Post-game thoughts
(Written by kencraw)
Various random thoughts on the game yesterday:
- Bridgeford looked terrible. His decision making was horrendous, but his passes were. And although they weren’t bad decisions, they were a bit on the slow side. If he’s the best thing we’ve got for a backup QB, we’re in trouble.
- Keeping Maynard out of the game may have been the decision that lost the Bears the game. We lost almost the entire 1st quarter of offensive play, gave Nevada too many early possessions, and Maynards slow start meant that there was very little offense for the first third of the game.
- That’s not necessarily to say I think it was the wrong decision (more on this in a separate post)
- As for Maynard’s performance, this rumored “big leap” he made in the off-season is a cosmic joke. Sorry, this is the same inconsistent Maynard we saw last year. He played worse in this game than he did against Fresno State to open the season last year. While I think Tedford can use a similar strategy as he did last year to win some games (rely on the running game and use Maynard to keep them honest, particularly by rolling out and threatening the QB run), we won’t be seeing the kind of improvement we had hoped for specifically because of QB problems.
- Seriously, how is that possible? I’m really starting to be at a complete loss as to why Cal can’t find/develop a good QB. No one can take away from Tedford his past of developing good QB’s, but whatever it was, he doesn’t have it any more. Either that or he’s a terrible recruiter of QB’s and just can’t tell who has the real tools and who is going to succumb to the Peter Principle when they get to college.
- The more I think about it, this game was lost in the trenches. The defensive line was a big disappointment, they were hardly disruptive at all. The offensive line did fine in pass protection, but did a poor job of opening up running holes.
- While the offensive line issues weren’t terribly surprising, the defensive line problems are. These guys were supposed to be the veteran unit that anchored an otherwise inexperienced group.
- Speaking of under-performing experienced players, both corners in my opinion did a poor job in pass coverage. Yes, they made a lot of tackles, so their run support was good, but the number of open receivers and the lack of getting a hand in to break up completions was very troubling, particularly considering how good they played last year.
- I think we may have underestimated the impact of all the injuries this fall. Wilkerson was experienced and very good. Backup cornerback Stefan McClure showed great promise last year and was solid and needed as a backup. Cecil Whiteside was likely to be a keep piece amongst our linebackers. That’s three important players on defense. Add in Galas on the offensive line and that was a tough group to lose over the course of training camp.
- Along those lines, the inexperience was showing itself during tackling. I saw a lot of diving at feet and WAAAAY to many instances when players weren’t wrapping up. Luckily, it didn’t really burn them at any point, but there were a lot of inside runs that were for 4-6 yards that could have been for 2-3 with proper tackling.
- I stand very much behind my podcast statements that CJ Anderson getting the bulk of the carries was a big mistake. I didn’t see any meaningful improvement in him and he never has been as good as Isi Sofele. Isi need to get the bulk of the carries. That could have the difference in this game too.
- Allen had lots of traction problems, obviously, and it makes me wonder if there were lots of traction problems in the trenches which are not as obvious from the stands. Seriously, how can this be? It’s the practice field. There should be no surprises. The equipment crew needs to solve this ASAP.
- I was very disappointed with Tedford’s decision to hand it off to the RB on 3rd and 16 from their own 6 yard line. Look, I get it that it’s a tough place to play from and in the 1st half, I accept being conservative. But there’s 3:30 left in the game and your defense isn’t sitting on a great track record of stopping the opposition. You can’t just give up on 3rd down and punt it away and hope for the best.
- Back to the secondary, one thing that was really disappointing was how often they had a guy in the area, but he wasn’t reaching in and breaking the pass up. Right down to the final drive, when Josh Hill could have made a move on the ball instead of just hitting him to tackle him, there were too many uncontested 3rd down completions… and not because there was nobody there to contest it.
- Both of the outside linebackers, particularly early in the game, didn’t anticipate the speed of the Nevada QB. We had a guy in position to tackle him (McCain) on his long TD run, he just got burned.
- For a defensive positive, although early in the game the defense was still figuring it out, by the 2nd quarter, it wasn’t the pistol itself that beat the Bears. They eventually got it figured out, although the overall quality of the Nevada offense, in particular the passing game, in the end proved too much.
- Final thought: Redzone defense… not where it needed to be. It sure seemed like the defense lost their heart right about the 20 yard-line.
So, in summary, I see 3 main reasons we lost:
- Maynard being benched for a quarter
- Losing the game in the trenches
- Too much of CJ and not enough of Isi
September 2nd, 2012 at 4:47 pm
Ken,
You make no mention of Tedford abandoning the offense he started out with in 2002. What do you think of him going to the spread, no huddle, and look at me?
Why would a coach totally discard the offense that made him a success for an offense that has no identity. On offense we look like a bunch of high school guys playing street football.
September 2nd, 2012 at 6:37 pm
Ed, I’ve seen that argument presented in a couple places in the last day and I have to say it’s pretty compelling. There’s no doubt that this offense lacks an identity. Tedford seems to be tacking on little components of lots of different offenses to his base offense. At this point it looks too much like spaghetti code. It’s a mess. I’m not sure even Tedford understands it all. It could be a big reason our players, particularly our quarterbacks look confused.
There’s something to be said, particularly at the college level, for fewer plays ran well.
September 3rd, 2012 at 9:18 am
Responding to both Ed’s and Ken’s points, I agree with both. I’d also like to add that somewhere along the way, Tedford decided or realized that he needs about 15 quality “pro-style offense” players every year to run a pro style offense successfully and, with the hippies in the trees, that wasn’t going to happen (FB, 2 TEs who can catch and block, 3 WRs, OL and QBs who are being heavily recruited by the big boys). Contrast this to the zone read or spread…where you need fewer high quality but well coached players. The zone read allows you to recruit smaller linemen who move well, allows you to not chase the USCs and the Alabamas for QBs who can actually QB. Every school who is trying to compete has a quality tailback, so that’s required for either offense. Tailbacks are also easier to find. Oregon seems to have no problems whatsoever finding replacement QBs…meanwhile, we haven’t been able to replace Nate Longshore back in ’07. Riley, Reed, Maynard, Sweeney, Mansion, Bridgford are all whiffs (and it doesn’t look good for Hinder or Boehm but it’s still early. I have a hard time understanding that they could be worse than Maynard).
Even Stanford found a niche they could exploit (bruising running game, lots of TEs and overloaded formations even though they had one of the best QBs in the history of college football).
September 3rd, 2012 at 9:34 am
3 carp,
Are you trying to tell me that the OL we have today is not as good as the OL Tedford put on the field in 2002?
What has changed since Tedford put his pro style attack on the field in 2002. I will tell you, it’s Tedford’s obsession with trying to out scheme his opponent rather than sticking with what made him successful in the first place.
The offense we saw Saturday is a disjointed mess of every offense in college football with no identity and no direction. I cannot believe we are unable to develop a QB who can actually play and that Maynard is the best QB on the squad.
Tedford should abandon this stupid offense, make it simple and start either Bridgeford or Hinder.
September 3rd, 2012 at 9:48 am
Ed…I have a hard time understanding how Coach M. could not ask Tedford, privately, “what the heck are we doing with this zone read silliness?” Coach M knows pro-style football very well, and I have to think that running both the pro style offense and the spread is not a good way to go. I don’t think the spread is a bad idea, I just don’t think we have the right QB and linemen to run it year in/out.
September 3rd, 2012 at 10:12 am
carp,
How many pro-style plays did we run on Saturday, four or five. Did we ever see an offset eye formation, a WR running through the formation, a play action pass with the QB under center.
All we saw was a disjointed pile of crap offense trying to keep up with the current fad in college football, a combination of spread, shotgun, no huddle, look at me and very little pro-style dropback QB play.
Tell me this, why would a coach abandon what made him successful for this junk. I am clueless.
September 3rd, 2012 at 12:06 pm
Carp, I’m not sure Tedford ever got to a point that he “gave up” on his offense because he needed too many high quality players to do it. While there’s some truth to their being an advantage of an offense that isn’t trying to go head-to-head with USC, as Oregon does, I don’t get the feeling that’s what Tedford is thinking.
Nevertheless, both of you are kind of touching on the same thing… Tedford has decided that for whatever reason, his base offense isn’t good enough and he’s making changes to try and adapt.
The problem is, instead of a holistic change, he’s fragmented everything to death.
September 3rd, 2012 at 2:15 pm
Ken,
Your observation is correct; this offense is a fragment.
When Bellotti decided he wanted to change his offense to the spread, he had Andy Ludwig as an OC. Ludwig was not familar with the spread, he went to spread class in the off-season; this was in 2004. The year 2004 was a mixed bag for Oregon although they almost beat us.
In 2005, Bellotti hired Gary Crowton to run his offense with mixed results until he hired Chip and turned the offense over to him and hinted that Chip would succeed him.
The point is, if you are going to drastically change the offense, you hire someone who is an expert in running it and turn the whole offense over to him. Tedford hired Dunbar to get acquainted with spread options and then refused to turn the offense over to him; Dunbar left.
Now Tedford is trying to mix what he has learned about the spread and everything else Oregon does with it on his own and meld it with his offense.
So now what we have is a half-a$$ offense with no defined direction and mix that with a QB who is less than adequate in running it and get you what we saw on Saturday.
September 4th, 2012 at 10:14 am
Man, I don’t know of any Cal fan who likes Tedford anymore. He has really squandered one of the most indebted and loyal fan-bases in the world. I thought he lost it in 2007, but I was considered a bit of an extremist back then. How can Sandy keep backing a guy that everyone has come to be SEVERELY disappointed in at best and ABSOLUTELY HATE at worst?
September 4th, 2012 at 5:02 pm
I have to disagree with the statement that Maynard was a disappointment. He looked a little rusty at times, but that can be expected. In fact, I was pleased to see him air it out to someone besides brother Keenan so often. A TD a piece for each of our new frosh WRs (Treggs and Harper) is certainly inspiring and I doubt Bridgeford would’ve made that happen. Unfortunately, I’m still not seeing Maynard’s running ability being used like it should, especially if Tedford is trying to emulate more spread offenses like Oregon.
This really comes down to Tedford and the run game. Maybe Ken is right about Isi over CJ, but I think the main reason the run game flopped was because of our new offensive look. Cal FBs have been unsung heros in some of Teford’s best offenses and the FB role was all too diminished in that game. No lead blocking from a FB may have only compounded the OL’s run blocking problems. And finally: the decision to run it on 3rd and 16 at the end of the game…? I would honestly appreciate if someone could defend this play call, cos I just can’t make sense of it.
September 4th, 2012 at 5:08 pm
I have to admit Danimal, that when I read the stat sheet, Maynard didn’t look all that bad. Perhaps I’m being too hard on him. I just feel I saw too many happy feet, too many errant balls, and a bit of slow decision making. He also had some very nice throws too. He just seemed inconsistent. Perhaps the rust will come off pretty quickly and I’ll regret having written him off.