I watch the offensive line closely when I replay games, including slo-mo and focusing on indiviudal blockers and blocking schemes. I'm not a coach and didn't play in college (because I know those comments are soon to follow!) but I certainly think the blocking scheme or philosophy was very different in 2009. In 2007 and 2008, the first two years of the Crowton/Stud regime, our run game had a lot of pulling guards and center, misdirection, overloading the point of attack, and releasing interior linemen to the second level while having the FB or a pulling G pick up the guy across from them on the DLine. While almost no run game blocking scheme these days is pure zone or pure drive (or assignmnt) blocking, it's my opinion we were much more drive blocking/trapping/pulling focused. And, for the most part, Jacob Hester and Charles Scott had gaping holes to run through. In 2009, besides the personnel changes - and make no mistake, Big Herm, Brett Helms, and Quinn Johnson were big losses - we resembled much more a pure zone blocking team. More like the Indianapolis Colts or the USC Trojans. You see a fraction of the pulling guards, or guys releasing to the second level to pick up linebackers, or even focus on opening a specific hole. Instead you see the zone blocking philosophy where the linemen are trying to create leverage and let the back pick his hole. Inside zone, outside zone. There could be a number of reasons why we switched blocking schemes - for instance, you better have a really good blocking FB to pick up the unblocked DT or DE that the pulling guard left, and we didn't have that FB last year. We also clearly had some personnel issues. But my question to the board is: does anyone else see the same change in our blocking schemes in the run game? Do you think we'll go back to the 2007/8 schemes? Have there been any articles on this subject that I've missed? Thanks in advance.
From what I've been told, yes, the O-line scheme was different in 2009 and it didn't take too well as we all noticed.. This year they will be going back to the system they were using before 2009 I'm told, and it should help in 2010. I don't know anything about the schemes and blocking in detail, but I trust where this info came from. We'll just have to see if it was fact or optimism.. lol
I think changes started in 2008. It takes athletic linemen to pull and trap and move quickly to pick up DL stunts, but in the SEC these athletic linemen have to be very big and strong, too. We don't always have the players to do all of that. Big Herm was an amazing inside blocker, but he couldn't pull and get outside consistently. We became more of a power inside blocking team that year. Last year we not only were weak at both guards and center, but we really didn't have the kind of big blocking tight end that LSU has been used to. Dickson was the best receiving TE around here in decades, but he wasn't a powerful blocker. LSU has always had tight ends that were like a second tackle on the strong side. We didn't have a guy like that to go with last year. Hopefully Ensminger can help there. I think the line has underperformed under Studrawa and I'm surprised that he is still here. It indicates that Les thinks that last year's problem wasn't the coaching, I suppose. A lot rests on whether these young offensive linemen, who got very little playing time last year, have got the right stuff or not.
Or maybe Les sees promise in Stud's coaching ability and realizes that people do learn by their mistakes. It's called "valuable experience".
totally agree. if the tigers want to compete for championships again it starts with the line of scrimmage on both sides of the ball, both have been lacking the last few seasons. is it recruiting? is it coaching? is it individual players? is it scheme? probably all play a part.
Regarding coach Stud, I think it's way too early to assume that he's "the problem". Our O-line was stellar in 2007, including two guys that switched that year from D-line to O-line (Hitt and the RT, can't think of his name, who was an absolute road-grader in the run game), and they were very good in 2008 until teams decided to load the box and dare us to throw the ball if we could in the latter half of the season. Don't forget Stud was Urban Meyer's OL coach at Bowling Green and he thought highly enough of him to bring him to Utah with him. A few weeks after arriving in Utah BG offered Stud the OC job and he returned. But that's a pretty good endorsement from one of the top coaches in the country. Last year was probably a combination of scheme, personnel, maybe coaching, and defenses constantly loading the box daring us to throw. At some point the OC has to be involved in drawing up new blocking schemes, it's not something the OL coach does on his own, either. Then there's the huge losses we suffered from the O-line recruits in 2006 and 2007. I think last year was our low point in terms of experienced O-line talent and this year we begin building back up with a lot of good young prospects. I'm hopeful that Les Miles - a guy that had very successful run games at Oklahoma State as both OC and later as head coach - will get this fixed. And I do believe we have more raw talent on the OL this year than last, it just might take a while to become a cohesive unit. I just hope the coaching staff does whatever necessary to get back to 2007 and early 2008 levels of run blocking.
Les has made it very clear to local media that he wants to run the ball in 2010, so I'm sure he's made that crystal clear with his coaches. It's looking like he's taking a more active role in establishing the team's offensive identity, and that is a very good thing IMO.
Yeah, this is key. And I think both Stud and Crowton have something to prove to keep their jobs. Miles won't stand being in the bottom of the BCS in rushing next year. I don't normally point fingers at coaches, but I think Stud (and Miles for that matter) will be correctly hanged if next year's line doesn't improve significantly in the running game. I still think they were OK in the passing game and that the excess sacks mostly had to do with Jefferson not using the pocket well enough and not getting rid of the football when he could've/should've. But that's more of an impression than the result of me breaking down OL play. Unlike the OP, I just can't stop watching the damned football when I rewatch games...:lol:. And I'm a former center!
