On the short yardage stuff

https://x.com/osborne__era/status/1977459952693153859

Can we find some way to get Osborne up here now? It will be fun to watch he and Kedren Young trucking people in the years to come.

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I was at the game so it was tough to diagnose live. I watched every short yardage play mulitiple times today to my wife’s chagrin.

There is not one thing, but multiple issues or breakdowns. So:

1) The lack of QB threat to pull the ball allows defenses to crash backside. This happened at least 2x
2) Aamil Wagner missed a backside block
3) We lost to a numbers advantage play side one time
4) Sometimes it is Love not seeing it correctly.
5) Both tackles got shoved back one time to the play side.

So, IMO, we need to figure something out on the backside to make teams play honest. Frankly, I’d create a Buchner or Minchey package.

We are mostly getting push to the play side. Also, snapping the ball 5 yards back in short yardage continues to be the dumbest thing coaches do on offense. Denbrock is not alone.

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I feel like we're more interested in making a manball challenge to our OL and RBs than we are getting the first down. Maybe trying to keep CJ from feeling like he's gotta be yoinked on money downs. I don't know, whatever.

And as I don't think Minchey is quite as runarific as Tyler, I'd opt for the WildBuck (I'll see myself out).

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He’s the Jurassic Park of college QBs. He had his opportunity, and nature selected him out. I don’t want him handling the ball on critical plays. He’s turnover prone.

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Maybe you're putting in better runners but are taking out a superior passer.

I vote no on that one, and it has to be tried in game, not just practice. It's getting rather late in the season for that, and definitely not this week.

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For the bad games. But they really need to get something with Carr working for short yardage. There's a million options they haven't explored since Miami.

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Freeman's got so much riz they need to call him Aura Parseghian

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https://youtu.be/TRaZ4bZxDw0?t=74

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Without looking at the actual plays called, I feel like ND is playing man-ball at the goal line and running it up the middle. It is easy to for the defense to crash when they aren't worried about anything happening outside of the tackles.

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At night, the ice weasels come.

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In games that aren't expected to be close, be as boring as possible. Establish the tendency to be boring. Maybe even add a tell for a smart defensive coordinator to identify.

And also maybe let Buchner have fun, cause I don't really want him throwing a pass against Alabama.

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If ND is controlling the game, is Freeman just trying to show a tendency that he can then break when he needs to? Or, maybe Freeman is saving his good plays for when he really needs them? Seems a little risky, but I don't know how coaches operate. Plus, ND should be able to power the ball in more often than not, and even a miss leaves the opponent in a hole.

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At night, the ice weasels come.

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Let's mix in some Play-Action Pop-Out

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At night, the ice weasels come.

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no, the other one

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The running game is so vanilla right now -- not sure how much of that is Denbrock or how much is designing around Love.

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Freeman's got so much riz they need to call him Aura Parseghian

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He's said, repeatedly, that he's back on the team to do whatever he can to help. That screams like a guy who's willing to put his body on the line in short yardage. And if he wants to throw a pop pass off it from time to time, then more power to him.

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He could motion into the backfield and take the snap, go in jet motion, or just be a decoy. He's a credible enough receiver that it's not completely wasting a skill position spot, and Carr could stay on the field, too.

Give other teams something extra to think about when we only need 2-3 yards.

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In all seriousness, we can run a true zone read with them and not have to "protect" the QB at all.

It worked pretty well on the fake punt with Buchner, and that was with the punter and long snapper lined up at wide receiver.

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"F--- everyone who isn't us."
#Team128

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Between the 2 guards is tough to run on. Frankly I thought we ran it pretty well into numbers. It we just convert the 4th and 4.... inches. I don't think we're really having this conversation.

Relatedly, how hard is it rewatching on peacock. I had to do it on my phone to use the 10 sec forward and back buttons, as well as the TV so I could always have one not on an ad.

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Is not ideal for coaches clicker analysis. AT ALL.

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Let Carr create. Didn't work this time -- agree, think it's coloring our overall impressions of the game. Not to mention the fact that the other fail was a RB fumble on a playcall that everyone wanted called.

But on the short rollout, hasn't Carr been successful on that multiple times in the past few games? Maybe they just had it scouted well, and we should have had a counter ready. n.b. I haven't rewatched the play yet.

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We only needed a few inches. If we don't want to run it with Carr, then put an EliPalooza in the playbook. Or use Minchey or Buchner.

The second one probably should have been a field goal, though if we were going to go for it, the bootleg was a reasonable playcall.

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Heck you could do it with Fields, he used to be a QB so you can preserve the throw threat.

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Buchner is smaller than Carr, which is not what you want in short yardage pileups. If all you want is a ball carrier, just improve the wildcat or call in someone bigger. Cross off Buchner.

Minchey is no bigger than Carr. He may be faster than Carr in a 40 yard dash but they're the same in a short yardage situation, i.e., both can move well enough to pull off a keeper. Minchey is also no better as a thrower than Carr. Unless you're only worried about injury protection, cross him off too.

So that leaves other guys. Ideally you want some extra beef with some wheels. Fields checks those boxes, but others probably do too.

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I'd be looking at James Flanigan. Big, strong, athletic, mean.

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They can’t crash if the QB has decent wheels.

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Aggressive and fooled us a bit. Although, that may have been on the 2nd 4th and 3.

Carr did have Faison open backside. He'd have to plant and throw across his body but on 4th down and into the end zone, it'd be worth the risk. He never looked that way and weirdly ran oob.

When I rewatched the game, I thought our oline did better than it initially looked. State was holding the los but they weren't really pushing us back and Love was pretty physical and falling forward. We weren't getting 5 yard chunks but I think we'd certainly have picked up a foot. Just my opinion.

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Carr carried the ball quite a bit against Miami. He seemed capable of the QB run then. Is he really incapable, or they just won’t let him?

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And Gino expressed a desire to get him more involved with the run game several weeks ago, so I don't know what the deal is. But Denbrock needs to start finding more ways to make defenses pay for overloading on the run. To the extent that they'll actually stop.

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For closer games. No point in him getting potentially hurt against NC State, but might need to do it this week if USC is closer. I get not running him much, but we went from feeling like too much in week one to not at all.

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At the time but maybe they were just trying to get him to do it live, so he created some muscle memory????

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From the defense not accounting for a pull threat. He doesn't seem to be seeing the field well with everyone coming downhill.

It's surprising to me we haven't seen any RPO bubble looks. Given how good our top WRs have been in and out of breaks you have to imagine teams would be hesitant to play press and crash down the way Miami did. Could be that Carr just stinks at the decision making. It would help a lot

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the Polo Grounds

Rewatched the game today

Thr Minchey/Buchner package gets my vote.

No thanks on Buchner

That's a fantastic analogy

The problem with that is

I'm ok with a package

steal this play from Purdue

Even Carr throwing to an RB or TE

One possible reason:

I wondered about this as well

Weis always had a ton of great goal-to-go plays

Throw it to Samardzija!

Marcus Freeman appearance in that clip reel

If it's a Kevin Rogers offense, throwback to the far side.

even basic stuff

I'm with this re Buchner

Put Buchner in at WR in short yardage, maybe?

can those guys do anything Carr can't in short yardage?

Get hurt and not tank our season?

BuchWild

Buchrecat

They were in a bear front a lot too. 1000 lbs of tush

Peacock

not opposed to an RPO rollout on short yardage

The first one should have been a sneak

I like a -palooza call more than Minchey or Buchner

I've seen enough of Buchner in the redzone for this lifetime

here's my thinking

If those are your parameters

It’s about threat, not execution.

Freeman said they had shown a look where they were

Is the lack of QB pull due to decision making?

He's plenty capable.

Maybe they are saving it

He'd did it in the 4th quarter. Thought it was strange

Love in particular seems to be suffering