- Oct 15, 2014
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I will say that Dan is doing a good job overall so far.
I am doing my best. I promise.
I will say that Dan is doing a good job overall so far.
I don't disagree. I thought you were confused about our road games which were msu and ut where we averaged a lot more than 14.5 pts/game.No. I think the team is better but I dont think we've played anyone with a pulse outside of UK. So, I'm not gonna get too high or low. Miss St will struggle to be 6-6. 13 pts isn't gonna win too many games. I will say that Dan is doing a good job overall so far.
100% correct. I don't think I've ever seen a coach not call TO in that situation. After a sack on 2nd down on the opponent's 10 yard line putting them in 3rd and 28 or something, and we had all 3 TO's left and over 40 seconds on the clock? On top of that, their punter was averaging about 35 yards a punt to boot (pun intended).Nah.
Sure he was happy to be down only three. But he did miss an opportunity. He could have called TO with 30 or 40 seconds left then, reset the D for third down, and then call another TO on 4th.
Watching again, it appears the booth alerted him to time remaining & down/distance...just by watching his reaction on the sideline.
This wasn’t a major transgression but, would be interesting to know his mindset
Exactly. Somehow we demand FF to be flawless and literally critique his every play and decision and break it down endlessly. Every QB throws bad passes or misses a read in the course of a game. I have never seen a QB held to this standard.
I could do it in reverse.....he threw 1 INT and 1 near INT. He also had 1 dropped, 1 blocked and 1 thrown away. He had another incomplete under heavy pressure avoiding a sack. Otherwise he was 22-25 with another deep pass called back.
Actually a very, very good game and executed the game plan masterfully.
I’ve read where FF was affected last year by all the negativity directed at him and Mullen had to work hard on getting him to tune out that noise. Makes you wonder if the opposite would hold true....what if the base really got behind this kid and took his confidence to another level? Interesting thought.
Roger Dodger, nothing we do here either helps or hurts.When has ripping down young kids ever helped?
A few thoughts from my seat:
The timeout situation was bad - he should have called it at the sack and used the last 40sec to get a FG before the half. He made it worse in calling for the TO with 4sec left. He's experienced enough to know better, so I'm not hoping he learns from this and does better in the future...this is his future, he should already do better than that. I'd love to hear anything to explain his rationale, but I'm not sure he'll address it in any Q&A.
Folks continue to chime in that Pierce needs more carries, and earlier. I am not in love with Scarlett, but am ok with how the RBs are used to date. Scarlett is what he is - experienced, stone hands, able to block a bit, sometimes hits holes but not always. However, he has the experience and knows how the SEC D will hit him. Perine is only a little behind Scarlett for experience (maybe not even that much with Scarlett sitting 2017). However, I'm fully OK with the coaches using Scarlett to pound it for the first quarter or two. Let him pound the D and give our QB time to throw in pass protection. I'm good bringing Perine in behind him to continue the pounding. I think part of why people see Pierce as stronger and deserving more carries is that he is coming in FRESH against a TIRED defense in nearly all cases. This builds his confidence, and gets him ready for a good career here in the coming years. We don't need him to be THE back right now, we need him to know how to read the holes, learn how to pass protect, learn how to catch the outlet passes (has he been thrown to yet?) and learn the offense. He has talent, but we're not in a position to require him to be the starting back, and his development can be done properly. I think he may have the highest ceiling of the three backs, but he's also lower on the learning curve than the other two, and he is benefiting from the work they are doing before comes in.
Special teams continues to stand out to me as a difference maker for us this season. Something that is unexpectedly pleasant. It could be 'expected' that we would improve without Nord, but I didn't expect us to get this much better.
Others pointed out in this thread the fact that our conditioning is starting to shine through. 4th quarter Defensive domination....one could say the other team started to get tired. I didn't see it that way as much as I saw our D take it to the next level (by play calling and individual effort). I've seen FL defenses in the past that could dominate all game long. It seemed like this one did what was needed for 3Q then decided it was time for beast mode. Perhaps we can get to that level for the entire game before long.
Marine1 does a lot of good posts and they all express rational uplifting, When has ripping down young kids ever helped? We've got so many of those helpers that if they had full swat, where would these kids be, where would the team be?
I think they are primarily on Twitter, IG and Snap but these kids are social media addicts. They are aware of message boards. They think of us the same as they think of their parents being on Facebook. Loserville.
100% correct. I don't think I've ever seen a coach not call TO in that situation. After a sack on 2nd down on the opponent's 10 yard line putting them in 3rd and 28 or something, and we had all 3 TO's left and over 40 seconds on the clock? On top of that, their punter was averaging about 35 yards a punt to boot (pun intended).
He looked confused for a minute and I'm pretty sure he didn't know the down and distance and time remaining because there is no logical reason not to call TO immediately after the sack. Don't try and tell me he just wanted to run out the clock because that doesn't make any sense at all when you've got your opponent pinned back in the shadow of their own goal posts, and he eventually called a TO anyway, but way too late.
Overall he called a good game and it didn't come back to bite us so nothing lost, but clock management is an important job of the HC and can make the difference between a W and a L so hopefully that was a one time deal.
I was on the fence about that at the time as well. But I don't think it was about being confused, or poor clock management. He clearly was ok to get into half and make the adjustments that ultimately won us the game. The reason he called the TO with :01 was to force a punt and give us either a chance to block it, or return it. The only thing he could've changed there was calling it with :10, so they couldn't just heave it and call it a day.
But otherwise, I'm totally fine with that decision. It was 3rd and 18, from their 15. And they gained 17 on the next play. If by some chance they'd converted, they'd be approaching midfield with :30 left, which gives them time to try to set up a FG or deep pass. The defensive adjustments were night and day in the second half, and I'm pretty sure he just wanted to get to the locker room down 3 in that environment. Maybe hope for a fluke ST's play to close. But he was not going to risk being down more. Especially with us getting the ball to start. Considering the second half play, I think it was clearly the right move.