Spin Doctor":2cgdc0eu said:
OrangeGravy":2cgdc0eu said:
AgentDib":2cgdc0eu said:
Sports Hernia":2cgdc0eu said:
First game was SW, it worked exceeding well, but it was outside of Pete’s comfort zone, so let’s stop doing it.
I just find this to be a theory that is completely unreasonable on many levels.
First, Pete's always been the defensive coach while he lets the offense do it's thing. The few times over the years where he has been mentioned in regards to the offense has been him shielding other people on the offense from blame each and every time. The latest example was in the timeout/Lynch fiasco from two seasons ago, where he took the blame for interfering in a 4th down play instead of throwing anybody under the bus for poor execution.
Second, if Pete didn't like the SW offense then why didn't he step in and make changes during the entire off-season and pre-season when it was installed? We can agree that he had the power to do so if he wanted at any point.
If Pete was as hands on with the offense as this theory suggests then he would have been involved during all of the initial offensive coaching meetings. He would have been involved when the playbook was distributed to the players, and when they spent months practicing the new scheme and plays. He would have been involved during the preseason, and in all of the preparation up until that week 1 Colts game. I don't see how people can simultaneously claim he let an offense he wasn't comfortable be installed and that he is also somehow a micro manager on offense. Those two concepts do not co-exist.
Third, the Colts game was a success offensively. If we had struggled and turned the ball over a bunch, then I could buy the motivation for some sort of adjustment. Instead it was one of the most comfortable wins we've had over the last two seasons where the AP subtitle was 'Russell Wilson looked right at home in the Seattle's new offense.' Russ was 18/23 for 4TDs and 0 INTs and a 152.3 QB rating. Carroll was effusive with praise for the new offense in the post game press conference.
Fourth, NFL game weeks go by very quick and there is never enough time to prepare for the upcoming opponent, let alone to make a significant change to your offense. Even if there was some unknown reason for Pete to want to change an offense that had just worked well, they only had a few practice sessions and a couple of walkthroughs to get ready for a good Titans team. It is simply impossible that he could have fundamentally reworked the offense and playbook that they spent the entire off-season learning, and they likely had at most four hours of padded practice that entire week due to the recent CBA limitations.
Fifth, we scored 24 points in the first half of that Titans game. So if Carroll did redesign the offense, he did a pretty good job of it? A problem did show up on offense, as the Titans adjusted during the game to try to take away our deep passing game. Leading 24-9 that would have been ideal time to run the ball, run clock and secure the win. Instead, our final four drives only featured ONE designed running play. Honestly, isn't that proof right there that Pete was not meddling in the offense? That was a rookie play caller learning a hard lesson about getting away from the run in the NFL.
And finally, there are already plausible reasons why we looked good against a bad Colts defense and less so against better defenses. Against the Colts we still had Carson and Eskridge who rushed for a combined 113 yards on a combined 6.3 YPC. Metcalf and Lockett had a good day against a suspect secondary while the Colts were busy respecting our effective running game.
You can tell everyone how stupid that narrative is until you're blue in the face. It's been repeated so often for so long it's never going away until Pete goes away. That along with run, run, pass that literally hasn't been a thing for years. Anyone that uses those talking points lose any benefit of the doubt for showing zero ability to comprehend what they actually see on a football field every week.
The offense is most likely still Carroll's playbook. When Schottenheimer was hired Carroll made a comment on how 80 percent of the playbook was going to be the one that they were using under Bevell. Darrell Bevell's offense also looked quite different in Detroit than it did in Seattle. Carroll is not the run, run, pass guy but the way his passing offense is structured is extremely bland and the rushing attack is usually simple compared to what other teams are running. He likes using a paired down, simple offensive system.
We also know that Carroll HAS meddled in playcalls before. Schottenheimer and Carroll got into spats over that and it's why Schottenheimer isn't our OC anymore. Carroll does have some degree of control over the offense, he's definitely doesn't just let them do their own thing. Even Matt Hasselbeck was playing like Wilson does, slinging the ball down field in his short tenure underneath Carroll, which is something Hasselbeck did not do much under Holmgren, he was all about the quick timing passes.
Does he exert the degree of control that some people say he does? Probably not. Is he heavily involved in our offensive scheming? Hell yes he is.
It's nuts that this myth is still perpetuated.
All offseason Wilson complains that the offense isn't diverse enough,obviously has zero issue tossing the blaim at Pete for the futility. And yet this year, after all of the uproar, what?... he allnof a sudden turns and decides to defend the offense tooth and nail, particularly when Pete is the one criticizing it? Do you understand how crazy your assertion is? Forget that it ignores x's and o's facts.
And which spat are you talking about? The one where Pete's arguing on the sidelined intentionally caused a delay of game and FG rather than a 4th down conversion attempt? Because it seems as though that lone incident is the one that the Russ fans have clung to to prove every single belief that they have.
You can't just throw out a theory without real evidence or at least arguments that make sense. If it was Pete's offense and he was meddling last year, there would have been nothing for him to 'dial back' mid season, and then, when the game plan over the 2nd half was again increasingly ineffective through the air in several games, if it was his doing, he wouldn't have said over and over again that we have to run better and take what's there. Which we never did well last year and still haven't through week 11 this year.
This year has been the same. Shane and Russ hatch the offense. Carrol was asked at the outset how much control Russ had of the offense, and Pete responded 'complete control'. Waldron has echoed that.
After the first game, Pete was asked how he felt about the offense and he praised it.
In game 2 when we lost to the Titans and he was asked about the elephant in the room... the play calling on offense that resulted in zero ball control and a critical wasted possession in OT, Pete was critical of the playcalling and execution, wishing we could have run more and that Russ would have helped out more by taking what was there. Russ didn't complain that he was just doing what he was allowed to in a 'vanilla' scheme. Why? Because it's not the case. It's his scheme now.
His frustration has gotten worse over the season, particularly after GB and especially more than ever, now.
Folks, you don't say things like 'i wish we would run more', 'I wish we would take what's there', if you are in control of the offense. There's no 'wishing ' if you excert any control over what's called or what decisions are made in the call.
To claim that that's the issue is just entirely ignoring the fact that the plays that Waldron (or apparently, Pete) call often work when you look at the film. That regardless, Russ has control at the line to do what he wants.
It also ignores the fact that Russ has DEFENDED the decisions he's made in playing the way he does when Pete has asked that we do the things that would OBVIOUSLY have helped us in games.
It also blatantly ignores post game video analysus of Russ that is available online of the same issues we've been seeing week in and week out for years... that it's not the playcall, it's the player not getting the ball where it needs to be on time.
It ignores the fact that we've all seen Pete when he's actually defending HIS desires and way of play. He owns it and goes down with it without dejection and says things like 'we've just got to keep on getting after it...' . If this was his call on offense and his playbook being called, that's what he'd be saying.
He's saying the opposite and still getting blamed.
The only thing at this point that he needs to be seriously assessed for is that he hasn't done something more about the issue with Russ, sooner. But then again what was he supposed to do? Bench Russ last year? Pull him in the wildcard game? .
He's been in an unwillable position with RW until now.
And after all of the hoopla Russ caused this offseason, it would have been a horrible look to trade away RW after he'd already grabbed the mic and framed the issue in Seattle of the offense just not being creative enough. It was a brilliant move by Russ.
But if he's to learn from his mistakes, his true flaw, I think he needs to pull the guy now. And when he does, let Shane try to do his thing with Geno.
And you can be critical of Geno all you want, I don't care what the defense is you're playing, to have completed 14 straight passes isn't a cake walk. IF ANYTHING, THE OFFENSE THAT WAS CALLED THAT DAY HAD PETES FINGER PRINTS ON IT MORE THAN ANY WITH RUSS AT THE HELM THIS YEAR.
It's obvious that Russ's issue hasn't gotten better now through 3 OCs. And what, now a 4th is going to solve it? Or better yet, let's blow the whole thing up because one player can't do his job correctly.