Manny officially lost me last night. Many will say I waited too long, but I am never the "Fly the Banner" guy - a new coach always means your recruiting class falls apart and it then becomes a total rebuild, which we haven't had any success with. I was (am still am) rooting for Manny to turn it around, but both sides of the ball are simply a mess.
The inside zone run over and over, into Tite lines, while Donaldson and Gaynor are losing at the point of attack to smaller guys constantly. The RPO with King when some combination of his limitations as a passer, his height, an OL he doesn't trust, and a serious knee injury. The penalties and drops. The personnel and unwillingness to at least try out younger guys and see if they have it when the lights are on.
The soft coverage when the best trait of our starting DBs (I include Ivey here) is their size, combined with the lack of pass rush - we can't get home, yet we still give them 8-10 yards without even trying to disrupt the routes to maybe give the pass rush an extra second to get there. And then all we do is delayed blitzes behind this? I guess I can understand it vs Bama when they had WRs that could just run right past our guys and an OL/QB combo that could make us pay for being too aggresive - but vs App State? Why don't we just have guys like Bolden and Flagg blitzing off the edge? Antrelle Rolle didn't disguise when he was coming, and he was one of the best blitzing DBs we've had in recent memory.
I don't have all the answers, but I am not at practice every day nor am I getting mid 7 figures to figure it out. Where I finally flipped to the dark side was the post-game presser. Saban tore into his team on Monday, and again after the game last night. I don't expect Manny to be Saban, and everyone has their own style, but when you are the University of Miami and you, as HC, are constantly talking about the "Miami Standard," then you need to tear into your guys and let them know this wasn't good enough.
Harley needed to be benched after his drops. He sat for a while I think, but he was right back in. Give those reps to X or Brinson/B Smith. Find a way to get K Smith more involved when he is tearing it up like that. Reward the guys who make plays, even if it means taking some of those snaps from the guy that is the 1st one in the weight room and the last to leave.
It's gonna be a tough go without Chaney and Kenotra. Carter played one of his best games last night (at least from watching live), but our whole LB core can't be converted DBs. Just roster mismanagement and recruiting failures. At some point, the HC has to be held accountable for this, and that time has come for me.
I had high, but realistic, hopes for this season. I do not expect championships, or even ACC championships. I didn't expect to beat Bama. But I do expect progress, and we don't see that. No player development, no coaching to fit the players. Manny needs to go, and I am not sure he is even a FBS DC at this point. I am serious when I say I don't even know if he has a future in football - he is a horrible position coach, and not to be a ****, but his lisp will keep him from getting a job as an analyst. He would probably be a decent AD, with all the rah rah bullisht. But this needs to be his last season.