I watched it, and unlike previous games against the Clucks, I wasn't raging and throwing stuff at the TV like my long lost cousin. It went pretty much how I expected it to go, and Dabo and Kyle Parker pretty much gave up. If Dabo doesnt realize how important this game is to his job, he will now.
People are looking for someone to blame for it all, but everyone should remember that the fans all jumped in behind Dabo Swinney when he was hired. I had my reservations about it, but didn't protest it. Not much point coming out against it when the minions are all going crazy for him. As a group we made an emotional decision without looking at the situation clearly. Swinney is admirable man by some accounts, but as Mark Antony said, so was Brutus. He's not qualified for the job. The worst part of it is, he's so arrogant that he thinks we're all stupid. He thinks I'm just a nameless, faceless 5%'er that doesn't see what improvement there is on the field and how we're so close. He doesnt understand something very basic to football, that his idol Bear Bryant subscribed to, which is that you must be committed to one system, no matter what, to win. Clemson doesn't run one cohesive system, we run plays from two books and some that are stuck in haphazardly, and there are clearly two minds running the offense.
Well the film don't lie Dabo Swinney, and we examine it every week. You don't know what youre doing. Steven Orr didn't show one thing last night for Auburn. All he had to do was throw it up for Jeffery and hand it off to Lattimore; it was a vanilla gameplan. He didn't have to, we shot ourselves for him.
As FF and I said to each other after the game, I feel somewhat sorry for Billy Napier and Jeff Scott. Its hard to take a new job on when you don't have enough experience and there is no one around who can teach you things. I couldn't do my job if I didn't have an old-timer teaching me the ropes. I'm sure many of you have had similar experiences. Billy had to learn from Rob Spence. Unfortunately, even though I do not think Napier sets our gameplan, he's about to be pushed on a sword for Swinney. The OC will always be the fall guy when the offense sucks. If I were you Billy, I'd jump off the sinking ship and go be an ace recruiter somewhere else, learn from an experienced coordinator or head coach, and if you're really a good coach then you'll rise back up.
Jeff Scott seems to have learned nothing about WRs when he was a player here, and less since, because aside from Nuke Hopkins I don't see any ball skills. We can't put all the blame on him though, as we have two other guys with WR coaching experience at practice. I like our young WRs, and I'm hopeful that the newcomers will be as talented as they've shown on film, but I have no faith in our WR coaching (no matter who is to blame) to see them truly develop.
Aside from our defensive staff I don't have faith in our coaches anymore at all. I've held off on calling for Swinney to be fired, because he should get his 3rd year, and he would whether we like it or not. I have the suspicion that Swinney would name himself OC if Napier leaves, or give it back to the horrid Brad Scott, who the fans will just heap praise on after landing serious consideration for Recruiter of the Year. I've already seen what Brad can do to an offense, and people forget that Tommy took away much of his playcalling duties when things weren't working. In my mind he hasn't done squat as a coach since taking Carolina to the Carquest Bowl.
If he named an outsider OC, and then let him bring in his own people, Dabo might be able to turn things around offensively. If he insists on keeping his buddies on the staff, and continues to interfere with the playcalling, we might have another Tony Franklin-Auburn situation on our hands. Best bet is for Tommy Bowden to get the Vandy job and take some of these guys away.
Not much else to say about this offense really, Parker gave up and cleaned out his locker last night, and I don't expect him to start the bowl game. I have not been happy with how he's handled his periodic benching. I'd be somewhat surprised to even see him play. It should go to Tajh Boyd. Neither one of them looked like they were well coached last night to me, so who knows how Tajh will do there or next season.
About the only thing that would give me any hope for Clemson's football future is TDP being axed. I've been tinkering with an article on that for a bit, so that will go up soon I hope. I've heard the rumors of Bobby Johnson, and though I do like Bobby Johnson as a man, he has no experience at this job...so why would anyone expect him to come in and give us the direction we need? Aren't we going through this problem with the head coach and OC right now? Clemson has to have a guy that has a concrete plan to improve our athletic program, and the fundraising acumen to do it. I don't think that is Bill D'Andrea or Bobby Johnson or Mike Hamilton. We need a house cleaning here, not simply hiring a "good Clemson man" to do a job he shouldn't be doing, without a full-on AD search.
For the film review, we'll have that up next weekend I think, and we'll look at tape on whomever we get for the bowl game that we don't deserve to go to. We're switching over to basketball and recruiting now, so hopefully something positive happens there.