[CTcard]

Okay, here's the good news.

The DL is slowly improving and doing it with puppies.  Next year's DL could actually be above average and trending upward as the season progresses.

I have been away from the board for a few days. Seems to have been a bit of a meltdown.

I think Hulk's threads on each line gets the focus on the heart of current issues. Stanford's resurgence as a football program was largely based upon strength along both lines. That created a pile of positively reinforcing conditions and a ton of wins. Both lines are currently down, which makes winning difficult no matter the scheme. Though both lines are suffering, they seem to be in strongly different circumstances


The fact that the DL ever became great is at least a minor miracle, maybe even major.
In the key years of Stanford defense dominance, particularly run dominance (2010-2014), we had the following starters on the DL (more or less, injuries changed things up from time to time. The recruiting rankings from 247sports):

2010 - Masifilo (#25 SDE, #323 overall), Fua (#42 DT, #507), Bulcke (not listed)
2011 - Masifilo, Stephens (#24 DT, #270), Gardner (#110 SDE, unranked)
2012 - Gardner, Stephens, Anderson (#37 WDE, #623)
2013 - Gardner, Anderson, Mauro (#61 SDE, not ranked)
2014 - Anderson, Parry (not listed, walkon OL), Leuders (#10 SDE, #114)

There's a lot of contribution there from a lot of guys who were not highly ranked.
I am not sure if this indicates bad rankings, fantastic development, finding diamonds in the rough, or pure dumb luck. I sense a lot of the latter.

The decline along the DL almost looks expected from recruiting - which suffered in numbers as well as quality for awhile.
Though mostly young, the guys currently on the DL are generally much more highly recruited out of HS. More so than we've seen in awhile. Broadly speaking, I think that the first and second year players look promising, but they are first and second year players.


OL recruiting has always been a little easier for Stanford. The current set of OL were generally highly recruited and are generally experienced. The complete collapse of run blocking is a mystery, though covered aplenty in the OL thread.

---

And. . .lots that could be improved.

That's for sure.

One of my least favourite is kickoff return yards. To have any meaning this should be measured versus the 25 yard line, which now is almost always an option as you can fair catch the KO.

[Has anyone tried to figure out whether Stanford has averaged better or worse than the 25 yard line after kickoffs by almost always trying to return them?
I guess I would give up a few yards on average for the chance for a big play - but not too many.]

[CTcard]

Okay, here's the good news.

The DL is slowly improving and doing it with puppies.  Next year's DL could actually be above average and trending upward as the season progresses.

I have been away from the board for a few days. Seems to have been a bit of a meltdown.

I think Hulk's threads on each line gets the focus on the heart of current issues. Stanford's resurgence as a football program was largely based upon strength along both lines. That created a pile of positively reinforcing conditions and a ton of wins. Both lines are currently down, which makes winning difficult no matter the scheme. Though both lines are suffering, they seem to be in strongly different circumstances


The fact that the DL ever became great is at least a minor miracle, maybe even major.
In the key years of Stanford defense dominance, particularly run dominance (2010-2014), we had the following starters on the DL (more or less, injuries changed things up from time to time. The recruiting rankings from 247sports):

2010 - Masifilo (#25 SDE, #323 overall), Fua (#42 DT, #507), Bulcke (not listed)
2011 - Masifilo, Stephens (#24 DT, #270), Gardner (#110 SDE, unranked)
2012 - Gardner, Stephens, Anderson (#37 WDE, #623)
2013 - Gardner, Anderson, Mauro (#61 SDE, not ranked)
2014 - Anderson, Parry (not listed, walkon OL), Leuders (#10 SDE, #114)

There's a lot of contribution there from a lot of guys who were not highly ranked.
I am not sure if this indicates bad rankings, fantastic development, finding diamonds in the rough, or pure dumb luck. I sense a lot of the latter.

The decline along the DL almost looks expected from recruiting - which suffered in numbers as well as quality for awhile.
Though mostly young, the guys currently on the DL are generally much more highly recruited out of HS. More so than we've seen in awhile. Broadly speaking, I think that the first and second year players look promising, but they are first and second year players.


OL recruiting has always been a little easier for Stanford. The current set of OL were generally highly recruited and are generally experienced. The complete collapse of run blocking is a mystery, though covered aplenty in the OL thread.

---

And. . .lots that could be improved.

That's for sure.

One of my least favourite is kickoff return yards. To have any meaning this should be measured versus the 25 yard line, which now is almost always an option as you can fair catch the KO.

[Has anyone tried to figure out whether Stanford has averaged better or worse than the 25 yard line after kickoffs by almost always trying to return them?
I guess I would give up a few yards on average for the chance for a big play - but not too many.]