forums

X's and O's Why Are We Playing In a Phonebooth So Often?

jps2344 said:
We dropped 49 points on Saturday and are averaging 40+ per game with two of our three opponents being top 25 teams. That’s why.

Credit to Mario for having Dawson for at least three years. We haven’t had a legit coordinator for more than a couple in decades.
Click to expand...
patrick nix (car insurance salesman today) says "hold my beer"
 
Advertisement
JHallCanes said:
I’m not here to tell people to never criticize Dawson

But we’ve got a WR group that’s very new. It’s talented but coming into the year it was going to need to show a lot. I’m not sure about the speed and skill mentioned here.

What we do have is a massive experienced OL, a veteran power back, and an accurate QB

I don’t see any problem with leaning on what’s proven for now
Click to expand...

Nobody is immune to criticism, or at the very least discussion about their performance.

But the quarterback is literally #1 in the country in completion percentage, while also averaging 9.9 yards every time he throws the football (all games).

It's too early to do this, but last year against FBS competition:

Cam Ward -- 66.6% completions, 9.4 yards per attempt, passer rating of 170

This year against FBS competition:

Carson Beck -- 74.1% completions, 9.4 yards per attempt, passer rating of 175

This is throwing to an entirely green group of receivers, beginning in June. While Cam was throwing to kids who had played about a combined 4 billion college games, beginning in January.

I don't see what questioning the results does for us right now. We can discuss intent of the offense design all we want. But jumping up and down and screaming about the intent of the offense when the results are what they are above (again, through 2 games, this doesn't mean **** yet), I'll let the guy continue to cook. He's proven he can do it.

One final thought in which I get even more over my skis.

There is a very real possibility that Shannon Dawson, with Mario's kids, takes a dude who was a Day 3 pick and helps him to 1.1........followed up the very next year by taking another dude who was almost an afterthought nationally this summer and helping him to 1.1, while replacing the ENTIRE skill talent around him, save for Mark Fletcher. We had 7 kids on the roster last season who had over 500 yards of total offense. ONE of them is still here. And our QB is the co-leader for the Heisman trophy currently.
 
My only knock on the offense is the TE production. I mean we say we have talented TEs, but why does the TE room only have 8 catches?
 
OrangeBowlMagic said:
This is throwing to an entirely green group of receivers, beginning in June. While Cam was throwing to kids who had played about a combined 4 billion college games, beginning in January.
Click to expand...
I agreed with your entire point in this post but I just want to clear up that Daniels, Marion, Johnson, and Bauman have a combined 183 games and 424 receptions. The young guys are playing well but this is an experienced group.
 
DTP said:
I agreed with your entire point in this post but I just want to clear up that Daniels, Marion, Johnson, and Bauman have a combined 183 games and 424 receptions. The young guys are playing well but this is an experienced group.
Click to expand...

That’s a good point. I was talking more the cohesion here. And also Bauman has caught 2 passes this season, Tony Johnson has caught 2.

But 2 of your top 3 guys are very experienced, just not at Miami and with Dawson. You’re right. I was more thinking Cam came into Dawson in Year 2 with Restrepo, George, Arroyo, and Horton all being very familiar with the scheme.

Beck came in with an entire group who had to learn the offense, including true freshmen, and couldn’t throw until the summer. I still have fears that the passing game is going to sputter at some point due to the lack of reps, but obviously with every passing week that concern gets less and less, and also Beck is just an accurate passer. He’s more accurate than Cam and said it all year. So if you give him time, eventually someone is going to be open and he’s going to hit them in the face.
 
DTP said:
I agreed with your entire point in this post but I just want to clear up that Daniels, Marion, Johnson, and Bauman have a combined 183 games and 424 receptions. The young guys are playing well but this is an experienced group.
Click to expand...
Yup though again this year where’s the NFL talent? Pretty impressive actually. But as the team gets deeper into the season and the WRs solidify themselves it’ll be interesting to see if we make some tweaks.
 
I can't even believe you have to ask.

Air Caveman GIF
 
Advertisement
With Lyle healthy - allegedly - I'd like to see some 3WR & 2RB shotgun sets. I know it's illegal and communism to play without a TE, but with Beck showing he's a willing and capable runner in the read option game, think we could be more explosive in the run game out of those sets, especially up the gut. Beck and one of the RBs would stress opposite edges and there could be more space for the other RB to run up the A-gap. Could also use Lofton as the second back in these sets too (know we tried it at least once against ND and it didn't work). He'd be a tough cover as a receiver coming out of the backfield.
 
rsa coral gables said:
Given the speed and skills of our receivers, why are we playing in a phonebooth so often? the following two plays were very early in the game with the score zero zero in both games and both on first and 10.

i understand that they are a million factors that influence the way we are lined up from game to game and play to play, but the idea still rings through. under dawson, we are playing in a phonebooth often.



View attachment 335867


View attachment 335868
In the Lashlee scheme, the players are spread out essentially from one side of the numbers to the other side of the numbers, essentially using most of the width of the field, causing the defense only to have 6 players in the box. in the dawson scheme, everyone but one player is within the hash marks and there are 8 players in the box.

wouldn't we have some advantage spreading the players out and not allowing stacked boxes? why can't we do this at least every once in while as an alternative formation on predictable run plays?

i've read that some of the run concepts are authored by Mario/Mirabal rather than Dawson and maybe THAT explains the phonebooth formation. I don't know and maybe some of the gurus here can elaborate on this. would like to see variety in formation (and don't tell me we are saving it for the Ave Maria game).
Click to expand...
Replace the name, Dawson with Mario
 
rsa coral gables said:
Given the speed and skills of our receivers, why are we playing in a phonebooth so often? the following two plays were very early in the game with the score zero zero in both games and both on first and 10.

i understand that they are a million factors that influence the way we are lined up from game to game and play to play, but the idea still rings through. under dawson, we are playing in a phonebooth often.



View attachment 335867


View attachment 335868
In the Lashlee scheme, the players are spread out essentially from one side of the numbers to the other side of the numbers, essentially using most of the width of the field, causing the defense only to have 6 players in the box. in the dawson scheme, everyone but one player is within the hash marks and there are 8 players in the box.

wouldn't we have some advantage spreading the players out and not allowing stacked boxes? why can't we do this at least every once in while as an alternative formation on predictable run plays?

i've read that some of the run concepts are authored by Mario/Mirabal rather than Dawson and maybe THAT explains the phonebooth formation. I don't know and maybe some of the gurus here can elaborate on this. would like to see variety in formation (and don't tell me we are saving it for the Ave Maria game).
Click to expand...
Go back and watch how Urby's OSU teams whooped Michigan. Urban ran mesh out of bunched sets, ran sets with the entire skill group to a side and ran speed option at that side. A lot of mesh and smash from bunched sets in 2018 and 2019.
 
ShadowSpring said:
Dawson said there were 4 or 5 times last weekend the TE was the #1 read but Carson went deeper
Click to expand...
Against SF there were a couple times where I saw Bauman running wide open, nobody near him. Now it is hard to be too critical because Beck completed passes to others on those plays. One was the TD pass to Brown where Bauman was all alone in the back of the end zone. On another play, he was totally unguarded running 15 yards downfield with open grass all around. Beck hit Toney, I believe, for a gain of 10+.
I wish we were including the TE’s but it also seems like the Offense is getting better every week. I still think there are things we will get better at as the weeks go by. Hopefully, integrating the TE’s is still coming.
 
Advertisement
OrangeBowlMagic said:
Nobody is immune to criticism, or at the very least discussion about their performance.

But the quarterback is literally #1 in the country in completion percentage, while also averaging 9.9 yards every time he throws the football (all games).

It's too early to do this, but last year against FBS competition:

Cam Ward -- 66.6% completions, 9.4 yards per attempt, passer rating of 170

This year against FBS competition:

Carson Beck -- 74.1% completions, 9.4 yards per attempt, passer rating of 175

This is throwing to an entirely green group of receivers, beginning in June. While Cam was throwing to kids who had played about a combined 4 billion college games, beginning in January.

I don't see what questioning the results does for us right now. We can discuss intent of the offense design all we want. But jumping up and down and screaming about the intent of the offense when the results are what they are above (again, through 2 games, this doesn't mean **** yet), I'll let the guy continue to cook. He's proven he can do it.

One final thought in which I get even more over my skis.

There is a very real possibility that Shannon Dawson, with Mario's kids, takes a dude who was a Day 3 pick and helps him to 1.1........followed up the very next year by taking another dude who was almost an afterthought nationally this summer and helping him to 1.1, while replacing the ENTIRE skill talent around him, save for Mark Fletcher. We had 7 kids on the roster last season who had over 500 yards of total offense. ONE of them is still here. And our QB is the co-leader for the Heisman trophy currently.
Click to expand...
I think Dawson is good, but I think the real game changer is Mirabal and his OLine. It's the foundation of our O and makes everything else tick.

I think we've had better skill position players run through here in the last 20 years (Ok maybe not Toney, he's clearly an NFL guy), but we've never had this type of OLine.
 
OldhamA said:
I think Dawson is good, but I think the real game changer is Mirabal and his OLine. It's the foundation of our O and makes everything else tick.

I think we've had better skill position players run through here in the last 20 years (Ok maybe not Toney, he's clearly an NFL guy), but we've never had this type of OLine.
Click to expand...

There’s a reason many of us wanted Mario here. Now you’re seeing it.

(To be fair, there are reasons why some people didn’t. And we’ve seen those. But give me a team with elite offensive and defensive lines and I’ll take my chances).
 
TitansHope said:
condensed formations have a lot of benefits:

1. if the defense chooses to keep a light box, you can punish them with the run
2. having bunched receivers can force the defense to tip their hand presnap in coverage- teams will often shade a safety over the bunch. you can see this happening in the screenshot you've posted.
3. tight, bunched receivers can also stress man coverage more post-snap, since you're forcing defenders into traffic. mesh is the classic example here.
4. it may sound counterintuitive, but you can often stress defenses horizontally *more* effectively from condensed sets than if you're spread out wide. one reason for this is that any receiver on the field has the room to run an in-breaking or out-breaking route, whereas if you're spread out wide your wide receivers often only have field space to run in-breakers. at that point outside CBs can sit on inside leverage and predict your routes more easily.

obviously this isn't necessarily true 100% of the time, and there can be advantages to spreading things out too. but there's a reason sean mcvay absolutely loves condensed sets.
Click to expand...
Jimbo Fisher just spoke about some of this on the ACCN Huddle show.

He also mentioned that the condensed sets allow WRs to come downhill and run block straight on.
 
Back
Top