All new staff, big money put in to the program (one hell of an ask considering the last 20 years). With these coaches and the number of coaching personnel to players on this staff….I don’t understand how all of that gets a result of an undisciplined, underproducing, and a team that finds a new way to beat it self week after week.
I’m not willing to give the coaches a break because they’ve hurt us as well, but there’s some seriously wrenched shit going on in the program from a player mentality standpoint right now. I’ve said it a long time but I truly believe there’s not a worst technically taught recruiting ground than south Florida - it just seems like the culture has to do with individual play with no understanding of the actually game and how to play it. It’s why guys shine when they go elsewhere and staffs can focus on getting them right, when you have 60 of those guys that’s too much for a staff to fix in limited time.
Back to this staff. The offense uninspired and a step back for the program schematically from Lashlee and FINALLY adopting the spread. Is that on Cristobal, 100%. How you take over this program with its online and not know you need to give them an advantage schematically is crazy. Nevertheless, is the actual play that’s taking place on the field even close to entirely a scheme issue. Hell no. These players don’t even seem to understand normal football. From penalties to turnovers to mental mistakes - I can’t remember a team in history that is consistently this bad at those things year after year after year. I expected this staff to put the wrench down on that issue at least. The fact that they have not made any app or much progress at all is so disturbing.
Team is remarkable for its overall shittiness. I mean wow. I don’t even know where to start on things there is so much wrong:
OC – crap concepts for sure, Gattis leaves A LOT to be desired. Hopefully gone in December (b/c lets not kid ourselves…we’re not making a bowl).
QB – we know the talent is there, execution has been poor, understanding the offense has been poor…that falls on Gattis and Ponce. Again, hoping both are fired in December
Pass game – see above, hope both are fired in December
Run game – severely underperforming line; injury ridden at back. Too little to blame Smith. IMO the RB position requires the least coaching (more natural talent than anything else). Thought the OL did much better earlier in the season. I’ll give a bit of a pass to Mirabal. I think these woes have to do with overall offensive concepts.
WR – trash recruiting coupled with trash coaching and trash concepts. Clean house. Hit the portal hard and fire Gattis
Defensive line – actually fairly decent, though I question if we’re wasting a coaching slot on 2 DL coaches (looking back to our clusterfuck coachless WR unit)
LB – fairly decent for how piss poor recruiting was at the position
DBs – just what in the actual fuck. Is there a single brain cell shared between all of them and Addae? Didn’t exactly have stellar talent at CB to begin with, but they’ve actually gotten worse this year, and I’ve seen more busts in a single game than a stack of Hooters calendars.
Steele – proven track record so he’s getting a bit of a pass. It’s hard to field a solid defense when you’ve got such a fucking disaster set of DBs. Have to wonder if he was on board with the Addae hire. Maybe Addae isn’t a problem and our DBs are just that fucking stupid? I don’t know.
Culture – we don’t have one. I don’t know what Mario thinks he’s instilling but it’s pretty clear nobody is buying.
S&C: remarkable # of injuries. Eyebrow-raising. It’s a tough aspect to judge. I’ll leave it at that.
Can’t believe this shit team is what we got for all the investment. Mario had a blank check and took three months to put together a staff that is collectively about as competent as the one that fuckstick Diaz put together. The players aren’t blameless but they’re also not clearing half a mil a year each to put forth this product.
Manny Diaz can laugh all he wants but he takes a big part of the blame. When you can’t develop and live in the portal, things can get messy. That doesn’t resolve Cristobal of what is going on now though.
I don’t want to be reactionary but I wouldn’t be upset if TVD doesn’t play again here. Yeah he can put up some huge numbers but it doesn’t always translates into TDs and it’s definitely not translating into wins. He’s going to look good at his pro day but he doesn’t look like a NFL caliber player. But maybe I am jumping the gun bc he’s still about a dozen starts removed from HS. But the NFL mock draft experts have overhyped him way too much.
The bulk of the problems for this team are squarely at the coaches feet. I don’t think TVD is a first-rounder, but he’s got the tools and has a solid shot to play in the NFL (whether he develops here, at another college, or in the NFL).
It’s a shit offensive coaching staff. Mario spent 3 months and millions to put this pile o crap together that got bested by Duke at home – Duke, which went 3-9 last year, has a first year HC, with an average recruiting ranking someone in the bottom half of the FBS, with an OC who came over from Memphis).
There is no sugar-coating it or squinting and trying to deflect the criticism onto the players. The only way forward IMO is for Mario to fire Gattis in December and pay up for a proven OC, giving him complete control of the offense and coaches. Mario needs to get his stench off the offense.
It’s a coaching problem and it’s a culture problem.
We fold the moment we have adversity. That’s the way it’s been for a long time. If the guys think the game is over they just lay down.
So soft.
Agree with all of the above on a trash offense and not good players.
How many years has it been since we fielded a complete offense or defense? There have been glaring position holes that are inexcusable all across the team.
Where we currently stand, I say beyond firing Gattis, we need to really evaluate the roster and use the portal to fill the weak spots. Get rid of the bums.
It’s very clear Cristobal really blew it by doing two things:
Forcing AND hiring a style based on what he wants versus what he has.
Not realizing that true power football is gone. You have to go spread biggly.
How you have TVD and force this offense this year is just dumb dumb dumb. I’ll bet even Steele and Strong are telling Mario this shits crazy.
We broke the bank for Gattis which is crazy (I believe he’s at least 2 years on contract…). If Mario was an honest guy he walks into the ADs office and says reduce my pay by Gattis contract for next year, I’m firing him. Period.
It’s a Coaching problem and a culture problem BUT it’s ALSO a player problem. We have not recruited good leaders. Name me one guy on offense or defense that is the unquestionable leader on this team? There is none. When we were good and winning we had multiple leaders on the field who demanded greatness. We don’t have one on either side of the ball who is leading this team.
In my opinion I would rank it as (prior to MC coming) 1. Coaching problems, 2. Lack of culture created which stems from 1 and 3. Player problems which is a trickle down of bad recruiting (overall), coaches not creating culture and then players not given a crap and relying on the U symbol to get them where they want to go.
It’s a ME first generation now guys. The NFL divas and the running to the endzone mugging for the camera has trickled all the way down to pop warner and has continued throughout these kids’ careers.
We have a GOOD coaching staff from a coaching perspective but you can’t weed out a ME now culture overnight. It is what it is this year.
I will also say, and i know some of you will disagree, that until we get an actual college stadium where the fanbase can come and call it home and where we can create a real college football atmosphere we will continue to struggle as a program. Coaching, recruiting, culture, player development, player leadership, a real college gameday experience is all one big ball of wax. It’s been this way for at least 18 years and at least the U are serious about pouring in the money needed to right the ship. There is hope…
Well, no! There’s absolutely no hope for a stadium. I don’t really see it. You don’t really have the land and even if we did, are you going to put a football field on it for UM that houses six home games a year with 32,000 people in it and watch it sit vacant the other 359 days a year? Not a very good use of money. You’re talking about something that has to be close to the school and then it better have other uses as well that draws people to it to make it financially viable. I know it’s been a big dream of a lot of people but I don’t think the winning starts once we pack a few more people into the home games.
All we can do is: 1) get rid of noon starts, it’s killer. 2) coach better and 3) get better players and hope we see the improvement.
