Do QB changes actually work? When does it make sense to change? Milton =...Cardale Jones?
Few topics of discussion:
With all the talk of switching QBs, I was curious if anyone had any data on whether or not switching QBs has a positive effect on a season in regards to replacing an established starter.
Off the top of my head, I can think of a couple of examples: Ian Book for the other Notre Dame guy last year, Connor Cook for Andrew Maxwell in 2013...Tyrelle Pryor for Todd Boeckman for Ohio State in 2008? Are there a bunch of examples of this failing miserably that I'm not thinking of?
There are also single game examples as well: Tua for Jalen Hurts against Georgia, not by design but I genuinely believe that Haskins coming in for Barrett won Ohio State the 2017 game. Minor, minor example, but Brandon Peters for O'Korn in 2017 against Rutgers.
Does the timing of the switch matter?
If Shea doesn't look good against Illinois and McCaffrey is still out with a concussion and McCaffrey is good to go against Penn State, do you really roll with Patterson if you're Harbaugh just because its a big road game? Don't you just go with who you think gives you the best chance to win? Or is the concern that because its a high profile road game, McCaffrey is more likely to be re-injured in some capacity due to poor decision making because he's nervous (or something along those lines)?
Joe Milton = Cardale Jones?
Let's say Patterson continues to look lost and McCaffrey is not ready because of the concussion: Could Joe Milton not step in and be a version of Cardale Jones? They are roughly the same size, both have cannon arms, aren't considered true mobile quarterbacks but can move if necessary and in theory both should be hard to bring down. If you think Charbonnet could fill the Elliott role in this scenario, don't you have to roll with it? Milton's arm should be able to stretch the defense (even if his accuracy leaves a lot to be desired) and open things up for Charbonnet, which should in turn cause the defense to respect the run.
Anyway, I hope that the switch goes on and Patterson finds his form again, but thought these ideas were worth discussing in case it doesn't happen.
October 9th, 2019 at 9:39 AM ^
2nd point: I meant if McCaffrey is still out with a concussion for this week against Illinois, but cleared for Penn State. Looks a little funny up there so wanted to clarify for everyone.
October 9th, 2019 at 12:56 PM ^
I actually agree with you. I think Patterson may be the "best" qb in a sense, but I think to see the kind of big play, boom or bust offense that many would be happy with, I think Milton would probably give that. It's sometimes sad to watch teams like Bama, OSU, [insert random Big 12 school] drop back and chuck it 50 times a game, and very rarely throw it shorter than 10 yards. Maybe Milton would take the snap, count to 3 and throw it to DPJ 50 yards down the field...and maybe it would work. Illinois is the team to find out against!
October 9th, 2019 at 3:13 PM ^
3.2 in the fifty yard dash (0.2 reaction time to the snap and first step)? DPJ is going to crush the NFL combine!
/s
October 9th, 2019 at 3:46 PM ^
He's quick for the first 50 but slows considerable in the second 50. His 100 time is nearly 8 seconds.
October 10th, 2019 at 9:50 AM ^
Old track coach here: 3.2 for fifty, 8.0 for a hundred? We talking Peoples-Jones or Usain Bolt? Flying start, hand held by coach or out of the blocks, electric timing? DPJ is a talent, but that stat is whack
October 9th, 2019 at 9:43 AM ^
They are not switching quarterbacks. I am as frustrated with Patterson/Gattis/Harbaugh as I can be, no idea why they don't throw the ball downfield more.
But the best QB is playing. Maybe if McCafferey wasn't injured he'd get more time, but he wouldn't supplant Patterson. This means... drum roll... McCafferey isn't a savior. It means he's not as good as Patterson. Yes I know that's depressing.
Harbaugh doesn't hold the best players off the field to torture this fan base. Dylan isn't as good, and Milton is well behind him.
October 9th, 2019 at 9:48 AM ^
Well, we don't know what would have happened as McCaffrey did replace Patterson during the Wisconsin game and was then injured.
Also, that was kind of the point of the first question: In each of those scenarios, the best QB was playing...till he wasn't. And it ended up working out. I just wondered if there was some data showing those as outliers.
October 9th, 2019 at 10:53 AM ^
Except in the Pryor example. He was always going to be the QB, they were just easing him in.
October 9th, 2019 at 9:54 AM ^
From what Harbaugh has seen, I would agree with you that he believes Patterson is the better qb. However, that judgment is largely being based off of practice. Further, McCafferey was apparently close enough to Patterson to warrant giving him some PT.
It is possible that McCafferey is in fact better than Patterson in game situations. Sometimes the backup gets a chance and never looks back (Lou Gehrig and Tom Brady being two prime examples). That being said, the odds are against McCafferey being a savior in waiting.
October 9th, 2019 at 10:14 AM ^
Maybe Patterson looks good when there's no pass rush and on the chalkboard where he knows the system but when it comes to gametime, he panicked under pressure and doesn't process quickly. I think looking good when there's no pressure is a big reason why Patterson is starting
October 9th, 2019 at 2:34 PM ^
Seems to me DCaf is just as likely to bail out of the pocket, and once out he's more likely to run than throw and get himself whacked.
October 9th, 2019 at 3:02 PM ^
DCaf actually process quickly and makes throws that Shea wouldn't attempt aka throw WRs open. He just needs to learn how to protect himself
October 9th, 2019 at 9:53 PM ^
The difference between when Patterson runs and McCaffrey runs is that McCaffrey is a McCaffrey. If he had a little bit more muscle on him he would be an amazing read-option QB in a running spread. Dude is legitimately fast and shifty. Patterson gets chased down by d-linemen regularly.
October 9th, 2019 at 9:56 AM ^
Yeah, obviously everyone is frustrated/perplexed with the offense (understandably so, by the way). What I don't get is that ALL of the blame seems to be getting thrust on Patterson, which I kind of don't get. The reality is that the offense has had issues since Harbaugh arrived. The players have changed, the offensive coaching staff has changed, but there is one constant in the equation - and that is Harbaugh, of course. Not saying Shea isn't a problem, but man, I think the issues run WAY deeper than that.
October 9th, 2019 at 10:16 AM ^
I am a huge supporter of Harbaugh, but I'm with you here. Problems earlier in his tenure could be blamed on OL issues of one sort or another. But not throwing deep all day to DPJ, Collins, Black, and Bell is awful. I thought Harbaugh learned his lesson last year, that he had to have an offense that aggressively sought to score on every possession. That's not happening.
Somebody on this board said Harbaugh must beat risk aversion into his QBs to the point of no return. I mean Patterson will not throw deep unless it's Collins, and even then he stares it him for a good while and turns it down way to often. Any of these guys are open deep in 1-on-1 coverage. This would be true even if the ground game and RPO games were excellent. Since they are not, it's even more obviously a high priority option. It's the THE high priority option.
Patterson needs to pull those guys aside and say "I'm throwing it to you, catch the fucking ball. If you miss or it gets picked, you know he's never going to let us do it again. I'm throwing it, just catch it, and keep doing that and they won't say anything." Guys it's your only possible path to B1G title contention. Take control of your offense. Take the reins - the coaches will let you do that if you prove it.
October 9th, 2019 at 11:16 AM ^
Going to disagree here:
https://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/fplus/2018
"Beginning with Football Outsiders Almanac 2009, Brian Fremeau and Bill Connelly, originators of Football Outsiders' two statistical approaches -- FEI and S&P+, respectively -- began to create a combined ranking that would serve as Football Outsiders' 'official' college football rankings.The Fremeau Efficiency Index (FEI) considers each of the nearly 20,000 possessions every season in major college football. All drives are filtered to eliminate first-half clock-kills and end-of-game garbage drives and scores. A scoring rate analysis of the remaining possessions then determines the baseline possession efficiency expectations against which each team is measured. A team is rewarded for playing well against good teams, win or lose, and is punished more severely for playing poorly against bad teams than it is rewarded for playing well against bad teams. The SP+ Ratings are a college football ratings system derived from both play-by-play and drive data from all 800+ of a season's FBS college football games (and 140,000+ plays). The components for SP+ reflect the components of four of what Bill Connelly has deemed the Five Factors of college football: efficiency, explosiveness, field position, and finishing drives. (A fifth factor, turnovers, is informed marginally by sack rates, the only quality-based statistic that has a consistent relationship with turnover margins.) "
So, if I understand it correctly, it's just looking at offense. If this is true then the rankings are:
2015 Michigan was 8th.
2016 Michigan was 4th
2017 Michigan dropped to 30
2018 Michigan had rebounded to 9th.
so, according to this combo stat; for 3/4 of Harbaugh's complete seasons his offenses were in the top 10.
The idea that Harbaugh's offenses have had issues his entire tenure doesn't seem to be supported by the data. I know people were (rightly) disappointed in tempo and other things, and the spread zealots were never really happy with any non spread team, but given that his first two years were with wonky O lines I think his offensive performance was admirable. It honestly if anything makes me question the wisdom of casheiring the offense we had instead of improving it.
But we are where we at. So no more changes, lets make this work. Even if Gattis doesn't work out as a playcaller if we replace him find someone who can come in and coach with the least amount of disruption.
October 9th, 2019 at 11:41 AM ^
The idea that Harbaugh's offenses have had issues his entire tenure doesn't seem to be supported by the data.
Why don't you include data for delay of game penalties and an inability to get two yards in order to ice a game? The offense has clearly had issues, even in years when it was mostly good in aggregate.
October 9th, 2019 at 12:08 PM ^
I'll disagree again. Those aren't included, and I'm guessing because those are issues that are more ad hoc and not as easily metricized, nor are they as relevant.
Nearly *every* offense in CFB has issues like that from time to time. It doesn't take away from the other, frankly more valid, metrics that correct for things like strength of opponent and cut out garbage time drives.
If you're looking for the perfect offense that is high tempo, no penalty/confusion, high scoring all the time you won't find it. And junking an offense over stuff like that is folly. Admittedly the elite offenses get close, but being in the top 10 doesn't mean you're trash.
You can tweak tempo and delay of game over time. You can tweak short yardage packages. I'd argue we were doing pretty well with Ben Mason last year to start to address that.
So, no. I wouldn't say his offenses had issues any more than any of the others in the top 10 did, outside of maybe the top 3. Could they have been better? Sure! Were they bad? In no way (other than 2017, arguably).
I'm bummed because I'd easily trade for one of our past top 10 ranked offense for what we have *right now* if I could magically do it. But that ship has sailed. So let's make the best of what we have. If this offense somehow were able to get into the top 10 and stay there for the rest of the season (unlikely), and the defense continues to progress, we'd likely have a pretty good season. But maybe in year 2 this offense takes off. And even if it does have silly quirks (WE DON'T TEMPO ENOUGH ARGGGGHHH) I wouldn't move away from it because consistency in a system allows you to fix things and get better over time much more reliably than junking it and throwing out all the time and experience invested. That's throwing out the baby, bathwater, and setting the tub on fire.
October 9th, 2019 at 12:17 PM ^
Well put.
We didn't lose The Game last year because the offense scored 39 points. That should have easily been enough to win. We lost it because Ohio State scored 69 points.
Instead, we changed the offense.
October 9th, 2019 at 12:42 PM ^
I dunno... the game last year was 41-19 with 3 min left in the 3rd. Just because Michigan ended up with 39 points doesn't give me any good feelings at all. Yes, the defense was the single biggest factor in losing that game, but it wasn't like the offense really took it to 'em either. Most of it was garbage time.
October 9th, 2019 at 1:47 PM ^
...by that point they had given up 41 points! Does anyone (outside possibly the no D Big 12) ever win a game when they give up a point a minute?
Scoring 19 with 18 minutes left to play is not bad at all, especially against a top 5 team in a rivalry game. That's basically a TD per quarter - and 28 points ain't a bad offensive performance against OSU.
We lost that game because our defense could not stop OSU.
October 9th, 2019 at 2:13 PM ^
How many teams have been able to beat OSU scoring a touchdown per quarter? That's living in a fantasy world with their offense.
October 9th, 2019 at 3:55 PM ^
If the offense had been effective, then OSU wouldn’t have had the opportunity to put up that many points. Our offense was doing nothing on far too many possessions.
October 9th, 2019 at 2:03 PM ^
Yes, if we had just kept Hoke and Nussmier for another year everything would have started to work just the same. Is that your argument?
October 9th, 2019 at 2:24 PM ^
No. I'm not sure why you'd say that; I don't see how you can get that from the data at all.
Perhaps I'll restate more clearly: If you have top 10 offenses you throw out the baby, bathwater, and get the blowtorch and kerosene for the tub. If you have an offense that keeps getting worse maybe it's logical.
in 2011 Michigans offensive efficiency was at 7. That was the 11-2 year.
in 2012 Michigans offensive efficiency was ranked at 25. They were 8-5. This equates roughly with Harbaugh's worst year here.
in 2013 Michigans offensive efficiency was ranked at 37. Michigan was 7-5
In 2014 it was 54. Michigan was 5-7.
Efficiency kept going down; as did the record. There is a world of difference between 4 years with offenses in the top 10 and 10 wins and 4 years with 1 good offense (2011) and 3 years of declining offensive efficiency and records.
It's this type of thing that drives me nuts with Michigan fans. Were things perfect? No. Was it a bad offense with problems? Not by the best statistical measures I can find. But every year I hear 'BUT THE TALENT!' 'THE TEMPO!' 'MODERN!' URGGGGGHHHH!!' 'IN THE OLD DAYS WE WERE DOMINANT DESPITE RARELY EVER GETTING DOUBLE DIGIT WINS! WHY CAN'T IT BE LIKE THEN!' (from '90 - 2000 we had double digit wins 4 times. From '15 to now we've had double digit wins 3 times.)
I know why this is; it's OSU. They got better. Way better. And our bet with RR went into the crapper; and we're still trying to dig our way out of it.
Harbaugh's offenses were good, relatively stable, and I believe could have gotten better with tweaking. Hokes offenses started good, and progressively got worse.
This repeated scheme and coach seppuku we want to commit when things aren't the way we want isn't helping us.
So back to my point. I, as much as everyone else, is annoyed with this offense. But I want to stay the course as long as possible to try to make it better. Maybe we have to get rid of Gattis; but if we do, lets get someone in who won't burn down everything.
October 9th, 2019 at 2:36 PM ^
And we're likely going to have the worst offense of any of those years this year. And you're okay with that? In year 5? Maybe Harbaugh just isn't very good at judging coaching talent as you think he is. Nobody forced him to hire Gattis...he could have hired whoever he wanted. You realize every OC is going to implement their own style offense right? I don't get this take of "keep the offense, fire Gattis". Most programs can transition their offense pretty seamlessly...we're the only one who seems to have such trouble, probably because we constantly make bad hires.
It has nothing to do with OSU, we were just run off the field by Wisconsin.
October 9th, 2019 at 3:46 PM ^
Offense: Agree, this year may well be the worst. But that is because we changed away from the old offense, and the install went poorly. My original point was addressing the idea that 'his offenses have had issues' his whole tenure. The 'year five' isn't relevant because in years 1-4 the offense, as shown, was pretty good. The issue I have with it is he switched when he likely didn't have to. Had he kept last years offense and kept tweaking it's likely we'd have another top 10 offense.
Talent judge: Disagree. The talent he's hired so far has included some guys who weren't good (Drevno had issues after 15, and maybe Gattis) but he also hired Don Brown, Fisch, Zordich, Partridge, kept Mattison early on, the special teams guy in '15, Ben Herbert, Warinner... All are very good coaches. So yes. I think in general he is a good judge of talent. Perfect? No. But very good.
I don't know why Harbaugh decided to move to the spread. I'm sad he did. But I don't expect perfection from my coaches especially when they generally have a provable good track record (38-14 in 4 years. Top 10 offenses in 3/4 of those years. Great defenses. All built on top of a team that was nose diving with Hoke).
And, for many (including me) it would be revisionist to say that Gattis wasn't welcomed and considered an up and comer. Sometimes you hire people and take a flier on them and it doesn't work out. I know we all were hoping for real 'speed in space' and an instant Oklahoma pill. But it wasn't the case and part of that is transition costs; part of it likely is Gattis himself, both in bad install and in play calling.
As for new O coordinators... kind of. Wisconsin has changed O coordinators over the years. As did Michigan over the years prior to RR. But no one made wholesale changes the way going from a pro-style to a spread does. They were more tweaks on an identity; a base way of doing things. Most programs that do transition their offenses follow this model. The ones that don't (us, now; us, with RR; Nebraska several years back.) have transition costs that take time.
So no. If we need to get rid of Gattis, find someone who will keep the spread. Don't decide to make another big change in a year and decide to be Wisconsin (which, honestly, I'd prefer, but I don't want to incur those costs again).
OSU has much to do with it. All else being equal if we bump off OSU one year, and maybe another, or at least have a very close game, in those first four years; I doubt many people would say 'Harbaugh's offense has had issues since he got here' or that we would have changed.
October 9th, 2019 at 4:15 PM ^
The best comparison that could be used is OSU under Tressel, once Troy Smith became the starter they transitioned to more spread concepts pretty quickly and with the same personnel. We have no excuse.
October 9th, 2019 at 9:48 PM ^
Aside from the new offense V old offense debate, a couple of key points are being left out. 1. There is no running back depth. A true freshman had 35 carries to bail out the O vs army. 2. The Oline is not nearly as good as 2018. 3. QB play putrid. You can’t believe that with the same system as 2018 you’d be getting the same results this year. That is a fallacy. The RB depth alone is significant and no Offense works without a good QB. Period. Now compound both of those issues by not having the same level of O line play...
We can do the defense next.... losing Winovich, Gary etc and now there are offensive converts on the Dline and no dropoff is expected?
It doesn’t matter who the coordinator is or what type of offense is being run, this team is not capable of challenging for the division. Not this year. Until a QB is DEVELOPED, they won’t be. Neg away but it doesn’t make it any less true.
October 9th, 2019 at 9:27 PM ^
Carr went 20-8 vs top 10 teams. 20-4 vs Wisconsin and MSU
Harbaugh is 1-10 vs Top 10 teams, 4-4 vs Wisconsin and MSU
October 9th, 2019 at 3:05 PM ^
Dude, you’re not using the webpage correctly. I don’t know what you’re looking at exactly, maybe overall FEI or S&P? Just use common sense for a second, do you REALLY think any of Harbaugh’s offenses have been top four??? The answer is no, of course not. They haven’t even been top 10. Harbaugh’s best offense was 2018 which finished 17 in FEI and 22 in S&P. Here are all his offensive ratings since he’s been here:
S&P: 35 (2015), 34 (2016), 49 (2017), 22 (2018)
FEI: 25 (2015), 22 (2016), 90 (2017), 17 (2018)
So his offenses have indeed been thoroughly mediocre or downright bad. Meanwhile, it’s the defense that has been top 10 in S&P every year. There was definitely some progress in 2018, but I think by that point everyone was fed up with the slow paced under center stuff and jealous of the type of spread style that put up 62 points on Michigan’s #1 ranked defense.
October 9th, 2019 at 4:10 PM ^
*THAT* may well be. And if I analyzed the data wrong I apologize. I did my best on short time.
In the interest of openness and brevity, here's the screen from '2018 listing the top 10 teams; that had Michigan 9th. I figured it was a composite of 6 in F+ and 13th in FEI.
October 9th, 2019 at 3:06 PM ^
Not exactly the right way to look at those metrics - you're looking at the combined F+ rankings, which is an overall team rating. F+ doesn't split into offensive and defensive measures, but the component rankings (FEI and S&P+) do! I agree that this is a much better way to evaluate vs the per game metrics. Michigan's offensive rankings each of the last 4 years:
Year FEI S&P+
2015 27 34
2016 22 35
2017 70 49
2018 17 25
So, never a top 10 offense, and only once even close to a top 20 offense. Remember that these measures are all adjusted by opponent as well - the only non-P5 schools you see near the tops of these lists are ones that truly dominated the lower competition like UCF. I think S&P+ does a slightly better job of making these adjustments, but that's subjective. The top teams in these rankings are usually, the best teams/offenses.
October 9th, 2019 at 4:13 PM ^
I was looking at a combined page. But I'll check it out again. I can certainly be wrong, and if so I retract my point. Thanks for catching it!
October 9th, 2019 at 6:14 PM ^
The rankings you give are completely wrong. Follow the link to S&P rankings that you provided in your post. Then from the drop down list of metrics, choose "S&P+ RATINGS, OFFENSE".
The correct offensive S&P rankings are:
2015 34th
2016 35th
2017 49th
2018 25th
October 9th, 2019 at 11:18 AM ^
Maybe you missed the play against Wisconsin where Collins jumped up and down in frustration because he was WIDE open on the play and Patterson didn't throw to him. There seems to be an issue where Patterson isn't reading the defense very well to understand what it is giving him.
If Collins is single-covered, it should be Harbaugh or Gattis pulling Patterson aside and say "When you see that, throw the ball to him." He cannot take the reins if the coaches have specifically told him to do something else. The fact he pulls the ball so infrequently when it's clear the D is crashing in is another clear indicator. He's been given his orders... for some reason.
October 9th, 2019 at 11:43 AM ^
Going to give the standard internet "not sure how you read what I wrote and came to that conclusion" reply here. That play is exactly what I'm talking about, as well as this entire idea. Patterson and the WRs have to come together for themselves, make the decision to throw those balls and catch them. If they do it and it works, the coaches will back off and keep letting them do it. That's the way it works in football. Coaches yell if you do something they told you not to and it gets crushed. If you score a TD they just kind of stand over there while everyone is high-fiving and the crowd is going crazy. They may murmer something in the film room about "why didn't you throw the 5 yard out", but the QB can just say "because I saw this (makes up something) and saw Collins was open for the 99 yard touchdown." What is the coach going to say. Nothing. He will say nothing.
Do that enough and the coaches will start calling the plays and not yelling at you when it's incomplete. They will probably never get to the point where the yell at you for not chucking it deep, but they will allow it to become part of the offense. This is how football works.
October 9th, 2019 at 12:11 PM ^
The "risk aversion" hill is the one I'm going to die on.
I've been saying it for a long time, because, to me, it best explains the regression in performance by the QBs, and it also fits Harbaugh's style.
October 9th, 2019 at 12:33 PM ^
1. Harbaugh is a football coach and I have to believe that turnovers of ANY kind, even the arm punt kind that are completely justified, are his kryptonite.
2. Harbaugh/Gattis may also be favoring offensive plans that limit Patterson's INT's as a way to help his numbers look better for NFL teams.
I don't know, total wild ass guesses.
October 9th, 2019 at 1:06 PM ^
Wrt item 2. I find it pretty hard to believe that the coaches would prioritize Patterson's stats so that he would be drafted higher.
October 9th, 2019 at 2:28 PM ^
NFL Teams don't care about interception numbers in college. It's about being able to make NFL Caliber throws. Jameis Winston through plenty of interceptions in college, Josh Allen and Josh Rosen both did too.
October 9th, 2019 at 2:32 PM ^
I think the early-NFL ship has already sailed.....
October 9th, 2019 at 10:00 AM ^
Yeah, I mean, what's really off putting is how much they talked about this being the best QB room that we have had in quite a while. Clearly they were blowing smoke, but it'd be nice if they were a little more honest. I think that's part of the reason why people are pushing to see McCaffrey.
October 9th, 2019 at 10:19 AM ^
yup, I've felt this way since the Army game. I think we were obviously sold a bill of goods in preseason about McCafferey. Wouldn't be surprised if Milton beats him out to be the starter next year, providing one of them doesn't transfer out
October 9th, 2019 at 10:38 AM ^
I am as frustrated with Patterson/Gattis/Harbaugh as I can be, no idea why they don't throw the ball downfield more.
Because Patterson sucks. I'm sure there is more going on. Maybe it's not coached well. Maybe the guys are taking longer to learn things than we expected. Maybe the install wasn't good. Maybe we just aren't good at what Gattis wants to do, so he's forced to try to do different stuff. But, watching the games there are open WRs all the time that Patterson just doesn't see or sees way too late. There are plays there and Patterson is just not getting them the ball. The offense won't work until he can read and process coverage quicker, which will probably never happen. And, Patterson's problem is less likely to show up in practice, because he can make great throws and hit WRs when he knows where to throw. His problem is know what do with the ball when he can't do what he wants. And, those situations only show up in games. So, it makes it harder for the backup to supplant the starter. They need opportunities in live games to prove they can do it better than Shea. Neither McCaffrey or Milton has had enough opportunities to know for sure.
October 9th, 2019 at 10:54 AM ^
I agree that Patterson hasn't been at all what I'd hoped.
There's a very, very easy solution to this though: throw it deep. Patterson is accurate with the ball when he knows where he wants to throw it, or I should say fairly accurate - he missed a few deep throws by just a yard or two early in the year. The problem is he doesn't know where he wants to throw it often enough, probably because 1) new offense, 2) reading a defense is not a great skill of his anyway, 3) golf is addicting. So keep an eye on the deep route on every play in which they're called, and anyone in single coverage gets the ball. Just throw it at that guy. This should terrify opponents, put the safeties deeper, and open up the run game.
If Iowa really did keep their safeties deep after the Collins catch, then heaven help us, but I don't think they did. If Patterson/Gattis/Harbaugh can't take advantage of deep Cover 2 with the run or pass, it's not happening at all in 2019. In that case... you're probably still best off throwing deep.
October 9th, 2019 at 11:13 AM ^
It's interesting because on the deep balls he tends to underthrow it. He's also generally good on the short stuff out in the flat. His problem is the intermediate stuff in the middle of the field. Unfortunately he's often looking down field and misses the underneath route that is wide open right in front of him. I don't think he's missing the deep open WR. If the guy is open deep he generally throws it. It's when that guy is covered, finding the open underneath guy. I guess he could still chuck it up deep. That's probably fine past your own 40 yard line. But, you don't want to do that deep in your own side of the field.
October 9th, 2019 at 11:25 AM ^
Fair enough. I do think he's missing people short and long, because again I don't he knows what to do on most plays because of the reasons above.
I'm proposing a 2016 PSU solution, which I assumed Gattis would bring with him naturally given he was there and his background with WR's. That solution is keep an eye on the deep route always, and if it's single covered, throw it. Don't worry about separation or whether the guy has a step on the DB. Just throw it. Collins is bringing those down, period. DPJ is likely bringing them down. Black is probably bringing them down. Bell is probably getting a step of separation, and given his basketball chops, is probably bringing those down.
Hit a few of those and magically everything else opens up. It seems a dumb fan solution, but that's the point we've reached. It doesn't seem like an improving scheme or QB is going to come quickly enough.
October 9th, 2019 at 4:46 PM ^
I'm proposing a 2016 PSU solution, which I assumed Gattis would bring with him naturally given he was there and his background with WR's. That solution is keep an eye on the deep route always, and if it's single covered, throw it. Don't worry about separation or whether the guy has a step on the DB. Just throw it. Collins is bringing those down, period. DPJ is likely bringing them down. Black is probably bringing them down. Bell is probably getting a step of separation, and given his basketball chops, is probably bringing those down.
I agree more or less, I just think it's a little more nuanced than chuck it up in single coverage because they'll win. I think it worked for PSU for a few reasons despite our WRs and o-line are just as good or better. One, they had a better running and RPO game with Barkley. Two, McSorely was a better runner and bigger threat to run than Patterson. And, three McSorely was more accurate and better at finding the open guy. I'm guessing your idea is what they want to do and Patterson just isn't as good at doing as McSorely was.