I keep saying it. Whose fault is it, that terrible teams and average teams can completely shut our run down? Syracuse, UNC, Pitt. No one can convince me that's on Rosier. The guy is an inconsistent QB. He should not be tossing the ball 34 times a game. Should throw more than 18-25 times. Most of his throws are in long yardage.
We don't care about the running game. We don't hit anybody. When it pops through it's mostly by accident. It's been maddening ever since Richt arrived. I can't criticize much else but the rushing attempt numbers are disgracefully low every week, especially in the first half. I realize nobody cares about that but I have several betting systems that center around that stat, and we flunk badly. It is illegitimate toward national laurels. Absolute frailty. You are guaranteed to hit the wall somewhere and be ruthlessly exposed, a la Mike Leach. That's why I've been equally thrilled and stunned all season. Instead of looking at how we fared against the team we played I've been projecting forward to facing the true blue bloods. Not fun when you do that. So many categories have been great -- like pass defense -- while others are horrendous -- like rushing attempts and passing percentage, etc.
Pittsburgh was a poor team but not a soft team. That's where we screwed up. If they had a tissue rushing defense like Virginia last season then we could have waltzed up there all overconfident and unconcerned and it wouldn't have mattered. Our loopy delayed running plays would have busted occasionally and Rosier wouldn't have been able to avoid the end zone multiple times. But this Panther team was like a low level version of all the blue collar teams that gave the great Miami teams fits in bowl games over the decades. Only two teams ran successfully on the Panthers -- Georgia Tech and North Carolina State. Those games skewed the stats to make the run defense look much worse than actual. Our game was the 8th time Pittsburgh held a foe under 4 yards per rush and 5 times it was 3 yards per rush or lower. They held Oklahoma State below 3 yards per rush.
We couldn't run, basically didn't try to run, showed up overconfident/tired and our quarterback is an admirable gutsy journeyman type. Not the greatest combination. Yeah, the deep balls were there but anyone who focuses on that aspect alone is whiffing the big picture. This is not a championship level offense as currently constructed. That's the third game (Florida State, Notre Dame) Rosier has been under 6 YPA this season. Bloody miracle we were unbeaten heading into Friday because in college football your win expectancy is less than 25% if the quarterbacking is below 6 YPA during the game itself.
How many permutations do we have...5? RPO handoff or fake, Rosier takes off up the middle, or makes a one-read throw. Sorry, I guess it's 4, not 5.
No matter the caliber of quarterback our emphasis should be hitting people on offense first, and variety of formation and style second. If we would merely shift in and out from under center, and utilize stuff like I formation toss play fakes while moving Rosier around and taking advantage of always-available 5-15 yard centerfield darts and crossing patterns, there's no way we wouldn't be less vulnerable and predictable than we are right now.
Frankly we got away with crap calls several times in critical situations this year. Those sideline lobs into double coverage are pure crappiola. This is at least the 12th consecutive year we waste too many pass plays down the sideline when as soon as it leaves the quarterback's hand I'm thinking...wonderful, that's a 10% expectancy. It's like the **** third down screens. Who cares if they work occasionally? Outliers are meaningless. Do the right thing and it's remarkable how everything falls into place.
