Fire Watson, Kick Lee off the team immediately!!

[BigWillie]

What will be funny, but scares the crap out of me as well, is if people get their wish and Watson leaves. The likely replacement will have everyone crying from day 1. Then you will have thoughts of suicide about 2 games into the season next year. :lol:

People better be careful what they wish for. They may actually get it, and deeply regret it.

 

[HuskerTrucker]

It totally amazes me how nobody is happy about the little progress that we DID make the last couple weeks or so. Yeah, there are still mistakes, but it is better. Everyone forgets that this is really Lee's first season of being a starter. Everyone also forgets that all these coaches are still dealing with recruits that 3/4 of which was really recruited under Callahan.

Watson can only TRY and figure out the best offensive scheme for the personnel that he has.

I wish everyone would just settle down, and realize that we still have a ways to go. It really amazes me that we are where we are at this point. People seem to have short memories to what it was like 2 years ago at this time.

Yeah, we are not that good, especially on offense - but it could be a whole lot worse people. :wasted

I don't care what anybody says I say Watson must be fired right now. He is ruining the program. Lee is doing good but if K-Sate hadn't of killed themselves with penalties, they would have kicked the huskers butts because of our crappy offensive plays by Watson. I can see the huskers getting 0 points against Texas because of our lousy offense.

<_< And you could do better? Watson can only work with what he has to work with...I am sure that Watson and Bo would love for you to come in and have a sit down so that you could tell them everything they are doing wrong and suggest what they could do to fix it. I bet you might even get a job if it worked.

No but I'm sure you could do better HuskerTrucker. You seem to have the answer for everything dont u, Mr. We're Going To Lose To Oklahoma 35-7 & Mr. If They Had Sam Bradford The Game Wouldve Been Over At Halftime. The majority of your posts are whiny & reek of negativity. I might be making myself look like an a$$ calling you out like this but you're IMO the whiniest poster on this board & I feel like someone has to do it

Your the guy with all the answers there Genius...Bo is waiting on you, I am sure he will appreciate your input. :nutz

 

[HuskerTrucker]

I do have a legitmate question though as it pertains to our offense. So many are using the excuse, "Well, the players on offense aren't Watson's players, they are Callahan's players."

Hmmm, okay. Well, wasn't Shawn Watson there when Callahan was recruiting? And what about our defensive players. They were almost all recruited by Callahan and yet they are playing ridiculously well. So what's the difference? Well, I know the difference, but for everyone defending the offensive coaches, what is the difference? Shouldn't the offense be close to the level that the defense is playing at?

Yeah, there are alot of seniors on the defensive side of the ball, but look how ridiculous Suh has become since the Pelinis rolled into town. Dillard wasn't even third on the depth chart a few games into the season and hadn't done anything under Cosgrove/Callahan. Asante was a below average saftey. O'Hanlon, I'm not even sure he saw the field under the previous coaches. Look how the defensive coaches developed players THAT THEY DID NOT RECRUIT for their system. Pretty amazing at the difference in performance between the defense and offense.

In a way, but BC was the offensive genius and I am sure he had all the input on the recruiting. QB's and receivers especially were being brought in under the guise that Callahan was going to put in a pro style offense, and they would have a better shot at getting drafted under it. Just like now, I think Bo has a lot of input and that is why we see so many more defensive players committing.

 

[HuskerTrucker]

What will be funny, but scares the crap out of me as well, is if people get their wish and Watson leaves. The likely replacement will have everyone crying from day 1. Then you will have thoughts of suicide about 2 games into the season next year. :lol:

People better be careful what they wish for. They may actually get it, and deeply regret it.

<_< Well, I have said this all along to those Watson haters. If you think he should be replaced, tell us who should replace him that 1-would want to come to Nebraska with the way we have had a revolving door for coaches the past few years; 2-who is available or could get a release from their current contract. It totally amazes me how people always thinks someone else can do the job better, but then when you press them on it, they can't name any names that would fit the criteria above. I think Watson deserves the opportunity to develop his offense under Bo, with recruits brought in under Bo. Then if it doesn't work, you question Bo, and it is up to Bo to decide if it is Watson, and if he can find someone to do the job better. I don't think Watson is the offensive genius that he was billed to be when brought in under Callahan, but I think he could be a good OC, if not at Nebraska, somewhere else.

I totally don't agree with everything I see on offense right now...but I also understand the limitations that Watson is having to work with. This offensive line is not that good, and it all begins there. If you don't have blocking, you don't have pass protection or holes opening up. Helu could be even better if we had a line that wasn't on their butts half the time. Lee, I could live with or without. Personally, I think Green has more raw talent - but it is very raw at this point. We could do like Texas did with Colt McCoy and throw him out there with no protection and let him get the crap beat out of him, and I think he could take it. Then let the line get better as he does like Texas did. I also think he is a better runner than Lee and could get out of trouble more naturally. But Lee has more experience at this point...but that experience only has him slightly ahead of Green IMHO. Lee can be yanked very quickly if things start going bad, and I think that weighs on his mind every time he steps foot out there, which is probably not helping.

 

[Fuzzy]

It's not selective memory, it's a realistic analysis of what Lee is as a passer. He throws off his back foot, and he puts too much air under the ball.

Lee is not a great passer. He is serviceable. He makes as many mistakes as he makes good plays. We've played against some pretty weak pass defenses or he'd have a lot more picked off/incompletions.

I'm not throwing Lee under the bus here. I like the guy, and I'm glad we have him. He's good people.

I agree with you Knapplc, Zac Lee's accuracy has not been the best. But if you look at the way he has been passing all season, I would say that his accuracy is inconsistent at best. But who knows, maybe his bad passes are a side effect of taking those big hits and shaking him up a little bit?

Not saying that Lee isnt tough, but on the outside he gets right back up and into the huddle, but mentally he may be a bit shaken up after some of those big hits.

 

[knapplc]

Zac Lee's accuracy has not been the best. But if you look at the way he has been passing all season, I would say that his accuracy is inconsistent at best. But who knows, maybe his bad passes are a side effect of taking those big hits and shaking him up a little bit?

It could be, and it could also be a factor of having a porous O Line in front of him. The pocket has been shaky at best all season. There isn't a QB in the country that's going to consistently perform well without confidence in their protection.

When we were 2nd and Goal at the KSU 5 yard line, Zac rolls to his left to set up a pass, and before he even gets set, 12 yards behind the line, he's hit. The lineman responsible for blocking the DT had a pretty nice view of the sack, too. Then Zac gets jumpy and throws that pick on the next play. Bad choice to throw that ball, yes, but you can understand why he might think he's got to make something happen alone in the passing game when you're constantly seeing him having to break the pocket. The whole reason we're doing so many rollouts lately is that we can't protect the pocket.

 

[mmmtodd]

i heard watson is a descendant of Hitler. he should be fired immediately.

and that zac lee dated the second chair flute player in high school. NOT the cheerleader captain. so there you have it, kid's not qb material. never has been. bench him.

 

[Guy Chamberlin]

I would not be sad to see Watson go. It has taken him too long the last two seasons to figure out what he has on offense

What he had last season was the 12th most productive offense in Division 1.

What he has this season is an untested quarterback who hasn't been as good as we hoped, and a backup QB who isn't ready to take over. Plus a lingering injury to his featured running back and injuries and dismissals to two other promising running backs.

Everyone was screaming for him to make adjustments. He has.

I think everyone is on the same page, now. This just isn't a very good offense.

And we're 9 - 3.

 

[BigWillie]

I do have a legitmate question though as it pertains to our offense. So many are using the excuse, "Well, the players on offense aren't Watson's players, they are Callahan's players."

Hmmm, okay. Well, wasn't Shawn Watson there when Callahan was recruiting? And what about our defensive players. They were almost all recruited by Callahan and yet they are playing ridiculously well. So what's the difference? Well, I know the difference, but for everyone defending the offensive coaches, what is the difference? Shouldn't the offense be close to the level that the defense is playing at?

Yeah, there are alot of seniors on the defensive side of the ball, but look how ridiculous Suh has become since the Pelinis rolled into town. Dillard wasn't even third on the depth chart a few games into the season and hadn't done anything under Cosgrove/Callahan. Asante was a below average saftey. O'Hanlon, I'm not even sure he saw the field under the previous coaches. Look how the defensive coaches developed players THAT THEY DID NOT RECRUIT for their system. Pretty amazing at the difference in performance between the defense and offense.

I think that's the biggest thing in all of this. We simply have dead weight position coaches.

People can hate on Callahan all they want, but he was directly responsible for our offensive line and coached them way more than Wags ever did. We constantly put lower tier talent and turned out respectable offensive lines.

I still remember that Alamo Bowl game. We put Seppo and Slauson at tackles, and had them going up against Lamarr Woodley and Alan Branch. Those guys more than held their own.

Callahan may be a many of things, but the guy was an absolute technician and a wizard of an offensive line coach.

Then Barney comes in, and every single bit of the progress our line made was changed. He even went as far to criticize the way Callahan had the line play. I know every coach in the country likes to think they know more than others, but there are few line coaches in the NFL or college you would put ahead of Cally. Real talk.

In any case, at no point in his coaching career has Barney shown to be even an average coach. Not in his initial run here. Not at Iowa State. And he's doing the same thing again here.

He took a line so well skilled in technique, from proper hand placement, pad level, foot placement, and took them into an 80's style of line 'em up then knock them down. He preaches little technique and it leads to so many mistakes. This is the reason we have so many breakdowns, especially with penalties that kill alot of the drives we do begin to put together.

Then you have Gilmore - of all the WRs we have had since '05, who has made a drastic improvement over their time in this program? You could possibly say Todd Peterson, just because he was a walk-on. What WRs that showed inconsistency ever improved under him?

Nunn? No.

Gilleylen? So far, no.

Hardy? No.

Holt? No.

Even with Niles Paul making big catches, the guy still has his mental mistakes that have not been corrected in 3 years.

The only 3 WRs worth a darn that have ever played under Gilmore here are Swift, Peterson and Purify. But from day 1 each of those guys showed great hands and never had a consistency problem or those constant mental mistakes that plagues so many of our other WRs.

Bet no one has even realized that we have not had a single WR to break the 1k mark either under Gilmore. We have only had 2 WRs even break the 800 yard mark for a season. In 5 years.

--

If our offense wants to take a step forward, they need to get at least one of these guys out of here this offseason. If you don't, it won't matter who our OC is. They will still have the same fundamental flaws they have now because we have position coaches who are simply not that good.

 

[Fuzzy]

When we were 2nd and Goal at the KSU 5 yard line, Zac rolls to his left to set up a pass, and before he even gets set, 12 yards behind the line, he's hit. The lineman responsible for blocking the DT had a pretty nice view of the sack, too. Then Zac gets jumpy and throws that pick on the next play. Bad choice to throw that ball, yes, but you can understand why he might think he's got to make something happen alone in the passing game when you're constantly seeing him having to break the pocket. The whole reason we're doing so many rollouts lately is that we can't protect the pocket.

I had a hard time trying to figure out what that play was designed to do, i first thought it was play action pass to the TE on the outside, but when i watched the replay over and over, it looked like a designed QB run off of the play action to the outside. Maybe it was a play action pass, because whoever the TE was lined up on the left, shed his block on Fitzgerald and ran a post route to the outside, the safety and LB bit on that, DJ Jones (I believe) pulls from his spot to block the LB on the outside, but since the LB bit on the TE's route, he didn't need to stay on him, in the meantime, Fitzgerald who is no longer being blocked comes in and runs after Lee, DJ Jones got beat by Fitzgerald's speed to get after Lee.

Nevertheless, i think it was a bad call by Watson, maybe if Jones picked up Fitzgerald instead of hesitating like that, Lee might have gone in for the score, but then again, if someone like Cody Green, who is faster and tougher to bring down was running that play, it would have had a higher chance to be successful.

I think they ran something like that against KU this year, and Lee fumbled the ball into endzone trying to put the ball over the line and Helu picked it up for the TD.

 

[74Hunter]

It totally amazes me how nobody is happy about the little progress that we DID make the last couple weeks or so. Yeah, there are still mistakes, but it is better. Everyone forgets that this is really Lee's first season of being a starter. Everyone also forgets that all these coaches are still dealing with recruits that 3/4 of which was really recruited under Callahan.

Watson can only TRY and figure out the best offensive scheme for the personnel that he has.

I wish everyone would just settle down, and realize that we still have a ways to go. It really amazes me that we are where we are at this point. People seem to have short memories to what it was like 2 years ago at this time.

Yeah, we are not that good, especially on offense - but it could be a whole lot worse people. :wasted

I disagree. Watson (with a few exceptions) ran a very similar offense to the one BC ran, and most of these players were recruited for that offense. It has only changed in the past 3 or 4 games because it took an inept OC half of a season to figure out what he had (same as last year).

Also, if this offense can only flourish with 5 yr. SRs at QB and WR, then it is NOT a good offense for the college game. Players come and go rarely do you have that luxury. It's his 3rd year in the system, Lee should have a better grasp of the offense.

I wanted to give Cotton the benefit of the doubt, but he is not the answer. Shawn, Barney, and Ted could all leave, and I wouldn't lose a minute of sleep.

 

[knapplc]

When we were 2nd and Goal at the KSU 5 yard line, Zac rolls to his left to set up a pass, and before he even gets set, 12 yards behind the line, he's hit. The lineman responsible for blocking the DT had a pretty nice view of the sack, too. Then Zac gets jumpy and throws that pick on the next play. Bad choice to throw that ball, yes, but you can understand why he might think he's got to make something happen alone in the passing game when you're constantly seeing him having to break the pocket. The whole reason we're doing so many rollouts lately is that we can't protect the pocket.

I had a hard time trying to figure out what that play was designed to do, i first thought it was play action pass to the TE on the outside, but when i watched the replay over and over, it looked like a designed QB run off of the play action to the outside. Maybe it was a play action pass, because whoever the TE was lined up on the left, shed his block on Fitzgerald and ran a post route to the outside, the safety and LB bit on that, DJ Jones (I believe) pulls from his spot to block the LB on the outside, but since the LB bit on the TE's route, he didn't need to stay on him, in the meantime, Fitzgerald who is no longer being blocked comes in and runs after Lee, DJ Jones got beat by Fitzgerald's speed to get after Lee.

Nevertheless, i think it was a bad call by Watson, maybe if Jones picked up Fitzgerald instead of hesitating like that, Lee might have gone in for the score, but then again, if someone like Cody Green, who is faster and tougher to bring down was running that play, it would have had a higher chance to be successful.

I think they ran something like that against KU this year, and Lee fumbled the ball into endzone trying to put the ball over the line and Helu picked it up for the TD.

I couldn't figure out what was going on with that play, either. I have yet to watch the game again, but I'm just wondering if there wasn't someone sneaking out on the back side of that play to the far corner of the end zone that Lee was supposed to target. From what I remember sitting here at my desk, the routes in front of Lee were pretty clogged up.

Willie - any insight here? I'm baffled... :dunno

 

[Guy Chamberlin]

The pocket protection is slightly better than plays that require the line to string it out.

I'd like to declare the option experiment with Zac Lee officially over. The play just doesn't work. At least Lee has been smart enough to go down with the ball and not pitch it back to an already engulfed Helu.

Or how about the old pitch out? A pivot and pitch out to Helu, who will immediately have a better angle at turning the corner?

And with this post I'm officially off the Travel Squad and deserving greater respect.

Thanks for not pointing out that my previous post had the Huskers at 9 - 3 when we are, of course, 8 - 3. For the moment.

 

[Bo-Nose]

Agree with these comments about Lee. Look at how he throws - it's almost always off his back foot, and he puts a LOT of air under the ball. He consistently over- or under-throws receivers, so even if they are open, it's a risky throw.
A competent defense picks off that long pass to Paul. We won't get away with that against Texas or USC/LSU.

I've been saying we should start Lee all season, and I stand by that (because Green is not ready to lead this team), but he's not without blemish.

Having said that, you can't help but be impressed with Lee's toughness. He took some really solid shots this weekend and got right back up. Did the same against Oklahoma. The guy is a gamer, and I'm glad to have him, blemishes and all.

Of course, the receivers don't reach for the ball much either. It's not JUST Lee at all. :yeah

 

[clone]

prime example saturday night. he had NP open deep but he severely underthrew the ball forcing niles to stop, wait for the ball (and the defender). NP caught it (was tackled immediately) and it went for a big gain, but had the ball been thrown so as to hit NP in stride, he would have walked into the end zone.

is that the pass that was 52 yards (in the air) into the wind??

the one where lee's back foot was on the 30yd line and Paul caught at the 18??

:snacks: