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3-4 or 4-3 it doesn't matter, time to get some development and the 4 game redshirt rule

djlhuskerfan said:
I agree this is a make or break year for Chinander. He has talent and it needs to start showing. Yes we are still lacking at a position or two but we need to show progress
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I guess I didn't mean this as a Chinander bash, it was more of a scheme hasn't mattered for over a decade, it's development. For all of the Chinander hate, the defense actually out-performed the offense in almost every category.
 

ThrowFar60 said:
I understand that this would be VERY tough info to get, but wondering if there are a few programs out there who caught your eye as using the 4 game redshirt rule extremely well?
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I actually don't as I really only have access to games played/charted for Nebraska. And let's be honest, this is a pretty new rule so it's not like we were going to get it "right" right away.

This stems to me more from a "we need our guys", two straight sub .500 seasons, and then not playing your guys the maximum amount of time allotted.
 



Lurker44 said:
I find the focus on Chin interesting. Frost is making 5 plus times more with similar results on offense and oversight of the whole team. I’m not trying to defend Chin as much as point out the leeway Frost has as a Nebraska guy who won us a title at QB. Probably a good thing given the state of the program.
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I agree. I guess I didn't post this as a burn to Chin, but just that whatever scheme we run it's time to be good at it.
 
The Nth Degree said:
The bolded above is my feeling and my frustration.

Coach Chin is being paid at a level where most would expect progress AND results to be evident. Thus my "adjustment" to the the expectation.

I worry whether or not Chinander actually possesses the talent and ability to execute; especially when there's several posters on this board that are pointing out obvious oversights and/or mistakes in his game-time performance.

Here's to looking forward to Coach Chin demonstrating his worth.
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Frost is making $1,250,000 more than Wisconsin’s Head Coach. So if we’re going to play that game, let’s start at the top.
 
ShortSideOption said:
And we never will be with the offense we run. Honestly, our offense was a bigger reason for our season in 2019 than our defense.
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Completely agree, yet I constantly argue with people on here who blame the defense for not being the 2009 defense and stoning everyone.

Two fewer possessions that end in opponent points a game and NU is 8-4 last year.
 




ShortSideOption said:
It's the offseason... let's talk:

It's put up or shut up time. Quite frankly I think it's more we haven't developed kids than grabbing guys that aren't suited for a 3-4. It's time to get things done.
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I guess for me it is not just put up or shut up time for the defense I think it is put up or shut up time for the whole program. Offense, defense, special teams, S & C, assistant coaches and head coach all need to do a better job next year. It is just that simple.

Doing a better job starts at the top with the head man. I love what Frost brings to the table. I think he is immensely talented and has a great grasp of football. But, with that said he needed a big dose of humility and I think he got that last year. It came way too easy at UCF and that really did him no favors.

The B1G is big boy football. It is linemen conference first and foremost and a conference that you aren't going to just outscore everyone to win games. You got to play some defense. Chinander should have known this, he went to Iowa. The B1G has plenty of spread offenses, but at its core it is still a smash mouth conference. I hope they have figured that out.

I hope they understand how important it is to get to a bowl game next year, any bowl game.

They need to use all of their players and get them on the field when they need them. If that means playing a freshman OLB that is the best pass rusher they got on 3rd and long do it. They need to be able to at least slow down the run. Remember B1G is big boy football.

If that means playing McCaffery at some wildcat or at WR some than do it. If you need a big WR get Hickman on the field. I think he could have helped last year. Get some designed TE plays. They have all this talent at TE and they only caught 30 balls. They should catch at least 60, four or five a game.

I have said this quite a few times on this board. Frost wants to be able to play a certain way, but if you don't have the personnel to play that way you have to do something different. The important thing is to win the game.
 
ShortSideOption said:
I agree. I guess I didn't post this as a burn to Chin, but just that whatever scheme we run it's time to be good at it.
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Agreed, I didn’t take your post as a slight to Chin, just been seeing lots of comments all over the forums pointing the finger at him more than others just as deserving. All the coaches need to improve the on field product next year or it’s going to get ugly.
 
NUinID said:
I guess for me it is not just put up or shut up time for the defense I think it is put up or shut up time for the whole program. Offense, defense, special teams, S & C, assistant coaches and head coach all need to do a better job next year. It is just that simple.

Doing a better job starts at the top with the head man. I love what Frost brings to the table. I think he is immensely talented and has a great grasp of football. But, with that said he needed a big dose of humility and I think he got that last year. It came way too easy at UCF and that really did him no favors.

The B1G is big boy football. It is linemen conference first and foremost and a conference that you aren't going to just outscore everyone to win games. You got to play some defense. Chinander should have known this, he went to Iowa. The B1G has plenty of spread offenses, but at its core it is still a smash mouth conference. I hope they have figured that out.

I hope they understand how important it is to get to a bowl game next year, any bowl game.

They need to use all of their players and get them on the field when they need them. If that means playing a freshman OLB that is the best pass rusher they got on 3rd and long do it. They need to be able to at least slow down the run. Remember B1G is big boy football.

If that means playing McCaffery at some wildcat or at WR some than do it. If you need a big WR get Hickman on the field. I think he could have helped last year. Get some designed TE plays. They have all this talent at TE and they only caught 30 balls. They should catch at least 60, four or five a game.

I have said this quite a few times on this board. Frost wants to be able to play a certain way, but if you don't have the personnel to play that way you have to do something different. The important thing is to win the game.
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I find it somewhat humorous that many people think it as simple as "Get some designed TE plays", or "if you need a big WR get Hickman on the field". Does anyone out there seriously think that the NU offense under SF doesn't have plays designed for the TEs?? Or simply putting Hickman out on the field automatically cures all the other ailments and the yards and touchdowns come by the bushel? If only the game were as simple as many fans make it seem.

Also, i'm pretty sure the coaches know it is important to go to a bowl game next year. I also suspect they will do everything they feel needs to be done to help the team achieve that goal. If they don't, then yes, this is the wrong staff.

Maybe it is the video game syndrome of "i'll just play all the guys rated 99 and beat everyone". And if that doesn't work, i'll hit reset and replay the game tomorrow.
 
One Hit Wonder said:
Quoting your words but the reply is for anyone that wants to listen.

To hell with blowing people out. In order to build depth and develop players, the anointed ones (aka the "starters") need to have a sense of urgency. Throwing a true freshman out on the field when the opposition is waiting for the clock to hit 00:00 doesn't do anything for the true freshmen. Late in the 4th quarter when the 2nd and 3rd team guys are in the game (rarely when it happens), it is "game PT" but not the anxiousness of the 2nd quarter when the "game" is in doubt. If it's a blow out, the starters are grab-assing and posing on the sidelines.

Starters are comfortable knowing they're starting and are not in danger of losing their spot – mostly regardless of whether they’re effective in a game. And how are true freshmen supposed to understand "game speed", assignments and responsibility standing on the sidelines?

Over the past 2 decades at Nebraska, there have been so many true freshmen that were praised as "practice All-Americans" but don't sniff the field. The excuses as to why they didn’t get into a game were mind-numbing. I say it's long overdue and it's time to start throwing the kids to the wolves, so-to-speak.

In the age of “transfer”, Nebraska doesn’t have the luxury of waiting to recruit the next great player and redshirt as many as they can. A lot of the kids recruited by Frost have a common theme in the sense of “being able to see the field early” but eventually prospects are going to see that as BS. Eventually the coaches need to sack up and start playing the freshmen.
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Well, putting in young players who aren't ready for 1st team or 2nd team reps in a tight game is one way for them to get experience, but it may also cost the team a win. As long as everyone is on board with potentially losing a winnable game, sure, by all means let's play everyone.

As for the "practice All-Americans", well, maybe sometimes coaches feel better saying the future is promising rather than "we need better players, _______ isn't ever going to see the field for us". I seem to remember when this staff has said they need better players, many on the board viewed it as counter productive and only an excuse. I'm pretty sure all coaches want to win and at least 98% of them will play the players that make winning the most likely outcome.
 



ShortSideOption said:
And we never will be with the offense we run. Honestly, our offense was a bigger reason for our season in 2019 than our defense.
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So we are back to looking for spots on the team that will likely get better to feed our "fanatic" optimism. Special teams will probably be better, because we won't use all the kickers on campus. I hope that a new emphasis on special teams will at least fix the coverages.

Offense, maybe OL, TE and WR block better and run to where they belong on each play - that would fix a lot of ills.

Defense, tackle. ;)

I really feel if Nebraska scores more points than their opponents in most of the games, they will come away with a winning record.
 
For me the issue is one of gaps and weaknesses and an inability to adjust to some of the styles we saw last year.

- Front 3 were good to very good most of the year. Maybe not exactly the type of guys we want, but we had experience, talent, and depth

- LB's were bad for the most part outside of Domann (depending on how you categorize him)

- DB's were pretty good last year.

But, despite having 2 units playing pretty well, the overall D was improved, but still not nearly what we want. What went wrong?

- We didn't get much pressure. While Khalil got 8 sacks, we didn't get pressure from the LB spot that traditionally provides pressure in a 3-4, and our blitzes just didn't seem to work, leaving DB's and LB's out in space way too long in coverage

- our ILB's and LB's (and sometimes safeties) filled gaps terribly. Only ILB I saw that was decisive and fast enough to make a difference was Reimer and that was in limited play. Domann was a difference maker, but I consider him the nickel/hybrid guy more.

- Our LB's mostly couldn't cover outside of Domann, too often against spread teams we had a LB out in space trying to cover someone they couldn't. I know we switched that up a bit later, but it cost us in several games.

My questions:

We went out looking for speed at LB and some more maturity, but we brought in a lot of talent there. Why wasn't it working last year? I get that we didn't have a rush LB to replace Davis (who did improve), but the young ILB's were highly recruited and athletic. how many do you need to recruit to develop one?

I didn't think we switched things up much to get pressure and coverage packages in - maybe the young guys weren't ready, but it was a glaring problem (and there was the report that they'd worked Reimer in the coverage package one week, but then we didn't see him on the field on passing downs). Part of the value of the 3-4 is the flexibility, but you need to take advantage of it.

-- addition to this, I'd like to see us pair a thumper at ILB with a smaller, speedier guy who we can let flow to the ball and who can take on coverage responsibilities. Fairly common with 3-4's, but they guys we had running around last year were usually the thumper kind and struggled in space

Personally, i think the talent is there to have a decent defense with fewer glaring holes this year, but the coaches have to show they can get that performance on the field.

FWIW, agree with the others that the offense was a much bigger disappointment last year (taking the year as a whole)
 
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ShortSideOption said:
...It's put up or shut up time. Quite frankly I think it's more we haven't developed kids than grabbing guys that aren't suited for a 3-4. It's time to get things done...
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Lurker44 said:
I find the focus on Chin interesting. Frost is making 5 plus times more with similar results on offense and oversight of the whole team. I’m not trying to defend Chin as much as point out the leeway Frost has as a Nebraska guy who won us a title at QB. Probably a good thing given the state of the program.
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Agreed. 3 years in with the majority of players recruited by this staff. Offense regressed from year 1 to year 2. IMO, 2020 should show marked improvement. Frankly, I'm tired of hearing about fixing the culture. It's starting to reek of excuses to me. I'm not saying we need to win the division or even compete for it this year but another losing season and I'm going to rip my heart out.

Frustrating.
 
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