The American Meets The Texas Longhorns Offense

by davey o'brien on Sep 13, 2010 12:37 PM CDT

Editor's Note - Davey sent this in after the Rice game but I was far away from my computer for a week or so.

- S.R.

Sunday I took my wife to see The American. She is a big George Clooney fan. Saturday she watched the entire Texas game with me and let me watch the TCU game in peace while she entertained our older daughter and some friends of her's from college, and I like most of Clooney's movies.

Upon leaving the theater and driving home my wife's first question about the movie was how many push-ups and pull-ups do I plan on doing so my back will look like George's in the movie. I just laughed and said Clooney has a damn good life. Guy gets paid to roll around in bed with an attractive naked Italian actress playing a whore and then goes home at night to his villa on Lake Como to roll around in bed with the newest much younger model/actress he is dating at the time. Remind me to talk to my son later about possibly resetting his goals for life.

Don't worry, I am not here to write movie reviews nor try to convince anyone that Solaris should have been given much more critical acclaim. Over the past couple of days I have started to think how the movie I watched on Sunday meshed with some of my thoughts about the Texas game on Saturday. Some of you have already jumped ahead and made a connection being an aging assassin who has stayed in the game too long with Greg Davis and Mack McWhorter and I will admit that thought did cross my mind.

Instead, it was "What took so damn long?" In the movie Clooney is hired to make a weapon for the person that is going to be his replacement and intended killer. For much of the movie we see Clooney do push-ups and sit-ups, walk around the town, talk-eat-drink with an old priest who has a bastard son, drink coffee, screw and fall in love with an Italian whore, and work on the weapon. You can tell the guy isn't easy with his situation and has a feeling something bad is going to happen. Odds are I missed the true meaning of the movie and I have thought that maybe it is just a bad adaption of the book. Either way I still kept thinking during the movie and still now why the heck did Clooney waste so much time working on the weapon. Stop with the coffee while reading Italian papers, talking to a lecherous old priest who you aren't going to confess to, build the weapon, and go somewhere safe. Unless of course he was lost in what and where he should go and what to do with the rest of his life.

Watching the Texas and then the TCU game I told my son that the biggest difference between the two offenses was not only that TCU had a very solid offensive line, but that all the pieces seemed to fit in the TCU offense. I am not saying TCU is the better team, they could beat Texas, or trying to build an argument for TCU being a contender for the BCS Title. Simply that watching the Horns and then the Frogs I saw an offense in TCU that was more explosive, could control the line of scrimmage, and appeared to have players that fit a specific offensive scheme.

The internet knee-jerk reaction is to blame Greg Davis but to me this is much more perplexing. If you asked someone to name Mack's biggest strengths, recruiting is a common answer. The biggest knock on Mack and Davis early on was the failure to use the talent on the roster. As a position coach and offensive co-ordinator Mack has been around some great offensive talent and yet the offense I saw start the game versus Rice was not loaded with great talent. Some will counter with recruiting list and position ranks, but let's do a little exercise and compare the starting offensive 11 for the first game in 2006 with the starting 11 for the first game in 2010 and you tell me which group has more talent.

In their 2006 opener versus UNT, Texas started an offensive line of Hills-Studdard-Sendlein-Dockery-Blaylock,Tweedie at tightend, receivers of Pittman-Sweed-Cosby,a backfield of McCoy-Young, and had offensive BACK-UPS that included Webb at tackle-Griffin at center-Shipley at receiver-Charles at running back.

In the 2010 opener versus Rice, Texas started an offensive line of Hix-Huey-Snow-Walters-Mitchell, Matthews at tight end, receivers of Chiles-Kirkendoll-Goodwin, and a backfield of Gilbert and Johnson. Looking at those two groups I don't see one player in the 2010 offensive line that starts in place of his 2006 contemporary, the 2006 had two starting receivers that made the NFL, a back-up tight end starting in the NFL, and three running backs that have at least made an NFL roster.

In the movie I kept asking how a guy who could be so good at his craft lose some basic skills so quickly and why did he have no sense of urgency to get out of the situation he found himself. The same with Mack. Here is a coach whose calling card for years was recruiting and yet for five consecutive years on the offensive side of the ball was disjointed and bordered on a lost half-decade.

Sound harsh? Go back and look at the Texas classes on the offensive side of the ball between 2004-2008. I understand you will always lose a few kids to grades, homesickness, injury, and such but see if you can find any real rhyme nor reason to the players signed. Tell me which area Texas really did a great job identifying great talent that fit into the Texas offense the Horns ran between 2006-2009.

Offensive Line
2004- Cedric Dockery
Greg Dolan
Adam Ulatoski
2005- Chris Hall
Charlie Tanner
2006- Buck Burnette
Steve Moore
Roy Watts
Jamarcus Webb
2007-Trey Allen
Michael Huey
Kyle Hix
Aundrae McGaskey
2008-Mark Buchanan
Luke Poehlman
David Snow

Tight End
2004-Peter Ullman
2005-Jermichael Finley
Britt Mitchell
Greg Smith
2007-Ian Harris
Ahmard Howard
Blaine Irby

Wide Receiver
2004-Myron Hardy
Nate Jones
Chris Ogbonnaya
Jordan Shipley
2006-Josh Marshall
Phillip Payne
Montre Webber
2007-Brandon Collins
James Kirkendoll
Malcolm Williams
2008-DJ Grant
Dan Buckner

Athletes
2004-Ramoce Taylor
2005-Quan Cosby
Henry Melton
2007-John Chiles
2008-Antoine Hicks
Brock Fitzhenry
DeSean Hales

Running Back
2005-Michael Houston
Jerrel Wilkerson
Jamaal Charles
2006-Antwan Cobb
Vondrell McGee
2007-Cody Johnson
Foswhitt Whttaker
2008-Jeremy Hills
Tre Newton
Ryan Roberson

Quarterback
2005-Colt McCoy
2006-Sherrod Harris
Jevan Snead
2007 GJ Kinne

Looking at that list I am actually impressed with the fact Texas has scored the points they have and won the games they did in 2008 and 2009. I realize many of those guys are great guys. How does a head coach who is known for his recruiting prowess and has coached on the offensive side of the ball allowed things to go through a five-year stretch where there seemed to be no real common denominator?

What I am saying is nothing new--it isn't profound or original. Texas is trying to find its offensive identity and I expect more games like Rice over the course of this year. Davis and the offensive staff are trying to fit older pieces that don't really fit with younger players that have no experience in the offense Mack wants this team to run. For the first time in a very long time Davis has been told to make the players fit a system instead of fitting a system to the players. Changes have been made in the type of players recruited and it can been seen in the 2009 class and the commits for 2010. It won't be pretty and there are going to be some bumps, but I do believe things are headed in a much better direction on the offensive side of the ball.

My only question: "What took so damn long?"

Tweet Comment 17 comments | 0 recs |

Do you like this story?

Comments

My only question, "What took so damn long?"

Mack/Davis, for all their abilities, require a driving force, a direction, or focus if you will to advance their program. Think of all the years, and all the talent that combo has seen, and yet it took a transcendent player for them to create an identity and finally win a conference title and legitimately compete at the national level.

To be fair, Ricky provided them with the same focus offensively, but the program wasn’t ready from an overall talent standpoint. For 2.5 years starting in 2003 with the KSU game in Austin, our identity was a known quantity with the advent of VY, and the transition to a ZR based offense in ‘04 further narrowed that focus. Then we stumbled around for two years before Blaine Irby’s injury revealed that we had the pieces in place to run a short passing offense with a quality QB, 2 NFL receivers, and a NFL roster quality 3rd down back. Two pieces graduated and we stumbled around for much of ’09.

Now, as the transition to Boom is underway, the focus for the kind of offense he wants to run is driving our recruiting, and the things we’re attempting to do on offense. We’re in for two interesting transition years, but at least there is a direction again for what we want to do.

by Bobby_Batronic on Sep 13, 2010 1:00 PM CDT reply actions

I posit that Texas’ offensive success the past few years had lulled Brown and Davis into a false sense of confidence about what they were doing on that side of the ball. Last years’ near misses and MNC game served as the wake up call. This year perhaps we pay the piper.

by Dumeril Seven on Sep 13, 2010 1:02 PM CDT reply actions

Holy crap the 2006 receiving class sure worked out well.

by milksteak on Sep 13, 2010 1:05 PM CDT reply actions

I’m all for doing whatever it takes to fix this thing, but hiring George Clooney to assassinate Davis and McWhorter might be crossing the line.

by Asthma Field on Sep 13, 2010 1:11 PM CDT reply actions

Don’t discount the effect Mack’s fear of the APR (the graduation thing, forget the acronymn) on his philosophy of “take good kids who graduate” during those years. After he won a ring, he got loess white knuckled about out talenting the opposition and let the academic side of the equation ease back into it. That’s still going on today, though to a lesser extent. Anyway, I believe this is a significant, though not the driving factor in some of the misses those years. Now that doesn’t explain guys like Webb and Watts but it does explain some of the others. It’s been said a lot that today’s Mack would never recruit Vince Young. That’s BS but there is an element of truth in the idea.

by Whoever on Sep 13, 2010 1:19 PM CDT reply actions

Good analogy. A lot of it is I think they did not know the identity they wanted to make so took a hodge podge of guys and tried to be too multiple. When you try to be everything, you end up coming short on everything. You just can’t be good at spreading it out, powering it in, ball control short passing game, and deep threat team. They took too many specifc role player guys (big TE, little TE, big back, scat back, big receiver, little receiver, H-back, athlete, etc) instead of being more system oriented.

by fear_the_cow on Sep 13, 2010 2:38 PM CDT reply actions

The American was as boring and predictable as Greg Davis’s offense. That laughing sound you hear is coming from Norman and Lincoln while they watch film

by ransomstoddard on Sep 13, 2010 3:29 PM CDT reply actions

The other laughing sound is Muschamp laughing right back at Nebraska.

by kevwun on Sep 13, 2010 3:45 PM CDT reply actions

Bobby-I think you did a great job hitting the nail on the head. The offense has been driven by the persona of the lead cow so to speak be it Ricky, VY, or Colt. After last year Mack issued the edict to never let that happen again, but they don’t have the pieces to run one specific offensive scheme. The portion of the offense that has the biggest upside is the passing game with the athletic ability of Williams, Goodwin, Davis, and White plus the anticipated growth of Gilbert. Unfortunately that means more responsibility on Garret and a couple of young receivers which means mistakes, I don’t think they are confident in the pass block abilities of the tackles with limited options, and if Gilbert goes down get ready to flush the season.

I will say that Mack is wiling to change things and that can be seen in him allowing Will to have a say in the talent been brought on campus in the recent classes. Mack the control freak of the early 2000’s would have never allowed this to happen.

milksteak – want a real sobering thought? Imagine the receiving corp in 2008-2009 if Quan could have hit a curve ball and Jordan had only one knee surgery? Good think the track coach and Christian Scott are better at recruiting wide receivers than the position coach.

Good idea not to try to actually woo Stonum.

Asthama – true but it might be more humane than if Will goes Buddy Ryan in a staff meeting.

Whoever -understand, but the most troubling aspect there is not the players not offered, but if that is such a big deal to Mack why does the football team continue to lose kids for stupid academic compliance reasons.

Fear- The is a monolouge by Charlie Sheen in Platoon where he says his character is a child born of two fathers, Elias and Barnes. I have always thought that the Texas offense is a byproduct of two co-ordinators Mack and Davis. Wouldn’t be such a bad idea if they both agreed on a base offense.

ransom- I thought that i might want to ge the book and see if it was just a bad screen play or if some key detail was left out, but the last time I did that I ended up watching a movie I didn’t like and then read a book I hated more.

by Davey O'Brien on Sep 13, 2010 4:07 PM CDT reply actions

Great observation on Mack and Greg. It is clear that Mack has been trying to make us a power running team, while Greg operates and perform best coachign a spread. Mack trys to do both, and has compromised by giving Greg the QBs and recievers he wants, while taking control of the RB recruiting.

McWorter is caught being pulled from both sides. Major has his RB opinions overriden. I think the offensive troubles we have had over the years (not many, but frustrating and preventable when they do occur) may be as a result of having a HC who was an OC. He can’t keep from meddling.

by fear_the_cow on Sep 13, 2010 6:14 PM CDT reply actions

I will add on offense we don’t have good competition on an apples to apples basis. We have these hodge podge role players all competing for a spot on the field with vastly differnet skill sets. So they don’t push each other as hard. At RB we have a big, a scat, and a third down back. They all specialise in one thing and do not directly push each other as their is a role for each.

by fear_the_cow on Sep 13, 2010 6:17 PM CDT reply actions

Like yer name. Seriously, the movie wasn’t all that it was cracked up to be. I prefer independent cinema. Good write-up.

by Goliath on Sep 13, 2010 6:23 PM CDT reply actions

Most of what comes out of Hollywood is boring. That is why I watch the Longhorns. Hook ’em!

by LonghornMike on Sep 13, 2010 6:47 PM CDT reply actions

Why is it that other teams can run plays in which their linemen are in positions to block defenders at the point of attack? Even teams with no All-America players?

by Dave on Sep 13, 2010 10:59 PM CDT reply actions

The title and picture for this post led me to believe it was headed in an entirely different direction.

by UT-06 on Sep 15, 2010 10:27 AM CDT reply actions

What took so damn long? Expect less…pay more!!

by Mind artistry on Sep 15, 2010 6:08 PM CDT reply actions

fear,

I agree completely on both points. Especially the lack of competition on the offensive of the ball. One can hope that the play of Mike Davis last week causes a light to go on in the head of some senior receivers who understand that they either step it up or step off the field. Unfortunately there won’t be true competition in the offensive line until next year.

by Davey O'Brien on Sep 16, 2010 7:12 AM CDT reply actions