HKBear97;842736950 said:
Thought I would jump in here:
A) We can and absolutely should pay our coaches more. Dykes received additional funds to do this, so there's no excuse there. Changes should have been made to some position coaches before this year started, but unfortunately they were not. I would be surprised if we don't see changes this coming off season.
B) btskr has a valid point on the number of wide receivers on the roster. Go to each teams website and sort by position. Just looking at those listed as wide receivers, not including tight ends, Cal has the most in the conference at 20. Two spread teams are Oregon at 16 and ASU at 17. The closest to us has 18 and that includes Arizona, fucla and Utah. While that might not seem like a big difference, it does represent more resources, time and training focused on one positional group. It's a valid concern and does not appear to be a feature of the system.
C) This is college football where EVERY team loses players to graduation, draft and injury. There are many coaches not named Urban Meyer and Nick Saban that handle that transition just fine. Moreover, this is Dykes fourth year, so he has had time to prepare for transition. This not a valid excuse.
It bears repeating - in six years as a head coach, Dykes' highest ranked defense was in 2011 when it was ranked 57 out of 120. The next best defense was 109th in the nation with the rest 116th and below. This year is shaping up in a similar fashion. For whatever reason, under Dykes the defense is simply not getting it done.
HKBear97;842736950 said:
Thought I would jump in here:
A) We can and absolutely should pay our coaches more. Dykes received additional funds to do this, so there's no excuse there. Changes should have been made to some position coaches before this year started, but unfortunately they were not. I would be surprised if we don't see changes this coming off season.
B) btskr has a valid point on the number of wide receivers on the roster. Go to each teams website and sort by position. Just looking at those listed as wide receivers, not including tight ends, Cal has the most in the conference at 20. Two spread teams are Oregon at 16 and ASU at 17. The closest to us has 18 and that includes Arizona, fucla and Utah. While that might not seem like a big difference, it does represent more resources, time and training focused on one positional group. It's a valid concern and does not appear to be a feature of the system.
C) This is college football where EVERY team loses players to graduation, draft and injury. There are many coaches not named Urban Meyer and Nick Saban that handle that transition just fine. Moreover, this is Dykes fourth year, so he has had time to prepare for transition. This not a valid excuse.
It bears repeating - in six years as a head coach, Dykes' highest ranked defense was in 2011 when it was ranked 57 out of 120. The next best defense was 109th in the nation with the rest 116th and below. This year is shaping up in a similar fashion. For whatever reason, under Dykes the defense is simply not getting it done.
Just to add a few more points.
A) I also forgot to mention that for at least Kaufman's first year, we were still paying Buh to go twiddle his thumbs. For at least one year we had 2 DCs making a combined ~$1M.
B) We may be recruiting Jerimiah as an athlete, but he is listed at 5-7. He may be able to play a situation NB on defense but not much else. And by adding Kunaszyk late, the coaches almost admitted we have some roster imbalance. With him we have 7 scholarship linebackers (with one being a converted safety). 2 of these linebackers are 205 lbs. or less, with one being a true freshman. So, in reality we have 5 scholarship linebackers that are linebacker sized. Let’s hope one of them does not get hurt.
I just realized I accidentally forgot to include Matt Laris in my earlier number. So, if Aaron and Strickland stay we actually have 16 scholarship WRs this year. Does anybody really think we need to go 4 deep with scholarship wide receivers? I know we throw the ball a lot, but by nature of the positions you would assume that WRs and CBs are going to be the least injured. Even if we have 4 WRs go down to injury we would still have a full 3 deep of scholarship players.
And like HKBear mentioned Sonny has been a head coach for 7 years (including this year). He has had 3 DCs that have worked for him and except for one year his defense is has been ranked 109 or lower. It seems to me that there is one common denominator.
