Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU

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Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - msqueri - 09-07-2025

1. A game like so many others in recent years in how unfun and uncompetitive we were and how unnewsworthy it is at this point for Stanford to play like a bottom rung team. It was far too similar to the Hawaii game and to many games of the Taylor era to make too much of it. It's more disappointing than surprising that we are showing no signs of turning the corner. Also disappointing is that an uncompetitive performance came after a bye. We made such a big deal of last year's disadvantage of facing teams playing on extra rest and then when we got to have that much-awaited benefit we squandered it, the first time Stanford has lost coming off a bye since Shaw was coaching. The really sobering thought is that the extra rest and preparation very well may have positioned us to have a relatively good game and that was what we did with it. If that ends up being an above-average performance for the 2025 Cardinal we are in for a very long year.

2. The thing that seems to give some hope to some is the idea QB1 is the main cause of our problems and swapping in a new one could unlock better play. That strikes me as wishful. For one, Gulbranson has been terrible but so have the WR/TE play and, now that we played a real opponent, the OL play. Moreover, every data point - but the especially salient recent ones being Reich's posture post-game that we did not consider changing quarterbacks and Gulbranson being sent out as the post-game press conference rep yet again - suggests that the coaches do not view Gulbranson vs. Brown as a close call, came into the season with a strong predisposition to ride with Gulbranson regardless of performance (clearly), and are more interested in building Gulbranson's confidence than seeing if somebody else can surprise and do better. This is subject of a lot of griping, which is to be expected when QB1 does as horrendously as Gulbranson has been playing (more below). But the coaches' behavior does not seem as crazy to me as many think it is if you accept the premise that our supporting cast sucks beyond description, no savior is walking through that QB room door, and the strengths and weaknesses of the alternatives are ill-suited to the task at hand (namely Brown being an immobile game manager and Rizk being an undisciplined gunslinger). I think Gulbranson's performance has been so bad that even my patient perspective is now calling for us to try somebody new but I can hope to see Brown in the coming weeks without having much hope it will change things for the better. He would still have to play behind this line and throw to these non-weapons. I'd expect it to be painful except maybe against bad defenses and maybe even then.

3. The eye test rendered the verdict clear as can be - an extremely Teevens-esque performance in which the offense was pitiful and the defense valiant. The stat of the week: we scored zero points per non-garbage drive. Can't do worse than that. That's too bad to all be on QB1. BYU's defense is their strength and it was predictable our greatest struggles would be from our offense but you have to do better than nothing no matter who you're playing. The offensive output and efficiency ranked with last year's SMU game as our worst in the 19 years since Walt Harris. I only looked back a decade for BYU comparisons and nothing in that timeframe has been more stifling for the Cougars on a per play basis aside from last week's Portland State game, and only one game (Navy in 2020) had fewer yards. The stats support eyeballs and common sense that the defense was much, much better. If I'm calculating correctly, we gave up 2.44 points per non-garbage drive, a scoreboard outcome that made BYU look like a top 50 offense, which is exactly what SP+ pegs them. And of course degree of difficulty is higher when the offense isn't doing the defense any favors, something we've been very accustomed to not only in the Teevens years but across decades. Even then, the points allowed were respectable, even without discounting that a touchdown came on a short field set up by Tiger Bachmeier's big return. Hats off to the defense.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - msqueri - 09-07-2025

4. Most encouraging about the defense is that I think they can credibly view themselves as taking a step forward following the bye. The defense was in the general vicinity of where it was against Hawaii (giving up 0.1 more yards per play to the Cougs); considering that SP+ pegs BYU as having the #48 offense and Hawaii as #122 that feels like progress. Put even more encouragingly, that was our second best yards per play allowed against a power opponent in the last four years (behind only the 2023 Wazzu game). In particular, pass defense continues to be a silver lining, with a second quality performance to start the season. Aside from that 2023 Wazzu game, no game under this defensive staff has had better yards per attempt or defensive passer rating and yesterday we gave up many fewer yards than even that standout performance. (By the way, the comfortable win obscures that it was a really bad game for Bear Bachmeier, who was 113th of 129 nationally in Total QBR this week) I have some concerns that the tweaks to our defensive staff may not have been the best thing for our run defense but nonetheless I see yesterday as a bounce back in that dimension as we gave up fewer yards per carry than we did against an inferior Hawaii and also were below BYU's 2024 average in both yards and yards per carry, significantly so in the case of the latter. I fear this is going to be one of those years when the defense is solid, gets no help, wears down and perhaps gets demoralized over time.

5. What can you say about 19 yards rushing on 0.79 yards per carry? We did not keep the momentum going from last week, to say the least. This was statistically worse than even last year's SMU game and reminiscent as well of the 2022 Utah game. This likely owes in significant part to the quality of BYU's run defense, which has now given up 16 yards in its last three games stretching back to the Alamo Bowl, but clearly a big failure. That failure stings given the whole identity of the Luck/Reich era and this offseason has been our physicality and establishing the run. Clearly there are still teams we are utterly incapable against. On the passing side, we don't need stats to know it was horrible. We never had a game under Taylor with a yards per attempt/passer rating combo as bad as what we've seen in both games so far this year. That said, the passing stats were slightly better across the board than they were against a much worse Hawaii defense, so this arguably constitutes passing progress, albeit from a subterranean baseline. It's also possible BYU has a really good pass defense. Last year they played numerous passing offenses this tough, including amazingly SMU. But it would be entering Mark Twain territory to try to spin Stanford's passing as anything but awful. It is also a problem that the pre-snap/getting into right plays/setting up conversions stuff one could have said Gulbranson did well to mitigate his failures fell apart this week. Even if one thinks Gulbranson was a bit better as a passer, he certainly wasn't as QB1 writ large.

6. Yeah....Gulbranson. That was 128th of 129 nationally in Total QBR this week, a true hold my beer performance to prove that folks were being way too hyperbolic in calling the Hawaii game the worst in Stanford history or the worst it can get. Last night's performance was closer to that but still has some company. Gulbranson yesterday was the seventh worst Total QBR in the 260 Stanford games ever measured (ranking just ahead of 2019 West vs. UCLA, 2018 Costello vs. Pitt, 2017 Chryst vs. San Diego State, 2008 Pritchard vs. TCU, 2006 Ostrander vs. Arizona, and 2023 Lamson vs. Sacramento State). On the season, Gulbranson is now 121st of 130 QBs nationally and the very worst in Power Four. As much as I think OL, WR, and TE play contribute significantly to the trainwreck, as much as I believe in reversion to the mean (in Gulbranson's case a much more established track record than Rizk and especially Brown), and as much doubt as I think there is ample reason to have in our alternatives....yeah, worst in Power Four through two games is the kind of play that begs for somebody else to get a look. I won't yet predict it because the signals from the coaches riding with Gulbranson have been pretty clear, but not scoring outside of garbage time, turning the ball over via both interceptions and fumbles, throwing a screen in the end zone for a safety, committing delays of game, telegraphing where run plays are going before big tackles for loss....that's a level of play that demands a controversy.

7. The rest of the offensive supporting cast sure leaves a lot to be desired though. After all the damage on the ground last week, running backs made a grand total of four first downs, only two by our potential offensive MVP Ford. To say Roush is playing like garbage is libel against garbage. I agree with all the comments that talk of Roush as an NFL guy needs to cease until he proves much, much more. Since Big Game 2023, Roush has one game in which PFF has graded him above 70. The hype is way out of control at this point. The receivers are what they are and I'm at least happy Farrell and Williams had very nice bounce backs, with Farrell in particular having a really nice game. [Moving the chains (first down) leaderboard: Farrell (3), Williams (3), Altahir (2), Ford (2), High, Marcus Brown] And it all starts up front. I was worried people were drawing too much optimism from a good performance against a non-serious Group of Five front seven and sadly that appears to be the case. They got whupped by BYU. House was especially bad. I won't draw firm conclusions on the OL until we see more, especially given BYU's strength, but it's not looking good.

8. I didn't see anything spectacular from the defense in terms of individual contributions or breadth of guys making plays but they did enough to be effective, perhaps with some assists from BYU having a freshman QB and also some ill-timed flubs/penalties. Tafiti, Barth, Patterson, Johnson, Wright, Rose, Rowell, and Leigber showed up multiple times positively in the box score, though Leigber needed garbage time to do it. Tafiti stood out most to me, with six such plays not even counting the should-have-been interception Green screwed up. Notably, Tafiti's plays included a sack to force a field goal and a third down tackle to force a punt, so I think it's fair to say he most positively influenced the final score of anybody on our team. That is great to see because OLB invisibility was one of the most disappointing aspects of the opener. I think it's safe to say our one sixth of the season MVP is a battle between Rose and Patterson. Barth's game against BYU seemed to be high beta, put both good and bad on tape. Johnson having a whopping three red zone run stops is an extremely loud stat, especially considering he comes off the bench. Really nice to have Wright back, good game.

9. I am starting to get worried about special teams post-Gregory. BYU swamped us in this one, with their field goals, 44 yard returns in both the kick and punt games, and how special teams played into field position. Flintoft certainly got a lot of work. He had net punts of 41 to the 29 (out-kicked coverage but adequate result), 25 to the 15 (very bad), 34 to the 50 (awful), 46 to the 27 (out-kicked coverage but good result and coverage team forced a fumble, bummer we couldn't recover), 9 to our own 43 after a disastrous return (finally got out deserts for out-kicking coverage). That's a rough game. We had some special teams tackles by usual suspects like Dubre and Mattingly but the only thing that jumped out was Edwards forcing the fumble. We didn't fall on it but that's the kind of special teams play that moves the needle. Kenney made his field goal but it was only 26 yards. I am happy for Thorpe getting action on a big stage, though in terms of results his returns of 18 and 21 yards left ten yards of field position on the table compared to fair catches. Wondering if this may be the year special teams isn't an advantage for us. Hope not.

10. Game balls: Bryce Farrell, Teva Tafiti, Scotty Edwards, Andy Thompson

11. I can make a case that we played better yesterday than we did against Hawaii and next week is our home opener against a very average opponent and thus we should still be holding out hope for the first happiness of the season to come next week. I can also make a case that we should be far from despairing on 2025 in the sense that there's still a lot of season left to show progress over our hapless norm of recent years. On the other hand, one could just as easily make the case that the Hawaii and BYU games are of a piece with everything this staff has coached (let's be real, Reich is just grafted on top of a Taylor staff), which is to say one of the worst teams in the country, and we aren't showing any real signs of progress as a program. I will be tuning in each week to see if the team makes the glass look a fifth full or 80 percent empty. Heading into Boston College I'd say we haven't learned anything fundamental about this team, just corroboration that we are lacking compared to real programs, especially at QB and OL. But I still hope games like last night can start to look like off nights rather than who we are.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - ADPinWDC - 09-07-2025

After FOUR straight seasons at 3-9, how can the coaching staff continue to be pig-headed about MAKING ADJUSTMENTS.

How can the answer be, "Well we've got a few things to work on this week... But, yeah, our GamePlan is solid." ?
"We just didn't execute."
There are reasons we are not executing.

What gives at the Coaching staff level?

It looks like Frank Reich is just punching the clock at $4M
https://www.sportscasting.com/news/frank-reich-contract-stanford-football-paying-4-million-to-hire-former-nfl-coach-as-interim-head-coach/

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - fullmetal - 09-07-2025

Folks on this board: "Reich couldn't hire anyone because he's a one-year interim head coach." Then who is the special teams coach? Do we have one? Maybe that's why special teams is taking a step backward.

The whole coaching staff is a bunch of dead men walking, expecting to be fired next season when a new head coach arrives and brings in his own people. Maybe everyone right now is prepping their resume and interviewing elsewhere.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - 82lsju - 09-07-2025

(09-07-2025, 07:40 PM)fullmetal Wrote: Folks on this board: "Reich couldn't hire anyone because he's a one-year interim head coach." Then who is the special teams coach? Do we have one? Maybe that's why special teams is taking a step backward.

The whole coaching staff is a bunch of dead men walking, expecting to be fired next season when a new head coach arrives and brings in his own people. Maybe everyone right now is prepping their resume and interviewing elsewhere.

Fred Guidici
Senior Special Teams Quality Control Analyst

https://gostanford.com/staff/fred-guidici

see all the coaches and football staff (all 36 of them) here

https://gostanford.com/staff-directory/department/football

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - fullmetal - 09-07-2025

I think my point was that a special teams quality analyst does not substitute for a special teams coach.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - ADPinWDC - 09-08-2025

(09-07-2025, 07:40 PM)fullmetal Wrote: Folks on this board: "Reich couldn't hire anyone because he's a one-year interim head coach." Then who is the special teams coach? Do we have one? Maybe that's why special teams is taking a step backward.

The whole coaching staff is a bunch of dead men walking, expecting to be fired next season when a new head coach arrives and brings in his own people.
Maybe everyone right now is prepping their resume and interviewing elsewhere.

Then MAYBE they could "prep their resume" best by winning football games! Non??
What other "prepping" a resume is there?!
Coming in on a dedicated 3-9 Regime and taking it to a one win season does what on a resume?

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - fullmetal - 09-08-2025

You think football coaching is a strict meritocracy? Look at the recent staff hiring practices...read the bios.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - Jamesy - 09-08-2025

(09-07-2025, 09:52 PM)fullmetal Wrote: I think my point was that a special teams quality analyst does not substitute for a special teams coach.

Difference is in title only. Fred is a great coach.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - fullmetal - 09-08-2025

(09-08-2025, 04:56 PM)Jamesy Wrote: Difference is in title only. Fred is a great coach.

Knowing nothing about the man aside from his published bio, I will evaluate him based on the special teams' performance on the field.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - Mick - 09-09-2025

(09-08-2025, 11:17 PM)fullmetal Wrote:
(09-08-2025, 04:56 PM)Jamesy Wrote: Difference is in title only. Fred is a great coach.
Knowing nothing about the man aside from his published bio, I will evaluate him based on the special teams' performance on the field.

What an interesting and innovative concept...:D

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - fullmetal - 09-09-2025

Definitely something the quarterbacking staff need to think about applying to the players. Failing to hold players accountable is a good way to lose the locker room.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - Mick - 09-09-2025

(09-09-2025, 11:53 AM)fullmetal Wrote: Definitely something the quarterbacking staff need to think about applying to the players. Failing to hold players accountable is a good way to lose the locker room.

Along those lines, the 49ers just waived kicker Jake Moody after to missed field goals in three tries. He was the former consensus second-team All American placekicker at Michigan and third round selection by the 49ers.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - qwerty49 - 09-09-2025

(09-09-2025, 01:47 PM)Mick Wrote:
(09-09-2025, 11:53 AM)fullmetal Wrote: Definitely something the quarterbacking staff need to think about applying to the players. Failing to hold players accountable is a good way to lose the locker room.

Along those lines, the 49ers just waived kicker Jake Moody after to missed field goals in three tries. He was the former consensus second-team All American placekicker at Michigan and third round selection by the 49ers.

I always wanted the Niners to offer Josh Karty a contract after his junior year instead of drafting Moody.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - fullmetal - 09-09-2025

Moody hung on longer than his shelf expiration date as a third-round SF pick who has a 74.2% pro career FG%. The Niners signed Eddy Pineiro to replace Moody, who has a pro career XP% of 92.1% and FG% of 88.1%.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - ADPinWDC - 09-10-2025

BC opened a 10 point favorite in Palo Alto and the line drifted up to 12, where the parlor says you need to bet $450 to win $100 by taking BC to win.
The Eagles have a slinging QB -- Lonergan.

We are in the easiest part of our schedule.
If we slip to 0-3, then 2 wins may be the ceiling.
Then what does the "Andrew Luck Era" of football mean?

It means that we paid Shaw $9M his last 2-3 years, and that is where we need to be for any new coach.
Clearly, $4M for Frank Reich is not a solution.
$1M NIL per O-Lineman might be the new levy.
[or all Linemen]
Other schools are focusing their NIL on high profile skill position players with flash. Get the 5-star O-Line, instead.

Reich offers NOTHING at press conferences.
What Stanford is puting on the field is not watchable.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - JeebsOak - 09-10-2025

This whole program is a facade of “we are Stanford” while operating as a high level Texas high school football program.

Just cut the program or move to Ivy and be done with it. It’s been unwatchable for half a decade.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - fullmetal - 09-10-2025

Change QBs, focus on running the ball with Ford. That's all I want to see in the BC game. I think the defense should be fine if they get reasonable rest, and I think a hard ground game will pay off late game as it did with Hawai'i.

There are numerous ways to run the ball, and I don't see why we can't be clever with blocking and misdirection. If you're stumped for ideas, you can go look up a generic Madden playbook for ideas. Add a fullback, start the QB taking snaps under center. If you want to recruit OL, commit to running the ball in this way, and OL will take Stanford seriously just as they did under JH.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - Goose - 09-10-2025

(09-10-2025, 08:15 AM)fullmetal Wrote: Add a fullback, start the QB taking snaps under center. If you want to recruit OL, commit to running the ball in this way, and OL will take Stanford seriously just as they did under JH.

No they won't. College football has changed. So has pro football. Some people say the NFL changed at least partly due to the kind of linemen the colleges were providing. Others say the game changed because the rules now favor the pass so much running anything but a spread formation is disadvantageous. In any case, the JH smash mouth approach is no longer "in". Wider line splits and more spread formations have won the day, that ship has sailed. Most teams don't even have a fullback. They use tight ends/linemen in the backfield when additional pass protection is desired. Even the Chargers under JH use this guy as their FB when they need one. https://www.chargers.com/team/players-roster/scott-matlock/ Even when JH used a run-heavy tight formation smash mouth offense many years ago at Stanford, it was considered an anachronism. Stanford was one of the very few teams that did it at the college level. It was more common in the NFL. Today, that is not the case. The Ravens are probably the closest, and even they use wider line splits than previously. Their fullback (https://www.baltimoreravens.com/team/players-roster/patrick-ricard/) is totally a blocker. He has had several seasons where he never carried the ball at all.

RE: Sunday morning (err, afternoon) thoughts - BYU - fullmetal - 09-10-2025

Well don't forget about Kyle Juszczyk!

I get that it's going out of style, which makes it, in the mold of Georgia Tech's previous triple-option offense, much more difficult to prepare for and defend. There's a greater premium on blocking rather than speed, correct recognition and gap discipline, etc etc. A commitment to that offense means that OL get to show off their fundamentals. An OL coming out of Stanford in the early 2010s would probably be thought of as likely having all the skills necessary to succeed at the next level.

I'm not saying Stanford's OL should neglect pass protection. But if QB1 has a problem recognizing blitz schemes and pre-snap reads, then maybe we need to do something to help Stanford win.