this quote from Chick on D'Onfrio bothers me

[Dingaan1828]

KSU was 101st in total offense last year. In a conference that mostly plays **** defense. It has very little to do with the players. Everyone runs a train on Ohno.

They were 59th.

But, yes, everyone runs train on Al's pal.

 

[CaneHammer]

I'm going with all of the above.

Certainly possible, but I just don't buy that Golden and D'Onofrio are idiots when it comes to defense; I mention Golden because they're in lockstep philosophically.

They had good defenses at Temple once they were able to get things straightened out.

They may not be idiots, but they're approaching the problem incorrectly. They've apparently assessed a lack of talent, and their solution is to extend games. That may work against lesser teams and will get us 5, maybe 6 wins. But, it won't prepare us for the future and it's a dangerous foundation for our youth. Additionally, I'm gonna shoot you straight here: I have zero evidence that D'Onofrio is capable of creativity or strategic advantages. At least on the other side, I've seen Fisch design some great stuff. His issue is lack of focus.

Wow, you nailed it.

It is not hard to see it. Some coaches try to over coach and others keep stripping it down until they find a comfort level with their players understanding what they are teaching. We do not call anything overly sophisticated on defense. I think they are trying to get the guys to be able to do pattern recognition and understand what their gap assignment is based upon formation. Basic tenets of playing zone defense. Unfortunately our guys are terrible at it. To make matters worse, I think our guys are terrible at playing man as well. So this leaves the coaches in a pseudo panic mode. At this point, our defense becomes overly simple and our guys (particularly the LBs) are still not worth a **** at pattern recognition and are still blowing gap assignments.


My biggest gripe comes is when we sit in single and two high safety in predominate running downs and distances. I would rather the safeties be closer to the action. I think it would help mask alot of the deficiencies of our LBs in rush defense. We got away with playing like we do against our weaker competition. Especially earlier in the year. I firmly believe it is a numbers game when it comes to running the ball. This is why people are infatuated with running a spread offense. When the QB can run with the ball, this makes the numbers even when there are 8 in the box (i.e. man on man). When we play 2 high, the offense is plus 1 in numbers. The Duke game highlights this. We stayed in 2 high for much of the first 3 quarters and did not bring our safety down into the box until the 4th quarter. At that point, the coaches went into desperation mode. Why wait so ******* long to do this? Why not make those ****** as QBs throw the **** ball to beat us in the beginning? I think our offense can bail us out if we give up a big play or two. Are we that ****** in our safety play that we cannot afford to play 8 and 9 in the box more than we do?

 

[TreOFive]

Dorito is getting paid to be better, I am sure there is no clause in his contract that says "your defense can be aweful if you do nt have the players to run it". That is a shyttty excuse, the guy has never proved the ability to deliver here. If your product gets worse over time and you show an inability to adjust then you need to go. Simple as that. While some of the claims about talent may be accurate, he is the one getting paid to produce a certain type of product. Get him out of here.

I will go on record: If he stays and we get more "talented players" the product on the field will not change. Why? because he is not the right buy for the job

 

[CaneHammer]

Dorito is getting paid to be better, I am sure there is no clause in his contract that says "your defense can be aweful if you do nt have the players to run it". That is a shyttty excuse, the guy has never proved the ability to deliver here. If your product gets worse over time and you show an inability to adjust then you need to go. Simple as that. While some of the claims about talent may be accurate, he is the one getting paid to produce a certain type of product. Get him out of here.

I will go on record: If he stays and we get more "talented players" the product on the field will not change. Why? because he is not the right buy for the job

I think him and Al are baffled and do not know how to fix it.

 

[Notsince1985]

How the **** would Chick know what great defenses do?

 

[Pennmed Canefan]

I think you guys are searching with some of these quotes. I didnt find this that interesting. I was frankly more alarmed by D's quote about guys making plays when the call is "right." In my mind, rarely are defensive calls right or wrong. The offense is the side with hundred page playbooks. Defense is simpler there arent a thousand defenses. If you call cover 2 it's not right or wrong it's all execution. Thus D believeing that his calls are "right" means that he's still chasing execution rather than accepting the lack of execution and asking why.

Vilma told an anecdote about how they went to UT in 2002 and Shannon let him call the defense to start the game to show him that the calls aren't that important. I believe that in the setting of proper execution. D seems to overcomplicate the matter IMO.