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3 Questions...that haven't already been discussed to death

by tmoney35 · 9/19/2012

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tmoney35
I had to take a break from CC for a couple days (mostly because I've been out of town...oh, and that football game on Saturday may have had something to do with it), but I'm back now and have been reading up on the threads.



I have 3 questions that I haven't seen much discussion that I'd like to hear your opinions on:



1) Where are the RBs in the passing game?

So far Alisa has 5 receptions, Foote has 2 and Williams has 1.

Pass catching RBs have been a staple in our offense. Plus, in situations where our OL sucks and Riley doesn't have any time to throw, you'd think we'd be seeing more dump offs to RBs. We have some backs in Williams, Foote and Falslev that have some speed and can make people miss. Why aren't we doing more to get them the ball in space? Do they all have stone hands or something?



On that last drive on saturday, Utah was blitzing on every play, where was the screen?! A screen pass is the perfect play when the D is completely pinning its ears back for the pass rush and bringing 5-6 rushers. I didn't see one.



2) Apo?

We were joking while watching the game that you could make a good drinking game around everytime you see Apo on screen, or maybe it would be a bad drinking game since you would rarely have to take a shot. Even when he's on the field, he's mostly invisible. If it's a work ethic problem with him, that's one thing, but other than that, I can't believe we don't use him more. It also seems like we rarely have Hoffman and Apo on the field at the same time. That just seems like a HUGE waste! Having two big, fast, athletic WR running deep routes on the field at the same time should be every offensive coordinators dream. What's the deal?



3) Slow Riley

What happened to Riley's legs? I swear I remember him being really fast back when he played for USU and when he was Max's backup. Now he just looks slow out there, this last game specifically, but I've been noticing it since last year. Anyone else think that he keeps getting slower, or is my memory bad and he was never fast?
Y
YNot
tmoney35 wrote:
1) Where are the RBs in the passing game?

So far Alisa has 5 receptions, Foote has 2 and Williams has 1.

Pass catching RBs have been a staple in our offense. Plus, in situations where our OL sucks and Riley doesn't have any time to throw, you'd think we'd be seeing more dump offs to RBs. We have some backs in Williams, Foote and Falslev that have some speed and can make people miss. Why aren't we doing more to get them the ball in space? Do they all have stone hands or something?



On that last drive on saturday, Utah was blitzing on every play, where was the screen?! A screen pass is the perfect play when the D is completely pinning its ears back for the pass rush and bringing 5-6 rushers. I didn't see one.


Absolutely! Short dump passes and screens would really add to the offense. First, they are high percentage passes, so even if they only get short yardage, they move the ball closer to the chains. It also keeps the defense guessing and spreads things out. Further, give Alisa, Williams, Foote, and even Pritchard a chance to make a move and turn a short dump pass into something big.


2) Apo?

We were joking while watching the game that you could make a good drinking game around everytime you see Apo on screen, or maybe it would be a bad drinking game since you would rarely have to take a shot. Even when he's on the field, he's mostly invisible. If it's a work ethic problem with him, that's one thing, but other than that, I can't believe we don't use him more. It also seems like we rarely have Hoffman and Apo on the field at the same time. That just seems like a HUGE waste! Having two big, fast, athletic WR running deep routes on the field at the same time should be every offensive coordinators dream. What's the deal?


??? Apo has been open. Perhaps Nelson doesn't trust his hands? Can't see him?



3) Slow Riley

What happened to Riley's legs? I swear I remember him being really fast back when he played for USU and when he was Max's backup. Now he just looks slow out there, this last game specifically, but I've been noticing it since last year. Anyone else think that he keeps getting slower, or is my memory bad and he was never fast?


If Riley is struggling with back pain or injury that would explain it. One of the first things to go with back problems are the legs = reduced speed. Hopefully this isn't the case, but Riley's game takes a huge hit if his running game is limited. He is not a great pocket passer.
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tmoney35
YNot wrote:
If Riley is struggling with back pain or injury that would explain it. One of the first things to go with back problems are the legs = reduced speed. Hopefully this isn't the case, but Riley's game takes a huge hit if his running game is limited. He is not a great pocket passer.


Even before the Weber game, do you feel he's significantly slower than he used to be?



I remember even last year thinking, "I swear Riley used to be really fast." Is that just me?
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SpiffCoug
YNot wrote:
2) Apo?We were joking while watching the game that you could make a good drinking game around everytime you see Apo on screen, or maybe it would be a bad drinking game since you would rarely have to take a shot. Even when he's on the field, he's mostly invisible. If it's a work ethic problem with him, that's one thing, but other than that, I can't believe we don't use him more. It also seems like we rarely have Hoffman and Apo on the field at the same time. That just seems like a HUGE waste! Having two big, fast, athletic WR running deep routes on the field at the same time should be every offensive coordinators dream. What's the deal?


??? Apo has been open. Perhaps Nelson doesn't trust his hands? Can't see him?


Didn't Apo miss spring ball with an injury? Wasn't he held out of part of fall camp with an injury? Maybe the reason for the lack of chemistry between Riley and Apo is that Apo hasn't been on the field in practice as much as Hoffman?



Bronco alluded to this on the coaches show that Apo has struggled staying healthy and this has impacted his ability to practice which is where trust is earned.
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Lawboy
Riley's legs were on pain meds. Dude was a glassy eyed, zombie QB. Again, love the toughness, hate the actual implication of what it means. If RN can;t bring the energy--he lacked it vs. Utah because he was in zombie mode--then I do wonder how those limitations hurt the team. Can;t lead and be fiery when you a doped down on pain killers.
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YNot
Lawboy wrote:
Riley's legs were on pain meds. Dude was a glassy eyed, zombie QB. Again, love the toughness, hate the actual implication of what it means. If RN can;t bring the energy--he lacked it vs. Utah because he was in zombie mode--then I do wonder how those limitations hurt the team. Can;t lead and be fiery when you a doped down on pain killers.


With the short week, will Riley still be on pain meds? How are his legs and back? Could be another long night tomorrow if Riley doesn't have the energy.
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Mars
tmoney35 wrote:
1) Where are the RBs in the passing game?

So far Alisa has 5 receptions, Foote has 2 and Williams has 1. Pass catching RBs have been a staple in our offense. Plus, in situations where our OL sucks and Riley doesn't have any time to throw, you'd think we'd be seeing more dump offs to RBs. We have some backs in Williams, Foote and Falslev that have some speed and can make people miss. Why aren't we doing more to get them the ball in space? Do they all have stone hands or something? On that last drive on saturday, Utah was blitzing on every play, where was the screen?! A screen pass is the perfect play when the D is completely pinning its ears back for the pass rush and bringing 5-6 rushers. I didn't see one.

This is what happens when the guy you hire to do an important job has never done that job before. Doman is not a good Offensive Coordinator. He will get more time, but the returns thus far have been poor, and this is no longer his first year.
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mizzoucoug
I don't really care about #1. That's just optional play calling, but yeah it could be used more.



Apo is overrated that's all. His best skill is to catch screen passes and use his long body to trample over DB's and pick up 5 yards at a time. I don't trust him catching passes downfield anyway.



And I was very frustrated with Riley never running until the 4th quarter last week. He had plenty of chances to step up or roll out but instead he went all statue Heaps on us and got hammered. I don't know if that is playcalling or bad reads, but wow not a single roll-out pass all game for Riley is a serious trangression on Doman's part.
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Mars
mizzoucoug wrote:
Apo is overrated that's all. His best skill is to catch screen passes and use his long body to trample over DB's and pick up 5 yards at a time. I don't trust him catching passes downfield anyway.

And he magically has been ever since Heaps got benched...
J
JamieVallen
Lawboy wrote:
Riley's legs were on pain meds. Dude was a glassy eyed, zombie QB. Again, love the toughness, hate the actual implication of what it means. If RN can;t bring the energy--he lacked it vs. Utah because he was in zombie mode--then I do wonder how those limitations hurt the team. Can;t lead and be fiery when you a doped down on pain killers.

I saw you post this on another thread and I was going to let it go but... In reality and I know it probably depends on the person, but pain mess can help a whole lot mentally and physically when playing sports. Like really almost to the point of being an advantage. It's not like he was probably so doped "up" (not down) that he couldn't feel his legs. There's been times where in order to play on some of my league teams that I'm on or in high school that pain meds were needed. Personally I felt a higher sense of motivation, concentration, stamina, and speed (due to the realization of less pain). Now as I said Riley can just be totally different, but even so I highly doubt he even would of taken a high enough dose of anything that it would effect him so negatively. If I were a betting man I would say its just still his back bothering him. Back spasms are the devil, and they can more than affect you mentally and physically.



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SpiffCoug
People need to stop with the revisionist Heaps and Apo history. Heaps throwing to Apo was never great. At BEST it was average.



I went into my data base and pulled up Apo's numbers for his career and split them up by the QB throwing to them. Here's how they grade out.



Here are Apo's numbers with each QB throwing to him and his totals:

QB-----------Catches--Targets--Yards--TDs--INTs--Pct----YPA----YPC--RER----TgtsperG

Heaps---------22---------47-------258-----6-----1---46.8%--5.4---11.5--130.08--6.7

Nelson---------16---------38-------230----3-----3---45.0%--6.1---14.4--103.21---4.2

Total----------38----------85------484-----9----4----44.7%--5.7---12.7--118.07--5.7



Apo just isn't that good of a WR. He's shown flashes, but has yet to really produce on the collegiate level. Injuries have hampered him, certainly, but a guy who catches less than half his passes either isn't getting open consistently or doesn't catch well consistently.



For comparison, same breakdowns for Cody Hoffman:

QB-----------Catches--Targets--Yards--TDs--INTs--Pct----YPA----YPC--RER----TgtsperG

Heaps---------24---------44-------340----2-----0---54.5%--7.7---14.2--134.45----6.3

Nelson---------55---------68-------884----10-----1----80.9%--6.8---16.1--235.67--7.6

Total----------79--------112------1224----12---1----70.5%--9.3---15.5--195.91---7.5



Games with a 200 or better RER: Apo 3 (two with Riley, one with Heaps); Hoffman 7 (6 with Riley, one with Heaps).



Apo is NOT the solution to our offensive problems. He is NOT being held back by a QB who won't throw the ball his way. He's been getting his chances, and needs to do better with the chances he does get.



We have one semi-effective WR and one extremely effective WR. Which one should be the focus of the passing game?
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CrimsonCoug
Good stats, Spiff.

The thing that jumps out to me is the HUGE, MASSIVE jump that Hoff makes from Heaps to Nelson in completion percentage: 55% to 81%. WOW!! At the same time, the data supports the observation of most of us that Apo's been more of an after thought with Nelson--from 6.7 to 4.2; but with the likelihood of Cody catching the ball seemingly twice as high as Apo, you can hardly blame Riley.



Still, as this isn't a discussion about the QBs but rather of the WRs, I wonder if the difference in percentage between Hoff and Apo with Riley chucking the ball might be related to whether Apo was the first read when he got the ball thrown his way; or of he was the second read, but by the time RN threw it to him, Riley was less composed and so threw a poor pass, or if Ross was covered by the time the ball got to him. Not saying Cody's not a better WR, just trying to rule out other possibilities



Heaps was also throwing just over 1 pass per game (1.2) more to these two than Riley was. That's probably because Riley has a package of called draw plays where Heaps didn't. But that also means that



So two questions: 1) What is Apo and Hoff's target, catch and % for when the QB moves out of the pocket (especially when he gets flushed); 2) Do you have any information on checkdowns? How many times was RA/CH the primary, secondary, and tertiary (or higher) target? For that matter, how often did Heaps check down versus Riley? My guess without looking at the data is that neither of them did this particularly well, and THAT's a big part of the OP's first question on why there isn't more passing to the RB/FBs in the flats--they never make it that far in their progressions: Jake, perhaps because he was young, and Riley perhaps because he's just a gutty, chippy, hero who's gonna make it happen with willpower alone.



I agree with the OP's opening question. My big thing is, if Iona Pritchard is the next version of Manase Tonga, where are those swing out passes to the Full Back? Give the guy some room and let him rumble.
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tmoney35
CrimsonCoug wrote:
I agree with the OP's opening question. My big thing is, if Iona Pritchard is the next version of Manase Tonga, where are those swing out passes to the Full Back? Give the guy some room and let him rumble.


This is really the big one that bugs me. If the offensive line is doing nothing to get our RBs some space, why aren't we doing more to get them the ball in space through the air?
G
Guest
tmoney35 wrote:
I agree with the OP's opening question. My big thing is, if Iona Pritchard is the next version of Manase Tonga, where are those swing out passes to the Full Back? Give the guy some room and let him rumble.


This is really the big one that bugs me. If the offensive line is doing nothing to get our RBs some space, why aren't we doing more to get them the ball in space through the air?


Dang right.



It used to be BYU's bread and butter, but we haven't had a running back catch passes consistently since JJ, and that was way down from Harvey and Manase.
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SpiffCoug
tmoney35 wrote:
I agree with the OP's opening question. My big thing is, if Iona Pritchard is the next version of Manase Tonga, where are those swing out passes to the Full Back? Give the guy some room and let him rumble.


This is really the big one that bugs me. If the offensive line is doing nothing to get our RBs some space, why aren't we doing more to get them the ball in space through the air?

Because right now our RBs aren't doing anything with the space when they are thrown to. We've got 8 RB catches and just 44 yards.
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CrimsonCoug
SpiffCoug wrote:
CrimsonCoug wrote:
I agree with the OP's opening question. My big thing is, if Iona Pritchard is the next version of Manase Tonga, where are those swing out passes to the Full Back? Give the guy some room and let him rumble.


This is really the big one that bugs me. If the offensive line is doing nothing to get our RBs some space, why aren't we doing more to get them the ball in space through the air?

Because right now our RBs aren't doing anything with the space when they are thrown to. We've got 8 RB catches and just 44 yards.


Spiff, what's our yard per carry attempt (non QB) and our yards per pass attempt to a FB/RB?
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SpiffCoug
We've got 8 targets to our RBs.



I've also got the RBs with 67 carries for 271 yards and 2 TDs.
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tmoney35
SpiffCoug wrote:
CrimsonCoug wrote:
I agree with the OP's opening question. My big thing is, if Iona Pritchard is the next version of Manase Tonga, where are those swing out passes to the Full Back? Give the guy some room and let him rumble.


This is really the big one that bugs me. If the offensive line is doing nothing to get our RBs some space, why aren't we doing more to get them the ball in space through the air?

Because right now our RBs aren't doing anything with the space when they are thrown to. We've got 8 RB catches and just 44 yards.


So 5.5 yds/rec. What's the problem? That's a heckuva lot better than our average option yardage (I'm guessing), but that doesn't stop Doman from running it.



Plus 8 receptions is a pretty small sample size to decide it's not working.
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CrimsonCoug
SpiffCoug wrote:
We've got 8 targets to our RBs.



I've also got the RBs with 67 carries for 271 yards and 2 TDs.


Thanks, Spiff.



So that makes 5.5 yards per attempt for pass targets to RBs and just over 4 yards per carry for the same group.



There's always a chance that a target could be intercepted, so a bit of risk aversion may be warranted, but beyond that we use this personnel group better with the swing out pass than with the run.



We get about halfway to a first down with a swingout. Seems like a good tool to use. The fact that we've used this tool eight times less than the alternative, even though by a yards-per-use metric indicator it's more effective, seems a bit out of balance. Not that we should optimally use them evenly, but an 8:1 ratio is probably too little.
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SpiffCoug
tmoney35 wrote:
tmoney35 wrote:
I agree with the OP's opening question. My big thing is, if Iona Pritchard is the next version of Manase Tonga, where are those swing out passes to the Full Back? Give the guy some room and let him rumble.


This is really the big one that bugs me. If the offensive line is doing nothing to get our RBs some space, why aren't we doing more to get them the ball in space through the air?

Because right now our RBs aren't doing anything with the space when they are thrown to. We've got 8 RB catches and just 44 yards.


So 5.5 yds/rec. What's the problem? That's a heckuva lot better than our average option yardage (I'm guessing), but that doesn't stop Doman from running it.



Plus 8 receptions is a pretty small sample size to decide it's not working.

It is a small sample size. But the problem is that our TEs are averaging 13.4 ypc and our WRs are averaging 12.3. So they're considerably less productive.



Granted a pass to the WR is probably more likely to have been thrown near, at or behind the LOS, but in theory they should have more open space with which to work.



For some comparisons, in 2010, JJ DiLuigi had 443 yards on 45 catches or 9.8 ypc. In 2009, Unga had 16 catches for 121 yards or 7.6 ypc and Tonga had 30 for 271 or 9.0 ypc. In 2008, Unga had 43 for 320 or 7.4 ypc. In 2007, Unga had 44 for 655 or 14.9 ypc.



Our guys are considerably less effective than RBs in the recent past. Heck, even last year, JJ averaged 10.2 per catch and Kariya 6.8.
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