"Monday Morning Quarterback" Discussion:

[The Peeper]

From a Kansas newspaper article:

While Fitzgerald did rack up 154 yards passing on only 11 completions, it took him 27 attempts to get there. He threw a pick right at freshman defensive end Wyatt Hubert, and repeatedly tried to go deep on the Wildcat secondary.

Fitzgerald completed one pass of more than 10 yards downfield. There were pass plays which gained more than that — 32, 23, 21, 16, and 13. Add that up and it’s 105 of his 154 yards, leaving 49 yards on six catches for the rest of his resume.
Those longer plays were, with the lone exception, the result of short throws underneath, and the safeties can be blamed for not making tackles.

 

[TheStateUofMS]

Their safeties stopped wanting to tackle after Kylin Hill ran them over for the 4th time.

Fitz was punishing them too. Haha what sour grapes.

 

[aTotal360]

Well Fitz did look pathetic throwing it. I don't think there is any other way to spin it, but I'm sure some will try.

 

[karlchilders.sixpack]

Fitz is billed as a Heiseman candidate

so they are critiquing his game.

At the same time this is a slap in the face to their secondary..

It's only going to get better on Fitz's part.

 

[TheStateUofMS]

The folks who thought Fitz was an elite or even above average passer weren't really familiar with his body of work and that's on them.

Fitz will be between 55-60% and likely on the lower end before the season is over. If it's 57% this year with 2,500yds and 800rush yards with 20pass TD and 10 rush TD and 10int or under, we'll have a shot at the SECCG.

I don't think that's out of reach judging from one game.

 

[Seinfeld]

Agree completely, and I’ll add that we in no way need 40 yard bombs in order to be very successful.

We need Nick to be effective running the ball and for him to be in a position to make throws that he can make. Hell, the article even says that our longest passing play were short throws, so the sooner we figure out that all we need Nick to do is consistently make those 10-15 yard tosses, the better we’ll be. Sprinkle in a deep throw to Mitchell or Guidry every now and then, but our receivers can make plenty of plays for us after a catch

 

[TheStateUofMS]

Fitz doesn't even have to hit our guys in stride, but just throw it up to Guidry and Mitchell and give them a chance to make a play on it. Even Ta'amu's balls aren't perfect every time. I see his WR make great catches.

Guidry is just as good as any of them IMO.

 

[Dawgzilla]

We need teams to respect the deep ball for Moorhead's offense to really be effective. Of course, they are not just going to leave a deep receiver uncovered, but Fitz needs to complete a couple of deep balls so that we see more cover 2.

 

[Seinfeld]

Respectfully disagree completely. Dak wasn’t much of a deep passing threat either, but he had a great RB and a diverse group of receivers in ‘14, and the offense was just fine. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t ever take a shot, but I’d rather excel at the things we’re built to do rather than force something we’re not.

Also, before anyone brings up Bama and OM, we did not lose those games because of lack of a deep ball. We lost due to mental errors and a complete lack of effort/coaching in the egg bowl

 

[Dawgzilla]

We have a new coach,and a new offense this year.

 

[johnson86-1]

Respectfully disagree completely. Dak wasn’t much of a deep passing threat either, but he had a great RB and a diverse group of receivers in ‘14, and the offense was just fine. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t ever take a shot, but I’d rather excel at the things we’re built to do rather than force something we’re not.

Also, before anyone brings up Bama and OM, we did not lose those games because of lack of a deep ball. We lost due to mental errors and a complete lack of effort/coaching in the egg bowl

We don't need Fitz to be good at the deep ball to be pretty good, but if you're talking about an SEC CG or playoff appearance, yes, he probably has to be able to keep people honest. If Bama or Auburn and maybe LSU or A&M decide to go one on one on the outside with no help and we can't make them pay for that, then that's going to make it pretty hard for the rest of our offense to work correctly. Our running game should be good enough that we'll still move the ball some, and our defense will probably still be good enough to give us a chance, but I don't think we can make it through those four games unscathed that way.

 

[Clarence Boddicker]

Respectfully disagree completely. Dak wasn’t much of a deep passing threat either, but he had a great RB and a diverse group of receivers in ‘14, and the offense was just fine. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t ever take a shot, but I’d rather excel at the things we’re built to do rather than force something we’re not.

Also, before anyone brings up Bama and OM, we did not lose those games because of lack of a deep ball. We lost due to mental errors and a complete lack of effort/coaching in the egg bowl

100% agree. I honestly cannot understand why others can't see this.

This RPO fun/n/shoot stuff may be implemented more with Thompson next year, but no need to do the whole Croom Error Square Peg stuff yet again.