Good post re Tech offense by UM blogger

Skeptic

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That's a good piece that lends some insight into the complexities of the offense and why it might be so hard to find QBs for it. He notes hat historic Navy drive against New Mexico, but note that just Saturday Army opened the game against Air Force with a 13 minute, 21-play, 75 yard drive to score and won 17-14. And Jeff Monken's team, strictly running the football with Johnson's offense, won 10 games last year and is 7-2 this season. One of those losses was a one TD defeat to Oklahoma. (The other, unfortunately, was to an apparent common haunt, Duke, by three scores. Go figure.) The death march is still alive out there.
 

684Bee

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Skeptic said:
That's a good piece that lends some insight into the complexities of the offense and why it might be so hard to find QBs for it. He notes hat historic Navy drive against New Mexico, but note that just Saturday Army opened the game against Air Force with a 13 minute, 21-play, 75 yard drive to score and won 17-14. And Jeff Monken's team, strictly running the football with Johnson's offense, won 10 games last year and is 7-2 this season. One of those losses was a one TD defeat to Oklahoma. (The other, unfortunately, was to an apparent common haunt, Duke, by three scores. Go figure.) The death march is still alive out there.
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I think Duke spends an inordinate amount of time on our offense.

Also, I’m going on record again as being for Monken as our next HC.
 

jgtengineer

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684Bee said:
I think Duke spends an inordinate amount of time on our offense.

Also, I’m going on record again as being for Monken as our next HC.
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Cutcliffe has decided he'd rather lose 4 -6 games a year and beat us than actually prepare for the rest of the teams. 1-7 start against johnson really annoys him.

That's why duke tries to schedule at least 1 other option team. The hope is that extra prep can give them at least 1 win.
 
GTRX7

GTRX7

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jgtengineer said:
Cutcliffe has decided he'd rather lose 4 -6 games a year and beat us than actually prepare for the rest of the teams. 1-7 start against johnson really annoys him.

That's why duke tries to schedule at least 1 other option team. The hope is that extra prep can give them at least 1 win.
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But he also believes the option offense is incredibly dangerous for his players and should be illegal. That is why he schedules one extra option team a year. Makes sense, right?
 

steebu

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Maybe it's just me in skeptic mode ... but I didn't think the article was all that.

People spend so much time talking about defending the 3O and how to defeat it but that's just one play. I can count on one hand the number of times we ran the 3O against VT and I'd probably have five fingers left over.

What I think is more interesting and hadn't really thought about is this: CPJ has taken GT to more bigger bowls than Miami has in his tenure. Take that 4 and 5-star recruits.
 
jacketup

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steebu said:
What I think is more interesting and hadn't really thought about is this: CPJ has taken GT to more bigger bowls than Miami has in his tenure. Take that 4 and 5-star recruits.
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Johnson took GT to the Peach and Orange with Gailey's 4 star recruits from the 2007 class. Then, after that over the next 8 years he took GT to the Orange and the, um, well.......there was the TaxSlayer bowl that time.

But I agree about the article. The usual blah blah about play assignments, limited possessions (a partial myth) etc. This offense isn't about the 3O. It's about run blocking assignments, which Johnson coaches better than anyone in college ball.
 

jgtengineer

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jacketup said:
Johnson took GT to the Peach and Orange with Gailey's 4 star recruits from the 2007 class. Then, after that over the next 8 years he took GT to the Orange and the, um, well.......there was the TaxSlayer bowl that time.

But I agree about the article. The usual blah blah about play assignments, limited possessions (a partial myth) etc. This offense isn't about the 3O. It's about run blocking assignments, which Johnson coaches better than anyone in college ball.
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Taxslayer bowl is the Gator bowl which was at the same level as the peach when we went to it. The peach has only now been elevated due to the playoff. The two orange bowls are the key, once with Gailey's recruits and once with His own. The key player in both of those teams? a 4 star QB.

Guess what James Graham is.

We are about to be the biggest we have been on the DL in awhile. The fastest we have been at LB too. and the biggest and rangiest we've been in the secondary on d. OUr WR's next eyar are likely going to be a 6'5 Stephen Dolphus, a 6'2 Jalen Camp, and a 6'3 Malachi Carter.

We have 3 Qbs that will be competing for the job next year that are all over 6 foot tall, Our B-Back depth will be as experienced as it has been since 2014. Our O-line depth should be as experienced as it has been. The A-back depth is the only weak point. However im not sure we don't spread some of the b-back depth there to get an ant allen type a-back threat.

People fear us running this year. Next year, they may have to fear us doing whatever we want.
 

TheSilasSonRising

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No coach can work the TO better than CPJ. And after 11 years we are at appx. 51% vs P5.

Replacing him with someone not able to run this O as well will be suicide

- win % wise
- recruiting wise
- ticket sales wise
- public relations wise.

And GT men are just stupid enough to do it.
 

g0lftime

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Skeptic said:
That's a good piece that lends some insight into the complexities of the offense and why it might be so hard to find QBs for it. He notes hat historic Navy drive against New Mexico, but note that just Saturday Army opened the game against Air Force with a 13 minute, 21-play, 75 yard drive to score and won 17-14. And Jeff Monken's team, strictly running the football with Johnson's offense, won 10 games last year and is 7-2 this season. One of those losses was a one TD defeat to Oklahoma. (The other, unfortunately, was to an apparent common haunt, Duke, by three scores. Go figure.) The death march is still alive out there.
Click to expand...
Monken ran some shotgun against Duke when he got behind. He seems willing to try something different.
 
katlong

katlong

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I appreciate the post - good read. I do find it incredibly entertaining that everyone who writes on this subject says "it's so simple to defend against"........yeah, ok. whatever.
 
MacDaddy2

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TheSilasSonRising said:
No coach can work the TO better than CPJ. And after 11 years we are at appx. 51% vs P5.

Replacing him with someone not able to run this O as well will be suicide

- win % wise
- recruiting wise
- ticket sales wise
- public relations wise.

And GT men are just stupid enough to do it.
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I will begin by stating, for the record, that I am not a CPJ fan. That said, objectively speaking, 51% against P5 is not success, it's average, as grits. I'm not sure replacing him with a non -TO coach would be long term suicide. An Air raid coach would help in 3 of the 4 criteria you spotlight above, whether it would translate into wins is another question. The offense itself is an old man offense. It doesn't appeal to the younger set, it's boring as a baseball game in August. We sorely need younger fans in our stadium and something to appeal to them.
 

jgtengineer

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MacDaddy2 said:
I will begin by stating, for the record, that I am not a CPJ fan. That said, objectively speaking, 51% against P5 is not success, it's average, as grits. I'm not sure replacing him with a non -TO coach would be long term suicide. An Air raid coach would help in 3 of the 4 criteria you spotlight above, whether it would translate into wins is another question. The offense itself is an old man offense. It doesn't appeal to the younger set, it's boring as a baseball game in August. We sorely need younger fans in our stadium and something to appeal to them.
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I am afraid we are fighting an uphill battle with young fans in general. it is getting harder and harder to get into Tech due to volume and quality fo applicants. The cross section between people who can hack it and people who like sports in general is starting to dwindle. You build youth following through alumni and their kids and their kids friends. Unfortunately we will always be fighting with the dwags for these converts and just changing the offense isn't going to fix everyone in that kids family being a dog fan. I wish this were not the case but it is.

Though the internet is not a good measure of a general population. Among other fan bases we are starting to become a bit of a meme, like leach at wazu. That has in my opinion actually helped him out in recruiting. Football also goes in cycles. The QB situation in the NFL might actually see some more option play starting. I could easily see a down and out team picking up 3 mobile qbs and running some heavy option schemes. Hell it almost worked for denver and tebow.
 
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