More time on special teams?

Jacobs4Heisman · Post by **Jacobs4Heisman** » Wed Sep 13, 2006 9:04 am

These quotes don't give me warm fuzzy feelings. Doesn't sound to me like he's planning on doing all that much differently.

Not to mention he threw his fresman kicker (who was injured) under the bus. I wish I was surprised. That was my favorite part.

(On special teams and the punting game in particular)
"We are talking about the obvious stuff, how to do a better job of protecting. The one that got blocked the other night was a high snap; we didn't do a good job at blocking that guy. We have to look at how we are doing that. The same thing happened against Wisconsin, so if we need to tweak the scheme then we will do it. But we blocked the same way last year and that particular deal never showed up. (Alonso) Rojas will keep getting better; he is a talented kid. To put the double duty on him (kicking and punting) Saturday, I think, might have been too much. And then, we don't protect him -- we need to protect on him."

(On preaching special teams)
"We don't spend an inordinate time on special teams, but we spend enough time on special teams to execute, and what's frustrating is that we're not executing. I don't know if more time is the answer; I think it's a personnel thing that we have to work through. Our kickers have to continue to improve. We need to kick the ball -- on the kickoff they returned (for a score), the kid caught it on a dead run. When the ball was in his hands we had only one guy across the 40. I am just stating the obvious. We have to do a better job in the kicking game, and we will."

I hear a lot of excuses here, and no plan for correcting the problems. As far as talking to the media goes, he's damned if he does, damned if he don't in this situation. There's really not much he can say that's going to quell our fears until we see it on the field. But still, these quotes don't make me think he's really changing anything.

Warthog · Post by **Warthog** » Wed Sep 13, 2006 9:21 am

One thing that I have yet to see mentioned is that we did switch long snappers at some point in the game. I didn't notice it Saturday, but the weekly media notes mention that FR Craig Rutherford (Eastwood) filled in at long snapper against Buffalo. On the depth chart, he is now listed as second at LS. Every other depth chart this year only listed Cutler at LS. No mention if this change was due to injury or ineffectiveness.

Flipper · Post by **Flipper** » Wed Sep 13, 2006 9:24 am

I don't think the coach needs to convey a sense that he's obsessed with the play of the special teams...that will only increase the pressure on the kids to perform. He's basically saying "stay calm and execute". I don't have a problem with that approach.

Jacobs4Heisman · Post by **Jacobs4Heisman** » Wed Sep 13, 2006 9:26 am

Warthog wrote:One thing that I have yet to see mentioned is that we did switch long snappers at some point in the game. I didn't notice it Saturday, but the weekly media notes mention that FR Craig Rutherford (Eastwood) filled in at long snapper against Buffalo. On the depth chart, he is now listed as second at LS. Every other depth chart this year only listed Cutler at LS. No mention if this change was due to injury or ineffectiveness.

He did say it was a personnel issue, so maybe that's one change already made. I think we might see some more ST issues in the next couple weeks just because I think we'll be putting a lot of new guys out there. As long as it's in the name of fixing it long term, have at it.

Rollo83 · Post by **Rollo83** » Wed Sep 13, 2006 12:10 pm

I wonder if the "personel issues" means that we'll see more starters playing special teams?

Falconfreak90 · Post by **Falconfreak90** » Wed Sep 13, 2006 3:46 pm

Rollo83 wrote:I wonder if the "personel issues" means that we'll see more starters playing special teams?

That's what I'm thinking.