Schottenheimer is a good OC for fixing QB fundamentals and in general being a QB mentor. The guy has a good track record with QB's, this niche seems to be his thing. Luck looks way better since Schotty got a hold of him, and we all know what he did for Drew Brees and Phillip Rivers. Heck, even ancient Hasselbeck looked rejuvenated underneath his tutelage.
That being said I don't think he is a good OC. He lives and dies by the game plan for better or for worse. His passing offense is overly simplistic, and a clear weak point of this team. I think some of this is a holdover from Carroll's playbook, that being said this has been the case on all of his teams. He doesn't maximize the talent here, and we're leaving a lot on the table in these respects. He somewhat makes up for his lack of passing chops with how he designs the run game and takes advantage of his runningbacks strengths and weaknesses.
A prime example of this is Penny. He realizes that Penny is not very good at running up the middle so he specifically schemes running plays that get him into space and lets Carson/Davis get the tough yards through the middle. He is also very good at working around the strengths and weaknesses of certain lineman. I believe he is just as responsible for the resurgence of our run game as Solari is.
His situational play calling is somewhat questionable at times and he often falls back into predictable patterns. Though, his philosophy is similar to Carroll's in that respect which is why I think Carroll fell in love with him. He doesn't outwit, he is fairly straight forward. Teams know when we're going to run, and when we're going to pass. He is very much of the mindset of "even if you know what we're going to do, you can't stop us".
Unfortunately this mentality often works against us as well. I don't think this approach works as well for offense as it does with defense. A lot of playing offense is about setting the defense up, and adapting to situations. Taking advantage of clear weak spots. It is more of a chess game on the offensive side of the ball. I do think that overall Schotty is a better fit for the team, but I feel as if his offense is a bit too one dimensional. I'm not talking about the run/pass balance either. His entire offense is predicated on the run game working. If the run game is only so-so our offense really seems to stymie. I don't blame this on Wilson. I think this is more of an issue of Schottenheimer being a one trick pony of sorts.
Unyielding and straight forward is what Schottenheimer is. I think he is a better fit than Bevell, but I must say he still is lacking in very many areas that most teams seem to have figured out.
