Damnit.

by Savage, Around Ye Olde Colonial College, Monday, August 27, 2012, 11:36 (4252 days ago) @ hobbs
edited by Savage, Monday, August 27, 2012, 11:41

I had a long post typed out and the submission ate it. Sorry.

I expounded on a "canonical final version" of my theory that HR and I started talking about back at the very beginning of last season, but here's a very brief summary:
-- Kelly can't win with "bad Dayne" because Dayne's flaws are the one thing you absolutely have to do right in the Kelly offense.
-- Kelly could win with "good Dayne", but "good Dayne"'s strengths aren't really that important to the Kelly offense (as seen at ND), so it's not a huge plus.
-- Kelly thought he could win with "bad Tommy", but found that his proclivity for turnovers was enough to offset his better fit in the offense. Hey, nobody could have known he was that much of a tunover machine, no sweat.
-- Kelly thought he could win with "good Tommy", but found that competent DCs can shut down a kid with such a paucity of arm strength and athleticism, because they have 11 men to cover 15-20 yards, and no worries about a QB breaking contain on a scramble. This should have been obvious, but apparently Kelly didn't realize it.

In brief: I'd have stuck with Dayne.
-- in the best case, Dayne would have gotten better at the "easy passes", and Kelly would have been willing to shift to his QB's strengths. We could have been quite good.
-- in the worst case, Dayne wouldn't have gotten any better at the "easy passes", Kelly wouldn't have been willing to deviate from his "system" (any more than he found he had to just to be marginally competent with Tommy anyway) and we would have sucked.
... would our sucking have been any worse than having 20+ QB turnovers that keep even mediocre teams in the game (Pitt, BC, Wake, FSU), while having no upside to be anything better than "meh" even if the turnovers abated?

As far as going into this year, then, he could have had a QB who is physically competent to play BCS-level football coming back with some experience, and maybe Kelly would have more experience humbling himself into adapting to his players' strengths, rather than shoe-horning them into his preconceived DII/MAC/BE platonic form of "Quarterback". Or, if Crist sucked, then he'd be in the same boat he is now, but without the huge distraction of having wasted a full season and spring on practicing the kid who never could be good enough.