[doug]

I agree most everything OF said. I think the problem is with Shaw and the coaching style/philosophy. The NW game brought back ugly memories from the last few years. I have often not enjoyed watching even when Stanford won under Shaw, even the Rose Bowl win vs. Wisc. The game was bad-to-dreadful from the end of the 1st quarter on. The only thing that made it fun at all was the first RB win since 1972. Under Shaw, we have all too often been slow, leaden, uncreative, conservative, robotic/mechanical, unable to make plays that are not on our script, often seemingly unprepared, and prone to avoidable mental mistakes. Shaw has real strengths as a coach and representative of Stanford, but his weaknesses -- particularly as a strategist, motivator and in-game coach -- are not just bad, they produce what is for me tortuous play. I am sick of watching our now highly-rated guys play on a seemingly tight leash/script and fail to make plays while the opposing coach trust his guys and lets them try to make plays and win. Think back to the Rose Bowl vs. MSU. The MSU quarterback Conor Cook came into that game as a relative unknown and young. The talking heads predicted the MSU coach would install a game plan to protect him, and they expected Cook to be on a short lease. Instead, Dantonio let him play, even after he threw a pick six in the 1st half. Cook rewarded Dantonio's confidence and he craved us up. Shaw never did that with our guys, so we dully and predictably stuck with power runs right to the infuriating failure on 4th down.

[doug]

I agree most everything OF said. I think the problem is with Shaw and the coaching style/philosophy. The NW game brought back ugly memories from the last few years. I have often not enjoyed watching even when Stanford won under Shaw, even the Rose Bowl win vs. Wisc. The game was bad-to-dreadful from the end of the 1st quarter on. The only thing that made it fun at all was the first RB win since 1972. Under Shaw, we have all too often been slow, leaden, uncreative, conservative, robotic/mechanical, unable to make plays that are not on our script, often seemingly unprepared, and prone to avoidable mental mistakes. Shaw has real strengths as a coach and representative of Stanford, but his weaknesses -- particularly as a strategist, motivator and in-game coach -- are not just bad, they produce what is for me tortuous play. I am sick of watching our now highly-rated guys play on a seemingly tight leash/script and fail to make plays while the opposing coach trust his guys and lets them try to make plays and win. Think back to the Rose Bowl vs. MSU. The MSU quarterback Conor Cook came into that game as a relative unknown and young. The talking heads predicted the MSU coach would install a game plan to protect him, and they expected Cook to be on a short lease. Instead, Dantonio let him play, even after he threw a pick six in the 1st half. Cook rewarded Dantonio's confidence and he craved us up. Shaw never did that with our guys, so we dully and predictably stuck with power runs right to the infuriating failure on 4th down.