[Goose]

Good insight.  I don't want to underestimate what the Cougs have achieved; but I also think that the air-raid, if forcefully countered, can become a house of cards.  Wazzu is running it very well and has had a lot of success; but, as d4cohn pointed out, they are having that success against teams with Big-12-like defensive units; and sadly, ours has devolved into such a unit.  The air-raid system is certainly less susceptible to the blitz because the routes tend to be shorter and the release is normally quicker; but I would have loved to see this same game with one of our elite defensive units (2010-2014) on the field.  A few sacks and a few batted passes would have shaken up the air-raid, gotten the stop, and the flow of the game would have looked very different.  A team with a menagerie of hulks on the front-seven would have a blast defusing the air-raid system.  Let's see how the Bears do next week; but they have to travel to Pullman, and that is a tall order for any team.

I don't agree with the idea that 7 hulks would be good. The air raid eats that up. What you need is four lock-down pass defenders that can tackle and one linebacker that can handle the #5 receiver. Basically, very few teams have that. If you look at past Stanford defenses, the thing that fixed our "Oregon problem" was an improvement in speed, particularly sideline to sideline speed. It wasn't that our DL was great, it was rather that our linebackers were. The could run and they could tackle. The "party in the backfield" only mattered because the "normal" Oregon read-option / stretch plays were contained so they had to resort to a more conventional set of pass plays. Our DBs were also an improvement over the previous Stanford norm, but they probably were no better than what we have now. It was also true that we could control the TOP so that our defense wasn't out there the entire game, which we can't do now (at least nearly as well).
The air-raid is a different beast. However, against both the spread and the air-raid, you need to be able to tackle one-on-one. The 2010-2014 teams were generally good at that. Our defense this year basically is not particularly good at it. The "bend but don't break" defensive philosophy that we use relies on the idea that we can force you to execute a long, multi-play drive, and that most teams are not efficient enough to do that. They will have a bad play, get behind the sticks, and not convert. That happened in the first half against WSU. The air-raid will take the short pass play if it is all that is available. If the DB makes the tackle, the offense has to execute a LOT of plays perfectly to score. Most team's who run the air raid can't do that. In the second half, WSU could. However, they were greatly helped by our DBs NOT making the tackle and reducing the number of plays they had to execute perfectly. That beat us.

[Goose]

Good insight.  I don't want to underestimate what the Cougs have achieved; but I also think that the air-raid, if forcefully countered, can become a house of cards.  Wazzu is running it very well and has had a lot of success; but, as d4cohn pointed out, they are having that success against teams with Big-12-like defensive units; and sadly, ours has devolved into such a unit.  The air-raid system is certainly less susceptible to the blitz because the routes tend to be shorter and the release is normally quicker; but I would have loved to see this same game with one of our elite defensive units (2010-2014) on the field.  A few sacks and a few batted passes would have shaken up the air-raid, gotten the stop, and the flow of the game would have looked very different.  A team with a menagerie of hulks on the front-seven would have a blast defusing the air-raid system.  Let's see how the Bears do next week; but they have to travel to Pullman, and that is a tall order for any team.

I don't agree with the idea that 7 hulks would be good. The air raid eats that up. What you need is four lock-down pass defenders that can tackle and one linebacker that can handle the #5 receiver. Basically, very few teams have that. If you look at past Stanford defenses, the thing that fixed our "Oregon problem" was an improvement in speed, particularly sideline to sideline speed. It wasn't that our DL was great, it was rather that our linebackers were. The could run and they could tackle. The "party in the backfield" only mattered because the "normal" Oregon read-option / stretch plays were contained so they had to resort to a more conventional set of pass plays. Our DBs were also an improvement over the previous Stanford norm, but they probably were no better than what we have now. It was also true that we could control the TOP so that our defense wasn't out there the entire game, which we can't do now (at least nearly as well).
The air-raid is a different beast. However, against both the spread and the air-raid, you need to be able to tackle one-on-one. The 2010-2014 teams were generally good at that. Our defense this year basically is not particularly good at it. The "bend but don't break" defensive philosophy that we use relies on the idea that we can force you to execute a long, multi-play drive, and that most teams are not efficient enough to do that. They will have a bad play, get behind the sticks, and not convert. That happened in the first half against WSU. The air-raid will take the short pass play if it is all that is available. If the DB makes the tackle, the offense has to execute a LOT of plays perfectly to score. Most team's who run the air raid can't do that. In the second half, WSU could. However, they were greatly helped by our DBs NOT making the tackle and reducing the number of plays they had to execute perfectly. That beat us.