Jump to content

Levi

Full Members
  • Posts

    2829
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by Levi

  1. 1 hour ago, MrBig said:

    Sark’s PR team lets puff pieces like this come out about how much he loves Alabama and then bounces for the Texas HC job 2 weeks later. Words don’t mean shit.

    https://www.si.com/college/alabama/bamacentral/steve-sarkisian-looks-back-on-filling-in-for-nick-saban-alabama-football
     

     

    Steve Sarkisian Looks Back On Filling In For Nick Saban: "I Wanted To Do the Best Job For the University"

    It doesn't appear that the 46-year old coordinator is leaving the Capstone any time soon

    Tyler Martin| Dec 29, 2020

    TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Even if it was for only one game, University of Alabama offensive coordinator Steve Sarkisian was back as an acting head coach after Nick Saban tested positive for COVID-19 ahead of the Iron Bowl last month. 

    He led the team during the Walk of Champions and out of the tunnel before coaching the Crimson Tide to a 42-13 beatdown of the in-state rivals. 

    It was the first time in over five years that Sarkisian had been in that position since he left USC. 

    "Obviously it was a unique scenario," Sarkisian said on Tuesday during his Rose Bowl media availability. "And it was one that I just wanted to do the best job I could do for the university, for our football program, for Coach Saban. And ultimately it was about the players. The guys played their tails off in that game. They played really well in all three phases, and I just kind of did my part the best I could.And again, I didn't want to lose sight of what my initial role always is, and that's to have our offense ready to play and to call plays. 

    "So the end result, it was an awesome opportunity. It was great to kind of be back in that role for a few hours. But the reality of it is it was about the players and their performance. And I was proud of the way they played in the game."

    The 2020 Broyles Award winner is nearing the end of his second year leading Alabama's offense and it's one of the most effective units in the country, averaging 49.7 points and 544 total yards a game which both lead the nation. 

    Under his leadership, the Crimson Tide offense has scored 35-or-more points in 24 straight contests, which is the longest in modern college football history.

    "I think Sark has done an outstanding job in terms of, first of all, system and scheme; secondly, in terms of how he teaches the players," Saban said earlier this week. "And he's a very good quarterback coach. So he's really helped the development of the quarterback. I think Mac [Jones] would be the first one to probably tell you that.. He's contributed as much as anybody that we've ever had here in terms of his knowledge and experience and how he manages the offensive side of the ball."

    Sarkisian has also played a massive role in developing redshirt junior signal caller Mac Jones who is a Heisman Trophy finalist, along with senior wide out DeVonta Smith. 

    In a shortened season game with only 11 games, Jones has thrown for 3,739 yards, 27 touchdowns, and leads the nation in yards per attempt (11.4) and completion percentage (76.5).

    "Coach Sark, you can see it on the field, he calls great players, great at developing players," Jones said. "All the players love him. We're all behind Coach Sark 100 percent.And he's an aggressive player caller, and it shows on the field. And we love how he adjusts to what we're saying and telling him, too. Some offensive coordinators probably don't listen to their players as much, but he definitely takes in what we tell him and what we see on the field, and we kind of combine to come up with a game plan and even in-game adjustments."

    After reportedly turning down a chance to interview with Auburn for its vacant coaching job earlier this month and pulling his name out of the Colorado search a year ago, it appears Sarkisian wants to stay in Tuscaloosa and isn't ready to hop back into a head-coaching role just yet. 

    Sarkisian is already one of the nation's highest-paid assistants at $2.5 million and he could very well be in line for a hefty raise and extension this offseason

    The 46-year old coordinator seems fine leading Alabama's high-powered offense for the foreseeable future and becoming, possibly, the next great story in Saban's long list of former head coaches who he has rehabilitated. 

    All Sarkisian says he wants to be at the moment is a sponge, soaking up all the knowledge he can from one of the game's very best.

    "I don't know what he's learned from me," Sarkisian said of his relationship with Saban. "But I would say, at the end of the day, I've just tried to be a sponge here, man. I had a choice here two years ago with some other opportunities, and had the opportunity to come back here to Alabama. I jumped on the opportunity, not just to coach the players and be part of the team, but to be around him. Coach Saban is the best ever to do it. And then a year ago I had a couple opportunities to become a head coach, and I decided to come back because I felt like my work here wasn't done. I felt like I owed it to him. I made a commitment to him to be part of this program. And I just try to do the best I can do. I try to be the best version of Steve Sarkisian every day that I show up and be a sponge, all of the aspects of the program that he has his fingerprint on, which is literally everything. 

    "And I think probably the biggest thing I've learned from him is his ability to balance all aspects of the program, whether it's on the field, off the field, recruiting, all that goes into being a head coach at a place like Alabama. Those are all the things that I've tried to take in from him because his balance of all of that, I think, is what is pretty incredible."

    Your reply to me on Sark not thinking the college level is beneath him, is a puff piece tactic used by any coaches agent when they have interest in other jobs? Those two things aren’t even connected at all. If Sark actually believed the college level is beneath him, he would have left a long time ago. The article carry’s more weight if you were trying to suggest he’s leaving for another job even after what his agency released and the post game presser comment. 

  2. 7 minutes ago, MrBig said:

    Sark has always come across as someone who thinks the college game is beneath him. When his concepts don’t work right in the college game it’s because the players aren’t professionals. I get it, some people have their preferences, but being the HC at Texas is not the fucking place to use as a stepping stone to the NFL unless you can bring a few titles within half a decade. Sark standing on his booger eating hill of “back to back CFP semis” doesn’t fucking count. One of his QB whisperer prodigies Mark Sanchez got to back to back AFC championship games and look at the guy now. That doesn’t mean shit unless you can get a ring. 

    Bit of a stretch. Sark has said in interviews why he prefers the college game over the pros. That opinion might have changed now for numerous reasons but it’s not because Sark thinks the college game is beneath him. 

  3. 12 minutes ago, Nicole44 said:

    People will always kick the tires on Sark the OC. There will be a HC to rein in his crazy sometimes Tin Cup mode play calling. He didn’t fare well with the Falcons as OC following Shanahan but I think people recognize he’s a talented OC. There are 32 NFL teams and about ten of them will try anything. I just never thought he would stay. He wants back to the NFL. He admires how they do shit. This coming out in the Athletic is disastrous for him. He loses errbody gonna go “well no wonder we lost he doesn’t even want to coach here enough to do his job.” It may feel like a box to him. But to us, we just got told our spouse has a wandering eye. It never works out well. And I feel like he’s incapable of reining himself in as play caller and he is spread too thin as HC and the entire team has suffered as a result of his asswater idea to do NFL prostyle practices and basically be virtually absent from our offseason. 
     

    who knows what happens now. The bloom is off the rose. 🌹 that’s all I know. If he seriously wants NFL then Sark needs to ride Sexton’s ass like Zorro to find him a landing spot asap.
     

    Stoops at Kentucky will never be the same after aggy tricked Stoops into taking a job offer and pulling it back. The bloom is off the rose there. They know he was gonna ditch them. it’s a damn shame because “4th quarter Mississippi State” Sark is who we hoped we hired for every game. This whole thing sucks. 

    The other way around—he’s spread too thin at OC while being the head coach. Sark over calculated with all the injuries that happened late in the season and went with the NFL model for the offseason. He also put too much faith into the homegrown Oline. If he comes back those are things that can be fixed. The hardest part for fixing Saturdays will be getting him to relinquish play calling duties. I may be in the minority here but I don't think it’s a forgone conclusion he doesn’t give up play calling. 

  4. The majority of Arch’s big time throws against OU were off of scrambles. Kentucky did a better job containing Arch but the Oline also did not help him with the shit show they were displaying in pass protection. As it pertains to the passing game against Kentucky, the small sample size of long developing plays actually had some success. The throw to Mosley in the 3rd quarter was nice and I think Moore had one as well. His wtf moments were on the quick, easy to read throws. 

    • Hook 'Em 2
  5. If I remember correctly Sark got more involved with the defense after the terrible first year they had. I imagine now that everything straightened out he’s not involved that much anymore. It does make you think if he was to hire an OC that runs an offense similar to his own, how valuable his expertise would be at identifying deficiencies from a CEO perspective. 

    • Hook 'Em 1
  6. 40 minutes ago, Codaxx said:

    it bigger than that. Sark would have taken 1 perfect recruit and made him into a 7th rounder. Then the other would be in the transfer portal after failure. That isnt on the resume of a great offensive mind and QB guru like Sark. Not to mention the Manning family approval gave Sark the endorsement he needed. Manning failing at Texas is not something I want to contemplate as a Texas fan

    Playing devils advocate here but Lincoln Riley only has Williams that he recruited and put in the NFL. The rest he either received via the portal or hit the portal to another school.

    It’s weird because Thompson and Card played their best under Sark but he struggles with the higher rated guys. Ewers was made of glass but he still did get better each year considering his circumstances. Manning may not be it and a total whiff by Sark and the media based solely on his name. Even with the context for both of those guys, there’s no changing the narrative with Sark struggling to develop high profile QB’s. 

  7. 1 minute ago, Park Gothic said:

    Agreed, but I also think Arch's failure to be consistent in the quick game is a product of the bad OL and playcalling. Dude is getting rocked on every other play. You can't get into a rhythm when you're expecting to take a hit. So even on plays where the protection is sound, he's still in panic mode because of all the shots he's taken. The OU game plan in the second half needs to be the whole offense. Keep it fast. Let the pocket roll. Let Arch use his legs to buy time. 

    He’s as tough as they come and definitely not contact shy. Ewers would feel pressure and just cave while trying to throw. Arch has no fear in a clean pocket, the guy is just simply missing easy completions that are there for the taking. It’s backwards the way he can locate the wr as he’s getting hit but can’t in a clean pocket.

    Like others have said, the only time he looks comfortable is when he’s scrambling and it turns into backyard football. I’m sure everyone in the program knows that an offense built off of scrambling isn’t going to get them far.

  8. 17 minutes ago, Park Gothic said:

    I'll say it again and again. Arch is a problem, but the playcalling and OL are much bigger problems. 

    A great QB would see this play was not going to work and tried something else. There's a lot of blockers standing around, maybe he can pick up 3 yards with his legs. But he's not a great QB and either way he's been coached to throw the ball instead of run. Arch is not who we thought he was, but Sark refuses to acknowledge or accept this and move on. Sark certainly can't see how badly the OL is fucked.

    This is a total team failure on the offense's side of the ball. Because the offense runs through Arch it's natural to point fingers at him, but I just don't know what he's supposed to do at this point. He's getting zero help. 

    One way to help a struggling oline and  quarterback not being able to read the field is to utilize more quick game, such as crossers, slants, 8 to 10 yard digs, etc but Arch at the moment isn’t good at those consistently. At this point, Sark has no clue which version of Manning is going to show up in the passing game.

    Sark failed Manning in the run game on Saturday. Six carries in the first half, with a total of 15 carries is a fucking joke after what they found that worked against Oklahoma. 

    • Hook 'Em 5
    • Like 1
  9. 7 minutes ago, Vertuzzi said:

    The issue is that I don’t think Sark knows that he needs to make changes. His comments of delusion seem to indicate that he’s just happy to win, removing any context regarding how shitty the team played and how poor the opponent is. 

    I think he knows exactly what needs to happen, but I fear his past is weighing heavily on his ability to make tough decisions.

    If there was a  ranking for Coach speak, Sark is easily in the top 3. I’ve stopped taking any stock into his press conferences. It is rare for him to acknowledge the negative in ways that Sabin or others bluntly do. If he does, it’s usually a quick hitter with hardly any explanation. 

  10. 21 minutes ago, Hank Kingsley said:

    I'm sorry you can't look a little deeper into it. 

    Arch is a part of the problem. But he would have to be elite for this offense to be functional and consistent. There is so much failure and lack of execution all over the offensive side of the ball, and two things can be true at once. 

     

    Elite is hitting Wingo and Endries running wide open? This offense just needs him to execute what the defense gives him. Theres nothing Arch can do when the pocket breaks down in under a second or Sark not even trying to establish the run game. That type of stuff is out of his control and needs to be fixed. But it’s also dumb to think that we need Arch to constantly be elite in the passing game, like the one throw to Livingstone in the OU game. 

    • Hook 'Em 1
  11. 2 minutes ago, Dbeasy said:

    Arch is bad. But he’s looking worse because of terrible OL protection a lot, and a bad scheme for him (at this point in time in his development)

    Caldwell wasn’t brought in for Owen’s, was he? It was for Arch. 

    Arch is missing throws that are in every scheme. Day 1 install type shit. He’s a tough SOB, that’s for sure.

    Caldwell is here because of Owen’s, who’s now behind a true freshman on depth chart. What do Arch, Caldwell and Lacey all have in common? 

    • Hook 'Em 1
    • Like 1
  12. 2 hours ago, I Plead Da Fif said:

    With Terry, how soon can we realistically expect him to get game snaps if his first practices at RB were a practice or two leading up to OU? Not sure he sees the field all that much this year unless we’re in a really bad place at RB injury wise.

    I think I read somewhere that Sark said Terry has been the scout team running back for the last 3 weeks. 

    • Hook 'Em 3
  13. 25 minutes ago, gmr548 said:

    I think I remember the one. I don't even know if Wisner was hit or if he slipped while trying to make a cut. He ended up getting just enough by falling forward but I remember a notable interior surge, the likes of which we had not seen in short yardage all season to that point. Wisner falling forward to get the first was only possible because the OU DL was moved, it would have been a stuff in a stalemate. I maintain most of our run game was Wisner hero ball but that particular play was the OL, and it was an important one.

    It looked like slight hesitation for reading the hole. I jokingly said to my buddy I was watching the game with that Wisner was initially shocked to see the online get movement on a third and short. 

  14. 4 minutes ago, Surly Bevo said:

    Mateer was making the same YOLO throws I saw him make when I watched them play Michigan and Auburn.  I don't think it was the thumb....it's who he is.  Our defense is just better than those other two teams and contained his running and picked those stupid ass decisions he makes.  

    This. He did make a couple throws during the game that showed the thumb wasn’t a big issue at all. Some posters on this board noted that  when Mateer was at Washington st, he struggled against good defenses. That’s basically what we saw yesterday. 

    • Hook 'Em 1
  15. 33 minutes ago, Coach pop a bitch said:

     

    Underrated part of this play is Townsend keeping his head on a swivel and making a key block. 

    • Hook 'Em 1
  16. 1 hour ago, BlackCat said:

    I see the rumors are finally hitting social media. Wanna know when I first heard these rumors?

    The week of the A&M game last season. 
     

    I don’t know shit about fuck, but I discounted those rumors based on the timing alone. Just because fuckface Aggies want to drag people’s names through the mud don’t mean the most ridiculous version of events are true. 
     

    Sark and his wife had marital troubles, that’s public information. All I know is they ended up not getting divorced and had a kid. Don’t put gas on a fire that’s likely started by Aggies. They’re going to stoke these flames now, let’s not help them do that. 

    But sir, the most reputable posters on this platform have confirmed it to be true. Moreover, Twitter — the most reliable bastion of objectivity and credible reporting, particularly when its comes from anonymous burner accounts — has also verified it. We are turbo fucked.  

    • Hook 'Em 1
  17. 31 minutes ago, victory88 said:

    100%.  RB was an issue last year.  I know Wisner had 1000 yards but everyone that watched him knew he was not an inside runner.  We should have gotten a proven guy in the portal.  If Baxter wanted to leave, so be it.  No point in betting on a guy that can't stay healthy more than 2 games in a row.  The ROI on the Baxter NIL package has to be absolutely terrible.

    We could really use a dynamic back like Blue right now. 

    • Hook 'Em 2
  18. 13 minutes ago, DFW Horn said:

    Both Stroh and Hutson keep getting worse, which I didn't think was possible.

    Stroh leans too much and gets out over his feet after first contact. Hutson doesn't anchor in pass pro. I'm glad we finally replaced Stroh, but is a true freshman really our best option? PFF grade says Brooks sucked, too.

    Our best options on the online right now are guys that can move people in the run game. I really don’t care who they are— we just need to give our run game a chance to succeed. 

    • Hook 'Em 2
  19. 4 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

    This is likely consistent with Sark's recovery mindset.  He's not going to try to control his subordinates.  He's going to tell them what should be done, likely on a consensus basis, and free them to do their jobs and expect them to do their jobs.

    The point about Bama above is likely on point.  Sark was reliant upon good recruiting, evals, and the other coaches doing their jobs.  He does his and results follow.  But the presence of Saban made those assumptions and reliances valid and now they may not be so valid.

     

    I think what Saban brought to his assistants the most was execution on game days. Simply put, his presence on the side line was felt top to bottom. Sark has course corrected multiple times on different aspects of the program throughout his time here. But Sark doesn’t have that feel on game days like Saban does. Most college coaches don’t. The correction usually comes after the fact and is really hammered in the offseason. Sark intervened with PK after the first year and we really haven’t looked back since. The offense on the other hand is his baby. The reflection and plan to action is different. I truly believe he’s a great great play designer and play caller but there is an obvious disconnect on game days that I fear can only be fixed if he approaches it the way he did with the defense. 

    • Hook 'Em 3
  20. 3 minutes ago, DFW Horn said:

    A coach has to build his playbook and game plan around what his players do well, or he has to recruit players to his system.

    I don't know WTF we're thinking right now. Ultimately, that's on Sark.

    Sark is throwing everything including the kitchen sink at the offense right now. Arch is too erratic to find a consistent groove during the game which makes it hard for Sark to adjust. Once the game slows down for Arch we will start to see the offense have more an identity. We were able to find one with Ewers and his deficiencies (he at least had an oline that could somewhat pass protect). The identity Sark eventually finds with Arch will still look flawed because there is no fixing the big bag of shit our Oline is right now. Wins are just too difficult to find with the combo we are getting from Arch and the Oline. 

    • Hook 'Em 3
×
×
  • Create New...