL after the 1974 season, was the quintessential Raider.

Otto, who never missed a game in his career, playing in the Raiders first 223 games (regular season and postseason combined), was commonly referred to as the Original Raider. He was drafted out of the University of Miami in the franchise’s first draft in 1960 and was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of fame in 1980.

Otto, who died on Sunday at the age of 86, was one of the toughest players in the history of the sport, enduring (by his count) more than six dozen surgeries. Otto rarely played a game without either a broken nose, broken ribs, damaged knees, a concussion, a missing tooth or cauliflower ears. Gene Upshaw, one of Otto’s offensive lineman teammates with the Raiders, once said, “You could always recognize him because he was always bleeding.”

One of Otto’s teammates during the Raiders’ inaugural season in 1960 was Reno High graduate Don Manoukian. Manoukian, who also played at Stanford, played alongside Otto for 14 games in 1960 at guard in his lone professional football season and was also one of the toughest Raiders in team history. Manoukian, a celebrated professional wrestler and, later, an extremely popular speaker and emcee at Northern Nevada events, stood just 5-foot-7 and weighed 235 pounds as a Raider.

Manoukian wore No. 67 with the Raiders and Otto wore No. 50 in 1960 before switching to his more recognizable No. 00.

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Did the Las Vegas Raiders even have a plan when they got rid of quarterback Derek Carr late in the 2022 season?

It doesn’t appear so. The Raiders’ starting quarterbacks after Carr have been Jarrett Stidham, Aidan O’Connell, Jimmy Garoppolo and Brian Hoyer. This year O’Connell will be joined by Gardner Minshew.

Carr, the former Fresno State quarterback who completed 76-of-127 passes for 1,022 yards, eight touchdowns and no interceptions in three games (2011-13) against the Wolf Pack, passed for 3,878 yards and 25 touchdowns last year for the New Orleans Saints. He passed for 3,900 or more yards six times in his nine seasons with the Raiders. He also passed for 217 touchdowns as a Raider.

But the Raiders didn’t want to pay him after the 2022 season. Carr signed a four-year, $150 million deal that runs through the 2026 season with the Saints.

Carr, though, was always blamed for all that ailed the Raiders throughout his time in Silver and Black. But while he might not have been George Blanda, Daryle Lamonica, Jim Plunkett, Rich Gannon, Kenny Stabler or even Jeff George on his good days, he also was not JaMarcus Russell or, yes, Gardner Minshew.

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Who will become the first major league baseball manager fired this season? It would be easy to suggest Bud Black (Colorado), Mark Kotsay (Oakland), Pedro Grifol (Chicago White Sox), Dave Martinez (Washington) or Derek Shelton (Pittsburgh) for that honor. But those organizations aren’t really trying to win, so what would be the point of firing the manager?

The list of serious candidates, therefore, to become the first to get fired probably includes Oliver Marmol (St. Louis), John Schneider (Toronto) and David Bell (Cincinnati).

Marmol had a good year in his first year with the Cardinals, going 93-69 and making the playoffs in 2022, but he fell to 71-91 last year and this year he’s at 21-26.

Schneider and Bell seem to be on more stable ground. Schneider was 46-28 after getting the Jays job during the 2022 season and was 89-73 last year before dropping to 21-25 this year. He really shouldn’t even be in the conversation to get fired. The Jays, who tried to sign Shohei Ohtani this past winter, will probably trade off valuable pieces before dumping Schneider.

Bell is in his sixth year with the Reds after finishing third in three of his first five years. His Reds are just 19-28 this year but he’ll likely have at least this entire season to start winning before his manager’s seat gets real hot.

The choice here to get fired first is Marmol. Cardinal fans aren’t used to losing.

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The Raiders, despite the less-than-exciting choices at quarterback, might be looking at a nine or 10-win season if things fall into place.

The first six games include winnable contests against the Chargers, Panthers, Browns, Broncos and Steelers. The last seven games include winnable games against the Broncos, Bucs, Falcons, Jaguars, Saints and Chargers.

We won’t talk about a mid-season run against the Rams, Chiefs, Bengals and Dolphins that will test young coach Antonio Pierce’s patience.

Pierce might find himself in the playoffs by season’s end if he finds a competent quarterback.

The goal for the San Francisco 49ers, of course, is always to win the Super Bowl. But that window might have closed last February, and we might be looking at a season in which the Raiders actually win more games than the 49ers.

Stop laughing.

The 49ers have a much tougher schedule than the Raiders this year, with two games against the Rams and Seahawks as well as non-divisional foes Minnesota, Kansas City, Dallas, Green Bay, Buffalo, Miami, Detroit and a Chicago team that should be much improved. The Niners also have to take on Aaron Rodgers and the New York Jets to open the season.

If the 49ers are not at least 4-2 to start the year after playing the Jets, Vikings, Rams, Patriots, Cardinals and Seahawks, they might even miss the playoffs.