Offensive Woes? Here's the Answer.

[Chin Diesel]

Straight from the OC, George.

Coaches gotta coach, players gotta execute.

"It's going to get to that point," DeLeone said. "We need to have 11 guys functioning, play after play for a greater percentage of the game than we're doing right now. We have shot ourselves in the foot too many times.
"Now that's a reflection on me. I've got to do a better job coaching them. We have to do a better job of coaching them. It's also a reflection of they have to do a better job."


http://www.courant.com/sports/uconn-football/hc-uconn-football-0920-20120919,0,3757354.story

 

[Doggie Style]

Wow, he went full circle with that one. Started out on the right track by taking a little heat but then dumped some on the players as well?? That part needs to stay in the team meetings with the offense, no need to go "Edsall" on them in the media.

 

[Palatine]

He does take responsibility and he puts the emphasis on himself and the coaches.

I hate the play calling and use of personnel but DeLeone didn't do anything wrong here.

 

[Doggie Style]

He does take responsibility and he puts the emphasis on himself and the coaches.

I hate the play calling and use of personnel but DeLeone didn't do anything wrong here.

No, my point is that people tend to respond favorably to leaders who stand out front and say "its on me and were gonna fix it."No need to mention that there needs to be improvement w/ the kids, they know that, and so does everyone reading the boxscore so it's pointless. Not that big of deal really, just an observation.

 

[Adios]

Not surprised one bit. Our O does need to mesh.

 

[Husky68]

Getting better at running an effective offense would be nice, getting better at what Deleone is designing is not a high ceiling opportunity but any improvement in execution will help, but not enough to win games. It looks like the year is squarely on the defense and special teams.

I laughted when Phil Steele came out and showed Uconn with one of the least expected amount of offensive yardage per game amongst BCS teams at 340 (10 more than Syracuse). Looks like at 278 per game so far that ol' Phil was too optomistic about Uconn. Guess I should have laughted at the Syracuse number as they are at 533 ypg of offense so far this year. Boy I wish we had Syracuse type talent.

 

[blitz8ru]

Here's the answer... fix your freaking OL...

Your offense looks like RU's O in 2010 with a crap OL... This year for the first time since 2009 we have a solid OL that can run and pass block... allowing our O to be ok to complement our great D... You are putting TOO much pressure on your D when you can't move the ball on the ground or through the air on O... Also get a decent running back... the one you have right now looks like a scatback... you need a power back... and STOP running that stupid wildcat ... it screws with the rhythm of your passing QB... that's another similarity between the RU 2010 O and the UConn 2012 O...

Jeez... you guys are squandering your great D with your shi*ty O...

This'll come to bite you in the a*s when you play teams with fast offensive players since your D will give up more big plays (they don't have the speed to recover from mistakes as was seen vs Maryland's Diggs or Stiggs or whatever his name is)...

 

[CTMike]

Oh... well jeez, I never looked at it that way... blitz8ru for OC!

 

[mattp]

by the title I was expecting to see a thread about Nick Williams. Give him the damned ball!!

 

[mattp]

Jeez... you guys are squandering your great D with your shi*ty O...

I'm pretty sure we have about a dozen threads about that, but thanks for the insight. Our OLine was actually improved last week and we were able to put together a competent run game. I think not having a single passing TD in 3 games, including one against UMass, is a symptom of our play calling as much as anything

 

[freescooter]

He does take responsibility and he puts the emphasis on himself and the coaches.

I hate the play calling and use of personnel but DeLeone didn't do anything wrong here.

Agreed

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

What happened to the sweep with Nick Williams?

Have we seen a designed play to roll Whitmer out of the pocket? If so, I missed it.

Any type of misdirection other the gimmick play against UMass when we were up by 34 late in the game?

Maybe put Whitmer in the shotgun if pass protection is a worry?

I mean am I asking too much? I don't expect to see the greatest show on turf and I think we need to run a base vanilla offense.....but would it kill them to run a handful of these plays during the course of the game? Why was the most imaginative offense called against UMass?

Edit: Forgot to mention....if only we had a 200 lb. RB on the roster with blazing speed to give McCombs a rest and run between the tackles.

 

[TouchdownHusky]

Coaches got to coach better? Really? Bet Mike Leach (had Uconn gone after him) would have that very same offense rated far higher in production than Dele.
Get the right coach, designed a modern day offense, and this same group of kids perform much more productively.

 

[ruskin]

One thing I find interesting in on the ongoing great defense/bad playcalling discussions is most agree Edsall deserves credit for recruiting great defensive players but failed in recruiting for offense. Point being, I don't think Edsall's offensive recruits are as bad as they're sometimes made out to be. GD needs to scheme better with talent he was given the way DB has made his system work with the players he was given.

 

[Rumrunner]

"Against N.C. State it was second-and-13, third-and-18. If you want to come down and call those plays, go right ahead."

http://courantblogs.com/uconn-footb...ne/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Do you think Deleone will really let me call the plays? Because I sure would love to have my hands on the playsheet and promptly torch the momentum killing wild-crap pages.

 

[TouchdownHusky]

"Against N.C. State it was second-and-13, third-and-18. If you want to come down and call those plays, go right ahead."

http://courantblogs.com/uconn-footb...ne/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Do you think Deleone will really let me call the plays? Because I sure would love to have my hands on the playsheet and promptly torch the momentum killing wild-crap pages.

I wanna call the first play of the drive and first play after a first down. Defensive coordinators will hate it - no more put 11 defenders in the box to stop another UConn handoff to Lyle McComb. Far few second and longs in any event.

 

[Husky25]

He does take responsibility and he puts the emphasis on himself and the coaches.

I hate the play calling and use of personnel but DeLeone didn't do anything wrong here.

Respectfully, I disagree. He throws the players under the bus ("We need to have 11 guys functioning, play after play for a greater percentage of the game..."). He puts the bus in reverse (""Now that's a reflection on me. I've got to do a better job coaching them."). Then realizes he actually threw them under the front tire before throwing the bus into Drive ("It's also a reflection of they have to do a better job.").

I'm no saying that it is all on the the coaches and no fault of the players, but 1) Coaches shouldn't say that publicly, and 2) It is the coaches' responsibility to recognize what isn't working and make adjustments. My non-expert view is that the offensive coaches are not putting the players in the best position to succeed.

 

[TouchdownHusky]

Agree with Husky25. I don't think anyone should quit on Whitmer, the WR's or the offense in general. Get us better coaching and this offense is an entirely different beast. Or maybe Jim Calhoun's contribution to an inept UConn hoops program are somewhat overrated. Get better coaching from HCPP down through Dele and things will take care of themselves. UConn can do it on defense (and have managed to do so for years now), so get someone who knows something about offense in the year 2012.

 

[freescooter]

One thing I find interesting in on the ongoing great defense/bad playcalling discussions is most agree Edsall deserves credit for recruiting great defensive players but failed in recruiting for offense. Point being, I don't think Edsall's offensive recruits are as bad as they're sometimes made out to be. GD needs to scheme better with talent he was given the way DB has made his system work with the players he was given.

Ruskin,
My view is that both things are true. Deleone's schemes and playcalling have been awful at times, sometimes it seems like he just does things almost randomly. On the other hand, I also don't think Edsall recruited much by way of game breakers and skilled player on the offensive side of the ball. That was especially true of receivers. You look at the position and they just aren't there. As I said in another post, we have a rotation full of #2 receivers. It is pretty clear that Edsall didn't recruit a quarterback after Orlovsky. Hernandez ended his career as a flanker. Lorenzen was McCummings with a slightly better arm. Frazer couldn't hit the broad side of a barn with a handful of peanuts half the time. Mike Box is a backup at some D2 program. Nebrich looks to be another Lorenzen at Fordham. The receiving corp was supposed to get a huge boost from a guy who had 1 catch last year and couldn't even make the 2-deep at Louisville...that is what we're working with. I have always been of the opinion that you can get by with weaker players if you have good schemes that more or less cover up those weaknesses. that is in essense what Edsall did. The Georgia Tech coach did it masterfully when he was at Navy. Or you can overcome a lot of poor coaching if you have talented enough players. West Virginia did that under its last coach. Neither situation is ideal, but they work. But we're not getting the coaching and we don't have th eplayers on offense to cover it up right now.

 

[TouchdownHusky]

Ruskin,
My view is that both things are true. Deleone's schemes and playcalling have been awful at times, sometimes it seems like he just does things almost randomly. On the other hand, I also don't think Edsall recruited much by way of game breakers and skilled player on the offensive side of the ball. That was especially true of receivers. You look at the position and they just aren't there. As I said in another post, we have a rotation full of #2 receivers. It is pretty clear that Edsall didn't recruit a quarterback after Orlovsky. Hernandez ended his career as a flanker. Lorenzen was McCummings with a slightly better arm. Frazer couldn't hit the broad side of a barn with a handful of peanuts half the time. Mike Box is a backup at some D2 program. Nebrich looks to be another Lorenzen at Fordham. The receiving corp was supposed to get a huge boost from a guy who had 1 catch last year and couldn't even make the 2-deep at Louisville...that is what we're working with. I have always been of the opinion that you can get by with weaker players if you have good schemes that more or less cover up those weaknesses. that is in essense what Edsall did. The Georgia Tech coach did it masterfully when he was at Navy. Or you can overcome a lot of poor coaching if you have talented enough players. West Virginia did that under its last coach. Neither situation is ideal, but they work. But we're not getting the coaching and we don't have th eplayers on offense to cover it up right now.

This post could not have been more on target. It touched on every flaw on the offensive side of the ball. Really simple to understand: problem start with Randy's recruiting ineptitude with skilled positions (until proven otherwise) and it extended to include failure of staff to "coach 'em up" on offense (same certainly can't be said of Donald Brown on the defensive side) and then throw in the offensive gameplanning of Deleeeeee (which is like watching paint dry) and there you have it. A woefully performing offense.

 

[ruskin]

Nice job, Scoot. That is the kind of well-reasoned positions I highly respect. I think our receivers might be a little better than that, but can't disagree with your overall slant (which I'd like to see more of, by the way).
I always laugh when I hear Paul Johnson's name. After the 38-0 beatdown in Annapolis in '02 word got out that Edsall boasted he'd figured out how to stop the option. Four years and 464 Navy rushing yards later at the Rent Mr. Johnson showed RE he hadn't quite figured it out.

 

[freescooter]

Nice job, Scoot. That is the kind of well-reasoned positions I highly respect. I think our receivers might be a little better than that, but can't disagree with your overall slant (which I'd like to see more of, by the way).
I always laugh when I hear Paul Johnson's name. After the 38-0 beatdown in Annapolis in '02 word got out that Edsall boasted he'd figured out how to stop the option. Four years and 464 Navy rushing yards later at the Rent Mr. Johnson showed RE he hadn't quite figured it out.

Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while...I hand't heard that story about Edsall and Johnson (whose name I couldn't remember for anything) but I can believe both.

 

[pj]

The problems people are complaining about are not uncommon, even at the NFL level. From a story on Tony Gonzalez:

There were times last season when Gonzalez felt like closing his eyes during film sessions, especially during Kansas City's nine-game losing streak to complete a 4-12 campaign. Frustrated by the motion-laden yet inflexible schemes of offensive coordinator Mike Solari, Gonzalez chafed as opponents such as Packers linebacker Brady Poppinga correctly called out his routes before they were run.

"Sometimes we'd do all that shifting and defenses wouldn't move," Gonzalez recalled. "They'd just sit there and wait, and we'd run the ball into an eight-man front and get stuffed. Even when we had a mismatch, the quarterback didn't have the freedom to change the play at the line. It's dumbfounding that we didn't do that."

 

[uconnflyer88]

I couldn't find the thread this was being discussed in, but I couldn't find it......so I chose this one, enjoy:

http://www.njcaa.org/sports_polls.cfm?sid=11&divid=0&gender=m&slid=5&menu=2&seasonselect=547

Notice who is Number 2....

 

[UCHuskies08]

Here's the answer... fix your freaking OL...

Your offense looks like RU's O in 2010 with a crap OL... This year for the first time since 2009 we have a solid OL that can run and pass block... allowing our O to be ok to complement our great D... You are putting TOO much pressure on your D when you can't move the ball on the ground or through the air on O... Also get a decent running back... the one you have right now looks like a scatback... you need a power back... and STOP running that stupid wildcat ... it screws with the rhythm of your passing QB... that's another similarity between the RU 2010 O and the UConn 2012 O...

Jeez... you guys are squandering your great D with your shi*ty O...

This'll come to bite you in the a*s when you play teams with fast offensive players since your D will give up more big plays (they don't have the speed to recover from mistakes as was seen vs Maryland's Diggs or Stiggs or whatever his name is)...

Could you come off as a bigger if you tried?