Where is Dennard Robinson?

[zoogs]

The identity thing is overblown, just in my opinion. Equally, the "multiple" stigma is also overblown and an unnecessarily lingering backlash against previous coaches on offense. Maybe they failed here, but multiple should not be a bad word. Every offense wants to be multiple, in its own way, unless you have absolutely no choice (injured, reigned-in offense at the back end of '09). Even Tom Osborne's power attack and option was multiple because they could strike in all these different ways.

And as far as identity goes, I think sometimes we just want a simple one-word label that makes real-world sense to be able to attach to the offense. Like "smashmouth" or "run literally all the time". But not having a label doesn't mean Tim Beck doesn't have a core set of principles he's put in place, or that he doesn't really have a clue of what he's doing and he's just throwing things every which way at the walls.

And even the much-maligned West Coast offense can be based on a smashmouth running game (see Stanford, just for example). If you really want to talk about a finessy, pass-happy game, maybe look at Spurrier's Fun-n-Gun or the Air Leach, but could our present commitment to the ground game be any more clear?

 

[Decked]

Im just going to come out and say it, I dislike dual threat QBs. Pro style all the way.

I knew you were really zoogies.

How did you find that out?

 

[knapplc]

The identity thing is overblown, just in my opinion. Equally, the "multiple" stigma is also overblown and an unnecessarily lingering backlash against previous coaches on offense. Maybe they failed here, but multiple should not be a bad word. Every offense wants to be multiple, in its own way, unless you have absolutely no choice (injured, reigned-in offense at the back end of '09). Even Tom Osborne's power attack and option was multiple because they could strike in all these different ways.

And as far as identity goes, I think sometimes we just want a simple one-word label that makes real-world sense to be able to attach to the offense. Like "smashmouth" or "run literally all the time". But not having a label doesn't mean Tim Beck doesn't have a core set of principles he's put in place, or that he doesn't really have a clue of what he's doing and he's just throwing things every which way at the walls.

And even the much-maligned West Coast offense can be based on a smashmouth running game (see Stanford, just for example). If you really want to talk about a finessy, pass-happy game, maybe look at Spurrier's Fun-n-Gun or the Air Leach, but could our present commitment to the ground game be any more clear?

Heck, the Niners had a pretty darned good running attack with Craig and Rathman back in the day, based on Walsh's West Coast Offense (which I believe he brought over from Cincy or Cleveland, so "WCO" is a misnomer).

Really, any scheme will work as long as you have the athletes to run it, train them properly, and know what you're doing. I frankly don't care if we run the West Coast Offense, Wing T, Wishbone, Fun 'N Gun or the fan-favorite Option as long as whatever we do, we do it well.

 

[tschu]

Agreed. Basically, we don't have the O-Line to have a purely run-based offense, but we don't have the QB to have a pass-happy offense. And the QB is more visible than the line, so people jump on Taylor.

 

[bshirt]

Agreed. Basically, we don't have the O-Line to have a purely run-based offense, but we don't have the QB to have a pass-happy offense. And the QB is more visible than the line, so people jump on Taylor.

You got it.

 

[kchusker_chris]

What's ironic about everyone's hatred w/ the WCO is that it was developed to compensate for a marginal passer under center (which we have). It's not a "pass all the time" thing like 99% of Nebraskan's think it is. It's based on short, high percentage passes. Many of which are horizontal and get your playmakers at WR (which we now finally have) into space. Some teams use the "spread" to do the same thing. The WCO is nice because you can run power football out of the same formations because your OL isn't spread so much.

I think we saw many of these principals used by Martinez against Northwestern. He was 76% that game with 2 TDs. It should have opened up a lot of things for Burkhead - but he was so gassed from Michigan St. that it obviously didn't. Here were the complete passes from Martinez in that game.

7,11,4,12,5,25,5,8,6,13,5,10,17,2,8,15,9,6,15,13,4,15,8,25,8,6,13,14.

He was very consistent that game. You can see (alternating bold/regular indicated drives) we actually had sustained passing drives. Crazy. We moved the ball well. We lost - but I don't think you can put that one on offensive scheme. Then you look at the very next game against Penn State, where he was 50% for 0 TDs...

15,5,14,12,5,1,24,8,17,1,24,6,1

There were multiple drives in there where Martinez didn't even pass the ball, or didn't have a completion. His yardages were all over the board. No consistency in the passing game. We won that one though.

I think we can win both ways. I think Martinez has proven (Oklahoma St, Northwestern) - that if put in the right position (not like Wisconsin) he can pass the ball consistently and effectively. At the same time we've proven against teams like Michigan St, Penn State, Iowa, etc...that we can win the other way. Martinez's attempts are generally shots down field or to keep the defense honest. Completion % isn't that important.

What I don't like to see is a lack of consistency (some call it identity) throughout an entire game (Wisconsin, SC). Beck out thinks himself sometimes (Watson did frequently as well). Look for that to change this year.

 

[knapplc]

What's ironic about everyone's hatred w/ the WCO is that it was developed to compensate for a marginal passer under center (which we have). It's not a "pass all the time" thing like 99% of Nebraskan's think it is.

I think most Nebraskans understand the WCO. I think the hatred for it stems, as zoogies points out, from its association with Callahan, a much-disliked coach. I really think it boils down to that.

 

[zoogs]

I also think it's not really to compensate for a marginal passer, at least not the kind we have. The West Coast "marginal" passer is a guy who maybe isn't 6'4, 225 and doesn't have the cannon arm to throw 70-yard strikes. Instead, it requires an extremely cerebral guy who's immersed in the system and keys on timing. That's nothing close to feasible for us right now.

Even with Watson we moved away from it when we decided to go to a running, read option kind of attack, but we still kept the terminology. Now we don't have that either. +1 to your post by the way knapp. Hopefully we are going to get there. At the least things look stable now, like we're going to build towards something long term.

 

[The Dude]

Im just going to come out and say it, I dislike dual threat QBs. Pro style all the way.

What is an pro style QB anymore? Guys like Aaron Rodgers, Cam Newton, Mike Vick, Tony Romo, RGIII, Andrew Luck, ect makes me think that the NFL is starting to trend towards more athletic QBs.

 

[kchusker_chris]

I also think it's not really to compensate for a marginal passer, at least not the kind we have. The West Coast "marginal" passer is a guy who maybe isn't 6'4, 225 and doesn't have the cannon arm to throw 70-yard strikes. Instead, it requires an extremely cerebral guy who's immersed in the system and keys on timing. That's nothing close to feasible for us right now.

Yeah I can agree w/ this. Then again not a single person (HC/OC included) has been immersed in our system beyond 12-16 months. Talking Husker offense is depressing.

 

[Jeremy]

I don't know if a stretch play with lateral zone blocking can be counted as a power play, and Callahan ran that stuff to death. Ferentz also likes it, as the bootleg play action off it opens up a lot of space for crossing/post routes and/or the FB/TE in the flat. In those kinds of runs, pancakes are avoided, because that trips up the other linemen and clogs running and cutback lanes. We grew to love and recognize pancakes here in the Cornhusker State for so long, and to completely flip that on its head had an understandable impact on the fanbase. I mean, sometimes it really DOES look like those linemen are playing patty-cake.

One of the disadvantages of the WCO is that blitzing can be highly effective at stopping it, whereas with a moble QB in the spread or power option, blitzing is a very big gamble, and can give up huge plays.

I don't think we recruit well enough to get linemen that can dominate in the running game while also giving Martinez all day to throw the ball. We can, however, get some big boys that know how to push the other guys around, though they might not be the best at pass blocking.

 

[bshirt]

I also think it's not really to compensate for a marginal passer, at least not the kind we have. The West Coast "marginal" passer is a guy who maybe isn't 6'4, 225 and doesn't have the cannon arm to throw 70-yard strikes. Instead, it requires an extremely cerebral guy who's immersed in the system and keys on timing. That's nothing close to feasible for us right now.

Yeah I can agree w/ this. Then again not a single person (HC/OC included) has been immersed in our system beyond 12-16 months. Talking Husker offense is depressing.

Heh. What's depressing is not having the foggiest clue what Beck is going to do. Whatever the heck it is, I have two things I really pray for....

1. Tim, "please" reduce trying to be cute. Surprise or not, guys like Turner & Reed simply aren't going to block anybody. Send them on their routes (write them on JT's hands if you have to....maybe both hands) but leave the heavy duty stuff to Cotton and others.

2. Unshackle Tmart for the runs and forget the slides. Trying to make him out to be Dan Marino (Wisconsin) simply isn't going to happen. We've got backups ready now so use him for the weapon he is or go with someone else.

I know I sound harse but I really don't intend to. Everybody rightfully gets 1st year mulligans and so should he. But "now" it's put up or shut up. I think/hope he'll stand.

GBR!

 

[bshirt]

I don't know if a stretch play with lateral zone blocking can be counted as a power play, and Callahan ran that stuff to death. Ferentz also likes it, as the bootleg play action off it opens up a lot of space for crossing/post routes and/or the FB/TE in the flat. In those kinds of runs, pancakes are avoided, because that trips up the other linemen and clogs running and cutback lanes. We grew to love and recognize pancakes here in the Cornhusker State for so long, and to completely flip that on its head had an understandable impact on the fanbase. I mean, sometimes it really DOES look like those linemen are playing patty-cake.

One of the disadvantages of the WCO is that blitzing can be highly effective at stopping it, whereas with a moble QB in the spread or power option, blitzing is a very big gamble, and can give up huge plays.

I don't think we recruit well enough to get linemen that can dominate in the running game while also giving Martinez all day to throw the ball. We can, however, get some big boys that know how to push the other guys around, though they might not be the best at pass blocking.

Yes!!

That's precisely where the "multiple" stuff kills us. Sure, if we were the NFL with truly endless practice time and talent that could work for us. But we're not. Sure, being "multiple" and/or "balanced" in theory sounds great (hey...we can do anything!) but in the real cfb world that very rarely works without overwhelming talent.

We have to have something we're really good at when the heat of battle is intense. I would even prefer a glorious zoogies scenario where we're the pirate and air the ball 90% of the time if that's what we recruit & practice for.

Trying to do everything in the cfb environment is suicide unless you've got an overwhelming talent edge that NU simply never has had. We have to excel at something (which means we have to recruit and practice for) or we'll never get back to a premier status. Never. We're not Florida, Texas or USC with endless 5 star recruits every year.

GBR!!

 

[BlueInTheFace]

At 6, Robinson is overrated. Not a good QB... Really good gamebreaker, but I would go insane with him as a QB.

I'm pretty sure a lot of Husker fans would think the same way with Martinez. Or at least used to. But the more I watch from him last year, he really is developing as a QB...not sure if Michigan fans would think the same about Robinson.

Martinez also isn't frequently ranked in the top 10 list of B1G players like Robinson is. I just don't see it. Neither does Brady Hoke...

Not sure what this means.

As for the rest of ya'll:

 

[HuskerShark]

At 6, Robinson is overrated. Not a good QB... Really good gamebreaker, but I would go insane with him as a QB.

I'm pretty sure a lot of Husker fans would think the same way with Martinez. Or at least used to. But the more I watch from him last year, he really is developing as a QB...not sure if Michigan fans would think the same about Robinson.

Martinez also isn't frequently ranked in the top 10 list of B1G players like Robinson is. I just don't see it. Neither does Brady Hoke...

Not sure what this means.

Why would Hoke ever take Robinson out of a game if he thought he was the best QB in the conference?... The best QB in the conference wouldn't be sharing playing time with another QB.