I have just seen him fail in location after location, but in all those spots he was the head guy.

Actually, I was kidding. However, I wasn't reading into it too much 'cause Herm and Chan both love to run a ball-control offense. If you read the sentence where Chan states he's more interested in his players beating the person in front of him instead of devising schemes like Al Saunders did, then you'll understand that this brand of football is exactly what most people don't like 'cause it only scores a few points per game, but more importantly, keeps games close.

The problem with the "we're going to beat them by one point" theory is always this: You're up by one point and your opponent has the ball with 2 mins to go, and you have a chance to lose the damn game- even by a simple field goal.

Nobody wants that. I don't mind ball control when you're a couple of touchdowns ahead, but ball control all game long only makes for games to be too close for comfort.

This is approximate but pretty close:

Passing frequency by quarter:
1st: 57% of the plays
2nd: 57% of the plays
3rd: 70% of the plays
4th: 72% of the plays

Yes, a lot of the passing was becuase we were behind. Also becuase we couldn't run the ball at all last year (3.3 yards per attempt. Terrible).


Passing freqency by down:
1st: 56%
2nd: 63%
3rd: 81%
4th and going for it: 69%

Looks like our offense was pass, pass, pass, punt.

I bet Herm hated last season more than any other.

Some other interesting stats:

Huard's sack rate was about 10% of the times he went back to pass.
Croyle's was 7.5%

Huard's best passing efficiency was on 1st down. Croyles was on 3rd down and worst on first down. Why was Croyle so bad on 1st down? Yards per attempt were low (the dumbass coaches only called short passes on first down) and interceptions were high (Croyle's inexperience). On 3rd down, Croyle's completion percentage was lower, but the yards per attempt were almost a full yard higher than on first down. Also, he made much better decisions on 3rd down with 3 TDs and only 1 INT. Let him play and see what he can do.

Both QBs had their best passing efficiency in the 2nd quarter, next best in the 4th quarter and worst in the 1st quarter. Again, to me that points to coaching and play calling. I feel like we come out of the locker room at the beginning of both halves just not wanting something bad to happen on the first drive. By the end of each half, we are in the groove (relatively speaking) and more effective, but the coaches don't trust the players with aggressive plays until later in the half. Contrast to Vermiel who always had a great set of plays scripted for the beginning of the game.

I hope this year the coaches will trust the players. But the most important thing is that we have to find a way to run the ball. I'm hopeful about running left and depressed about the thought of running right.

Yep. Under-promise and over-deliver. Smart philosophy.

Probably. But after 2 years of hearing Herm say the stupidest things and then watching the direction of the offense be perfectly consistent with the stupid things that come out of Herm's mouth, you can see why people would do this.

Baby steps.

QFT, That there folks is a very honest answer!

Oh, I'm not complaining. I think I was one of the first to point out how many new players we would need to acquire/develop before we could put a legitimate contender on the field. I think some people think that the OL is somehow fixed. I think it will be better on the left side. Pass protection might be a little better if McIntosh is able to adjust to the right side. But because an OL is only as good as the weakest link, I don't really expect a huge improvement this year.

You're still getting hung up on the "one point" term. It's not a theory at all. As someone already eloquently stated, the goal is not going to be scoring exactly 1 point more than the opponent in various amusing ways. It's not going to be a totally different method than what DV and Al had. That was a power running game too. They just had better offensive talent to execute it. It looked so much better because the had the talent to pull it off.

The point I believe he's trying to make is that it only takes 1 point more to win. In no way does it mean the goal is to keep the scoring low. We're going to keep it simple and do whatever it takes to come out on top at the end of the game. 56-55 is still a one point victory.

How the **** would he know what kind of offense he has
he has a cast of unknowns
generic is the only way he could talk right now