ESPN’s Paul Finebaum has been team Arch Manning for months, so it had to be disappointing to him to watch the guy he said would be the best player in the SEC since Tim Tebow look average on Saturday afternoon.
But credit to Finebaum for taking his medicine Monday morning and admitting he was wrong, at least this week, about Arch Manning.
Finebaum simply called Manning’s first outing “disastrous.”
“It was disastrous,” said Finebaum Monday morning on “Get Up”. He was not ready for the moment, and neither was his coach.”
“I was convinced this moment was not too big.”
Finebaum also lit into Texas head coach Steve Sarkarsian, saying he was outcoached by Ohio State head coach Ryan Day.
Finebaum thought, like many, that the moment wasn’t going to be too big for Manning, but clearly it was. The expectations of a whole team and a season were put on the back of a kid who had to start his season on the road against the defending national champion, which would be a hard task for anyone.
This is the second time in a row that the Longhorns were bullied by the Buckeyes, and the issues that plagued the team when they played last year continued, including a lack of efficiency on the goal line.
Finebaum admitted that it may have been a different outcome had the Longhorns been able to score on a critical 4th down play on the goal line, which was the deciding factor in the ball game. Still, all is not lost for Texas, and Manning and Texas can still make the playoffs.
Yet, despite their opening loss, Finebaum still sees light at the end of the tunnel for the Longhorns.
“I came away optimistic but not what I was expecting,” he said.