How do we feel about our Special Teams coach!?

[rocklloyd]

Fran gets “help” for balance of season and fires him at end.

 

[djcon57]

It will change but he isn’t going to publicly humiliate a guy. My guess is you will see some “help”

I’m hoping you are right on the “help” part

regardless, if we don’t see this get better going forward, it’s on Fran. Either by not getting rid of the guy or not getting the right “help”.

 

[kingtidge]

Fran gets “help” for balance of season and fires him at end.

Bring in the linebackers coach from the Memphis Showboats to help with ST through the end of the year and let him take over ST next year

Alpha and Omega.

 

[Dr. Bill]

They are taught to block, then release to try and cover.

Its obvious all they want to do is cover and don’t want to block.

That’s a coaching thing.

 

[Dr. Bill]

A coaching thing!! This is the first block. UNLV lineup with 8 men on the line, notice that 2 are linked up in the gap to the right of the center…. One of these guys comes free unblocked up the middle. The last OL men to the left, looks inside and lets the outside defender rush the punter unblocked!!!! #72 on the second line on the left,looks inside and doesn’t block the guy on his outside at all!!!! How is that coaching? The guy is back there to block and he blocks no one!!!

 

[kcsu]

I don’t see him firing him till after the season but I can see him having other coaches step in to right the ship.

100%. He said what he had to say during the press conference. But... he also made it clear that he was personally going to fix it. That he was going to reach out to other coaches. That he was going to do a deep dive not that he was going to let his special teams coach fix it. Going forward I believe that Fran will take over the special team's unit with help from other coaches. I would bet that our current coach will find another opportunity after the season.

 

[djcon57]

A coaching thing!! This is the first block. UNLV lineup with 8 men on the line, notice that 2 are linked up in the gap to the right of the center…. One of these guys comes free unblocked up the middle. The last OL men to the left, looks inside and lets the outside defender rush the punter unblocked!!!! #72 on the second line on the left,looks inside and doesn’t block the guy on his outside at all!!!! How is that coaching? The guy is back there to block and he blocks no one!!!

I highly assume he’s taught to block the guy first coming at him at a straight line which was 23.

The issue is with the right tackle at the line not holding the block or possibly not blocking anyone at all.

You can say it’s not coaching but I’d disagree, to me, issue is the players absolutely do not understand this formation and what their jobs are.

 

[orange_in_VA]

Fire this dude into the sun! It's the worst ST I've ever seen

 

[FrancoPizza]

I wonder what the probability of a win is when a team has 2 punt blocks (or one block and one muff) lead to TD’s? Has to be very low.

Didn’t VT do that to us in the 1998 game at the Dome? Maybe we’re on to something… unbeaten when we let a team block us twice.

 

[007]

I don't believe this for one second.

What is the second word of DART? Accountability isn't let's all hold his hand and figure it out. The dude has a job, he is the worst at his profession at it, if you can't hold the staff accountable then how can you expect that from the players?


Dude is over his head, he needed to go after the last game and if we lost this game they should've gave strapped him to the goal post and waited for the Raiders staff to release him.

Always such a measured and reasonable thought process...

As other have said, Fran is not going to publicly eviscerate the guy. He mentioned specifically in the PC that the "man has a wife and a family" when one of the reporters brought up making a change. He again took full responsibility publicly and said he would be on the phone to call other coaches about how to fix the issues.

Without saying it directly, and without strapping the dude to the goal posts, he said it. At a minimum, there will be a change to the punt blocking scheme and maybe the ST personnel. I'm sure that behind closed doors Vollono knows exactly where he stands in all this.

 

[OburgOrange]

 

[two3zone]

Always such a measured and reasonable thought process...

As other have said, Fran is not going to publicly eviscerate the guy. He mentioned specifically in the PC that the "man has a wife and a family" when one of the reporters brought up making a change. He again took full responsibility publicly and said he would be on the phone to call other coaches about how to fix the issues.

Without saying it directly, and without strapping the dude to the goal posts, he said it. At a minimum, there will be a change to the punt blocking scheme and maybe the ST personnel. I'm sure that behind closed doors Vollono knows exactly where he stands in all this.

You realize this is a message board right?

 

[Dr. Bill]

I highly assume he’s taught to block the guy first coming at him at a straight line which was 23.

The issue is with the right tackle at the line not holding the block or possibly not blocking anyone at all.

You can say it’s not coaching but I’d disagree, to me, issue is the players absolutely do not understand this formation and what their jobs are.

Look at the tape of the play again, the guy on the second level on the left side blocks no one!! LIke driving a car and making a left hand turn, you check left first, no car, then check right, and turn..here head is on a swivel, look inside first... the inside guy was picked up by the second level blocker to your left, check outside next. # 72 makes the fundamental mistake of moving his entire body inside instead of just looking, then he see guy is covered, then looks outside...but because he moved inside first, it is too late because dude is past him!! You can't tell me these guys were not "coached" on how to block this play...they teach you this in high school!! The guy doesn't block a man who runs completely free ! Put the blame where it belongs..on the players who missed the block. Look at # 72's body language as the punter is tackled...He knows he screwed up!! The second block for the TD...is an even worse case of players not blocking ...3 guys came free so fast...how does that happen??

 

[AZOrange]

Always such a measured and reasonable thought process...

As other have said, Fran is not going to publicly eviscerate the guy. He mentioned specifically in the PC that the "man has a wife and a family" when one of the reporters brought up making a change. He again took full responsibility publicly and said he would be on the phone to call other coaches about how to fix the issues.

Without saying it directly, and without strapping the dude to the goal posts, he said it. At a minimum, there will be a change to the punt blocking scheme and maybe the ST personnel. I'm sure that behind closed doors Vollono knows exactly where he stands in all this.

Not sure I’ve ever really see 2 guys in front of the punter in the modern special teams game. I thought they forgot a guy twice

 

[SWC75]

 

[dasher]

you guys are missing the big picture on this. We could have had 3 blocked punts and we had only 2. And that ain't bad

 

[Chip]

Regarding punting. Don’t punt. If a 4th and not likely comes up simply throw a deep pass. Outcomes:
1. It is caught. Huge positive.
2. It is intercepted. Works like a punt.
3. It is incomplete. This is the worst case as you turn it over on downs but absolutely better than a “punt-six” or whatever the hell we saw last night.

Intentionally under throw it. Best chance of WR adjusting to the ball, or DPI because the defender doesn’t look back, or an interception that shouldn’t be much of a return. Most players love the stat too much to bat it down.

 

[SU91]

Here’s a discussion point that’s a bit different than the obvious mistakes…what’s up with our punt return and kickoff return blocking schemes? There doesn’t seem to be any. Does anyone have observations on this? Difficult to tell on TV but Pena is going to get killed.

 

[Dr. Bill]

I highly assume he’s taught to block the guy first coming at him at a straight line which was 23.

The issue is with the right tackle at the line not holding the block or possibly not blocking anyone at all.

You can say it’s not coaching but I’d disagree, to me, issue is the players absolutely do not understand this formation and what their jobs are.

 

[dwilmont44]

Look at the tape of the play again, the guy on the second level on the left side blocks no one!! LIke driving a car and making a left hand turn, you check left first, no car, then check right, and turn..here head is on a swivel, look inside first... the inside guy was picked up by the second level blocker to your left, check outside next. # 72 makes the fundamental mistake of moving his entire body inside instead of just looking, then he see guy is covered, then looks outside...but because he moved inside first, it is too late because dude is past him!! You can't tell me these guys were not "coached" on how to block this play...they teach you this in high school!! The guy doesn't block a man who runs completely free ! Put the blame where it belongs..on the players who missed the block. Look at # 72's body language as the punter is tackled...He knows he screwed up!! The second block for the TD...is an even worse case of players not blocking ...3 guys came free so fast...how does that happen??

Bad coaching is how that happens

 

[AckerMan]

Here’s a discussion point that’s a bit different than the obvious mistakes…what’s up with our punt return and kickoff return blocking schemes? There doesn’t seem to be any. Does anyone have observations on this? Difficult to tell on TV but Pena is going to get killed.

This to me is the smoking gun on why he needs to be fired. It’s not just miscues and 1-2 people not doing their job. Every aspect of every unit on special teams is producing nothing.

 

[Dr. Bill]

Look at the block: UNLV has 8 guys on the line, 5 of which are all to the left side of the left guard guard. On the right side of our OL , first level, we only have 3 guys(Center, guard, tackle) to block 5 guys. Two defensive linemen will run into the backfield unblocked. The right tackle completely ignores the man over him and moves to block inside, leaving this guy unblocked. the 3rd level blocker on that side moves inside because he see a free defender, but that defender is picked up by his partner, by this time, it is too late for him to pick up the outside rusher to his right and this guy blocks the punt. The biggest problem here is the fact that the defense has 5 /8 guys overloaded to one side with 3 guys in the gaps on either side of the center. We have enough guys to block, they are just not in the right locations to pick up all of the defenders. Each blocker needs to account for each defender, and that didn't happen here, one guy blocked no one...and this guy blocks the punt!

 

[billsin01]

a special teams play not talked about. UNLV kicked off from the 20 and we got the ball at our own 16. That’s tough to do.

That was brutal. Unlv had been kicking the ball through the end zone all night. They get the 15-yard penalty, you have to figure it would be somewhere around the goal-line or maybe the 5-yard-line. That’s about where it landed, but we were chasing the kick backwards. I just don’t understand how that happened. Like we can’t do math or something.

 

[Dr. Bill]

Bad coaching is how that happens

We are all too fast to blame the coaches...just like parents want to blame the teachers for their kid's bad grades...If your kid isn't studying for the test and doing his homework, he will get a bad grade. # 72 missed his assignment, he didn't block the free defender to his side...simple as that! Either he learns from his mistake or we get another guy to play that position. That is not a Coach's fault. Stop blaming he coaches. Coach Fran said it best in his press conference, it is disrespectful! We want to jump right to bad coaching.

 

[SUDadx2]

Before I bust on the ST coach...

ST has always been a pathway for 2s and 3s for playing time. Massive dedication to STs. Massive.

I understand Fran wanting 1s to be more appealing in the draft, but I'm going to start here.

1s are dedicating 95% of their time to their position. I'm guessing a guy that's donating 90% of his time to specials might just be better at it.

They earned the right to wear that uniform for a reason, too. Let em specialize.

I cannot stand the rationale of playing starters on special teams to enhance to appeal to the NFL. I would prefer we focus on winning games now.

It is unconscionable to me that Gadsden would NOT be off the field on 2nd and 20, but would be on the field to be the adjuster for punt team. Foolish to not have Gadsden in the field for almost every offensive snap.

Using Petry and Mang as personal protectors is a bad decision. Neither has the lateral mobility to be affective nor the speed to get down field after ball is kicked. Besides that, both are going to be tired following an offensive series.

Our kickoff return team is bad. Why can’t the returner figure out when to put up the iron cross or fair catch the ball? We seem to be experimenting with new returners every week and many are true freshmen who lack the experience to make good decisions in games. It’s doesn’t have to be that complicated, fair catch the kick and start the possession at the 25 yard line.

We have played five games and every week there’s a new adventure on special teams. We should be settling in a getting better, instead we are still trying to figure out how not to beat ourselves.


The most frustrating part for me is how good could we be with a few adjustments?

- Fire Vollono.
- Put the o-line coach on notice
- Leave Gadsden on the field and stop running him on curls and hitches. He’s a hybrid TE let him run crossing routes. He ran one last night for a big gain.
- Can we stop giving WR’s a ten yard cushion?


Go Orange!