DeaconSig
Well-known member
Keep in mind you're judging them based on what they did under an ineffective prior staff. Clawson has done everything we could ask for so far. It's not too much to believe that he could make some major breakthroughs this Spring and Fall before stepping on the field.
I appreciate the positivity, but there is a bit of a dynamic that ends up setting up Clawson for failure in this post. I think there is a way to objectively judge the talent in your program irrespective of the staff coaching it. Bad staffs certainly get the least out of their talent, and good staffs maximize what they have. But the talent in the program actually matters. And right now, we don't have a lot of it at key positions. Bringing in highly ranked recruits is great, but football is a sport where recruiting is best judged 2-3 years later- its not like basketball where a couple of talented freshman can come in and really impact an otherwise pedestrian team.
I'd bet we will end up with a better offensive line this year than last, just based on coaching and a workable scheme. We should be able to upgrade our WRs overall (group vs. just Campanero) for the same reasons, although who knows how much we will notice it given the gaping hole we have at QB. RBs will most likely suck, although that is the position where it is easiest to have a true freshman contribute.
On D, our secondary should be good, our linebackers average, and our DL should be pretty horrible, especially should any of the guys get nicked up.
I think there are ways to judge a coach outside of wins and losses for his first few years. If Coach Clawson can both put a team on the field that plays hard, competitive, relatively mistake-free football that shows a coherent offensive system and also recruits at a level above Grobe, I will be very satisfied with this year. If we go 0-8 in conference, get run off the field more often than not, and look like a fucking train wreck on O (otherwise known as the NCSU approach), then I will be much more concerned.
We don't have a bowl team this year. So I really don't care about the difference between 3-9 and 4-8.