Two games in, Texas coach Charlie Strong has suspended or dismissed 11 players.

You’ve heard the snark: He’s getting down to the 53-man roster limit.

Two games in, Strong has lost his starting quarterback, center and may be missing a key receiver Saturday against UCLA. He has only eight offensive linemen available -- with 10 career starts to their credit. A month ago two of them were playing defense.

Two games in, Texas’ coach remains in the process of shaping the Longhorns in his image. You know, the one that produced 37 victories in four years and a Sugar Bowl win at Louisville.

Two games in, a cynic could call the season a wash. Come back fresh next year. The 41-7 loss to BYU was the worst at home since 1997. There’s a symmetry there. That game 17 years ago was the infamous Rout 66 against UCLA (66-3) that ushered John Mackovic out the door.

Recall, again, who the Horns play this week?

But two games in, Strong also doesn’t need anyone telling him how to do his job. Except that’s part of the job at Texas.

That was a UT truth before Strong arrived, before his first season sputtered to a depressing 1-1 start.

Before Red McCombs returned my call this week.

The 86-year old former owner of the Spurs, Vikings and Nuggets still holds significant power at a place that traffics daily in it. There’s a statue of him inside the stadium. His name is on the business school. McCombs reportedly has donated more than $100 million to the school, has a reported net worth of about $1.5 billion.

Who is going to tell him no regarding … anything Texas? He’s the guy who ripped the Strong hire, then apologized. He’s the guy who was also an honorary captain at the season opener.

Now?

“Expectations have been lowered by the results of our first two games,” McCombs said. “I don’t think our expectations are going to get much lower than what they are now. I think our move is going to be up.”

McCombs spoke to a group of boosters Saturday and was asked what impressed him most about the Horns Saturday.

“The fact that three of the guys sweated enough to have to take a shower after the game,” he said. “The players and the coaches wouldn’t want to hear that. They knew that was a joke.”

We’re not saying this follows any logical, linear form. It is merely Week 3 of 2014 in Austin. It must be endured. Mack Brown was everybody’s friend until he didn’t win enough games. In the state, Texas A&M has assimilated nicely into the SEC. Baylor won the Big 12 (beating Texas to do it). Rival Oklahoma is coming off an Alabama win in the Sugar Bowl and is ranked in the top four.

Strong deserves the time and space to reshape the Horns, to toughen them up -- to win. From this perspective, he has and he will.

Strong has a track record. Perhaps the biggest criticism of Texas football is its alleged country club atmosphere. Perhaps it is ridiculously early to be talking about any of this.

It’s also fair to the take the temperature of a program that has the largest budget in the country. McCombs is one [rich] man with one [significant] thermometer.

Hey, Strong was the guy who told us the Horns weren’t going to win the national championship. Honesty has turned into accuracy.

McCombs said he didn’t criticize Strong’s hiring -- although he did say at the time Strong would make “a great position coach.”  Instead it was what McCombs called the school’s “practice and process,” in replacing Brown that bothered him. McCombs says he was told by former Texas president Bill Powers at one point “no big hurry, we’ve got another couple of weeks.”

“[At the time] I was talking to a coach who I think is one of the top five coaches in the nation,” McCombs said. “I think I had him at the five-yard line …”

Whether that was Jon Gruden, a replacement McCombs reportedly courted, is not known. He did say it was not Nick Saban.

“The next day they announced they’d hired Coach Strong. Obviously, something happened … It fell out like I was disappointed in Coach Strong. I was disappointed in the decision being made.”

McCombs has made peace with Strong, says he is a strong supporter. Still, is there that a temptation to write off a season to misfortune and transition?

“You can’t do that,” McCombs said. “You’ve got to improve every day. They’ve got kids to work with. They’ll be getting better. I’m sure that Coach Strong and his staff have been surprised with some of these kids because they thought they’d get more out of them.”

What about optimism?

“It’s always OK -- honest to God -- to be optimistic in Texas. We have the greatest high school football factory in the world …

“Coach Strong’s stronghold was his relationship with Florida high school coaches. Now he’s going to have to develop that background with Texas high school coaches. There’s no reason why he shouldn’t be able to do that …

“Will that take another couple of years? Probably so?”