Will The New Offense Stick?

Following the disgraceful Texas Bowl showing and a regular season full of offensive futility, Charlie Strong did the right thing in the off-season. Since then, he has said the right things and recruited the right way. The hopes of the Longhorn faithful have been raised, at least somewhat, by the promised return to a more open, spread offensive philosophy. On paper, it’s the absolute right move.

The spring game supported this. Although neither Tyrone Swoopes nor Jerrod Heard duplicated the insane performance Garrett Gilbert put on the 2010 spring game, both showed promise running the new O. Heard’s performance in particular gave fans hope that the horrors of 2014 would not be repeated.

One thing remains to be seen, however. Just how dedicated to this new philosophy will the staff remain once the games start to matter?

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Changing offenses without changing coordinators is a tricky business. Coordinators tend to establish their own identity and with it, their own system. Asking that coordinator to then change his system is asking him to abandon a deeply held philosophy. This can be easy to do at first, but when things get tough, it is easy to slip back into old habits.

Case in point. Remember Mack Brown’s ill fated attempt to turn the Horns into a power running team in 2010? Yet, by the Oklahoma game, then offensive coordinator Greg Davis was back to his beloved horizontal passing scheme. It is difficult for a coordinator to change his stripes, especially if the early returns aren’t there.

Adding to that, Shawn Watson was specifically brought to Texas to run his offense. An offense that Watson has been fine tuning for years. One that turned Teddy Bridgewater into an elite collegiate quarterback. In his heart, Watson is a West Coast offense guy. That is his identity. Asking him to change now may be too much.

We’ve already seen how Watson can be reluctant to change. It was fairly obvious to anyone who watched Texas last year that Swoopes was better when Texas went up-tempo. He looked more comfortable and more confident. Yet, Watson was reluctant to commit to go up-tempo for extended periods, even when the offense was going nowhere and needed a jolt.

Could some of that been because of the heat the staff took after failing to run out the clock against UCLA? Possibly, but again, if you abandon something that works just because it didn’t work once, you won’t stick with anything for long. Last year, the Texas offense continually tried to return to it’s West Coast roots regardless of how poorly they were performing.

Tyrone Swoopes was clearly more comfortable running an up-temp offense last year. Mandatory Credit: Brendan Maloney-USA TODAY Sports

To mitigate this, Texas did hire WR Jay Norvell from Oklahoma and I am confident that he will help develop the Texas receiver corps, but I’m doubtful as to how much influence he will have on Watson and his playcalling. Remember last year, then-WR coach Les Koenning and OL coach Joe Wickline were supposed to bring their experience in spread systems to help Watson. Remember the play-calling by committee approach? The sham that Wickline and not Watson was OC? None of that helped last year and Koenning got the ax for his trouble.

The other question I have regarding the new offense is Strong himself. Strong’s defensive identity is even more firmly established than Watson’s offensive identity is. Defensive coordinators as head coaches tend toward more conservative, ball control offenses in order to protect their defense. This falls right in line with the offense Texas tried and failed to run last year.

It was apparent that part of Strong’s approach to combating the lethal spread offenses of the Big 12 was to play keep away from them. In fact, denying teams like Baylor the ball is often the best defense. The well-established and expertly coached offenses at schools like Baylor and OU will get their yards and their points given enough opportunities.

If Texas does successfully switch to their own version of the spread, it will mean faster possessions, which will lead to more opportunities for his defense to be exposed. If the team finds itself in a shootout, will Strong clench up and order Watson to slow down in an effort to save his D? If they get a lead in a big game, will he order Watson to run out the clock as opposed to putting his foot down and trying to put the game away?

“They were always putting their foot on the brake. They didn’t want to score anything.” That was what former Louisville receiver DeVante Parker said about the Watson-Strong offense. In 2013, Strong’s last year in Louisville, the Cardinals ranked #2 in time of possession but only #95 in passing plays of 40 yards or more while running a play every 29.5 seconds. The Major Applewhite coordinated Texas offense led by Case McCoy ran 121 more plays than Louisville that year. Watson and Strong had a future first round draft choice at quarterback for them.

I give Strong full credit for recognizing the landscape of Texas high school football and acknowledging that a change needed to happen. He adjusted his recruiting accordingly and made two excellent hires for his offensive staff. He’s done everything right, so far.

We won’t find out just how dedicated they are to this new direction until September 5 in South Bend. The progress of the new offense will go a long way towards determining how high the ceiling for the 2015 Longhorns will be.

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