PJ Fleck has become Jerry Kill

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gopherdudepart2 said:
Nobody I'd say is insinuating or talking about firing the head coach. People are just tired of how games like today started. I get it your trying to protect the red shirt freshman QB, but Gophers played right into Penn States hand starting the game the way we did the first 3 to 4 drives. Trying to run long stretch plays to an inside zone, or get the edge on them was a pretty poor game plan to start the game. Handcuff the team doing that. What did we have to lose going tempo and throwing quick outs and some fast stick routes and move the ball. Penn State is good not great, and we made them look great in the first half by running predictable running plays into the teeth of the defense. Absolutely hate how conservative on offense Gophers played to start the game. Ohio State is going to kill Penn State.
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How many times are we going to play conservative on offense.
 


I think PJ should PLAY TO WIN - Have your freshman QB start throwing the ball from the very first snap - If AK has to "eased" into his first start in front of 103,000 screaming fans then PJ has picked the wrong guy. If AK had been PLAYING TO WIN he would have thrown for a million, billion miles and about 10 touchdowns!! Winning is about WANTING TO WIN. PJ and AK just didn't want to win badly enough. PJ should be fired and then we can hire a successful coach like Urban Meyer (if Neb hasn't hired him first). I am just sick of losing and playing to LOSE!!
 

howeda7 said:
An average power 5 coach. Poor use of timeouts. Overly conservative except in weird spots like going for it on your own 30 etc.
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I think he is pretty good with timeouts. There haven’t been many games to my memory where we haven’t had a timeout when we needed one.
I don’t think burning first half timeouts is as a big of deal as people think.

I mean you can certainly point to 3-5 specific punt/fg/convert it decisions but I think you don’t watch enough football if you don’t think every coach has 1-2 decisions like that per year. For instance if Illinois is 2/4 on 4th down instead of 4/4 and the gophers won everyone blames BB for the loss.
He is a fine game day coach.

His bigger issue to me is his overall philosophy. People are going to want fleck fired for the same reason people wanted tressel fired. Just frustrating to watch. Urban Meyer was better than tressel, but tressel still really good.

If we could hire tressel or Meyer, we should drop fleck
 

there are multiple ways to create a winning program.

-- bring in talent that is superior to the teams you face
-- bring in talent that is equivalent to the teams you face, and win through schemes and coaching
-- bring in talent that is inferior to the teams you face, and win through superior coaching

obviously, the less talent you have, the better the coaching has to be.

If it was up to me, I would rather have superior talent and an average coach as opposed to average talent and a superior coach. but in today's game, superior talent costs $$$$$.
 

diefirma said:
I think PJ should PLAY TO WIN - Have your freshman QB start throwing the ball from the very first snap - If AK has to "eased" into his first start in front of 103,000 screaming fans then PJ has picked the wrong guy. If AK had been PLAYING TO WIN he would have thrown for a million, billion miles and about 10 touchdowns!! Winning is about WANTING TO WIN. PJ and AK just didn't want to win badly enough. PJ should be fired and then we can hire a successful coach like Urban Meyer (if Neb hasn't hired him first). I am just sick of losing and playing to LOSE!!
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PJ thought the opening 3 points were big. LMAO
 



Some guy said:
I think he is pretty good with timeouts. There haven’t been many games to my memory where we haven’t had a timeout when we needed one.
I don’t think burning first half timeouts is as a big of deal as people think.

I mean you can certainly point to 3-5 specific punt/fg/convert it decisions but I think you don’t watch enough football if you don’t think every coach has 1-2 decisions like that per year. For instance if Illinois is 2/4 on 4th down instead of 4/4 and the gophers won everyone blames BB for the loss.
He is a fine game day coach.

His bigger issue to me is his overall philosophy. People are going to want fleck fired for the same reason people wanted tressel fired. Just frustrating to watch. Urban Meyer was better than tressel, but tressel still really good.

If we could hire tressel or Meyer, we should drop fleck
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Timeouts haven't been bad this year. The usage was brutal in prior years. Some of that was on Sanford's incompetence. I'm not advocating Fleck be dropped.
 

Some guy said:
I think he is pretty good with timeouts. There haven’t been many games to my memory where we haven’t had a timeout when we needed one.
I don’t think burning first half timeouts is as a big of deal as people think.

I mean you can certainly point to 3-5 specific punt/fg/convert it decisions but I think you don’t watch enough football if you don’t think every coach has 1-2 decisions like that per year. For instance if Illinois is 2/4 on 4th down instead of 4/4 and the gophers won everyone blames BB for the loss.
He is a fine game day coach.

His bigger issue to me is his overall philosophy. People are going to want fleck fired for the same reason people wanted tressel fired. Just frustrating to watch. Urban Meyer was better than tressel, but tressel still really good.

If we could hire tressel or Meyer, we should drop fleck
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Did he use any TOs in the second half?
 

WindyCityGopher said:
Bullshit. A lot of people saw that game, the opportunities it presented for the program, and called out the absolutely weak and passive game plan against a team they should’ve beat. Go back and read that game thread, it was being noted in real time.
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Defense lost that game when three guys couldn't tackle a receiver or push him out of bounds.
 

Gopher028 said:
I was nervous from the get-go when PJ would play down to crappy non conference teams like 'jer did and beat them by 3 with a 4th quarter comeback...

All vanilla offense where the playbook could fit on a post-it note.

Yesterday was no different. It's like they ran 4-5 plays all game and became so predictable. I know you have a frosh but you ALWAYS have to play to win, whatever it takes even if you have to dust off the last 10 pages of the playbook. Athan is a smart kid with a helluva lot of talent. Put him in a position to WIN. Not to lose by as few points as possible. IT. NEVER. WORKS.
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Not sure we were playing to win for very long. Coming out for the second half PJ told reporter he wanted to run to "shorten the game ". We were behind at the time so one might infer he wanted to hold down the margin of loss.
 



howeda7 said:
Timeouts haven't been bad this year. The usage was brutal in prior years. Some of that was on Sanford's incompetence. I'm not advocating Fleck be dropped.
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Boy Howdy, there was sure one timeout we could have used when they lined up a receiver way wide left and we didn't even notice him. Maybe a coach could have noticed that and called for TO.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
there are multiple ways to create a winning program.

-- bring in talent that is superior to the teams you face
-- bring in talent that is equivalent to the teams you face, and win through schemes and coaching
-- bring in talent that is inferior to the teams you face, and win through superior coaching

obviously, the less talent you have, the better the coaching has to be.

If it was up to me, I would rather have superior talent and an average coach as opposed to average talent and a superior coach. but in today's game, superior talent costs $$$$$.
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You might notice all the great coaches have superior talent. Is Ryan Day a great coach at Wyoming?
 


WindyCityGopher said:
I made the “not a guy that ever gets you there” assessment during the Iowa game in 2019 when we were a win away from winning the West and going to the Rose Bowl and his testes sucked up into his chest cavity.
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I made the same assessment at the same time. Keep hoping to be proven wrong.
 


Replacement Gopher said:
I made the same assessment at the same time. Keep hoping to be proven wrong.
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I mean betting on the gopher coach to never get over the top has been a safe bet for literally 50 years.
If you have the answer I am all in
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
You play to win the game, not to limit how much you lose by. Pathetic coaching this season so far. I thought when we hired PJ it was someone who had a pair and knew when to use them. PJ has become a scared little kid who’s no better than the previous regimes. Fuck this.
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By the second quarter it was obvious that Penn State wasn't just going to roll over and give us the game. Apparently this threw a wrench into our game plan.
 

cjbfbp said:
Big Ten doesn't go to Vegas this season. Big Ten goes to the Duke's Mayo Bowl (Charlotte NC) instead this year. Unless we perform better than expected for the remainder of the season, I'm guessing the Pinstripe or Duke's Mayo, both against ACC opponents, are the likely destinations. Perhaps at 8-4 we could go to Nashville. I don't think they'd send us to the Guaranteed Rate two years in a row.
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Charlotte would be better than the Pinstripe Bowl!
 

Gophergrandpa said:
So, our wide receivers can’t beat man coverage. We did have one wide open throw, which Athan nailed. Bryce W came out of the backfield uncovered because of blitz pressure (naked screen?). The uncontested throw went for 19 yards. I don’t think we tried that play again. Maybe we did and I missed it or the RB was covered. But it seemed like a brief flash of successful creativity that vanished soon, replaced by mind-numbing predictability. Predictability works when you can overpower; predictability is the kiss of desth when you can’t. Creativity and unpredictability help you beat a team that is physically better. Coaching had a lot to do with this loss … or, I should say the feeling of frustration after this loss. It feels like we didn’t give it our best shot in offense. No scheme adjustments (at least to the untrained eye).
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Exactly.
 


He's better than Jerry Kill, but our program is right where it's been the last 10 years. Even with Purdue & below Michigan, OSU, PSU, Wisconsin & Iowa. We haven't jumped any levels. 2019 feels like a long time ago and if you look at our recruits for 2023...there's not much to get excited about. We still lose the state's top player every year.

Our WR group is bad. Hardly any talent there. If MBS & Geary are getting playing time, you're not doing a good enough job recruiting that that spot.

Our RB group is awful behind Mo. There's really no excuse for that. I know we've seen good players transfer, but that's on PJ & staff. Potts & Williams are brutal. The coaches clearly came to that conclusion after the Purdue game because they barely play.

Safety is another weak spot. I know they wrote a nice article about Nubin, but...there's more to playing the position than just tackling. Howden is really weak.

On the positive side, i think we've done a much better job recruiting on the OL & even the DL. We've got some nice young players waiting in the wings on the DL. We've done a good job at CB, as well. Walley is elite and Smith is having a very good year. I think we've upgraded at QB, too. LB is a push. Some hits, some misses. Lindenberg is going to be really good. MSM is a 2-down player and teams are taking advantage of him in the passing game. Great run-stuffer, though.

We need more talent at key positions. There's no excuse for not having multiple top-flight RB in a program that is as dedicated to running the ball as we are. The flip-side of that is, you better find some diamonds in the rough at WR & TE because the top players are going to look at our offense and go someplace else.

Our use of the portal hasn't been that good, either. We've had better talent go out than come in. This year's crop of DL & CB have been very underwhelming. Carroll has not played like the player he was thought to be coming out of HS.

We aren't as good as we hoped to be and it really is lack of talent. This is fully PJ's program and we all thought we'd be farther along than we are right now. It's disappointing and it's important to hold him 100% accountable. It's OK to support Fleck & still ask tough questions.
 

Dakota2 said:
Not sure we were playing to win for very long. Coming out for the second half PJ told reporter he wanted to run to "shorten the game ". We were behind at the time so one might infer he wanted to hold down the margin of loss.
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The whole quote was something like "We want to be able to run the ball to shorten the game but at the same time need to be able to throw the ball downfield."
 

I'm probably in the minority. There were many things to be disappointed about, but the game plan that resulted in the Gophers being down 17-10 at halftime while receiving the ball to me isn't one of them.

To me, there are other concerns. Not being macho in a 0-0 game in the 1st quarter with a QB making his first start when in FG range isn't in my top-5.
 

Some guy said:
Maybe he should have right before penn state scored touchdowns. But then people would’ve complained about timeout usage

Lose lose
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In one of the 1st half TDs, it was obvious the defense was disorganized. They went fast and we subbed. Then the 2nd half TD with no one covering. Both were obvious on TV and I'm really surprised Fleck didn't call a TO in both instances.

Who cares if some people would have complained.
 

bleedsmaroonandgold said:
Talk of firing seems very premature. With our track record of hiring coaches, I'd be surprised if our next coach has a better big ten record six years in than PJ does. It is frustrating when you have a bad year, but plenty of teams have been rewarded for sticking with a coach through a down year or a few. There were stretches where people talked about firing Lucia, then he came back and gave us 2 frozen fours in 3 years. Iowa has gone through lots of stretches where people were frustrated with Ferentz, and he always seems to come back with another great year.
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Lucia should have been fired way, way sooner - from where I sit. That program should never have to settle - if there is any team in the state that we should have perennially high demands on, it's Gophers Hockey.

Ron Gardenhire should have been fired much earlier as well.

I am all for giving Fleck more time - that said, as a state we have been ok with just "getting in the playoffs" for a long time.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
there are multiple ways to create a winning program.

-- bring in talent that is superior to the teams you face
-- bring in talent that is equivalent to the teams you face, and win through schemes and coaching
-- bring in talent that is inferior to the teams you face, and win through superior coaching

obviously, the less talent you have, the better the coaching has to be.

If it was up to me, I would rather have superior talent and an average coach as opposed to average talent and a superior coach. but in today's game, superior talent costs $$$$$.
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Ding Ding Ding. When people expect teams to compete with other programs with built in revenue advantages, they lose credibility. Beat the teams you have advantages over and pull off some upsets and win 10+ games 1-2 times every five years. Not sure what more people can expect. Win more and your coach will be at one of the schools with all the advantages.

I think the U holds Fleck back more as a coach than Fleck holds the U back.
 

MaxyJR1 said:
Ding Ding Ding. When people expect teams to compete with other programs with built in revenue advantages, they lose credibility. Beat the teams you have advantages over and pull off some upsets and win 10+ games 1-2 times every five years. Not sure what more people can expect. Win more and your coach will be at one of the schools with all the advantages.

I think the U holds Fleck back more as a coach than Fleck holds the U back.
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I agree, for the most part. The issue is, i think this was supposed to be "one of those years" when the stars aligned and we won 9-10 games. Multiple 6th year starters returning at key positions, some of the premier programs perceived to be in down years in the West and the 6th year under PJ Fleck.

Instead we're 4-3 with 5 games to play and we haven't beaten a good team yet. We have 2 games that we HAVE TO win (Rutgers & Northwestern) and 3 that we can win. If we come out of this next stretch with anything fewer than 3 wins, i think we've sunk back to Kill-level.
 

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