Anti-Leach doesn't mean anti-pass

[Hot Rock]

Not anti-Leach. I'm anti-sucking. I'm anti-one dimensional. I'm anti-throwing the ball 60 times against a 3 man rush.

msstate7, how many offensive points have we averaged since LSU?

Leach's offense is the most balanced offense in the league. Your understanding of the subject just makes it clear you have no clue what that means to him. It's your definition of balanced or nothing.

Will State suck tomorrow? Yes, but at some point he will get this team or the next team out executing the opponent. At that point, you will eat crow.

It's not that he needs all new players, he needs all the players on same page at the same time executing to a high level. They cannot do that right now. So, they suck. They suck against Bama and the suck against Vandy. It's not the so called SEC speed that's killing them, it's the poor execution level.

The only way to get better is to keep teaching and working and not listen to the noise.

[bluelightstar]

Leach's offense is the most balanced offense in the league. Your understanding of the subject just makes it clear you have no clue what that means to him. It's your definition of balanced or nothing.

Will State suck tomorrow? Yes, but at some point he will get this team or the next team out executing the opponent. At that point, you will eat crow.

It's not that he needs all new players, he needs all the players on same page at the same time executing to a high level. They cannot do that right now. So, they suck. They suck against Bama and the suck against Vandy. It's not the so called SEC speed that's killing them, it's the poor execution level.

The only way to get better is to keep teaching and working and not listen to the noise.

Huh??

[msstate7]

Huh??

Equally crappy passing as running = balance, maybe?

[FISHDAWG]

Huh??

yeah I know lol .... it's time to quit engaging this guy in discussion

[HoopsDawg]

Leach's offense is the most balanced offense in the league. Your understanding of the subject just makes it clear you have no clue what that means to him. It's your definition of balanced or nothing.

Will State suck tomorrow? Yes, but at some point he will get this team or the next team out executing the opponent. At that point, you will eat crow.

It's not that he needs all new players, he needs all the players on same page at the same time executing to a high level. They cannot do that right now. So, they suck. They suck against Bama and the suck against Vandy. It's not the so called SEC speed that's killing them, it's the poor execution level.

The only way to get better is to keep teaching and working and not listen to the noise.

Ok Crack Rock.

[Hot Rock]

Ok Crack Rock.

Balance is attacking all portions of the field and not run vs pass. Leach's offense can do that as well as any offense out there.

The problem with this team is in the execution level. We truly suck so bad at execution that even Vandy's defense looked good. That's actually encouraging to me. I know he will get this team executing at a higher level within a year or two then State will be competitive for a very long time. Let's see how it plays out... we in now.

[HoopsDawg]

Balance is attacking all portions of the field and not run vs pass. Leach's offense can do that as well as any offense out there.

The problem with this team is in the execution level. We truly suck so bad at execution that even Vandy's defense looked good. That's actually encouraging to me. I know he will get this team executing at a higher level within a year or two then State will be competitive for a very long time. Let's see how it plays out... we in now.

Balance is being able to pass when a team takes away the run, and being able to run when a team takes away the pass.

The only portion of the field Leach can attack vs the 3-8 is the 3 yard checkdown. This isn't 2001, it's not even 2014, teams are comfortable playing 5-6 DB's. The back 7 is much more athletic across the board in college football and especially in the SEC.

[Hot Rock]

Balance is being able to pass when a team takes away the run, and being able to run when a team takes away the pass.

The only portion of the field Leach can attack vs the 3-8 is the 3 yard checkdown. This isn't 2001, it's not even 2014, teams are comfortable playing 5-6 DB's. The back 7 is much more athletic across the board in college football and especially in the SEC.

If you think 3-8 solves this offense you are wrong. It does nothing but expose the pitiful execution of this team.


Balance is being able to attack as much of the field with multiple weapons no matter what they take away. It's about space not running when you can't pass.

Running the ball is much easier to teach. Why did Croom fail? It wasn't his offense, the West Coast offense works great for Joe Montana and lots of teams use it effectively but Croom couldn't teach it to college players well enough for them to get the execution level required. Leach can and has taught his offense effectively but never without a spring or even summer workouts. No way this year should be used to judge whether or not it can work. It won't take all new players either, a lot of the guys we have on the roster now will still be here when things start to turn around. They just have to execute it better.

I will bookmark this thread and you guys will see it one day pop up with me calling you out.

[RezDog7]

Yep, that's working well Hot Rock. Not to mention it's the most boring brand of football I have seen in 40+ years of watching football.

I bet you didn't think the LSU game was boring.

[RezDog7]

Equally crappy passing as running = balance, maybe?

No, spreading the ball out to 10 different players is balance instead of letting Fitz and Dak run up the middle every other play.

[HoopsDawg]

I bet you didn't think the LSU game was boring.

I didn't. And we won't see that defense again until Leach is either fired or adapts his scheme.

[RezDog7]

I didn't. And we won't see that defense again until Leach is either fired or adapts his scheme.

Like that time we played Vanderbilt?

[HoopsDawg]

Like that time we played Vanderbilt?

What adjustments were made against Vandy? We had 200 yards of offense.

[Percho]

Pruning removes dead and dying branches and stubs, allowing room for new growth and protecting your property and passerby from damage. It also deters pest and animal infestation and promotes the plant's natural shape and healthy growth.

Chopping off instead of kicking off?

[the_real_MSU_is_us]

You make some fair points, but I feel like there's this underlying sentiment by many, and I see it in your post, that it would have been easy just to plug any Tom, Dick or Harry in at coach and do what Dan Mullen did. Not only what Dan did, but I what he did in 2014 or at least 2015 & 2017.

1) We just weren't set up to sustain that level of success based on personnel. Yes, for 2018 and especially on defense, and that's a failing of Moorhead's, but there were some holes in the roster that are coming home to roost. There's a great T&L podcast episode from a week or two back that breaks down the last few recruiting classes and it's a mess.

2) Dan was/is a damn good coach. Yes, he lost some focus and drive with us towards the end, but what he did at his peak isn't easily replicated. He's a top coach and we were fortunate to scoop him up on the rise. Hiring a head coach in the SEC is hard, especially at State. We just don't have the ability to pick whoever we want. It's not poor ol missippi state, it's just the truth. You make a bad hire in Moorhead and a program like ours gets in a hole in a hurry. Mike Leach is a proven winner at the P5 level and has always done so with inferior talent relative to his opponents in his conference. That's exactly what we're facing, so it makes sense to get someone with that resume. You could try and land another up and comer like Dan, but the failure rate on that approach is higher than the success rate. The obvious guys have "better" options than State.

All that to say, maybe we didn't have to take on THIS transition, but I think some of what we're seeing would have happened with any coach just based on what was being taken over. We could be MORE successful on offense, but how much more? Enough to win one more game maybe? The hope obviously is that the medium/long term success will outweigh the short term sacrifice. We'll see.

Those holes are arguably more home to roost now than then. Every teams 2 deep should be a mostly Sr/rJr or Jr rSo players, with a few experienced but non NFL caliber rSr thrown in there with the few true studs of the younger classes. But mostly it should be older guys.

So lets look at those 3 classes:

RSr is a good group of experienced, non NFL caliber guys. Spencer, Kobe Jones, Parker, Eiland, Osirus Mitchell. The trench guys are really critical contributors for us, the other 2...

Sr/rJr has Kylin (headcase that's no longer on the team but I included him because he did play some this year), Odom, and Austin Williams. That's absolutely PATHETIC to only have 2 guys of a 4th year class be in the 2 deep.

Jr/rSo class has actual talent. Dolla Bill, marcus Murphy, Cole Smith, Crumedy, Brule, Watson, Furdge... but some guys that aren't very god yet (Preson) are forced to play due to the upper 2 classes being so bad.

The rest of the players are young. OL specifically (our worst position group) is coincidentally the position group that is the hardest for young guys to play at. it takes about 3 years to even hope of being ready to play, with many well remembered players needing till year 4 to reach their potential.

So of course we suck. We've got guys that should ride the bench a year playing in the 2 deep. We've pressed almost the whole team up a year from their natural development

[CaptainObvious]

This is one of the more annoying, bothersome critiques from the pro-Leach crowd. Just because I'm not a fan of Leach (never have been) doesn't mean I want to run the wish bone or triple option. It just means that I think there are better (pass happy) options that would fit our university and demographics better. Yet there are several people who act as if Leach invented the passing game and his is the only sure fire way to go.

We also have to figure out what our goals are as a football program. When we hired Leach it was all about Cohen attempting to take us to another level that Mullen couldn't; to be able to beat the top level teams by throwing it more. Now the goalposts have been moved to we need to transition to a more modern day offense...pass heavy, throwing it all over the field. And now here we are rebuilding our football program after nuking it from the ground up, just to get back to where Dan had it. And for what, just to pass more? You're telling me the only way to transition into a more modern style offense was to blow up the program?

I get there were some locker room problems as well but you don't always have to cut off all your limbs because you have a hangnail.

You gave an opinion.

Mike Leach is our current Head Coach.

He isn?t going to change his philosophy.

State is not firing him 6 or 7 games into season 1.

State is not firing him at the end of season 1.

So without platitudes and ?personal opinions?, with all of the above as fact, what do you suggest should happen?

[RiverCityDawg]

What adjustments were made against Vandy? We had 200 yards of offense.

We went almost exclusively quick game, used more 12 personnel, and we added that toss/pass that worked several times against the 3 man front. We scored 17 points in the first three possessions.

Problem was it forced them to get out of the rush 3 drop 8 and they started bringing more guys and changing up the coverage, still zone but different than the 8 man coverage they had been doing and what Arkansas/UK did. Our freshman QB and inexperienced OL couldn't pick it up or block it, and yes coach didn't do a good job of adjusting again and we got nothing from then on.