Jewel headed to...

tm3308 said:
Yeah, a 600-yard back (Coker) is WAY better than a 400-yard back (both true freshman) :rolleyes:

Seriously (not aiming this directly at you, Mike), over-hyped/overrated don't apply to Hampton. He really could have been that good, and injuries prevented that from happening (not at all unlike what happened to Jermelle Lewis). That doesn't mean he was overrated. That kind of term applies when a guy had all the opportunities in the world and never lived up to the hype.
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Coker doesn't have near the hype that Hampton had. Hampton was a good running back but sitting out that year just allowed the hype to build and build. People were expecting him to just come out and rush for 150 yards every game.

Hampton rushed for 400 yards in mop up duty, he never did anything close to Coker's Insight Bowl performance. It wasn't Hampton's fault but he never had a chance to live up to what everyone thought he would be.
 
HawkeyeMike23 said:
Coker doesn't have near the hype that Hampton had. Hampton was a good running back but sitting out that year just allowed the hype to build and build. People were expecting him to just come out and rush for 150 yards every game.

Hampton rushed for 400 yards in mop up duty, he never did anything close to Coker's Insight Bowl performance. It wasn't Hampton's fault but he never had a chance to live up to what everyone thought he would be.
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Coker has drawn serious comparisons to Shonn Greene. As far as I'm concerned, you can't get a whole lot more hyped than that.

All I'm saying is that it's not fair to him to say he was over-hyped/overrated. Because it's not his fault that he didn't get the opportunity, as you said.
 
tm3308 said:
Coker has drawn serious comparisons to Shonn Greene. As far as I'm concerned, you can't get a whole lot more hyped than that.

All I'm saying is that it's not fair to him to say he was over-hyped/overrated. Because it's not his fault that he didn't get the opportunity, as you said.
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He was still over hyped. It went from, "yeah he looked good filling in for Greene, I'm pretty excited to see him start next year" before his injury to "just watch out, Hampton is the best RB in the B10, once we get him back we'll be unstoppable" after his injury. His expectations increased exponentially during a year where he was just rehabbing his knee, I highly doubt his talent increased that much during that redshirt year. He was mainly a product of Iowa fans optimism, he had done nothing on the field to match the expectacions for him after he returned from his injury.
 
LutherHawk said:
Hampton is the epitome of over-hyped. Doesn't mean he wasn't/could-have-been a great player, but almost all of his yardage in 2008 came against weak competition and/or late in games. He was never the featured back, where he could demonstrate an ability to withstand 20 - 30 carries a game.

However, I hope he does well at Southern Illinois.
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Totally agree. And the majority of his yards were gained during mop-up duty where Shonn Greene had already bulldozed the opposing defense for 3 quarters.
 
Stupid move. Why is he even leaving? Big downgrade for him and for no reason. He didn't need to leave.
 
most of these overhyped/overrated comments about jewel could be used to describe the entire team. for whatever reason the team couldnt live up to its billing just like jewel. both had injuries and rumored problems.
 
Who's to say he will do well in that league? Even if he had three years at Iowa and broke a bunch of records, you still need a good supporting cast. Most importantly an offensive line. I have to imagine there's a ton of really good players in the lower divisions, but don't have the teammates to help. No matter how good you are, you can't do it all.
 
I think Sash will do well at the next level. Will he dominate, can't say but I think he will have a few good years in the NFL.
 
HawkeyeMike23 said:
Most hyped 400 yard rushing back in Iowa history.
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I was wondering who would have the nerve to be first to post this. I agree! I posted earlier on a site all JH's games and who he had yards against. JH may have been a gem, but all is just speculation. There was nothing he did his fresh year that led me to believe he was going to be a great back.
 
HawkeyeMike23 said:
He was still over hyped. It went from, "yeah he looked good filling in for Greene, I'm pretty excited to see him start next year" before his injury to "just watch out, Hampton is the best RB in the B10, once we get him back we'll be unstoppable" after his injury. His expectations increased exponentially during a year where he was just rehabbing his knee, I highly doubt his talent increased that much during that redshirt year. He was mainly a product of Iowa fans optimism, he had done nothing on the field to match the expectacions for him after he returned from his injury.
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Well....there WERE those folks on BTN (DiNardo, Griffith, C-Mart) that said Jewel would lead the Big Ten in rushing when he returned, based on what they saw during the BTN "preview days".

Jewel definitely had the tools. Unfortunately, two messed up ACLs prevented us from seeing what he could do with them as a feature back.

And the question still remains as to whether Jewel would have been as productive as ARob, who had some pretty damn good games last fall.

The bigger question is whether the depth we would have had IF Wegher hadn't turned in to an Oklahama "fan" would have changed anything last season.

I tend to doubt it. Any kid that walks away like that would have to have some shortcomings on the field, IMO. I don't give a crap what his "reason(s)" was(were). He quit on the team.

For all his eventual faults, ARob ALWAYS left 100% on the field. He played through injury. He wasn't expecting to play at OSU in 2009 and yet played a very solid game. He came back from injury to have good games again this past season.

Frankly, Jewel needed a fresh start. The frustration alone would have to play havoc with his mindset if he had stayed. ARob, on the other hand, can still really help the team if he can get back to academic and KF-related good graces.
 
HawkeyeMike23 said:
Coker doesn't have near the hype that Hampton had. Hampton was a good running back but sitting out that year just allowed the hype to build and build. People were expecting him to just come out and rush for 150 yards every game.

Hampton rushed for 400 yards in mop up duty, he never did anything close to Coker's Insight Bowl performance. It wasn't Hampton's fault but he never had a chance to live up to what everyone thought he would be.
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You're being a bit too harsh there.

We'll never know what Hamptom was capable of doing.

What we DO know is that he was already rushing pretty well at the beginning of the season this past year ... and that was even with over a year of rust that he needed to "shake off."

Also, Hampton saw FAR MORE than just "mop up" duty. You apparently do not recall that Greene's conditioning wasn't all that great early in the '08 season. As a result, Ferentz and Co would put Hampton in pretty EARLY in games in order to ensure that Greene would be able to play through the 4th quarter.

Thus, Hampton saw QUALITY rushes against FRESH defenses ... and still managed to pull off pretty respectable production. A particularly impressive feature of Hampton's running was that he had a great nose for finding the endzone. Also, despite being quite a bit smaller than Greene ... he ran A LOT bigger than his given size. He benefitted a lot from getting mentored by Greene and he learned to not run too tentatively.

Of course, could it be said that there were undue expectations heaped upon Hampton? Sure there were. However, I also trust the Iowa coaches ... and they had him slated to start after Greene departed. The implication is that they really liked what he brought to the table. Then, after he returned from his injury ... he was seeing plenty of reps and definitely had the capability of winning the starting job from ARob. Did that happen? No it didn't ... and that was because he got reinjured before it could.

The term "overhyped" has a lot more to do with "unmet expectations" when the player actually has had the opportunities to meet expectations but still fails to do so. That certainly WAS NOT the case with Hampton.

Anyhow, I feel for UNI ... because Hampton is good ... really good.
 
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