What Frustrates Me (and I think, most of us)

I'm sick of hearing this excuse every first 3-4 games of the season...its not keeping it vanila..it's our offensive philosophy and it sucks..

 

I'm afraid this is true. We weren't keeping it vanilla, and I don't think we ever have been. We just assumed that's why we were so poor on offense.

I realized that wasn't it when we were vanilla ALL of last season.

 

I created a thread a lot like this one a year ago and one of the responses was this:

"So, that's it. It really is all about you!"

So, get ready.

But I agree with you, though. It's frustrating, and it still looks to be the same product yet again.

 

Agreed! Painful--very painful--to watch the second half.

Whatever do the coach(es) say to the players at halftime.....? "We're up by 20...it's in the bag?"

Of course not, but it seems so!!!

We need those coaches to come down from their perches upstairs; come down to BREATHE FIRE INTO THE PLAYERS AT THE FIRST SIGN OF COMPLACENCY! Stalk the sidelines and snap wet towels at any player who even LOOKS less than RABID!

We have astonishing TALENT that never seems to get FULLY UNLEASHED due to plain vanilla, conservative (read: scared) play calling. Where is the determination to USE our guy's skills? When we have a playmaker who's HOT--run his a$$ off!

CLM gets upset when there's a poor call; he seems less upset when his team--his entire team--is somehow ALLOWED to get off the GAS.

---Scared stiff for 2010-11!

 

I agree that it's not complacency, it's the offensive philosophy - which is actually kind of difficult to nail down, quite honestly. Seems all over the place at times.

But I'd be interested to know, in at least a little detail, what exact kind of offensive philosophy you're looking for?

I confess to liking a run-based offense that uses play-action and designed passes to change the pace and catch teams cheating. What LSU hasn't done well in my mind is mix up play calling to keep the defense on their heels, like TE passes on first down to get 5 or 6 and give more options on 2nd down. I'm not a big fan of always trying to get 20 via the air - too many 3rd and ten situations.

What are you asking for?

 

Yep. There really hasn't been any TEAM offense really since 2007. It's all one offs. Basically, how many times do you see LSU run basically the same formation back to back but different plays? Never.

Something I have been saying since early last year, there is no identity to the offense.

The only time I feel like Crowton and the offense had a identity was there was like a series in the Tulane game I think it was last year and Ridley and Lee were in there... Crowton went from running Ridley inside to outside in a standard formation then they went to screen or something... it just all felt right... like the old Tigers. Nothing real fancy, it just had a feel to it. I think I posted out here. I was like, they weren't doing a bunch of crazy formation or anything just standard stuff but it was mixed up nicely.

 

A play style that at least does not assume victory. An offensive philosophy that takes advantage of the playmakers we have.

Like a buddy said last night, "Whoever is calling these plays is costing Ruben Randle and Terrence Toliver millions of dollars right now."

 

I see it in a little different light. Yes , I do believe this offense has yet to open up and do what it is capable but when you have a 20 point lead it's inevitable that you will sit back a bit...that is coaching plain and simple. Whether it was Miles that decided to coast or Crowton someone needs to keep this game in mind for future reference.

NO game is out of reach (as Jacksonville St proved) but to have a bleak outlook after an opening game against a very good NC team, depleted or not, isn't the way to look at this. There were some positives and I think the negatives can be adjusted. This team scored 30 points...just need to keep the killer instinct for 60 minutes and not let off.