Tom Herman

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Apr 16, 2009
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He came in with a lot of hoopla but I'm not impressed with what he has done at ISU on offense. I do not like his overall style and calling plays at the line of scrimmage is incredibly annoying. I think he's in over his head at the major D-1 level. I think we need to go back to something more basic. Thoughts?
 
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I love AA and I certainly don't want to bash the kid...but I really hope Herman get's a chance to put an offense on the field that has a high caliber qb.

I was thinking...what if Iowa and ISU just switched qb's for the game? I don't think we win but I'm thinking it's more than 28-14 if AA just hit's his freaking receivers and doesn't throw two picks inside the 20.
 
I don't think it's so much of Herman's play calling today, its the fact that Iowa just ate up the clock for the entire first half. The receivers could have caught the ball a little better and the Offensive line could have blocked better for AROB to run the ball. Austin could have also thrown a few more better passes today. It's one game in the season, if theres a trend then I'd start to be worried.
 
This offense appears to based on having a QB who can complete a high percentage of short passes while putting the ball where a WR can do something with it, and also WRs who can take short passes and turn them into long gains.

Right now, we don't have either of those things on this team.
 
He came in with a lot of hoopla but I'm not impressed with what he has done at ISU on offense. I do not like his overall style and calling plays at the line of scrimmage is incredibly annoying. I think he's in over his head at the major D-1 level. I think we need to go back to something more basic. Thoughts?
i dont think he is in over his head at D-1 level, more like over his head for this team who obviously cannot execute at the line of scrimmage.
 
I love AA and I certainly don't want to bash the kid...but I really hope Herman get's a chance to put an offense on the field that has a high caliber qb.

I was thinking...what if Iowa and ISU just switched qb's for the game? I don't think we win but I'm thinking it's more than 28-14 if AA just hit's his freaking receivers and doesn't throw two picks inside the 20.

I don't think that Stanzi fares much better than Arnaud if he played for ISU today. The coverage and pressure from Iowa was just too much today.

Switch D-Lines, and now you're talking.
 
I was particularly disappointed with today's game plan. I was hoping we would stick more to the quick outs, WR screens and timing routes. Especially at the beginning of the game, to get Arnaud in the flow of the game. We also seemed to abandon our hurry up offense, I thought that would work well against Iowa. I also thought we ran way to much on first down. There is not many teams that are successful running the ball against Iowa, I was hoping we can pass first and open up the running game.
 
He came in with a lot of hoopla but I'm not impressed with what he has done at ISU on offense. I do not like his overall style and calling plays at the line of scrimmage is incredibly annoying. I think he's in over his head at the major D-1 level. I think we need to go back to something more basic. Thoughts?
AA is the wrong QB for the Herman system -- maybe any system?? but AA looked best under GC.
 
There are plays that will work against Iowa's 4-3 defense, Iowa gives a 5 yard cushion. Iowa dominates the middle of the field, we needed more sideline timing routes. They did a lot of that against Northern Illinios, but strayed from it today. Watch Northwestern play Iowa this year, they now how to do it.
 
Marty Fine
Barrney Cotton
Robert McFarland
Tom Herman

When is the last time fans have been happy about their OC. Some didnt like what Loney ran.
 
The thing that I don't like about this offense is the way that they stop any tempo that they gain.

I don't know how many times (even last year) I yelled about getting up to the line and snapping the ball.

As far as AA goes, it really isn't fair to be way down on him. This is the third offense that he has had to learn. Last year he started to get comfortable against K State, and then hurt his hand.

AA's problem, and the problem of the offense in general, is that when he takes the snap, he thinks too much.

Iowa's defense will give you little plays all day. You have to be patient and take the 3 yard pass. NW does this, that is why they give Iowa fits. AA is not patient enough, and he tries to go for too much which leads to the ints.

But we have ten games left, let's see what happens.
 
Not just Herman...Offensive play calling has looked weak for years now.


My opinion, too weak of play calls. When you're up step harder and turn your foot on the throat. When down... well start taking some damn chances.
 
Those first 3 and outs screwed our undersized D. The game was over before the first half was. Had our O moved the ball at all in the first 25 minutes, we might have kept it respectable. Once we were down 21, the game was over. However anyone wants to spin it, I'm fine with that. Plain and simple we weren't even close to a competitor with Iowa out there today. They were the better team and showed us why. They could move the ball. I'm sorry, but right now, Iowa is a far better football team than ISU is. It's that simple. They just have better football players. Blame it on AA, whomever. Receivers didn't make plays, AA threw bad passes, and our D bent and broke against a better team.
 
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Iowa has our number right now, until we step out of the norm and show them something different, we are screwed. Those first 3 and outs screwed our undersized D. The game was over before the first half was. Had our O moved the ball at all in the first 25 minutes, we might have kept it respectable. Once we were down 21, the game was over. However anyone wants to spin it, I'm fine with that. Plain and simple we weren't even close to a competitor with Iowa out there today. They were the better team and showed us why. They could move the ball.

You are correct, we haven't thrown any wrinkles at them the past two years.

But you also have to remember that this is still a new program. I really believe that they are still trying to get everything put into place. You almost can't be anything but vanilla right now. The goal is still winning against the conference opponents, and maybe by week 5-6 there will be more continuity.

The problem is that the o-line is pretty veteran, I don't know enough about the back-ups and the kids to know if this will be a problem next year or not.

However, and this is really all that counts, we competed POORLY today. That is the thing that had me so disheartened. You can get run over, but the effort was not anywhere close to what it needs to be to win at this level. That I put on the coaching staff.
 
The only complaint I have with Herman is the last 2 years game plan against Iowa, I don't think he's put Arnuad in a position to succeed. They need to simplify the offense for him, and call plays he can execute. He is incapable of throwing the ball down the middle of the field against Iowa, or any team really. I think they will simplify things for him from here on out, similar to what they did last year after Iowa destroyed us.
 
This whole deal seams very similar to when Chiz brought McFarland in. AA isn't good we all know that. As far as the passing, i question how consistent you can move the ball when it's dumps, bubble screens, and rubs. Even when we have 5 wide 2-3 of those guys are used to rub. Maybe it's just me, but when we run the zone read it looks like AA and the back are in slow motion. Not good. Thoughts?
 
Nothing is wrong with Herman's offense. It takes time to get the personnel that we need for it. AA is not built for this system. He has, overall in his career, done a decent job making the best of it. He struggles with Iowa's D, but hell, a lot of teams and QB's do. He just hasn't improved at the rate ISU needs him too. He's still got a lot of growing up/learning to do in this system with making accurate passes and the correct reads. Don't get me wrong though, I'm not saying time to look to the bench. Tiller/Barnett/Capello will have their respective times/chances. Putting one of them in now doesn't give us any better chance to win football games. AA is the best option we have and he needs to slow things down in his head and go play football. He didn't play well today, but he also wasn't the sole reason, we were down 14-0 before he even threw his 2nd pass of the game. Iowa's really good. We're still a good football team too, and Iowa didn't take that away from us. Let's take some early year anger/frustration out on some purple cats!
 

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