Krieg said:
He started Anu Solomon over Zach Smith, a QB that nearly beat OU a few games later while running a hurry up, no huddle spread attack for one game.
1- Anu got concussed against UTSA and had to retire. Unfair to judge him on that game given the impact of that and he got UofArizona to a Fiesta bowl. If he won the job in practice he won the job.
2- OU was the worst defense in the Big 12 that year. Worst Yards per Drive against common foes. If Smith was so unstoppable how come we didn't see it again? Probably says more about OU than ZS.
3- They used spread tactics in other games as well.
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People think these guys didn't have talent because they won a single game that year but that's not the reality. Their talent might not have fit what Rhule wanted to run but they had talent to run something successfully and win a lot more than 1 game, as you admitted as well.
4- Two more games maybe stretching for an upset maybe two isn't a lot more. Certainly not a dramatic amount of talent.
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In the end we'll never know how good they were or weren't because they were recruited to do one thing and then asked to do something else. It is what it is.
If Briles had stayed we'd be saying they had a ton of talent as they'd have played in a system they were chosen to run. Are we pretending he didn't know how to spot talent now? That's absurd.
5- If CAB had stayed the roster is likely MUCH better due to recruiting classes and not losing Autry. Huge difference there.
6- Give Briles the 2017 guys Rhule had after departures and retirements. What you'd see is the production would have been like 2009's terrible output.
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Clearly we had worse talent than in 2015,
7- 2015 was arguably the top roster in the entire CAB tenure. You must mean 2016 which was a steep dropoff from 15
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but as you said 3-5 wins was reasonable. I'd argue sightly more but regardless it was a massive coaching failure in year 1. Why that gets pushback is astounding to me.
We lost to an FCS team for the only time in our history and followed that up by losing to a 2nd team that had never beaten a P5 school. There's no other way to look at that season than it being a coaching failure. Rhule can have a failure in that season and not be a failure overall. It's ok to admit as much.
8- What other games are reasonable with basically no OL and losing almost every major 2016 contributor? In hindsight do you think that group is a lock for a bowl with different coaching? I'm calling bs on that.
9- Liberty And UTSA werent reasonable losses. First one was backup secondary repeatedly screwing up (9 players in the back five positions were out) and UTSA was a solid but not good G5 that we should have beaten and probably beat if they correctly diagnose Anu's injury. Remember they had a few really good players on D including a first round DE that wreak havoc on a bad OL.
10- There's no pushback on saying we should have won the first two.
11- The pushback is on thinking that shell of a roster was going bowling or had any expectation to. Big 12 + Duke wasn't going to give many assured wins.
12- Look at the roster as if you are an opponent scheming against them:
- Bad OL outside of RG and RT.
- Average DL but not great in pass rush
- Two good LBs
- Best CBs were a recently converted WR and a true freshman
- Safeties outside of Chris Miller were very slow and all but Hall weren't big.
- No capable coverage options at nickel that also are run capable. Down from two in 2016
- Receivers are good but lost Platt, Holmes, Sneed throughout the year.
- QB was a true freshman Brewer, true Soph pocket passer who was up and down in 2016, and Solomon.
- TE was basically Fuerbacher and a hoops player barely learning the position.
It's much worse than you want to admit. CAB's Offense relies on the run. 280 pound converted TEs and true freshmen that weren't ready wouldn't support that. Th only year remotely in range of this roster was 2009 after injuries piled up. Outside of one game that offense got slapped around.
