Danny, Grevey thinks he has all the answers. Doesn’t blame any of it on Stoops. Thinks we are not conservative in our playing style. Dear God.
What Would you Say Is The Bedrock Problem With Our Program?
- Thread starter Random UK Fan
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Because Coen is not totally in charge! We've not 4+ OCs for nothing. I know a little something about one of them that I'm not at liberty to say.
He definitely is. If stoops had the input you think, Davis wouldn't have 12 carries. He completely changed offense and handed over the reigns.
You can't blame stoops for the offense. That's all coen. Now I definitely don't blame coen for all the offensive woes, because that's mostly players, but if you want to blame a coach for the offense it's coen
It is more MORE than just"slinging" it around. Sorry if you don't know that. It's why we are LAST in the country in offense. If you think Stoops would be anywhere remotely into that then you just aren't watching. It's so much more.
Don't blame it all on Marrow. He's the one guy who goes out and brings recruits to UK. Blame it on the other 5 or 6 coaches who don't hardly do anything in recruiting. But then that goes back to the head coach who hired a bunch of coaches who had no business being hired by an SEC school.
He’s the RC in charge of recruiting. I don’t pass the buck. And I’d buy the point he does yeoman work more if he beat out OSU and Michigan for guys that are their top priorities but he doesn’t.
OSU passed on Bowden, Snell, and Conrad. Michigan passed on Walker, McCall, and Rogers for their preferences. Clemson and Alabama pluck five stars from Lexington’s backyard. Louisville wasn’t beating UK for Weaver at that point in time. And so on.
I can see the 30 yard sideline route to Brown now. It’s like it was written into his contact. Which it all but was.
My broad point being: don’t expect Top 15-20 results with Top 25-35 signing classes. It can happen but not regularly (which is why I think 8 wins is good all things considered)
He’s probably the 3rd best option at receiving. Robinson is the most consistent receiver we have.
At the rate Georgia is going, tell me who is on pace to win the East? besides, divisions will be done away with after this year.
Agreed. I can't believe this hasn't been liked thus far.
Let's look at history of college football. How have programs improved their reputations?
a) Make a slam dunk hire. Let's take Miami for example. Prior to Schnelly/Johnson/Erickson, Miami was basically a .500 program who wasn't regarded much on the national scene. Schnelly showed up and won a natty......which springboarded to Johnson who won a natty and the Erickson. Now, Miami is still regarded by many as an upper tier program even though they haven't done nearly as much since then.
Now, completely understand that his is NOT a likely option. By far, most of the time when teams catch lightning in a bottle and win well, they come crashing back down. Auburn won a NC in 2010 and it didn't springboard them to a change in status. Vandy went 9-4 under Franklin 2 yrs in a row.....did nothing.
b) Longevity. Virginia Tech, Penn St, Florida State, etc. There have been a number of programs that rode a coach for a long period of time in order to change the reputation of their programs. And you could even argue that Miami would fall under this category as well given how long Schnelly/Johnson/Erickson were there.
This is a far more likely option for actually changing our program and brings us to Stoops. We all want to win more. Is Stoops our Bobby Bowden? Not likely. He drives me nuts at times. But no matter what each individual fan thinks, Stoops IS changing the perception of the program nationally. The issue is with riding a coach for a long time is that there isn't a magic target point/date to get to. About the only thing you can say is that the longer you win the less likely you'll go back to losing.
In my mind, the biggest problem is the AD and Mark Stoops. The program is in disarray b/c Stoops is no capable head coach and the AD enables him. Barnhart's unwilling to hold Stoops accountable because some of that blowback would rightfully be directed back on him personally. The only thing they will do now is to replace subordinate coaches to appease detractors that they can't ignore now. No talented assistant coach with real talent will work under Stoops ... why would they? The problem, and it's a real one, is still the same and it starts with the AD who hired Stoops and now will not/can't (by design) hold him accountable. The unwarranted contract awarded to Stoops actually served Barnhart b/c the money and terms of the Stoops contract are such that we can't afford the buyout and forces UK to retain Stoops but allows Barnhart to avoid another coaching search as he coasts into retirement, suckling on the UK teat.
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I pulled a non caring football state out of a hat and Dakota was easy to spell.
That's a fact. A few years ago, think south Carolina hires sandman guy to fly over for the UK game? No way. Same with Mizzou and Florida: beating UK is now one of their goals, because it makes or breaks their season. Each of those programs had at least one coaching change to get back to overtaking UK on the ladder.
In trying to take the next step, we lost the physical edge that made sure we kept our foot on programs like those three. Even our dominance of Florida this season was on the ground. Instead now we're losing ground. Mizzou is ahead of us and Florida is a hire away from blowing our doors off again.
Even UL is closing the gap. It'll be a tough game to win whereas in years past we just physically broke their will every time. Now instead of handing off for 8-15 yards a carry and snatching their soul, we have to hope we're completing passes to guys who will consistently catch and hold the ball.
GEt back to Kentucky football. Big physical lineman and rbs. We can absolutely couple that with what we're doing, the ratio needs to change back to the run.
Stoops has shown he can coach. Good enough for the elite level, I'm not sure. But it all comes down to recruiting, style of play and recruiting. When the top teams in the nation have more 5 stars, than we have 4 & 5 stars combined, that's a huge obstacle to overcome. You can mask it, sometimes overcome it with style of play and gimmicks. But in the end Jimmy and Joe's normally overcome X's & O's. If we had a uptempo, fun to watch, get players noticed type system we could use that to help recruiting. This slow, check and double check break from huddle system, while used in the NFL, does not translate well for college. I understand they are trying to use it as a calling card piece to get players ready for the NFL, but it's not working.
lack of identity while we are modernizing the offense, discomfort in the coaching staff with change, and total lack of discipline.
No one is saying we have to win the east. We have to be competitive with everyone we play. We have to beat the teams we are supposed to beat and beat someone we are not supposed to beat every now and then, and not get slaughtered by Ga and Bama and look like a high school team while doing so.
How many pts/plays are you going to give me with that running game? If you're going to go back to that then hand the OC reins back to EG.
This, in my view, requires two approaches to answer the same question.
Generally speaking, one huge problem is overcoming some of the worst program history spread over decades. We are so void of success, that it is extremely difficult now to compete favorably with the multitude of schools, primarily in the SEC, who do enjoy a great football history. We are in the best football conference, but we are also in the most difficult to generate winning consistently, given our futility in the past.
Specifically, for the AD and Coach Stoops, the bedrock problem is still recruiting at a low level despite being in the SEC, having a beautiful stadium and much improved SEC-caliber gameday atmosphere, having a state-of-the-art practice/training facility, and having a very passionate fan base. We have better athletes than 10-15 years ago, but we still lack "players" and still do not get them in great numbers. "Stars" in recruiting make a BIG difference. Coach Stoops has proven that recruiting will likely not get much better during his tenure, and that's why we see some good wins and still are very capable of laying some eggs.
I have little confidence in his ability to get us out of the doldrums...yes, we are better under him, but if he left today, I think there are plenty who would be excited to get their shot at making us even better.
Who cares. I know how many more wins we have this year with that offense - 2; maybe 3.
I am more entertained by winning than just scoring.
But we’ve lost the physical ability in the trenches and whatever we’ve gained in passing the ball….we’re turning it over and not scoring uptick to offset what we’ve lost in running the ball down mizzou and usc throats for years
We need to get back to physically working teams over in the trenches and get Coen ti work some passing game from there
Your talking about Neal Brown telling someone you know there was a difference in philosophy. You've said it before. But you can get that same info from a lot of articles when Brown left. Stoops wanted to get more physical cause we ranked towards the bottom in rushing yards.
Can you run pro style at Kentucky? The successful pro style teams have a full roster of five stars. Coen had his most success with a QB and WR that starts Sundays in the NFL. How many years is Kentucky going to recruit that type of talent?
Coen isn't going to speed up the pace in his pro style offense. Stoops even admitted that Scangs offense didn't even have the capability of moving faster outside of a two minute setting. We are not going to move any faster.
Consistency. I know everyone wants to blame Stoops and I certainly think when it comes to lack of discipline and coaching adjustments he takes the blame there but we won 10 games with those same issues. However, over the last two seasons, we’ve had 3 coordinators with 3 different systems. Sure Coen came back but he still was new when he took over Gran and was different than Scan. Players are recruited for systems and that’s not just skill guys.
On the defensive side of the ball, there’s been a lot of injuries, a lot of turnover with the portal. That hurts a program like UK. I just don’t think the answer is as simple as replace Stoops
On the defensive side of the ball, there’s been a lot of injuries, a lot of turnover with the portal. That hurts a program like UK. I just don’t think the answer is as simple as replace Stoops
I’d say the bedrock problem is our lack of success historically. It sucks for us now and we are doing the best we can with what we have to work with.
You are just acting very foolish due to your hatred of Stoops. What year did we have the personnel to field a passing game like the great Oklahoma and Alabama but Mark just refused? Which year did we have a QB or receivers on that level but refused to throw? When we had Levis and Wandale did he refuse to utilize them? Can you honestly not realize how stupid this sounds? You got the emphasis on passing you want this year it is just so inefficient we are where we are.
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You have to go back to the point when we started installing the outside zone, I think our line lost its identity at that point. Looking at the UF game this year, seemed like we ran a lot of inside zone which was our strength at one point. We were trapping DTs and blowing guys off the ball, may not have been hitting those medium passes but we didn’t need to. Not sure how many more we win had we stuck with that but i at least think the Mizzou and SC games. I just shake my head when I see us often go play action when we’ve abandoned our running game, things like that absolutely make no sense.
We're last in the country in offense? Pretty sure we're just last in pace and those are two different things.
The pace criticism is legit but it's aimed at the wrong guy. We need to get rid of the shifts. They do nothing at this level and just add to 1) the length of the play call x 2 (from the oc then from the QB) and 2) run even more clock down than our naturally slow operation and 3) just give young guys another opportunity to make a mistake or have more to think about.
In cfb a shift gives you very little value but adds plenty of potential for negative outcomes. Just line up, motion, and snap.
Oh, and it ain't stoops designing those plays fyi
Recruiting. We suck at recruiting WRs Qbs and pass rushers. And the last couple years we’ve sucked at recruiting the Oline and corner And it shows. They’ve just missed on a lot of guys as of late and Kentucky is a developmental program. If we miss like that it’s hard for us to recover.
And the last couple years we’ve sucked at recruiting the Oline and corner And it shows. They’ve just missed on a lot of guys as of late ,
100% agree.
White's scheme needs a lockdown corner like Carrington to shrink the field. Max has played well, but he is not true corner and was a project.
How did they not address this last season? We have DB's for a zone scheme, but no true corner.
IMO this will be portal pick up #1.
100% agree.
White's scheme needs a lockdown corner like Carrington to shrink the field. Max has played well, but he is not true corner and was a project.
How did they not address this last season? We have DB's for a zone scheme, but no true corner.
IMO this will be portal pick up #1.
If you believe your own BS I can't help you. MS is hiding his offensive ineptness/ignorance on his OCs and still believing defense is more important in cfb in 2023. Till he has a true CTJ moment like his brother Bob and even TGOAT had, his problems will continue to plague him.
We recruited a starting NFL QB and starting NFL WR through the portal. It's a philosophy issue.
Again with this stupid crap. You actually believe we have had the ability to field an Alabama/Oklahoma type passing attack but Mark simply refuses? We have tried to throw more and you see where it has gotten us so far. I am not saying scrap the goal of a great passing game I am simply saying recognize the reality of the current situation. Did you think Levis and Wandale were underused in '21?
