OregonDucks

LOL. An oldie but goodie! Think it still applies today?!

I’m not a ship captain but have some advice: If you see an aircraft carrier coming towards you, you might want to get out of the way, quickly. (Glad that no one was seriously injured.)

To be fair, he did lead his team to the state title as a junior. It looks like he completed over 70% of his passes (accurate passer) and threw for 38 TDs with only 3 interceptions (good decision making). He also appears athletic and throws well on the run. Watching his tape reminds me of Caleb Williams (watch the play in the below clip at 0:46). I’m no expert but if all the top teams are recruiting him, they must see something.

Hope it’s the 1s vs. 1s (and 2s vs 2s). While you can see individual talent (e.g., Tez) with split squads, it’s difficult to gauge how good the team and units are overall, especially the lines.

And the long layoff after the conference championship games… And the tie in to the traditional bowls (Why shouldn’t the top seeds get a home game in round 2 of the playoffs?)…

Well, the Beavers were in the top 2 in their current conference…

Finally, something out of his mouth that I agree with! Just get rid of the automatic qualifiers completely and seed the top x number of teams based on the committee’s rankings, in order from 1 to x (like they do for the NCAA basketball tournament). Stop trying to overthink it or get cute, it resulted in the mess we saw last season.

I wonder what it was in the 3rd and 4th quarters… Do advertisers get a refund, if viewership is lower during their ad?

I’ve only found very limited videos but he seems like he’s good in coverage (albeit he’s listed at 5’10” on one site) and has good ball skills (former WR in high school?). It’ll be interesting to see how he fits in the rotation but seems like a good pickup and I love the pipeline.

I wish Coach Adams the best of luck. What is the connection between Dallas and Oregon’s offensive position coaches?

I promise that this will be my last post in this thread about this subject. First, for the record, I was the first on this site (and potentially anywhere) to mention Coach Stein as a possible OC replacement for Coach Dillingham (if you don’t believe me, you can look it up). I saw the offensive numbers he put up at UTSA, noticed that the offense was similar to that of Dillingham’s at Oregon and knew that Coach Lanning preferred young coaches. I believe that Coach Stein is a very good OC but is not elite, yet. I am not, nor have I seen anyone in this thread, calling for Coach Stein to be fired. On the contrary, I am hoping that he and our other young coaches can learn from the Rose Bowl so that they don’t repeat the same mistakes twice and maintain that “growth mindset” so that they can become better. Second, to respond to Mr. Fisher’s comment above, it was widely reported, leading up to the Rose Bowl, that Ohio State made adjustments to their defense following the Oregon loss. They went to playing their safeties deeper (cover 2?) to prevent explosion plays and ran more stunts/twists on the defensive line. Sure, you could try to attack the cover 2 with deep passes to the perimeter but that is exactly what that defense is designed to prevent (even with a healthy Evan Stewart the probability of success with that strategy would have likely been low). The better strategy, IMHO, would have been to establish the run and/or focus on short and intermediate routes, especially over the middle to bring one of the safeties up. Then you could try to attack deep. Coach Stein knows more about football than I’ll ever know but my questions for him (if I were in the media conducting an interview) would be: 1) Why wasn’t DG running (e.g., speed options, pass-run options, called QB runs) a bigger part of the game plan? Especially since it was an elimination game and there was no point preserving his health for later in the season (Patrick Mahomes’ rushes have doubled in the playoffs). 2) Why didn’t we move the pocket more to give DG more time to throw the ball, play to his strengths (e.g., scrambling, throwing on the run, improvising) and give him clear line of site downfield? (Note: Joey Harrington called for this earlier in the season on Talkin’ Ducks.) 3) Why didn’t we call more RB or TE screens or WR reverses early in the game? Since it’s the “offseason,” perhaps someone can start another thread ranking Oregon’s best OCs. We’ve been fortunate to have some great ones over the past few decades.

Neither the offense nor the defense showed up in the first half of the Rose Bowl. And the second half didn’t matter because the game was already out of reach. I turned the game off around the end of the first quarter. It was a complete embarrassment and EVERYONE in the Oregon program deserves blame for that game. It’s like everyone within the program was overconfident because we beat Ohio State at home in the final seconds (despite being underdogs) and our coaches were too busy recruiting or arrogant to make adjustments. They just assumed that we would show up with the same game plan and beat OSU again, despite the widely reported changes that the Buckeyes made to their defensive scheme and offensive play calling. Ohio State was a very good team but Oregon was talented enough to at least to give them a game. Instead they got run off the field. That is why that game hurt - we didn’t even show up.

LOL. I was thinking the same thing. You could say that about every conference champion from this past season. The author is really not going out on a ledge…

If someone is going to give Coach Stein complete credit for a 25-3 overall record at Oregon, then he should also share the overall post-season record of 1-1. The Rose Bowl loss is on EVERYONE. It was a complete cluster #%$& from top to bottom. The team was completely unprepared to play. It’s not like Oregon lost 41-38. Oregon’s offense started the Rose Bowl: 1) Punt (3 and out) 2) Punt (3 and out) 3) Punt (7 plays) 4) Turnover on Downs (7 plays) 5) Punt (3 and out) 6) Punt (3 and out) 7) TD (end of half) Oregon had 7 possessions in the first half, including 5 punts and 1 turnover on downs (6 straight possessions without scoring a point). Someone can find the first half time of possession but I’m sure that that played a part in Ohio State’s success on offense (our defense was likely gassed by the second quarter). We did punch it in to end the half but by that time we were down 34-8 and the game was all but over. Does it really matter what the offense did in the second half? Ohio State was likely looking towards the next game. How did Coach Stein prepare for the adjustments that Ohio State made during the season? Why wasn’t DG’s mobility and running ability a bigger part of the game plan (e.g., moving the pocket, designed QB runs, options)? For comparison, Patrick Mahomes averaged 3.6 carries per game during the regular season but has averaged 9 in the playoffs. At some point you have to let your players do what they do best and I don’t believe that our coaches allowed DG to do that in the post season. We can agree to disagree. As I mentioned, Coach Stein is a very good OC but is still young and learning on the job. I’m glad that he didn’t go to a conference rival, but I do not believe that he is irreplaceable. Oregon would receive plenty of interest in the position given our reputation and track record of prior OCs. I’m much more concern with Oregon’s defense, as this was year 3 under Lanning and Tosh and our defense was absolutely gashed against the 3 playoff teams we faced this year.

He’s a fantastic player and person. Really wish my Niners could have kept him and DeForest Buckner. They were the best defensive line in the NFL with Nick Bosa. (Damn salary cap.)

On the flip side, Coach Stein is 1-1 in the post season. As I said in my earlier post, Coach Stein is a good OC but not irreplaceable. OC should be the easiest position to fill at Oregon. We are now known coast-to-coast for high powered offenses and have a long track record of Oregon OCs getting HC positions (e.g., Mike Bellotti, Bob Toledo, Jeff Tedford, Chip Kelly, Kenny Dillingham). We’ve had the occasional dud(wig) but have luckily made the correction quickly. Offense, or lack thereof, has not been Oregon’s problem for a very long time.

Perhaps a bit too slow… Coach Stein is a very good OC but he is young and learning on the job (as are most of Oregon’s assistants). I’ll be interested to see how he is at developing QBs. Glad Coach Stein didn’t leave for a conference rival and believe it’s a good decision because he will be offered a HC job sooner rather than later, if that is his goal (look at the long history of Oregon OCs who have become successful HCs). However, I do not believe that Coach Stein is irreplaceable. Hopefully Coach Lanning is keeping that notebook with coaches updated because it’s probably just a matter of time.

Marcus would be a good insurance policy for the Raiders. They could select the best available QB at #6 and then, if they are not ready, Marcus could be the starting QB early in the season. He has shown that he is capable of winning games on a good team.

I’m shocked that Royce didn’t have a more productive NFL career. He had all of the attributes you’d look for in an NFL running back.

I mentioned Onterrio. Dude was special and deserves to be on any list of top Oregon running backs. He signed with the National Champions Tennessee out of high school and then transferred to Oregon.

Sorry for the confusion. My list above wasn’t a ranking. The running back that I would select would be based on the offense I ran. LMJ would probably not be the best fit for a traditional pro style offense (look at his NFL career). Just like Droughns wouldn’t be the best fit for a spread-option offense. If we were looking for the most balanced running back, I’d probably go with J-Stew, Onterrio Smith or Bobby Moore. However, I don’t know how I’d choose one over the others as they all have different strengths. Maybe you give the edge to J-Stew or Bobby Moore because they had the best NFL careers?

Oregon had been blessed with so many great running backs over the years (Gary Campbell was a great coach): Bucky Irving LaMichael James Barner DAT Royce Freeman Jonathan Stewart Onterrio Smith Ruben Droughns Derek Loville Bobby Moore … LMJ is the all time statistical rushing leader but I’m not sure he is the “best.”

I wonder if we are going to see more turn over at the non-football coaching positions at the West Coast schools, as a result of the increased travel. If you could make just as much (or more) at another school and don’t have to travel…Cronin is barking up the wrong tree and should be complaining to the UCLA administration instead. They are the ones who blew up the PAC for $$$.

Dante Moore throws a beautiful ball. However, IMHO, he does not have the arm strength of Justin Herbert (very few QBs do). You’re spot on, his (and Oregon’s) success will come down to his familiarity with the offense and decision making. I think Oregon fans should temper their expectations until we see how Dante plays against good teams. We should not expect him to step in and be as good as 5th/6th year QBs.

I believe that the layoff is part of the story. All four top seeded playoff teams with the extra break, lost in the second round. Tennessee had just as long off as Ohio State so there was no advantage in that first round. Ohio State has the better athletes (across the board), better / more experienced coordinators and position coaches who out-schemed Oregon's and players who had a chip on their shoulder having lost the first game in Eugene, losing to their arch rival (again) and listening to how their coach was going to get fired. It was the perfect storm and Oregon was not prepared / dialed in.