I wasn't talking about Bray. My team went 3-1 with a high school freshman QB. I also coach girls high school softball. We rode the backs of 4 freshmen starters all the way to the substate playoffs 6 years ago. We had 2 starting seniors and only 2 starting juniors last year and finished 3rd in our conference when we were picked to finish 6th (next to last). Our players, young and old, played fundamentally sound. I agree that the absence of senior leadership is a huge factor. That is more important than many realize. Leaders can come from other classes too, though. In the absence of said leadership, it is even more important for the staff to fill part of that void. I don't think a lack of senior leadership has a bearing on fundamentals, though.
I agree Jo. I don't even entertain the notion that high school coaches are in the same zip code of college coaches. I simply was pointing out that I wasn't coming from a casual observer's viewpoint. I also agree that we don't have the horses to challenge ghetto upper crust now. I do not believe and never will that it takes talent to be fundamentally sound. That's my only beef with the staff. We are garbage fundamentally. I don't expect wins. I expect improvement only. In my opinion only, I am not satisfied with the level of improvement or the level of fundamental, assignment football.
Here's my question and you may know this from coaching clinics: What percentage of any college staff spends time working on fundamentals throughout the season? I imagine all of game week is planning, installation and recovery. I would think an hour of tackling drills might be a waste of time and even counter-productive. Would "fundamentals" be a preseason/postseason deal? Am I way off base?
I think this year, fundamentals should have been priority. Clearly there is not enough time in the post season for such matters.
The scheme tonight told me some guys were in the right position. The technique showed me they don't know how to tackle. I am not sure what my takeaway should be from all of this.
Most if not all clinics are during the spring, so actually the vast majority of time is spend in individual periods. That amount of individual works lessens some during the regular season, but from my experiences, individual work still takes up somewhere around half the practice period. I'm sure that varies from team to team based on needs. I would think that the younger and more inexperienced the team, the more indy time would be allotted.
Throwing these out there just because: UT had never started 0-6 in the SEC until this year. UT hadn't lost three games by at least 30 points in a season since 1893 (came up one point short in 1905, so it almost wasn't as long, almost) before this year.
Welcome. Glad to help. Keep in mind, that's just my experience. We went to Auburn's clinic several years. My HC's roommate was Tubberville's D-line coach. Tubbs only did about 25-35 minutes of team drills per practice.
I went to a few Fulmer practices back in the day and a lot of Kiffin's. It is interesting to see how different folks do it.
Maybe it's just my eyes, but the tackling (or lack thereof) has been an ongoing issue since the last days of Fulmer, through Kiffin, and continuing with Dooley. Perhaps it's epidemic in college football overall, but it has managed to remain uncorrected through three different coaching staffs at UT.