RE: Offensive Concerns
I have a slightly different slant.
Some say our offense is too predictable. I say it's more an execution problem. And I would attribute the execution problem largely to the fact that it requires people to execute things that do not fit well within the skill sets of our athletes.
Army's offense is very predictable. At one point late in their game yesterday, they had run the fullback dive 28 times and the quarterback keeper 28 times, pitched to the halfback 5 times, and thrown the ball 4 times--and had scored 43 points. Their athletes are limited by various recruiting restrictions (sound familiar?), but they execute perfectly, and their system that fits the kinds of athletes that they can recruit.
I think our big problem is that the particular style of running that we have chosen--pound the rock--is ill-suited to the types of athletes that we can recruit to play football. That style requires big, strong offensive lineman who can blow defenders off the line of scrimmage and open big holes, powerful running backs, and strong-armed drop-back quarterbacks. We're actually closer on the running backs than on the other two, and have been for some time. But the offensive linemen and quarterbacks that we need to make this system work are few and far between, and by the time the P5 schools get through recruiting there are few--if any--left for us.
It's the old square pegs in round holes dilemma. Do you change your system to something that your athletes can execute, or do you keep your system until you can recruit athletes to fit it? Most coaches prefer the latter, for whatever reason. Bloomgren obviously fits that mold, with two different offensive coordinators.
What I see is that there are athletes out there who don't fit the profile that we can recruit and win with.
- The HS QB who is a winner, but doesn't fit the mold, so TexasU and aTm and LSU and Oklahoma say, "Come here and we will make you a safety," but he really wants to play QB
- The multi-sport athlete who wants to play football plus his other sport, but the P5s say play football only or else; I think we could carve out a niche as a destination school for such athletes
- The lineman who is quick and athletic enough to play defense, but not the huge behemoth that most offensive lineman have become; Fred liked recruiting d-linemen and converting those who turned out not to be agile enough to play defense at the next level into o-linemen; those types also work well for Hatfield's (and Army's and Navy's) option game
Bloomgren came to Stanford, which has some things in common with Rice, but some significant differences--starting with the fact that it is a relatively successful P5 program, which means it gets to step to the head of the line in recruiting instead of having to pick from leftovers.
As Tomball Owl pointed out on a different thread, our rushing yards per carry under Bloomgren have been, by year:
2018 - 3.8 ypc
2019 - 3.6 ypc
2020 - 2.8 ypc
Yesterday - 2.1 ypc
That is a clear indication that something is not working, and is trending in the wrong direction. The need for change should be obvious.
I think we can run the ball effectively if we
1) choose a running approach, like Hatfield's/Army's/Navy's option, that fits the athletes we can recruit (running QBs, small but athletic o-linemen, and the running backs that we are getting now), and
2) have a passing attack, like Ruowls's approach, that uses intellect and thinking to stress defenders.
I think the key is to do something unconventional that forces defenders to do things that they don't usually do and don't want to do.
As I posted yesterday, an offense that ran the ball 45 times, averaging 5 yards per carry, and threw the ball 30 times, averaging 7.5 yards per attempt, would produce 450 yards total offense. Goals would be 25/30/35--25 first downs, 30 points,35 minutes time of possession.Yesterday we ran the ball 39 times for 81 yards (2.1 yards per attempt) and threw the ball 35 times for 227 yards (6.1 yards per attempt), so 308 yards total offense, and we had 19 first downs, scored 17 points, and had 33:54 time of possession. All in all, not terribly far from those goals. Arguably our passing attack was more effective, but it also produced 3 interceptions, which were probably the difference between at worst a one-possession game, and a 3-TD loss. Had we run the boring dive into the middle of the line on those three plays, we might very well have had a legitimate chance to win at the end.
(Cue WRCisForgotten to point out that Navy got blown out yesterday. But Navy has averaged 7.4 wins per year over the last 10 years, and Army has averaged 7 wins a year since Jeff Monken got there.)
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