New Staff Selection

[The Dude]

13 minutes ago, Jason Sitoke said:

Gotta say, I'm pretty satisfied with these hires given the circumstances.  With Joseph, he's got a guy that just might salvage some of this recruiting class at the 11th hour, and Whipple may deliver a transfer QB or two.  With the OC hire, Frost didn't just go find another buddy that he's comfortable working with.  He found a guy with pedigree and is going to largely hand the offense over to him.  This is how you hire when you want your program to succeed as a first priority.

 

All that to say, I have no idea how this is going to turn out.

 

Whipple does seem to be a good football coach.   I just don't know about the timing and the fit.  Moving to a pro style offense?  In this economy?

 

Seems like it sets us up to struggle for a couple years before it clicks.  I don't know if we have that kind of time.

[Jason Sitoke]

3 minutes ago, The Dude said:

 

Whipple does seem to be a good football coach.   I just don't know about the timing and the fit.  Moving to a pro style offense?  In this economy?

 

Seems like it sets us up to struggle for a couple years before it clicks.  I don't know if we have that kind of time.

Certainly any plan forward will need to consider the timeframe that's being afforded to him.

[The Dude]

10 minutes ago, runningblind said:

 

I hear what you two are saying, my thinking is it just needs to be of more importance, however you coach it, coordinator or not.  It's losing us games, we're almost dead last in the country. Put more emphasis on it.

 

I'm not against having a dedicated ST coordinator.   Ideally I would think he needs to be a good recruiter and should double duty as the recruiting coordinator. 

 

I was just saying last time we did it, it was very controversial.  The irony is what I found funny.

[PattyG]

11 minutes ago, The Dude said:

 

I'm not against having a dedicated ST coordinator.   Ideally I would think he needs to be a good recruiter and should double duty as the recruiting coordinator. 

 

I was just saying last time we did it, it was very controversial.  The irony is what I found funny.

Bill Busch would fit in that role nicely. Just need to see how the rest of the staff shakes out.

[Mavric]

28 minutes ago, runningblind said:

I hear what you two are saying, my thinking is it just needs to be of more importance, however you coach it, coordinator or not.  It's losing us games, we're almost dead last in the country. Put more emphasis on it.

 

And most of our issues were the result of one player not successfully executing their one job.

 

Yes, the kickoff return for a TD was a team failure.  The punt block was probably on a couple guys.

 

I don't know how focusing more on special teams is going to prevent last year's B1G Kicker of the Year from falling off the ledge.  Or how you prevent a guy from punting it 62 yards one time and 7 yards the next.  Or a couple odd bounces that the punt returner made a bad decision on.

 

At some point the players have to make the plays.  Especially when they are (mostly) routine plays.

[BigRedBuster]

55 minutes ago, Mavric said:

 

Yep.  And we've tried both with poor results.

 

But people like to insist if something would just be done how they want it to be done everything would instantly be fixed.

 

Just like when we hired Riley.  Our offense was going to be so much better because we used fullbacks.  And our defense was going to be so much better because it was more simple.  And had a dedicated special teams coach.

 

I agree.  I've said I wanted a special teams coordinator only because they have been so bad.  But, unless you get someone really good, there's no indication there would be improvement.

I've never understood why more teams don't do it like Iowa.  Oline coach takes care of punt and kick line.  D line coach takes care of Punt return line.  Someone like WR or DB coach takes care of return specialists and gunners on punts....etc.  Then you have one guy who is in charge of bringing it all together and that's where I think a HC like Frost who isn't an O or D coordinator can be effective.

[DevoHusker]

Kind of crazy how Wikipedia had both Whipple and Joseph as "Nebraska coach" prior to any of the public announcements. 

[Red Five]

6 minutes ago, Mavric said:

 

And most of our issues were the result of one player not successfully executing their one job.

 

 

 

You can say that, but we didn't even try to return kicks of punts for most of the year.

[Red Five]

1 hour ago, runningblind said:

Iowa doesn't use a dedicated coordinator, every coach has some ST responsibility including Ferentz.

 

1 hour ago, Mavric said:

 

How can that be??? There's no way you can have good special teams if the coach doesn't care enough to have a dedicated coordinator!!!!!

 

9 minutes ago, BigRedBuster said:

I've never understood why more teams don't do it like Iowa.  Oline coach takes care of punt and kick line.  D line coach takes care of Punt return line.  Someone like WR or DB coach takes care of return specialists and gunners on punts....etc.  Then you have one guy who is in charge of bringing it all together and that's where I think a HC like Frost who isn't an O or D coordinator can be effective.

 

Iowa does have a dedicated ST coordinator - Levar Woods.  He also is their main recruiter for Omaha.

 

https://hawkeyesports.com/coach/levar-woods/

[Mavric]

5 minutes ago, Red Five said:

You can say that, but we didn't even try to return kicks of punts for most of the year.

 

We actually did.  Not much, but we did.  

 

When we did try to return a kick and failed to make the 25 yard line people acted like it was the dumbest thing ever to even try when we could just fair catch it and get better field position.

 

We had a more dynamic punt returner back there to start the year but then a couple bad things happen and people freak out.  So it was changed to the safe route.

[runningblind]

10 minutes ago, Red Five said:

 

 

 

Iowa does have a dedicated ST coordinator - Levar Woods.  He also is their main recruiter for Omaha.

 

https://hawkeyesports.com/coach/levar-woods/

I looked at that during Iowa week and swore I saw otherwise.  Good catch.

[Farms]

3 minutes ago, Mavric said:

 

And most of our issues were the result of one player not successfully executing their one job.

 

Yes, the kickoff return for a TD was a team failure.  The punt block was probably on a couple guys.

 

I don't know how focusing more on special teams is going to prevent last year's B1G Kicker of the Year from falling off the ledge.  Or how you prevent a guy from punting it 62 yards one time and 7 yards the next.  Or a couple odd bounces that the punt returner made a bad decision on.

 

At some point the players have to make the plays.  Especially when they are (mostly) routine plays.

That kickoff return sucked but those things do happen, I think our coverage was good otherwise.  I seen people complaining about having walk-ons on special teams but you want guys like Phalen Sanford and John Bullock on kickoff in my opinion.  However I can't believe that we can't find a more dangerous guy to return kicks than Zach Weinmaster.

 

Agree on the kicker, that's just our luck here lately, if Culp just played like he did last year we may have won 6 games.... Talk about a difference maker.

 

In regards to the punter, one thing I didn't understand is the rotation between Przystup and Cerni.  Especially when one is a left footed traditional style punter and one is a right footed rugby style punter.  Stop using them situationally, just pick the best damn guy and try and run it to perfection.  And don't ask a punter to punt directionally when they struggle to get it off clean half the time anyway.

 

My biggest gripe is that we make no effort to pressure punts that I've seen yet we have have absolutely no punt return (did we have a single return over 10 yards?).  Same on kick return, other teams have players begging to return one yet we get a short one and fair catch it.  We've had so many struggles in the return game we're just happy if they make the catch, we are basically forfeiting those plays.  

[Red Five]

4 minutes ago, Mavric said:

 

We actually did.  Not much, but we did.  

 

When we did try to return a kick and failed to make the 25 yard line people acted like it was the dumbest thing ever to even try when we could just fair catch it and get better field position.

 

We had a more dynamic punt returner back there to start the year but then a couple bad things happen and people freak out.  So it was changed to the safe route.

 

Yes, you tend to want to fair catch everything when you rank 127th in yards per punt return and 124th in yards per kick return.

[Jason Sitoke]

29 minutes ago, DevoHusker said:

Kind of crazy how Wikipedia had both Whipple and Joseph as "Nebraska coach" prior to any of the public announcements. 

To be fair, I also think Jeff Quinn was listed as our OL coach for a hot minute.

 

Was removed shortly thereafter:

[Undone]

44 minutes ago, Mavric said:

Or how you prevent a guy from punting it 62 yards one time and 7 yards the next.  Or a couple odd bounces that the punt returner made a bad decision on.

 

We could first look at how many reps our special teams unit and punters have in practice relative to other B1G teams with successful special teams. I mean, I couldn't, but I'd assume a quality special teams coach could and would figure that out.

 

But the most obvious answer is that you prioritize looking for a punter out of the transfer portal, if a guy is at all available. That one is so obvious that it's almost physically painful.

 

Then for the "couple odd bounces that the punt returner made a bad decision on" part, again my completely uneducated guess is that we might not be putting in enough reps on special teams plays.

 

Throwing up one's hands and just saying "not even sure how to improve some of these things" kind of seems like roughly what Frost has been doing - and it is clear that isn't cutting it, right?