Brian/Nate's Objective Performance

[Ree4]

With Iowa, you can NOT simply look at Offensive or Defensive stats like YARDAGE or even POINTS to decide how “good” or “bad” each side of the ball is!!

Iowa does EVERYTHING it can to SHORTEN games (keep clock moving, bleed 39 seconds off every play clock, make the other team take 15 plays and 8 minutes to move down the field, etc)

This is in STARK CONTRAST to most other COLLEGE TEAMS...who spread field, run hurry up, try to score in 2 minutes or less. We really run a rare PRO-STYLE offense and defense. Heck even have plenty of fullbacks and tight ends, that most teams don’t even have or use.

Other coaches will iterate how important possession are vs Iowa cuz you have so few of them.

Bottom-line...you CANNOT compare yardage or points to determine how effective either side of ball, vs other teams yardage and points. It’s comparing apples to oranges!

Some people will never get it. I went back and forth for days last year with a poster who was using total yardage as the only metric for comparing our offense to others. Points per possession is a much better metric for what we try to do each game, and this year we are much worse than last.

 

[Ree4]

Why has our defense generally ranked in the top half of FBS programs, while our offense is generally ranked in the lower half of FBS programs?
If both offense and defense have similar recruiting and talent challenges, then the cause would appear to be scheme / coaching.
If the OC name was not Ferentz, would this performance merit a promotion to a head coaching position at any school?

Because our offense has fewer plays per game than most teams. Because our defense has fewer plays per game than most teams. That's the point we're trying to make. The data gets skewed to where if you look at total yards/total points, the defense looks better than it is and the offense looks worse than it is.

 

[Fryowa]

Loss to North Dakota State NBD

Does the loss to NDSU impact your chances of winning the Big Ten West?

This whole thing centers around what people want to see more of as fans. Myself, I feel that winning a B1G west title and hopefully a conference championship is the ultimate goal of the season. To do that you have to beat good conference teams.

After being eliminated from the possibility of winning either the division or conference, I feel that the season is busted and the bowls games aren't something I can get very interested in. They are so numerous now that it doesn't have much meaning anymore (to me). I get that players and some fans go crazy over the bowl experience, but to me personally making the Outback or Pinstripe or Music City Bowl doesn't do much for me. If it does to you that's great, but we differ.

Like I've mentioned before, my original post wasn't meant to say that I don't care if the Hawkeyes lose non-cons, but it was meant to show that this team has beat only one "strong" conference opponent in two and a half years, and lost to ten of them; that's a huge disparity, especially when the mirror image is true when we play lesser conference opponents. My definition of strong is an arbitrary conference record of above .500--you can take that or leave it. Either way two and a half seasons is a pretty decent sample, and one of the reasons why we aren't successful against the rest of the conference. Again, that depends on what your personal measure of success is. Mine is a division victory. Also, whether we agree on what success is, it is 100% true that what establishes your standing tin the Big Ten at the end of the year is your conference record and nothing else. That's not debatable.

If your measure of success is the final AP ranking and a middle-of-the-road Bowl game, that's fine. It's definitely more realistic as a Hawkeye fan and it for sure would make for a more content fan.

 

[Xerxes]

With Iowa, you can NOT simply look at Offensive or Defensive stats like YARDAGE or even POINTS to decide how “good” or “bad” each side of the ball is!!

Iowa does EVERYTHING it can to SHORTEN games (keep clock moving, bleed 39 seconds off every play clock, make the other team take 15 plays and 8 minutes to move down the field, etc)

This is in STARK CONTRAST to most other COLLEGE TEAMS...who spread field, run hurry up, try to score in 2 minutes or less. We really run a rare PRO-STYLE offense and defense. Heck even have plenty of fullbacks and tight ends, that most teams don’t even have or use.

Other coaches will iterate how important possession are vs Iowa cuz you have so few of them.

Bottom-line...you CANNOT compare yardage or points to determine how effective either side of ball, vs other teams yardage and points. It’s comparing apples to oranges!

How about points per offensive play? Is that an accurate assessment to compare the effectiveness of an offense?

 

[deanvogs]

Does the loss to NDSU impact your chances of winning the Big Ten West?

This whole thing centers around what people want to see more of as fans. Myself, I feel that winning a B1G west title and hopefully a conference championship is the ultimate goal of the season. To do that you have to beat good conference teams.

After being eliminated from the possibility of winning either the division or conference, I feel that the season is busted and the bowls games aren't something I can get very interested in. They are so numerous now that it doesn't have much meaning anymore (to me). I get that players and some fans go crazy over the bowl experience, but to me personally making the Outback or Pinstripe or Music City Bowl doesn't do much for me. If it does to you that's great, but we differ.

Like I've mentioned before, my original post wasn't meant to say that I don't care if the Hawkeyes lose non-cons, but it was meant to show that this team has beat only one "strong" conference opponent in two and a half years, and lost to ten of them; that's a huge disparity, especially when the mirror image is true when we play lesser conference opponents. My definition of strong is an arbitrary conference record of above .500--you can take that or leave it. Either way two and a half seasons is a pretty decent sample, and one of the reasons why we aren't successful against the rest of the conference. Again, that depends on what your personal measure of success is. Mine is a division victory. Also, whether we agree on what success is, it is 100% true that what establishes your standing tin the Big Ten at the end of the year is your conference record and nothing else. That's not debatable.

If your measure of success is the final AP ranking and a middle-of-the-road Bowl game, that's fine. It's definitely more realistic as a Hawkeye fan and it for sure would make for a more content fan.

Everyone is agreeing with you that conference wins are MORE IMPORTANT. Yet the stance you took with me is that non conference games are MEANINGLESS is silly, and it seems you are walking that a bit. Winning a game vs an above .500 non conference team is every bit as hard as winning one vs a above .500 confernce foe. While the conference foe is more important, to say that Iowa or Brian deserve ZERO credit for winning non conference games is where you lose us reasonable fans.

 

[Fryowa]

Everyone is agreeing with you that conference wins are MORE IMPORTANT. Yet the stance you took with me is that non conference games are MEANINGLESS is silly, and it seems you are walking that a bit.

I said from the get go that they're meaningless to the conference standings. You knew that, and needed something to freak out about with your caps lock key.

And in reality, the only thing they count towards is what shitty bowl you go to, or whether you're 14th or 17th in a popularity contest. You seem to like to complain about objectiveness, but you really love to drool over the most subjective thing in the entire sport, the AP poll.

 

[Ree4]

Does the loss to NDSU impact your chances of winning the Big Ten West?

This whole thing centers around what people want to see more of as fans. Myself, I feel that winning a B1G west title and hopefully a conference championship is the ultimate goal of the season. To do that you have to beat good conference teams.

I can agree with this. This is the whole difference of opinion that everyone is arguing about. Of course the Big 10 championship is important, Big 10 games are more important, but I wouldn't ever write off ANY game as unimportant. That's where people in this thread are all different. We care about different things. Gonna have to agree to disagree instead of beating our heads against the wall.

There's no doubt we've been shitty against decent B1G teams under Stanley/BF. We've been ok against decent non B1G teams under them (4-0 against ISU, MSU). I need to see what a QB with a little more moxie can do before I completely give up on BF.

 

[deanvogs]

I said from the get go that they're meaningless to the conference standings. You knew that, and needed something to freak out about with your caps lock key.

And in reality, the only thing they count towards is what shitty bowl you go to, or whether you're 14th or 17th in a popularity contest. You seem to like to complain about objectiveness, but you really love to drool over the most subjective thing in the entire sport, the AP poll.

AP poll is nice, but what I droll over is WINS. See what I did there with my caps lock key? All wins count, I thought maybe you had actually come around, but it seems your head is still stuck in the sand.

 

[Ree4]

How about points per offensive play? Is that an accurate assessment to compare the effectiveness of an offense?

I think it's a decent measure for the explosiveness of an offense, but Iowa will never try to have an explosive offense. It's not our strategy. Ours is to keep our defense off the field, keep the other team's on the field and slowly grind them down for 4 quarters until they're demoralized. In that regard I feel it does our offense a disservice because that is not what we try to do. Should that be what we try to do? That's a different question.

 

[Ree4]

And in reality, the only thing they count towards is what shitty bowl you go to, or whether you're 14th or 17th in a popularity contest. You seem to like to complain about objectiveness, but you really love to drool over the most subjective thing in the entire sport, the AP poll.

Do recruits care more about the popularity contest or what our Big 10 standing is? I'd argue the former. Seasons where we don't win the Big 10 or division (which is often) are more memorable when we're ranked than when we're not. National ranking absolutely does matter, even though it's incredibly subjective.

 

[Xerxes]

I think it's a decent measure for the explosiveness of an offense, but Iowa will never try to have an explosive offense. It's not our strategy. Ours is to keep our defense off the field, keep the other team's on the field and slowly grind them down for 4 quarters until they're demoralized. In that regard I feel it does our offense a disservice because that is not what we try to do. Should that be what we try to do? That's a different question.

But Iowa's offensive is predicated on execution correct? If a play is executed well it should go for good gains. If it is executed very well it could equal an explosive play. If it is executed perfectly a TD.

So do you think Iowa's offense is contradictory? They strive to keep their D off the field and not have explosive plays but at the same time try to execute a play as best they can which could result in a one play scoring drive?

Or do you think they are just trying to execute plays that are going to gain 4-7 yards per play?

 

[hawkeyes87]

to say that Iowa or Brian deserve ZERO credit for winning non conference games is where you lose us reasonable fans.

So how much credit do you "reasonable fans" think BF should get for his unit putting up 13 & 18 points against ISU the last 2 years?

PP's unit giving up only 3 & 17 points was way more important to those wins.

As usual under KF, those were wins in spite of the offense, not because of it.

 

[MelroseHawkins]

Some people will never get it. I went back and forth for days last year with a poster who was using total yardage as the only metric for comparing our offense to others. Points per possession is a much better metric for what we try to do each game, and this year we are much worse than last.

Yea, you can't look at just total yardage. Same can be said for Iowa's D. Iowa typically has a good D but does give up some yards between the 20's (Bend but don't break) but stiffens up to prevent TD's. So, It looks like the other team is able to rack up quite a bit of yrds against Iowa but the score may not show that.

 

[Ree4]

But Iowa's offensive is predicated on execution correct? If a play is executed well it should go for good gains. If it is executed very well it could equal an explosive play. If it is executed perfectly a TD.

So do you think Iowa's offense is contradictory? They strive to keep their D off the field and not have explosive plays but at the same time try to execute a play as best they can which could result in a one play scoring drive?

Or do you think they are just trying to execute plays that are going to gain 4-7 yards per play?

Yeah somewhat contradictory, I'm sure that they would be more than happy with plays like what Tracy did against NW, broke a tackle and housed it It's not so much about not wanting the explosive play, more so about not taking big risks. Generally we don't risk longer plays and instead go for 4-15 yarders with the hope of getting YAC, very similar to New England without having an amazing QB. We throw a few fades for 30-40 yards a game, and have improved markedly at these, but could do more. All of this is my opinion of course.

 

[Ree4]

Yea, you can't look at just total yardage. Same can be said for Iowa's D. Iowa typically has a good D but does give up some yards between the 20's (Bend but don't break) but stiffens up to prevent TD's. So, It looks like the other team is able to rack up quite a bit of yrds against Iowa but the score may not show that.

Exactly. For several years around 2001-2005 our defensive yards rank was average, but our points per game was usually top 10 in the country. Look at the disparity against Penn State in 2017. 579-273 total yards and they had to score on 4th down on the final play of the game to win. Yards don't matter, only points. ISU outgained us plenty this year and lost. Nebraska regularly outgains us and loses. It's all part of the plan.

 

[HawkGold]

AP poll is nice, but what I droll over is WINS. See what I did there with my caps lock key? All wins count, I thought maybe you had actually come around, but it seems your head is still stuck in the sand.

First you describe you as reasonable. My sides still hurt.

What do you do when you droll?

Unless you mean playing the fool, you don't need to play when you do that. It comes naturally.

 

[ChosenChildren]

I still think Fryowa isl Rob Howe. Look at this thread. Amazing.

OK we get it Fryowa, you don't like Brian Ferentz and you think he is a lousy coach. Newsflash: The next two games will tell us a lot about Brian Ferentz. They are both winnable games. Wisconsin is very good, but not elite. Same with Minnesota. Both are ranked and will finish with winning Big Ten records. Those two games check all of your boxes for evaluating a coach's worth.

 

[ChosenChildren]

I'll say one thing: I would love to see what Brian Ferentz could do with a mobile QB. Dad apparently won't allow that.

It could make all the difference in the world.

 

[deanvogs]

So how much credit do you "reasonable fans" think BF should get for his unit putting up 13 & 18 points against ISU the last 2 years?

PP's unit giving up only 3 & 17 points was way more important to those wins.

As usual under KF, those were wins in spite of the offense, not because of it.

That is your thing, not mine. I don't assign values to coaches as to who deserves credit or blame. If the team wins, the coaches win and the players win. If the team loses the coaches lose and the players lose.

 

[smitharooney]

Losing to Akron and Duke will kind of look bad.

My point was Northwestern didn't win the Big 10