OC Hired - App State OC Kevin Barbay

[BlackSailsDawg]

There are a ton of candidates out there that ran some version of the air raid that I'm sure were qualified. Just go look at some of the names mentioned on this board the last few weeks but I'm sure they were all less qualified, rolls eyes. We'll see what transpires and maybe he will adapt but we'll find out in a few weeks I guess.

The more and more comes out, the more it looks like you are right.

[Coach34]

In Year 1 we dont need All-SEC types at TE. Just bring in a couple guys that are physical. Then recruit better players there. We can still go alot of 3 wide

[BlackSailsDawg]

This was not a panic hire. I'm almost sure he was the second OC offered. Sounds like it was a well ran process with several interviews & Barbary really impressed them.

Here are the words of APP St:

Mississippi State called Kevin Barbay yesterday afternoon, he interviewed last night, and he took the job this morning.

That's not a well ran process.

[Coach34]

Here are the words of APP St:

Mississippi State called Kevin Barbay yesterday afternoon, he interviewed last night, and he took the job this morning.

That's not a well ran process.

Translated:

Arnett has been interviewing people and nobody really impressed him. Barbay interviewed and Arnett knew he had found his guy.

[Cooterpoot]

Thomas is trolling y'all

[Really Clark?]

We interviewed multiple candidates but none, outside of Briles last week, were offered the job. The coaches spent a lot of time on this and knew what they were looking for. When they interviewed Barbay they knew within 15 minutes he was the guy. He fits. In personality and in philosophy with what ZA wanted. This was NOT a rushed hire or a panic hire. He was the guy and ZA knew it almost immediately. If it works, time will tell but this was as a very well thought out search.

Look at all the guys we know he targeted / discussed the job with, Briles, Littrell, Kittley, Johns, Cramsey, Candle, Nagle, and Barbay. What is a common thread among most of. If not all of those candidates. Their offensive output analytics are some of the top of the profession. ZA is smart and most definitely had a well thought out plan of what and who he was looking for.

[Todd4State]

Translated:

Arnett has been interviewing people and nobody really impressed him. Barbay interviewed and Arnett knew he had found his guy.

Or that we were turned down multiple times.

[662dawg]

Here are the words of APP St:

Mississippi State called Kevin Barbay yesterday afternoon, he interviewed last night, and he took the job this morning.

That's not a well ran process.

He was interviewed at the convention. Now he may have had a second interview last night & then offered, that I don't know. But word on the screet is he WAS interviewed in Charlotte.

[Todd4State]

We interviewed multiple candidates but none, outside of Briles last week, were offered the job. The coaches spent a lot of time on this and knew what they were looking for. When they interviewed Barbay they knew within 15 minutes he was the guy. He fits. In personality and in philosophy with what ZA wanted. This was NOT a rushed hire or a panic hire. He was the guy and ZA knew it almost immediately. If it works, time will tell but this was as a very well thought out search.

Look at all the guys we know he targeted / discussed the job with, Briles, Littrell, Kittley, Johns, Cramsey, Candle, Nagle, and Barbay. What is a common thread among most of. If not all of those candidates. Their offensive output analytics are some of the top of the profession. ZA is smart and most definitely had a well thought out plan of what and who he was looking for.

So we're going off of Dave Bartoo's matrix to hire our offensive coordinator?

Comforting.**

The only guy that remotely fits our personnel on that list is Kittley.

Play calling is important- but having players that fit is perhaps even more important. For example- Dan Mullen as a play caller with Dak had better numbers than Dan Mullen with Tyson Lee and Chris Relf.

That's going to be a HUGE issue for us next year unless Barbay can actually adjust his scheme to his talent. Which in my experience watching football pretty much never happens. And when someone actually does try to adjust their personnel to the scheme it never maximizes the production because those players are put in positions where they aren't maximized so it's essentially a waste of talent.

Again- MSU fans falling for the "we can outscheme them" trap while grossly undervaluing the importance of players and their actual skill sets.

[DownwardDawg]

Here are the words of APP St:

Mississippi State called Kevin Barbay yesterday afternoon, he interviewed last night, and he took the job this morning.

That's not a well ran process.

There's NO WAY you are not a troll at this point. No way.
Well done. You've ruffled a couple of folk's feathers.

[DEDawg]

This is not true. This offense will actually fit Will really well. It doesn't require the QB to run or even be that mobile at all. Granted we all wish Will was way more mobile, he can still run this offense really well.

Ehhh my only concern is will on deep play action. I am cautiously optimistic but would feel better if he had a little better arm. I am envisioning lame ducks floating

[662dawg]

So we're going off of Dave Bartoo's matrix to hire our offensive coordinator?

Comforting.**

The only guy that remotely fits our personnel on that list is Kittley.

Play calling is important- but having players that fit is perhaps even more important. For example- Dan Mullen as a play caller with Dak had better numbers than Dan Mullen with Tyson Lee and Chris Relf.

That's going to be a HUGE issue for us next year unless Barbay can actually adjust his scheme to his talent. Which in my experience watching football pretty much never happens. And when someone actually does try to adjust their personnel to the scheme it never maximizes the production because those players are put in positions where they aren't maximized so it's essentially a waste of talent.

Again- MSU fans falling for the "we can outscheme them" trap while grossly undervaluing the importance of players and their actual skill sets.

Kittley ran the ball 40 times per game this year including 48 times against Ole Miss. He adapts well, just like Barbay.

[SPMT]

So we're going off of Dave Bartoo's matrix to hire our offensive coordinator?

Comforting.**

The only guy that remotely fits our personnel on that list is Kittley.

Play calling is important- but having players that fit is perhaps even more important. For example- Dan Mullen as a play caller with Dak had better numbers than Dan Mullen with Tyson Lee and Chris Relf.

That's going to be a HUGE issue for us next year unless Barbay can actually adjust his scheme to his talent. Which in my experience watching football pretty much never happens. And when someone actually does try to adjust their personnel to the scheme it never maximizes the production because those players are put in positions where they aren't maximized so it's essentially a waste of talent.

Again- MSU fans falling for the "we can outscheme them" trap while grossly undervaluing the importance of players and their actual skill sets.

Mullen, was very good at that. Relf offense was not like Russell offense.

[Really Clark?]

So we're going off of Dave Bartoo's matrix to hire our offensive coordinator?

Comforting.**

The only guy that remotely fits our personnel on that list is Kittley.

Play calling is important- but having players that fit is perhaps even more important. For example- Dan Mullen as a play caller with Dak had better numbers than Dan Mullen with Tyson Lee and Chris Relf.

That's going to be a HUGE issue for us next year unless Barbay can actually adjust his scheme to his talent. Which in my experience watching football pretty much never happens. And when someone actually does try to adjust their personnel to the scheme it never maximizes the production because those players are put in positions where they aren't maximized so it's essentially a waste of talent.

Again- MSU fans falling for the "we can outscheme them" trap while grossly undervaluing the importance of players and their actual skill sets.

Please show where in my post I said anything about just out scheming our opponents and undervaluing the importance of players.

You know as well as anyone the importance of analytics. Some look at it harder than others, sure. But it's foolish to completely disregard it. I know you wouldn't care if it was an air raid guy that Barton liked and we hired. Because Kittley is right on that list, that leaves him out in your opinion then, right?

Barbay can and has run offense not predicated on a running QB. We don't have that so that fits. He is creative in getting the ball in the hands of his playmakers. We have several of those, so that fits. Tulu, Marks, Price, etc. can absolutely eat with his offense. Another check. His OL scheme fits our players. That fits. So what if he is not air raid, we have players that absolutely work under his scheme. We need TE's and QB, for sure. Guess what, we would have needed that with Kittley as well. I know it's Air Raid or nothing with you for some reason but that's not the only offense can adapt for players and skill set.

[Todd4State]

Kittley ran the ball 40 times per game this year including 48 times against Ole Miss. He adapts well, just like Barbay.

The biggest thing with Kittley is he typically runs more tempo. That means more plays- which means more opportunities to run or pass.

[Todd4State]

Mullen, was very good at that. Relf offense was not like Russell offense.

And then there is Brandon Holloway.

[Coach34]

And then there is Brandon Holloway.

Which was a top 10 offense in school history

[Todd4State]

Please show where in my post I said anything about just out scheming our opponents and undervaluing the importance of players.

You know as well as anyone the importance of analytics. Some look at it harder than others, sure. But it's foolish to completely disregard it. I know you wouldn't care if it was an air raid guy that Barton liked and we hired. Because Kittley is right on that list, that leaves him out in your opinion then, right?

Barbay can and has run offense not predicated on a running QB. We don't have that so that fits. He is creative in getting the ball in the hands of his playmakers. We have several of those, so that fits. Tulu, Marks, Price, etc. can absolutely eat with his offense. Another check. His OL scheme fits our players. That fits. So what if he is not air raid, we have players that absolutely work under his scheme. We need TE's and QB, for sure. Guess what, we would have needed that with Kittley as well. I know it's Air Raid or nothing with you for some reason but that's not the only offense can adapt for players and skill set.

I was making more of an "in general" statement about the MSU fanbase than a personal statement directed at you. You just happened to have the misfortune of having the post I responded to.

Analytics is important- but much like baseball it also requires context. It's not simply as black and white as "hire this guy and it will work no matter who your players are". Which is on the surface what it appears Arnett has done. I mean I've seen football analytics that says you are better off passing on every down except for third and 1. Doesn't mean that we should do that.

The reality about scheme is all of these coordinators can draw up something that works. The players have to make it work. This dude uses a H-Back a lot- and multiple ones. We're just assuming Antonio Harmon is OK doing that. Our fans are just assuming Woody can make it through the season and he is injury prone. What WR is going to consistently catch those deep balls? We're not going to magically get more consistent there because it's man coverage and we're running the ball more or whatever false football bravado some of our fans come up with. We're going to be asking our offensive line to do stuff that they haven't done a lot of three year but hey it will work because they're offensive linemen and they like this! What kind of analytical logic is any of that? This is absolutely going to be a big transition for our players. I mean at one time we were talking ourselves into Joe Moorhead's scheme being seamlessly translated too.

The biggest reason I want to run the Air Raid is because that would be the easiest transition for our players who are mostly veteran players. I don't really care what the run pass ratio is within that Air Raid framework. And by the way I think Kittley would have been able to build on what we were doing in a big way because of our players familiarity with a lot of the scheme. Running the Air Raid gives us the best chance to have a highly successful year next year of 9-10 wins during the regular season. That's what this is about for me.

[Todd4State]

Which was a top 10 offense in school history

Yeah. Because of Dak.

[Really Clark?]

I was making more of an "in general" statement about the MSU fanbase than a personal statement directed at you. You just happened to have the misfortune of having the post I responded to.

Analytics is important- but much like baseball it also requires context. It's not simply as black and white as "hire this guy and it will work no matter who your players are". Which is on the surface what it appears Arnett has done. I mean I've seen football analytics that says you are better off passing on every down except for third and 1. Doesn't mean that we should do that.

The reality about scheme is all of these coordinators can draw up something that works. The players have to make it work. This dude uses a H-Back a lot- and multiple ones. We're just assuming Antonio Harmon is OK doing that. Our fans are just assuming Woody can make it through the season and he is injury prone. What WR is going to consistently catch those deep balls? We're not going to magically get more consistent there because it's man coverage and we're running the ball more or whatever false football bravado some of our fans come up with. We're going to be asking our offensive line to do stuff that they haven't done a lot of three year but hey it will work because they're offensive linemen and they like this! What kind of analytical logic is any of that? This is absolutely going to be a big transition for our players. I mean at one time we were talking ourselves into Joe Moorhead's scheme being seamlessly translated too.

The biggest reason I want to run the Air Raid is because that would be the easiest transition for our players who are mostly veteran players. I don't really care what the run pass ratio is within that Air Raid framework. And by the way I think Kittley would have been able to build on what we were doing in a big way because of our players familiarity with a lot of the scheme. Running the Air Raid gives us the best chance to have a highly successful year next year of 9-10 wins during the regular season. That's what this is about for me.

I just think the assumption that our players are too deficient mentally and / or physically to run this offense is a big stretch.

I had no problem with Kittley but he wasn't coming and never was. Bringing him up doesn't do anything for your argument. He is a non-entity in our OC search once he let us know he wasn't interested.

So the question is where do you go from there? You gauge the interest of who fits what you want and you can legitimately hire. When you strip away the ones who are not interested you get the best guy you can. Air Raid is irrelevant at that point. And honestly the candidates left who would consider being OC for us and run Air Raid, were not available. Hatcher wasn't coming, we didn't contact him and he didn't contact us because he is not giving up running a program. Harrell was already under contract elsewhere. Arbuckle, you cannot consider him at this point. He was an assistant in HS just 2 years ago, a quality analysis in 2021 and 1 year as OC following Kittley and with Helton making sure of the game plan. Way too risky. He may be great but you cannot take that risk. So who?