[msqueri]

My gut feeling says the program is in a very bad place fundamentally, with assistant coaches that are, in aggregate, out of their depth.  But it's very easy to feel good/self-righteous when criticizing the program, and I won't reiterate what those before me have so passionately said.

If the team plays healthy (relatively speaking), I think there's a chance we could be very good, and I fear that this might be our only window to excel before a lot of the team departs for the next level and the rebuild starts over again.

I see two things as most key to right the ship and avoid the trap you reference of having a small window before talent departs and we don't have the juice:

In 2022, we need the front seven to massively surprise to the upside. The biggest cause for optimism is that some combination of the scheme change (hopefully it's more than cosmetic and actually changes what's broken) and oft-referenced attitude change lead to a much more effective and disruptive front seven. Without the front seven being much, much better than seems likely (or even really all that possible to my eyes) we're in for one of the worst defenses in the country. No matter how healthy we are or what the offense does (unless it's like 40+ point per game dominance, which would be beyond shocking given everything we've ever seen from Shawfense) a defense hovering around 100th in the country will preclude the possibility of the team being "very good." Can't get there without the front seven being much better than it seems like it will be.

In 2023, we need to be blessed by the player retention gods when it comes to the offense. If recent trend lines hold and we don't have multiple key guys return we'll suffer a double whammy of losing key talent at a time when recent offensive recruiting has not been up to par to replace that talent. This is arguably true at every position other than running back (where I'd expect 2023 to be better than 2022) and tight end (where Yurosek could potentially leave brobdingnagian shoes to fill but where the recruiting pipeline has experienced a recent uptick that could improve depth/help weather that storm). As a result, absolutely must have multiple among McKee, Rouse, Bragg, Nugent, Yurosek, Wilson, Tremayne, and Higgins decide to return in 2023. Otherwise, we will go into the crapper on offense just as the roster is set to experience an on-paper uptick on defense by virtue of recent recruiting.

In other words, I think we need surprising things to happen to avoid being in a whack-a-mole situation where just as we solve one problem an equally big problem emerges, and on and on it goes.

[msqueri]

My gut feeling says the program is in a very bad place fundamentally, with assistant coaches that are, in aggregate, out of their depth.  But it's very easy to feel good/self-righteous when criticizing the program, and I won't reiterate what those before me have so passionately said.

If the team plays healthy (relatively speaking), I think there's a chance we could be very good, and I fear that this might be our only window to excel before a lot of the team departs for the next level and the rebuild starts over again.

I see two things as most key to right the ship and avoid the trap you reference of having a small window before talent departs and we don't have the juice:

In 2022, we need the front seven to massively surprise to the upside. The biggest cause for optimism is that some combination of the scheme change (hopefully it's more than cosmetic and actually changes what's broken) and oft-referenced attitude change lead to a much more effective and disruptive front seven. Without the front seven being much, much better than seems likely (or even really all that possible to my eyes) we're in for one of the worst defenses in the country. No matter how healthy we are or what the offense does (unless it's like 40+ point per game dominance, which would be beyond shocking given everything we've ever seen from Shawfense) a defense hovering around 100th in the country will preclude the possibility of the team being "very good." Can't get there without the front seven being much better than it seems like it will be.

In 2023, we need to be blessed by the player retention gods when it comes to the offense. If recent trend lines hold and we don't have multiple key guys return we'll suffer a double whammy of losing key talent at a time when recent offensive recruiting has not been up to par to replace that talent. This is arguably true at every position other than running back (where I'd expect 2023 to be better than 2022) and tight end (where Yurosek could potentially leave brobdingnagian shoes to fill but where the recruiting pipeline has experienced a recent uptick that could improve depth/help weather that storm). As a result, absolutely must have multiple among McKee, Rouse, Bragg, Nugent, Yurosek, Wilson, Tremayne, and Higgins decide to return in 2023. Otherwise, we will go into the crapper on offense just as the roster is set to experience an on-paper uptick on defense by virtue of recent recruiting.

In other words, I think we need surprising things to happen to avoid being in a whack-a-mole situation where just as we solve one problem an equally big problem emerges, and on and on it goes.