When the day you fall every source the exists Marvels in your defeat!!! That's when you know!! The media, every never had, never could, blowhard and armchair QB takes a shot at your program!!! Yesterday people was a Calling Card as much as a defeat! We set a trend that the nation follows now!! We can fix the D line and toughen up our O Line in the gym, this is fixable!! Maybe that chin music woke up the talent that was sleeping in some sloppy play on Thurs. Something tells me it has! The more I hear why the O can't, the more I know we are making a ton of schools, coaches, boosters and fan bases very nervous! Stanford has taught us two great lessons on how to beat Bama, I thank them for that! Now let's get focused Ducks!
Our style of play doesn't allow for a quick "fixable" solution for the big nasty's on both sides of the ball. Offensively we play fast, so we recruit faster, more agile, and more durable lineman. The zone-run game is predicated not on brute force but on movement, stamina and the ability to shield defenders, not necessarily pancake them. The goal is to cut down the initial man and scrape to the second level, eventually wearing down bigger front sevens. You can't put 330 lb o-lineman out there an expect them to keep up with what we do. We can't just "go big" on defense either. Because our offense plays so fast (whether they score or go 3 & out), the defense is GOING to be on the field A LOT. Big guys just wear down faster. Oregon has won a lot of games in recent years by pulling away in the 2nd half because we are better conditioned. You just can't have it both ways. I wouldn't change much. What we do works pretty darn well. I'd like to be a little stronger on the d-line, but I don't want to do a "make over" on the whole program because we get pushed around once a year. Some say we're flawed. Well, every team is. How often are we exposed? Not very. I still think we beat Stanford 7 out of 10 times, even if we lose the line of scrimmage battle every time. We were 24 pt favorites last year, and 11 this year. If we played them next week at Autzen, we'd be a TD favorite. Our skill position players are just that much better than theirs. It sucks we lost, but I still wouldn't change much.
I don't want to change our offense one bit, rather just get a bit stronger on the O line to give Marcus or whoever is next that extra half second to get rid of the ball. If our line can't open those gaps and hold their blocks, our rb's can't get through them. Further east to west running against Stanford or any SEC team wont work if their DB's are overpowering our blocking receivers. I'm quite well aware of how our offense moves and what we need to keep that tempo, but more strength and more technique is always a plus on any line. Having a true north to south gap blaster like Royce next year will also be HUGE. As for defense that's a whole different story, we are essentially a defense that excels with a 30 point cushion that our offense 95% of the time hands them and fast. The other 5% is the national championship group that wont go down 30 to us, make us play their tempo, and kill the clock while doing it. Stanford, LSU, Bama come to mind. When this happens we need some Fairley, Sapp and Wilfork types to not just plug the gaps but create true line penetration and get to the QB or at the very least allow our LB's to get into their backfield. We can still have the Dion Jordan's on the end and our secondary speed as usual, but our Dline needs to forget this bend don't break stuff, and start being a statement D line! If that's not achieved the Stanford game will be the blueprint used to beat us by ever heavy O line team with a great blocking FB. Essentially what I'm asking for is 2 SEC sized DT's and a laying paint SS to keep the long ball honest. I'm pretty sure we can work that into our defensive scheme fair enough?
The blue print has been there before Stanford. Ohio State, Auburn, LSU, etc. almost everybody we play wants to impose physicality on us. Sometimes it works for a quarter, or a half, but rarely for 4 quarters. And hey, I hope we find another DT like Haloti, a guy who can cover and crack like Boyett could . . . and a defense that's physical enough to stand up to the Stanford's and Alabama's, meanwhile fast/agile/athletic enough to keep up with a Florida State or Baylor.
FSU is huge on the D and O lines.. they have recruited monsters for the last 4 years... Now that they have a Cam Newton type to finally give them an offensive leader that they haven't had since Charlie Ward. Just because you're a big D tackle or DE doesn't mean you're a slob, Sapp and Suh and Eisha Shaw could have both played on our D line with ease! We need those type of guys, and we have enough name sake now to get them. The question is with guys like Buckner and Armstead who are bigger than the guys I mentioned above, what's going wrong? This I feel falls solely on the type of defensive scheme Aliotti has installed and teaches. It's not our kids, it's the coordinator. Problem is, it just doesn't work playing from behind against the big boy lines. Stanford has proven that for two years in a row now and so did LSU.
While O/D-Lines generally rule, there are ways to overcome it. We just didn't do it. I think we have the personnel just need to coach up differently for that game.
