As you've probably read by now, Darius Wade is out for the remainder of the season with a broken ankle. The only good news from the story is that SI believes Wade will apply and should receive a medical hardship redshirt.
Now the Flutie-Smith debate will begin. I want to roll with Smith and will explain that all week. I think he's a better fit for our current personnel and I think he has the chance to turn something out of nothing. With this defense, all we need are a few fluky big plays each game and we can win.
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Ohio State 20-Northern Illinois 13. The injury to Wade was a matter of destiny. Smith has only been on campus for one month. In the FSU game, he went in for a few plays and the announcers noted that he knew about 5 plays. He played like a "deer in the headlights". Flutie then went in. Now, Addazio has to reintegrate a raw quarterback into his system and bench a very good quarterback because he does not fit the system. The system must change or Flutie must leave. Flutie is being sent a message "loud and clear" by the coach. Actually, Wade had his ankle broken because the pass blocking was terrible. It was a clean hit and Wade should have gone down when he was hit using the O.J. Simpson philosophy of success the next time. In reality, the lack of pass preparation caused the injury to your quarterback. I have never seen a game where a team "runs out the clock" starting with the opening kickoff.
JBQ absolutely correct in his comment. Flutie picked the wrong school for his skill set.
Beyond that, however, I don't see BC ever being a factor in the ACC with the current offensive philosophy. Florida State, Clemson, Virginia Tech and others will always have better athletes to shut down any run oriented team unless you get incredibly lucky and have an elite athletic QB like Tyler Murphy land at the school - and even with him they went 7-6 (I know the kicking game cost them several games). You need deception and imagination to beat the teams that are better than you on paper. Pass when they are looking for you to run and run when they think you will pass. With that, however, comes the assumption that your philosophy will be "play to win" but after watching this team the past few years that is not the philosophy - they "play not to lose" in close games which is a huge difference and usually doomed to failure if you have the inferior athletes.
What happened to BC Friday against FSU was predictable after seeing the team struggle offensively against Maine in game #1. By the way, did you see that Maine lost 38-7 to Tulane Saturday? How good is Tulane? Well prior to the Maine game they lost 65-10 to Georgia Tech who themselves go beat yesterday by Notre Dame. Tulane also lost 37-7 to Duke who got beat yesterday by Northwestern. Think about that when assessing BC.
I don't see this coach ever going in a different direction on offense to design a scheme that would play to Flutie's strengths. It would require taking chances and throwing the ball 30+ times. From the outside looking in, it is hard to understand the Woody Hayes mentality on offense since with it they will never put "fannies in the seats". In the Boston market a college team needs to be daring and exciting to get attention. Conservative play calling and going 6-6 or 7-5 doesn't do it and I fear the record this year could be much worse. All they need to do is go back to see what the offensive approaches were like when there was excitement over the team and people wanted to go to the games. With QBs such as Doug Flutie, Glenn Foley, Matt Ryan, the two Hasslebacks, Paul Peterson (remember him?), and Brian St. Pierre the offenses were fun to watch and they had their fair share of wins against teams that were better on paper.
Ironically, the current philosophy on offense seems to be the exact opposite than on the defensive side of the ball where the imagination and willingness to take chances keeps BC in a game against a team like Florida State. It is very strange to see a team be very aggressive on one side of the ball and ultra-conservative on the other side. I am sure the national TV performance the other night against FSU hurt them on the recruiting front for offensive players as they got the ball over midfield twice the whole game but at least a defensive player may have seen that game and said - I would like to play for that defensive coordinator.
In sum, I am in favor of going with Flutie and changing the offense to give him the best chance to succeed - but I see little chance of that happening. I hope I am wrong but I see major problems ahead with the true freshman (or even Wade if the poor kid didn't get hurt) running the "run, first, last and always" game plan they have now.
Wait, we play Tulane
I would argue that the lack of talent on offense makes us more attractive to recruits. They can get playing time immediately if they are good enough.
Right now our best option is to go with goal line offense throughout the game by loading up on linemen, TE's and FB's and running the ball.
Ironically our defense is so damn good that it is going to give the ball to our offense TOO much. The goal line offense will "run clock", shorten the game and keep our defense tight.
You obviously know nothing about football. Also your basically saying Flutie should start because his last name is Flutie. He's awful (see his decision on the 4th down). Even if we let Flutie play he won't have enough protection to throw the ball. The only, and best, option is Smith period.
You obviously know nothing about football. Also your basically saying Flutie should start because his last name is Flutie. He's awful (see his decision on the 4th down). Even if we let Flutie play he won't have enough protection to throw the ball. The only, and best, option is Smith period.
Please stop with this Flutie nonsense, the faster Addazio switches him to a slot receiver or DB the better, just so everyone can stop with this. I was honestly cringing when the whalepants in my section got all excited that Flutie was coming in.
And to the person who said "Flutie chose the wrong school for his skill set", where exactly could he have gone that works, because if I remember correctly, HE HAD NO OTHER SIGNIFICANT OFFERS. If you want to make the case that he would be better off at UNH or a different NE 1AA school thats fine, but dont act like Flutie had all these options, picked BC, and is being use incorrectly.
the revisionist history presented above about the "storied" BC QB history is funny. BC's offensive identity has always been tied to the offensive line, and the O-Line remains the biggest problem. Addazio is an O-Line coach first and foremost - our offensive fate this year is tied to the Big Uglies up front. if they don't clean things up, it doesn't matter if its Jeff Smith, Troy Flutie, or Doug Flutie playing QB.
the strength of the offense is the running back stable. Willis, Hilliman, Outlow, Rouse - all bring different things to the table but at least they are bringing things to the table - the same cannot be said of the WR group. Alston (and now Thad Smith) are effective on the jet sweeps and reverses, but otherwise, i don't see any of the WRs as a threat. "opening up the offense" to let flutie throw behind a bad line to a group of WRs that can't get open or catch would be the fastest route to losing most of the remaining games.
the path ahead is pretty straightforward. first, the line needs to get its timing down and start opening up holes. next, go back to the Murphy offense, but let Smith run it. start with some basic stuff and go from there. mix in flutie for a series every now and then just to lessen the beating Smith (who is listed at 182 lbs. and is probably in the 170s) is going to take, but i'd be committed to Smith as the starter and the guy who is going to receive the majority of first-team snaps. Smith is allegedly faster than Murphy (a direct quote from Addazio during the preseason) - if we can get half as many big plays as we got from Murphy last year we'll be in fine shape given how good our defense is.
if Smith were to get hurt, i'd honestly prefer installing Willis (who played QB in HS running an option offense) as the QB over going to Flutie, simply because the WRs are so bad.
Interesting to read these comments. Flutie might not be the answer and he might belong at UNH in Division 1-AA. Who knows? My problem is this. If you are so run oriented that the other team knows you are going to run except in obvious passing downs, you had better damn well have the superior athletic team in the line and at the skill positions or you will lose to every good team.
For a middle of the road team such as BC whose likely record will vary anywhere from 4-8 (in a bad year) to 8-4 (in a good year) and who has very obvious recruiting limitations (team doesn't sell out and has a small stadium by major college standards, Boston is a pro sports town, academic standards are high) you will not be able to assemble the talent needed to operate a run oriented office in one of the power conferences to ever compete for a championship. You will have a lot of of "3 and outs" each Saturday vs. the good teams which will wear down your defense. That is why you need unpredictability in the play calling. Would be a different story if you played in the MAC with UMass or the AAC with UConn but the current BC approach won't get you to the top of the standings in the ACC, SEC, Big 12 or Big Ten.
In any event Smith will play next week. You can take that to the bank. The fact they will go with him next week was made obvious when the coaches put him in after Wade went down in the 4th quarter the other night. They were down 14 points and had not moved the ball all night with a running QB (Wade) who in theory is better than Smith. Despite that, their instinct was to put another running QB in even though the clock was as big of an opponent for you at that point as Florida State. You needed to pass to have any shot of getting back into that game but you still went with the running QB. To me that defied common sense and they seemed to realize this a few plays later and went to the better passer (whether his name was Flutie or Trump is irrelevant to me) - but even then there were too many running plays called for that point in the game. It speaks to how entrenched they are to the run game philosophy which is why Smith will start Saturday. I hope he does well and they can beat Northern Illinois Saturday (and they no pushover losing in Columbus to Ohio State by just 7 points Saturday) but as I look at the rest of the schedule and take into account how the offense looked against Maine and FSU (and I think we will find later in the season this is not one of FSU's best teams) I see a 5-7 or 4-8 record for BC this year.
@Unknown: When Addazio came in the quarterback of note for the future was Christian Suntrup. Suntrup had been recruited by Nebraska. He is from my hometown. Addazio dumped him just like Flutie and ostracized him. He is still in school and will graduate this year. He is hiding behind a medical issue. Addazio did not want him is the truth. The same goes for Flutie. When Flutie went for it on 4th and 2 with the option, the play was sent in from the sideline. The pitchman was covered and he did his best. Whatever the reasoning and you may very well be right. BC is looking at a disaster. 4-8 very easily could turn into 2-10. There are 3 sources on similar websites which say that Addazio is already trying to get out of his contract after 3 years. There are plenty of fireworks going on behind the scenes. He is being paid 2.6 million per to try to win and not to try to tie.
No chance for success this year if you can't pass. 1960 assessment is right. If Flutie is a better passer than Smith he should play. The RBs can do the running. With this D they could throw three picks in a game and win. They can't get 100 yards a game passing and win. Take a risk. How did TOB produce all those NFL QBs? Does Daz really think Tebow was the ultimate QB? All the BC QBs mentioned above were NFL QBs and vastly superior to the RB Tebow. Where is Tebow playing? There are about 90 QBs in the NFL and he can't crack a roster. The QB has to throw to be effective. Daz should call TPB for advice.
TOB
The issue with the Florida State game is that Willis had the hot hand early and only had a few touches the rest of the game. He was averaging 5 yards per carry while Hilliman was barely hitting 1. You need to get the ball in the hands of your playmakers and Willis can create something whereas Hilliman depends on the O-line to blast holes for him. That worked last year with a very experienced offensive line.
Since I have not attended any of the practices, I have no idea whether Flutie or Smith is the better choice. I find it interesting how so many on here can be so passionate about this when we have only seen each player for a few snaps. We need to trust that the coaches will put BC in the best position to win.
I predicted 6 wins in August and that may be on the high end given the injury to Wade. One only had to look at the roster to realize this would be a step-back year. 60 freshmen or sophomores out of the 80-some scholarship players. The roster is built for success year 4 and 5. This is due to Spaz not recruiting depth on the O-line or at the QB position. That guy was a disaster and we are still paying a price for his ineptitude (fortunately, it will all be on Addazio after this year).
Also, I'm not sure about these rumblings about Addazio wanting out. He seems energized to me. I like his style and smash-mouth attitude even though I wish we could open things up. BC's identity on offense historically is pro-style passing to open the run (Our offenses were very potent in the 80's, early 90's and TOB era).
The good news is that the D looks great. Go Eagles!
BCfansince1960s
excellent points
to stand up and say "we will run down your throat" you need talent. LSU and do it. Alabama can do it. And they can do it without much of an element of surprise because of the deep talent.
BC can do it too if we have 3, 4, 5 NFL-level (or close) experience lineman and an Andre or so - like the last two years.
but this year we obviously can not be so bold. BC desperately need to spread the filed and keep the defense guessing. we need some elements of surprise The sherm alsoton reverse where the FSU guy was waiting for him and flattened him is all you need to know of DAZ's "foolish consistency" not working and how predictable the Daz-O is
Not many high schools playing pro style offense these days. QB centered offenses are a thing of the past in college now. The Times had a recent story about how unprepared college kids are now for the pros. So the Bible TOB style is history.
Repeating from prior thread.
I think people are pushing the panic button a little early. W/ this D, so much better than last year, we should be in every game. The offense is very young, and should get better as we go through the season I think we play Smith and bring Flutie in relief, when we are behind in the second half.
The only thing is, if you can't sustain drives on offense-and isn't that our biggest fear?-you can have the best defense in the conference and the results will inevitably disappoint. You lose just based on the sheer volume of plays/possessions defensed. The 4th quarter energy suddenly looks a lot different than the 1st when you're on the field too much.
JBQ: can you link to said sites suggesting that Daz wants out?
As I said before - the great equalizer for BC has been and always will be the forward pass. Yes - you need a solid running attack as well - but without a dominant line it is pure folly to think you will win many games in this conference without a complementary passing attack.
Obviously too late for this season - but why doesn't Daz follow the Georgia Tech approach and go with a full option offense that slowly churns out first downs and keeps the other team off the field? If you are going to run almost exclusively - isn't that the better route to go?
Also - with injury so inevitable - why don't you have one back up QB fully versed on the entire playbook?
Nappy
In the big picture I think he is trying to do what Ga. Tech does. It's just more power, and less option based. I agree about having multiple QBs ready if you plan to run them. We've been lucky the first 2 Daz years. Pass or run, no offense will work if you can't block. Getting the line play where it needs to be will fix most of our problems. It's only one game. would love to see the comments from last year, including my own, after Pitt. That was even worse than this years FSU.
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