I never went coulda woulda shoulda. I pointed to known facts to pose a legitimate question. Those facts point to a level of talent struggling to run the offense they were hand picked for under the direction of the best guy possible to coach that offense and yet many fans hold the belief that they would have been able to magically win 6-7 games had the new staff simply schemed around their strengths.
FWIW, I have been told several times by several different people knowledgeable of the situation that Collins was pretty much told to rip the band-aid off by the AD/Donors, which is probably why TStan went all in with him last season.
I will counter with this most of these players never played in Johnsons offense in highschool we were sorta gone from the days where his offense was actually run often at the highschool level. Most highschools had actually gone to the Clemson style spread by the end of Johnson's career (yates played in this and won a championship with it) so getting our lineman ready to play in johnson's offense was starting to take longer and imo was actually what was exposing sewak even more.
We were not ready to go to the catch and move styles of an RPO offense. We very much could have transitioned to a power run offense or another form of spread option that looked a little more modern. Hell we probably actually could have transitioned to an air raid. (air raid offenses are predicated actually on getting the ball out quickly on fast mesh routs or swing passes if the streak isn't open). But that would have required a new QB (though air raid QBs are all over the portal).
Our offense was not a problem in 2018 according to espn we Averaged 33.6 points per game. We were more productive on the ground than 2016, which sorta speaks to the primary part of the offense working. We had a few games we got shut down in Clemons UGa and MINN. and a an argument with Pitt though we sorta still ran for over 320 yards we just turned the ball over and missed a field goal and duke in which we turned over the game.
In 2017 it could be argued we struggled. That one was definitely not as productive but comparing to 2016 we only average 28.1 ppg instead of 28.2.
The point being Johnson wasn't struggling to run an offense. he was struggling to pass in an offense that had a lot to do with who he had throwing the ball.