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Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - BostonCard - 11-05-2014

Since I've been on this board, we haven't routinely talked about who we would want to bring in once Johny Dawkins is fired, even though I get the sense that people have a stronger belief that there is a need for change in MBB over football. A debate on whether Bloomgren should be fired seems reasonable (at least for a message board; I still don't know how anyone can say with certainty who is responsible, beyond simply saying that the offense is sucking and Bloomgren is our current OC) given the offensive lack of production this season.  Talking about what kind of an offense would be a good fit for Stanford seems reasonable, which, as WIM has mentioned can be done internally.  But starting to look for replacements?  As I said, it comes across as unsavory, and I don't think the "that's what sports message boards do" excuse is valid; there's lots that happens at other message boards that we don't tolerate here (thank God).

BC

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - yvonne - 11-05-2014

I — Yvonne the fan, not Yvonne the message board goddess — agree. When we're talking about changing OC, we're talking about a guy losing his job, moving his family, and everything that goes with that. I'd be happy to talk about the kind of offense I'd like to see, and the kind of players I think we can get.

Nevertheless, I think it would be out of bounds for me to prohibit the discussion.

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - Bruce Wang - 11-05-2014

(11-05-2014, 12:49 PM)Yvonne link Wrote:I — Yvonne the fan, not Yvonne the message board goddess — agree. When we're talking about changing OC, we're talking about a guy losing his job, moving his family, and everything that goes with that. I'd be happy to talk about the kind of offense I'd like to see, and the kind of players I think we can get.

Nevertheless, I think it would be out of bounds for me to prohibit the discussion.

Here's the solution to your dilemma.  Kal pulls another Andy Buh and hires Bloomgren as an OC.  That way he doesn't have to move his family. 

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - BostonCard - 11-05-2014

(11-05-2014, 12:49 PM)Yvonne link Wrote:I — Yvonne the fan, not Yvonne the message board goddess — agree. When we're talking about changing OC, we're talking about a guy losing his job, moving his family, and everything that goes with that. I'd be happy to talk about the kind of offense I'd like to see, and the kind of players I think we can get.

Nevertheless, I think it would be out of bounds for me to prohibit the discussion.

Yeah, we appreciate your light touch.  I think there were better ways that the OP could have gotten his point across, but I certainly wouldn't want outsider fan to be shut down.

BC

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - OutsiderFan - 11-05-2014

Reading between a few of the lines, it seems some people are afraid it might be possible that no matter who the OC is, that David Shaw is effectively the OC.  This is of course a possibility.

My discussion about changing out the OC assumes that the OC will effectively run the offense without interference from the head coach.  The Shaw is effectively OC idea has currency particularly because if you look at Bloomgren's resume, he never ran an offense at the D1 level or higher before being elevated to the job at Stanford.  He was an assistant OC at the Jets, but that's not the guy in charge.  It seemed when he was hired that Shaw would be heavily involved in the offense because of Bloomgren's light OC experience at the major college and pro levels.

As for the OC having full responsibility, the head coach can certainly have veto power on decisions, and make suggestions, but nobody can really know who is responsible for what unless there are clear lines of responsibility.  Coaches must have full "P&L" responsibility when coordinating a particular unit, otherwise there is no way to know which coaches are capable of getting the job done and which ones aren't.  So I'm operating on the assumption a new OC/QB coach would be given enough autonomy to be fairly judged on his own merits.





Well, since we're playing Fantasy Football of sorts - Redrum - 11-05-2014

I don't think Bloomgren needs to:  lose his job, move the spouse and kids, etc. etc.  There is decent evidence that he knows the OL coaching job.  If he gave up/was forced to give up the OC job, then the urgency in his football future might be eased.  He could look around in the normal post-season shuffle and land another gig. Understandable,  but that would entail the whole career/family dislocation.  Or, he might look at the situation and accept that he tried and being told to concentrate on the OL is a pretty decent outcome to his first-time experiment.  Then, with time, HE might bug out on Stanford, but it would be on his schedule. 

I'm still chewing on WIM's challenge that Bloomgren did two jobs in '12 '13 and the Oline improved. [Ergo, full time coaching might not be needed]. Haven't fully digested it, but when I look at the depth charts it sure looks like he had better talent and experience back then.  Not so talented (or, at least, not as productive) now and the OL experience that is on hand has not yielded plug-n-play  (or at least, plug-n-win) OL performance.  Maybe THIS group does need lots of teaching and developing.

Re: Well, since we're playing Fantasy Football of sorts - washingtonismoney - 11-05-2014

(11-05-2014, 01:58 PM)Redrum link Wrote:I'm still chewing on WIM's challenge that Bloomgren did two jobs in '12 '13 and the Oline improved. [Ergo, full time coaching might not be needed]. Haven't fully digested it, but when I look at the depth charts it sure looks like he had better talent and experience back then.  Not so talented (or, at least, not as productive) now and the experience has not yielded plug-n-play  (or at least, plug-n-win) OL performance.  Maybe THIS group does need lots of teaching and developing.

That seems plausible. But if the critical variable were the quality of the personnel, then it seems like Bloomgren is at worst a neutral here...and so calls to remove him from OC to allow him to focus on OL seem misguided. It also suggests the critical problem here isn't 2014 coaching, but class of 2012 evaluation.

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - Spiny_Norman - 11-05-2014

Stewart Mandel (a Bay Area resident so he has the chance to see a lot of Stanford football) thinks that Shaw needs to strive for stability among his assistants this offseason.

Quote:Stanford’s downturn this season is not completely surprising given the number of standout veterans it lost, but I didn’t think the Cardinal would be quite so inept offensively. Shaw didn’t win consecutive Pac-12 titles -- neither of them with Luck, mind you -- by accident. The guy knows how to coach. I’m not the biggest fan of his rigidly conservative pro-style play-calling, but that’s not the reason the Cardinal are 5-4.

One thing that has to be catching up to Shaw is the massive staff turnover since he took over. His original coordinators were Pep Hamilton, now Luck’s coordinator with the Colts, and Derek Mason, now the head coach at Vanderbilt. Current coordinators Mike Bloomgren (offense) and Lance Anderson (defense) and D-line coach Randy Hart are the lone remaining holdovers from Shaw’s 2011 staff. Harbaugh and Shaw did such a good job of creating a unique identity for that program, but it’s asking a lot for a revolving door of assistants to maintain it. If Shaw can maintain some continuity this offseason at Stanford, it should help. Beyond that, the Cardinal aren’t lacking for talent or depth at most positions so I’d be surprised if this proves to be more than a one-year hiccup.

http://www.foxsports.com/college-football/story/college-football-playoff-rankings-sec-nightmare-scenario-mississippi-state-mailbag-110514

Or... - Redrum - 11-05-2014

A less talented/ less developed OL group calls for MORE attention and the first element in that is maximizing the coaching and development they get.  That takes focus of resources.  Otherwise things stay pretty much the same.  They might get better on the current course.  But from a program standpoint, they absolutely, positively MUST get better enough to not repeat our experience of this year.

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - washingtonismoney - 11-05-2014

(11-05-2014, 02:02 PM)Spiny_Norman link Wrote:Stewart Mandel (a Bay Area resident so he has the chance to see a lot of Stanford football) thinks that Shaw needs to strive for stability among his assistants this offseason.

Yeah, I have wondered whether this is a factor -- and Mandel doesn't mention the Crook or Sanford departures either.

People have contended the offense is poorly coached for a while. If that's the case, why are other coaches so eager to hire Stanford offensive coaches?

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - gocard14 - 11-05-2014

(11-05-2014, 02:10 PM)washingtonismoney link Wrote:[quote author=Spiny_Norman link=topic=11056.msg104501#msg104501 date=1415221358]
Stewart Mandel (a Bay Area resident so he has the chance to see a lot of Stanford football) thinks that Shaw needs to strive for stability among his assistants this offseason.

Yeah, I have wondered whether this is a factor -- and Mandel doesn't mention the Crook or Sanford departures either.

People have contended the offense is poorly coached for a while. If that's the case, why are other coaches so eager to hire Stanford offensive coaches?
[/quote]

As always, we judge based on recent results, whether fairly or not. 

When Greg Roman took over for the 49ers and Alex smith and Co. became a respectable offense he was a genius.  When the offense stagnated completely in the redzone, he was overly conservative and holding the team back (sound familiar?). When Kaepernick burst onto the scene he was again a genius for integrating the read option into an explosive offense that incorporated a lot of spread elements.  When that offense stagnated, he was an idiot for not running the ball enough.  Over that time his personnel grouping has changed from a fantastic Oline with a stable but unflashy QB and weak recievers to an average Oline with a flashy but unstable QB and great recievers. 

I highly doubt Greg Roman went from a great to a poor offensive coordinator, rather the circumstances around him changed and the NFL is an extremely competetive environment. 

Whats the point of this?  Well the Pac 12 has gotten extremely competetive and we too have had a drastic shift in the talent distribution of our personel.  I don't know if Bloomgren is the man for the job or not, and I agree our offense has had major deficiencies, however I'm hesitent to scapegoat.  Do our players look bad because of poor coaching? Do our coaches look bad based on less talent?  I don't know. But I do believe that Shaw has had enough success with this program to earn our patience through some tough (relatively speaking) times.

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - cardcoug - 11-05-2014

(11-04-2014, 01:51 PM)garvin link Wrote:I'm amazed at the number of people hold Tavita Pritchard responsible for perceived shortcomings at quarterback. Kevin Hogan is in his fourth year in the Stanford football program. Pritchard has been his position coach for 10 months. And nobody here has any idea what instructions Pritchard has received from his OC or head coach when it comes to quarterback instruction. The presumption of knowledge of the inner workings of the coaching staff is, I think, dubious.

(Also in reply to your second post further down, as well, but most directly to this one. Not sure how to double quote.)

I'm not sure I understand exactly what has got you so bothered here Garvin. First, by using "perceived shortcomings at quarterback", do you mean to cast doubt on the fact that our quarterback play this year has come up short? If so, I don't know what I could say to that. But more importantly, with your reference to the quarterback instruction being given from above to Pritchard, are you saying it could be that P. is just coaching Hogan exactly as Shaw & Co. tell him to, and so it could be their fault?

If I have misunderstood you, please do clarify what you mean here. But if I got you right, then I do think there is still plenty to criticize Pritchard for in this situation, though you are definitely right that it is too rash to assign sole blame to Pritchard. One thing is glaringly obvious: Hogan's technique - most notably his throwing motion and his (in)ability to scan the field - has simply not improved over the course of his time at Stanford. Pritchard has only been in his position 10 months, so somebody else is to blame for the lack of progress prior to that. But if Pritchard's title has any meaning at all, then Hogan's failure to develop this spring and fall is to a large extent his fault. Perhaps Pritchard has been given poor guidance from above, but then it is his job to say "Coach, this isn't working...", and to make some adjustments in his approach. (Perhaps he has. If so, they haven't worked.) The simple fact is that his job is not being done well; as is almost always the case whenever any job is not being done well, many things and many people factor into the problem. But there is plenty of blame to go around.

I do agree with you that we don't have anything even approaching the necessary information to call for his job. Think of it this way: if you were putting together a new coaching staff, would you pursue Pritchard for your QB coach? I think that would be a terrible idea. He may blossom into a great coach, but it is simply true that the Stanford quarterback is not developing through his college career. While I'm sure this happens occasionally, I can't think of any other college QB that started for multiple seasons and simply did not improve in some of these basic aspects of QB play. Hogan's job has become more difficult with the loss of a run game and adequate pass protection, for sure, but some of his problems are independent of that. (One's throwing motion doesn't change based on who the running back is.) These are defects that we all saw two years ago, and we assumed he'd outgrow them. He hasn't, and I don't see how you can not fault the person on the staff who has the specific task of helping him develop.



Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - OutsiderFan - 11-05-2014

Last year Greg Roman was considered the cat's meow of offensive coordinators.  Today, Niners fans want his head on a pike.  Or, if you'd like, yesterday Obama was a hero.  Today he's a punching bag.  They are still the same guys now as when they were loved, but when you are in charge and in a profession where everyone can see your performance, opinions can change quickly.  That's why big jobs pay so well and come with lots of perks, and why I'm not worried about Bloomgren or his family if he leaves Stanford.  He'll find a job somewhere, getting paid more than 99% of the population.

People from successful organizations are always sought after.  Mason may not have been a hot commodity last year if Stanford finished 6-6.

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - stupac2 - 11-05-2014

(11-05-2014, 04:29 PM)garvin link Wrote:Reasonable people can differ about what constitutes "going off the tracks." To me, a single season in which we don't win as often as we expected falls well short of the mark. (Especially because I thought a lot of the expectations, the "all-in" stuff, was foolishly over-optimistic.)

What bugs me is that, as it currently stands, this season isn't even that far off of expectations! If anyone expected yet another >10-win season, they're delusional. The only team that has any justification for expecting to win more than 10 games a year is Alabama, and that's largely a byproduct of ridiculous recruiting and fairly friendly schedules (they usually have around 5 competitive games a year).

Reasonable expectations for this team were around 8-4, and while we may fall short that we haven't yet. We need to wait until we've played the whole season to judge it.

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - BostonCard - 11-05-2014

(11-05-2014, 02:42 PM)OutsiderFan link Wrote:Last year Greg Roman was considered the cat's meow of offensive coordinators.  Today, Niners fans want his head on a pike.  Or, if you'd like, yesterday Obama was a hero.  Today he's a punching bag.  They are still the same guys now as when they were loved, but when you are in charge and in a profession where everyone can see your performance, opinions can change quickly.  That's why big jobs pay so well and come with lots of perks, and why I'm not worried about Bloomgren or his family if he leaves Stanford.  He'll find a job somewhere, getting paid more than 99% of the population.

People from successful organizations are always sought after.  Mason may not have been a hot commodity last year if Stanford finished 6-6.

It's not a question of whether human nature tends to turn on people quickly, or even whether that is understandable, let alone justified.  The real question is whether an organization is better off acting upon it or not.  Certainly, if you have a low threshold to fire someone, you are likely to get rid of the truly incompetent early.  The cost is that you get rid of fundamentally competent people going through a rough patch.

I think even those of us who are more conservative about personnel (and really, like Gavin, it's not that I think our OC shouldn't be fired, it's that I don't pretend to know whether he should), will readily acknowledge that something is wrong with the offense this year.  I think that is readily visible, both on a statistical level and a "what your eyes see" level.  Different people have suggested different reasons for this problem, from offensive line play, to QB play, to underperforming running backs, to playcalling, to mistakes (penalties and turnovers).  My gut instinct is that the problem is multifactorial; that all the above are contributing to the problem, but I will readily admit that is based on very limited data as a non-expert in the field.

The fundamental question then becomes, going forward, how many of the problems would be addressable if we had a different offensive coordinator (or a different offensive system).  And what cost would that incur?  In addition to the human element involved in someone losing their job, there are very real (both literal, if there is a buyout involved) and figurative, in firing a coordinator.  For example, as was suggested elsewhere in the thread, there are benefits to continuity in a system.  For example, if we get a new system and switch away from our zone blocking scheme, would that retard the development of our offensive linemen?  Then there is also the issue of morale; if Bloomgren has the team behind him, how will they react if he's fired, and the next guy fails to get buy in.  What will be the impact on recruiting if Bloomgren, who was recognized by Rivals as the recruiter of the year last year (and by ESPN as Pac-12 recruiter of the year in 2012) is gone or doesn't have as prominent of a role.

And, of course, there is no guarantee that the next guy will be any better than the last guy.  It was hard to believe that we could hire anybody worse than Buddy when we fired him, yet, arguably, we did in hiring Walt Harris (of course, some transitions you hit the jackpot; replacing Walt with Harbaugh was a stroke of genius).

Bloomgren has had two years as offensive coordinator at Stanford (he's also been offensive line coach since 2011).  He had one good year, where the offense showed improvement from the year before, despite major questions at wide receiver (answered positively) and tight end (a brobdingnagian problem last year), and to some extent running back (thank goodness Toby Gaffney [thanks Stupac] came back).  This year, obviously has been a brobdingnagian disappointment.  Which of the two years was the anomaly and which one would be the long term trend if he stays as offensive coordinator?  I can't claim to know.

One last thought.  If my math is right, Ty Montgomery and Lee Ward are the only two players on our two deep on offensive who have no eligibility left.  That's quite remarkable and bodes well for next year, especially for the offensive line, which, as weak as it might be by Stanford standards, will be a tremendously experienced line who has worked together come next year.  It seems to me that the offense should be poised to be much better next year, and that if it isn't I will readily join the chorus of those calling for us to get a new OC.

BC

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - stupac2 - 11-05-2014

(11-05-2014, 05:54 PM)Boston Card link Wrote:(thank goodness Toby came back)

If only.

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - OutsiderFan - 11-05-2014

Lets's not diminish expectations.  In a hyper competitive college football landscape it doesn't take much to be subsumed by other programs.  Stanford at worst should be 7-2 right now, and I'm not so sure Stanford shouldn't  be 8-1.  No Stanford fans should in any way claim a 10 win season was unrealistic in 2014.  Anyone think David Shaw thought that, or he wants lower expectations?

The losses to U$C and ND were imminently avoidable, and the margin of defeat at ASU was basically two ST turnovers.  But the one common denominator is the offense failed to score even 20 points.  U$C gave up 30+ to mediocre BC and that same ASU team.  A terrible UNC put up 43 on a ND defense Stanford could only put 14 on.  Granted the weather was terrible when Stanford played in South Bend, but still.  Even the UW game Stanford only scored 20, and a mediocre Oregon defense held it to 16.  The only teams Stanford has scored over 30 on: Davis, Army, WSU, and OSU after clobbered by injuries. 

Usually when you see a unit making all manners of mistakes it is indicative of a coach who can't get his players to execute.  Players can be miscast, asked to do things they can't or otherwise put in positions they can't succeed in, may stop trusting teammates to do their job, and might stop buying into what the coach is telling them to do.  It can all go off the rails quickly, and like in any relationship, once trust is lost, it's hard to ever get back.  This is why coaching changes are most often made.  It's tough to follow a leader into battle again after just witnessing that guy get half your platoon killed. 

It's possible Bloomgren might be able to substantially improve Stanford's offense in 2015, but unlikely. Good coaches almost never have years like Stanford's offense in 2014; highly regarded OL, experienced QB, quality backs, receivers, and TEs.  In college football, you can't afford to be patient when on top.  Another down year can impact recruiting and set the program back.

Look across the bay.  UC basically sacrificed three recruiting classes by keeping Tedford too long.  Stanford will get a mulligan from recruits in 2014 it would seem, but have another lackluster performance in 2015, and both the 2015 and 2016 classes can be compromised, which could impact future competitiveness. 

It's really hard to get from the 8-4 level to the 10-2 or 11-1 level, but very easy to slip back.  You have to be able to act quickly and decisively when performance slips in college football if you want to stay on top.  It's the nature of the beast.

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - stupac2 - 11-05-2014

(11-05-2014, 07:33 PM)OutsiderFan link Wrote:Lets's not diminish expectations.  In a hyper competitive college football landscape it doesn't take much to be subsumed by other programs.  Stanford at worst should be 7-2 right now, and I'm not so sure Stanford shouldn't  be 8-1.  No Stanford fans should in any way claim a 10 win season was unrealistic in 2014.  Anyone think David Shaw thought that, or he wants lower expectations?

No one ever said that having another 10-win season was unrealistic. What I said was that expecting a 10-win season was delusional. And you're right, Stanford could easily be 8-1 right now. The problem with this thinking, of course, is that Stanford could just as easily have been 8-4 in 2012 or 2013. In fact, in 2012 we went 8-2 in close games, when you expect an average of 50% (because close games tend to be effectively random), so really our record "ought" to have been 9-5 (I'm counting the bowl game there). This year we're 1-2 so far, below average but not by a lot! Our luck just ran out.

That's my whole problem with your analysis, you're diagnosing a problem where we don't know one exists. The sample size is just too small to have confidently determined that there's a problem here or what the problem is. In fact, I am completely baffled by your confidence in your assertion about the problem, because it's entirely unwarranted.

Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - shinsengumi - 11-05-2014

(11-05-2014, 04:48 PM)stupac2 link Wrote:[quote author=garvin link=topic=11056.msg104517#msg104517 date=1415230169]Reasonable people can differ about what constitutes "going off the tracks." To me, a single season in which we don't win as often as we expected falls well short of the mark. (Especially because I thought a lot of the expectations, the "all-in" stuff, was foolishly over-optimistic.)

What bugs me is that, as it currently stands, this season isn't even that far off of expectations! If anyone expected yet another >10-win season, they're delusional. The only team that has any justification for expecting to win more than 10 games a year is Alabama, and that's largely a byproduct of ridiculous recruiting and fairly friendly schedules (they usually have around 5 competitive games a year).

Reasonable expectations for this team were around 8-4, and while we may fall short that we haven't yet. We need to wait until we've played the whole season to judge it.
[/quote]

Looks like a lot of delusional people on this board, in that case.

http://thecardboard.org/board/index.php/topic,10461.0.html
http://thecardboard.org/board/index.php?topic=10382.0

And of course, a lot of delusional pollsters and coaches as well - you know, the ones that considered us a top 15 team.



Re: New OC suggestions or wishes? - CTcard - 11-05-2014

(11-05-2014, 07:33 PM)OutsiderFan link Wrote:The losses to U$C and ND were imminently avoidable, and the margin of defeat at ASU was basically two ST turnovers. 

Interesting.

I am far more upset that Stanford was not able to field a team that could meaningfully compete with Oregon and ASU than I am with coming out on the wrong side of a close game vs the domers or the mistakey/fluky loss to S.-C. Close games are going to happen, you're going to win some and lose some. But I don't see any reason Stanford shouldn't be fielding a team that can make a game of it vs Oregon (and ASU).

Quote:It's possible Bloomgren might be able to substantially improve Stanford's offense in 2015, but unlikely. Good coaches almost never have years like Stanford's offense in 2014;

And that is based upon what exactly?
Maybe it's true, maybe it's not, maybe it's sometimes true.
So - how do you know that? 

Quote:Look across the bay. 

Yep - look.
Last year they had the worst offense in the Pac 12. Filled with comedy of errors. They did run a lot of plays, but were last in yds/play, last in pts/game, last in points per possession. But, they kept their coaches on the offensive side of the ball and this year are one of the better offenses in the Pac 12. Interestingly, they also sucked at defense, but got rid of Buh (don't know if they canned anyone else). Presumably actually paying attention to the details showed that despite similar ineptitude, in one case the coaches were competent and not the other.


----------------
One other item on the offense, but not really related to the post referenced above.

A thing that is driving me crazy is that many of the complaints about the offense are complaints about a system we are not currently running. We are not running a Power Run offense. We are not running much of a run-based offense at all. As noted in another thread, we aren't running the ball that much more than Cal - which runs one of those Raidey offenses. We have only occasionally run the Ogre packages, except suddenly vs Oregon it showed up again.

Personally, I think giving up on the run game is part of the problem. It would appear that some time ago the coaches decided we couldn't run much this year. Thus the Oline (which I think does look like it has some individual talent) seems to have quit learning to run the power game. Now we lurch from approach to approach; season to season and game to game. I don't even know what to call Stanford's offense right now - it's just a bunch of plays hoping something might work this week. No wonder we have execution problems.