Thoughts and concerns

[*PhilHos*]

(12-18-2023, 03:10 PM)NUGDUKWE Wrote: I don't intend this to be a negative thread. I just wanted to bring up a couple of things and I thought we could put positive or negative things we've noticed.

But a common criticism I have had of Zac is his situational football. I think trick plays and short yardage gimmick plays fall under that umbrella. Taylor deserves a ton of credit for the team rallying around Browning and has silenced many of the doubters myself included. But these last few games while great we still have bad situational football. I keep hoping we will improve in this regard but it doesn't seem to be happening. The trick plays against Jax were bad and they've been talked about. But again in this game we come up with another bad trick play that could've cost us the game. Maybe like all plays you can say if it works your a genius if it doesn't your dumb. But the trick play came at the end of a solid 1st drive in a time when most teams have scripted plays on a 3rd and 1 when the offense had been moving effectively. I mean the list goes on and on why that was not a good time to run a play like that. Another play I didn't like was the tush push. I felt not only were we running well but it was not a play we should be trying in a time when we absolutely need it. Luckily Mixon bailed us out. But I think that tends to happen with failed situational football if you win it doesn't matter and if you lose there were more reasons for the loss. It's just something I think we need to address in the future as so many games come down to a field goal.

I missed the 1st 3 qtrs live and have since rewatched the game and I do want to say that it was probably one of the most exciting 4th qtrs I've seen in what feels like a while. But I also feel like we didn't scheme this game as much for Browning as we did in the 2 other games. Again the coaches deserve a ton of credit but in this game I think it was the players that really bailed us out.

I disagree about the trick play this past Sunday. Tanner Hudson is a former QB, it's 3rd and short so the defense is probably expecting a run or the QB throwing after faking a run. Credit to the Vikings defense for not being sucked in and sticking with the receivers. To me, this is no different than calling a play action pass that sees the receivers blanketed and Browning having to run out of bounds and lose yardage.

So yeah, it sucked that it didn't work, but I don't think it warrants any extra criticism aside from the mindset that we should've just run the ball.