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Message: [QUOTE="SWC75, post: 1186900, member: 289"] I'd prefer to see a coach take more chances than we've seen. Doug Marrone used to describe the mental equation this way: "Do I have a good enough team to overcome the results if we fail?" I think the equation should be: "If our team isn't as good as theirs and we do everything in a conventional fashion, what is the likely result?" I still remember all the things that Maine coach threw at Marrone's superior team that gave us so much trouble. We did beat them but we did it in spite of Maine's tactics, not because of them. I wonder what might have happened if we played that way vs. Penn State, Florida State, Notre Dame, Clemson, etc. I also recall years ago when Gene Stallings was coaching Alabama. They had a 4th and 9 at the end of an SEC title game against Florida and went for it. They ran the ball, got about 4-5 yards and Florida ran out the clock. The announcers debated running with the ball on 4th and 9. One said "Gene Stallings has always been a conservative coach". I wondered about that statement. What are the odds of running for a 1st down on 4th and 9? Isn't that actually a bigger risk than throwing the ball int hat situation? "Conservative" should mean you play the percentages, not go against them. "Conventional" and "timid" are different words entirely. So I agree that Shafer should have gone for it on 4th and 3 with 6:58 left.When you are an underdog or depleted or simply down on the scoreboard, especially late in the game, you need to be aggressive. But I don't see it as an indictment of Shafer as much as I see it as an indictment of the vast majority of coaches, who likely would have done the same thing. if you view that as a reason to search for another coach, you need to make sure it's a coach who would have gone for it in that situation. Rightly or wrongly, you won't find a lot of them. [/QUOTE]

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