In Defense of our Offense

W

WinOneThisCentury

Well-Known Member
First off, yes...offensively, we have issues. Stanley hasn't looked very good (throwing and decision making) and we've been ultra conservative in both games. We have also had drops...which, when the two things above are also happening...well...it means things are going to look ugly.

There is a silver lining however. The two teams we have played have been very good, VETERAN, defensive football teams. Both teams we have played expected coming into the year, that their defenses would excel...and be the strength of their teams. Iowa dominated NUI up front in the second half. They did enough in the second half against ISU to win. Iowa State in particular had a veteran defensive line and very, very good corners. Spears is an absolute stud at LB and the young kid, Rose, played very well yesterday at LB also. These are legitimately strong defensive football teams.

The offense certainly needs to start improving...and it starts this week. Having the OL consistent for the first time this year will certainly help, but our QB needs to lead by example and start playing like he did last year.
 
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Well, I'm of the opinion you can polish a turd I guess. In 2009, we blocked two field goals to beat UNI. A game in which our offense scored 17 points against a less than average defensive football team and looked like a complete turd. That team won 9 in a row and the Orange Bowl.

Great graphic though...you must spend a lot of time around turds to have such a wonderful signature graphic.

My new motto: Sirius Knows Turds
 
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WinOneThisCentury said:
First off, yes...offensively, we have issues. Stanley hasn't looked very good (throwing and decision making) and we've been ultra conservative in both games. We have also had drops...which, when the two things above are also happening...well...it means things are going to look ugly.

There is a silver lining however. The two teams we have played have been very good, VETERAN, defensive football teams. Both teams we have played expected coming into the year, that their defenses would excel...and be the strength of their teams. Iowa dominated NUI up front in the second half. They did enough in the second half against ISU to win. Iowa State in particular had a veteran defensive line and very, very good corners. Spears is an absolute stud at LB and the young kid, Rose, played very well yesterday at LB also. These are legitimately strong defensive football teams.

The offense certainly needs to start improving...and it starts this week. Having the OL consistent for the first time this year will certainly help, but our QB needs to lead by example and start playing like he did last year.
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I admire your optimism but there always seems to be an excuse (last year's was it was BF's first season at OC) for this offense. Now its Iowa has gone up against 2 great defenses and their OL has been mixed up the last 2 weeks.

But these excuses got old 10 years ago. I came into this season with very low expectations for this offense because they lost their best player. But somehow they have managed to not meet them. At some point you just have to perform, regardless of the circumstances. They're not.

I've said this before, I'll say it again. This is not a BF problem, or a Davis or KOK problem. Its not play calling. Its Kirk Ferentz. He's the problem. The man has done great things here but his offense is just plain bad.
 
At this point I just want Stanley to hit on 3 or 4 big throws a game and capitalize on a short field when you have it. Let the defense carry the team.....play Kirk ball and let’s see where it takes Iowa.
 
At this point...I still believe we can become a good offensive football team. You have a QB that has shown ability, two great TEs and backs that are improving and have talent. Our OL should become a strength...and I honestly see improvement from last year. Stanley has time to throw against two teams that blitzed us. He just hasn't thrown it all that well.

Yesterday, we had a receiver make a play to essentially put the game away after the team drove the length of the field in 13-14 plays...and 7 minutes of time.

Those are things you can build on. 2-0 is the most important stat.
 
The older I get, the less I tend to care HOW we win...just that we win.

I tend to appreciate the game in the trenches more than the game outside of it.

But as it relates to this offense, I’ve seen 2 issues.

1. Continuity on the OL. In 15 games played over last year and this year, how many different OL combinations have we used? That, coupled with the overall lack of talent and bodies on the OL, from stealing scholarships for worthless wide receivers, really set us back.

2. Inability to find an overall consistent rhythm on offense. We go from Wisky, NW, and MSU ineptitude, to looking like machines against ISU, OSU and Nebby. And once again, I think a lot of that stems from #1 above.

Hopefully we can find a rhythm on O this year to match what’s shaping up to be a championship level D.
 
I don't know the mechanics of throwing the ball, but I have picked up from others have said along the way that Stanley came in with several issues. He tended to overthrow intermediate and long passes, and the ball also tends to sail on him a bit. He also has issues with his footwork and doesn't have good touch on throws. It appears that they have tried to address both issues over the off season. Unfortunately, Stanley is now over-compensating causing him to throw short. He is also being overly deliberate and late on many throws. He showed signs of settling in the third quarter of the Northern Illinois game and to a lesser degree late in the Iowa State game.

Maybe against UNI Stanley can settle in a bit. Same goes for the offensive line. If the line can get a little better handle on their blocks and buy Stanley a bit more time it would help.
 
WinOneThisCentury said:
Well, I'm of the opinion you can polish a turd I guess. In 2009, we blocked two field goals to beat UNI. A game in which our offense scored 17 points against a less than average defensive football team and looked like a complete turd. That team won 9 in a row and the Orange Bowl.

Great graphic though...you must spend a lot of time around turds to have such a wonderful signature graphic.

My new motto: Sirius Knows Turds
Click to expand...
Put it in your signature.
 
trj said:
At this point I just want Stanley to hit on 3 or 4 big throws a game and capitalize on a short field when you have it. Let the defense carry the team.....play Kirk ball and let’s see where it takes Iowa.
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I sure hope the offense gets better but if we keep winning I don’t really care what it looks like.
 
The offense is a work in progress. The lost week of practice and game speed experience for the young tackles definitely has slowed the progress on that front. The positive I did see was that Stanley did manage to connect on a few down the field passes against ISU. The deep post to ISM and the touch pass to Brandon Smith were encouraging. Alot of teams are going to look at the ISU game tape and try and cover Fant and TJ with safeties and let the LB take care of the run game. They'll fire there safeties on the zone read plays. This leads to alot of stuffed runs and the occasional broken play. Getting some success with the play action to the TE and WR out of this is the most important way we'll get defenses to back off. We've had some success with the FB dives so far because that play hits the LOS quickly. We need more balance in the run game too. Both Seargent and Young have good enough vision and wiggle to make plays on the dive and iso plays. We need to seriously stop running zone left and right so much.
Iowa believes in the concept of complimentary football and really only attacks aggressively downfield when they have to or when they want to finish a team. This year the defense looks stout and less vulnerable to the big play. If anything with the improved punting Kirk likely this year will double down on conservative play. If the defense doesn't give up the big play we'll see more games like the ISU game than last years clunkers against purdue, northwestern, and michigan state. This approach might get iowa to 9 or 10 wins if the defense is what it appears to be. It won't win if we get to indy or beyond though. I'm hoping to see progress in the next two weeks but it doesn't help that the players with the most speed IKM and ISM are hurt.
If Iowa beats Wisconsin in 2 weeks it will be because of turnovers by Taylor and Hornibrook in a low scoring ugly game. I really hope the staff tries to attack like last year against OSU, though I don't expect it. If we can get wisconsin into passing mode I think good things can happen for us. If we play the game of who has the better run offense, I think that's a game we are going to lose.
We have to find other receiving options besides TJ and Noah by this game. Wisconsin's safeties will do the job in coverage against them so we will need something else.
 
WinOneThisCentury said:
First off, yes...offensively, we have issues. Stanley hasn't looked very good (throwing and decision making) and we've been ultra conservative in both games. We have also had drops...which, when the two things above are also happening...well...it means things are going to look ugly.

There is a silver lining however. The two teams we have played have been very good, VETERAN, defensive football teams. Both teams we have played expected coming into the year, that their defenses would excel...and be the strength of their teams. Iowa dominated NUI up front in the second half. They did enough in the second half against ISU to win. Iowa State in particular had a veteran defensive line and very, very good corners. Spears is an absolute stud at LB and the young kid, Rose, played very well yesterday at LB also. These are legitimately strong defensive football teams.

The offense certainly needs to start improving...and it starts this week. Having the OL consistent for the first time this year will certainly help, but our QB needs to lead by example and start playing like he did last year.
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Ok, NIU loses to Utah, Iowa State only played Iowa. I'll reserve judgement on Iowa State's defense until their date with OU before throwing out such lavish praise on them. This isn't a very substantial body of work to make assumptions on. NIU did play well defensesively against Utah. If we continue to struggle against UNI, even those with Brian colored glasses with have doubts. More than likely we struggle and have a few big plays to break open a close game, but the engine continues to pause, rattle, and seize up.
Although I'm not one of them, I believe in Stanley, this offense in it's current form will struggle all year and many will point to the back-up QB to save us. But that's like changing the oil with a blown engine. Not gonna fix the problem.
 
Wisconsin will be the key on whether or not this offense works. It's the fourth game in and if we continually have 3 and outs we will get totally embarrassed. Eventually every D wears down when the offense can't sustain drives.
 
archiehawk said:
Wisconsin will be the key on whether or not this offense works. It's the fourth game in and if we continually have 3 and outs we will get totally embarrassed. Eventually every D wears down when the offense can't sustain drives.
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The O-line looked like trash, too. Wisconsin is gonna run that 3-4 with pressure from one of the LBs every play. If we don't figure out how to block that, we will struggle to put up 100 yards on them.
 
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