The challenge that is this year | Page 2 | Syracusefan.com

The challenge that is this year

I think there are offenses that arw outdated. There's a reason why some have disappeared even if certain concepts from them have carried along. The thing is every offense looks outdated when your offensive line doesn't look even mediocre, WRs drop the ball when it gets to them, or QBs miss open guys. We've taken turns doing all of these this year.
 
The same outdated offense that averaged 40 points two years ago? That is quick
If you and others would like to pretend Dungey wasn’t largely to credit for that, rather than the O play calling he often bailed out, by all means go ahead.
 
So I don’t understand constantly posting the injured list like this year is any different from what we experience on an annual basis minus 2018. Is it part of the reason we lose. Sure, but it’s not an excuse.

Not just injured - some opt outs.

Also, play across the board in CFB is way down due to COVID and weird schedules. There's a mental cost no one factors in. I'm pretty sure my work product has suffered in 2020.
 
If you and others would like to pretend Dungey wasn’t largely to credit for that, rather than the O play calling he often bailed out, by all means go ahead.
ED was definitely a big reason to its success but is was partly due to the offense scheme is all.
 
If you and others would like to pretend Dungey wasn’t largely to credit for that, rather than the O play calling he often bailed out, by all means go ahead.
There are a lot of offenses that get bailed out by great QBs. What does the 95-98 offense look like without McNabb? LSU is down 13 ppg and 100 ypg without Burrows and that's with all of the talent at every other position they routinely bring in.
 
Yeah - I know the tendency around here is to put all the credit on Eric for any success in Dino's tenure. That's tempting and overly simplistic. It's a mix. Just like the "he's never built his own team" like every coach gets to start fresh with an all new program, no recruits/players/support staff/AD staff that carry over from previous regimes.

There is much to criticize without dumbing it down.
 
There are a lot of offenses that get bailed out by great QBs. What does the 95-98 offense look like without McNabb? LSU is down 13 ppg and 100 ypg without Burrows and that's with all of the talent at every other position they routinely bring in.
What we lost in talent between 2018 and 2019 is absolutely in no way comparable to LSU.
 
What we lost in talent between 2018 and 2019 is absolutely in no way comparable to LSU.
The talent they have been able to recruit the last two decades is in no way comparable to our recruiting challenges.

If their elite talent at every other position can't make up for losing their QB, what does that say about the importance of a QB?
 
The talent they have been able to recruit the last two decades is in no way comparable to our recruiting challenges.

If their elite talent at every other position can't make up for losing their QB, what does that say about the importance of a QB?
Im confused what your point is.

My point is that the offense has not worked to our advantage for a large portion of Dino’s time here. We were lucky Dungey was great at improvising on broken/bad plays, and we were unlucky in that it resulted in his being sidelined by injury multiple times.

To that point, we either score fast or turn the ball over fast. And over the past two years we’ve turned the ball over a whole lot more than we’ve scored it. By turnover, I mean giving the ball back the opposing O whether on downs or otherwise.

This results in the defense being on the field for extended possessions while our offense cannot provide them extended breathers. Results in higher fatigue and more injuries. You could be in fantastic shape and still be worn down at this rate, see Trill.

Burrows leaving LSU is not the dominating factor in their struggles. They had an unbelievable graduating/moving on of talent to the draft on O and D that could hardly be supported by any team in college football not named OSU or Bama.

Our struggles result from lack of depth, stubborn play calling and loyalty to a scheme, and a laundry list of injuries. LSU has a year like this maybe once in every 5. We’ve now had one good year in 5.

I think depth and talent is improving, for what its worth. But it pains me that we’re holding back young talent at QB from gaining experience in a meaningless year because they’re not caught up with our scheme. The scheme’s not working anyways. Give them a script and let them play. What do we do if god forbid tommy’s sidelined in 2021? Rely on a grad transfer? Its year 6 coming up I think this is fair criticism.
 
Im confused what your point is.

My point is that the offense has not worked to our advantage for a large portion of Dino’s time here. We were lucky Dungey was great at improvising on broken/bad plays, and we were unlucky in that it resulted in his being sidelined by injury multiple times.

To that point, we either score fast or turn the ball over fast. And over the past two years we’ve turned the ball over a whole lot more than we’ve scored it. By turnover, I mean giving the ball back the opposing O whether on downs or otherwise.

This results in the defense being on the field for extended possessions while our offense cannot provide them extended breathers. Results in higher fatigue and more injuries. You could be in fantastic shape and still be worn down at this rate, see Trill.

Burrows leaving LSU is not the dominating factor in their struggles. They had an unbelievable graduating/moving on of talent to the draft on O and D that could hardly be supported by any team in college football not named OSU or Bama.

Our struggles result from lack of depth, stubborn play calling and loyalty to a scheme, and a laundry list of injuries. LSU has a year like this maybe once in every 5. We’ve now had one good year in 5.

I think depth and talent is improving, for what its worth. But it pains me that we’re holding back young talent at QB from gaining experience in a meaningless year because they’re not caught up with our scheme. The scheme’s not working anyways. Give them a script and let them play. What do we do if god forbid tommy’s sidelined in 2021? Rely on a grad transfer? Its year 6 coming up I think this is fair criticism.


That's not true. We had three years of Dungey, and it worked fine except when he was injured [because we had a dropoff at backup QB, for all years except when Tommy filled in, with a good OL in front of him].

Tommy hasn't lived up to expectations post-Dungey. That's the issue, along with the OL injuries. That feels circumstantial, not systemic.
 
That's not true. We had three years of Dungey, and it worked fine except when he was injured [because we had a dropoff at backup QB, for all years except when Tommy filled in, with a good OL in front of him].

Tommy hasn't lived up to expectations post-Dungey. That's the issue, along with the OL injuries. That feels circumstantial, not systemic.
I think Dungey got hurt, multiple times, on bail out broken plays. Quite frankly I think it was ridiculous he made it out of 2017 as able to play again in 2018 after the beatings he took during the gauntlet of ‘17 trying to win us games.

I will agree to disagree here. I find our offense to be another limiting factor in addressing glaring issues like depth, injuries and developing young players. I see few justifications in continuing to play Rex because he allows the best version of our play calling to be displayed. If this offense works, and is sustainable, it’s not going to happen without giving our available depth a chance to gain experience here. Injuries aside, the qb depth is an issue the staff’s responsible to address
 
I think Dungey got hurt, multiple times, on bail out broken plays. Quite frankly I think it was ridiculous he made it out of 2017 as able to play again in 2018 after the beatings he took during the gauntlet of ‘17 trying to win us games.

I will agree to disagree here. I find our offense to be another limiting factor in addressing glaring issues like depth, injuries and developing young players. I see few justifications in continuing to play Rex because he allows the best version of our play calling to be displayed. If this offense works, and is sustainable, it’s not going to happen without giving our available depth a chance to gain experience here. Injuries aside, the qb depth is an issue the staff’s responsible to address

Yes, it is. And in their first full class they went out and got a 4-star QB [Tommy] who had a big showing at the Elite 11. Then they got a dual threat who had lots of ability [Chance]. Chance left school, and Tommy hasn't produced consistently -- and here we are. If either one of those guys pan out, then it buys the staff time for the next QB in the pipeline [Lamson?] and things don't drop off.

Lots of programs -- even teams like Ohio State -- get highly rated QBs who don't pan out. It impacts us more than most, both when they excel and when they fail to produce.
 
Yes, it is. And in their first full class they went out and got a 4-star QB [Tommy] who had a big showing at the Elite 11. Then they got a dual threat who had lots of ability [Chance]. Chance left school, and Tommy hasn't produced consistently -- and here we are. If either one of those guys pan out, then it buys the staff time for the next QB in the pipeline [Lamson?] and things don't drop off.

Lots of programs -- even teams like Ohio State -- get highly rated QBs who don't pan out. It impacts us more than most, both when they excel and when they fail to produce.

When Chance left we needed a body to fill the void. We should have looked for a transfer to add depth. We had one QB from Dino's 1st three classes. That is crazy.
 
I don't think any offense is really outdated. It's just not executed. Either because the players aren't good enough, or because defensive coordinators have caught up to your tendencies.

Dino acknowledged it can be better by going out and getting Gilbert to be his OC/QB coach. It's tough to be a successful OC from game 1 because of all that goes into it, but Gilbert lost the spring and a traditional preseason. People need to give him a chance, no matter what weirdos at USF say.
If no offense could possibly be successful with the talent and there's nothing obviously wrong with the system, you really only need to figure out how long you'll wait for recruiting to improve.

This isn't some hairbrained unproven offense

If guys get fired because of lack of talent , fine, I get that, gotta recruit
 
If no offense could possibly be successful with the talent and there's nothing obviously wrong with the system, you really only need to figure out how long you'll wait for recruiting to improve.

This isn't some hairbrained unproven offense

If guys get fired because of lack of talent , fine, I get that, gotta recruit


Exactly, want to argue lack of talent and recruiting as a logical reason to dismiss a coach yeah I get it. The scheme averaged 40 points per game two years ago. It's not insane to think that it can once again be somewhat successful a few years later.

People want to carry on about a new head coach in a lab just scripting and coming up with some high octane offense with inferior talent that scores points in bunches. Talk about chasing rainbows.

You know what the next coach won't be a miracle worker either, there are no shortcuts to rebuilding this thing and hey in a year or two the university goes down that road I will be the first one stating you need to give him a ton of time because Syracuse isn't some factory where they can just hire and fire at will and quite honestly it just never seems to work. There's some pretty good evidence that it doesn't at countless programs as well as Syracuse. We stink right now I get it but Dino has done a few good things as well
 
Im confused what your point is.

My point is that the offense has not worked to our advantage for a large portion of Dino’s time here. We were lucky Dungey was great at improvising on broken/bad plays, and we were unlucky in that it resulted in his being sidelined by injury multiple times.

To that point, we either score fast or turn the ball over fast. And over the past two years we’ve turned the ball over a whole lot more than we’ve scored it. By turnover, I mean giving the ball back the opposing O whether on downs or otherwise.

This results in the defense being on the field for extended possessions while our offense cannot provide them extended breathers. Results in higher fatigue and more injuries. You could be in fantastic shape and still be worn down at this rate, see Trill.

Burrows leaving LSU is not the dominating factor in their struggles. They had an unbelievable graduating/moving on of talent to the draft on O and D that could hardly be supported by any team in college football not named OSU or Bama.

Our struggles result from lack of depth, stubborn play calling and loyalty to a scheme, and a laundry list of injuries. LSU has a year like this maybe once in every 5. We’ve now had one good year in 5.

I think depth and talent is improving, for what its worth. But it pains me that we’re holding back young talent at QB from gaining experience in a meaningless year because they’re not caught up with our scheme. The scheme’s not working anyways. Give them a script and let them play. What do we do if god forbid tommy’s sidelined in 2021? Rely on a grad transfer? Its year 6 coming up I think this is fair criticism.
My point is that a QB is the key to any team's success. Teams like LSU stockpile elite talent every class. I don't care what they lost, they still have more on the bench than we have in the starting line up even with everyone healthy. Despite all of that stockpiled talent, they are feeling the loss of Burrows. Do we know how good they'd be if Burrows was playing with all of the other losses? No, but I guess the dropoff would be less, because QBs matter more than anyone else.

I don't think our struggles on offense are scheme. That's just the easy thing for fans to point to. I'll point to two things. First, Dungey threw for 1298 in 8 games as a freshman. As a sophomore and junior he played 9 games each and threw for over 2600 and 2400 yards. Did he change that much as a player from year one to year two? I doubt it. The scheme he played in changed. Two, when he went out those two seasons did the offense fall flat on its face. In 2016 there was a significant drop except in the Pitt game, but in 2017 we still put up over 400 yards per game.
 
Exactly, want to argue lack of talent and recruiting as a logical reason to dismiss a coach yeah I get it. The scheme averaged 40 points per game two years ago. It's not insane to think that it can once again be somewhat successful a few years later.

People want to carry on about a new head coach in a lab just scripting and coming up with some high octane offense with inferior talent that scores points in bunches. Talk about chasing rainbows.

You know what the next coach won't be a miracle worker either, there are no shortcuts to rebuilding this thing and hey in a year or two the university goes down that road I will be the first one stating you need to give him a ton of time because Syracuse isn't some factory where they can just hire and fire at will and quite honestly it just never seems to work. There's some pretty good evidence that it doesn't at countless programs as well as Syracuse. We stink right now I get it but Dino has done a few good things as well

Look no further than what LSU did with Brady ... look at 2018 vs 2019 with nearly the same roster. Offense was vastly different. Bama with Kiffin and Sark ... Sark was hired as an analyst and has completely revolutionized their O. This isn't just about Dungey its the fact that the staff had a plan and it worked, the plan as is won't work for other QBs and this staff has failed to leverage the strengths of a Devito vs Dungey. 2018 was a flash in the pan. In 2017 & 16 the PPG was comparable to Shafer's last year ... lets not pretend success on offense has existed outside of 2018 and 2020 is an anomaly.
 
Look no further than what LSU did with Brady ... look at 2018 vs 2019 with nearly the same roster. Offense was vastly different. Bama with Kiffin and Sark ... Sark was hired as an analyst and has completely revolutionized their O. This isn't just about Dungey its the fact that the staff had a plan and it worked, the plan as is won't work for other QBs and this staff has failed to leverage the strengths of a Devito vs Dungey. 2018 was a flash in the pan. In 2017 & 16 the PPG was comparable to Shafer's last year ... lets not pretend success on offense has existed outside of 2018 and 2020 is an anomaly.
There is a difference between improving an offense that already has Alabama/LSU talent and what is required here. To compare the situations doesn't make sense.
 
There is a difference between improving an offense that already has Alabama/LSU talent and what is required here. To compare the situations doesn't make sense.

I don't disagree but the argument that there aren't coaches that could make a significant difference with the talent we have also doesn't make sense. I have news for you the LSU team shutout by Bama in 2018 didn't see a significant influx of talent to make them look so different against Bama a year later so lets quell the talent argument when it comes to what this team is vs what it could be. FWIW I am a Baber's fan but there are many things I question with his decision making.
 
I don't disagree but the argument that there aren't coaches that could make a significant difference with the talent we have also doesn't make sense. I have news for you the LSU team shutout by Bama in 2018 didn't see a significant influx of talent to make them look so different against Bama a year later so lets quell the talent argument when it comes to what this team is vs what it could be. FWIW I am a Baber's fan but there are many things I question with his decision making.

I bet it didn’t include losing their top 2 RB and a bunch of OL. We have a new OC - I just don’t know how to judge him this season
 
I bet it didn’t include losing their top 2 RB and a bunch of OL. We have a new OC - I just don’t know how to judge him this season

That points to recruiting and once again the coaches ... not quite sure why this is hard to grasp. We rave about Monroe and his recruiting prowess and the guys we bring in ... that is a coach thing, right? An assistant that recruits like the other names I mentioned, right? You folks realize A&M saw 19 true frosh see time last year and they play in the SEC ... we need to stop justifying this season and realize our weaknesses and adjust accordingly.
 
Look no further than what LSU did with Brady ... look at 2018 vs 2019 with nearly the same roster. Offense was vastly different. Bama with Kiffin and Sark ... Sark was hired as an analyst and has completely revolutionized their O. This isn't just about Dungey its the fact that the staff had a plan and it worked, the plan as is won't work for other QBs and this staff has failed to leverage the strengths of a Devito vs Dungey. 2018 was a flash in the pan. In 2017 & 16 the PPG was comparable to Shafer's last year ... lets not pretend success on offense has existed outside of 2018 and 2020 is an anomaly.
The roster was still good.

A bad system can hold back a loaded roster but a good system can't fix a terrible roster
 
The roster was still good.

A bad system can hold back a loaded roster but a good system can't fix a terrible roster

Either way that is on the coaches ... my point is you can change the staff and improve things. That being said I love Tony White ... not sold on Gilbert.
 
That points to recruiting and once again the coaches ... not quite sure why this is hard to grasp. We rave about Monroe and his recruiting prowess and the guys we bring in ... that is a coach thing, right? An assistant that recruits like the other names I mentioned, right? You folks realize A&M saw 19 true frosh see time last year and they play in the SEC ... we need to stop justifying this season and realize our weaknesses and adjust accordingly.

Wait, you think we should be recruiting like A&M, LSU and Alabama?
 
The roster was still good.

A bad system can hold back a loaded roster but a good system can't fix a terrible roster

Yep. You can mask some things, but over 12 games, it will be exposed pretty often.

Especially us now with all these first and second year players getting all the time. They're just not strong enough yet.
 

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