Triaging the QB room

[Hayseed]

On 9/10/2023 at 11:35 PM, Mavric said:

 

I mean... Casey Thompson scored as many points on Ohio as Long Island University did.  

 

And Sims had a better completion percentage, more yards per attempt, fewer interceptions and a better QBR on Saturday.

Maybe we can disguise Ganz as a walkon! Yeah, that’s it…our only hope.

[Hayseed]

4 hours ago, Enhance said:

Agreed. This harkens back to my comment in this thread (or another) where I questioned the veracity of those who think Satt's playbook is too big or too complicated.

It's certainly possible they're over-complicating things offensive, but it's tough to know when a QB is staring down receivers, making inaccurate throws, and not even getting the snap correctly from the center... along with some other procedural errors. Doesn't really matter what kind playbook or offense they run in those scenarios.

Crouch wins both games with the same plays. Lack of Crouch is the problem.

[DefenderAO]

5 hours ago, BigRedBuster said:

Ok…yes, best case scenario is he doesn’t play this week and someone else steps up and takes jus spot. 
 

I was talking about his best case scenario if he plays. 
 

You’re wrong in that the worst case scenario is if whomever plays, we lose these games. 

 

If Rhule is truly playing a long game this season, I'll drop a game to teach kids how to be accountable vs. limping around at 4-8 end-of-year having taught Grant it's not okay to be loose but Sims it's just fine.

[unl7fan]

Tommy Frazier looked good in Day by Day, let’s get him back

[Red Five]

Unconfirmed by the staff, but word is Sims didn't practice Tuesday.

[Husker in WI]

13 hours ago, Archy1221 said:

There are very very very few offenses in college football that are too complicated.    The error is almost always on the player not being able to comprehend any offense very well that every other player does just fine with, so it takes too long for QB to process the play as it’s happening during the game which leads to mistakes.   Basically the game moves too fast for a player like Sims.  
 

The interception to Fidone was a prime example.   It didn’t happen in the context of the actual play design if I remember correctly but in the time after the play broke down and Sims recognized Fidone being open too late.   AM had some of the same in-play processing issues (not as bad as Sims).  

 

That one was incredibly frustrating - you have to watch both views, but it appears Fidone came out of his break wide open at exactly the time Sims ran out of the pocket for no reason. By the time he got out of the pocket and re-acquired Fidone, it was way  too late. Why are you moving out of this pocket?

 

From what I can tell this is about when he broke the pocket, although it might be right before (which is actually worse)

 

Outside of this pass, the decision making and throws were good. But it's a very costly mistake, as were the snap/handoff issues.

[ZRod]

15 minutes ago, Husker in WI said:

 

That one was incredibly frustrating - you have to watch both views, but it appears Fidone came out of his break wide open at exactly the time Sims ran out of the pocket for no reason. By the time he got out of the pocket and re-acquired Fidone, it was way  too late. Why are you moving out of this pocket?

 

From what I can tell this is about when he broke the pocket, although it might be right before (which is actually worse)

 

Outside of this pass, the decision making and throws were good. But it's a very costly mistake, as were the snap/handoff issues.

So annoying. This should have been any easy pitch and catch for positive yards.

[Husker in WI]

3 minutes ago, ZRod said:

So annoying. This should have been any easy pitch and catch for positive yards.

 

It was 3rd and 12 too, first down and we're driving with a little over 2 minutes to go and only down 3-0.

[Scofrosghost]

When will this team understand we don’t need a freak athlete at qb. We need someone with a brain that isn’t easily rattled that can process information quickly. We need a scrappy gamer that can manage the game and stay ahead of the sticks and hold on to the ball. 

[Undone]

Just mentioning this one more time: In my opinion, the Colorado game's offensive problems were almost entirely on Sims, but in the Minnesota game it was almost entirely on other guys and not Sims.

 

So, he had one really bad game. The sample size of games is too small for me to say that we can't make a bowl game with him as QB1 and all of that just yet.

 

But for the love of Bob Devaney's ghost...if he's struggling in the first half of another game, put a different guy in at that point. Don't just watch the same nightmare play out when it looks like it might be happening again.

[ZRod]

14 minutes ago, Undone said:

Just mentioning this one more time: In my opinion, the Colorado game's offensive problems were almost entirely on Sims, but in the Minnesota game it was almost entirely on other guys and not Sims.

 

So, he had one really bad game. The sample size of games is too small for me to say that we can't make a bowl game with him as QB1 and all of that just yet.

 

But for the love of Bob Devaney's ghost...if he's struggling in the first half of another game, put a different guy in at that point. Don't just watch the same nightmare play out when it looks like it might be happening again.

Minnesota had a few more contributions (i.e. Grant's fumble) but the 3 picks were a major reason for the loss. 

 

He should have been pulled after the second turnover against CU. This isn't like a 2AM thing where's he's just missing plays and needs to see the game from the sideline for a series or two. Dude is literally costing his teams games because he's a major liability.

[Undone]

5 minutes ago, ZRod said:

Minnesota had a few more contributions (i.e. Grant's fumble) but the 3 picks were a major reason for the loss. 

 

I can't totally disagree with "a major reason for the loss."

 

One INT was the drive where we're on their 1 foot line and Piper false starts on a play where Sims dives 2 yards into the end zone, touchdown is called off. The pick he throws then on that 2nd & goal from the 6 play was a bad one...but the scouting report shows you shouldn't really have him throwing there much anyway. We could have taken the FG or, you know, just not have false started on the 1 in the first place.

 

Then on his INT that gave them the ball back with about 1:00 to go in the game, yeah, terrible decision to throw where he did. But also, we shouldn't have been in that situation in the first place due to a lot of bad plays made by people other than him.

[Mavric]

2 hours ago, Undone said:

 

I can't totally disagree with "a major reason for the loss."

 

One INT was the drive where we're on their 1 foot line and Piper false starts on a play where Sims dives 2 yards into the end zone, touchdown is called off. The pick he throws then on that 2nd & goal from the 6 play was a bad one...but the scouting report shows you shouldn't really have him throwing there much anyway. We could have taken the FG or, you know, just not have false started on the 1 in the first place.

 

Then on his INT that gave them the ball back with about 1:00 to go in the game, yeah, terrible decision to throw where he did. But also, we shouldn't have been in that situation in the first place due to a lot of bad plays made by people other than him.

 

Yeah, I actually don't think the Colorado game was all that bad, at least as far as a precursor to future issues.  It felt terrible because of his game against Minnesota .... and the last several years of Husker football .... and because it was Colorado .... and because of He Who Shall Not Be Named (or at least doesn't refer to themselves by their actual name).

 

But I really can't imagine that he'll have another game with the dropped snaps.  That can't be something that happens regularly.  It can happen - even Josh Allen dropped a snap in crunch time the other night - then picked it up and fumbled.  So it sucks at the time but I don't see that being an ongoing issue.  Other than that, he had a pretty decent game, even with the one INT.  Not great by any means, but serviceable.

 

But the Minnesota game was atrocious.  Two of the INTs would have been bad from average high school quarterbacks.  Those are the kind of things that make you (me) wonder if he's ever going to get past that.  If you've played that much football and are still making mistakes like that, I don't think that bodes well.

[Lorewarn]

The way I see it goes something like this. 

 

While Sims has a history of turnovers, it steadily improved in his first three seasons and then through spring and fall camp with an emphasis from the coaches on ball security and a good response by him, they likely felt good about his progress even with an understanding that he'll still be good for the occasional boneheaded bad decision. Then by the time the first game comes around, being thrown into two intense environments on the road, the moment became a little too big for him and resulted in a subsequent shellshock effect. I'd wager money that Sims, the staff, and the entire team all agree that what we've seen as fans is not who they truly believe him to be as a quarterback.

 

Ideally, the team will take the next two weeks to get right and the coaches will set him up well for success mentally and physically, then proceed through the rest of the season in a somewhat similar fashion to 2009; shutting the offense down to ball control, clock bleeding possession football.

[Undone]

34 minutes ago, Mavric said:

But the Minnesota game was atrocious.  Two of the INTs would have been bad from average high school quarterbacks.  Those are the kind of things that make you (me) wonder if he's ever going to get past that.  If you've played that much football and are still making mistakes like that, I don't think that bodes well.

 

So just my opinion, but I think the staff should make one or both of these adjustments:

 

1. Try running some high percentage stuff as much as possible to the outside, whether it's tosses to the RB, WR screens (do we even have this play?), swing passes...something. Drastically limit the amount of dropback passes on 1st & 2nd down (which honestly we probably already did in the Colorado game).

 

2. Maybe this isn't much different than #1, but just accept that his only real strength is as a battering ram. Just run the hell out of the guy to try to put yourself into 3rd & short as much as possible. 3rd & long will be a "cover your eyes" nightmare when you ask him to drop back and scan multiple routes in 11 man personnel.