Marrone and Rahme are just plain wrong

[CIL]

You're missing my point. We're not going 8-4 with this offense.

What was our record last year, 8-5? And where are we now, 4-2? Was our offense worse last year? If it was, does that mean defense actually means something?

It's all about selling bowls and trending positive to potential players, period. 6-6 works right now for Doug, unlike a Schiano. Doug can now say we've been to two consecutive bowls after not being in one for close to a decade.

Now, if we are still selling 6-6 five years from now like Schiano, then we have issues - that just means your program is stagnant.

 

[kingottoiii]

I see what you did there, it was generic. Let me say it much clearer for you leach jr, it's easier to sell winning than losing, bowl vs no bowls.

I'm not anti spread, anti wishbone or anti anything - I too want an offense that scores points, but I'd rather have a team that wins.

I think you're missing my point, which is this offense doesn't have the talent to run any type of effective offense, spread or flexbone. Marrone's belief is that this vanilla pro style offense helps them eat the clock and move the chains. Is it boring? Yup. Are we winning games? Yup.

Once again, I will reiterate the offense we are seeing isn't the one we will have in a few years. He's trying to sell improvement to recruits and fans. That's really tough to do when you lose.

I agree with you, but not with Marrone. I don't see how having an O that is forced to execute at a high level is better than an O playing to the strength of your talent or that tries to cause mismatches. Wake's O in 2006 was boring as hell and they lacked talent. But it worked for them. What we are doing now doesn't work for us. Nassib isn't a fit for this O. Bailey isn't a fit for this O. Having a TE in over a WR in passing situations isn't a fit for this team. Never going 3 WRs is not a fit for this team. What we are doing with the players we have isn't even logical.

 

[Millhouse]

What was our record last year, 8-5? And where are we now, 4-2? Was our offense worse last year? If it was, does that mean defense actually means something?

It's all about selling bowls and trending positive to potential players, period. 6-6 works right now for Doug, unlike a Schiano. Doug can now say we've been to two consecutive bowls after not being in one for close to a decade.

Now, if we are still selling 6-6 five years from now like Schiano, then we have issues - that just means your program is stagnant.

Of course defense means something. I think that's where almost all the credit belongs for getting to 8-5 last year and I don't think that last year's sh!tshow on offense had much to do with it.

It's really hard to imagine an alternative offense making our record worse last year.

2 IAA and one NAIA-AA school akron.

other regular season wins we gave up 9, 14, 7, 10.

we really couldn't have hoped to average 10 ppg to get bowl eligible in any other offense? that's parianiesque

 

[OrangePA]

Did any of those teams we played this year whose QBs can run better than Nassib run the air raid?

If Nassib is such a terrible runner, why did Marrone put him in the games to run the option in 2009? Are you saying you know more than Doug Marrone? Do yo? Do you?? Give that stupid nonsense a rest, please.

Here's what I think.

Marrone isn't the smartest guy. (Tommy Boy graduated quicker.) He is a very good coach who knows a lot in depth about his own offense. He can't stop on a dime and undo everything he's worked for. That takes time. He has his offense and he has to run with it. That's how it works with these guys - there's specialization and you hope like hell that the competitive environment allows what you know to be successful. Alot of these most successful coaches hit the jackpot.

Marrone knows complex multiple non descript NFL 12th derivative west coast anti-systems. Those don't work as well in college due to youth and limited practice time. It especially doesn't work here where his recruiting philosophy is to teach raw NYC talent basics. He's finding that it doesn't work so well in college and has to come up with terrible excuses for why we can't run anything but the thing that he knows best. He can't possibly believe what he said about running qbs in WVU's current offense.

His way out of this is to hand the keys to an up and coming offensive coordinator who knows the right system in depth - he can narrow his focus to offensive line technique and managing the overall program.

I know that you are the final arbiter on intelligence. I am now a member of your club of stupid people.

You have been identifying stupidity in others for as long as I can recall.

As I have said time again in response to your posts, trying to assess the intelligence of others from long distance is always a bad idea. I would never comment on your intelligence because other than that one moment when I met you at the Sheraton following the Orange's win against ND in 2003, I don't know you at all. (I do recall how down you seemed that night after the game, but that's about it).

I don't know for sure, of course, but I suspect you have never met Doug Marrone. For you to attribute to him average intelligence below average intelligence is I think folly.

The notion that Coach Marrone only knows one offensive system is also folly, considering that he has coached under various systems at Ga Tech, Tenn, GA, and even Cortland State - not to mention his NFL experience.

And Rahme is a profession who speaks with coaches on and off the record for a living. He is reporting what he learns and that's good enough for me.

The idea that Nassib is a decent running QB I think is inaccurate. In 2009 Ryan was asked to run a limited package, the primary purpose of which was to take advantage of his downfield arm strength. The use of the option was not to take advantage of his speed or agility, but to present to defenses the need to play assignment football on certain downs - to alter its basic scheme. It was also an attempt to get him on the field in a way that would provide experience while relying on him to win games at that point. When he spent substantial time in I think the last home game he revealed why he could not handle the job on a full-duty basis.

I love the guy, but he does not have the feet to run anything other than what he is running and I think that's the point that Marrone and Rahme have made.

This is all fun of course. I enjoy the banter. Breaks up the day. So, keep posting - and so will I.

 

[Scooch]

Reading Marrone's quotes again... man, he has completely tied himself up in knots, hasn't he? I'm really concerned he doesn't know what to do at this point. He knows he's getting craptastic production, but it really seems like his solution is the tandem of "less mistakes" and "better talent". Well, no right? Isn't every team not named Oregon trying for the same thing?

I like Marrone a ton, but he totally gives off the impressions that he's drowning sometimes. Last year for those last 4 games he seemed shellshocked. Rutgers week this year he was the same. His statements about the O the past couple weeks inspire no confidence whatsoever. It's troubling.

 

[Chip]

Upon further review and some sober self-scouting, I must say this story was poorly conceptualized, poorly researched and poorly executed. I am embarrassed my name is on it. I should have stuck with my original plan of writing a Nick Provo profile with the short week. I let myself be persuaded otherwise despite some issues going on outside the job. I agree with CIL that Marrone's vision is more Northwestern than New Orleans and believe I saw a lot of that early in the season before foes exposed the weaknesses, which have been well documented by me and others. I believe the mobility of Kinder, Hunt and presumably Broyld plus the premium of running quarterbacks in the ACC point in that direction. It was just a piss-poor job on my part. Unfortunately, there is no delete button in the newspaper.

Not sure if you're being sarcastic Dave, but we wouldn't have a 125 (and growing) post thread if you wrote the Provo article. Given the struggles of our offense in year 3 of Coach Marrone, and the instant success of Holgerson in year 1, I don't think you could have picked a more appropriate topic.

I know you said you had a long discussion with him, and probably had to be careful about what quotes to use. I just think Marrone came off as someone making excuses to some extent, and some of his comments didn't even make a lot of sense. I'm sure off the record, he'd be pretty blunt about the talent level on this team, whether some of that is because it's the only kids he could bring in, or the kids he inherited. But he can't really come out and say that, so he kinda alluded to it.

As Bees said, he's winning more than he's losing, and we're all happy for that by comparison. But is it sustainable to keep winning games in the manner we win them? Seems like a stretch, but hopefully. When Marrone got the job, he was very gung ho about all the attacking we'd be doing. Offense, defense, we were dictating games. Well that worked on one side of the ball, but on offense he's been playing it a little safer each year.

I think the million $ question, and probably the underlying point of your article is, is Marrone doing a good enough job with this offense? Could it be better if he had handed the reigns to a more seasoned OC? Because that's an option now with ACC $. If the answer is that he's doing all he can with what he has to work with, then I guess the question becomes when can we expect his players to develop to the point that we're at least Top 50ish in offense, because right now we're not even close.

 

[Scooch]

I love the guy, but he does not have the feet to run anything other than what he is running and I think that's the point that Marrone and Rahme have made.

Am I losing my mind (possible), but isn't the point that you DON'T need a "running QB" to effectively use a spread?

 

[upperdeck]

really if you just watch just the tulane game you see most of the issues that we address here and why what ever offense people thing we are running is having issues..

You would be hard pressed to find more than a handful of running plays were at least 1 if not 2 of the oline was getting pushed into the backfield. Even the plays that worked we failed as a oline.

Just watched the game last night. Nassib missed 4-5 open rcrvs in the first half , two of which should have been long tds. In the 2nd half Tulane came up tight and we couldnt block anyone on the edge running or passing.

no matter what offense people think we should be running if you cant block 4 men rushing its going to fail..

We are not running the system the coaches want to run.. we are calling plays that we think the D is not expecting because we dont think the team can run the plays that we really want to run in those situations.. You can see that every game we have called 2-3 plays against the D that was expected and still failed to execute. the coach talks about them in the weekly PC so you know its probably frustrating them.

the only thing that we really need to criticize is the play of the oline as that is probably more the issue than any play calling discussion.. the coaches need to fix that

 

[SU94]

I, too, am not enthralled with the offense.
That said, my sky is not falling quite as much as it is for many here.

My reasons for optimism include ...

1.) When Marrone came here, he came in with the spread or some bubble-screen version of it. Someone had planted in his head that this is the way to go at the college level. Having his baseline helps. Or, at least the notion of a spread attack is not foreign to him. Mr. Rahme also alerts us to this fact.

2.) The O-Line should improve in time. I think he has recruited well here and next season we should really see some of the fruits of this. Mackey M. as a starting sophomore center could be a good clue that he could be looking to get some derivation of the spread in place.

3.) Broyld, Hunt and Kinder all fit spread type offenses, or at least many of them. He really has not recruited many pocket QBs. *Perhaps Chad Kelly, but he went to Klempson, so we will never know. And who knows exactly just how hard we recruited him. And, for all I know, the Kelly kid might be wicked fast.

3a.) Wasn't there an interview recently in which Marrone himself was very open to an offensive attack that is based on a mobile quarterback. I remember something from about 3-4 weeks ago. And I was happy to see it. Does anyone remember where that came from and can we peek at it again?

4.) Say what you will about Marrone (I'll be upfront, I am a big big supporter), he is self-reflective both personally and in terms of the program. If he does not like the end result, he'll make adjustments or changes.

Now, I may believe he may have made a slightly faulty choice in the spring of 2010 switching to more of a pro style, but it is hard to argue that it worked (8-5, Bowl Game victory) at least in the short term. We are on our way.

And let's also admit that the programs assent is not without various ups and downs along the way.

 

[IthacaBarrel]

Reading Marrone's quotes again... man, he has completely tied himself up in knots, hasn't he? I'm really concerned he doesn't know what to do at this point. He knows he's getting craptastic production, but it really seems like his solution is the tandem of "less mistakes" and "better talent". Well, no right? Isn't every team not named Oregon trying for the same thing?

I like Marrone a ton, but he totally gives off the impressions that he's drowning sometimes. Last year for those last 4 games he seemed shellshocked. Rutgers week this year he was the same. His statements about the O the past couple weeks inspire no confidence whatsoever. It's troubling.

Good post, which begins to lend itself to a woodshed beating tomorrow night and hoping we can white knuckle a few more wins versus UCONN, Lville and maybe one more. He's basically admitting that we can't outscore anybody with skill on O if need be

 

[Avatusstone28]

What was our record last year, 8-5? And where are we now, 4-2? Was our offense worse last year? If it was, does that mean defense actually means something?

It's all about selling bowls and trending positive to potential players, period. 6-6 works right now for Doug, unlike a Schiano. Doug can now say we've been to two consecutive bowls after not being in one for close to a decade.

Now, if we are still selling 6-6 five years from now like Schiano, then we have issues - that just means your program is stagnant.

I completely agree, but what puzzles me, is the fact that Schiano can still recruit like crazy. Despite his mediocre tenure at Rutgers.

I have no doubt, that if Marrone can start getting some playmakers, this program will be successful.

 

[Millhouse]

I know that you are the final arbiter on intelligence. I am now a member of your club of stupid people.

You have been identifying stupidity in others for as long as I can recall.

As I have said time again in response to your posts, trying to assess the intelligence of others from long distance is always a bad idea. I would never comment on your intelligence because other than that one moment when I met you at the Sheraton following the Orange's win against ND in 2003, I don't know you at all. (I do recall how down you seemed that night after the game, but that's about it).

I don't know for sure, of course, but I suspect you have never met Doug Marrone. For you to attribute to him average intelligence below average intelligence is I think folly.

The notion that Coach Marrone only knows one offensive system is also folly, considering that he has coached under various systems at Ga Tech, Tenn, GA, and even Cortland State - not to mention his NFL experience.

And Rahme is a profession who speaks with coaches on and off the record for a living. He is reporting what he learns and that's good enough for me.

The idea that Nassib is a decent running QB I think is inaccurate. In 2009 Ryan was asked to run a limited package, the primary purpose of which was to take advantage of his downfield arm strength. The use of the option was not to take advantage of his speed or agility, but to present to defenses the need to play assignment football on certain downs - to alter its basic scheme. It was also an attempt to get him on the field in a way that would provide experience while relying on him to win games at that point. When he spent substantial time in I think the last home game he revealed why he could not handle the job on a full-duty basis.

I love the guy, but he does not have the feet to run anything other than what he is running and I think that's the point that Marrone and Rahme have made.

This is all fun of course. I enjoy the banter. Breaks up the day. So, keep posting - and so will I.

I didn't say you were stupid. I called your post stupid nonsense.

I'm surprised I made such an impression on you. I'm sorry I don't remember how your mood was 7 years ago.

Marrone came to SU in 1982, left in 1985, and graduated in 1991. Some really smart people take that long to graduate - they're called doctors.

 

[upperdeck]

I bet if you let coach all the plays for WV and halderston call the plays for SU people still be unhappy with the results.. is anyone denying that across the board that every skill player at WV would be starting ahead of the SU kid? the fact the coach came out and said they need to recruit playmakers in the luncheon pretty much sums up the fact they know they have a limited ability to change the game in a good way by calling plays.

when the WV kids can run around and get open against the LSU D then you know it goes way beyond play calling. Pitts coach had great offenses at tulsa goes to Pitt with probably more talent and fails, did he forget how to call plays or is he lacking a solid QB to run the team and and oline that gives up too many sacks?

 

[Millhouse]

I bet if you let coach all the plays for WV and halderston call the plays for SU people still be unhappy with the results.. is anyone denying that across the board that every skill player at WV would be starting ahead of the SU kid? the fact the coach came out and said they need to recruit playmakers in the luncheon pretty much sums up the fact they know they have a limited ability to change the game in a good way by calling plays.

when the WV kids can run around and get open against the LSU D then you know it goes way beyond play calling. Pitts coach had great offenses at tulsa goes to Pitt with probably more talent and fails, did he forget how to call plays or is he lacking a solid QB to run the team and and oline that gives up too many sacks?

this would have much more merit if their offense wasn't 35% better than last year's

no one is arguing that we have more talent than WVU. we just like david halberstam's offense better

and todd graham is a defense guy. he had his best success when malzahn was his OC. kinda helps our point about the importance of having a good college OC

 

[IthacaBarrel]

I bet if you let coach all the plays for WV and halderston call the plays for SU people still be unhappy with the results.. is anyone denying that across the board that every skill player at WV would be starting ahead of the SU kid? the fact the coach came out and said they need to recruit playmakers in the luncheon pretty much sums up the fact they know they have a limited ability to change the game in a good way by calling plays.

when the WV kids can run around and get open against the LSU D then you know it goes way beyond play calling. Pitts coach had great offenses at tulsa goes to Pitt with probably more talent and fails, did he forget how to call plays or is he lacking a solid QB to run the team and and oline that gives up too many sacks?

this would be fine in year 1, as in Pitt's case the fact is it's year 3 and we are still hearing the same stuff. Geno Smith isn't a world beater, you don't see Holgorsen making excuses stating that he needs a more accurate passer and a better decision make at QB. SMith was recruited to run a different system. Like I said, it has been a built in excuse for years now.. Lack of playmakers would be a decent answer if we were average and couldn't get over the hump, right now we are disfumctional

 

[DaveR52]

No sarcasm at all Chip. It may have been an appropriate topic but it was handled poorly by me. There is simply no way around it. Whether folks here criticize or praise me and whether Coach Marrone pats me on the back or bites my head off with the cameras running, I ultimately use the mirror as my guide. If I can look in it and the face looks back and says you were honest, you were fair, you did the best you could I am OK with it. Half the people will think I have some kind of agenda regardless, so that is my guide. This time, the mirror told me I failed on the latter part of that formula. I'm sure we've all felt that way at some time or another.

 

[kingottoiii]

the fact the coach came out and said they need to recruit playmakers in the luncheon pretty much sums up the fact they know they have a limited ability to change the game in a good way by calling plays.

Well when will that happen? Right now it looks like at a minimum we are stuck watching this O for 2012 and 2013 as we lack talent on the roster and have little coming on O this recruiting class. Sorry but 5 years of crap O is unacceptable. I wonder if Spence were still here would our O be better right now?

 

[Millhouse]

No sarcasm at all Chip. It may have been an appropriate topic but it was handled poorly by me. There is simply no way around it. Whether folks here criticize or praise me and whether Coach Marrone pats me on the back or bites my head off with the cameras running, I ultimately use the mirror as my guide. If I can look in it and the face looks back and says you were honest, you were fair, you did the best you could I am OK with it. Half the people will think I have some kind of agenda regardless, so that is my guide. This time, the mirror told me I failed on the latter part of that formula. I'm sure we've all felt that way at some time or another.

this is a painful week for me. in 1999 i wanted the air raid. people were trying to tell me that dusty rhodes bonner was some freaking superstar. the guy throws like carl lewis

so we finally get this offense in the dome.
except it's the wrong team
located in east bumblef***
with a qb who wasn't great last year.
and a drunken maniac with a skullet who twitches like he's coked up...
and ho hum they get 500 ypg like it's a piece of cake
because it IS a piece of cake
it's nothing against you. had i known it would've caused so much strife i would've just kept to marrone's quote... i'm just really tired of the spread offense is too hard stuff, it gets my goat... 12 years of (not from you) it's a gimmick... only bad schools do it... wait scratch that only great schools can do it... wait... i don't know

 

[OttoinGrotto]

I bet if you let coach all the plays for WV and halderston call the plays for SU people still be unhappy with the results.

I'd be pretty cranked off if Halderston called the plays for Syracuse, yeah.

If Holgorsen called the plays though I'd be stoked.

 

[RF2044]

really if you just watch just the tulane game you see most of the issues that we address here and why what ever offense people thing we are running is having issues..

You would be hard pressed to find more than a handful of running plays were at least 1 if not 2 of the oline was getting pushed into the backfield. Even the plays that worked we failed as a oline.

Just watched the game last night. Nassib missed 4-5 open rcrvs in the first half , two of which should have been long tds. In the 2nd half Tulane came up tight and we couldnt block anyone on the edge running or passing.

no matter what offense people think we should be running if you cant block 4 men rushing its going to fail..

We are not running the system the coaches want to run.. we are calling plays that we think the D is not expecting because we dont think the team can run the plays that we really want to run in those situations.. You can see that every game we have called 2-3 plays against the D that was expected and still failed to execute. the coach talks about them in the weekly PC so you know its probably frustrating them.

the only thing that we really need to criticize is the play of the oline as that is probably more the issue than any play calling discussion.. the coaches need to fix that

I think there is a lot of validity to your post, more than most recognize.

I don't think that what we're seeing on the field is a byproduct of Marrone's "system," I think the coaches are calling a small subset of plays that they think the offense can execute because the OL sucks and we don't have any players on offense [other than Bailey and Provo] who would crack a top 25 lineup, and because when we DO throw the QB rarely has time to let the play develop before the pass rush gets there.

Nothing against Macky [who I think gets way too much blame on this forum], but having to start him reminds me a lot of Justin Outten a few years ago--a gamer / smart kid / hard worker, but a bit physically overmatched. The OL also lacks depth. Thankfully, we have several frosh redshirting this year, and we're bringing in 4 more guys next year who will presumably also be able to redshirt, so at some point the play of the OL will begin to level out.

 

[Millhouse]

Well when will that happen? Right now it looks like at a minimum we are stuck watching this O for 2012 and 2013 as we lack talent on the roster and have little coming on O this recruiting class. Sorry but 5 years of crap O is unacceptable. I wonder if Spence were still here would our O be better right now?

he's at temple teaching WR to block on 80% of their downs. so if we're missing out on something there, so are a lot of teams

he's a good example of the guy who has his offense, hell or high water. i'm the bubble screen guy, god i hope this works, please let this work... doesn't matter what other teams are doing, this is my chance

 

[IthacaBarrel]

All I see is ina few years, at some point, hopefully in a year or two.. What it's year 3

this is a painful week for me. in 1999 i wanted the air raid. people were trying to tell me that dusty rhodes bonner was some freaking superstar. the guy throws like carl lewis

so we finally get this offense in the dome.
except it's the wrong team
located in east bumblef***
with a qb who wasn't great last year.
and a drunken maniac with a skullet who twitches like he's coked up...
and ho hum they get 500 ypg like it's a piece of cake
because it IS a piece of cake
it's nothing against you. had i known it would've caused so much strife i would've just kept to marrone's quote... i'm just really tired of the spread offense is too hard stuff, it gets my goat... 12 years of (not from you) it's a gimmick... only bad schools do it... wait scratch that only great schools can do it... wait... i don't know

It's built on obviously using the entire field, using all your skill guys, simplicity, repetition, accuracy and a decent decision maker at QB. It's not rocket science... kids understand it an actually don't have to think as much and guess what they begin to play faster! 4.7 kids play at the 4.4 level at the wr position, we just have too many built in excuses and have had them for 10 years, also allows the qb to audbile and change the play 100% of the time

I give up!

 

[RF2044]

All I see is ina few years, at some point, hopefully in a year or two.. What it's year 3

IB, I don't think that you appreciate the depths to which this program had sunk--which surprises me, because I know you're an astute college football guy.

Honestly, getting to a bowl last year with smoke-and-mirrors was fools gold to an extent. 3 years ago, we were widely considered the worst BCS conference program in college football. There are no easy or quick roads back from that.

I get the frustration with the poor offensive play, but let's not lose perspective on the magnitude of this reclamation project.

 

[upperdeck]

So I guess we can say the same thing since against non fcs teams thru 6 weeks of last season we scored 19 per game and 6 weeks of this season we scored 28? are we 30% better this year? are you refuting the statement that WV has better skill across the board?

We struggled to score 13 vs rutgers last year. we imploded this year and managed 13 in regulation. When Nassib is no longer the QB then we will know whether the offensive plan is working. By then the talent will have improved and the oline gotten better or we will have the proof that 4 years will have shown..

I think next year we start to see the real offense, we start with Nassib and someone else running something part time and the year after we see the offense with some depth at QB and somehow they find a playmaker or two

I can live with the hiccups if we somehow get 2 more wins out of the this year and a bowl. like someone said Coach cant really answer our questions outloud but I am pretty sure he knows what is broken even if he cant fix it..

 

[IthacaBarrel]

IB, I don't think that you appreciate the depths to which this program had sunk--which surprises me, because I know you're an astute college football guy.

Honestly, getting to a bowl last year with smoke-and-mirrors was fools gold to an extent. 3 years ago, we were widely considered the worst BCS conference program in college football. There are no easy or quick roads back from that.

I get the frustration with the poor offensive play, but let's not lose perspective on the magnitude of this reclamation project.

Point taken, I see your point, the frustrating point is people point to needing playmakers and the youth, yet are still playing all of GROB's guys there,.. That has been my point, so it looks like we are still 2-3 years away using tha criteria and I find that not only discouraging but really unacceptable of we are going to being to play better, all the kids have gone to d, but are D now sucks too