Playcalling is something I try not to criticize too much, because I frankly know nothing about how playcalling an offense really works. I know about exploiting strengths and weaknesses in Madden and believe me, I can really exploit a defense there, but this is a completely different animal. That said, I will add that I am very, very critical of the playcalling at the end of the OU, especially because of the magnitude of the situation. That said, there are others that are more knowledgeable about this sort of thing, so I will just shut up and mostly defer to them here. Jaw at HI, who wrote the excerpted portions above, is someone I consider to be fairly knowledgeable in this area, but opinions vary.
Plus, Bo is still figuring out what type of offense he wants. But at this point he is still trying to get the right recruits for that offense and at the same time win games. So we don't have an identity because of this. That is why so many new coaches fail...they try to ram in their system with the wrong players and have multiple bad seasons. Which in turn gets the coach fired before he can establish the culture he wants.
This goes back to the offense's problems being put on Bo. He is having quite a hand in the offense's operation, which is fully appropriate as head coach. But if that's going to be the case, and he is figuring out and changing his mind and trying to ram a system in the wrong way with coaches, then it all goes back on him. Which could get
him fired (probably never while Osborne is around though), or at least hurt the team to the point where fans will want him to be fired. That's something I hope will never come to pass. I'd hate to see it and love the defense we are establishing here.
But Bo has to figure out something different about how to steer the offense though. When I say coaches, by the way, I am talking about Barney, as he is completely unsuited as an OL coach for the spread option, and the men in the trenches really are critical to any offense. Watson can work in more or less WCO principles but isn't particularly wedded to him past it being a preference thing. I think he's a guy that really will take the strengths of a team's roster, and play to them. IMO Bo can do better just by letting Watson run his own show a lot more independently. It's no good having an OC that will play and adapt the offense to any kind of strength depending on the year, when Bo will tie it down to certain styles. Then again, this could be an unfair characterization. The sunshine pumper in me says that Watson and Bo are on the same page but it's getting harder to believe that.
Then for the guy to say Blaine Gabbert would have made a difference is ludicrous. Not with the offensive philosophy that Bo wants anyways. He wants a QB that can be a threat to run to make defenses account for all 11 guys on the offense. It is basically like when we ran the power option in a way. Defenses had to account for the QB as well. That is what I heard him say in an interview anyways...that was straight from Bo.
This is symptomatic of the problem in my opinion. If we had a Blaine Gabbert here, we should run to play to Gabbert's strengths, regardless of whether Bo loves running QBs or not. We're talking about an elite talent at quarterback here and he would definitely have made a difference. We wouldn't have gone to this offense while Gabbert was starting, for one thing. And a note on the 'accounting for 11 guys' - yes, that's something that will work very well, as we've seen this year. But it also closes other doors, as everything really has trade-offs. With a top QB like Gabbert, you can make full use of all the other playmakers on offense and get a lot more creative, not in the least because of how much more of the playbook you would have open to you. You look at how innovative OU with Landry can get, even though we don't have to really account for Landry's running (except on 4th and 1, I guess!) When we have a guy who may not ever reach that level in the mental part of the game, the playbook closes down and people wonder why we are always running the same plays. When some of the things we want to see (some I formation, runs up the middle, and then playaction/deep passes) would be there if Green had to go in. And if you ask me, once Taylor's legs are negated and defenses don't have to defend 11-on-11 it hinders us so immensely it isn't even funny. Why Bo decided to stick with Taylor when it was obvious OU wasn't defending 11-on-11 is beyond me.
The advantage with a guy like Taylor is if the light does come on enough he will just be deadly. And we don't have Gabbert, so that debate is too hypothetical to really get into.
On QBs, I think the problem is more that we just missed on guys. Witt left and was never really replaced. Spano replaced Gabbert which, respect to Kody, isn't a fair trade, and then it's moot anyways since Spano has been hurt - and hasn't been replaced. And even before that, when Freeman left and wasn't replaced in that class. Lee is a guy that can do a little of both but is mostly a passer. Green is really a runner that can't make people miss like Taylor can, the only reason people think he's a 'sorta both' guy is because he is farther along than Taylor in passing, but that is only because Taylor was so, so far behind to start with. Green and Taylor were both project type players. Speaking on that, we DID commit to recruiting run first QBs and that's dangerous IMO, because when you have too many projects pretty soon you don't have anyone who is really solid in crucial things like quarterbacking fundamentals. It's why to me a guy like Carnes who is a *true* dual threat, was so important for us and even then we were lucky to get him at the end after losing another Gabbert. I would rather have a mix, but we haven't and that's partly responsible for the lack of depth IMO. Not so much this year maybe, as last year, when we needed a spark to replace Lee but Green was in no way, shape or form ready for that, and we had to limp by with injured Lee for the rest of the year.
These are just some minor squabbling points though, in response to one or two of your points. Don't take it as an authoritative opinion, just a "just my opinion" kind of thing. I know most will disagree on the mix of QB styles. It is how most schools operate though, as Vince Young was followed by a guy like Colt McCoy since Colt was best (and not Sherrod Harris or John Chiles or other projects they had that didn't pan out), and now their best guy is again a pro-style guy, or Florida with Tim Tebow being followed by Brantley...or Ohio State, which I don't know much about, but it's not like Pryor is for sure going to be replaced with some read option QB. IMO for project guys, the light has to come on to run with them and if not, we will need QBs that can QB to build the offense around. It's no help in our offense to have a QB that can't do those fundamental QB things. Maybe we are trying to evolve past that as Oregon perhaps has done, but I'm skeptical as long as we are trying to do that with Barney and with WCO principles in the passing game.
