thf24
09-25-2016, 11:28 AM
-Myles needs a permanent spot on the bench. Hate to say it because he's a legacy and a good Dawg, but he's an absolutely liability. He simply can't catch the ball with anything approaching consistency. He would have a place in the run game out of the slot, but we've got other guys there (Dear, Mixon) just as good or better in that regard who can also catch the ball down the field.
-Smokey is getting better. He still got picked on in coverage at times, but he had multiple huge plays that arguably saved the game for us. If he continues to improve, he could have a big senior year next year.
-Shump needs more carries. His ceiling is what it is, but he's figured out how to make the most of his strengths, and he's playing angry like he's got something to prove. That's going to translate into being serviceable enough to open Fitz up, which is what our offense has to revolve around this year.
-Main point: we are poorly coached. No way around it. Poor tackling. Poor awareness (defenders running past the ballcarrier). Confusion in lining up, even after a timeout. Brainless dead ball penalties. Failure to utilize our best talent. OL lost to start the game. Garbage pass coverage philosophy. I feel like it mostly stems from Mullen's stubborn, hubristic belief that a) his system is so good that it will succeed with perfect execution, regardless of personnel or talent, and b) perfect execution is a reasonable expectation. I firmly believe at this point that Mullen plays older guys not just for the hell of it, but that the youngsters truly aren't ready to play due to his needlessly over-complicated system and possibly sub-par position coaching. Look at Freeze and Malzahn's offenses; they're explosive with a decent QB, yet they only consist of a handful of plays with minor variations on each. As a result, their top talent is on the field at each position, regardless of age or time in the system. It doesn't take RB's three years to get on the field. Simplifying his system to utilize his best talent is a change that Mullen is going to have to make if he wants heightened success in the future, whether here or somewhere else, because limiting your available players to juniors, seniors, and the remaining handful who can grasp the offense sooner than that is severely limiting your odds of fielding a good team.
More disturbing than that though is the undeniable fact that Mullen and staff are unable to motivate a team without strong leaders to do it for them. A clear trend has been established that we do not get up for the perceived easy wins. We came out asleep and uninterested against our first two gimmes this year, and it resulted in a loss and an ugly scare. Even worse is that we aren't always up for the games that should be easy to get up for. This one has me pretty discouraged, because I don't feel like this is a light bulb thing that Mullen can wake up to and improve like a lot of our other issues.
-Smokey is getting better. He still got picked on in coverage at times, but he had multiple huge plays that arguably saved the game for us. If he continues to improve, he could have a big senior year next year.
-Shump needs more carries. His ceiling is what it is, but he's figured out how to make the most of his strengths, and he's playing angry like he's got something to prove. That's going to translate into being serviceable enough to open Fitz up, which is what our offense has to revolve around this year.
-Main point: we are poorly coached. No way around it. Poor tackling. Poor awareness (defenders running past the ballcarrier). Confusion in lining up, even after a timeout. Brainless dead ball penalties. Failure to utilize our best talent. OL lost to start the game. Garbage pass coverage philosophy. I feel like it mostly stems from Mullen's stubborn, hubristic belief that a) his system is so good that it will succeed with perfect execution, regardless of personnel or talent, and b) perfect execution is a reasonable expectation. I firmly believe at this point that Mullen plays older guys not just for the hell of it, but that the youngsters truly aren't ready to play due to his needlessly over-complicated system and possibly sub-par position coaching. Look at Freeze and Malzahn's offenses; they're explosive with a decent QB, yet they only consist of a handful of plays with minor variations on each. As a result, their top talent is on the field at each position, regardless of age or time in the system. It doesn't take RB's three years to get on the field. Simplifying his system to utilize his best talent is a change that Mullen is going to have to make if he wants heightened success in the future, whether here or somewhere else, because limiting your available players to juniors, seniors, and the remaining handful who can grasp the offense sooner than that is severely limiting your odds of fielding a good team.
More disturbing than that though is the undeniable fact that Mullen and staff are unable to motivate a team without strong leaders to do it for them. A clear trend has been established that we do not get up for the perceived easy wins. We came out asleep and uninterested against our first two gimmes this year, and it resulted in a loss and an ugly scare. Even worse is that we aren't always up for the games that should be easy to get up for. This one has me pretty discouraged, because I don't feel like this is a light bulb thing that Mullen can wake up to and improve like a lot of our other issues.