"I wish I knew." -Bo Pelini 10/6/12

[gratefullred]

Thanks husker_x. Well thought out post.

 

I too have been in the "wait and see" camp for awhile. Several posters here were outraged that anyone would dare question Bo . . . but now we're seeing what I've been suspecting. Ultimately, I see a coach without answers. I see a defense that is even worse than the average to below average defense that I expected. I see a shocking lack of team speed across the defensive unit.

 

This is not a good football team. Bo has had 5 years to install his system and to recruit his players. The result has been a steady but gradual decline since Bo's first seasons. There is no tangible progress and Bo's vaunted process seems to be a failure. I said before the season that I hoped that the wheels didn't fall off during this stretch of games (Ohio St/NW/Mich/Mich St/Penn St). Given what I've seen so far this season I won't hold my breath.

 

Go Big Red, and prove me wrong Bo.

I believe the main reason for the declining D is a result of Bo's first 2 recruiting classes which were poor. The D did improve in Bo's first 3 years to a point of greatness with Callahan's players. It has since declined quickly while relying on Bo's first 2 classes. With those 2 poor classes there is no reason to expect great improvement in year 5.

 

I agree with everything else you said. Bo has 2 weeks to make some changes scheme wise and personel wise. I really believe Bo should get 2 more years to see what he can do with his better classes, but if the wheels come off that might not happen. It's a tough business.

[RedRedJarvisRedwine]

One thing that I don't think this coaching staff has a grasp on is opposing coaches making in game adjustments. It seems like our staff and quite a few posters here are resigned to the idea that adjustments can only be made once a game, at halftime!

ItS like our staff also seems to think that the only team allowed to make adjustments is us! We seem to make little adjustments(only at halftime) that work then the other team adjusts to what we are now doing and we get stuck in the mud!

We don't seem to adjust in the appropriate time! It's as if we see what the other teams pattern is but rather than fix it on the fly, we wait till halftime so we can go through it with the players face to face.

I'd rather Bo try something creative and be wrong than stick to his guns and go down with a confused team looking him in the eye post game and him just shrugging his shoulders!

[Haspula]

Our troubles might be from the new book Papuchis is reading:

 

[BartonHusker]

What the Duke posted...

 

What happened to the Nebraska football program?

 

1. Frank stopped recruiting

2. Steve P. stopped tradition

3. Cosgrove stopped the Blackshirts

4. Bo kept the status quo.

 

WE ARE NEBRASKA!!! And Nebraska does have standards.

• We believe in running the football and stopping the run on defense.
  
• We believe in physically dominating the line of scrimmage on both sides of the ball.
  
• We believe in option football. We believe in power football.
  
• We believe in a play-action passing game.
  
• These spread offenses may work for other teams, but we had an identity that worked for over 50 years, and it wasn't the spread.
  
• We understand that penalties are part of the game, but many of these stupidly repeated penalties lately have to stop. It's not just a coincidence anymore, the frequency of the same penalties have become a habit, and they are costing us games.
  
• We believe in winning at least 9 games a year, at least competing for a conference championship every year, playing in a bowl game, and being consistently in the Top 10.
  
• We believe in playing for a National Championship before we ever think about roses.
  

I wanted to highlight this post again and I belive the 2nd time now in this thread alone. This is what I'm looking at and expecting!!!

 

 

We need to play not only smart tough football but we need to start playing back to our strengths. Play the brand of football that works in this region. Kansas State is playing to these guidelines now and I know for sure we can recruit at a much higher level than they can. Things would have had worked for Coach Solich if he just would have changed up his staff earlier to fit the needs of recruiting. Coach Solich HAD the blueprint for success and we are witnessing him doing it at Ohio now.

 

Why is it we run a offense that is uptempo but turnover over prone to counter a defense that can't stop anyone? Shouldn't we be playing smash mouth football with ball control? Playing smash mouth football doesn't mean you can't recruit speed... look at Alabama. Our best defense can be our offense. We can take more chances on defenses if they aren't out on the field all the time with short fields. These are things Bo can fix but he is to damn stubborn and set in his ways. We had the blueprint for nearly 50 years but in time we lost who we are. We lost it with Callahan and it was suppose to be restored with Bo... that has never happened!

 

Bo can fix these issues currently by changing up his scheme to fit his personnel. We aren't talking wholesale changes to the scheme in the middle of the season but impliment packages that may help the defense combat against certain looks.

 

What he can do in the off-season to help him keep his job for many years to come is bring in a defensive coordinator that can get the job done. We know more than likely Bo isn't going to do that as he is the "true" DC in the long run. Offensively Beck needs to tone it down and fit the offense to the team make-up. He is running a offense that is contradicts our defense.

[The Dude]

Out of everything that was seen and heard during last night's massacre--the only predictable thing Pelini teams are associated with anymore--this comment is the most important. The most revealing; and, frankly, disastrous. When Watson politely fled the state I said this was Bo Pelini's Don Corleone moment. That moment where you realize you simply have to do whatever you have to do, fire whoever you have to fire, replace whoever you have to replace. Be brutal. Kill friendships. Cut all dead weight. Bring in the most seasoned, talented, expensive staff you can. What did he do instead? Promote his buddies, and why not? That's the Pelini way.

 

But that's not the reason this comment is the most important. Everyone else knew that hiring unqualified, untested, unproven toddlers for the #s 2 and 3 most important positions on the staff after the head honcho was a risk, and not just a risk. A silly risk. A stupid risk. An unnecessary risk.

 

Why? Because we're f*&^ing Nebraska, and we don't need to settle for unproven commodities. We have more money than that. We have more tradition than that. In other words, we already knew what anyone with any semblance of strategic sense knew: you don't need to take these risks, and taking risks when you don't need to is the harbinger of failure and a sign of a serious mental flaw. Whether it's stupidity, delusion, pride, arrogance, or some combination--Pelini is seriously flawed as a coach. He makes unsound decisions and then sticks with them no matter the cost.

 

I don't post as often as I used to. The reason is I had no expectations for this season, and I'm unsurprised by last night's result. I, like anyone who's not themselves completely deluded, was firmly planted in the Wait-And-See camp. There is no more reason to wait. We've not only seen it, but Pelini has said it. He's clueless. And that's why this statement is one that I think will ring for the rest of Pelini's tenure, and loudly.

 

I'm a fan of stability. I prefer keeping coaches with modest success over throwing the dice with a coaching carousel. I'm still in that camp. But Bo, you know why you don't field well-coached, disciplined teams? Because your coaching staff sucks and they don't know what they're doing. You can cover flaws with strategy. You can't cover incompetence with it. You can't hope your quarterback, who makes about a 1-1 ratio of mistakes to splash plays to 0 net benefit, will magic you to a championship. (Where, by the way, will the accountability be on this one? Please point it out to me, as I'm willing to bet Taylor trots out there again next week.)

 

Anyway, in conclusion, what we now know is the most relevant fact: Pelini is clueless. We know because he said so. All the "Trust Bo" cheerleaders and the sunshine pumpers have had their day. Thanks, fellas. We'll take it from here. Bo, I'll give you a clue, because I'm pretty sure you're going to be here next season come hell or high water, and I'm okay with that.

 

Bo Pelini, it's here again. Your Michael Corleone moment. Fire anyone. Fire everyone. Bench anyone. Bench everyone. Scrap any scheme. Scrap every scheme. As Damon Benning said during the freakout fest last night, it's time to bring in people who are smarter than you to do the things you can't. You need to accept your deficiencies and then take steps to offset them. That's what you do in strategy. It's all you can do, really.

 

If he's not willing, his tenure will not last long. It's not what I want but it's the inevitable fact. He's tried everything else except the obvious solution.

[Husker_x]

More like the alarm has been reduced from flaring red to yellowish orange.

 

I'm thrilled about the win. The defense looks like it's improving. We're also in one of the worst football conferences and the opponent we beat last night was without its starting quarterback. We're also not out of the woods. We've got four games left, with opponents in Michigan State and Penn State that are good enough to squeak a win over a team that (still) ritualistically self-destructs with turnovers and penalties). Nothing short of a conference championship will move me from the camp of skepticism. We've been here before. There's still plenty of time for another meltdown. There are also some encouraging signs.

 

It's an interesting sort of selective memory when you beat a mediocre team without the player that accounts for the majority of their offense, it somehow nullifies that one time you got 63 hung on you. I guess we'll just sort of forget about that national embarrassment. In other words, let's not get ahead of ourselves.

 

The team did what it was supposed to last night. The offense was average--and the play calling/use of substitutions (see milk carton running backs) was suspect at times--but the defense stepped it up and we got a convincing win. That's great. Now do it four more times and beat the team you already beat and you've let out plenty of leash for this staff. Implode again--and there's no reason to think it can't happen--and we're right back where we started.

[B.B. Hemingway]

More like the alarm has been reduced from flaring red to yellowish orange.

 

I'm thrilled about the win. The defense looks like it's improving. We're also in one of the worst football conferences and the opponent we beat last night was without its starting quarterback. We're also not out of the woods. We've got four games left, with opponents in Michigan State and Penn State that are good enough to squeak a win over a team that (still) ritualistically self-destructs with turnovers and penalties). Nothing short of a conference championship will move me from the camp of skepticism. We've been here before. There's still plenty of time for another meltdown. There are also some encouraging signs.

 

It's an interesting sort of selective memory when you beat a mediocre team without the player that accounts for the majority of their offense, it somehow nullifies that one time you got 63 hung on you. I guess we'll just sort of forget about that national embarrassment. In other words, let's not get ahead of ourselves.

 

The team did what it was supposed to last night. The offense was average--and the play calling/use of substitutions (see milk carton running backs) was suspect at times--but the defense stepped it up and we got a convincing win. That's great. Now do it four more times and beat the team you already beat and you've let out plenty of leash for this staff. Implode again--and there's no reason to think it can't happen--and we're right back where we started.

 

It seems that you might be trying to diminish what was accomplished last night just so you can try and keep your argument alive. I will never believe that the coaches that Bo has hired don't know what they're doing. They must be smart and good at their craft or they wouldn't be where they are, right? Are all of our problems fixed? No, but we seem to be on our way to fixing them. The sky is not falling, so some should stop trying to bring it down....

[It'sNotAFakeID]

There was nothing to suggest that Dennard was going to go for a land dragon against us. Absolutely nothing. For the second week in a row the scheme Pelini drugged up (using the secondary to contain the running threat, allowing the LBs to move freely) has worked.

 

Here's a fun fact. Ohio State put up 498 yards of total offense against our defense. Really the same defense running a different scheme in that game. Braxton Miller ran the ball 16 times for 186 yards. We gave up 371 yards rushing. In our next two games, we have given up a combined 489 yards of offense, 275 of that being from the rushing game, 80 of which came on one play. That makes the other 74 attempts good for 195 yards which is good for 2.64 yards per rush. The two mobile quarterbacks, Colter and Robinson combined for 24 attempts for 81 yards, a 3.38 yards per rush average and ZERO touchdowns. Whatever Bo and company implemented during the bye week has done nothing but produce positive plays for the defense.

 

As for the offense, credit has to go to Michigan's defense. Did we leave points out there? Yes. But I do feel that Michigan played a big part in forcing us to leave points on the field. Nothing can be taken away from that except that Michigan has a really strong defense, and the statistics back the statement.

 

We're going to have to play well on offense to beat Michigan State. But that's the one unit I'm more confident in having a good game. Instead of being confident that we'll win 42-24 against Sparty, the way the defense has played the past two weeks has me confident that we can beat Sparty by scoring 24 points. That's improvement, at least in my book.

[The Dude]

The "scrap everything, let the heads roll, hit the panic button" mentality that permeated after that game was most assuredly a false alarm.

 

Bo did the exact opposite, he kept his cool, and stuck with what he believes in. So far, so good.

 

 

 

However, I think we all agree (including Pelini - especially Pelini) that the team needs to play cleaner football. I'm pretty frustrated with that aspect of our team, but I don't think hitting the panic button is the answer. Bo still has learning to do. I don't think there's any question he's a good enough coach in other aspects to keep us afloat while he figures it all out.

 

The premise of the thread - the idea that he's completely clueless - has no merit.

[Caine Mutiny]

Urban Meyer lost to us last year with a complete defensive meltdown....obviously he should've been fired or at least replaced his entire staff.

Urban Meyer lost to us, only because he lost Braxton Miller...... Otherwise, it may have been slightly less bad, as it was this year...

[It'sNotAFakeID]

Urban Meyer lost to us last year with a complete defensive meltdown....obviously he should've been fired or at least replaced his entire staff.

Urban Meyer lost to us, only because he lost Braxton Miller...... Otherwise, it may have been slightly less bad, as it was this year...

Urban Meyer didn't lose to us last year!

[The Dude]

Urban Meyer didn't lose to us last year!

Belly G. . .

[kchusker_chris]

love how people call out the "haters" as overreacting yet it only takes 1 game for everyone to declare things "fixed". Great game, great win...but this defense is no where near where it needs to be to be competitive in the Rose bowl. I won't say we don't have what it takes to get there though - however that is based less on our abilities and more on the current state of B1G football.

[The Dude]

It's 2012. Anyone who uses the word "hater" is not to be taken seriously.

[Count 'Bility]

Urban Meyer lost to us last year with a complete defensive meltdown....obviously he should've been fired or at least replaced his entire staff.

Urban Meyer lost to us, only because he lost Braxton Miller...... Otherwise, it may have been slightly less bad, as it was this year...

Urban Meyer didn't lose to us last year!

I know right? How are these guys supposed to even remotely taken seriously.