Something has been brewing in my mind all summer as I’ve thought about the upcoming season. Late this Spring, I pointed out in the FishDuck Forum with Decorum, a nagging foreboding about Our Beloved Duck (OBD) defense. I discussed it with Mr. FishDuck himself. We both shared some interesting perspectives. He suggested I should relieve my worries by looking at ...

Why Tosh Lupoi Must Have His Best Season

Thanks Mike West! Excellent thoughts to look to during this season.

The resurrection of Chip Kelly at the Rose Bowl is exactly what you are telling us.

It will be interesting to see how/if Tosh continues in his "growth" as the Ducks DC. He has definitely shown growth from his days in (California?) and Jacksonville, but still seemed out coached by his college football nemesis, Chip Kelly last year in the playoffs.

Defense being D.Lannings "cup o tea" and the fact that he himself seems to have a lot of confidence in Tosh as his DC since bringing him in four years ago, gives me hope that they are both on the same page, defensively, and are creating one of the more dominantly consistent defenses in all of NFL-lite football.

However if future games arise that Tosh seems to be a "day late and a step behind" the game plan of the opposing offense, with no clear in-game adjustments to counter, then it would not surprise me to see some interest in taking our DC in a different direction. D. Lanning will NOT wait forever for his vision of dominating defense, year in and year out, to become reality.

Here's hoping Tosh has continued his progression as OBD's defensive coordinator. It can only bode well for OBD this year and into the future.

Go Ducks (T-minus 3 days, 5ish hours)!

QUACK! 🦆🏈🪨's

Great observations Mike, and it is always fun to have a guest article from you. Many thanks!

Thank you, Mike West!

Fortunately, Adventure Gamers didn't rock your pods beyond your skilled ability to discuss loopholes in Lupio's schemes.

The Ohio State O plodded along against Michigan, and a reliable FG kicker missing two attempts he usually made, sealed the Buckeyes' 4th loss in a row to TSUN.

The players had a meeting, including Ryan Day and no other coaches, to air things out. As Tennessee and, sigh, OBD can attest, it looked like the message sent to Ryan and Chip was, Get the Playmakers the Damn Ball in Space! Open it up! No more 'typical Big Ten, Nebraska, and Michigan-like games.'

I think the same plan was in place against Texas in the Cotton Bowl, but DC Pete Kwiatkowski, after his D was lit up at home by Cade Klubnik and Clemson, was prepared and shut down Jeremy Smith and the Ohio O for most of the game, aided and abetted by TOSU's 9 penalties on offense. Saturday's match-up between DC Pete K and OC Brian Hartline should be fascinating.

The above is my too-long way of saying that even with all the talent brought in by Day and friends to Columbus, it wasn't until Day's 6th season and DC Jim Knowles' 3rd season that the talent was assembled to overcome an embarrassing loss and win a national championship.

It was not only Chip who learned during the 2024 season; in the Rose Bowl, Knowles shut down Stein's O until the game was out of reach. A healthy Evan Stewart would have helped OBD's cause, but it's not often a tree can stop a buzz saw.

I am thankful that other Forum members and I have X&O gurus like you and Charles to see and describe details that I cannot. But one thing was painfully obvious in the postseason: the Texas D-backs were superior to Lupoi's D-backs in size and skill. Oregon's guys played hard on both sides of the ball and never quit, but Ohio State clearly had the deeper, more talented roster.

Coaching matters, but over a three or four-game postseason, the best football coaches need the best football players to win the ultimate prize. One upset? Doable. But three or four in a row?

I hope Tosh 'gets it' this season. The talent is there, but it is inexperienced and hopefully will gel in the first four games of the season when OBD will have a clear roster advantage before matching up with Penn State.

Thanks again, Mike, and Tosh, please start the season off by caroling a bunch of Cats!

3 hours ago, Smith72 said:

Thanks Mike West! Excellent thoughts to look to during this season.

The resurrection of Chip Kelly at the Rose Bowl is exactly what you are telling us.

Pretty much Smith,

Lupoi did a very good job of shutting down Henderson and Judkins in Eugene. Chip came back and exploited Lupoi's tendencies in Pasadena so well it looked like it was a scrimmage.

16 minutes ago, Jon Joseph said:

The players had a meeting, including Ryan Day and no other coaches, to air things out. As Tennessee and, sigh, OBD can attest, it looked like the message sent to Ryan and Chip was, Get the Playmakers the Damn Ball in Space! Open it up! No more 'typical Big Ten, Nebraska, and Michigan-like games.'

Thanks Jon for the compliment.

As for above, I believe Ohio State's plan for the season was to script slugfests while in conference play. I am sure the players DID emphasize they wanted to exploit their talent advantages. But I am almost sure the team had been practicing plenty of plays designed for the playoffs. The way they executed reminded me of Michael Penix and his receivers the way they played us in Seattle-they were unconscious. The back shoulder throws were perfect, and in my eyes that was due to hundreds of passes in the summer were thrown to be that perfect. I believe Ohio State had done the same. In no way were they going to expose much of their "real" offense during the season (though I did see one play run twice against Penn State).

I personally believe the elite teams should design game plans for the playoffs (against likely contenders) all year. I actually would be surprised if they didn't. They have a whole team of analysts that scout all year. In fact, I'd personally develop those analysts as if they were coaches. I'd have one set scout and design game plans for opponents, and the other design game plans against OBD. I would have them emphasize every players' weaknesses as well. But that's just me. Who knows what these elite coaches do.

Great read, thank you!

I mean, Chip Kelly is a certifiable offensive wizard that just doesn’t like recruiting. If he didn’t out coach Lupoi as an OC with that much talent, that should be considered shocking.

I don’t consider it an inditement to have the D struggle last year against the best of the best in our last 2 games. It was the longest season in history and I do think we ran out of gas a bit.

Our secondary personnel wasn’t all that relatively great IMO. We had 10 guys drafted, but not one from the secondary, that’s very general but telling. Jabbar was supposed to be all world and didn’t get drafted. The plodding B1G made the relative secondary weakness pretty easy to mask. Go figure we struggled against a couple of west coast style teams OOC to start the year.

Looking forward to moving on, it’s on in a few days lads!

Edited 5 hours ago5 hr by JabbaNoBargain

2 hours ago, MicroBurst61 said:

Defense being D.Lannings "cup o tea" and the fact that he himself seems to have a lot of confidence in Tosh as his DC since bringing him in four years ago, gives me hope that they are both on the same page, defensively, and are creating one of the more dominantly consistent defenses in all of NFL-lite football.

However if future games arise that Tosh seems to be a "day late and a step behind" the game plan of the opposing offense, with no clear in-game adjustments to counter, then it would not surprise me to see some interest in taking our DC in a different direction. D. Lanning will NOT wait forever for his vision of dominating defense, year in and year out, to become reality.

I agree Microburst. If Lupoi struggles this year, I believe he will be on the hot seat. This year's unit is too talented to waste.

11 minutes ago, JabbaNoBargain said:

Our secondary personnel wasn’t all that relatively great IMO. We had 10 guys drafted, but not one from the secondary, that’s very general but telling.

Very good observation about the secondary, and the fact the OOC teams (and West Coast Offense type teams) exploited those weaknesses.

While they recruit bigger DL, and faster players on defense, it does seem that our defensive progression is slow. Tosh seems a little like Cristobal, except on defense. Meaning that the defense seems to be underperforming to their capabilities.

Not sure what the missing ingredient seems to be, but isn’t the MINT defense designed to make it difficult on a QB to determine where pressure may be coming from? Good defensive set for spread offenses, but adjustments need to be made based on personnel matchups.

Perhaps the best is yet to come.

It was nice to see that he took the step and realized he had a scheme/counter scheme problem

"He indicated he underestimated his fellow adversaries’ ability to not only adjust to Lupoi’s scheming, but also their ability to set up Lupoi and use his strengths against him. That was my impression from the discussion."

Fool me once . . . hopefully moving on to the Who's "Won't Be Fooled Again" mantra.

1 hour ago, Mike West said:

Thanks Jon for the compliment.

As for above, I believe Ohio State's plan for the season was to script slugfests while in conference play. I am sure the players DID emphasize they wanted to exploit their talent advantages. But I am almost sure the team had been practicing plenty of plays designed for the playoffs. The way they executed reminded me of Michael Penix and his receivers the way they played us in Seattle-they were unconscious. The back shoulder throws were perfect, and in my eyes that was due to hundreds of passes in the summer were thrown to be that perfect. I believe Ohio State had done the same. In no way were they going to expose much of their "real" offense during the season (though I did see one play run twice against Penn State).

I personally believe the elite teams should design game plans for the playoffs (against likely contenders) all year. I actually would be surprised if they didn't. They have a whole team of analysts that scout all year. In fact, I'd personally develop those analysts as if they were coaches. I'd have one set scout and design game plans for opponents, and the other design game plans against OBD. I would have them emphasize every players' weaknesses as well. But that's just me. Who knows what these elite coaches do.

I think in general coaches are risk adverse and prefer not to play with their food and risk it running away from them. You can lose any given Saturday, so you'd better be willing to put your best foot forward to win.

3 hours ago, Jon Joseph said:

Fortunately, Adventure Gamers didn't rock your pods beyond your skilled ability to discuss loopholes in Lupoi's schemes.

I appreciate everyone's patience in overlooking those "backlink" sentences in articles that help to pay the bills of the two FD sites.

The SEO company who paid me on this backlink was located in...

Andorra!

A nation the size of the Willamette Valley...

@Mike West - Great article, thank you!

All of your article, and many of the comments here, focus on Lupoi being the sole steward of the defense.

Am I being too much of a stickler if I link Dan Lanning to the defense as much as Lupoi? Seems like he should have the defense humming, regardless of DC, given his background, no?

Would be interesting to know how involved Dan Lanning is in the defense.

Then I remind myself to put things in perspective that I can't expect OBD to thoroughly dominate every single team on both sides of the ball. Other teams have excellent coaching and talent and resources, too.

The spoiled fan is coming out in me, that I want perfection against . . . the best teams in college football. Ha, that's not fair

Either way, I'm very excited about this season, and have high hopes for both offense and defense.

4 hours ago, Drake said:

While they recruit bigger DL, and faster players on defense, it does seem that our defensive progression is slow. Tosh seems a little like Cristobal, except on defense. Meaning that the defense seems to be underperforming to their capabilities.

Not sure what the missing ingredient seems to be, but isn’t the MINT defense designed to make it difficult on a QB to determine where pressure may be coming from? Good defensive set for spread offenses, but adjustments need to be made based on personnel matchups.

Perhaps the best is yet to come.

I'm with you on this Drake. Sometimes it just boils down to mano y mano, and your philosophical take on the game won't necessarily work.

8 minutes ago, WTD25 said:

The spoiled fan is coming out in me, that I want perfection against . . . the best teams in college football. Ha, that's not fair

Oh I believe we all feel this way. We really want that Natty!

2 hours ago, Solar said:

I think in general coaches are risk adverse and prefer not to play with their food and risk it running away from them. You can lose any given Saturday, so you'd better be willing to put your best foot forward to win.

I couldn't have said it better Solar! If you're going to get criticized anyway, you might as well do it your way! I do believe the best coaches are flexible however. Think of Nick Saban throwing a Freshman into the fire in the second half of the Natty. That takes guts!. Then imagine the next year, those two players switch again, and defeat the same team-again. In both cases, the playbook expanded according to each players' relative strengths. Against an extremely talented defense both times.

In my eyes, that says to me Saban recognizes things happen that require junking your game plan. Of course, that's a tough pill to swallow if you believe in your philosophy (or game plan), Which of course means, how much do you trust yourself and your instincts? How much do you trust your staff? There are so many components to dealing with the intricacies of the game. Which means sometimes it really isn't ego, but just going with what you feel is the best move to make according to what you see and feel about what's happening. Which is why I believe your point is so valid.