[TrumpCard]

Let's leave aside the issue of the 3-4 versus the 4-3 for now. 

The question is whether Stanford recruits the right kind of athletes to run a higher octane offense.  Let's start with the obvious.  Even though it's possible to run power with a small back, it's certainly easier to run power with a bigger back, which Stanford doesn't have.  Also, in the past Stanford has had an NFL-caliber fullback (Hewitt and Marecic), but Stanford is currently playing a former walk-on and next year may be only marginally better.  That's two very goods reason to implement a higher octane offense.  If the argument against is that Stanford recruits too many TEs and not enough WRs, Shaw could just move one TE to line up at WR.  That's what he did with Cajuste and with Fleener.  I could easily see the same thing happen with Cotton or Schultz.  I'm not even sure that's necessary if Shaw lands Irwin and JJAW this year.  The other arguments in favor of a power running offense don't seem all that powerful.  In particular, I think it's pretty uncontroversial to say that a good QB and a good OL still would be valuable in an offense that passes more often. 

[TrumpCard]

Let's leave aside the issue of the 3-4 versus the 4-3 for now. 

The question is whether Stanford recruits the right kind of athletes to run a higher octane offense.  Let's start with the obvious.  Even though it's possible to run power with a small back, it's certainly easier to run power with a bigger back, which Stanford doesn't have.  Also, in the past Stanford has had an NFL-caliber fullback (Hewitt and Marecic), but Stanford is currently playing a former walk-on and next year may be only marginally better.  That's two very goods reason to implement a higher octane offense.  If the argument against is that Stanford recruits too many TEs and not enough WRs, Shaw could just move one TE to line up at WR.  That's what he did with Cajuste and with Fleener.  I could easily see the same thing happen with Cotton or Schultz.  I'm not even sure that's necessary if Shaw lands Irwin and JJAW this year.  The other arguments in favor of a power running offense don't seem all that powerful.  In particular, I think it's pretty uncontroversial to say that a good QB and a good OL still would be valuable in an offense that passes more often.