I'm optimistic

[Benton]

(12-20-2020, 05:20 PM)Bengalholic Wrote: For me, it's hard to say 'head coaching aside' when talking about replacing coordinators because the HC is also the OC, and he's been very emphatic that he'll continue to call the plays. When you're as young and inexperienced as Zac, and have failed to the extent he has, the stubbornness and refusal to try another approach is pretty damn concerning and doesn't exactly give me confidence in his management skills...along with a number of his other decisions.

Then you look at DC. They talked to established guys like Del Rio and Capers, but both said not thanks. Grantham used them to leverage a new deal with Florida. It continued to go downhill from there and we ended up with Lou. My concern is that Zac had trouble landing a quality candidate for DC when he was fresh of SB and had no record. How many experienced DC's are going to want to join a 4-27-1 (potentially) coach?
It seems likely it will be another unproven guy who's just looking for a shot at DC. 

I also think there's a chance he would keep Turner, who's pretty much family to him. His commitment to Turner's evaluations and recommendations has led to an extremely weird dedication to guys like Jordan and Hart. You talked about the money they spent in free agency, and I agree it was good to see them spend for a change. The problem was the 'plan' or direction, which again makes me call Zac's decision making into question. Mike said they gave Zac 'his way' so I have to believe it was Zac's call on who they went after. The fact that they spent 7% of the money on the o-line, after years of struggles there and having just taken a potential franchise QB was a complete head scratcher for me, to say the least. IMO, it was an ass backwards approach. 

IDK, when it comes to the possibility of Zac being back for a 3rd season, I just haven't seen much from him that inspires confidence or even demonstrates that he actually knows what he's doing / has any real direction other than a few catchphrases. I didn't mean for my post to be so much about Zac, but it's hard to talk about the staff, the team, etc without mentioning how historically bad he's been and the fact he's the guy we have to ultimately have confidence in if he's brought back. The fact is that no HC in the SB era has ever won 4 games of less in their 1st 2 seasons and survived more than halfway through a 3rd. Zero. So, bringing Zac back (assuming they do) seems like they're just delaying the inevitable.

The dc has been an issue and probably will be but I'm hopeful.

I think to get a decent one, were going to have to either throw money and picks at it and say 'look, here's all the options you've got, you're in charge of that side.' I think that would help bring in someone decent. Or we've got to go the unconventional route, which we did with gruden. People kind of scoffed at the move, but the guy was a good OC, good enough to get a hc gig.

But I'm good if they don't bring back ZT. He hasn't shown anything special. I do feel like the roster has though, maybe in spite of him