Texas-Baylor Football Post-Mortem: Offense/Special Teams

So is that the story about why Ash was announced as coming in, but didnt? Brown overruled Harsin?

Here’s hoping that Ash can regain confidence, Brown and Bergeron can get healthy, Shipley can get healthy, and we can roll the western Bears down in San Diego.

It may be sobering to you, but I just want to get drunk.

GM Platter -
 
That’s what I hear. But what’s important for me is the reason for the overrule. I’m more interested in the why over the what.
 
uthookem -
 
You said it. However, I’m not so sure Case McCoy isn’t our starter in San Diego.
 
lurker -
 
I’m running a tab. Jump on.

Thanks for the post-mortems.

I love this feature.

Well done although there isn’t much more there than can be or hasn’t been repeated many times save for the jolt to the "Case is just like Colt and has that danged old “it” factor" mavens. One can only hope the reason Mack refused to replace Case late isn’t that he is one of said mavens but I actually have serious doubts. Hell, who knows what is swimmimg around in his muddled noggin at ths point. To wit, I still have the halftime interview ringing in my ears where he was asked how we intended to do fix the repeated OL penalties and to slow down their big plays on offense and his response was to break out into something resembling Doris Day’s “Que Sera, Sera” and/or Gordon McCrea’s “Oh What a Beautiful Morning”. Truth is, it’s the only thing he could think of because he had no answer to the actual question asked. Talk about sobering.

If everyone can agree that the QB position is an abject failure why do we not look anywhere and everywhere for some sort of immediate help for 2012?

I mean, we are doing it for left tackle. Someone please tell me the staff is going to try to address this issue with something other than an additional freshman.

This one read like a 2010 post mortem. Regression well beyond the mean, imo.

Put another way, of the guys we rolled out in Waco, only Shipley would grab a starting job for Baylor, and he’d be Baylor’s #3 WR. And Baylor’s back up QB Florence is better than anyone on our roster. Puts it in perspective, doesn’t it?

I’d rather visit beowulf’s roadside proctology clinic than ponder this thought.

At least we beat the Aggies.

Dayne Crist?

Can they make that happen?

Mack Brown post-game comment:
“The passing game grew up tonight.”

I find this comment scary. I guess if you ignore the four interceptions and the fact that the two long pass plays were more because of horrible Baylor defense than our passing game you could see this as playing at a new level.

Case may be our next Blake Gideon.

newy,

Because there is about a 15% chance that a JUCO guy like Mossakowski, assuming he’ll even come here, will be more effective than David Ash after a full year in the system or incoming guys like Overstreet or Brewer. I have no doubt an incoming JUCO could beat out McCoy, but so could The General.

And there’s the reality that Mack has never even sniffed a JUCO QB.

I don’t think that’s the only time this yearbthat Mack took the reins from HarsinWhite. I had -and still have some – hope that they would find a way to stop this… I don’t see real change unless it stops. Sad.

" If there’s a silver lining here, it’s that the McCoy mythology was exposed for what it is – a projection by goofy fans (and coaches) who believe QBing is purely hereditary and who won’t see what’s in plain sight."
THIS
Could the reason Ash didn’t go in be that he didn’t know the plays? Now I know how Kansas, Baylor, etc felt all those years when their best player couldn’t start for us & our “C” effort kicked their ass.
$100,000 a week should buy more than this but that’s how the score is kept by Dodds.

“Why are his passes released like a Dirk Nowitski fade away?” – Thank you. Its absolutely a fade away, calling it throwing from the back foot doesn’t even begin to describe how bad the motion is. Now back to reading.

All the penalties , the slow start indicate to me that the team left their heart in San Francisco I mean College Station.

I’m beyond thankful that this is the second to last O/ST Post-Mortem for 2011.

Fingers crossed that B&B are healthy for the Bowl game. The Ash v. McCoy snap allocation will be, as always, beyond interesting.

Scip,

How much stock do you put in what you heard about the decision to put Case back in? Good source? Have any doubts as to veracity? I.E. Please tell me it might not be true! If I am forced to face the reality that Mack thought it was a good idea to put Case back in the game rather than Ash – and it’s not because Ash had a shitty week of practice or some other rational explanation – or (even worse) that he did it despite his better judgement just to show the Case McCoy fan club how delusional they were, that might be the final crack in my hard candy faith in Mack shell. Good thing it’s cold outside.

I too would love to know the reason for the overrule regarding McCoy. Is Ash really that mentally devastated? Ash’s appearances for only a single play at a time aren’t very effective. It’s not a huge surprise to the other team that he’s gonna run. He’s not really in there for any other reason so it didn’t seem to throw Baylor off at all.

What are the chances of B+B+S all being healthy for the bowl?

Thanks so much for these posts. It’s so great for us Horns far away from home.

Great write up as always Scip. I think “Gideii” is my new favorite word. It’s going to be challenging , but I WILL drop that in a conversation somehow.

WTF do you want Mack to say during the interviews? What exactly does he have to gain by being honest about the sorry state of the offense?

I hope Scipio is correct, and Mack’s decision to keep Ash on the sidelines had more to do with driving a Whaley-ian sized stake through the heart of the Case is the answer cult. I also wonder if they don’t want to run the kid out there and further damage his confidence.

It’ll be damn interesting to see how the snaps work out in San Diego.

I thought Harsin’s play calls in certain instances did us no favors. Right before pick 6, or pick to the 2, I was thinking – you have the lead, just sit on it here and take it to the locker room. That would be the smart, safe play if your QB sucks. But Harsin does not seem to obey the old coaching maxims, like play conservative when your QB sucks. I also don’t understand why we EVER run a fade when we have no receiver who can out jump ball anyone and a QB who sucks. Fades require a strong handed tall guy who can muscle for position and a QB who doesn’t suck.

If you’re not going to stay downtown, I prefer the Dana in Mission Bay, but make sure you ask for the new rooms, the old ones suck pretty hard. Nice pool, decent restaurants, right across the street from Sea World.

We need to sign about 3 quarterbacks this year.

PS Gideon is on the cover of Smart Football, and not in a good way either.

Scipio:

Relapse! Or prolapse, depending on perspective.

Thanks for the yeoman’s effort on these reports for a second straight year. They are an entertaining and informative read – and I’m certain a lot less enjoyable to develop these days.

Looking forward to your work on the Cal game.

We had as many offensive holding calls in this game as we did in the other 11 games combined. Probably just Baylor’s dynamic front giving us problems.

Our QB play,mostly, and the inability of our RBs to punish Baylor, a little bit, screwed us in this game.

Fumble #1: botched shotgun snap. Either Espi was too soon or Case wasn’t paying attention. Case also missed the ball trying to recover it.
Int #1: QB misread. Should have thrown to Shipley running the intermediate route.
Int #2: underthrown. Mike D has 3 steps on the defense.
Int #3: overthrown. Shipley over the middle. Tight window.
Int #4: QB misread. Fade into endzone. Safety was running to the corner before the snap.

Thanks for slogging through this one to bring us the Post-Mortem. The Plague of Turnovers and surfeit of Baptists gave this one an Old-Testament feel that I think ‘Gideii’ complemented quite nicely.

Bay Club Marina and Hotel on Shelter Island. They have a bar, free breakfast, and nice marina views. Very convenient to downtown and the airport, and very reasonable prices.

I was thinking the same thing about Harsin trying to keep Gilbert in the game. In retrospect, hoping that his head would clear was probably the best bet for the offense. I can’t help thinking that if Gilbert had taken a few weeks off, hit the reset button, and then come back as an eager to learn 3rd string QB, we might have had some options. I’m not writing off Ash, because running the offense through a true freshman and asking him to throw to our receivers with no running game would break anyone’s spirit. But I’d bet that Gilbert would have been back in and making plays by Missouri.

What I find particularly disturbing is that we can hang our hat on some imrpovement to 7-5 over 5-7 last year. In reality though we really should have been 5-7 again this year. A&M outplayed us and our offense was so horrible we didn’t deserve to win. BYU was the other game we really got lucky to win. Conversely there are no games we lost that you can honestly feel like we should have won. KSU would be the closest but even there we were really outplayed.

We realistically should be looking at back to back 5-7 seasons and I wonder how different the outlook would be be that had been the case (no pun) with a 4 game losing streak to finish.

Third possibility: Bringing Ash in would’ve produced a negligible possibility of pulling the game out against some likelihood of further undermining his sagging confidence.

With QB play the largest factor in our poor performance two seasons running, you’d think someone would be working with those guys on footwork, reads, throwing mechanics and the other fine points of the game. Not Gilbert, not McCoy and Not Ash showed any sign of progress in the basic techniques of the position, and Wood didn’t merit a chance. What gives? I don’t know who all has a hand in our QB development, but it is not only not working, it seems to be wrecking promising young players.

I was hoping Brown’s hype to McCoy during Aggie about having his QB-arrival moment was just ego-boosting. But it looks instead like he believed his own BS. A salary of five really big ones a year is meant to insure you don’t trip over problems, much less repeatedly trip over basic coaching issues. I’m guessing once the next herd is in the corral, Mack is out the door, especially because he seems to have done nothing to insure this problem will not continue to bite us next season.

I confess I was one who conjured up images of Major Applewhite when defending Case. I still think they both had about the same arm strength, but Major possessed many other qualities that Case doesn’t. And at the time he did look better than Ash based on results.

Now it looks like we really have nothing. Maybe Ash can get his mind untangled during bowl/spring/fall practice. That’s the best case scenario right now.

There seems to still be a lot of mental poison in the program. Penalties, turnovers, execution… I still think this team if it had a healthy work ethic and confidence could have won 9 games. They seem to find ways to lose.

And yes I do recognize injuries played a significant factor in that this year.

Vasherized-

I did not specifically mention JUCO but certainly look there. The Notre Dame QB transfer candidate is infinitely better than McCoy even though he is far from perfect. Even though I do not have the exhaustive list of players in front of me I just hoped that maybe someone on our staff recognizes the need to try and look somewhere for a stop gap until Ash or Brewer are ready to lead the offense.

Put it another way. You are running a business and there is a critical flaw with one of your departments. What do you do? Wait 1-2 more years and hope it gets fixed organically?

Of course not. But I fear that is the path we have chosen and I fear that will cost Mack and the entire offensive staff their jobs at the end of the 2012 season.

Nunna Yo,

According to Sagarin, last year we had the 47th toughest schedule. We went 5-7 and were pretty health from what I remember. This year, accoridng to Sagarin, we played the 4th toughest schedule and improved to 7-5. This with significant injures to our 4 best offensive skill position players. So I think it’s safe to say that this team is much better. Still not where we expect to be at Texas, but much better nonetheless. Lots of reasons to be encouraged.

“A ridiculous number of holding and procedure calls, some of them spurious. I guess Grant Teaff was retiring again?” I was at that game, and Saturday’s, and I did have flashbacks, although the Teaff thing was the worst I have even seen.

22 third downs meant 22 snippets of “Black Betty” spewing from the scoreboard speakers in Waco. Still not over it.

I’m not sure about the Ash was going in, but Mack overruled it thing. Ash warmed up a lot on the sidelines during the game, which makes sense given they had at least one pass in the game plan for him. Gotta be ready for your turn in the spotlight?

As for that last pick, I am no fan of the 4th down fade. And as a previous poster noted, Baylor was camped waiting for it.

The QB situation is a huge black cloud over an otherwise brightening future right now.

They haven’t needed a game as badly as they need the Cal game since Arizona State.

“The fool’s gold of 11 of 17 for 237 yards and 3 TD start (basically two throws of 78 and 80 to Shipley and Goodwin and then some dinking) on easy throws morphed into a 11 of 22 for 119 yard and four interception denouement as Baylor contested the early window with their corners and stood two 4.7 40 Blake Gideii 15 yards from the LOS and told them to grab whatever fluttering duck plummeted to earth nearby.”

PURE GOLD. Frame it and send to ebay.

The reason Ash didn’t go in after Pick 3 was that Ash wasn’t warmed up.

Monahorns -

I think your memory is shorting The Major quite a bit on arm strength. He wasn’t firing frozen ropes on 15-yard outs by any means, but he could drop in a bomb to McGarity or Cavil that traveled more than 35 yards in the air without it looking like the ball had been blasted with a .410 at the apex of its flight. Of course if Major’s throwing motion had combined a freshman-year Vince Young wrist-flick with the aforementioned Nowitzki fadeaway then his results might have been similar.

You may also be short-changing a lot of the kids in the program with respect to work ethic and the like. It’s just really hard to overstate how devastating the deluge of injuries was to our ability to do anything of substance on offense. I don’t think there was any quit or lack of fire in anyone – I think some slothful holdovers started the season but got ushered aside (a la Tray Allen) or just never saw the field (what up, Darius?). We were hurt in a lot of spots by youth and a lack of functional physical development that certainly had its roots in our past malaise, but I think the guys who saw the field were, pretty much down to a man, on board with doing things the right way under the new regime.

Last year we were loaded with under-utilized talent that were doomed by poor coaching. This year we are loaded with super duper coaches that are doomed by piss poor talent. I feel like I have been to beowulf’’s proctology clinic every game this year.

did we really have under-utilized talent last year? what is this talent that you speak of?

Many thanks for slogging through these game summaries, Scipio. They are the best thing about these losing games, imo.

QB is a huge problem. Mack really thinks that Case took a big step forward vs Baylor. Case is now the man at QB. Case is a very slow learner who is physically lacking. His main asset is an unshakable confidence in himself. Ash has been psychologically damaged this year; let’s hope the damage is reparable. The horns have to look for transfer QBs. Maybe they find one, maybe they don’t, but due diligence demands that they try.

Mack said he decides tempo. For example, Mack made the decision to go for it on offense at the end of the 1st half. The horns would do much better if Mack had no realtime responsibilities.

Bold-faced emphasis mine. I think Mack cares quite a bit about what his players think because he wants no repeat of last year’s internal divisions, this time on the QB position.

I think he cares, albeit to a lesser extent, what people like Brad McCoy think.

About what we think, game by game, he surely cares very little. Fans are a fickle breed and not, by and large, very well informed. If Mack wins, we’ll think well of him and the program — that’s all there is to it.

As for the canard that Ash is psychologically damaged, I put not much faith in it. Reminds me of the similar canard that he’s the “running QB,” because Case is the superior passer, which was echoed all year by witless commentators with similarly little foundation.

I think Ash is a true freshman busy adjusting. Call it damage if you like; I call it progress.

“I thought Harsin’s play calls in certain instances did us no favors. Right before pick 6, or pick to the 2, I was thinking – you have the lead, just sit on it here and take it to the locker room. That would be the smart, safe play if your QB sucks. But Harsin does not seem to obey the old coaching maxims, like play conservative when your QB sucks.”

Do you really think Harsin is calling pass plays there if Mack doesn’t want him to? A decision was made to not sit on the ball for that possession, and it came from Mack Brown. Much like his desire for GD to call something “safe that could break” when GG had his Utah pass intercepted in the MNC, Mack wanted to be aggressive here. That he’s more than a touch deaf to the game doesn’t matter. He won’t admit it, and apparently there is no one on the staff who has the street cred to lay the truth on him.

I also grow quite tired of Big XII officiating crews trying to influence games. Be a stickler, or let them play, but be equitable.

So, many of you want to find a JUCO QB with a current So, Fr, and 2 incoming Freshman. How do you expect to accomplish keeping all the kids happy?

General comments:
 
- I thought our effort was pretty good all year. We’re a lot of misplaced parts, recruited by a staff without a plan. And a glaring hole at QB at the college level isn’t surmountable.
 
- This team (with healthy players) would beat last year’s team by two touchdowns. We improved. We were a much better coached team overall.
 
- A good QB covers up a multitude of sins in the right system. The Indy Colts agree with me.
 
- Kafka, that’s a great point about Case’s best attribute. He has absolute confidence in himself and that’s an important attribute in a QB. The downside is that it’s not grounded in realism.
 
- JUCO QB ain’t gonna happen unless there’s a Josh Heupel or Aaron Rodgers out there I’m not aware of. I do like the idea of exploring Dayne Crist. He’s thoroughly average and 4-6 as a starter, but thoroughly average is all we need to get 9-10 wins.
 
- If Mack made a call on the QB, the why is far more important than the fact that he did it.
 
- I don’t think Ash is unsalvageable at all. He should be priority #1 in the offseason.

java –
 
Why would we remotely care if all of our kids are happy? Maybe we should concern ourselves a bit less with player happiness and a little more with player competition.

I don’t want a JUCO QB, but it doesn’t impact Brewer much and if Ash and McCoy feel their QBing warrants full confidence and want to be affronted, they’re welcome to hit the road.

LLJ, I agree. Progress, re Ash.

Louis L’am Jones said:

“As for the canard that Ash is psychologically damaged, I put not much faith in it.”
“I think Ash is a true freshman busy adjusting. Call it damage if you like; I call it progress.”

You don’t think that Ash at this point is shell shocked and that his confidence has been shaken? If you put a guy in over his head, it can easily traumatize him. That is what has happened with Ash. It would have been much better to redshirt him this year.

“Reminds me of the similar canard that he’s the "running QB," because Case is the superior passer, which was echoed all year by witless commentators with similarly little foundation.”

Actually Ash seemed to do fine as part of the package that focused on running and passed only on play action passes. He is clearly a much better runner than Case. As far as passing goes, Ash has a good arm but really isn’t up to reading defenses yet and has thrown 8 picks in 84 passes.

I agree about McCoy; however, bringing in 3 QB’s at one time seems like a tall order – unless the older one was familiar with Harsin’s system. Two bad Moore doesn’t have another year of eligibility.

If we did bring in another QB, we could field an offense composed strictly of TE’s and QB’s. That would be unique, at any rate.

Overstreet really isn’t a QB. He’s a depth stop gap in his early career who may end up a LB, RB, S, general baller.
 
I do like the TE/QB offense. Just a series of Frank Wychek laterals on every play.

“I confess I was one who conjured up images of Major Applewhite when defending Case. I still think they both had about the same arm strength”

Standing next to Case, Major looks like a Greek god with a laser for a right arm.

“I don’t think Ash is unsalvageable at all. He should be priority #1 in the offseason.”

I certainly haven’t given up on Ash but it seems like it may take a while (a couple of years, for example) before he is ready to be the man. He is really raw. There is a reason that Harsin was bringing Ash along so slowly before the OU game. The Case fiasco in the OU game caused Ash to be prematurely elevated to be the fulltime QB before he was ready.

Everything that Mack and Harsin have said and done recently leads me to believe that Case will get the bulk of the snaps vs Cal.

That was a Mack Brown decision and either it stemmed from a desire to prove to fans (and players and parents) that McCoy isn’t the answer and allow the appropriate reshuffling of our QB hopes

Hmm, Mack as secret Machiavellian?

Overstreet does appear to be a highly skilled athlete that could be groomed for numerous positions. Didn’t Royal frequently play QB’s at safety or cornerback for a year or two, before he moved them to QB?

I thought you might like the TE/QB offense. Hey, we’re Texas!

Scipio – You were asked by another poster above about the basis for your statement that Harsin was overruled by MB concerning Ash getting PT. Please elaborate.

torre -
 
I didn’t make that statement. I just heard it, like the rest of you.
 
It makes sense given that the sideline reporter mentioned Ash was going in, then wasn’t.

Let’s face it.

Mack has hung his c*ck out in the wind long enough.

Ash was serviceable with a healthy running game. I have no qualms with giving him time to develop when MB, Joe B, and J Grey have his back. Ship will only help the cause next year and Goodwin will have an entire off season to improve, unlike this last year.

As long as the football gods don’t shit on us w/ injury bugs, we’ll be back to 10 wins.

“That was a Mack Brown decision and either it stemmed from a desire to prove to fans (and players and parents) that McCoy isn’t the answer and allow the appropriate reshuffling of our QB hopes or it was motivated by some irrational sentimentality that McCoy might work some A&M magic. "

Yaahhhh, I’m gonna go with door number 2.

Was ash or our QB play serviceable with a healthy running game? He was bludgeoned against OU, threw two picks against Okie State (fozzy returned a kick for a td), did nothing against KSU and did nothing against A&M with brown getting 17 carries. Teams figured out that they can stack the box and don’t have to worry about any of our QB’s or WR except ship. Goodwin will be training for the Olympics in the offseason.

Ash might help the program in the long run, but we better talk to Crist about competing for the job at Texas next year. Did you see either of our QB’s make these throws this past year?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hf-Yob-v2l8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9M2UBEBcOnw&feature=related

Look up Ash’s stats, Not that great. We threw 7 times against Tech. Yes, Crist had an unfortunate fumble against USC but Kelly put him in the game and he went a quick 4 of 5 to lead ND to the USC one in a tight game. The kid can sling it and by all accounts is a good kid who has battled injuries his whole career. He would lead us to 10 wins with Ash backing him up.

I think he cares, albeit to a lesser extent, what people like Brad McCoy think.

I wouldn’t be surprised if dear old dad blames his baby boy’s poor performance on the coaches & the other players.

UT07 said:
“Ash was serviceable with a healthy running game. I have no qualms with giving him time to develop when MB, Joe B, and J Grey have his back. Ship will only help the cause next year and Goodwin will have an entire off season to improve, unlike this last year.

As long as the football gods don’t shit on us w/ injury bugs, we’ll be back to 10 wins."

Ash was OK with a healthy running game vs weak defenses. He was and is not ready to be the starting QB vs a good defense. I’m a big fan of Ash but realize that he has to mature and improve a lot to be the starter. He has a long way to go in 9 months. There is no shame in not being ready to start at QB when you are a true frosh or soph. There is a reason most starters at QB are juniors or seniors. QB is a very complicated position and can take years to master.

There seems to be a general assumption that all the problems with the Texas running game were due to TB injuries. Even if Texas TBs had stayed healthy, the Texas OL would still have been challenged to block adequately vs a good DL. The Texas OL will be better next year but will it be elite?

Getting back to 10 wins would be an improvement but is not a great accomplishment. A more worthy goal would be to win the Big 12. Texas has been way down in the Big 12 for two years (under .500 for two straight years), it is time to at least compete for a conference championship.

The reality is that both Ash and Case are well less than average QBs at this point and that it would be a good idea for Texas to pick up (if possible) an upper classman transfer QB who is at least an average quality div 1 QB. This will buy time for the younger Texas QBs to learn how to play QB in the Big 12 and get Texas out of the vicious cycle of playing QBs before they are ready (and damaging them in the process).

Me too, Joe.

Well said, Kafka.

Seems this year’s super-duper JuCo QB is interested in The University. He’s 6’5" and 220, plays on same team with Brandon Moore (DT), and apparently said “absolutely” when asked if he’d like to hear from Texas. Could enroll in spring. Kemo Sabe?

We should be making every effort to recruit Crist and to a lesser extent that QB from Oregon State, if he’s still on the table. There have been no rumors of anything happening with these guys, and I doubt anything does unless one of them decides to wait till January to make a decision (which won’t happen).

Mack cares in some aspect as to what the fan thinks, but only in a dismissive, “I hate putting up with you assholes” kind of way. I really doubt he feels the need to prove anything to the fanbase, especially regarding a topic as sensitive as the QB position.

Also, Mack believed that benching GG in 2010, regardless of how bad he was playing, because that would “hurt GG’s confidence.” He didn’t understand that he was doing precisely what he was attempting to avoid.

These two things, coupled with the glowing comments about Case’s play all point to Mack actually, truly believing that Case can be the answer at QB. If this is true, and Mack hitches our wagon to Case in 2012, this will being the final nail in his coffin.

“These two things, coupled with the glowing comments about Case’s play all point to Mack actually, truly believing that Case can be the answer at QB. If this is true, and Mack hitches our wagon to Case in 2012, this will being the final nail in his coffin.”

Oh, I fully believe it’s true. He has talked himself out of the quandry he was in (as per the Big Cigar) over having the energy to bring the program back without a quality QB by mentally re-inventing Case as the second coming of his brother.

“What a great football game, Sam! Texas-21, Baylor 24!” Heaven help us.

If Mack truly believes Case is going to be his QB long term then it will be the validation of my belief that Mack has been following in the footsteps of Phil Fulmer and Bobby Bowden.

Both of them diddled until their programs dramatically fell off. At that point they were forced into a corner and made changes to the coaching staff they should have made years earlier. The coacing changes were too late as the programs never could get their offenses in back to consistent productivity, and they were particularly plagued year in and year out by bad QB play.

It amazes me how people fail to learn from history. How can he not see himself going down the same path. Having gone this far down that path he should see that he’s got to turn the offense around quickly to change were this goes. Leaving no stone unturned for a QB (including looking at transfers and JUCOs) should be something he sees as a priority.

i don’t think Mack’s halftime interviews are any kind of window into his soul. He’s recruiting kids and parents when he’s on camera there. With our QBs, there’s not much you can say . . . anything positive makes you sound like Baghdad Bob as U.S. troops are bearing down. However, Mack seems to prefer that to any other option

A funny thought about our QB situation . . . I live east of the Mississippi River and have been looking forward to the Ole Miss game in Oxford next fall. After Garrett Gilbert led the second half comeback against Alabama, I got a little bummed doing the QB math. I figured Gilbert would declare for the draft at the end of 2011 and Texas would be breaking in a new QB against the Rebels. . . . Well, I was half right . . . Gilbert won’t be there.

Mack proves again there is no better way to entrench yourself in the QB position than to throw multiple interceptions. (See GG v KSU)

Bill Parcells claims an offense should score a TD for every 100 yards of offense. We should have hung 35 to 38 points on Baylor according to Bill. Still not enough with the turnovers and dumbass penalties taking away over 100 yards.

In fairness to Mack, all he has to choose from is Case or Ash.

Also, in fairness to Mack, he got his ass in this mess.

If Mack truly believes Case is going to be his QB long term then it will be the validation of my belief that Mack has been following in the footsteps of Phil Fulmer and Bobby Bowden.

Yes. Yes. And YES.

If Case McCoy is our starting QB next year, the final won-loss record is nothing but window dressing on the question it will definitively answer: Mack is DONE.

When the TV cameras Saturday showed Ash gathering the offense to go out and then McCoy trotted back out there, I clung to the hope that it was to shut up the Case apologists. Then TexasNick burst my bubble by offering that Mack probably doesn’t give a rip about making such a statement.

If rolling Case back out there was Mack’s decision alone, my hope that he can let his coaches coach without meddling leaves me less than optimistic. I’ll reserve judgement until next season’s starting quarterback is announced.

Are we trying to win ASAP? Yes. Do whatever is necessary to get proper skill and talent on the field. I love that I went to school at such a prestigious institution, but this is football. If our the education is truly exceptional then no one qualified should be denied a chance to succeed at UT, not even football players. It’s like we have an unwritten rule regarding JUCO transfers. Cut the bullshit and find the best qualifying players, let your coaches coach, and get the fuck out of their way. It’s bad enough during Mack’s tenure we’ve had to see Brees, RG3, and Luck play at other schools and have only been lucky to have Vince (recruited by Brewster) and Colt (black swan). I almost want Mack “retired” effective immediately. He is the reason the program is in disrepair.

Thanks for keeping at this thankless task.

I am less frustrated than I was last year, with different questions.

Last year’s team couldn’t run the ball, the O-line sucked ass, the TEs were awful, the WRs were young and inconsistent (or disappointing), and the QB was shaky. Meanwhile, the defense was really solid, with poor safety play.

This year’s team can sometimes run the ball (although less against the 8-man fronts we faced against decent teams), the O-line got much better until they got super twitchy, the TEs were awful, the WRs were slow, shaky, and inconsistent (and injured), and the QB play was atrocious. Meanwhile, the defense was pretty solid, with poor safety play and completely inability to understand zone concepts, which relates to the safety problem.

So we got better at RB and OL. We regressed or stayed the same at TE and WR. We actually might have gotten significantly worse at QB. The defense was close to a push.

I do not know for sure, but I’m guessing that SOME of the shaky WR and OL play relates to the inconsistency from the QB position. QBs run huddles different, have different cadences, and different levels of understanding with the other guys on the field. I am not making excuses, but if you’re wondering why WRs are not breaking off routes to get open (and some of our route calls were fucking stupid), it may well be that they have no idea where the QB is going to look when he flushes the pocket.

It’s pretty obvious that we need to find a QB that can be average. I know nothing about Brewer, but if he can give us that then great. I do not have any faith in either QB right now. McCoy was never Major — Major threw a pretty nice deep ball and was accurate before Arkansas broke him — McCoy, with the hallmark of a weak-armed QB (which I recognize as one myself), has to skip/hop into any throws that need to go more than 25 yards. This, by the way, contributes to him breaking from clean pockets — he knows that he needs 2 yards of space in front of him so that he can run into a throw and he cannot do that in a clean pocket that is even beginning to collapse.

Ash just doesn’t appear, to me at least, to have the judgment or presence for the position. If he can figure out how to not throw INTs (which he could not do this year) then he might be able to give us average play with his above-average athleticism. But it ain’t easy to coach presence and judgment.

Texas hasn’t done QB development in at least 8 years. The QBs developed themselves. And now we’ve ruined 3 or 4 kids with potential. I still think McCoy can be developed into a successful college-level QB. He sat on the sidelines for a year while GG (who was also poorly developed) floundered, had to compete with someone else who wasn’t any more developed than he was, then tossed into the starting job. What he lacks in skills are partly made up for in leadership, which I did not see in either Ash or Gilbert. Spend some time this spring really developing your QBs, find plays in which they can be successful, and move on. And for @#$(* sake find them some real targets.

Mack isn’t following the footsteps of Bowden and Fulmer. He has already charted down that path for the last four years.

Without an answer at QB Mack’s last year will be 2012 and it will not be on his terms.

1. I’ve never seen a ball under thrown by 20 yards before until Saturday night.
2. Anyone have any word on the personal foul penalties? ABC had its thumb up its ass and we were never shown or given an explanation.
3. How was Baylor never called for holding?
4. How bad is Blake Gideon when the announcers assume he’s injured? I started cracking up thinking, “no, that’s just how he plays.”
5. Why did the officials ignore the upside down Hook ‘Em all evening until the final minute when they finally made an unsportsmanlike conduct call?
6. I still don’t understand how 5 yard passes are so difficult for our QBs. I think McCoy threw two, out passes directly into the ground at the receivers’ feet.
7. I thought it was funny when Jeremy Hills busted out a 20-yard gain in the 1st quarter, got all excited, and then never had more than 4 yards the rest of the night.

This game was as much fun as colonoscopy! I knew when that first long TD pass was in the air that this team was not ready for primetime. The DB’s just seemed slow and out of position defensive line play was sporatic and never really put any pressure on the QB ( who should be the Heisman owner no question). While I would dearly love for Case McCoy to be the next great McCoy it’s not gonna happen he can’t stand still long enough to make the passes he needs to complete. I watched him bail out of the good pocket and run around and make silly uneeded throws and was screaming at my TV stop running and set your feet. When he did set his feet he threw some really good passes, when he self flushed it was pathetic.

I am not sure how it is possible that anyone who watched McCoy struggle to throw the ball more than 15 yards can honestly believe he can ever help us at QB against anyone but a seriously unprepared or untalented team. Harsin requires a QB who can at least threaten a deep ball. Without that then you get what you got against a terrible Baylor defense; a stacked line against the run and DBs sitting in a soft zone and waiting to jump underthrown balls. It is a recipe for disaster that guarantees no running game.

Maybe I’ve missed it somewhere along the way….

…..

…….but what in the hell happened to Malcolm Brown that he suddenly couldn’t go?

I’ve probably missed it somewhere, but would love to know the answer.

Once again the plays that were called after we took the lead helped to give the win to Baylor it was not the time to start throwing each down it was time to soften up the defense. Beat them up a bit, J. Hills was making some good runs as was C. Johnson I thought we should have kept hammering them with off tackle plays and then hit them with some Goodwin or Monroe on the edge. Penalties like they were going out of style, strange play calling and poor QB decisions = DOOM!

Echoing others, I really have to thank Scipio Tex for putting together these analyses throughout the years, and stomaching the rancidness that is our offense for the last 2 seasons.

By my viewing, McCoy made 1 championship-caliber throw all game … the TD pass to Goodwin. The Shipley long play was a trip by a LB away from another pick. And the ensuing Poehlmann TD could have been made by a 6th grader. Irby’s catch was all Irby. Terribly thrown ball on a well executed play … Irby bailed McCoy out. Give Ash the same looks and the same two reads, and I think the results are similar.

On the flip side of that, maybe Ash doesn’t connect on the 2 big plays, but he certainly doesn’t get picked on a 5 yard hitch thrown to the inside shoulder with the corner shading inside in man coverage. What enfuriates me more about that is McCoy threw the same effin’ pass earlier and nearly had it picked before, when Davis won the fielder’s choice. Lack of accuracy or lack of arm strength are manageable independently … but both faults are unreasonable to game around.

Regarding QB’s, I’m of the mind that Brewer is the horse that we need to hitch our wagon to … ala Matt Barkeley. Protect him with the killer B’s and Gray, and make his reads EASY. McCoy clearly doesn’t have a grasp on the fundamentals … nor seemingly the desire to improve on them. And Ash does not seem to catchup to the speed of the college game, nor seems to possess the anticipation needed to be successful at this level. I’m hopeful that a month’s bowl prep will prove me wrong … on either of the McAsh duo, but the data does not indicate any functional changes.

And 2012 will be a long painful season if Goodwin and Davis are still vying for #2/#3 on the WR depth chart.

RE: 2011 offense without Brown, Berg and Fozz

I think Happy Gilmore’s girlfriend said it best:

“There’s just one problem….you’re not any good!”

BimmerFan – your comment about McCoy the Younger’s is spot on (“nor seemingly the desire to improve on them.”) He’s a college sophomore and still looks like a freshman in high school. I remember McCoy the Elder busting his butt each summer to get bigger and stronger. I don’t see it in Case.

Agree w/Scipio, SaltWaterCroc and sundry others that with McCoy’s horrid mechanics, our QB/OC coaches are/have been incredibly negligent or McCoy is even more hard-headed.

That was a Mack Brown decision and either it stemmed from a desire to prove to fans (and players and parents) that McCoy isn’t the answer and allow the appropriate reshuffling of our QB hopes or it was motivated by some irrational sentimentality that McCoy might work some A&M magic.

One other possibility occurred to me. Someone had mentioned the only asset McCoy seemed to have was an unwarranted amount of confidence in himself. Maybe putting him back out there to get INT number 4 was to send a message to Case that he’s going to have to truly work on his mechanics and other things to even have prayer of being the future. “Your aren’t THE shit. You are shit. Get over yourself and work on fixing your shortcomings instead of continuing to believe you’ll somehow get it done despite the issues.”

I think people are giving Mack too much credit on the McCoy reasoning. I don’t think he sent him back out to prove a point to Case, nor do I think he sent him back out to prove a point to Case’s bandwagon.

Remember, this game was one week removed Mack having told Case, “Every quarterback has his moment…this is going to be yours.”

I think after the A&M game, Mack thought Case was finally “getting it.” He wanted to believe.

And he wanted to believe so badly, he left him in, waiting on it to happen.

And it never happened.

Some will think that’s idiotic. But when have we ever seen Mack know what he is doing with a quarterback?

Simms/Applewhite, anyone?
 
Wouldn’t let Vince have the reigns, only to win a NC when he finally did?

Gilbert?

McAsh?

Basically NYB, I opt for irrational sentimentality.

And I don’t even think it’s close.

Nunna, while you present a reasoned point of view, one could also take the position that keeping him in may have strengthened the sense of entitlement that Case demonstrated with his conduct against ISU and OU. Hey, I’m the man no matter how badly I play.

This is a very slippery slope, folks. I would feel much better if Mack had done what his QB coach and OC wanted, if he indeed overruled him. If he is continuing to meddle in such matters, that is a significant problem for our program’s recovery.

@bduran,

Re: Texas’s schedule. It’s even more evident if you look at Football Outsiders’ FEI strength of schedule. Texas was 67th in ’10 and jumped all the way to 18th in ’11.

QB is the obvious black hole here. McCoy has zero upside and if he is our guy next year the running game will get pummeled too. You need some deeper threats.

I think Ash is salvageable and that MUST be the plan absent Brewer coming in and setting the world on fire. Too big a leap from AZ ball to big time D-1 in my mind.

I think it is ridiculous to waste another month of bowl practice on Case. He is what he is and that is a future QB at Abilene Christian.

Even with all that crap, we have 2 out of 3 healthy RBs and we probably beat KSU and Mizzou and have a real good shot at Baylor. Thats 9-10 wins right there.

We had a 2-3 standard deviation on injuries at the position and it was a killer.

We get our two bruisers back with Gray next year this team could look a lot different.

I do agree that if Case is the guy in 2012 the season will be crap and it will be Macks last season at Texas and he will have no one to blame but himself.

I’ll feel a little better if Malcolm and Joe knock the Bears back to Berkeley. Injuries or not, the RB position has not been a highlight of recent teams.

I’m hoping Irby has done enough to make a go at the next level. If the back line of the west endzone at Floyd Casey had extended through the stands, I would have been on it. I feel lucky to have witnessed that catch live, from that particular angle. What a beautiful piece of receiving!

I think it should be “post-mortem” if we lose and something else when we win.
like post-birth? dunno

afterbirth

“…that’s a great point about Case’s best attribute. He has absolute confidence in himself and that’s an important attribute in a QB. The downside is that it’s not grounded in realism.”

LOL, that’s a really nice way of saying Case is delusional.

Regarding the idea of (grad shool eligible) transfer QBs, is there any chance a good one would come to Texas as a preferred walk-on? If they really want a shot at an NFL career, it seems that a chance to play at Texas with an improving OL, RBs and WRs in offense orchestrated by Harsin would be an opportunity worth taking. Mack could offer preferred walk-on status with the opportunity to earn a scholarship if/after they earned the starting QB position, which would allow Brewer to redshirt. It’s involves a little bit of risk on everyone’s part, but offers everyone a lot to gain as well.

“Even with all that crap, we have 2 out of 3 healthy RBs and we probably beat KSU and Mizzou and have a real good shot at Baylor. Thats 9-10 wins right there.”

Pretty much agree with this. If someone had told me before the season that we’d be limited to Case McCoy or a true frosh at QB, our top 3 RBs would get hurt and be unable to play in several games, we’d play a true frosh at LT for about half the season, and our top 2 WRs would either get hurt or regress to a significant degree, I’d have predicted another 5-7 season or maybe even worse.

Bottom Line:
Case was only supposed to replace John Paul Floyd with the clip board and backwards hat. He was never intended to play. Which brings up the question of why he was given a ship in the first place. His body will just not do what his mind is telling him needs to be done on the field.
Ash was supposed to red shirt. He was not recruited to play as a true freshman. In general, there are not many true freshman who play well at QB in major college football. In my mind, OB and OL are the most desired red shirt positions in the game. Ash has all the physical abilities needed. His mind has just not caught up with the game.

I would rather take a chance on being able to develop Ash and have the game slow down for him. That is something that can be taught and brought up to speed. It is unfortunate that he was not able to red shirt. McCoy’s issues can only be corrected by better genes and God. Not good odds.

We can’t be a productive program if we are not able to red shirt freshman QB prospects. The odds are that Brewer, no matter how good he is, will not be ready to do much as a true freshman. If we don’t get back to red shirting, we will not like the result.

If McCoy’s name was Johnson, and his Dad did not have a media spin machine at his fingertips, he would have never seen the field this year.

I think people are giving Mack too much credit on the McCoy reasoning. I don’t think he sent him back out to prove a point to Case, nor do I think he sent him back out to prove a point to Case’s bandwagon.

Remember, this game was one week removed Mack having told Case, "Every quarterback has his moment…this is going to be yours."

I think after the A&M game, Mack thought Case was finally "getting it." He wanted to believe.

And he wanted to believe so badly, he left him in, waiting on it to happen.

So how many turnovers would McCoy have had to commit before Mack would become a non-believer?

I thought the main criterion wrt the QB position this year was not turning the ball over.

Ultra is correct: “Int #4: QB misread. Fade into endzone. Safety was running to the corner before the snap.” But I’ll go further, is Quise the best receiver to throw the fade too? Surely
his vertical doesn’t make up for his size. Maybe it does, but I would think a Miles O type
is better option….

Estelle, Hawkins, Cochran…Hopkins, Walters, Riser…that’s your tackle/guard rotations for 2012, gents and ladies. Everybody else is redshirted or end-of-game scrubs.

In my opinion, Case McCoy shouldn’t even be attending the University, much less be playing football on scholarship. He needed to be at Sam Houston or S.F.Austin.
I have no idea what the Hell mack is doing.

The only thing I can surmise, and this explains the rumors of him being “tired”, is that Mack is an honorable man and takes the “family” thing very seriously. I believe he had a close personal relationship with Gilberts family and we know he did with Colt’s, and the subsequent events and relationships have taken their toll – not only on his health but on his decision making as well.

The bad news here is that this is not going to turn out well – for the team, the coaches and, ultimetely, Mack. We are heading for more attrition on the team, very possibly our coaching staff and this will lead to Mack hanging them up as well.