Why does KF not like to be held accountable?

I want to reiterate that I am not white washing this year's results....its far beneath what this team should have accomplished. And we'll keep hashing it out for weeks and months.
 
I don't particularly like KF's football philosophy's. I don't have a problem with a ball control offense - but it doesnt particulary match up with the defensive philosophy.

The Indianapolis Colts have a similar def strategy but they have an offense that can put up points and allow the cover two shell defense to waste time and effectively win games.


A low scoring offense doesn't match up well with a cover 2 type defense. Also (like this year especially) if our defensive line is getting 0 pass rush we are in big trouble - and we have no plan of attack to supplement the lack of pass rush - hence why during certain years we can have very poor pass defense.

From day 1 I never was gung ho on Kirk and his old school strats, but I don't care if we win.

I dont need an Oregon duck offense to be happy, but I just wish we would stop playing football in 1987 sometimes.

I'm not saying Kirk being gone would be better, because he has done a great job here, but for 3 million dollars a year we could get talented coaches (if we are willing to spend that kind of cheddar)

We just have to see what the next couple years bring. Hopefully Kirk kicks some people in the *** over the next few months.

BINGO! Exactly! The bend but don't break defense is meant to work with a LEAD - something you can't really do if your Offense can't put points on the board. After 2003 any success this team had was due ENTIRELY to the Defense. Iowa won gones DESPITE the Offense. Well, as we can see, if you rely completely on just one half of the ball you are not going to have consistent success.
 
He adamantly refuses to believe there is anything wrong with this philosophy.....instead blaming "execution". And since it's the players executing the plays, then by default, he's saying it's their fault.

Whenever he's questioned by a reporter about the offense, he always has some snide remark......the other week it was about how they were going to switch to Oregon's offense, until he saw they only scored 14 points. Kirk, I hate to break it to you, but Oregon averages over 50 points per game.....you averaged 17 against IU, NW and Minn. In addition, your offense is perinnially in the bottom 25% of all of FBS football. Yet every year he trots out the same offense. What's the old saying......insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result? That sums up Kirk's philosophy to a "T".

Same thing with the defense. It's always someone or something else's fault. It's either injuries, or the other quarterback had a phenomenal day (isn't it weird how every QB we played had a "phenomenal day"?), or the players just didn't execute. Last I looked, Wisconsin lost a helluva lot more talent to injuries this year than we did, but they're going to a BCS bowl.....somehow most other teams didn't let Persa have a "phenomonal" day against them.......Arizona's O has looked downright pedestrian against everyone but us.......and most defenses in the country don't "execute" to perfection like this staff expects of their defense. In fact, most coaches in the country are able to mix it up on defense when it's apparent something isn't working in order to make the "execution" better. Ours, of course, don't.

Wouldn't it be nice if, just once, Kirk just came out and said he and his coaches flat-out sucked this year and, come he!! or highwater, there WILL be improvements in their coaching next year and then list off 3 or 4 things that everyone will see improvement in?

Raw:

I've been 100% in your camp up to this point.

I believe Kirk does, in effect, do the things you talk about. But, the problem is, you want to HEAR him say it. He's not going to say it publicly. But can't you read it on his face? The guy looks like he's aged 20 years over the last 10 weeks.

At this point, KF is accountable. He's accountable for win's & losses. He's not accountable for how he manages the public & the media when it comes to pinpointing everything that has gone wrong this year. If we go 3 years of dramatically underperforming on a W's & L's basis -- He's out of a job. THAT is accountability.

Another thing that I suspect is that he's at a bit of a loss as to exactly what has gone wrong. I think he's a man honestly befuddled by what has transpired -- especially Saturday. So, why start making statements about what has gone wrong, when you're not even sure what actually HAS gone wrong. What exactly caused Clabyborn, Ballard, & Klug to get pushed around Saturday??? Be real careful how you answer -- see what I mean?

I get the sense that some of our fanbase feels entitled to answers. Well, you're not. You're entitled to win a bunch of games -- we're paying our coach $3mil a year -- and 7 wins per year isn't sufficient. But your not entitled to KF bareing his soul in a post-game press conference. Believe me...I'm as frustrated as you are, but I don't expect answers. We might even get some candor from him a year or two down the road....but we're not going to get it in the heat of the moment. And that's one thing I admire about him.
 
I want to reiterate that I am not white washing this year's results....its far beneath what this team should have accomplished. And we'll keep hashing it out for weeks and months.

Then who gets fired? Special Teams coach(s)? Ken O'Keefe? What is accountability mean if no one is actually held accountable? If a player were to consistently underperform year-after-year-after year how long do you think he'd still be starting?

How many years of underperformance by the Offense do we have to expect before the OC in charge of the Offense is replaced with someone who can productively run KF's Offense?
 
I think almost shapes up to be does Kirk Ferentz deserve the right to either improve (do the things necessary) or cut his own throat so to speak (hope for the best with the same schemes or die by the sword) for the things he has accomplished at Iowa. I would say yes.

I think the next 3-4 year cycle will show the results of this.
 
Then who gets fired? Special Teams coach(s)? Ken O'Keefe? What is accountability mean if no one is actually held accountable? If a player were to consistently underperform year-after-year-after year how long do you think he'd still be starting?

How many years of underperformance by the Offense do we have to expect before the OC in charge of the Offense is replaced with someone who can productively run KF's Offense?

KF doesn't agree with the premise, I'll bet.

Offensive production - in his view - is most effectively measured by win's & losses. In that view, our offense is solidly above average.

So, you're barking up the wrong tree.

Just take these last 3 games, for example. They were all team losses, period. Did the offense play well? Absolutely not...However, they played well enough to have us leading by more than a FG in the last 6 minutes of the game with a long field in front of the opposition.

Given those parameters, we are supposed to win about 90% of the time when you have a defense as highly thought of as ours.

I'll never understand the line of thinking that the only way to hold someone accountable is to fire them. Well, Ron Zook thinks that way, so you're not completely without company.
 
I've said this numerous times in the past and I'll say it again, Kirk Ferentz is conservative to a fault. Great coaches adapt and adjust. Great coaches don't keep running the same game plan when it's obviously not working. For instance, a great coach probably knows to go away from the run, at least for the time being, when the other team is stacking 8 men in the box, especially when you have a fifth year senior with the most talented receiving corps the team has seen in ages. A great coach has the ability to look up at the freaking game clock to see that there's more time left than they originally thought they would have left. Man, that one still bothers me. A little kid could have figured that one out. A great coach substitutes an actual defensive back (ya know, the position player that is meant to cover a pass) when his linebacker has been getting burnt all day by a slot receiver. At least put yourself in a little bit better position to try and succeed! A great coach adapts and adjusts when they need to instead of keeping the same stubborn game plan in place just because "we're Iowa". There are little things that can and could have been done by this staff that seem so obvious to many of us that for some reason they do not notice. Or wait, perhaps they do notice, but don't change it because "We're Iowa". That kind of characteristic is what is keeping Kirk Ferentz from being a great coach and not just a good coach. Please please please do not let your conservative values hamper your game management any more, Kirk. Think outside of that conservative box once in awhile. I think it'll do wonders for you. And oh, by the way, KOK isn't going anywhere folks. Not until Kirk leaves or KOK leaves on his own will. Kirk and KOK are the best of buds and we all know how loyal Kirk is. Wouldn't even go with the running back that was gashing OSU for chunks of yardage just because he had known ARob longer.
 
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I think people are tired of watching an offense underachieve. Tired of seeing other schools like WI who run the same type of schemes, average nearly 60 points over their last few games.

We understand that WI gets hogs for OL, but for all the talk about Iowa being a OL school, we consistently put undersized athletes, and if they're not a special kid (Buluga, Reiff, etc), they don't start to blossom until their Junior or Senior year.

Again, it comes down to losing to NW and IN more times than not. OSU doesn't, WI doesn't, MSU doesn't (though they do struggle at times), and Penn State does not struggle with these teams historically.

The past four years have been brutal to watch Iowa on offense, and this year the defense didn't have the stars at LB to bail the team out like in some years past.

So most of us want some accountability out of the staff. We've seen multiple seasons of poor offense execution, and poor clock management. We get told that they will work on correcting these faults, yet every year something like this shows back up. Usually a OL that can't block, a QB who can't throw an accurate pass, or WR who don't know what a blitz pickup is.

KF has done a great job at Iowa, the fact that we're even having this discussion proves so. He's given the school taste of success, and it's natural for us to want more of it. Iowa is at a point now where they do have some decent depth, so saying a injury or two ruined the season just doesn't hold weight anymore. Yes LB was thin, but we didn't adjust to it and got burnt. And RB ended up being thin because of injury and one player quitting the team. And we didn't adjust in that aspect either.

I really hope things can change next year. Adjust to our weaknesses, try to hide them better, and try to expose the other team's weakness (if they're a poor Run defense, let's do our best to establish the run, not two off tackle runs, and then forget it for rest of the game).

Adjustments is all most of us are asking for.
 
KF doesn't agree with the premise, I'll bet.

Offensive production - in his view - is most effectively measured by win's & losses. In that view, our offense is solidly above average.

So, you're barking up the wrong tree.

Just take these last 3 games, for example. They were all team losses, period. Did the offense play well? Absolutely not...However, they played well enough to have us leading by more than a FG in the last 6 minutes of the game with a long field in front of the opposition.

Given those parameters, we are supposed to win about 90% of the time when you have a defense as highly thought of as ours.

I'll never understand the line of thinking that the only way to hold someone accountable is to fire them. Well, Ron Zook thinks that way, so you're not completely without company.

If that really is KF's philosophy (and I doubt that it is) then he should indeed be removed as the head coach - because anyone who honestly believes that load should not be coaching football at any level.

And as far as firing being the only means of holding someone accountable: If Iowa had not had an Offense as consistently bad as it has had since 2004 then I would agree firing would be an over-reaction. However, Iowa HAS HAD an Offense that has been consistently TERRIBLE since 2004. In fact, it has been SO BAD you have come to expect it to be bad and have come to expect the Defense to carry the O's weight for them. It's gone so far that you now blame the Defense for NOT carrying the O's dead weight around season to season.

And Ron Zook? Yeah - firing the OC worked. Take a look at what they did this year compared to last.
 
Then who gets fired? Special Teams coach(s)? Ken O'Keefe? What is accountability mean if no one is actually held accountable? If a player were to consistently underperform year-after-year-after year how long do you think he'd still be starting?

How many years of underperformance by the Offense do we have to expect before the OC in charge of the Offense is replaced with someone who can productively run KF's Offense?


While I don't necessarily agree that accountability *HAS* to include firing someone, I think KOK needs to go.

I understand that KF may prefer a conservative offense with a focus on not turning the ball over, but I have trouble believing that he wants a predictable offense that is easy to prepare for and requires college students to play to near-perfection to be successful. Honestly, when we, as Iowa fans, can sit there watching the game and, with 80+% success, call the upcoming Iowa play, there is something really wrong. Additionally, it seems like KOK is quick to over-react to events. How many times have we seen him completely abandon a phase of his offense because of injury or some other event? KOK needs to go.

KF needs to examine his philosophy on offense overall. Quite frankly, the offense should be tailored to the talent on the field. We should not be holding it back in any situation. When we get a big lead and want to "take the foot off of the gas", put in the reserves - but don't limit/stop the offense. Plain and simple - our goal should be to score pretty much each and every single time we touch the ball (with the exception of when we are running out the clock at the end of the half/game).


I also think that this year has shown us that we do not have anyone on our staff that is capable of replacing Norm. The "group effort" failed - miserably. Our defense was unable to make the needed adjustments to what other teams were doing (or our injuries). In my opinion, our DC's really failed to put our defensive line in a position to succeed (especially AC - they should have moved him around more so he wasn't constantly facing double/triple teams) and in responding to what the opposing offense was doing. Yuo may not always see the adjustments that Norm makes during the game, but they are always there. Our DC's failed to make adjustments, and oru defense really paid for it late in games.


As a side note, I understand that KF is steady/businesslike. That is a good thing, overall. But maybe he needs to let his coordinators/coaches be rah-rah and help the team get hyped up. There is never an excuse for the product that they put on the field Saturday. Whether they like it or not, college coaches need to make sure that their players are mentally ready to play - and Iowa certainly was not...
 
Raw:

I've been 100% in your camp up to this point.

I believe Kirk does, in effect, do the things you talk about. But, the problem is, you want to HEAR him say it. He's not going to say it publicly. But can't you read it on his face? The guy looks like he's aged 20 years over the last 10 weeks.

At this point, KF is accountable. He's accountable for win's & losses. He's not accountable for how he manages the public & the media when it comes to pinpointing everything that has gone wrong this year. If we go 3 years of dramatically underperforming on a W's & L's basis -- He's out of a job. THAT is accountability.

Another thing that I suspect is that he's at a bit of a loss as to exactly what has gone wrong. I think he's a man honestly befuddled by what has transpired -- especially Saturday. So, why start making statements about what has gone wrong, when you're not even sure what actually HAS gone wrong. What exactly caused Clabyborn, Ballard, & Klug to get pushed around Saturday??? Be real careful how you answer -- see what I mean?

I get the sense that some of our fanbase feels entitled to answers. Well, you're not. You're entitled to win a bunch of games -- we're paying our coach $3mil a year -- and 7 wins per year isn't sufficient. But your not entitled to KF bareing his soul in a post-game press conference. Believe me...I'm as frustrated as you are, but I don't expect answers. We might even get some candor from him a year or two down the road....but we're not going to get it in the heat of the moment. And that's one thing I admire about him.

I think you may have misunderstood me or I probably did a poor job of typing it out.......I don't want any answers, I'm way past that. What I DO want, though, is an admittance that the coaching staff royally f*cked the year up by not being smart.......putting Stanzi under center against Arizona when you knew they were going to come after him.......not putting on the punt safe against Wisconsin when the whole f*cking stadium knew it was coming........constantly putting linebackers on slot guys and watching those guys burn us in 3rd down after 3rd down. Those are NOT execution problems.....those are coaching problems. Period. End of sentence. And I'd like to know that those f*ck ups will be addressed by the start of next season. If not, I may as well start planning to fill those Saturday's in with something else.
 
Jon:

Your posts on this thread have been excellent. They have been rational & sensible.

Sure, I am disappointed that Iowa didn't get its fourth top ten finish in the last nine seasons. The season was painful & frustrating. However, prior to 2002, Iowa had finished in the top ten only twice in the previous 41 seasons. Both times at number 10.

Magical seasons like 2002, 2004 & last year are very rare at Iowa. I expected another one this season, but was extremely dissatisfied.

Coach Ferentz is a victim of his own success. People that expect Iowa to challenge for a BCS bowl game every year at Iowa are delusional at best.

It is very hard to win at Iowa. According to Scout.com, Iowa only has four 3-star recruits in the state. In contrast, Ohio has 81 3-star recruits or better. With their commitments, Ohio State is considered to have a top five recruiting class. However, they lost two of the top five prospects in the state to Alabama. If French decides to go to Oregon or Notre Dame, people in Iowa will be upset. In Ohio, the Bucks just move on to a player that is just as good or better.

To compete Iowa has to develop players like Clark, Sanders, Gallery, Klug & Adam Robinson. The list goes on and on. Hell, few people realize that Jonathan Babineaux started his first game at Iowa as a 195 lb. fullback.

Only through player development, strength & conditioning, and excellent coaching has Iowa reached the level for the fans to be utterly frustrated with this season. We are who we are and it is not going to change until Ferentz leaves.

There are going to be many vacancies in college & the NFL over the next several months. Maybe, Coach Ferentz will move on. I hope not. Michigan would love to have him.

Maybe the next coach will run the spread offense and use a 3-3-5 defensive scheme. Let us face it. O'Keefe is not going anywhere unless it is to follow Ferentz to his next coaching position. Likewise, don't expect Coach Ferentz to pull a Zook and fire anyone. Coach Ferentz earns every penny.
 
I don't particularly like KF's football philosophy's. I don't have a problem with a ball control offense - but it doesnt particulary match up with the defensive philosophy.

The Indianapolis Colts have a similar def strategy but they have an offense that can put up points and allow the cover two shell defense to waste time and effectively win games.

A low scoring offense doesn't match up well with a cover 2 type defense. Also (like this year especially) if our defensive line is getting 0 pass rush we are in big trouble - and we have no plan of attack to supplement the lack of pass rush - hence why during certain years we can have very poor pass defense.


From day 1 I never was gung ho on Kirk and his old school strats, but I don't care if we win.

I dont need an Oregon duck offense to be happy, but I just wish we would stop playing football in 1987 sometimes.

I'm not saying Kirk being gone would be better, because he has done a great job here, but for 3 million dollars a year we could get talented coaches (if we are willing to spend that kind of cheddar)

We just have to see what the next couple years bring. Hopefully Kirk kicks some people in the *** over the next few months.

It is actually the opposite. It works with poor offenses because it forces the other team to earn their way down the field, thus shortening the game and shortening the game, and taking away potential scoring opportunities.

What makes Indy's defense go is that Peyton gives them a lead alot, and their pass rush off the edge is one of the quickest in the game. They get a pass rush with four more than we do due to the speed of their edge.
 
again, all that is being said is moot; there is no fair weather, nor is there a bandwagon; there would be accountability if Barta didn't have such a great view through his navel. Ferentz has pulled one of the slickest deals in recent Iowa memory; he holds the whole state hostage while he behaves as he pleases. Time for a change.
 
again, all that is being said is moot; there is no fair weather, nor is there a bandwagon; there would be accountability if Barta didn't have such a great view through his navel. Ferentz has pulled one of the slickest deals in recent Iowa memory; he holds the whole state hostage while he behaves as he pleases. Time for a change.

Judging by your Nov 2010 join date and level of posts, I'm assuming you joined this board as a way to voice your frustration over our struggles.

You're not alone.

But to think it's time for Ferentz to go is asinine.
 
Judging by your Nov 2010 join date and level of posts, I'm assuming you joined this board as a way to voice your frustration over our struggles.

You're not alone.

But to think it's time for Ferentz to go is asinine.

Yeah, probably. However, it is time for a change - a change from the incompetent OC who has been running the Offense these last pathetic several years to one who can translate talent on the team to points on the board and production on the field.
 
Iowa is one bad hire away from being in the same or worse position that Michigan, Tennessee or Notre Dame is in right now...Traditional power houses with national title history, that are floundering badly.

If things can change that dramatically at places that have deeper pockets than Iowa, bigger recruiting advantages than Iowa, a better platform for success than at Iowa, they sure as hell can happen at Iowa real quickly.

People assume that this is the new 'floor'...that winning 27 games over three years is the baseline of what we should expect every year.

Sorry, but you are creating your own problem and you are emoting it to everyone else, then you need to check yourself.

That doesn't mean that this year wasn't a disappointment. It also doesn't mean that last year is some norm, either.

Georgia barely got to 6-6 this year after a disappointing season last year. Florida is 7-5. Texas is 5-7. Tennessee is 6-6. Notre Dame is 7-5. USC is 7-5.

These programs have so many more advantages than Iowa it would choke a billy goat. Their fans are disappointed too, but these are not apples to apples comparisons. Iowa is the interloper, in a pure college football aristocracy point of view, on this list.

For a number of reasons, this team didn't have it this year. I am writing up as many things as I can think of as to why that might have been, and then we can look at it and talk about what we think the real problems were, etc.

But I remain steadfastly convinced, as do most people I speak with that live in the football world, that Kirk Ferentz is in the cream of the crop, and especially for Iowa.

Some will scoff at this, some will say I am kissing his *** or whatever. I really don't care what you think of me, otherwise I would have been long gone by now doing something else. It's what I believe, given the obstacles Iowa has to overcome in this sport, and how well they have done that under Ferentz.

You can hope for more, but when your basis for expectations is on a foundation of hope with little material evidence beyond speculation, that's on you.

It still doesn't white wash this year; things were set up to do much better than they did, and they didn't get over.

But people are acting like this program has been a chronic disappointment under Ferentz, which is BS, plain and simple.


Jon, I respect the heck out of you, but what you've written here is the same ol' tired "Woe is us" stuff you always pull out every time someone criticizes Ferentz.

The fact of the matter is, I started this thread asking why KF refuses to be held accountable for what happens and you respond with "We are one bad hire away from being irrelevant, we have no built in advantages, all these other normally good teams stunk this year, blah, blah, blah."

I, nor anyone else who posted before you, called for KF's head on a platter. No one that is a relevant poster is calling for KF to be fired.

What I would like to know is when is it going to be his or his coaches fault? When? We put Stanzi under center at Arizona and don't have any quick passes or screens called to take advantage of what everyone (except for the coaching staff apparently) knows is coming....an all out blitz. How is blocking 8 guys with 5 an "execution" problem? Sounds like a coaching problem to me. Or against Wisconsin when everyone in the stadium (except for the coaching staff apparently) knows a fake punt is coming and they don't call punt safe......How is that an execution problem? Sounds like a coaching problem to me. Or against Ohio State when we put a linebacker on their slot (for the one millionth time) and they burn us once, but the guy drops it in the endzone so they go back to it and it's complete.......How is that an execution problem? Sounds like a coaching problem to me.

I can go on and on, but I think you get the point. At the end of the day, coaching decisions and philosophy based on the existing personnel have cost us more games than execution by the players. That's why Ferentz always goes to the "execution" card......because it puts the blame on the players. If he admitted that there were some philosophy issues that need to be tweaked or addressed, then that would admit that the coaching staff was at fault, and we can't have that.
 
Yeah, probably. However, it is time for a change - a change from the incompetent OC who has been running the Offense these last pathetic several years to one who can translate talent on the team to points on the board and production on the field.

No doubt.

Changes need to be made on both the offensive and defensive side.

It might be a tweaked scheme. It might be the way the approach the game to these guys. Maybe a little more emotion.

I don't know.

But changes need to be made all around. This was an entire team collapse this year, not just the offense.
 
He adamantly refuses to believe there is anything wrong with this philosophy.....instead blaming "execution". And since it's the players executing the plays, then by default, he's saying it's their fault.

Whenever he's questioned by a reporter about the offense, he always has some snide remark......the other week it was about how they were going to switch to Oregon's offense, until he saw they only scored 14 points. Kirk, I hate to break it to you, but Oregon averages over 50 points per game.....you averaged 17 against IU, NW and Minn. In addition, your offense is perinnially in the bottom 25% of all of FBS football. Yet every year he trots out the same offense. What's the old saying......insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result? That sums up Kirk's philosophy to a "T".

Same thing with the defense. It's always someone or something else's fault. It's either injuries, or the other quarterback had a phenomenal day (isn't it weird how every QB we played had a "phenomenal day"?), or the players just didn't execute. Last I looked, Wisconsin lost a helluva lot more talent to injuries this year than we did, but they're going to a BCS bowl.....somehow most other teams didn't let Persa have a "phenomonal" day against them.......Arizona's O has looked downright pedestrian against everyone but us.......and most defenses in the country don't "execute" to perfection like this staff expects of their defense. In fact, most coaches in the country are able to mix it up on defense when it's apparent something isn't working in order to make the "execution" better. Ours, of course, don't.

Wouldn't it be nice if, just once, Kirk just came out and said he and his coaches flat-out sucked this year and, come he!! or highwater, there WILL be improvements in their coaching next year and then list off 3 or 4 things that everyone will see improvement in?

I haven't read through the rest of this thread, so maybe some will echo my comments.

Who are you to say it isn't?

None of the losses this year came when Iowa just get completely blown off the field - in all five, Iowa made enough mistakes to leave the door open, and in all five, the opponent took advantage of the opportunity.

Hell, in all five games, it came down to execution - or rather, the lack of it.

Special teams **** the bed against Arizona, giving away 14 points in a game Iowa lost by a touchdown.

Numerous special teams gaffes cost the Hawks against Wisconsin; it was the only area on the field where Wisconsin was better.

Offense the has the ball with 6 minutes to go against NW with a chance to get some first downs and kill the clock, they don't do it.

Same for Ohio State, same thing for Minnesota.

In four of those five games (Arizona being the exception) Iowa had the ball - and the lead - past the halfway mark of the 4th quarter. In every instance, neither unit did their job. You can say that's on the coaches, I can say it's on the players.

Kirk has fallen on the sword MANY times in the past, so it's odd that you pick now to say the he refuses to accept accountablilty. It simply isn't true.
 
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