Fo Fiddy
- Thread starter ZRod
- Start date
Apathy
All-American
Haha I have no idea. For what they get paid, you would think they wouldn't suck donkey balls
SuperBigFan69
Head Coach
Because the staff is nice and professional. Even though the media has a job to do they still probably really like dealing with the Husker staff and they probably let a few questions slide. I would probably do the same.
Savage Husker
All-Conference
Kinda figure Read is relegated to only coaching up the individual special teams players..kickers, punters, long snappers...and not the units themselves. Coach Riley is king of coach speak and his press conference from Monday, taking the heat for the ST's struggles, makes me wonder if Read is reduced from his role already and the rest of the coaches are also struggling to fix the problems.
cg_8
Special Teams Player
The fact that they don't coach DPE to count players prior to snap is beyond me. Or the fact that no one is counting themselves? I mean, I am not an official, but I'm counting from the stands...
Also, going back a few weeks to OSU game when Bryant returned a ball close to the boundary. The fact that he wasn't coached that if he were to catch that out of bounds, that's a penalty against the kicking team. I know that sort of thing rarely happens, but there aren't too many rules for returners to need to know right? That to me seems like one to mention. Bryant looked like it was never mentioned.
I don't know. It's the 11th game of the season, and we had 10 guys on the field twice on special teams. 12 guys the week before on the 10th game of the season.
The fact that I have to mention these things as a fan in preparation of the last week of the regular season is troublesome. We are incredibly lucky that these things haven't cost us a game (yet).
shyndy
All-Conference
i thought I counted 11 on the picture of the blocked FG. The problem with that one was we had 5 guys left of The long snapper and 3 guys right of the LS, and Maryland came free on the right side
84HuskerLaw
All-Conference
Having the wrong number of guys on the field for a play of any kind is a serious problem when it is recurring. But, the lack of positive production in the special teams in general is the biggest issue in my view. We are not doing well (defined to be signficantly above average I suppose) in any areas of special teams except of course for Drew Brown in making field goals. Drew is doing OK in kick offs but one would really like to see about 65% of the kick offs going deep into the endzone and not returnable. I believe Drew is somewhere around 50%. Not bad by any means but could be better.
I understand that some coaches see the high, shorter kicks which land around 2 yards into the endzone as 'ideal' as it forces the returner to decide whether to come out or not. Presumably the idea is that he will choose to come out and be tackled well inside the 20 helping in field position defensively. I am not sure this is a good strategy as it seems most returns end up beyond the twenty and a few yards of field position is not worth the risk of a big return in my opinion.
I don't recall any particularly remarkable special teams plays ( we have not blockedany punts or field goals or PATs for example). After this many games, one would have expected atleast one or two blocked kicks or a TD return and several more 50 yard KO returns and several 40 plus punt returns.
Coverage has been decent for the most part although there have been a number of kick off returns against us where the last man made the tackle up near the 40. I believe Drew Brown sat this game because he had to make the tackle on a kick off
If you graded the special teams play thus far, I think you might be able to give a C- but far short of an A.
I understand that some coaches see the high, shorter kicks which land around 2 yards into the endzone as 'ideal' as it forces the returner to decide whether to come out or not. Presumably the idea is that he will choose to come out and be tackled well inside the 20 helping in field position defensively. I am not sure this is a good strategy as it seems most returns end up beyond the twenty and a few yards of field position is not worth the risk of a big return in my opinion.
I don't recall any particularly remarkable special teams plays ( we have not blockedany punts or field goals or PATs for example). After this many games, one would have expected atleast one or two blocked kicks or a TD return and several more 50 yard KO returns and several 40 plus punt returns.
Coverage has been decent for the most part although there have been a number of kick off returns against us where the last man made the tackle up near the 40. I believe Drew Brown sat this game because he had to make the tackle on a kick off
If you graded the special teams play thus far, I think you might be able to give a C- but far short of an A.
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dergibog
Five-Star Recruit
On Saturday, one of our punt return guys let the center run right past him unblocked. DPE had to call a fair catch.
One advantage of the rugby kick is that it allows the punter to run and delays the punt, creating a kind of artificial hang time.
But if we don't block anybody at the line of scrimmage, it doesn't make any difference. We aren't going to get much production from punt returns.
On BROR after the game Verzal said as an opposing coach, he liked seeing those big slow linemen back as protectors, because they aren't going to make a tackle on the punt returner.
One advantage of the rugby kick is that it allows the punter to run and delays the punt, creating a kind of artificial hang time.
But if we don't block anybody at the line of scrimmage, it doesn't make any difference. We aren't going to get much production from punt returns.
On BROR after the game Verzal said as an opposing coach, he liked seeing those big slow linemen back as protectors, because they aren't going to make a tackle on the punt returner.
This is what kills me. The conversion. IIRC, earlier in the season when asked about lack of return it was because "X" team put on film they like to run fake punts so we account for that".....
Dude needs to be gone. End of story.
Our ST play, truly 1/3 of the philosophy, is non-existent. DPE, an all freshman returner in 2014 is a complete non-factor. Again, this was a guy who was more than 300 yards in front of the next closest return guy that year for total yards and Fo Fiddy acts like he doesn't exist....
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Count 'Bility
Banned
It's been a long time. i dont even know if it's ever happened. That we've had one particular guy in charge of special teams exclusively. Seems to me that with this has come with an inordinate amount of overthinking, from the stupid little charade we do before extra points (someone could explain why the hell it's called a swinging gate, kthnxby) to all these nuances being discussed about the punt return issues, to the constant substituion penalties. For a while our opponent couldnt kick an extra point without us jumping offsides for whatever reason. I think that with this one guy, there's too much prep time. Too much focus on trying to find an advantage here and there, that focus is lost on just executing the simple basics that make special teams successful. Staying in lanes on covering kicks. It's not rocket science. Put athletes on the field. Stay in lanes. Make tackles. On punt return, perfect the bare basics. Either play for the fake, or play for the return. it's situational. Where int he past with a coach that had other responsibilities (or 3 like Els-ST, LB, RC) there's ONLY enough time to make sure you fine tune the simple basics.
desertshox
All-Conference
that one is more attributed to being a freshman mistake. in high school he was probably able to return that for a good gain but not so much in college.
This is where I'm at as well. It's entirely possible that we're too sensitive to every mistake because of having a dedicated guy making a lot of money. But the other side of that coin is it seems like we should be decently above average if we're making that kind of investment. Especially when we have an All-American punt returner and a pretty good kicker to work with. But we seem to be below average in too many areas, not the least of which is organization.
It's not justifying having one guy who only does that and barely recruits. Not trying to diminish the role of special teams but it is "only" 15-20 plays per game. We could have a guy who is coaching a position that is on the field for 80 or so plays per game and recruiting 3-4 guys per year instead of 1.
Count 'Bility
Banned
i got in a debate with Mckewon on twitter last week about the notion that he also thinks fans are a little over sensitive to the mistakes bein made cuz his salary is in a bright light. I call bullsh#t. Mckewon's self riteousness of pointing out the obvious of what everyone already knows irks me a little. but to say ppl are just dissatisfied with Read cuz of his salary and that it's really not that bad was a total insult to people who know football, who are able to see the real problems. EVERY SINGLE GAME there's something as a result of total lack of preparation. He could be making 50,000 right now, and this fanbase would still be pissed cuz most of us know football. We can see the ridiculous time spent on some crapshot extra point, waste of time, gimmick, but yet in game 11, we STILL cant get 11 guys on the field. Sub penalty keeps us from getting off the field to start Minny game, allowing them to continue drive for a game opening TD. A problem that's been there week in week out. And like i said to Mckewon, we're at a point that mind games and pure incompetence has just spread throughout all ST personnel. negative punts. letting guys come clean on field goals to block it. it's a mental block now. No wonder we went for it on 4th inside the 15 against minny when a short fg gives us the lead. Riley sees what's going on. There's no trust in anything special teams right now.
The whole unit across the board is an insult to pure football right now. The salary is completely irrelevant.
"Junior high stuff"
Exactly Coach Riley. Exactly.
GBRHouston
Special Teams Player
I am heavily, heavily surprised that we have not lost a game due to sh#t special teams play. We certainly have given up too many unnecessary touchdowns due to horrible special team play, cue the Minnesota game.I hate having to be scared every time we return a punt for DPE to muff it due to poor coverage. I am a huge MR supporter, but keeping Read after we have placed last in many ST categories is inexcusable
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