Wisconsin Badgers vs Iowa Hawkeyes game thread

[CheezWizHed]

It is more about the offense looking very inept during some past games. An offense that can't execute a simple passing game plan just doesn't look legit in this day and age.

 

Personally, I don't think PC should be fired. Going with Mertz over Coan this year was a bad decision. Mertz still isn't quite ready. The offense this year (IMO) is just a reflection of not having a capable QB and a porous O-line (at least earlier in the year). PC has had too much success to simply dump him on a bad year.

[tmwiese55]

Yea I'd agree on that. It's not so much the plays being called, but they haven't been trained/developed to execute them. OL development isn't there compared to the past. QB you can say isn't ready, but that's on the coaches too. Best talent they've had it, early enrolled and is now in his 3rd year. To me I also don't think Mertz would look so bad with a better OL, like last game when he drops back and can set throw he's ok. They have to get the OL back to the dominant level it was from like 09-14ish of just pumping out NFL linemen even if they started as 3 stars or lower in some cases. Being able to run for 200+ even when they had Stave and ony 1 WR so were completely one dimensional and facing 8-9 guys in the box.

[BillScottCanRake]

I'm not a big "fire x" "hire y" guy because coaches have more roles in college than the NFL. I don't want to hire an offensive genius who can't recruit, for example.

 

What I would like to see, especially from the offensive coaches, is more adaptability to their personnel on the field and a little less "this is how we play football at Wisconsin, and we are going to do that no matter what". It's great when you have 3 or 4 future NFL players on your line, and you have Melvin Gordon or JT in running 25 times a game, but when you don't winning is harder.

 

If you watch the early Packer teams under McCarthy, their offense looked different each year 2006 thru 2011 as they transitioned from Favre to Rodgers to peak Rodgers. They did an excellent job figuring out who did what well and they game planned and schemed to fit their personnel. It got a bit stale from 2015 onwards, but early on the scheme did a lot to make the players successful.

 

I think MLF and Hackett have also done a good job in their first three years as well. 2019 was a blend of McCarthy's offense and the one he wanted to run, which I think helped Rodgers buy into MLF. In 2020 and 2021 MLFs offense has continued to evolve and adapt as players have come and gone. MLF also does a nice job from game-to-game, especially as personnel changes due to injuries (7-0 without Adams), and I suspect they will adapt again after Rodgers departure, whenever that is.

 

I know they have less time available to football in college, so it isn't as easy to be so adaptable. However, other than the short time Gary Anderson was the coach, the offense has largely been the same with the same play-calling philosophy. When Wilson was QB they probably threw a bit more and perhaps had more QB runs, but the superior results were not because of changes in play-calling so much as Russell Wilson was the quarterback.

 

What I haven't seen so much of are tweaks to the game-plan when they can't run the offense as they'd prefer. If you can't run against 9 in the box, find ways to throw on early downs that give you four, five, or six yards to keep you ahead of the chains so you don't have a lot of 3rd and 6+ situations. I'd love for them to run screens besides the tight end middle screen they seemingly run two or three times a game. It would be nice to run some action off the fullback dive they like to run as a short yardage play, whether that is a run or a pass. It wouldn't take massive changes to bring a little less predictability to the offense while still remaining true to their identity as a smash mouth, run first, second, and third offense.