At 7:52 on Saturday night, approximately one hour after the Bearcats disappointing performance at Tennessee, linebacker JK Schaffer sent out the following tweet to his 812 followers:

@Schaff37 JK Schaffer

Don't give up on us

On Tuesday, I asked the senior linebacker if he is concerned about people writing-off the Bearcats just two weeks into the season.

"Fans were pretty excited about that game, and some people might fall off a bit after seeing us lose to Tennessee," said Schaffer.  "But that was my point.  Don't give up on us because we're going to get things corrected and be a good football team."

You're entitled to be skeptical after seeing Tennessee quarterback Tyler Bray go 34-for-41 for 405 yards and 4 touchdowns against the Bearcats.  Using the NFL formula, that's a quarterback rating of 140.3

But after watching Tom Brady pass for 511 yards against Miami on Monday Night Football, and reading that a record 14 NFL quarterbacks passed for more than 300 yards on opening weekend, it is obvious that defending the pass at all levels - high school, college, and pro - is becoming increasingly difficult.

"With the new spread, high-tempo offenses, it's harder than back when they were running 21 personnel (2 backs, 2 receivers, 1 tight end), I-formation all game," said safety Wesley Richardson.  "There are a lot of things that go into it, between pass rush, linebackers in coverage, and obviously the defensive backs.  But when we give up 400-plus yards passing, we take that on our shoulders, so it was definitely a wake-up call.  We need to get in gear and get this corrected right now, and that's what we intend to do."

"Tennessee is definitely a good football team," said Schaffer.  "They have a good quarterback, NFL-type wide receivers, and an NFL-type offensive line, but when you look back at the game, we made a lot of mistakes.  That's what makes me sick.  We know that if we don't make those mistakes, we're in the ballgame."

So while Schaffer is asking you not to give up on the Bearcats, it's clear that the Bearcats have not given up on themselves.

"It didn't dent us and we're not going to let it affect us for the rest of the year," said Richardson.  "We're not going to let Tennessee beat us more than once.  We're past Tennessee, we're upbeat, and we're ready for Akron."

"We have to forget about it, but learn from it at the same time," said Schaffer.  "How we played on Saturday is not who we are.  We're not going to play any more games like that."

I'd love to hear from you.  The address is dhoard@pawsox.com.

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Speaking of young Sam, here's a recent photo.