Bearsalwayswin said:
agreed. i understand people's frustration but many fans on these boards just begging for his failure is disturbing.
A point of clarification here. Patterson always split defensive playcalling duties with Dick Bumpas until the latter retired in 2015. And we all know what happened to the TCU defense after 2015, so I'm not sure there's a ton of modern precedent out there for a HC being fully in control of the defensive playbook and it working out super well.OsoCoreyell said:
He's taking the Patterson approach this season - Dave focuses on the D and lets someone else do the O.
We'll see.
Yes, they are. If they actually do succeed, many on here will make sure that it's because of someone else. People hate Aranda more than Steele around here.TinFoilHatPreacherBear said:
Well Baylor people aren't wanting him to fail first of all.
EvilTroyAndAbed said:Yes, they are. If they actually do succeed, many on here will make sure that it's because of someone else. People hate Aranda more than Steele around here.TinFoilHatPreacherBear said:
Well Baylor people aren't wanting him to fail first of all.
I think one of the greatest problems with "intellectualism" these days is the manner in which personal prerogative interferes with reading comprehension. We read material under the veil of our own subjectivity rather than just discerning utilizing objectivity.Bearsalwayswin said:
agreed. i understand people's frustration but many fans on these boards just begging for his failure is disturbing.
Many on previous ancestors of these message boards were saying the same type of things about Scott Drew AFTER he had gotten the program stabilized (which took many years). Yes he started in a much worse situation, but after he got it stabilized the team didn't seem to progress any further providing basis for people saying he performed a miracle but wasn't a good coach. Players continued to make the same mistakes. There seemed to be no discipline.PartyBear said:
There have been people belittling the off season developments which have all been very good. But spinning negatively our signees, transfers and new staff members. Yes there are people here invested in him failing just so they can crow on this site about being right. It is bizarre the people obviously with no memory or who are just ignorant who compare where we are now with the Steele era or Morriss' final year and seek to delight in erroneously thinking now is like then.
PartyBear said:
Ther have been people belittling the off season developments which have all been very good. But spinning negatively our signees, transfers and new staff members. Yes there are people here invested in him failing just so they can crow on this site about being right. It is bizarre the people obviously with no memory or who are just ignorant who compare where we are now with the Steele era or Morriss' final year and seem to delight in erroneously thinking now is like then.
"they think he's a bad coach with a top ceiling of mediocrity." TRUETinFoilHatPreacherBear said:EvilTroyAndAbed said:Yes, they are. If they actually do succeed, many on here will make sure that it's because of someone else. People hate Aranda more than Steele around here.TinFoilHatPreacherBear said:
Well Baylor people aren't wanting him to fail first of all.
I'll clarify a few points for you - they think he's a bad coach with a top ceiling of mediocrity. They think the program will be better off long term with a different HC. They think winning 5 or 6 games next year doesn't mean much in terms of long term success and will only prolong our suffering.
Given all of the above they fully expect him to fail long term. But if CDA somehow turned this program into a conference champ contender next year they certainly would be glad. I'd suspect 99% would be glad if we are a convincingly improved program with meaningful wins in excess of 6. Whereas the frequently pronounced "let's keep him at 6 wins" really doesn't indicate much improvement in the new B12 and shouldn't be a basis for keeping him.
In short, they expect him to fail, would rather cut bait than linger, and will be happy with him turning the program around quickly.
What they don't want is an additional 2-5 years of mediocrity before getting rid of him.
elayer said:
I just don't want to hear "person over player" ever again. Now if they come up with " person AND player" I'd be down with that.
BigGameBaylorBear said:elayer said:
I just don't want to hear "person over player" ever again. Now if they come up with " person AND player" I'd be down with that.
Haven't heard it in a while, I think Dave's new slogan is Ball, Battle, and Brotherhood or something
It's kinda funny. It's almost like we've re-arranged the staff and their duties consistent with the idea that what we have for a head coach is really instead a very good DC.parch said:A point of clarification here. Patterson always split defensive playcalling duties with Dick Bumpas until the latter retired in 2015. And we all know what happened to the TCU defense after 2015, so I'm not sure there's a ton of modern precedent out there for a HC being fully in control of the defensive playbook and it working out super well.OsoCoreyell said:
He's taking the Patterson approach this season - Dave focuses on the D and lets someone else do the O.
We'll see.
Further, I'm not sure we know if Aranda is handling 100% of the playcalling either, or if Powledge is sticking to the DBs (his positional specialty) and Aranda is taking the front 7.
Given that we're now on our third wholesale different offensive philosophy in five years - balanced spread, pro-style, Air Raid-style spread - I think it's fair to say Aranda has no offensive identity of his own. Which is OK in theory for a defensive mind, Rhule was the same way. Briles was the same as well in inverse. Our offense hasn't been amazing, but I've actually never minded his direction on that side. I think Fedora was a bad idea, but jettisoning him early was the right call, Grimes was a good hire at the time, and firing Grimes was the right call at the time. And Spavital was (I think) the right hire. I think he's been stumbling upward year over year on that side, and our O has certainly been good enough statistically for winning seasons every year sans COVID.Robert Wilson said:It's kinda funny. It's almost like we've re-arranged the staff and their duties consistent with the idea that what we have for a head coach is really instead a very good DC.parch said:A point of clarification here. Patterson always split defensive playcalling duties with Dick Bumpas until the latter retired in 2015. And we all know what happened to the TCU defense after 2015, so I'm not sure there's a ton of modern precedent out there for a HC being fully in control of the defensive playbook and it working out super well.OsoCoreyell said:
He's taking the Patterson approach this season - Dave focuses on the D and lets someone else do the O.
We'll see.
Further, I'm not sure we know if Aranda is handling 100% of the playcalling either, or if Powledge is sticking to the DBs (his positional specialty) and Aranda is taking the front 7.
The HC should give the team a vision and an identity for everyone to follow. That needs to include complementary approaches on both sides of the ball and an overall approach to the game. The HC should attract, manage, lead the staff and the players. The fact that we are on our third OC in 5 years shows that Aranda has to this point failed to do that. Practically, we're also on a third DC, given that Aranda is the de facto DC. Are we basically putting him back in the position that fits him really well? And hoping that somehow the HC part just works itself out?
Oh our offense certainly hasn't been as good as it should be, even in 2021 (Bohanon wasn't exceptional in any way and never would have been, but he was effective), but it's been good enough to win 6+ games every year in the right contexts.Robert Wilson said:
I agree with the last half of that. Our D was abysmal last year and way worse than our O. Troubling that this happens under Aranda, after he fires a guy who was supposedly some kind of mentor to him, and then we regress that badly under a new DC.
I think our offense has been good enough but incredibly pedestrian, other than one year in which we had an absolute sledgehammer RB and an NFL WR who could just go get the ball. Grimes was a one trick pony, and once that trick played out he was toast. We made a bad call on Bohanon, IMO, no one on our staff could develop (or then, by extension, attract) a QB, and our failure to develop or attract functional OL or a new stud RB after Smith ran for 1500 yards is inexcusable.
Briles wasn't active on defense, but he and Bennett figured out what kind of defense complimented Briles' O. The D didn't have to (and couldn't) be statistically great b/c of the pace and # of plays and possessions, but they had to break serve every now and then by forcing turnovers or making a big play. In general, they learned to play complimentary football, and the team had an identity and a brand - fast, loose, fearless, physical, and make your mistakes in motion. The thing made sense, worked together, and we knew who we were. Aranda is the team leader, and he hasn't instilled that sort of identity and cohesiveness on either side of the ball, much less together.
And to further this stat, we were 63-9 when we scored 30+ (and almost half those losses were despite us scoring 40+). If that isn't imbalance to the point of insanity I don't know what is. If we didn't get to 30 you could pretty much guarantee a loss, which is no identity I'm aware of. Our defense last year sucked but for different reasons and at a different pace.parch said:And when our offense inevitably didn't produce at massive levels in a few big games - 2014 vs WVU, 2015 vs Texas, 2013 vs OSU - the defense was incapable of filling the gap. Here's a crazy Briles stat for you. Baylor scored fewer than 30 points (30 points is a pretty freaking lot!) 31 times under Briles. We won two of those games. Two! 30 points! That's nuts! 2-29 in games in which we scored fewer than 30 points! I still can't believe that stat.Robert Wilson said:
I agree with the last half of that. Our D was abysmal last year and way worse than our O. Troubling that this happens under Aranda, after he fires a guy who was supposedly some kind of mentor to him, and then we regress that badly under a new DC.
I think our offense has been good enough but incredibly pedestrian, other than one year in which we had an absolute sledgehammer RB and an NFL WR who could just go get the ball. Grimes was a one trick pony, and once that trick played out he was toast. We made a bad call on Bohanon, IMO, no one on our staff could develop (or then, by extension, attract) a QB, and our failure to develop or attract functional OL or a new stud RB after Smith ran for 1500 yards is inexcusable.
Briles wasn't active on defense, but he and Bennett figured out what kind of defense complimented Briles' O. The D didn't have to (and couldn't) be statistically great b/c of the pace and # of plays and possessions, but they had to break serve every now and then by forcing turnovers or making a big play. In general, they learned to play complimentary football, and the team had an identity and a brand - fast, loose, fearless, physical, and make your mistakes in motion. The thing made sense, worked together, and we knew who we were. Aranda is the team leader, and he hasn't instilled that sort of identity and cohesiveness on either side of the ball, much less together.
Offensive identity, of course. We're talking about defense.Reverend said:
You can make pretty much any argument you want to with selected stats, but I'd say scoring over 30 points in 72 out of 103 game's establishes a pretty strong identity. I haven't checked but I'd guess the percentage was even higher from 2013-2016.
I think you're oversimplifying that. Of course our D had bad game and season statistics - they were back on the field about every 30 seconds one way or another. If you weight their stats to possessions, they start to look a lot more reasonable. Any DC who really cared about his stats wouldn't work for Briles. He'd want to work for Rhule (who also did a good job of building a cohesive and complimentary team identity - he knew he "wasn't an offensive genius" but was a solid HFC because he saw the whole picture and ran a good ship). But, I digress, defenses that were put in bad positions a great deal of the time broke serve enough that we usually won ballgames. You're saying Aranda's O isn't that bad because it's good enough to win 6 while criticizing a system that won ... how many?parch said:And to further this stat, we were 63-9 when we scored 30+ (and almost half those losses were despite us scoring 40+). If that isn't imbalance to the point of insanity I don't know what is. If we didn't get to 30 you could pretty much guarantee a loss, which is no identity I'm aware of. Our defense last year sucked but for different reasons and at a different pace.parch said:And when our offense inevitably didn't produce at massive levels in a few big games - 2014 vs WVU, 2015 vs Texas, 2013 vs OSU - the defense was incapable of filling the gap. Here's a crazy Briles stat for you. Baylor scored fewer than 30 points (30 points is a pretty freaking lot!) 31 times under Briles. We won two of those games. Two! 30 points! That's nuts! 2-29 in games in which we scored fewer than 30 points! I still can't believe that stat.Robert Wilson said:
I agree with the last half of that. Our D was abysmal last year and way worse than our O. Troubling that this happens under Aranda, after he fires a guy who was supposedly some kind of mentor to him, and then we regress that badly under a new DC.
I think our offense has been good enough but incredibly pedestrian, other than one year in which we had an absolute sledgehammer RB and an NFL WR who could just go get the ball. Grimes was a one trick pony, and once that trick played out he was toast. We made a bad call on Bohanon, IMO, no one on our staff could develop (or then, by extension, attract) a QB, and our failure to develop or attract functional OL or a new stud RB after Smith ran for 1500 yards is inexcusable.
Briles wasn't active on defense, but he and Bennett figured out what kind of defense complimented Briles' O. The D didn't have to (and couldn't) be statistically great b/c of the pace and # of plays and possessions, but they had to break serve every now and then by forcing turnovers or making a big play. In general, they learned to play complimentary football, and the team had an identity and a brand - fast, loose, fearless, physical, and make your mistakes in motion. The thing made sense, worked together, and we knew who we were. Aranda is the team leader, and he hasn't instilled that sort of identity and cohesiveness on either side of the ball, much less together.
