Sherman: As problems mount, judgment must wait on Mike Riley at Nebraska

[Huskers19911]

Luck has nothing to do with it? You choose your own luck? I disagree to some extent. Luck plays a part of every game, the impact it plays vary from game to game. Texas in the conference championship? Bad luck. Different set of refs may have made a different call. We could have won the conference title.

 

Does bad luck excuse our record this year? No, it doesn't, by any means. We haven't had great coaching thus far, and I'm just as disappointed as everyone else is. That doesn't mean bad luck doesn't happen in sports, because it does.

[Hujan]

The problem with the "give him time argument" is that Riley is losing games because of simple game-day mistakes that a rookie coach would be embarassed to make. Clock management is horrible, play calling in key situations is a joke, he doesn't make effective use of timeouts to get players on the same page before important plays, player personnel is a disaster (Newby over Ozigbo and Wilbon when everyone in the state can see that Newby is consistently the fourth best runner in the box score behind Armstrong, Jano, and Moore).

 

Our losses are not due as much to a transition from one system to another as much as fundamental coaching mistakes.

[alwayshusking]

Show something and fans will start to believe. This staff hasn't shown much yet, hopefully do in the 2nd half of the season. Land some big time commitments in recruiting, something.

 

Husker fans aren't that crazy, they just want some reasons to have hope.

[Kernal]

The problem with the "give him time argument" is that Riley is losing games because of simple game-day mistakes that a rookie coach would be embarassed to make. Clock management is horrible, play calling in key situations is a joke, he doesn't make effective use of timeouts to get players on the same page before important plays, player personnel is a disaster (Newby over Ozigbo and Wilbon when everyone in the state can see that Newby is consistently the fourth best runner in the box score behind Armstrong, Jano, and Moore).

 

Our losses are not due as much to a transition from one system to another as much as fundamental coaching mistakes.

 

I keep seeing people talking about all these glaring coaching mistakes, but I'm not seeing them. What I see are people going back after the fact and picking apart things that didn't work out. That's not the same as a coach making a fundamentally wrong decision. I pretty much agree with Sam McKewon's comments below.

 

Husker Talk Live Replay w/Sam McKewon:

 

"I didn't like the 3rd and 7 call. Other than that - and I mean this sincerely - I've seen no glaring mistakes. Their decisions are within the range of reasonable decision-making and, to some degree, you're either going to have grace about that or you're not. Some people - that's just not the way they're wired. They have to pick it apart. And I appreciate that. But that's not me. To the extent that I'm alarmed about anything, it'd be the pass defense, which I have written about. I'm not particularly worried about the offense, but that's just me, others may disagree. I thought the offense would struggle this year. I think it will continue to struggle from hereon. Any games over 400 yards and 30 points, treat those like candy."

[zoogs]

That's a great quote. And yeah, I think we're all just on different parts of the spectrum when it comes to how much we need to pick something apart. Me, as long as the coaches are providing good off-field leadership that seems worthy of Nebraska, and keep it a positive fan experience, I'm good. But I have a pretty picky side, too, and that was coming out in full force by the end of the last tenure.

 

Some do need to pick things apart and I can't begrudge them that, it's just fan passion and in our nature. However, I probably won't get too far into those conversations. I'd rather watch things as they happen and enjoy it.

 

I think that's a good take but we all just hoped for more from the offense, especially after what they showed early on.

[Kernal]

That's a great quote. And yeah, I think we're all just on different parts of the spectrum when it comes to how much we need to pick something apart. Me, as long as the coaches are providing good off-field leadership that seems worthy of Nebraska, and keep it a positive fan experience, I'm good. But I have a pretty picky side, too, and that was coming out in full force by the end of the last tenure.

 

Some do need to pick things apart and I can't begrudge them that, it's just fan passion and in our nature. However, I probably won't get too far into those conversations. I'd rather watch things as they happen and enjoy it.

 

I think that's a good take but we all just hoped for more from the offense, especially after what they showed early on.

 

Yeah, I'm not exactly thrilled about being 2-4 or some of the play by various units. And like you said, especially when the offense seemed to be playing so well early on. Also, it seems like a different season now, but remember how crisp the tackling was in the first game? Geez...

[Mavric]

 

The problem with the "give him time argument" is that Riley is losing games because of simple game-day mistakes that a rookie coach would be embarassed to make. Clock management is horrible, play calling in key situations is a joke, he doesn't make effective use of timeouts to get players on the same page before important plays, player personnel is a disaster (Newby over Ozigbo and Wilbon when everyone in the state can see that Newby is consistently the fourth best runner in the box score behind Armstrong, Jano, and Moore).

 

Our losses are not due as much to a transition from one system to another as much as fundamental coaching mistakes.

 

I keep seeing people talking about all these glaring coaching mistakes, but I'm not seeing them. What I see are people going back after the fact and picking apart things that didn't work out. That's not the same as a coach making a fundamentally wrong decision. I pretty much agree with Sam McKewon's comments below.

 

Husker Talk Live Replay w/Sam McKewon:

 

"I didn't like the 3rd and 7 call. Other than that - and I mean this sincerely - I've seen no glaring mistakes. Their decisions are within the range of reasonable decision-making and, to some degree, you're either going to have grace about that or you're not. Some people - that's just not the way they're wired. They have to pick it apart. And I appreciate that. But that's not me. To the extent that I'm alarmed about anything, it'd be the pass defense, which I have written about. I'm not particularly worried about the offense, but that's just me, others may disagree. I thought the offense would struggle this year. I think it will continue to struggle from hereon. Any games over 400 yards and 30 points, treat those like candy."

 

 

First, this is pretty short-sighted. If you're only going to focus on the last couple plays of a game, you're inherently conceding that everything else up to that point went basically as well as could reasonably be expected. I don' think that's the case.

 

Second, among other things that completely ignores the coaching decisions on how to defend BYU's last three plays. Not just the Hail Mary - it would have been nice to do some different things but it was pretty standard defense - but also the two plays before that that allowed BYU to get into the position to be able to even ATTEMPT the Hail Mary. Or the offensive play calls that led up to that. Perhaps people want to semantic those and not call them "mistakes" but there were plenty of things the coaches could have done differently that made a victory extremely likely.

 

The same goes for the Illinois game. Even after the third-and-seven play, we had to stop a team for 50 seconds that had, to that point, scored seven points on us. Yet we went with our base coverage that had a safety covering a WR deep. Not to mention continuing to throw - and often stopping the clock - quite a few times in the third and fourth quarters despite being ahead and not having success with the passing game. And for that matter, trying a field goal on fouth down - which is what TA was expecting - wouldn't have been any worse field position or time for Illinois than what they got and would have won the game if good. There is a risk of getting it blocked but it doesn't seem like that much more of a risk than expecting our pass defense to stop anyone. Then we repeated those mistakes again the next week, plus made no attempt to get a first down that would have clinched the game even though we'd just seen their offense go right down the field on us.

 

So, if you want to semantic it to a glaring "mistake", the one third and seven is definitely the most glaring. But there are PLENTY of other decisions that are very questionable if not outright wrong - some just might not be as recognizable as that one play.

[QMany]

A team that isn't great will find themselves in a lot of close situations at the end of games. 5 of 2014 games and 5 of 2013 games were one-score differences.

 

There's been almost no time given, by some, for the new coaches to flip culture and scheme and take this team to a place where the likes of Iowa, Minnesota, McNeese State, and Wyoming are not one score contests...which of course is the long term goal.

 

If there's a disappointing narrative, that's the one.

Unfortunately, we're flipping the wrong way. We're taking 2 and 4-score wins against Miami and Illinois(!) and turning them into 1-score losses.

[Blackshirt39]

Luck has nothing to do with it? You choose your own luck? I disagree to some extent. Luck plays a part of every game, the impact it plays vary from game to game. Texas in the conference championship? Bad luck. Different set of refs may have made a different call. We could have won the conference title.

 

Does bad luck excuse our record this year? No, it doesn't, by any means. We haven't had great coaching thus far, and I'm just as disappointed as everyone else is. That doesn't mean bad luck doesn't happen in sports, because it does.

 

You can't rely on luck, and you can't let the other team have a chance to beat you when the game is on the line. That's how good teams do it. You have to make the win happen. Is it nice to have luck, yeah and SOMETIMES you need it. luck will hurt you more than it helps.

 

Everyone likes to say that we are 4 plays away from being undefeated. They're wrong. We are 40 some bad playcalls, a poorly managed RB situation and a crap coverage scheme from being undefeated.

[Kernal]

 

 

The problem with the "give him time argument" is that Riley is losing games because of simple game-day mistakes that a rookie coach would be embarassed to make. Clock management is horrible, play calling in key situations is a joke, he doesn't make effective use of timeouts to get players on the same page before important plays, player personnel is a disaster (Newby over Ozigbo and Wilbon when everyone in the state can see that Newby is consistently the fourth best runner in the box score behind Armstrong, Jano, and Moore).

 

Our losses are not due as much to a transition from one system to another as much as fundamental coaching mistakes.

 

I keep seeing people talking about all these glaring coaching mistakes, but I'm not seeing them. What I see are people going back after the fact and picking apart things that didn't work out. That's not the same as a coach making a fundamentally wrong decision. I pretty much agree with Sam McKewon's comments below.

 

Husker Talk Live Replay w/Sam McKewon:

 

"I didn't like the 3rd and 7 call. Other than that - and I mean this sincerely - I've seen no glaring mistakes. Their decisions are within the range of reasonable decision-making and, to some degree, you're either going to have grace about that or you're not. Some people - that's just not the way they're wired. They have to pick it apart. And I appreciate that. But that's not me. To the extent that I'm alarmed about anything, it'd be the pass defense, which I have written about. I'm not particularly worried about the offense, but that's just me, others may disagree. I thought the offense would struggle this year. I think it will continue to struggle from hereon. Any games over 400 yards and 30 points, treat those like candy."

 

 

First, this is pretty short-sighted. If you're only going to focus on the last couple plays of a game, you're inherently conceding that everything else up to that point went basically as well as could reasonably be expected. I don' think that's the case.

 

Second, among other things that completely ignores the coaching decisions on how to defend BYU's last three plays. Not just the Hail Mary - it would have been nice to do some different things but it was pretty standard defense - but also the two plays before that that allowed BYU to get into the position to be able to even ATTEMPT the Hail Mary. Or the offensive play calls that led up to that. Perhaps people want to semantic those and not call them "mistakes" but there were plenty of things the coaches could have done differently that made a victory extremely likely.

 

The same goes for the Illinois game. Even after the third-and-seven play, we had to stop a team for 50 seconds that had, to that point, scored seven points on us. Yet we went with our base coverage that had a safety covering a WR deep. Not to mention continuing to throw - and often stopping the clock - quite a few times in the third and fourth quarters despite being ahead and not having success with the passing game. And for that matter, trying a field goal on fouth down - which is what TA was expecting - wouldn't have been any worse field position or time for Illinois than what they got and would have won the game if good. There is a risk of getting it blocked but it doesn't seem like that much more of a risk than expecting our pass defense to stop anyone. Then we repeated those mistakes again the next week, plus made no attempt to get a first down that would have clinched the game even though we'd just seen their offense go right down the field on us.

 

So, if you want to semantic it to a glaring "mistake", the one third and seven is definitely the most glaring. But there are PLENTY of other decisions that are very questionable if not outright wrong - some just might not be as recognizable as that one play.

 

 

 

This is the post I was responding to.

 

The problem with the "give him time argument" is that Riley is losing games because of simple game-day mistakes that a rookie coach would be embarassed to make. Clock management is horrible, play calling in key situations is a joke, he doesn't make effective use of timeouts to get players on the same page before important plays, player personnel is a disaster (Newby over Ozigbo and Wilbon when everyone in the state can see that Newby is consistently the fourth best runner in the box score behind Armstrong, Jano, and Moore).

 

Our losses are not due as much to a transition from one system to another as much as fundamental coaching mistakes.

 

 

So the point of my post was to distinguish between "fundamental coaching mistakes" and decisions that could have been better, perhaps, but that nonetheless fall within "the range of reasonable decision-making."

 

You're argument, I guess, is that the distinction is only semantic. I see it as fundamentally different. One view leads to a conversation about how things might have been called better- a common conversation at all programs after losses. The other view leads to a conversation about how Mike Riley is unqualified as a coach- a job he has held for the better part of 40 years.

 

That's a big difference. While I'm fully on board with the former, I disagree there is evidence of the latter.