Sunday morning reflections

[aubaseball 2,698]

If anyone thinks Gus is an offensive guru, they are not watching this team play.   And I'm not just talking about last night.  

The two biggest things I saw that had my head aching was the fourth down call to JJ.  Score was 13-3, late 3rd quarter and AU had just converted two fourth down plays.   Kick the field goal and go into the 4th quarter down 7 to the #2 ranked team.  Next play was Clemson ball and 3rd and goal from the 15, why blitz when they have to score.  Play a zone and force them to throw underneath.   We put a full blitz man coverage and they score a td to go up 19 to 6.   Blows me away.  Just not very smart coaching.

[kd4au 1,145]

3 minutes ago, AU64 said:

No. 2 Clemson, Watson survive 19-13 scare against Auburn

Headline from local paper....the Clemson view of the game is quite different than what you read on this site....basically they were happy to get out of town with a win and think much more of AU's prospects  than many of our fans do. . 

They should be happy,because with any kind of offense we win the game.

[WarEagle1983 2,185]

Just now, Randman5000 said:

Agreed. It would be one thing if JJ was actually a threat when he runs. 

A decent run game with our running backs and some standard short passes would have won it for us with the way the defense was playing.

 

That's the part that makes it sting so much. If we just had ran a standard offense with either SW or ran the QB read with JF3 we win. But pick one and go with it. They would not have had to do much. 

[auburnalum1974 36]

I supported Gus in the past but noticed his demeanor on the sidelines and the lack of organization with play calling, an audible, snap count and alike. These all due to constant disruption of a measured amount of time for a QB to transition a new collection of team members under the lights in a "big game environment". Those of us learned many years ago as a coach in high school play what works, tailor your scheme according to your talent(or lack of), and seek advice from others of great experience.

 

After reflecting on Gus' post game press conference I was sadly disappointed in his inability to accept responsibility. We learned through the coaching staff even in Coach Jordan's Football course offered only to those personally chosen to sign up to qualify he and the assistant coaches stressed to always accept the blame for a game loss. It is the head coach who must always step up and state publically I lost the game in not preparing my team. Just as upon a victory always state the team and assistant coaches earned the win and not the head coach. Our father taught my older brother and I this coaching philosophy as well and as so many other great coaches as Coach Jordan, Bryant, Dooley, Dodd, McClellan, Majors, and Vaught. Go back and catch some of their comments they did not spin the truth only stood up and accepted responsibility.

[tbone4jc 2,242]

 

For 2 1/2 quarters the offense play calling was awful. I think the lights came, we had opportunities but didn't execute, JJ under throw for the int of a sure td, Whites overthrow of Cox in the end zone of a td, K Johnson not hauling in the pass at the 1 yard line for a first and goal just to name 3. 

As frustrated as I was last night and in spite of some wild  game planning I think we are on the cusp of something special. 

I remember the knee jerk  negative reaction of quite a few people when we hired Kevin Steele as the DC but he just held  the Heisman contending qb in check and gave us a great chance to pull the upset. 

I'm still on the Gus Busbut the tires need some air in them, running kinda slow here.l

War Eagle! 

[TigerinSC 0]

Some one help me understand .  Gus is an "offensive genius" and look what our offense is on the field the last 2 plus years.  We were rolling with the HUNH. Now we come to the line with no clue of call or personnel. Either run HUNH or huddle up and get everyone one the same page before running a play. 

[WeagleAU 594]

Just now, TigerinSC said:

Some one help me understand .  Gus is an "offensive genius" and look what our offense is on the field the last 2 plus years.  We were rolling with the HUNH. Now we come to the line with no clue of call or personnel. Either run HUNH or huddle up and get everyone one the same page before running a play. 

Exactly, where has the HUNH offense gone?  One of the mysteries of the universe we will probably never know.

[WarEagle1983 2,185]

Just now, WeagleAU said:

Exactly, where has the HUNH offense gone?  One of the mysteries of the universe we will probably never know.

Some have stated that in order for us to see it we must get first downs. I still didn't see it when we did get first downs. Only time it looked even close to the HUNH was when JF3 came in and it looked somewhat like when we had Nick and Tre but of course we yanked JF3. 

[WeagleAU 594]

I thought surely we would see better offensive line play with Herb Hand taking over duties, considering Gus and Herbs history together.  But after what I saw last night, I'm not so sure.  Where was our offensive line last night?

[WarEagle1983 2,185]

O line def. struggled. I'm just hoping it was a bad game for a couple of them but i don't think we can look past the fact that the shuffling QBs can and did affect them as well. 

[AU64 10,122]

5 minutes ago, WarEagle1983 said:

O line def. struggled. I'm just hoping it was a bad game for a couple of them but i don't think we can look past the fact that the shuffling QBs can and did affect them as well. 

I don't know much about how blocking assignments are designed for an OL but all the stuff in the first half seemed to have everyone confused...defenders coming in virtually untouched, etc.  When we went to a more conventional offensive plan after the half (even when shuffling QBs) it seemed the blocking got better. 

The offensive woes in the 2nd half looked like last year...move the ball between the 20s but could not get it in the end zone.  Better red zone play in the 2nd half and we would not be yacking near as much about the Chines fire drill that was the first half offense.  

I'm thinking that even settling one one QB is not going to solve the issue about how to get the ball over the goal line once we are inside the 20 and as found last season, just kicking FGs every time down the field will not get it done.

[WarEagle1983 2,185]

3 minutes ago, AU64 said:

I don't know much about how blocking assignments are designed for an OL but all the stuff in the first half seemed to have everyone confused...defenders coming in virtually untouched, etc.  When we went to a more conventional offensive plan after the half (even when shuffling QBs) it seemed the blocking got better. 

The offensive woes in the 2nd half looked like last year...move the ball between the 20s but could not get it in the end zone.  Better red zone play in the 2nd half and we would not be yacking near as much about the Chines fire drill that was the first half offense.  

I'm thinking that even settling one one QB is not going to solve the issue about how to get the ball over the goal line once we are inside the 20 and as found last season, just kicking FGs every time down the field will not get it done.

Agree. I think this is where we need to better use JF3...inside the 20. It was very clear he opens up running lanes when he's in the game. I think he's going to give us our best option scoring TDs in the redzone but only if he actually gets to run and pass the ball.

[WarTim 3,457]

4 hours ago, GoAU said:

I should have known better to come to the forums last night and then again this morning, but like a moth drawn to the light here I am. The "fire Gus" crowd got what they were not so secretly hoping for - a loss to "prove they were right".  I am not an advocate of moral victories in any sense of the word, but am also a believer in trying to be objective and having reasonable expectations. So here are a couple of random thoughts to consider:

1) I remember more than a few posts last week saying that expectations of a close game in which the team never quits would have been acceptable - check.  I think the fact that the D played well enough to keep us in the game almost makes it worse for some people.  We were closses to pulling off the upset, which makes everything that mush harder to accept because "if we just would have..." comes into play so much more.

2) The D played very well.  Enough said there.  #7 on Clemson had a career game - and that was annoying,  but he didn't have success due to our failure to cover him. DW only had one significant scramble, and we kept the pressure on, while keeping him contained - this is a huge improvement over last year.

3) O line really struggled. It's too early to know if Clemson is "that good" or if our O Line is just mediocre,  time will tell for that. 

4) Rotating QB's - although I am a Gus supporter, I am completely baffled by the strategy on offense last night. I always thought a "balanced offense" meant close to equal running vs. passing plays, but I guess it means roughly equal snaps for every QB on the roster. The lack of giving any one QB to get into a rhythm seemed to hurt us. I sure hope that experiment ends immediately. 

5) I may be in the minority,  but I liked the "go for 7" mentality when we had the ball in the second half - FGs weren't going to win and our D played very well.  Even though we failed to convert a couple of times, they started deep in their own territory versus us getting 3 and then kicking off. It's impossible to tell if 2 FG'S would have made a difference because everything after that changes.  But I believe that Gus made the right call - we needed touchdowns. I would spend a whole lot of time on red zone passing if I was RL this week. 

In conclusion, we played a VERY good Clemson team, and played them pretty close. There are about as many things to be optimistic about as there are to be pessimistic.  Let's all step away from the ledge and see what a little bigger of a sample size shows us. Remember, this game wasn't a "must win", and although it's a huge long shot this year, it has no effect on our standings in the SEC.

Best post I have read today. Thanks 

[AuburnEagle79 2,171]

My $0.02 is that we have the men to compete with any team in America. Our defense is stout. They will keep us in every game this year and will win us a lot of games. There needs to be some real soul searching on offense. I'm supportive of Gus and the staff, but I still don't know what to think about last night. I nearly snapped my orange shaker in half before halftime. We need to commit to a quarterback, let him grow, and take the lumps as we go and we would be a much better team for it. 

 

On on the bright side, I'm not convinced anyone else in the SEC west is any better than we are besides Bama. 

[AU_Engineer 24]

A little off topic, but could someone tell  what happened to Jason Smith? I thought he would be great things for us this year at WR

[tombigbeetiger 223]

14 minutes ago, AuburnEagle79 said:

My $0.02 is that we have the men to compete with any team in America. Our defense is stout. They will keep us in every game this year and will win us a lot of games. There needs to be some real soul searching on offense. I'm supportive of Gus and the staff, but I still don't know what to think about last night. I nearly snapped my orange shaker in half before halftime. We need to commit to a quarterback, let him grow, and take the lumps as we go and we would be a much better team for it. 

 

On on the bright side, I'm not convinced anyone else in the SEC west is any better than we are besides Bama. 

after watching south alabama beat moo state, i was in a good mood because i saw enough of moo state to think that we wouldn't finish last in the west again this season....then i saw whatever it was that i saw last night.....now, nothing is certain....from a talent standpoint, we have enough to compete,,,, from a coaching standpoint?....deadass last

[autan 760]

6 hours ago, lionheartkc said:

As much as I hate to admit it, the problem appears to be that Gus refuses to trust his players to get out there, make things happen, and work through their mistakes.  He pulled Sean far too often for him to develop anything resembling rhythm. He relegated John to hand-off duty. He's taken his chess playing too far and relegated our offense to sandlot status.

What I saw last night was a team with some solid talent that desperately needs help at right tackle and a coach who will trust one quarterback to get out there and develop as the year  goes on.  If he's going to throw the year away with this 5 QB crap, we might as well just play Woody so our next coach has a seasoned QB to work with.

I agree with most of what you wrote. Gus or Rhett do not trust his QBs. Plays appeared to be 100% designed. There were times I think a healthy SW wanted to keep the ball but did not have the option. I see leadership in Seans eyes but they won't let him lead.  I actually trust him make audibles more than coaches predesigned calls. WDE

[Eagle Eye 7 2,535]

6 hours ago, aubaseball said:

If anyone thinks Gus is an offensive guru, they are not watching this team play.   And I'm not just talking about last night.  

The two biggest things I saw that had my head aching was the fourth down call to JJ.  Score was 13-3, late 3rd quarter and AU had just converted two fourth down plays.   Kick the field goal and go into the 4th quarter down 7 to the #2 ranked team.  Next play was Clemson ball and 3rd and goal from the 15, why blitz when they have to score.  Play a zone and force them to throw underneath.   We put a full blitz man coverage and they score a td to go up 19 to 6.   Blows me away.  Just not very smart coaching.

Steele admitted that was his bad call and one he wished he had back. That is what I want from out HC is to admit when he is wrong. If you can't admit you are wrong then it ain't going to get fixed. Winner's own their mistakes , losers don't. WDE

[hambone79 11]

For me it's clear as day that Gus has not one clue what he is doing and that is the reason he continues trying schemes and players at random.  I see it this way:  When Gus came into the college game he was employing a scheme that was foreign and unfamiliar to anyone he was up against.  His schemes were simple, but unorthodox.  Players could learn the system very easily and execute against opposing teams that for the most part had never played against a confusing scheme that operated so fast.  Fast forward about 10 years and now you have most of college of football employing most or parts of this offensive scheme into their own game plan.  Most coaches have adapted their offensive philosophy to the system, but continue to develop and add to it.  Defensive coaches are now more adapted and know how to scheme against it.  The way I see it, Gus' system is no longer effective in the ways he tries to utilize it.  He has tried to adapt and overcome, but he has no clue how to do that.  Hence, we now see an offense that resembles something out of Barnum and Bailey rather than college football.  

[Farmer Brown 2,391]

2 hours ago, hambone79 said:

For me it's clear as day that Gus has not one clue what he is doing and that is the reason he continues trying schemes and players at random.  I see it this way:  When Gus came into the college game he was employing a scheme that was foreign and unfamiliar to anyone he was up against.  His schemes were simple, but unorthodox.  Players could learn the system very easily and execute against opposing teams that for the most part had never played against a confusing scheme that operated so fast.  Fast forward about 10 years and now you have most of college of football employing most or parts of this offensive scheme into their own game plan.  Most coaches have adapted their offensive philosophy to the system, but continue to develop and add to it.  Defensive coaches are now more adapted and know how to scheme against it.  The way I see it, Gus' system is no longer effective in the ways he tries to utilize it.  He has tried to adapt and overcome, but he has no clue how to do that.  Hence, we now see an offense that resembles something out of Barnum and Bailey rather than college football.  

We need a few more spinaroo plays. LOL. What am enbarrassment.

[Tiger 8,833]

On 9/4/2016 at 1:58 PM, homersapien said:

This is very perceptive.  If you had told me we would lose by 6 a week ago, I would have taken it.  

And if you had told me we'd hold Clemson to only 19 points, I would have thought we won.  

I really expected Clemson to hang more than 40 on us.  To see our defense actually put is in a position to win, only to see an offense too inept to take advantage of it, is particularly painful, almost as bad psychologically as being run out of the stadium.

I wish I could like this 100 times. This is exactly how I feel. We let Clemson off the hook. We would've been the biggest story of the evening on a day full of crazy upsets. arggg