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Why is Sark fucking changing the offense in year 4
puppylove_sugarsteel
Member Posts: 9,133
Just watched Saban talk of his philosophy. A similar one Sark used to run at USC. Instead of coming to Washington with a plan, a disciplined running offense with play action and the TE.
Sark instead doesn't have a plan, doesn't know if he'll run or pass and uses the best TE in America as a slot receiver, with cutesy little 5-yard curls and bubble screens. David Shaw HAS a philosophy. One that made Washington great. Now we just Dink and dunk with little lobs and change-of-pace hand offs to Sankey (who does EVERYTHING on his own.)
Sark instead doesn't have a plan, doesn't know if he'll run or pass and uses the best TE in America as a slot receiver, with cutesy little 5-yard curls and bubble screens. David Shaw HAS a philosophy. One that made Washington great. Now we just Dink and dunk with little lobs and change-of-pace hand offs to Sankey (who does EVERYTHING on his own.)
Comments
The guy isn't innovative at all. Seriously, there is nothing in his offense that is unique. The thing I hear over and over again about Sark's offense is that he runs a lot of the same plays out of multiple formations and uses shifts, motions, and other bullshit to trick defenses into coverages that he wants to run those plays against. I could name plenty of D3 teams that do that shit. Hell, decent high school coaches do that.
Guys like Bill Walsh, Don James, Chip Kelly - those guys off the top of my head - are innovators. Guys like Sark are fucking copycats and are a dime a fucking dozen.
Seriously, what would Sark say if he had to talk about his coaching philosophy?
He seems like a pretty nice guy but he's not going to take the program to the next level. He's a people-pleaser who wants to be liked by everyone. That's not usually a concern of strong, innovative leaders. He just doesn't have that leadership "it" factor.
But the topic is why Sark is changing the offense in year 5. I'll even submit to you that he's NOT changing the offense. He's only changing the pace at which it's run. And there's even good reasons for it. The opposing defense can't get set, can't substitute as much as they want, they run more base fronts and basic coverages. This enables a hurry up offense to run more basic plays (that even dumber-than-a-rock QBs can audible into), offensive linemen don't have to be as dominating, and gaps in defenses start to get wider.
The shit isn't rocket surgery. If you've been to a coaching clinic the last couple of years, this is what's talked about and it's all the rage. And Chip Kelly is the guy who innovated and perfected it. Sark is just copying what his butt buddy Chip built. Sark tried to copy Pete's fucking "Always Compete" mantra, now he's copying Chip. Wake me when he comes up with an original idea.
HTH
But here's my concern: Remember back in the Neuheisel days, when he got all cutesy with trying to do late substitutions to get the best matchups defensively with the opposing offense? How many times did the opponent snap the ball before we were set? The players I interviewed in subsequent years told me how much they hated it. That's my concern for the offense under Sark. That as the season wears on it'll be a cutesy clusterfuck and announcers will be deriding it during a national telecast at some point.
In fact that could be the name for your next book. "Husky football in the Steve Sarkisian era: A cutesy clusterfuck".
The guy is so far in over his head. He has no identity as a coach or as an offensive play caller. When he gets fired by UW(in 2017) I wouldn't even want him as an OC or QB coach.
Its just like basketball. If you have the better talent, you'll want to speed the game up to give yourself more possessions, more opportunities to score. If you don't, you're going to want to slow down the pace, take the air out of the ball, and hope you're more efficient than the more talented team.
Who knows if Sark gets this. I'm guessing he doesn't and Arizona, ASU, UCLA, and Oregon will sideways plunger fuck us into tears because their time of possession will be 40 minutes to our 20, our special teams will suck balls again, and their score will start with a 5 and ours will start with a 1....rather easily, say 56-13?
The only way to beat teams like that is get them in a phone booth and slug it out. Is there a team in the conference that can do that? Oh yeah...Stanford, the Rose Bowl champs.
People get fooled by the smoke and mirrors of Oregon, but the majority of their success comes from the quality of their beef in the trenches.