[MV72018]

You know whose offense was deadly predictable?  Utah’s.  They predictably ran the ball down our throat, with nothing fancy, to the tune of 441 yards rushing and 581 yards of total offense.  I mean, pretty much all of us knew that they were going to run it between the tackles most of the runs, and yet most of the time, the first time a Stanford defender touched the rusher around 5 yards downfield.  And with our poor tackling, they averaged 9.6 yards every single time a Utah running back touched the ball.

To the extent any team tried things like an end around and having the wildcat QB throw it to the tight end, it was Stanford.  The problem was not that we didn’t try anything innovative in the playcalling it’s that whatever we tried, whether predictable or not, generally didn’t work.

Which is to say, I would rather do a few unimaginative things really well, than fail to execute a brilliant plan.  The biggest indictment of the coaches is not that they call a predictable game, it’s that they have failed to teach the kids how to play fundamental football: blocking, tackling, assignments, etc.  “better play calling” ain't fixing that.

BC

When an O meets no D resistance, it doesn't need unpredictability. When an O, like ours, meets a lot of D resistance, it damn well  needs unpredictability.

[MV72018]

You know whose offense was deadly predictable?  Utah’s.  They predictably ran the ball down our throat, with nothing fancy, to the tune of 441 yards rushing and 581 yards of total offense.  I mean, pretty much all of us knew that they were going to run it between the tackles most of the runs, and yet most of the time, the first time a Stanford defender touched the rusher around 5 yards downfield.  And with our poor tackling, they averaged 9.6 yards every single time a Utah running back touched the ball.

To the extent any team tried things like an end around and having the wildcat QB throw it to the tight end, it was Stanford.  The problem was not that we didn’t try anything innovative in the playcalling it’s that whatever we tried, whether predictable or not, generally didn’t work.

Which is to say, I would rather do a few unimaginative things really well, than fail to execute a brilliant plan.  The biggest indictment of the coaches is not that they call a predictable game, it’s that they have failed to teach the kids how to play fundamental football: blocking, tackling, assignments, etc.  “better play calling” ain't fixing that.

BC

When an O meets no D resistance, it doesn't need unpredictability. When an O, like ours, meets a lot of D resistance, it damn well  needs unpredictability.