Sebastabear said:
Musgrave will be back. We've recruited for his offense for a few years now. Think Wilcox is willing to give him a shot with a new QB.
Personally I thought sometimes Musgrave's play calling was great and resulted in some impressive gains and sometimes it was great and the players didn't execute. But sometimes it was terrible. I'll never get over how we refused to let Chase run in that Nevada game or how we seemed wholly unprepared at UCLA to scheme around a blitz happy defense (which honestly everyone who watched five seconds of UCLA tape or had even a passing familiarity with Azzinaro knew was coming). I also don't understand why we saw some of the most creative play calling at the end of the Stanford game when we were way ahead and some of the most boring and predictable play calling in games where we were desperate for any kind of offensive spark. See WSU. Should have been the opposite.
So a mixed bag with Musgrave, but Cal has devoted a lot in terms of recruiting and teaching players his schemes and we've seen flashes of how it could work and those have been impressive. And the players really like him. But even setting all that aside, Wilcox is clearly a super loyal guy and is loathe to "throw anyone under the bus" for things outside their (or any coach's) control, which he obviously feels happened to him at USC. The good part of this is JW's coaches return that loyalty, want to work for him and have on numerous occasions rejected offers with significant pay raises from other schools. I've lost track of how many times our competitors have come after Browning and Toler - and they are still here. But sometimes JW has stuck with coaches who are clearly in the wrong spot too long. See Beau Baldwin.
But that's Wilcox and that what we've signed up for. And no one will be more impacted by these results than Wilcox himself. He's willing to bet his fate on Musgrave and we're willing to bet on Wilcox. Hopefully all our bets pay off.
I have been defending Musgrave to a fault largely because of the extremely negative position some are taking. Your comments are more balanced and also more accurately reflect my views.
My clock is ticking on Musgrave but I feel like he did enough right to buy more time.
I think some of the criticisms you have were addressed and he improved over the course of the season. I disagree with you that the UCLA was about coaching because I don't think it's as easy to scheme around superior talent as you say it is. There were plenty of good play calls that could not be executed because Garbers was thrown off his game early and often.
You are very intelligent and I agree with your take on things a large majority of the time but forgive me if I assume that Musgrave knows more what he has to deal with against UCLA and simply didn't have the tools to do it.
Musgrave has a long tenure in coaching, to think that he simply wasn't prepared for UCLA despite the evidence is a kind of analysis I'm not willing to make.
I do agree that he should not have forced Garbers into a pocket passer, but it may have been part of what he needed to do to install his offense fully. After that happened, he did give Garbers more latitude.
However, Musgrave has to continue to improve. His offense needs to more often look like a combination of Nevada first half (ball control) and the Big Game (razzle dazzle) and less like the WSU and UCLA games. And the red zone problems need to go away.
Additionally Angus McClure needs to make more of his OL, but remember he is relatively new too. I think once these 2 have each had 5 years together along with Wilcox, I will have lost patience for many of the things folks complain about now.
The big difference for me is timing. Wilcox just made an unprecedented commitment to Cal. Folks here think a savant from a lower division could do more. Maybe so, but will they commit to Cal? NO. They will move on once they are successful. Troy Taylor would be the exception and I am all for hiring him at any time. But minus that, this is the wrong time for a coaching change and Cal may finally have the pieces in place long term to gain some momentum.
Having said that, do I expect Wilcox's record to improve next season, not really. So I'm sure that, for those whose only significant metric is winning %, the pitchforks will be raised and the torches burning once again next year. But by year's end, Cal will have surprised some teams. That is my expection.
New QB Plummer has 2 years. I don't know if he is the guy, but that is significant because I think 2023-2025 are the most promising years. Cal has to get another QB as well though, someone out of HS or maybe Millner becomes the guy, who knows. Millner has the highest composite rating of any Cal QB out of HS since Goff.
Seriously, we wish him the best. 