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My thoughts

gef21

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Jan 25, 2005
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I am going to keep this one short. No point talking about scheme and players, play calls and systems.

1. In my opinion we haven't played hard since the second half of Nebraska as a team, especially on defense. This is my biggest concern, and I have many. If you look around the B10 mid to low level teams are improving, working hard, and winning games while having fun.

I think the injuries, and collapse of the season has made us spiral. We feel sorry for ourselves that we are not having the special season. To me this is the biggest coaching failure I see. To me I see the team sitting on the edge of giving. Up.

I'm not saying everyone has checked out, and some kids are selling out, but as a team/program we look miserable. You can see it on the kids when they make mistakes, even early in games.

We preach culture, and for the first time I really don't see it.
 
I am going to keep this one short. No point talking about scheme and players, play calls and systems.

1. In my opinion we haven't played hard since the second half of Nebraska as a team, especially on defense. This is my biggest concern, and I have many. If you look around the B10 mid to low level teams are improving, working hard, and winning games while having fun.

I think the injuries, and collapse of the season has made us spiral. We feel sorry for ourselves that we are not having the special season. To me this is the biggest coaching failure I see. To me I see the team sitting on the edge of giving. Up.

I'm not saying everyone has checked out, and some kids are selling out, but as a team/program we look miserable. You can see it on the kids when they make mistakes, even early in games.

We preach culture, and for the first time I really don't see it.
That is 100% on Greg.
Too bad Pat gave him a ridiculous extension and raise. Nobody was going to steal Greg from Rutgers.
Same for KC. Ridiculous raise and extension.
Pat handed out raises and extensions throughout athletics like candy at Halloween.
 
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Agreed and this is why I said 2 weeks ago coaches (especially offensive staff) have to look themselves in the mirror. They are not putting these players in a position to succeed. Because they have done a horrific job of preparing this team. Very little emotion. Very little group coaching (I watch the sidelines in between plays to see which coaches are engaged). Outside of Flats working with his group there is very little engagement. Lots of standing around and watching. Which is not like a Schiano team. Something is off with this staff this year. Can’t put my finger on it.
 
I don’t agree that the team is not playing hard, they are. The LB play is poor, they are often out of position. The secondary is banged up and it is effecting the tackling in the secondary. You have to look at coaching and scheme on defense. The UCLA TEs killed them today. They just can’t sit in quarters coverage with 2 deep safeties. They don’t have a pass rush. USC will rip that defense up. They will need to mix coverages at USC.
 
Something went out of this team emotionally after the Nebraska loss. It was clearly evident in the Wisky debacle, and even today, though a close game, there seemed to be little fire or emotion with the team. ...They're playing with effort but not effectively or efficiently, particularly as far as something like whiffing on tackles is concerned.

And of course, being decimated by injuries doesn't help, but all teams have injuries by this point in the season. UCLA had a slew of 'em. -This coaching staff has one hell of a job ahead of them over the next weeks to try to get this team back on track, and USC certainly won't be an easy first step to have to take.
 
Maybe Nebraska was a red hering? Washington, Wisconsin and UCLA have absolutely lit our defense up. Nebraska is actually just an average team at best on offense (probably will finish with 6 losses).

Today we seemed interested in making a hit instead of wrapping up when we had a chance to make a tackle.

UCLA didn't do anything different this week. Did the staff watch the tape for the wrong opponent? Did some of the staff take some PTO during the week? Did the UCLA rb's sneak in an invisibility cloak? Garber missed a completely uncovered Berger 2x but hit Jones for the easy TD.

The game has passed GS's defensive scheme/philosophy by.
 
That is 100% on Greg.
Too bad Pat gave him a ridiculous extension and raise. Nobody was going to steal Greg from Rutgers.
Same or KC. Ridiculous raise and extension.
Pat handed out raises and extensions throughout athletics like candy at Halloween.
@Knight Shift I was briefly in the hoitey toitey club..not really my bag, a whole bunch of peep gorging on unhealthy food and not paying attention to the game
 
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That is 100% on Greg.
Too bad Pat gave him a ridiculous extension and raise. Nobody was going to steal Greg from Rutgers.
Same or KC. Ridiculous raise and extension.
Pat handed out raises and extensions throughout athletics like candy at Halloween.
Unfortunately, that’s the rule in college athletics rather than the exception…lemmings.
 
I'm not saying everyone, but the lack of effort from some makes me wonder, are they just playing to not get hurt, with every intention of making bank next year someplace else. We have heard about the endless (legal) tampering, well the lack of effort, and visible care makes me wonder.

With this system it is not about the program anymore. It is about personal finances.
 
Agreed and this is why I said 2 weeks ago coaches (especially offensive staff) have to look themselves in the mirror. They are not putting these players in a position to succeed. Because they have done a horrific job of preparing this team. Very little emotion. Very little group coaching (I watch the sidelines in between plays to see which coaches are engaged). Outside of Flats working with his group there is very little engagement. Lots of standing around and watching. Which is not like a Schiano team. Something is off with this staff this year. Can’t put my finger on it.

Its been my impression that Schiano wants to be perceived as deferring to the coordinators and position coaches. He talks about KC as if KC is running the offense independent of Schiano when KC runs the offense GS wants.

I'm not ready to dump GS because Ash 2.0 is a very likely .
A football savvy AD is needed to brings a sense of reality about the schematic futility people see.
Army did that with Corrigan and Monken
Constantly playing "not to lose" doesn't work vs decent B1G teams in 2024.
What SEC team plays "not to lose" ?
If GS was given Harbaugh's title-winning Michigan players they would quickly be tied-up in knots playing safe
 
How will a team like Rutgers ever build quality depth in an era of NIL?

We can’t have offense and defensive philosophies that require nearly every position to play like a 4-star player. It can’t be that 1 or 2 injuries essentially destroy the integrity of the scheme.

We ought to be running schemes where it’s easier to plug and play players as they come and go.

On offense, that’s Air Raid where everything is simplified — just get really good at running a handful of formations/concepts.

On defense, that’s an attacking style where you are given one assignment and defenders are doing less “reading”. That lends itself to more single-gap, blitzing and man coverage.

You can get newer and/or younger players on the field with greater success if they don’t have to worry about too many different things mentally.

Anyway, just talking out loud in an effort to calm myself down.
 
Its been my impression that Schiano wants to be perceived as deferring to the coordinators and position coaches. He talks about KC as if KC is running the offense independent of Schiano when KC runs the offense GS wants.

I'm not ready to dump GS because Ash 2.0 is a very likely .
A football savvy AD is needed to brings a sense of reality about the schematic futility people see.
Army did that with Corrigan and Monken
Constantly playing "not to lose" doesn't work vs decent B1G teams in 2024.
What SEC team plays "not to lose" ?
If GS was given Harbaugh's title-winning Michigan players they would quickly be tied-up in knots playing safe
I’m not ready to dump Schiano either. I was hoping he truly learned from his time at Ohio state. I have been saying the last 2 years that playcalling was designed not to lose and I was ridiculed on this board for saying so. He needs to shake up his staff and his offensive philosophy in order to survive and prosper. The players deserve better.
 
I'm not saying everyone, but the lack of effort from some makes me wonder, are they just playing to not get hurt, with every intention of making bank next year someplace else. We have heard about the endless (legal) tampering, well the lack of effort, and visible care makes me wonder.

With this system it is not about the program anymore. It is about personal finances.
That makes the .most sense. Split allegiance. They don't have to sing The Fight Song at every practice but individuality seems more important then team. Should not question when you're open field tackling you might get hurt.
You play for your brothers too.
 
I’m not ready to dump Schiano either. I was hoping he truly learned from his time at Ohio state. I have been saying the last 2 years that playcalling was designed not to lose and I was ridiculed on this board for saying so. He needs to shake up his staff and his offensive philosophy in order to survive and prosper. The players deserve better.
He’s prospering plenty: earning 2x what he’s delivered, and increasing every year for another five. Complete botched contract and in a few years there may be more players and staff on the field than fans in the stands. And oh yeah, it’s not Ash’s fault
 
Maybe Nebraska was a red hering? Washington, Wisconsin and UCLA have absolutely lit our defense up. Nebraska is actually just an average team at best on offense (probably will finish with 6 losses).

Today we seemed interested in making a hit instead of wrapping up when we had a chance to make a tackle.

UCLA didn't do anything different this week. Did the staff watch the tape for the wrong opponent? Did some of the staff take some PTO during the week? Did the UCLA rb's sneak in an invisibility cloak? Garber missed a completely uncovered Berger 2x but hit Jones for the easy TD.

The game has passed GS's defensive scheme/philosophy by.
they can't wrap up, it won't look good on social media.........you need to make the ronnie lot highlight reel tackle with the shoulder so the running back can become a pin ball.
 
I am going to keep this one short. No point talking about scheme and players, play calls and systems.

1. In my opinion we haven't played hard since the second half of Nebraska as a team, especially on defense. This is my biggest concern, and I have many. If you look around the B10 mid to low level teams are improving, working hard, and winning games while having fun.

I think the injuries, and collapse of the season has made us spiral. We feel sorry for ourselves that we are not having the special season. To me this is the biggest coaching failure I see. To me I see the team sitting on the edge of giving. Up.

I'm not saying everyone has checked out, and some kids are selling out, but as a team/program we look miserable. You can see it on the kids when they make mistakes, even early in games.

We preach culture, and for the first time I really don't see it.

Wanted to get your insight.

From an offensive scheme perspective why do we never seem to throw to a TE open in space in over the middle/deep-middle? Is it that we keep them in to block, a talent issue or some other scheme issue? UCLA consistently carved us up this way. AK seems to mainly throw to the sidelines (think I counted only a few yesterday over the middle). I think this is prevalent in most games.
 
So much for going 1-and-0 each week, one week at a time
Kyle Flood did it better. Lob all the hate you want, but he was a realist. And he had the best Rutgers offense ever in the B1G in 2014, with a "signature" win over a "hokey" Michigan. 😁

This is not altered, an oldie but a goodie --was it a typo by Gannet (mycentraljersey/app/north jersey) or the work of a prankster?

buuEPCO.jpg
 
@Knight Shift I was briefly in the hoitey toitey club..not really my bag, a whole bunch of peep gorging on unhealthy food and not paying attention to the game
I would not call it hoitey-toitey- and you are 100% right on the food. It's gone downhill since we started in the club 5 or so years ago. You have to "shop" carefully to find the high protein/low fat items. Chicken, pork, and avoid all the fried garbage and desserts.
 
I would not call it hoitey-toitey- and you are 100% right on the food. It's gone downhill since we started in the club 5 or so years ago. You have to "shop" carefully to find the high protein/low fat items. Chicken, pork, and avoid all the fried garbage and desserts.
Funny I noticed the same issue at the lofts in Prudential. Used to be more than enough sensible options. Fresh carving station, tenderloin, turkey, pork loin etc… with an assortment of vegetable options. Now it’s one protein option that isn’t fried. And carbohydrates and sugar.
 
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Funny I noticed the same issue at the lofts in Prudential. Used to be more than enough sensible options. Fresh carving station, tenderloin, turkey, pork loin etc… with an assortment of vegetable options. Now it’s one protein option that isn’t fried. And carbohydrates and sugar.
Make Club Food Healthy Again? MCFHA? Does have a ring to it. Also could be construed to be More Carbs, Fat, Heart Attacks. Don't miss bad carb and fried food a bit. French fries and deep fried foods are disgusting to me. Sorry for the diversion, but the holier than thou food choices are my only solace this morning. Maybe the Mets will deliver some joy.

USC will be fun either way. I might wear Trojan gear, and hopefully I will score with that! 😜
 
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Not that it would have made a difference in Saturday's debacle, but I thought I saw way too many times RU guys trying to pry the ball lose from the ball carrier instead of making the friggin tackle.
 
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How will a team like Rutgers ever build quality depth in an era of NIL?

We can’t have offense and defensive philosophies that require nearly every position to play like a 4-star player. It can’t be that 1 or 2 injuries essentially destroy the integrity of the scheme.

We ought to be running schemes where it’s easier to plug and play players as they come and go.

On offense, that’s Air Raid where everything is simplified — just get really good at running a handful of formations/concepts.

On defense, that’s an attacking style where you are given one assignment and defenders are doing less “reading”. That lends itself to more single-gap, blitzing and man coverage.

You can get newer and/or younger players on the field with greater success if they don’t have to worry about too many different things mentally.

Anyway, just talking out loud in an effort to calm myself down.

This is reflective of what I've been saying about NIL for the last several years.

The original vision of NIL - allowing players to seek compensation for use of their name, image and likeness, wasn't particularly disruptive. But its Wild West implementation, which is nothing more than a pay for play scheme, is IMO fatally disruptive. It ensures the ability of deep-pocket schools to get the best players. It ultimately results in a "Big 20" (or 10, or 25, or whatever) being able to collect all of the top-tier talent while all of the other schools are battling for 3-star players and minor bowls.

The only way for those schools to be competitive, going forward, is to be innovative. Whatever positive things you can say about Greg, "innovative" is most assuredly not one of them.

NIL has been the "MTV moment" of college revenue sports - "video killed the radio star", etc. One of the reasons I decided to give up my season tickets, after 37 years, was that I wasn't comfortable resetting my expectations to something like "reasonable" while being forced to pay more and more money each year.

Schiano is the 8th highest paid coach among the 18 B1G coaches, only a few shekels behind James Franklin. Rutgers will struggle to become bowl-eligible this season. It's not unrealistic to say that we're overpaying for average results, we have consistently done so (with the peculiar exception of Kyle Flood) and the overall value prop is not likely to improve. There are still people in this fan base - in this very thread - who insist that "Schiano is the best coach we can get for the money", which to me is sadly absurd given that he's been beaten this season by two coaches who, combined, make only $1M more than he does.

The status quo will continue for a few more years. We'll run out Greg's contract, the fans will be asked to pay more each year for season tickets and parking while at the same time being relentlessly solicited to write checks to the NIL collectives, AKA "player compensation funds" and it still won't be enough to compete with the top-tier teams stacked with megadonors and the ability to siphon off the best players, at will. By that time, IMO, football will be resolving into two very specific levels of play - one "super conference" and "the rest", which will likely be comprised of a level of regionalization that looks a lot like 30 or 40 years ago. Broadcast money will be heavily weighted toward the top tier and the lesser schools will be looking at increasing budget deficits within their football programs, at which point the necessary adjustments will be made, further degrading the product.
 
We are going to look back at the BCS as the Golden Age of college football.

Truly special and memorable games.

Now the importance of the regular season is diminished due to the expanded playoffs.

And bowl games outside the actual title game don’t mean squat which is why players opt out.
 
Not that it would have made a difference in Saturday's debacle, but I thought I saw way too many times RU guys trying to pry the ball lose from the ball carrier instead of making the friggin tackle.
They're too hurt from injuries they're masking or that they haven't recovered from. That's part of why they haven't been tackling successfully as well.
 
To me this game was lost on the opening drive, when UCLA carved up our defense like a hot knife through butter. It’s embarrassing to win the opening coin toss and defer, only to let your opponent march straight down the field for a TD.

And what’s with all the fair catches on kickoffs? The opposing kicker is probably told, hey don’t strain your leg kicking it through the end zone, just get it to the 10-yard line and Rutgers will down it. Sorry but we look like pussies especially when our KR appears to have room to run.

And our defensive strategy seemed like, let’s not cover their tight ends or passes to their running backs. And by the way give all their receivers plenty of room to catch the ball, especially over the middle. If they need 12 yards for a first down, let’s backpedal until we’ve given them a 13-yard cushion.

And shouldn’t we have some type of deception or trick play just for 2-point conversions, which are usually only attempted in somewhat desperate or rare catch-up situations?

So frustrating in so many ways. VaTech and Washington must be thinking, how the hell did we lose to these guys?
 
To me this game was lost on the opening drive, when UCLA carved up our defense like a hot knife through butter. It’s embarrassing to win the opening coin toss and defer, only to let your opponent march straight down the field for a TD.

And what’s with all the fair catches on kickoffs? The opposing kicker is probably told, hey don’t strain your leg kicking it through the end zone, just get it to the 10-yard line and Rutgers will down it. Sorry but we look like pussies especially when our KR appears to have room to run.

And our defensive strategy seemed like, let’s not cover their tight ends or passes to their running backs. And by the way give all their receivers plenty of room to catch the ball, especially over the middle. If they need 12 yards for a first down, let’s backpedal until we’ve given them a 13-yard cushion.

And shouldn’t we have some type of deception or trick play just for 2-point conversions, which are usually only attempted in somewhat desperate or rare catch-up situations?

So frustrating in so many ways. VaTech and Washington must be thinking, how the hell did we lose to these guys?
Good thing we played Howard and Akron early else they’d beat us in October too.
 
That is 100% on Greg.
...
I don't buy that.

I think the problem is on ALL OF US.

The media hyped this team beyond what was reasonable.. and many here bought into it. how could the players not do the same thing. Maybe coach did have some positive things to say preseason.. but nothing like what others were saying.

I think that caused teh players to expect being a CFP team or coming close to that, for example.

And count me among those that think key injuries could create a collapse scenario that seems worse (seems? I meant IS WORSE) than losing only a few players. I think that is possible AND that it has happened on defense... and quite possibly on the OL too... to a lesser extent.

So, I do think the players are disappointed. Their expectations have not been met. They don't know what they are playing for now. And some of the results have been disheartening.

Whether Coach Schiano can reset their attitudes and avoid them quitting.. that may be the measuring post for GS now. And if they do "quit".. what does that say about this process fo finding players that "fit"?

When Flood had problems with behavior and in the lockerroom, I chalked it up to lack of real leadership in the lockerroom.. if they had that then those crimes.. and they were crimes.. would never have occurred. Because the leaders would know what everyone was up to and would sniff out and stop nonsense right away.

Are the leaders who could prevent "quitting" hurt? Has their ability to lead despite being injured disappeared?

Lets see what happens. Boot and rally.

 
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Lot of bad plays and decisions. To me the worse was letting them score the TD just before the half and that turned out to be more than the difference. The only team that may be more disappointed than us is USC after losing to Maryland and being 1-4 in conference after being rated a top 10 team and contender to win the conference pre season.
 
Schiano is the 8th highest paid coach among the 18 B1G coaches, only a few shekels behind James Franklin. Rutgers will struggle to become bowl-eligible this season. It's not unrealistic to say that we're overpaying for average results, we have consistently done so (with the peculiar exception of Kyle Flood) and the overall value prop is not likely to improve. There are still people in this fan base - in this very thread - who insist that "Schiano is the best coach we can get for the money", which to me is sadly absurd given that he's been beaten this season by two coaches who, combined, make only $1M more than he does.


This excludes NW coaching salary. Where are you getting 8th of 18 from? Or did u think we agreed not to fact check?
 

This excludes NW coaching salary. Where are you getting 8th of 18 from? Or did u think we agreed not to fact check?
Yeah, the article says:

"Greg Schiano is scheduled to make $6.25 million this year, which ranks him 12th out of the 17 Big Ten coaching salaries publicly revealed in a USA TODAY database released Wednesday."

But also, "UCLA's DeShaun Foster is the lowest paid at $3.25 million."

Roughly half the cost of Greg, and . . . . .the result.
 
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This excludes NW coaching salary. Where are you getting 8th of 18 from? Or did u think we agreed not to fact check?
I've mentioned this in the other thread but as far as order it can be a little misleading/inaccurate if looked at in a different way. This list looks at the current year rather the average over the life of the deal and everyone is in different areas of their deal. Don't know what the order is when you take that into account.

GS's makes 6.25M this year but his deal is 7M/yr over the life of it. Matt Rhule is making 6.5M this year but his deal averages over 9M/yr over the life of it. Bielema is ranked higher in this current year but I think his deal averages 6.375M/yr over the life of it.
 
That is 100% on Greg.
Too bad Pat gave him a ridiculous extension and raise. Nobody was going to steal Greg from Rutgers.
Same for KC. Ridiculous raise and extension.
Pat handed out raises and extensions throughout athletics like candy at Halloween.
These extension with these results is going to make it harder to get a real seasoned AD to come here. No AD is going to want to watch this team keeping going backwards and not have the ability or funding to pull the plug of a coach and his staff.

We are probably going to wind up with some up and coming associate AD.
 
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