About a week ago, Antonio Gonzalez of the Associated Press wrote an article recapping Stanford's season. It is a fine article, and you can read the rest of it HERE.
One quote in the article really struck me:
"I'll try to look back on the season and learn some lessons," Shaw said. "Schematically, there were some things we could have done better, but I never lament. I don't go back and say, 'What if?' I'm a big believer in looking forward. Learn from what's happened in the past. I've always believed that and these guys have cemented that."
If you are a regular reader of Rule of Tree you too are likely quite excited by this quote. So many have attempted to diagnose Stanford's 5 losses but one (actually several) of our readers hit the nail on the head in a comment on a recent post:
For those of you that cannot read the comment, the relevant line is:
"The season was an indictment not of the level of talent in the program, but of the coaching staff's inability to use talent when it does not immediately fit the scheme."
This season's problems had little to do with lack of talent, or the inability to replace key players on offense. Stanford did not lose five games solely because of poor performance in the red zone or Kevin Hogan forcing passes to Ty Montgomery (those now appear to be symptoms, not causes). Stanford lost five games this season in large part because David Shaw ran an offensive scheme that did not capitalize on his players' strengths. Coach Shaw wanted to go big up the middle, but the players' talents were suited to a more open passing attack.
If Shaw altered the offensive scheme earlier in the season would Stanford have won the PAC 12 and made the playoffs? I am not prepared to go that far, but I certainly would have loved to see the Stanford offense that showed up against Cal, UCLA, and Maryland line up against the likes of Oregon, Ohio State, Alabama and certainly Florida State.
I do not want to read too much into Coach Shaw's quote, but it sounds like he is acknowledging that at times he attempted to (if I may borrow a line from one of our readers: Pugesh) fit a square peg into a round hole on offense and that we should expect to see less of that next season. It almost sounds as if Coach Shaw is telling us that next year we might expect the type of success the Stanford offense saw at the end of this season (though not necessarily the same type of scheme) as opposed to the Stanford offense we saw against Notre Dame and USC. If that does not get you excited about next season then I do not know what will.
Comments
Every year is different and every team is different
What happens if Kevin Hogan doesn’t come back? I don’t think the offense that we ran the past three games would fit the skill sets of Crower, Chryst, or Burns. It would again be trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. Properly evaluating, and knowing, your personnel’s strengths and weaknesses is the key to coming up with a scheme that would fit their skill set. Just cause something worked at the end of this year, doesn’t mean that it’ll work next year, just like what worked last year (and the previous three) didn’t work this year.
It all starts with the most important player on the field, Hogan, and hopefully he comes back. Once you know who will be your QB, then you can begin planning an offensive scheme that takes advantage of his strengths. This is why I’ve never been a fan of long-drawn out QB competitions. If Kevin leaves, (please don’t leave!), then I think the coaching staff needs to quickly decide who the next QB1 will be and how to best take advantage of that person’s skills, not just look back at what went well this season and duplicate it in 2015. We’ll be right back here having this same conversation and lamenting close losses.
I also think a very underrated aspect of the success at the end of the season was the play of the OL. The last three games, they finally played like many – me included – expected them to play all season. However, this group will again be in transition as Peat is leaving, with Murphy presumably moving over to LT to take over his spot and Brendan Austin and Casey Tucker competing for the RT spot. How long will it take this new unit to gell? Again, different year, different line.
By Spider2-Y-Banana on 01.08.15 2:43pm
If Hogan doesn't come back . .
And Shaw is still capable of adapting an offense to his players’ talents then we wont see a high flying offense, but an offense that still works well.
"Properly evaluating, and knowing, your personnel’s strengths and weaknesses is the key to coming up with a scheme that would fit their skill set." - Completely agree, and from the Shaw quote I think we can infer that he will work on getting better at that.
I think I may have obscured my main point that it sounds as though Shaw is going to work on adapting his offensive scheme to his players talents. I’m going to try and edit the final paragraph so that it doesn’t sound as though Shaw was saying that we will run the exact same offense as the final 3 games.
By nickdempsey on 01.08.15 4:07pm
Sorry, I mistunderstood you
Nick, thanks for the clarification and for editing the final paragraph. I thought you were inferring that Shaw was alluding to running the same style of offense that we saw at the end of the season.
I think the key for Shaw and company will be identifying those adjustments earlier during the season. Let’s hope we see the same efficiency that we saw at the end of the season, no matter the offensive scheme!
By Spider2-Y-Banana on 01.08.15 6:43pm
Yep
Let’s keep Hogan, though.
If he stays, we have the canniest, most experienced and most, I don’t know, "gamer", QB in the league. People like to talk crap about Hogan, but I think other teams fear him when they look at tapes like the UCLA games the past few years, the Oregon games before this year. etc. Also gives Chryst another year to learn the 10,000 page playbook …
By Brendan Ross on 01.09.15 5:01am
Spot on
It absolutely starts with Hogan. People may have been down on him this year, but considering he was dealing with the loss of his father, and an offensive scheme that didn’t play to his strengths, he actually played well.
You can often see the value of someone through the eyes of another team’s fan base. When speculation came out that Hogan may be a possible transfer candidate, several other high-profile programs were delighted at the possibility of landing him. We, the Cardinal fan base, should be just as excited (if not more) if he decides to stay for his SR season.
By Spider2-Y-Banana on 01.09.15 9:18am
Most Important
Team ? or one, or even 3-4 backs..?
Kevin Hogan prefers team
from what I’ve seen
and’s why, they got his back..
..with the OL you’re back
on track…
there’s incredible depth
there
with Oser n others
for numerous combos
without discounting continuity
it wood seam
By maddogsfavsnpiks on 01.15.15 2:09pm
This seems precisely backwards to me
If it were the case that we needed to start passing more, why is that our best offensive games were the ones with the most running plays on first down? http://thecardboard.org/board/index.php/topic,11492.msg110290.html#msg110290
I really don’t think this is as simple as "We called too few XXXX plays", but if it is it seems like your conclusion is completely backwards. That shows how hard this actually is to figure out.
By stupac2 on 01.08.15 3:26pm
Didn't mean to suggest we should run the exact same plays that we ran in the final 3 games
What I was attempting to convey, and perhaps I failed, was that Shaw was running an offensive scheme for which he did not have the players. My ultimate point was Shaw needs to get better at adapting his scheme to the talents of his players. If he does that, then we should expect to see similar types of success that we saw at the end of the season, not similar plays.
By nickdempsey on 01.08.15 4:00pm
I've made an edit or two to hopefully make my point more clear.
By nickdempsey on 01.08.15 4:02pm
Is Shaw The Square Peg?
Honestly, I am not comforted one bit by David Shaw’s soundbites. His "adaptations" this year were way late and all too obvious to do, and arguably forced a bit by Ty Montgomery’s unavailability. Despite being obvious modifications, they nonetheless seemed to work (as we all expected months ago). But I have a really hard time giving a coach "credit" for implementing these adjustments about 11 games too late.
Given Shaw’s intransigence this year in the face of fairly obvious and predictable challenges/limitations, I am scared to death of Hogan not returning. Can a coach who fails to "tweak" be truly ready to undertake a successful QB change? Heck…………..we had Josh Nunes for longer that we should have. I would be afraid that we would see Evan Crower out there because "he is familiar with the playbook" rather than a more talented passer. Don’t want to go there.
My personal take on the season is that the offensive line finally gelling allowed the Stanford offense to be more successful. Holes were being opened and drive killing penalties stopped occurring. That permitted Hogan to do what he does best. And even allowed Remound Wright to find the end zone. Hogan also had some off games this year, which I can very easily attribute to personal issues surrounding his father.
I am not sure if Shaw learned any lessons this year. He may view the last several games as validating his strategy, just that it took a while for the team to "execute it" effectively. To some extent, that is true (the offensive line coming around). But that doesn’t excuse a lack of effort to work around this limitation earlier in the year.
Shaw has proven to be a great recruiter, a good leader of the program and a fine representative of the university. But this year’s problems were also evident in previous seasons – we just lost fewer games. Shaw clearly needs to adapt better, be somewhat more aggressive in his approach to the game (no punts on the opponent’s 30 yard line please) rather than playing percentages, and to get an offensive coordinator who will live, breathe and call the Stanford offensive game plan. David Shaw is a head coach……and a good one. He needs to learn to delegate or listen to others more on the offensive side of the ball.
Having said all of that, I am very glad how the season ended (we played like a top 10 – 15 team) and am looking forward to next year! GO CARDINAL!
By hoyaparanoia on 01.09.15 11:50am
Playing the percentages
I agree with you 99% Hoya!
However one of most frustrating things is that I’m almost certain shaw doesn’t play the percentages.
I think a statistical analysis would show his punt / FG / go for it decisions are highly sub-optimal.
If we can’t get a more aggressive OC, maybe we can just get a stats major to generate a table of what to do inside the opponents 40. ;)
By WhatDoestheTreeSay? on 01.09.15 1:17pm
Fair Enough
Chip Kelly has that study! And yes, the percentages would dictate a different game plan. I guess what I meant was Shaw’s preference for playing it safe ("avoiding losing") which translates into running when you might pass (avoiding a 0 gain or a potential interception), punting when you might go for it or kick a field goal (avoiding a negative field position outcome) and generally not trying to put the ball in the end zone unless it is in the normal course of the offense.
While I do not have the official study, I think the plan inside the 40 is to TRY TO SCORE!
By hoyaparanoia on 01.09.15 11:32pm
Great Summary
I tend to be optimistic; and although I was dreadfully frustrated with Shaw’s lack of adjustment during the season, I still hope that he’s learned one vital lesson: playing not to lose leads to losses. He got away with that style (to a certain extent) in 2012 and 2013 and managed two Pac-12 championships. We avoided a number of losses simply because we were far enough ahead to withstand the rallies (thinking here particularly about our 2013 regular-season clash with ASU). But there were unnecessary losses in those two years, as well (Washington and Notre Dame in 2012, Utah and USC in 2013); and these losses certainly compromised the season and took us out of national title contention. Nonetheless, playing to avoid the loss (instead of to win) seemed to be working for him, so he did even more of it this year and became even more conservative. And the losses started piling up. Five in total. He didn’t start winning again until there was little left to lose. Lesson learned? I hope he’s smart enough. After all, he did graduate from Stanford.
By Jeff Tarnungus on 01.12.15 7:29am
I still say give him another year.
He’s still a young HC and this year forced some changes and he didn’t seem to handle it well at least schematically or personnel wise. Though if Hogan does not come back and he is not afforded the opportunity to take lessons from the end of this year into next season with largely the same group, then he needs to be able to evaluate the roster and tailor the playbook for the new QB. I will be at the Spring Game to see how it goes regardless of Hogan’s status.
I watched Jimbo Fisher get mired in the demand for an OC too and that worked out okay. Though to be fair, those years could never compare to what we all saw from Shaw’s offense this year. May as well have come out and punted on first down. I don’t know how much we can read into his quote but I do have faith that the ability to be a great offense is at least on the roster and the coaching has at least used it effectively late in the year. So the data is there on tape, and Shaw is perhaps leaning on that tape, but we have to wait and see.
Still gotta give him another year at it though. If the offense is as bad next year then I would hope the AD would force Shaw to bring in an OC.
By Pugseh on 01.12.15 11:42am
Def in 2015 requires filling more holes than Off
More talent is leaving key slots on Def than we lost last year: DLine, DBs.
By ADPATERSON on 01.09.15 2:36pm
Agree
A great defense is not a Cardinal birthright.
By Jeff Tarnungus on 01.12.15 7:30am
TBF
We all thought the same thing coming into this year.
Though even MORE of the greats from the past 2-3 seasons will be gone coming into next year. It is a worry, but losing players and plugging holes is a worry every single season on every single team.
I have faith in the defensive coaches to get it done.
By Pugseh on 01.12.15 11:44am
2015
The problem with that is we’re losing an awful lot on defense, especially with both Carter and Lyons going pro early, that we’ll have to rely on our offense a lot more. I don’t know that the offense we saw even the last three games will be enough if they don’t have the defense to crutch on at times. Almost all the offense from the bowl game will be back if Hogan returns, so we could be really good on offense, but the whole O needs to step forward not just to average or slightly above average but all the way to really good if we want to challenge for the playoffs, and I just don’t have faith in Shaw or the coaching staff to get us there.
I think we’ll be a good team again next year, and we might even win the pac-12 north depending on how far Oregon falls back, but it feels like we missed our window to win a national championship.
By kcolloran on 01.09.15 4:46pm
doesnt bother me too much
Stanford isn’t really a national championship caliber program, the fan base isn’t big enough, recruiting is too difficult and it strikes me the only way we could get there would be to lower admissions standards unacceptably and court some kind of scandal.
The only time we’ve had the best team in the country was the end of the 2010 season, and we didn’t even know that team was that good until the Orange Bowl. Neither Auburn or Oregon was that great that year. If only we hadn’t gotten gassed against the Ducks.
By vk on 01.11.15 8:48am
Stanford is not the classic Football Factory
Still, without compromising admissions standards, Harbaugh showed that Stanford can be a top ten team. Shaw is riding that legacy and may be doing enough to ensure we crack the top ten in the future. We can only seriously contend for a national championship if a number of fortunate factors fall into place: finding a second Andrew Luck combined with a Taylor- or Gerhart-caliber running back AND a beast of a D. In 2010 (arguably our best team in this recent run of success), we did not have the D we have enjoyed the past two seasons, but we had the O. From 2012-2014, it was the other way around, while 2011 (Luck’s last season) was somewhere in-between. The football factories will always out-recruit us, so we need 1) good fortune (I could have said Luck…) and 2) great/smart coaching and development of the talent we are able to recruit. I think that combination should keep us in the top 25 and provide a platform for a few top 10 and playoff runs. But I agree: Stanford is not the perennial football powerhouse. And, as you note, trying to become one might damage other things of much higher priority.
By Jeff Tarnungus on 01.12.15 7:47am
Did Lyons declare?
Last thing I read was he was trying to get another year of eligibility.
By Tim Eckert-Fong on 01.12.15 8:15pm
Only thing a Twitter search brought up was that he's committed to play in the NFLPA bowl
Which I missed, somehow. Release came out on Dec 26
By Jack Blanchat on 01.12.15 11:56pm
Great article
Good work.
By Ben Leonard on 01.14.15 10:30am