[SamuelMcF]

A few thoughts.
First, I agree with you that the fall-off in the defensive output has been at least as significant as the decline in offense, and probably more so.  Last year, we averaged 1.82 points per drive (100th in FBS), while our defense gave up 2.62 points per drive (95th in FBS).  Here's our tragectory over the Shaw years:

[...]

The third down/red zone offense is clearly deficient.  However, our stats were poor on all downs.

Passing, we were 124/181 (68%) for 1359 yards (7.5 YPA) with 4 TD and 2 INT, PER was 137 on first downs; 98/152 (64.5%) for 971 yards (6.4 YPA) with 9 TD and 2 INT; PER was 135 on second down.

Rushing we got 672 yards on 168 carries (4 YPC) on first down, and 410 yards on 110 carries (3.73 YPC) on second down.

These are... not very good stats.

BC

Eye-opening but at the same time unsurprising, given we all watched what happened. Overall your point is well-taken that it wasn't one particular problem. However I'm sure multiple offensive philosophies in a tug-of-war couldn't have helped things.

Overall it feels to me like the offense's struggles can be much more attributed to injuries than the defense's. Having 3 true frosh on the OL will limit you no matter what. Mills showed some flashes of brilliance with opposing big men barreling down on him, and I think those moments on film will look great to NFL scouts. Some of his best throws were on busted protections where Walter Rouse or Barrett Miller got absolutely punked by much more seasoned DL. On the whole I thought the frosh OL performed admirably, and weren't nearly as bad as one would reasonably expect 3* true freshmen to be (but of course, compared to your average 21-year-old P5 starting OL they were still not good...how could they be?).

The defense just felt like a different story:
- Tackling was bad pretty much universally. Toohill a bright spot, and Pryts pleasantly surprised me though that was in part due to my low expectations.
- Pass rush was completely nonexistent, even with a mostly-intact front of DL and OLBs (everyone but Jordan Fox was healthy). This was probably the biggest issue, and it was even worse than last year where it was already an issue!
- To expand on the above, late in the season I saw instances of twists/stunts where multiple DL/OLBs ran into each other. Garbers in particular ate us alive on those pass rush failures in Big Game.
- Against the run I thought our DL and particularly Toohill anchored surprisingly well, but that didn't matter when the second level was an undersized Pryts - who honestly wasn't even that bad given his physical limitations - and an absolutely atrocious Robinson (he had 5 of the 10 worst-graded games by a Stanford defender versus the run, though a silver lining here is that four of them were in the first half of the season, signaling improvement over time as he logged more starts at his new position). Yes, the injuries to Miezan and Mangum-Farrar hurt really badly here.
- I could go on an entire separate rant about just the safety room in particular. Williamson was ok (a pleasant surprise given Akina's dismal recent history with converted corners), McGill showed some flashes even with his limitations as an undersized 5'9" true frosh, and that was it. I knew the position would be a weakness this year but holy crap...

[SamuelMcF]

A few thoughts.
First, I agree with you that the fall-off in the defensive output has been at least as significant as the decline in offense, and probably more so.  Last year, we averaged 1.82 points per drive (100th in FBS), while our defense gave up 2.62 points per drive (95th in FBS).  Here's our tragectory over the Shaw years:

[...]

The third down/red zone offense is clearly deficient.  However, our stats were poor on all downs.

Passing, we were 124/181 (68%) for 1359 yards (7.5 YPA) with 4 TD and 2 INT, PER was 137 on first downs; 98/152 (64.5%) for 971 yards (6.4 YPA) with 9 TD and 2 INT; PER was 135 on second down.

Rushing we got 672 yards on 168 carries (4 YPC) on first down, and 410 yards on 110 carries (3.73 YPC) on second down.

These are... not very good stats.

BC

Eye-opening but at the same time unsurprising, given we all watched what happened. Overall your point is well-taken that it wasn't one particular problem. However I'm sure multiple offensive philosophies in a tug-of-war couldn't have helped things.

Overall it feels to me like the offense's struggles can be much more attributed to injuries than the defense's. Having 3 true frosh on the OL will limit you no matter what. Mills showed some flashes of brilliance with opposing big men barreling down on him, and I think those moments on film will look great to NFL scouts. Some of his best throws were on busted protections where Walter Rouse or Barrett Miller got absolutely punked by much more seasoned DL. On the whole I thought the frosh OL performed admirably, and weren't nearly as bad as one would reasonably expect 3* true freshmen to be (but of course, compared to your average 21-year-old P5 starting OL they were still not good...how could they be?).

The defense just felt like a different story:
- Tackling was bad pretty much universally. Toohill a bright spot, and Pryts pleasantly surprised me though that was in part due to my low expectations.
- Pass rush was completely nonexistent, even with a mostly-intact front of DL and OLBs (everyone but Jordan Fox was healthy). This was probably the biggest issue, and it was even worse than last year where it was already an issue!
- To expand on the above, late in the season I saw instances of twists/stunts where multiple DL/OLBs ran into each other. Garbers in particular ate us alive on those pass rush failures in Big Game.
- Against the run I thought our DL and particularly Toohill anchored surprisingly well, but that didn't matter when the second level was an undersized Pryts - who honestly wasn't even that bad given his physical limitations - and an absolutely atrocious Robinson (he had 5 of the 10 worst-graded games by a Stanford defender versus the run, though a silver lining here is that four of them were in the first half of the season, signaling improvement over time as he logged more starts at his new position). Yes, the injuries to Miezan and Mangum-Farrar hurt really badly here.
- I could go on an entire separate rant about just the safety room in particular. Williamson was ok (a pleasant surprise given Akina's dismal recent history with converted corners), McGill showed some flashes even with his limitations as an undersized 5'9" true frosh, and that was it. I knew the position would be a weakness this year but holy crap...