I didn’t expect to be here this fast. Richt isn’t Golden, but this is a Golden season. We just flipped sides of the ball.
What hurts the most is hearing the spin regarding talent. It sounds like the Golden era, minus the sanctions excuse. The class is collapsing and a quick fix (i.e. an offensive version of the Manny hire) is unrealistic. Richt came here to call plays and he is going to see it through. This is a bad time to be a Hurricane fan.
Some scattered thoughts:
- Richt has botched the QB position, and we shouldn’t be surprised. That’s what got him fired. Personally, I focused on his prior successes and hoped the way it ended in UGA (with Greyson Lambert and Faton Bauta) was an aberration. It wasn’t. This might just be who Richt is in 2018. When I watched Cam Newton and Deshaun Watson win games on Sunday, it only drilled home that point. There is a disconnect between Richt and the modern game.
- It’s even more concerning to hear Richt talk about Jarren’s redshirt. Now, Jarren isn't going to save the offense. He might not even be ready to play. We don't know. But the redshirt shouldn’t be entering Richt’s mind. If Jarren is good, he won’t be here in five years. If he’s bad, he won’t be here in five years. Or he’ll be Malik. Either way, the fifth year should be irrelevant. I’m worried Richt’s mind is stuck in another era that no longer exists.
- The fans have been screaming for more motions and jet sweep action since last year. Richt dismissed it. But in Week 10 of the season, there it was. He is reacting, as opposed to getting ahead of the trend. And as you'd expect, everything looks haphazard and thrown together. Darrell Langham, who can't run, faked the jet on multiple snaps. Why not use Homer, Dallas, Harley, or Pope? We have guys that can scare people, but we don’t use them in a manner that scares anyone. And when we lined up for a jump ball to end the game—the classic Langham scenario—we pulled him and sat him on the bench. I just don’t see any reason or rhyme to what we do.
- Deejay Dallas is another example. Duke scored on us with a jump pass. Meanwhile, we have one of the most versatile players in the country being utilized like a one-dimensional runner. Where is the throwing threat? Where is the receiving threat? He might as well be Gus Edwards.
- Much has been written about how we ran out of time with four minutes left and two timeouts. It was an embarrassment. And it’s just a continuation of what we’ve seen the last two games. Why is there no urgency coming from the QB position? Can you imagine Drew Brees or Baker Mayfield carrying themselves like our guys? It’s not an experience thing, because Malik is even less urgent than Perry. It is coming from the head coach and the quarterback coach.
- We need to do a better job of self-scouting. Everybody knew Malik’s limitations going into the year. And on our pre-camp podcast, me and Lu spent a good chunk of the time describing how Mahoney and Jones were not talented enough to start for us. We had an absurdly easy stretch after the LSU game. Why didn’t Scaife and Perry start until conference play? Why were we so consistent with our first-team offensive lineup early in the season? If the upperclassmen aren’t talented enough—which was obvious before the season—we need to fast-track the young talent and take our lumps early. That did not happen.
- One last thing on the talent spin job. You are seeing it all over Twitter from the media and staff. The New Orleans Saints played the LA Rams yesterday. Biggest game of the year. The Saints have one of the best QBs of all time, the best OL in the league, and two RBs that combined for 3,000 scrimmage yards last year. If anybody can line up and “out-dude” the opposition, it’s them. But on a crucial fourth and one, Sean Payton called a reverse pass to put the ball in the hands of Taysom Hill. It worked. Nobody is just lining up and beating guys man-on-man. The state of football is too advanced. You need to always be looking for an edge. We aren’t looking for that edge right now. We are just looking for excuses.
Anyways, I'll be watching on Saturday. This November, like so many other Novembers of the past decade, is about seeing young talent develop and learning from failure. I thought we were past this stage.
