David Marsh

I would like to point out how many Nebraska N's are on this map... And there isn't an N on Nebraska itself. There is also a Utah U on this map... But it isn't on Utah.

Put a "DC" after that Washington please... The only Washington Mariota should ever play for.

The fumble I'm honestly not sure if it was an actual fumble. It feels like the refs were very quick to call it a fumble and then there weren't any good camera angles to give any difinitive evidence to over turn... Though it does look (with fan bias) than he was down before the ball came out. I do say let them play it out and see who comes out on top. I do believe that at this point Oregon does need a passer first and a runner second. Oregon must stretch the field vertically and the run game will be just fine. I found so many of the problems from the offensive collapse this season came when the quarterback forced a run rather than stayed patient for a pass.

I doubt MC would have told Shough to look elsewhere but he does preach competition. And there are workouts going on right now and players have probably started meeting up on their own to practice among themselves. It sounded like Butterfield was coming along quite well last year working with the threes. Thompson is working out with the team and is probably practicing with some receivers... Both have stronger arms than Shough and if they have the accuracy thosr two will be in contention for some real playing time. Brown's ceiling isnt as high as Butterfield or Thompson's but he has expirence and if he can make a good show of it he can win it. Shough isn't in a great position to win the job and his confidence took a serious hit at the end of the season. Odds are Shough wasn't going to win the job.

I was sure we would see another quarterback transfer out sometime soon. My prediction was no one was going to transfer out of the program until after Spring at the earliest though leaving now would allow Shough to potentially transfer somewhere in time for spring practice. Best of luck to him, I don't envy any quarterback who has to follow one of the all time greats at Oregon, Justin Herbert.

Beat me to it... This is an earthquake within the program. Not inherently bad but it does set the stage for an even more competitive Quarterback competition in the Spring and Fall.

Rivals Top 5 Offensive Line classes of 2021 Oregon and Notre Dame are both tied at No. 5. Though Oregon is the clear cut best in the West.

Additional Notes... 2021 Position Breakdown and which school "won" recruiting this year. (Using Rivals) Offense Offensive Line: Oregon Quarterback: Oregon (USC recruited 2 quarterbacks but only one is on the field at any one time and Oregon has the best individual prospect) Wide Receivers: Oregon Tight Ends: Oregon (but USC is pretty close here) Runningbacks: Oregon (both have 4-star runningbacks but Oregon has also has the wildcard of Seven McGee) With the addition of Donte Williams to the USC staff the defensive side of the ball is a bit more of a mixed bag between the two schools. Defense Defensive Back: USC? (USC has 5 four-stars and Oregon has 4 four-stars, more of a numbers game here) Linebacker: USC? (USC has 2 four-stars and Oregon has 1 four-star and 2 three-stars though Oregon has two really underrated three stars... so tie maybe?) Defensive Line: USC (USC has Korey Foreman which wins this position... if Oregon lands JTT then this might be a tie) USC basically straight lost the recruiting war with Oregon on offense though on defense it looks pretty close with maybe a slight edge to USC. Most importantly the USC losing the recruting battle to Oregon at receiver and tight end expose the problem with USC's desire to go Air Raid. The wild card is where are those athletes placed in terms of being the final tie breaker in some of these recruiting positions battles and I will be honest I don't know those athletes well enough to project exactly where they will be placed. USC is going to be interesting to watch... but I do expect Oregon to be No. 1 in the conference and USC to be No. 2.

Mariota is a unique talent and he is not a plug and play player (unless your offense is the Kelly-Helfrich offense). In the Raiders-Chargers game this year the offense was molded to fit Mariota better and Mariota was able to keep some drives alive with his legs. Mariota played pretty good in that game on the whole and looked like a real force out there to deal with. He was, however, let down by the Raiders defense that was destroyed by Herbert (good on Herbert). If New England was willing to build their program around Mariota, and New England is looking at a bit of a rebuild, then it would be a good trade. If they are looking for a savior that they can just plug into the quarterback position and solve their problems... Mariota is not the player for that.

Both... he was pretty darn good up through the first half of the Cal game... then something happened and he fell to pieces in the second half of Cal and beyond. the Oregon State loss was not the fault of the offense but the defense. Yes, Shough threw a couple bad interceptions but the defense's inability to stop the run was what killed Oregon that game. Against Cal the defense did its job keeping Cal to 21 points but it was Shough and the offense's inability to score that resulted in defeat. On the whole Shough wasn't so bad... he was just REALLY bad down the stretch.

When this offense got rolling this last year there were really very few 3rd downs. A highly efficient and deadly offense when it had momentum.

I can see that happening. A more cohesive defense will allow him to really bet set free as he can focus more on his job... which is destroy the quarterback.

Experience is invaluable but it isn't the end-all-be-all. We saw in 2016 Prukop (a senior transfer) was beaten out by Herbert half way through the season, though there could probably be an argument made that Herbert should have just started game one. I think Shough practices well and I think his potential ceiling is significantly higher than Brown's. Something happened in the second half of the Cal game that made Shough regress dramatically. I am not saying that Shough was all conference before that game but Shough was putting up good numbers and Oregon's offense had scored over 30 Points-per-game up until the Cal game. Shough had some freshman mistakes and some turnovers that are cringe worthy but he still finished the season with one of the better quarterback ratings in the conference. Getting a future quarterback that invaluable experience is super important because it is very difficult to have a team live off transfer quarterbacks. Oklahoma has done pretty well but in 2020 they had to finally turn over the offense to a Freshman. LSU had an incredible one-hit-wonder in Burrow but last season they had to turn to their roster and they settled on a freshman with potential in the end (I think... in truth I kinda lost track of who was the quarterback at LSU after awhile). I'm not trying to defend the decisions made by the coaches, in the end I personally really hate it when a team runs two quarterbacks. It can be gimmicky and it can work in small amounts, as we saw in the Pac-12 Championship game as USC was completely unprepared for Brown. Though on the whole I find it creates more chaos than actual production. I do agree that I think Thompson or even Butterfield may take over this off season and become the starter next year. It is possible Shough gets himself back on track. Though I feel in College experience matters but it comes with a caveat as overall athletic potential and ability and beat experience. Brown will have a chance to win the starting job this year though is he athletic enough to beat some of these big time youngsters? and by the way... I wrote an article about this last theme last summer... Graduate Quarterbacks: Saviors or Usurpers give it a read if you have the chance!

... He will have yet another nondescript season at Washington.

True.. but at this point he is OLD ... for a professional football player. He doesn't even have youth on his side at this point.

Experience matters! That's what kept popping up in my head with Brady winning another super bowl. At this point in his career Brady isn't the most athletic guy out on the field.... Not even the most athletic quarterback on the field. He is, however, the most experienced player on the field. That experience gives him such an edge, especially at quarterback. Brady tends not to make the same mistake repeatedly in the same game. He also tends not to get flustered when he's beat. He also knows when he is beat and just gets rid of the ball or protects the ball and goes down. Brady isn't the most exciting player, he just gets the job done. Thinking about this year's Oregon team the big thing missing was experience. With such a young team they just didn't have the depth of knowledge that experience brings. Athletically Oregon was fine... But the mental errors were what hurt Oregon this season. Especially when talking about Oregon's offense the biggest problem was at quarterback. Both Shough and Brown tried at times to do too much and they lost the ball.

Oregon has room for one additional coach right now with the departure of Heyward. If this hire is for Tight Ends that would mean that there is some reshuffling of the position coaches on the defensive side of the ball. Does Rod Chance take over coaching the entire secondary? Does DeRuyter take over some of the secondary and leave Wilson to coach all the line backers? If this is a coaching hire that would mean Bobby Williams takes over coaching special teams exclusively. Oregon's special teams do need some love and attention right now. Kattleman looks poised to take hold on the place kicking job... Snee was ok at punter... kick off was horrible. Special needs need some special attention right now.

A big difference going into 2021 is also need. Oregon has a full quarterback room and ONE of them is going to emerge as Oregon's starter and one of them will be operating the Oregon offense at a better level than we saw last year. Simply because they will have all spring to reinstall the offense and then fall to install the offense again. Someone is going to emerge from the quarterback room a starter and they will have an incredible supporting cast around them. Washington on the other-hand has really dubbed (pun intentional) Huard their savior and NEEDS him to perform. Washington's passing game was non-existent. Thompson may take the starting role at Oregon, he may not but someone is going to emerge and become the next rising star at Oregon. Washington really only has one option... hope Huard works out.

To be absolutely blunt... an undefeated USC was NOT going to get into the playoff no matter what in 2020. They failed the eye test. They had to beat ASU (2-2), Arizona (0-5), and UCLA (3-4) in the last minutes of the game in order to win. If anyone watches those game winning drives they saw there were some incredibly lucky bounces the ball took. If USC made the playoff they would have fully embarrassed themselves.

RatherBe thanks for getting the clip... I remember Herbert fighting for extra yards just not the overall play. I know Braxton was just in over his head playing. Though there were a lot of plays just built around running the ball and it was very predictable. This was mostly when Herbert was was injured.

2021 will be the real test. Though I have had the feeling that Oregon has really lacked the personal for the past 5 years. Yes, I'm going back 5 years because in 2015 Oregon had a good group of recievers (many of whom were injured during the national championship game the previous season) and solid runningback in Freeman and a quarterback who could and throw the ball everywhere. If you watch the games from 2015 and earlier you see the quarterback throwing touchdowns to multiple recievers. The talent dried up in 2016 and Oregon has really hobbles along trying to get good recievers. Now, there have been some bright spots but I can't in good conscience say that we have had a recieving corp as good as the one in 2015 yet. Though I do believe that is about to change in the next year or two as all this young talent gets a shot at playing in an Oregon uniform.

Where I criticize the Taggart system with Herbert is really in how Taggart wanted to run Herbert more up the middle rather than more opportunistic run plays. I would have to check to see what was going on in the Cal game in 2017 when Herbert broke his collar bone. But the biggest problem with the Taggart system is its overall lack of half time adjustments. So Herbert would be wasted in the second half of games. Granted, that was really the biggest problem with the Arroyo offense as well. Though I do agree that the loss of supporting cast members was what really hurt Herbert. 2015 was really the last time Oregon had a stellar cast of receivers. Mitchell was good but he was really the only receiver that was any good in 2018. Really looking forward to seeing what this new receiving corp can do!

Herbert had a pretty good freshman year with the Helfrich offensive system. The Taggart and then Arroyo systems didn't do him any favors.

I would like to mention that Oregon has more playoff wins than the following teams ... Oklahoma, Notre Dame, Florida State, Michigan State and Washington Oh... They also have more playoff wins than all of those teams combined. Just thought I'd throw that stat out there for funsies.

Though... Wilson and DeRuyter both coached at Nevada together for a year so they are probably more in sync than most... But still... Gotta love being a duck fan right now where when the prospect of coaches leaving generates excitment and speculation rather than dread and fear.