[needle]

I pin my faint hopes on the idea that Pritchard and Richard, first-time coordinators, after all, can really find some lessons out of this extraordinarily poor and (at least for the offense) underachieving performance.

Isn't that part of the issue? They aren't first-time coordinators. Pritchard has a years-long (not very impressive) track record as OC during the downfall of Stanford football, and Richard has multiple years as a DC coordinating a defensive scheme that was impressive for its time, but for all intents and purposes has been solved at the pro level.

We can hope that they'll achieve better results now that they presumably have more autonomy than when they were under David Shaw and Pete Carroll, but it feels like exactly that--hope.

My mistake, as I had forgotten that Richard does have defensive coordinator experience (just not in college). I don't know enough about the Seahawks to say how much autonomy he truly had under Carroll.

While Pritchard did hold the title of offensive coordinator, I think it's pretty clear he was not an offensive playcaller at Stanford, so I'm (probably) justified in calling him new at the job of calling plays, at least.

Anyway, your points are good ones. But--it's just one game, as horrible as it was. So, I'm choosing to hold on to hope.

[needle]

I pin my faint hopes on the idea that Pritchard and Richard, first-time coordinators, after all, can really find some lessons out of this extraordinarily poor and (at least for the offense) underachieving performance.

Isn't that part of the issue? They aren't first-time coordinators. Pritchard has a years-long (not very impressive) track record as OC during the downfall of Stanford football, and Richard has multiple years as a DC coordinating a defensive scheme that was impressive for its time, but for all intents and purposes has been solved at the pro level.

We can hope that they'll achieve better results now that they presumably have more autonomy than when they were under David Shaw and Pete Carroll, but it feels like exactly that--hope.

My mistake, as I had forgotten that Richard does have defensive coordinator experience (just not in college). I don't know enough about the Seahawks to say how much autonomy he truly had under Carroll.

While Pritchard did hold the title of offensive coordinator, I think it's pretty clear he was not an offensive playcaller at Stanford, so I'm (probably) justified in calling him new at the job of calling plays, at least.

Anyway, your points are good ones. But--it's just one game, as horrible as it was. So, I'm choosing to hold on to hope.