Aliotti throws players under the bus

by Addicted to Quack on Oct 8, 2008 9:00 PM PDT in Football Comment 19 comments

You know, I watched that game four times. Because you check your own hole card first. There’s always some things that you can do better, do a little bit different. We’ve got to get our eyes trained a little bit better. I don’t want to put it all on the kids, but we’ve got to get our eyes trained a little bit better. We’re looking at the backs in the backfield at times when we should be looking at our keys, and then we’re getting fooled. We’ll correct that. We’ve got a good group of kids. They’ll work to get it right, and we’ll work with them to get it right. We’re going to probably have to simplify some things a little bit more. And SC’s a good football team. They’re a good football team. There were times that I don’t have an answer for a guy running a comeback on Walter Thurmond, and he’s on him, and the guy comes back and makes the catch, or they run by us, things like that. But no excuses. Unfortunately it was a bad loss. Whether you loss 24-23 or 44-10, whatever it was, it’s still a loss. But it was a bad loss. We could play a lot better. We will play a lot better. I trust that these kids will rally back. If we work hard and rally back and guys practice and we read our keys and do the things that we all know we can do, we can be 5-2 and 3-1 in the league, and get a little rest and start the second half of the season. I think it’s a key game. I think it’s key that we play well, and then get a chance to get healthy a little bit. But first we’ve got to get through and play.

I don't want to put it all on the kids, but I'm going to put it all on the kids.

The truth of the matter is that you run your corners in single coverage with the safeties playing up. That means that they can't try to make a play on the ball because if they get beat, its going for six. All they can do is let them catch it, wrap, and tackle. Meanwhile, you're so overplaying the run that any type of play action completely fakes everyone out.

The players are playing your scheme. Your scheme just sucks. It seems that you would have discovered this in the myriad of years that our passing defense has royally sucked this decade.

God, please quit. Soon.

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Never been anti-Aliotti until this year

And man did I have a change of heart. Not just by this blog, but it’s getting me epically pissed off in general.

Your friendly neighborhood placekicker.

by qrsouther on Oct 8, 2008 9:23 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

Wrong.

Aliotti is the coordinator, and certainly there have been enormous holes in our defensive scheme this year, but the guy doesn’t have a freakin jersey on!

Aliotti is completely accurate in pointing out that the defense as a whole has been really slow making adjustments this season.

You have to either play to stop the run, stop the pass, or contain a general attack. If you play to stop the run and the offense passes, it is up to the secondary to adjust, and stop the play.

Aliotti can’t help the team make adjustments on game day, anymore than he can make Chung cowboy up and make a tackle through a stiff-arm.

I swear, the FPPs on this page are more flaming than any blog I have ever read.

by everett on Oct 8, 2008 10:33 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

take a look at Bruins Nation

he may not have a jersey on, but if he can’t run a decent defense out there with this talent, that’s on him.

--Dave
Addicted to Quack, SBN's Oregon Ducks blog

by Addicted to Quack on Oct 8, 2008 10:44 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

obviously you haven't been a duck fan for very long have you?

if you had, and knew anything about football, you would understand that Aliotti has been holding us back for years… our Defense has been “bend but don’t break” at best… AT BEST! that’s a complete effing joke dude. he had one good year, Gang Green, and its like he’s been granted immunity.

for years MB and NA have been claiming that NA’s defensive scheme is just SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO “complex” and that they have to “simplify” or dumb down the defense everytime something goes wrong.

I just wish the muscle (UNCLE PHIL) would flex himself for once when it comes to football, and at least put some pressure on MB to get rid of Aliotti. I mean the boosters have gone insane over Ernie Kent, he’s been on the hot seat for years. It is so much easier to make a bowl game then it is to make the NCAA tourney, and even after a bunch of mediocre years and a 5-6 season MB got no heat what so ever…

I mean for christsake Auburn just fired their Offensive coordinator today! That’s the difference between the pac-10 and the SEC.. they live and die by football, and they also have accountability.

he, along with MB, are one of the guys ALWAYS making excuses as to why we played poorly. The beav fans who consistently flame on about how we are all about our image have a point. I mean we are always making excuses instead of trying to find solutions to our problems… we have let aliotti stick around and say his players aren’t smart enough for his scheme for too long.

if it wasn’t for John Neal, these defensive backs would be getting torched for 500+ yards a game like Andrew Walter, Carson Palmer and Cody Pickett are playing QB in 2002. Not to mention a 50+ beatdown at autzen by Wazzu in 03 right after we beat michigan.

I will be a duck fan 4 life, but the aura around this program is really pissing me off right now. Something has got to change!

by jdogg on Oct 9, 2008 2:59 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Have to agree. If you’ve watched the Ducks longer than 5 years, you’ve picked up on the crappy scheme that Aliotti plays. It’s not good.
The front 7 can stop the run, but he never adjusts to that. The scheme brings the safeties up to help with the run.
Bend don’t break, bend don’t break. Watch on third downs, watch the corners keep their guy in front of them, but of course it’s a comeback right to the first down marker. That play is there all day long because that’s what he teaches.

The secondary was supposed to be a massive strength for this team. Instead it’s a massive weakness. Did the players suddenly starting sucking ass from last year to this year?

by KDean75 on Oct 9, 2008 6:17 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

I totally disagree about comebackers on 3rd downs.

So…what should we have happen instead, play bump and run on 3rd and 13, or even 3rd and two. There is a reason why most defensive schemes don’t do this often. And it’s because, over the long haul of a game/season, it usually produces better results.

Now, there are definitely other schemes that can be run, but they are more susceptible to long passes, especially when you don’t get immediate pressure (which we haven’t been getting)

I think that this reaction to the 3rd down conversions is entirely irrational. Over the past few years (since 2005, before that we were simply AWFUL), Oregon has been at worst average in the Pac-10 on 3rd downs, and have been pretty consistent around the 35% range, which should be expected.

It’s really easy to just make assumptions about 3rd downs, based on your emotional reactions at the time, and that’s why its important to go back and look at what happened through statistics, etc.

--www.AddictedToQuack.com, SBNation's Oregon Ducks blog

by jtlight on Oct 9, 2008 6:39 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

You miss my point and then pick an advantageous data point to start your statistical argument. Aliotti has been here longer than 2005, using that as a starting point makes no sense other than to use it to back up your argument.
Why not use his whole Oregon career, or the last 10 years, or the last 5 years? Why the arbitrary 3 years plus this year?

by KDean75 on Oct 9, 2008 8:21 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Because the conditions and expectations are quite different...

It’s not about the numbers on 3rd down, it’s about expectations. In 2003 and 2004, Oregon gave up 39 and 41% rate of 3rd down conversation. I wasn’t ignoring these stats, but was trying to make the point that our success on 3rd down is to be expected based on the overall strength and talent of our defense.

In 2002-2004, we literally had very little talent on the defensive side of the ball. Our All-Pac 10 players during that stretch were Kieth Lewis (20031st), Igor (2003 2nd), Haloti (2004 2nd), and Kevin Mitchell (2003 2nd). I couldn’t find the 2nd team All Pac-10 for 2002, so please post it if you can find it.

We were a bad on defense those years. It’s not like we suddenly become super crappy on 3rd down. If you look at the situations that Oregon gets into overall, they are pretty average on 3rd down. On 3rd and longs, the other team doesn’t get it very often. On 3rd and shorts, they get it more often. Overall, they finished right around where you would expect them to.

Overall, there are many people railing about 3rd downs or whatever. But, my point is, that the 3rd downs are not the problem. It’s not borne out in statistics, and any reasoning for thinking that is an emotional response based on a few plays that happen during the game. This argument relies on generalizations.

For the most part, the performance on 3rd down lines up with where you would expect it based on the situations the defense got itself into. The problems this year have pretty much nothing to do with 3rd down defense.

As far as missing your point, I don’t think I did. You seem to be arguing that the defensive schemes run lead to more 3rd down conversions than would be expected. This is simply not the case, and all you have used to support this is generalizations about an overall scheme which is far over-simplified.

Even in the USC game, the problems that created the loss weren’t seen on 3rd down. USC mostly found itself in 3rd and short, though was 3/4 on 3rd and 7+, and those were given up on a slants, a screen, and a broken play. Other than that, it was all 3rd and shorts, which led to about a 50% success rate, which again, is to be expected.

--www.AddictedToQuack.com, SBNation's Oregon Ducks blog

by jtlight on Oct 9, 2008 9:14 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

You’re right, I mentioned 3rd down, but I didn’t mean it as the entire basis of an argument. It seems that 3rd down, specifically 3rd and longer situations, are a good time to see the bend don’t break play that the corners run in action.

And of course I would never expect close bump and run on a long yardage down, however, would mixing up defensive schemes not be a good idea? I see very little variation. Whether that’s by design or caused by personnel is unclear. But given the high expectations of the secondary this year, I would say that scheme, not personnel is the reason for this.

by KDean75 on Oct 9, 2008 9:31 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

I tended toward that as well...

Though I’ve been sifting through the USC footage, and will be posting on that at some point, and really don’t know if that’s the case. The 3 long touchdowns all had different defensive schemes.

Was this a case of just everything going wrong? Maybe… I guess we’ll find out over the next few games…

--www.AddictedToQuack.com, SBNation's Oregon Ducks blog

by jtlight on Oct 9, 2008 9:43 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Purdue game

Saw the Purdue game in person, and I saw little variation. They ran that pick play on the corner all day. Granted it was for minimal gains (5 yds. or less, typically), but there was no adjustment to it.

Just saying I’m not basing this on USC alone, past history as well. Due to children, I’ve only seen 2 full games, so there’s that caveat as well.

by KDean75 on Oct 9, 2008 9:48 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

sorry, meant this year I’ve only seen 2 full games.

by KDean75 on Oct 9, 2008 9:49 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Hey, I was at Purdue also!

And I do agree about Purdue. There wasn’t a whole lot of variation in Oregon’s defensive gameplan, or Purdue’s offensive gameplan. They ran the same 5 yard patterns all day long.

While this was annoying…I didn’t have a huge problem with it, only because that led to very few points or yards for the whole of the game. There were no big plays given up (that I remember off the top of my head), and the only reason Purdue was in it on the final drive was due to some horrendous calls.

--www.AddictedToQuack.com, SBNation's Oregon Ducks blog

by jtlight on Oct 9, 2008 9:53 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

and Chung’s inability to tackle, take a good angle, or fight off a stiff-arm. I don’t like him. I agree that he’s a problem.

by KDean75 on Oct 9, 2008 10:01 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

I was at Purdue too!

Painter. Not stellar.

4.1 Yards/Att.

While we did give up a bit (207), it wasn’t nearly as bad as other games. Utah State actually threw more yards than Purdue. Actually, Purdue was statistically one of our best defensive passing games all season. All stats from that game need to take into consideration that they had 50 attempts.

It's spelled "S-h-u-f-a-i-l"

by JShufelt on Oct 9, 2008 10:02 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

calling. A coordinator doesn’t just sit and call plays. They oversee their side of the ball.
It isn’t like we have a horrible defense. We have one of the best rushing defenses, but that’s because of the play calling. We play up close, and we play the run. We don’t blitz the run. We just contain it like every player is Reggie Bush.

if the players aren’t doing well, someone needs to get in their ear. Someone needs to teach them how to run the play. That someone doesn’t wear a “freakin jersey”.

It's spelled "S-h-u-f-a-i-l"

by JShufelt on Oct 9, 2008 6:40 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

I went to Bruins Nation

And all I saw was how much more participated in their site was then ours.

by everett on Oct 8, 2008 10:53 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

I have no idea what your sentence means.

by KDean75 on Oct 9, 2008 6:09 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

We probably wouldn't be so up in arms...

…if it didn’t seem like Oregon defenses consistently underachieve when stocked with solid personnel. In this case, the defensive line has held up nicely and the defensive backs are great individual players. (Why John Bacon starts ahead of Casey Matthews, though, I’ll never know. I blame this on the coaches also.)

The bottom line is that Aliotti seems constantly unprepared for situations in which it’s not logical to run the football, which is completely baffling. I enjoy shutting down teams at the line of scrimmage, but not at the constant expense of the big play.

by Freeing Ray Schafer on Oct 9, 2008 2:24 AM PDT reply actions 0 recs