Starting QB 2011

[girlknowsfootball]

Eric Crouch stated after the Washington game, that he believed by the end of the season the team had given up on T-mart. When asked why he believed this he pointed out several things... 1) The team never went over to celebrate with T-mart when he scored, and T-mart never went over to celebrate with his team when they scored. 2) A lot of the offense was playing through injuries (ankles, bruises, etc.) and felt like T-mart lacked toughness and didn't work through pain, he simply said he couldn't. 3) There were numerous rumors of Taylor missing practices and threatening to quit the team. He missed a couple of fall practices when he was mad he didn't get his reps and got kicked out of a practice when he was texting his girlfriend during team meetings, he wore his boot on his wrong foot when his ankle went down as if to say f* you, he skipped a couple of team meetings during the season and it was reported his dad showed up a couple of times to talk to Bo. And It was apparent at the end of the season Taylor's team did not want to follow him.

Do you have a link that to an article somewhere, or was it word of mouth this was found from?

I searched around and couldn't find a link talking about how the it appeared to Crouch that the team "gave up" on Taylor, and if it's true, that's sure how it looked like from time to time out there, and the signs were there all-season they may not have respected him, not that you have to "like" someone [ie, Frazier] but they respected Frazier and it seems they team may not have respected, or even liked, Martinez. The non-celebrations, the distance on the sideilnes, the non-communication, etc., all of those things eventually add up it seems like. Perhaps I missed this link somewhere.

Cody seems like a natural leader, but not the fastest nor best passer, but could be serviceable, Carnes has the speed and arm strength, just needs some muscle, Turner sounds like a natural leader with the tools as well to make plays with his feet and his arms, and Starling looks like a great runner but I think needs to work on his passing big time before he can come in and take the job, if he even steps on campus that is.

Even with all the hearsay, all the drama, I'm looking forward to Camp Quarterback 2011. :snacks:

I do not believe there is a link to a written article, as Eric was on a radio show stating the above. I believe he was on 1620 the zone, but I would have to go back and listen to each show to find the episode. I will try to look through some archives and locate this information for you. I am positive it was stated though... just trying to locate where. Thanks!

 

[C N Red]

See my avatar! You can Marky Mark that!!

 

[girlknowsfootball]

I agree when Crouch said the team gave up on him. The other rumors who cares they are "rumors." Looking at the facts it was obvious when no one came to celebrate when he scored and he never went to anyone else when they did. This IS a problem no matter what anyone says. The QB has to have respect of the players and Martinez didn't last year. He was only a fresh so lets hope something changes otherwise even being talented get him out.

If the team "gave up on Taylor" then that is a major, major coaching problem...

If in fact the team did give up on Taylor (and it is reasonable to suggest that they did --- and, if the Washington game was an indicator... it could be argued that the team just simply gave up.. on each other, their fans, etc. simply bellying up and not caring) --- then the coaching staff is to blame for letting it get that bad. Certainly, the professional leadership on the team (the coaches) are called to be aware of team dynamics, team cohesiveness, team morale... and proactively stop the little problems before they become big problems. A team that has given up on its QB --- and maybe just given up --- well,.... blame the coaches (the players too... but the coaches should be able to work through such things to keep the team focused... and they did not).

I hope the new coaching staff will perform better than the last one did at getting these kids prepared, focused and playing hard.

Great Post! I do believe it definitely had to do with coaching problems, but I also believe some of it was beyond what the coaches could control in the time. Here's what I mean... Yes the coaches should have noticed if the team was giving up on Taylor and not respecting him and done something about it. Yes they needed to put the right guy in there. I absolutely agree with your statement above! And I do believe Bo recognized this as a problem and addressed it this offseason by letting some coaches go and shifting others around. So part of that problem should now be fixed. But this brings me to the second part... let's say the coaches did recognize what was going on, let's say they knew they needed to do something (just speculating here). If Zac Lee was hurt like some have stated, and if Cody really had fumble problems and was not quick enough to run the zone read well... then who can the coaches replace him with?

Here's my 2 cents, however accurate or inaccurate, take it fwiw... the callahan coaching staff recruited passing quarterbacks, (Taylor, Lee, Witt, Ganz) for several years under Callahan and Watson. These guys were the type to run the WC/Pro Style. Pelini came in and saw what he had to work with, he couldn't transition to what he wanted immediately due to the type of guys he had on the team, so 1st year him and Watson go to a WC/Spread mix... implementing a little more of the direction Pelini wanted to go. Ganz has some legs too so first year Ganz plays, then green comes in second year and plays with Lee, They bring in Green who is a hybrid out of HS... he can step back and throw, but also has a little more legs. While this is going on second season Pelini is recruiting fast guys at the Playmaking positions young in HS (WR, RB, QB, TE)... you see this in the drastic difference between the upperclassmen and the underclassmen at these positions (smaller faster TE's, fast WR's, RB's made for space, etc.) Martinez beats out Green last year, the zone read is implemented with a little spread Carnes is brought in, and now we have Turner and Starling (all 4.4 - 4.5 guys). We are just now in 2011, getting to the point where we have a depth chart of like guys at QB, where we have our type of RB in the smaller shiftier (started by Burkhead). So here's where this ties to Martinez... I really believe that the coaching staff taught an offense last year that we only had one guy cut out to run well, that one guy being Taylor Martinez. Zac didnt have the speed, Cody didn't have the hands or quick decision making ability and lacked a little speed... Taylor was the only one who could run it well and he knew it... Does this reflect poor decision making on the coaching staff? Absolutely! They had 3 different types of qb's and thus had no depth for any sort of effective system... 1 guy for WC/Pro-Style, 1 guy for Spread, and 1 guy for option/zone read. They picked an offense that suited their most talented QB and went with it. So when Taylor went down nobody could step into his shoes. The same thing would have happened if we went with Zac lee in a pro-style, or Cody in a spread... Taylor wouldn't have been able to make the passes or reads, Cody wouldn't have been able to execute the pro-style consistently. Same thing with Trey Robinson in the run game... he was a power-i back, didn't fit the zone read. There was a theme of the offensive coaching staff getting good players, but players of all different styles of play. Lately you've seen the staff make the switch to getting the guys that fit their style... QB's with similar speeds and skillsets, RB's with the same, more of an emphasis on OL competition, etc. You get the jist... So the fact that T-Mart played had more to do with the coaches making a bad decision at the beginning of the season in creating the type of offense they did, what transpired during the season was a nasty downward spiral from that initial path. And I think Beck knows it and is going to actually fix it. Just wait...

 

[Enhance]

Wasn't Martinez interviewed within the last few months? And didn't he say that he was going to work at being a better leader?

 

[zoogs]

I think it was a released statement, but yes.

 

[Fuzzy]

Tim Beck recently stated that the #1 attribute his starting quarterback will have is leadership. He wants a guy who has the respect of the team, who can lead the huddle, works hard, etc. Now here's where we question Taylor. There were rumors flying around last season everywhere that Taylor was not a leader for that offense. During the Texas a&m game, when Taylor got hurt, team members were frustrated. Several guys said Taylor lacked toughness, anytime he got hurt a little bit he took himself out of games. The kid didn't play well through injury. Eric Crouch stated after the Washington game, that he believed by the end of the season the team had given up on T-mart. When asked why he believed this he pointed out several things... 1) The team never went over to celebrate with T-mart when he scored, and T-mart never went over to celebrate with his team when they scored. 2) A lot of the offense was playing through injuries (ankles, bruises, etc.) and felt like T-mart lacked toughness and didn't work through pain, he simply said he couldn't. 3) There were numerous rumors of Taylor missing practices and threatening to quit the team. He missed a couple of fall practices when he was mad he didn't get his reps and got kicked out of a practice when he was texting his girlfriend during team meetings, he wore his boot on his wrong foot when his ankle went down as if to say f* you, he skipped a couple of team meetings during the season and it was reported his dad showed up a couple of times to talk to Bo. And It was apparent at the end of the season Taylor's team did not want to follow him.

I take quite a bit of this with a grain of salt, because many of these rumors I've never heard before, even from insiders on other boards who aren't Taylor's biggest fans. Also, the boot wasn't on the "wrong" foot, it was for a Turf Toe. I've seen this confirmed in multiple places.

As for leadership, I do think he needs to grow up a bit, and take the reigns. We will see....

A lot of the those rumors faded when Taylor said that he was staying with the Huskers. It was a bunch of smoke but no fire to those rumors.

 

[Blackshirtsguru]

I think it was a released statement, but yes.

Was the statement given by Taylor's dad?

 

[junior4949]

I remember the ESPN writer for the Big 12 (sorry, name not coming to me and don't feel like looking it up) said that Nebraska was the most interesting team off the field to watch last season, and you really hit the nail on the head here. It's pretty amazing we were as successful as we were with all the distractions.

If the team "gave up on Taylor" then that is a major, major coaching problem...

If in fact the team did give up on Taylor (and it is reasonable to suggest that they did --- and, if the Washington game was an indicator... it could be argued that the team just simply gave up.. on each other, their fans, etc. simply bellying up and not caring) --- then the coaching staff is to blame for letting it get that bad. Certainly, the professional leadership on the team (the coaches) are called to be aware of team dynamics, team cohesiveness, team morale... and proactively stop the little problems before they become big problems. A team that has given up on its QB --- and maybe just given up --- well,.... blame the coaches (the players too... but the coaches should be able to work through such things to keep the team focused... and they did not).

I hope the new coaching staff will perform better than the last one did at getting these kids prepared, focused and playing hard.

:yeah

Well said.

It's the coaches job not to let it get "that bad". As much as this appears to be true, I'm sure another part of it was the fact we already stomped Washington into the ground earlier in the year and we just plain old "didn't want to be there", because during the Oklahoma game it didn't look like we gave up, but for the bowl game, combining the fact that the team may have started turning on Martinez plus the fact we didn't want to play in a re-match, could have all equaled what we saw on the field that night.

I just think with all the hooplah of the last Big XII season, Texas, Oklahoma, getting robbed against A&M, last conference trips to Manhattan, Stillwater, Ames, College Station, still upset about 00:01, moving conferences, "not running from Texas", Freshman Quarterback, dropped passes, Watson under controversy, Eric Martin hit/suspension, Cotton's parts being grabbed and nothing was done about it, Beebe not showing up to present us the North trophy, Beebe saying there were threats against him that were never followed up on, Taylor quitting/not quitting/quitting/not quitting, Bo's demeanor at A&M, one last time against Oklahoma, Another Biased Call signs and waving yellow flags during the Colorado game, quarterback controversy at the start of the year, Zac Who talk, minimal depth at quarterback....I think that just mentally wore on the team, coaching staff, and fans to the fact that we choked away the Big XII Championship game, and a re-match in the same bowl as the year before against a team we already blew out....ya we were done after the announcement of what bowl we would play in. We clearly weren't interested in being there, and it showed, and it showed even more if that was the game the team gave up on the season and finally Martinez at that point in time if it happened

However, it's still the coaches jobs to not let it get to that level. Time to circle the wagons, move on and all we can worry about is next year.

Did Nebraska have as big of distractions as Auburn? They didn't even know for a while whether their hypseman QB was even going to be eligible the remainder of the season. Yet, they seemed to do just fine. In 1995, TO had to throw our potential hypseman RB off the team. Yet, we continued to win just the same. Great teams find a way to win despite distractions.

I have always wondered over the past couple of seasons who really did make the decision on which QB played. When things were imploding against Texas, who really made the call for Lee to go into the game? I have a feeling the question will be answered in the 2011 season.

 

[PaulCrewe]

Shawn Watson says you all are stupid. I had no idea of what kind of an offense I was running for the last three years.

WHAT!?! Wrong forum? The Woodshed, in the Quips thread? Tough, it fits perfectly right here.