Les advising Dan on what to run- you got to remember- there are 4 people on the headset- not just Les and Dan.
I don't know if it's improved offense, but firing him allowed us to hire Brian Johnson. From all indications he is one hell of a coach and recruiter with ties to Louisiana.
And who the receivers were, and who the main running back was. Dark is obviously the biggest change, but we got better pretty much across the board. Our offensive play calling is obviously going to be better with a running threat at qb, but a large prt of the reason we couldn't adjust with Russell was thy we didn't really have any of the other pieces either.
Les ran the offense Dan put in place. The offense works with the right players in the right positions. It does not work well with a pro style qb. Way to many people posting as experts who just like to throw rocks at glass houses. Les is a great coach and a wonderful human being.
Here it is. Last year was our best QB, best WR group, and best OL under Mullen. And probably our best read option RB since Dixon. Plus our best defense. Everything came together last year. I doubt Les had a lot to do with it. But you put Tyler back there, and we weren't going 10-3.
First the remarks about Tyler Russell are way off the mark. I'm never surprised by the masses thinking that the "failure" of that season is on him. That's the most absurd thing I have ever heard. Just like the 8-0 run when we lost to Bama. All of the sudden "Tyler can't throw"... "his passes were off". Never a consideration to an issue we had.. lack of a run game by the RBs. When a DL can stop your run with a 3 man front... your QB is not the issue. At no point has an SEC been consistently successful without a viable run game.
You could have put DAK (and we did btw) behind that OL without a run game and he would have had no better results.
The success of last season is exactly what PMDawg stated. Credit that to Mullen red shirting players and building them while recruiting ready to play guys. It gave us depth that we lacked. The OL was seasoned and when that happens, younger players get to see how that position is played within this system.
To the question.... I believe it helped. To many chiefs.
Nm