Back in January, I looked at the depth chart and noticed that on defense, the only returning linebacker was back up Jaylin Minor. Sure We had all our defensive backfield return sans a safety, but was this a good thing. Even since then, our best of the group was thrown off the team. The only strong defensive position was the defensive line. Last night the defense shined. Even now, the two deep is littered with true freshman and red shirt freshman and sophomores. I think the fire Fick talk is ridiculous.

On the offensive side, you need to go no further than the oline. 3 starters on the offensive line that did not have scholarships is unbelievable. Can anyone give me an instance when they can remember 3 non scholarship players starting on both sides of the ball rather than limited to one position group. Some of the other stories on the offensive line consist of converted defensive tackles and hockey players. Lets be realistic, this is not the formula for winning. Place the blame where it belongs, at Flubervilles feet.

In addition, Fick is recruiting like a mad man. He is making all the correct decisions. Yea his game management leaves a little to be desired, but if this is his only weakness, he will do fine. Taking over a new program is a daunting task. Everything is brand new to the coach and the players. The players do not know the schemes or drills and it takes forever to get across all the nuances. Once the team gets on the same page and the talent takes its place in the lineup, this team will take off. Enjoy the ride.

(10-15-2017 05:36 PM)rosewater Wrote:  Back in January, I looked at the depth chart and noticed that on defense, the only returning linebacker was back up Jaylin Minor. Sure We had all our defensive backfield return sans a safety, but was this a good thing. Even since then, our best of the group was thrown off the team. The only strong defensive position was the defensive line. Last night the defense shined. Even now, the two deep is littered with true freshman and red shirt freshman and sophomores. I think the fire Fick talk is ridiculous.

On the offensive side, you need to go no further than the oline. 3 starters on the offensive line that did not have scholarships is unbelievable. Can anyone give me an instance when they can remember 3 non scholarship players starting on both sides of the ball rather than limited to one position group. Some of the other stories on the offensive line consist of converted defensive tackles and hockey players. Lets be realistic, this is not the formula for winning. Place the blame where it belongs, at Flubervilles feet.

In addition, Fick is recruiting like a mad man. He is making all the correct decisions. Yea his game management leaves a little to be desired, but if this is his only weakness, he will do fine. Taking over a new program is a daunting task. Everything is brand new to the coach and the players. The players do not know the schemes or drills and it takes forever to get across all the nuances. Once the team gets on the same page and the talent takes its place in the lineup, this team will take off. Enjoy the ride.

The "anti-Fick" crowd is a small but vocal minority. I admit I was part of the "fire Riverboat Captain Compost" crowd but who wasn't after four years of listening to his drawl of _hit after each game. From my perspective, Fick gets a token number of years to build his program and show improvement. Shoot, he can realistically try and do this with the final 5 games on the schedule and hopefully with improved play at the QB position (from Trail and a weaker schedule). If that does not improve, then success will be daunting indeed. Next year, the expectations will rise and justifiably so. But, it's not next year yet. This season needs to play itself out to see where we are.

I get the frustration. We're all there drinking from the same cup. I just think it's misdirected by some at this juncture.

Folks need to take a deep breath. We desperately need bodies. That takes time.

This year is all on CTT. Next year we can only begin judge CII.

Here is my issue with the coaching staff, dumb penalties and game management. The staff needs three years before the win-loss record determines if the hire was a good one or bad one but we still can ask difficult questions.

Will Trail play more in the last five games?
What happened to Andrew Gantz?
Why does the this team have so many pre-snap penalties?
Why does the this team commit so many personal foul?

Fickell is doing a great job on the recruiting side of the job which he will need to continue with if he wants to turn the program around.
Fickell is doing a bad job with game management which isn't all that different from what he did in is one year at Ohio State.
There has to be adjustment from going from elite talent to lower tier talent. I am also guessing the American is a whole lot better than most in the power five believe it is.

Delete

(10-15-2017 07:37 PM)Bcatbog Wrote:  This year is Exhibt A why the best hire is a proven winner at a lesser level. We are graduate school for CLF. We now need to finish his education.

I think you might be getting a little over the tips of your skis saying he has made all the right decisions. The weird mortar kick last week, and the going for it on 4th down with the initial possession of the 2nd half in the Miami game come to mind as poor decisions, although I do like the aggressive posture. All coaches have a few of these snafus. There's no quick fix to this. We just have to be patient. Unless Bohn leaves, Fickell will have plenty of rope considering that he's the biggest hire of his tenure here.

Not sure about the kickoffs, but obviously the "going for it on 4th down" against Miami was a miscommunication. Moore was supposed to be trying to draw them offsides and obviously there was some confusion.

Obviously it's to early to grade CLF's performance, as we have the rest of the season to play and we may salvage something from it. If not, obviously it's Tommy Tee Time's fault.

(10-15-2017 07:55 PM)JackieTreehorn Wrote:  I think you might be getting a little over the tips of your skis saying he has made all the right decisions. The weird mortar kick last week, and the going for it on 4th down with the initial possession of the 2nd half in the Miami game come to mind as poor decisions, although I do like the aggressive posture. All coaches have a few of these snafus. There's no quick fix to this. We just have to be patient. Unless Bohn leaves, Fickell will have plenty of rope considering that he's the biggest hire of his tenure here.

You are right about everything, but the large decisions is what I meant. I can agree that the play calling has been atrocious in many instances.

Aside from the stuff covered above, the lack of progress in the areas specifically highlighted by Luke after reviewing last year's play is very disappointing to me. I don't have links, but if memory serves didn't he specifically highlight each of the following areas as ones that desperately needed improvement?

1. Tackling. Make fun of Tubs' tackle high teaching all you want, but to me eyes our tackling is still atrocious overall.
2. Turnovers. I'm thinking we may have cut a few offensively (I guess that we could call it improvement from Moore), but we still get very few defensively and we are significantly negative overall again this year. Maybe it goes back to tackling and I'm probably forgetting some, but I can't think of a single fumble recovery we've caused all season.
3. Special Teams. Didn't Luke say he was going to take a personal interest in these? I guess our kickoff team has been mostly good and the punting seems to be coming around (helped largely by the lack of big opponents' returns) but our own punt and kickoff returns haven't amounted to much of anything either and I'm sure I'm not the only one who holds his breath every time we place-kick (including PATs!) just like last year.

Throwing anything but a hail Mary to end the half last night was incomprehensible.

(10-15-2017 08:06 PM)rosewater Wrote:  

(10-15-2017 07:55 PM)JackieTreehorn Wrote:  I think you might be getting a little over the tips of your skis saying he has made all the right decisions. The weird mortar kick last week, and the going for it on 4th down with the initial possession of the 2nd half in the Miami game come to mind as poor decisions, although I do like the aggressive posture. All coaches have a few of these snafus. There's no quick fix to this. We just have to be patient. Unless Bohn leaves, Fickell will have plenty of rope considering that he's the biggest hire of his tenure here.

You are right about everything, but the large decisions is what I meant. I can agree that the play calling has been atrocious in many instances.

Can someone give me some instances of where the play calling was really bad? When I see open receivers getting the ball thrown over and/or behind them that seems like a good play call with terrible execution. Or if the ball hits the receivers hands and they drop it that seems like a good call With terrible execution.

(10-15-2017 08:24 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  Throwing anything but a hail Mary to end the half last night was incomprehensible.

The WRs were all running go routes towards the end zone. Inexplicably Moore thought a wr would break off his route in that situation so he threw way under his target.

I can't figure out how to copy a gif from twitter but OHVarsity has a great gif of the play. I don't know how Moore could possibly make that decision in that situation. That is not something that should have to be explained to a college level QB. It also shows how badly Moore locks onto his target right from the snap.

(10-15-2017 08:35 PM)BeerCat Wrote:  

(10-15-2017 08:24 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  Throwing anything but a hail Mary to end the half last night was incomprehensible.

The WRs were all running go routes towards the end zone. Inexplicably Moore thought a wr would break off his route in that situation so he threw way under his target.

I can't figure out how to copy a gif from twitter but OHVarsity has a great gif of the play. I don't know how Moore could possibly make that decision in that situation. That is not something that should have to be explained to a college level QB.

From that yardage there's no way Moore makes it anywhere close to the end zone if he tried.

I want to see Trail at QB with a week of preparation as the guy. Having the right guy at QB can alleviate a lot of the issues with discipline. Moore doesn't strike me as a guy who is sound in his execution or understanding of the situation around him. Maybe Trail can improve on that and simply not making bad decisions can really mean a lot for this offense.

I think the defense started really well and played with sound technique at the beginning of the year but has regressed. Don't know if that's guys going back to what they've done in previous years to get something going or what. It's going to take some time to wash the stink off and likely some fresh blood that hasn't been tainted yet.

(10-15-2017 08:39 PM)Racinejake Wrote:  

(10-15-2017 08:35 PM)BeerCat Wrote:  

(10-15-2017 08:24 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  Throwing anything but a hail Mary to end the half last night was incomprehensible.

The WRs were all running go routes towards the end zone. Inexplicably Moore thought a wr would break off his route in that situation so he threw way under his target.

I can't figure out how to copy a gif from twitter but OHVarsity has a great gif of the play. I don't know how Moore could possibly make that decision in that situation. That is not something that should have to be explained to a college level QB.

From that yardage there's no way Moore makes it anywhere close to the end zone if he tried.

Which is why I argued last night that you take the knee and go to the locker room down only 9...

But Beer is right as well: be aggressive, what is there to lose? Then knowing what you've got at QB, you put it on the ground and try some sort of "hook and lateral" play.

I simply do not get how any coach, knowing that your QB is Hayden Moore calls running a passing play with 0 left on the play clock, in that position on the field. Totally baffling.

Hindsight is 20/20, but considering how adept USF has been at creating turnovers this year and how poor our offense has been at big plays, the chances for them pulling off what they did on that single untimed play were probably greater than us scoring a miracle TD.

Re: Trail, i suspect we will see him more the next 5 games if he stays healthy. However, i was not encouraged by his throwing motion in the limited mop up role last night. He appeared to pretty much throw only with his upper body, almost a flinging motion. Leg work is very important in the world of throwing motion, and he seemed to be more or less flinging the ball with very little leg drive. Anyone else notice this? Possibly his injury impacting his throwing mechanics?

(10-15-2017 08:39 PM)Racinejake Wrote:  

(10-15-2017 08:35 PM)BeerCat Wrote:  

(10-15-2017 08:24 PM)bearcatmark Wrote:  Throwing anything but a hail Mary to end the half last night was incomprehensible.

The WRs were all running go routes towards the end zone. Inexplicably Moore thought a wr would break off his route in that situation so he threw way under his target.

I can't figure out how to copy a gif from twitter but OHVarsity has a great gif of the play. I don't know how Moore could possibly make that decision in that situation. That is not something that should have to be explained to a college level QB.

From that yardage there's no way Moore makes it anywhere close to the end zone if he tried.

https://twitter.com/twitter/statuses/919369112475889665

The play call was not bad but Moore's read of the play was horrible. It looked like Geddis (I think) streaking down the sideline on the near side would've been the correct read. Instead, Moore threw it short (as he often does) into the middle of the field where USF had everyone dropped back into coverage. IMO the coaching staff has tried to give Moore the benefit of the doubt but has gotten burned too many times. That trust in the player to execute is part of trying to build confidence but Moore has blown too many key plays. It's Trail time.