When watching Leach teams of the past...

[CadaverDawg]

I was watching the WSU vs Auburn game from 2013, and I've looked at some clips from other Leach games in the past, and a few things stuck out to me.

- They moved the ball pretty well on everybody.

It was encouraging to see that Leach moved the ball on everybody, but at times he got too stubborn with the pass when the box was empty. Although this was a theme of his against Washington, I am not too worried about it bc with our experience at OL, our stud at RB, and the brain of our QB..I see Leach and Costello being smart enough to see an advantage in the defensive alignment and capitalize on it. When you have a line like ours and a RB like Hill, you can turn a handoff vs a 3 man front into a homerun just as easily as you can a pass vs cover 0.

- When the QB threw picks, it was USUALLY when the QB clearly made up his mind before the snap as to where he was going with the ball.

Again, I'm leaning on our QB's brain on this one, but I think KJ will have to make sure he's making a read before throwing, bc SEC defenses are smart and fast as hell, so they can make you look foolish if you aren't making smart decisions.

- Leach didn't seem to have very good OL's, but still made it work..... Which peaks my interest.

Two things with this. Our OL should, SHOULD, be too good for people to totally abandon the box. Therefore it could open things up tremendously for the run as I said above. So in my opinion it is imperative that in the first two seasons Leach lean a little more than normal on the ground game, bc he wants to show OL recruits that they can excel at State. A true upper half of the SEC OL should give Leach more options than he's ever had, so take advantage and sell it early to offensive linemen. We might see a whole new version of Leach's offense bc he has never had a group of big uglies like he's going to have this year. I'm Interested to see what he does with it.

- Rhythm was key

When his offenses get rolling they are very tough to stop. Penalties and drops seemed to be the biggest derailments to the air raid. Catch the ball when it hits your hands, No false starts. I'll be looking at that early and often.

- His Running Backs had a TON of space

I get wooly as heck seeing how wide some of the running lanes his running backs had. He never had a talent like Hill, so we should see him in space a lot, which in the words of Boobie D should be "Fun, Fun, Fun"


Ultimately I'm a little skeptical as to how this system will work in the SEC...but Leach has definitely made it work pretty much everywhere else and he will have some talent to work with. It has been said a million times among our fan base, but I am most concerned about the defense and Leach's willingness to utilize the run game when we have the numbers in our favor. He's proven the passing game will at least be competent, and should improve each year...but how will he adapt to SEC speed on defense and can he run the ball more when the numbers are there? We will see. Nothing leads to blowouts like quick three and outs and a weak and exhausted defense, and that's my major fear. But I'm going into this first year with optimism and excitement for the following reasons...

1) It ain't Joe Mo
2) The air raid should be fun
3) It ain't Joe Mo
4) Why not be optimistic? 2020 is a mess, yet we have football next week when I thought we may not play this year.

Sorry for the long post, but I'd love to hear y'all's thoughts.

Hail State

PS: Are we not doing "Who's Your Dawg?" this year?

[BeardoMSU]

Word.

[CadaverDawg]

Word.

[Todd4State]

I think the big difference and what I think explains the interceptions and lack of running at times is Leach's offense is VERY QB centered where most of the time the QB is making the play call. Leach will call in a formation and he will "suggest" a play but he expects the QB the change it to something that he thinks will work best. His view is the QB has the best view of what is going on the field and so he trusts him to call the right play. Most of our recent coaches on offense were the ones calling the plays and had their fingers on the offense more or less.

I would imagine that if you have your QB calling the plays- guess what they're probably going to call the majority of the time? Probably some kind of pass I would think.

That's also why Leach typically wants a veteran QB although if Rogers is as advanced as they say he is it wouldn't shock me if he is an exception in 2021. Especially since he ran the offense in high school. That has been proven to work at times at the NCAA level- See Art Briles and Kevin Kolb at Houston circa 2009.

I think what's going to be different with Leach at MSU compared to other places is he has a lot more resources at MSU to draw from and I think we may see some different things than what is sterotypical Leach- like we may see him use a H-Back/TE type of receiver in the slot some. Honestly Leach has surprised me already with several things in his tenure at MSU because to be honest I would not have thought that he was a fit for MSU at all. And it looks like he may actually be perfect. Certainly better than Moorhead. Yes, he likes to throw the ball but he's also very disciplined and demands hard work. He understands the importance of S&C. And to me it looks like he is going to recruit better than I anticipated.

[msbulldog]

I was watching the WSU vs Auburn game from 2013, and I've looked at some clips from other Leach games in the past, and a few things stuck out to me.

- They moved the ball pretty well on everybody.

It was encouraging to see that Leach moved the ball on everybody, but at times he got too stubborn with the pass when the box was empty. Although this was a theme of his against Washington, I am not too worried about it bc with our experience at OL, our stud at RB, and the brain of our QB..I see Leach and Costello being smart enough to see an advantage in the defensive alignment and capitalize on it. When you have a line like ours and a RB like Hill, you can turn a handoff vs a 3 man front into a homerun just as easily as you can a pass vs cover 0.

- When the QB threw picks, it was USUALLY when the QB clearly made up his mind before the snap as to where he was going with the ball.

Again, I'm leaning on our QB's brain on this one, but I think KJ will have to make sure he's making a read before throwing, bc SEC defenses are smart and fast as hell, so they can make you look foolish if you aren't making smart decisions.

- Leach didn't seem to have very good OL's, but still made it work..... Which peaks my interest.

Two things with this. Our OL should, SHOULD, be too good for people to totally abandon the box. Therefore it could open things up tremendously for the run as I said above. So in my opinion it is imperative that in the first two seasons Leach lean a little more than normal on the ground game, bc he wants to show OL recruits that they can excel at State. A true upper half of the SEC OL should give Leach more options than he's ever had, so take advantage and sell it early to offensive linemen. We might see a whole new version of Leach's offense bc he has never had a group of big uglies like he's going to have this year. I'm Interested to see what he does with it.

- Rhythm was key

When his offenses get rolling they are very tough to stop. Penalties and drops seemed to be the biggest derailments to the air raid. Catch the ball when it hits your hands, No false starts. I'll be looking at that early and often.

- His Running Backs had a TON of space

I get wooly as heck seeing how wide some of the running lanes his running backs had. He never had a talent like Hill, so we should see him in space a lot, which in the words of Boobie D should be "Fun, Fun, Fun"


Ultimately I'm a little skeptical as to how this system will work in the SEC...but Leach has definitely made it work pretty much everywhere else and he will have some talent to work with. It has been said a million times among our fan base, but I am most concerned about the defense and Leach's willingness to utilize the run game when we have the numbers in our favor. He's proven the passing game will at least be competent, and should improve each year...but how will he adapt to SEC speed on defense and can he run the ball more when the numbers are there? We will see. Nothing leads to blowouts like quick three and outs and a weak and exhausted defense, and that's my major fear. But I'm going into this first year with optimism and excitement for the following reasons...

1) It ain't Joe Mo
2) The air raid should be fun
3) It ain't Joe Mo
4) Why not be optimistic? 2020 is a mess, yet we have football next week when I thought we may not play this year.

Sorry for the long post, but I'd love to hear y'all's thoughts.

Hail State

PS: Are we not doing "Who's Your Dawg?" this year?

Long posts are okay, when they are good. You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to CadaverDawg again.

[ShotgunDawg]

Good stuff C Dav

[MedDawg]

I think the big difference and what I think explains the interceptions and lack of running at times is Leach's offense is VERY QB centered where most of the time the QB is making the play call. Leach will call in a formation and he will "suggest" a play but he expects the QB the change it to something that he thinks will work best. His view is the QB has the best view of what is going on the field and so he trusts him to call the right play. Most of our recent coaches on offense were the ones calling the plays and had their fingers on the offense more or less.

I would imagine that if you have your QB calling the plays- guess what they're probably going to call the majority of the time? Probably some kind of pass I would think.

That's also why Leach typically wants a veteran QB although if Rogers is as advanced as they say he is it wouldn't shock me if he is an exception in 2021. Especially since he ran the offense in high school. That has been proven to work at times at the NCAA level- See Art Briles and Kevin Kolb at Houston circa 2009.

I think what's going to be different with Leach at MSU compared to other places is he has a lot more resources at MSU to draw from and I think we may see some different things than what is sterotypical Leach- like we may see him use a H-Back/TE type of receiver in the slot some. Honestly Leach has surprised me already with several things in his tenure at MSU because to be honest I would not have thought that he was a fit for MSU at all. And it looks like he may actually be perfect. Certainly better than Moorhead. Yes, he likes to throw the ball but he's also very disciplined and demands hard work. He understands the importance of S&C. And to me it looks like he is going to recruit better than I anticipated.

QB usually will call for a pass, unless it's Fitz calling the play.

I imagine Costello will be open to using Kylin Hill as a rusher. That will keep the defense a little off balance and only help Costello find open receivers.

Kylin Hill in open space? Looking forward to that! Even with fast and smart defenders in the SEC, they can't cover two places at once. And it's not like the spread option with little passing, where the D can keep 8 in the box because either the RB or the QB will running with the ball. The defenders will have to cover a lot more area under Leach, and with Kylin Hill possibly rushing, that includes even more area.

[turkish]

Penalties and drops, you say...

[BeardoMSU]

I think we're going to score a ton of points. Our defense may indeed be as atrocious as some fear, but having a decent offense will at least help with that, no? It certainly beats the alternative of having a shitty offense and a shitty defense. We obviously know how awful Joe was, but even Dan's offense wasn't really built to come from behind...I'm struggling to remember a time we overcame more than a 10 point deficit, and all I'm getting is Arkansas in '14 and '15, but I'm inclined to give Dak a bunch of that credit, tbh.

[SheltonChoked]

I think the big difference and what I think explains the interceptions and lack of running at times is Leach's offense is VERY QB centered where most of the time the QB is making the play call. Leach will call in a formation and he will "suggest" a play but he expects the QB the change it to something that he thinks will work best. His view is the QB has the best view of what is going on the field and so he trusts him to call the right play. Most of our recent coaches on offense were the ones calling the plays and had their fingers on the offense more or less.

I would imagine that if you have your QB calling the plays- guess what they're probably going to call the majority of the time? Probably some kind of pass I would think.

That's also why Leach typically wants a veteran QB although if Rogers is as advanced as they say he is it wouldn't shock me if he is an exception in 2021. Especially since he ran the offense in high school. That has been proven to work at times at the NCAA level- See Art Briles and Kevin Kolb at Houston circa 2009.

I think what's going to be different with Leach at MSU compared to other places is he has a lot more resources at MSU to draw from and I think we may see some different things than what is sterotypical Leach- like we may see him use a H-Back/TE type of receiver in the slot some. Honestly Leach has surprised me already with several things in his tenure at MSU because to be honest I would not have thought that he was a fit for MSU at all. And it looks like he may actually be perfect. Certainly better than Moorhead. Yes, he likes to throw the ball but he's also very disciplined and demands hard work. He understands the importance of S&C. And to me it looks like he is going to recruit better than I anticipated.

I watched Wyatt's QB video yesterday. Leach calls or suggests a play, and the QB has 4-6 variations on that play, depending on what the defense shows. That's the real magic of his air raid. It's just a few plays, with some easy options. (I.e. leach calls 4 vert, but the corner is playing 8 yards off, the WR runs a 4 step curl).

If you want to really get wooly, watch this



I expect having KJ, who has played against Power 5 competition, and put up numbers to

[R2Dawg]

I watched Wyatt's QB video yesterday. Leach calls or suggests a play, and the QB has 4-6 variations on that play, depending on what the defense shows. That's the real magic of his air raid. It's just a few plays, with some easy options. (I.e. leach calls 4 vert, but the corner is playing 8 yards off, the WR runs a 4 step curl).

If you want to really get wooly, watch this



I expect having KJ, who has played against Power 5 competition, and put up numbers to

Alright the video and thinking about that with our OL, Hill and Leach is growing me some wool.

[KOdawg1]

Good stuff Cadaver.

And yes, we need to do "Who's your dawg?"