be any excuses in 2021. This has to be a position of strength. If it’s not, something is wrong."
Exactly.
on the field receiving for them but it wouldn’t have mattered had one been on the field for our Irish - the ND QB couldn’t get the ball to him anyway. ND head coach made sure of that by not supporting the one guy in his arsenal who could make those down-field throws or the face paced throw needed to hit open receivers so that QB who could do that left the program. The ND QB of choice was mostly late on his throws when receivers were open when he did see them.
The Bama coaching staff aren’t dumb and they didn’t give ND time to have open receivers knowing the field was much smaller and tighter for ND. On the flip side, ND D had to respect the Bama QB and their receivers which gave Bama that extra moment to complete downfield passes to their super-star. They had the whole field to make plays.
ND’s issue was the ND QB couldn’t stretch the field with his mediocre passing ability and Bama took total advantage of it as did Clemson in the second game.
It wasn’t about the receiving corps, it’s the QB choice.
The rest of ND’s groups were pretty much up to the task of playing as an elite team.
I don’t dislike Book, he is certainly a decent serviceable player, dedicated and played well in the first Clemson appearance and played above his talent vs Bama, and if Book was the only QB at ND, I wouldn’t say a thing, but he wasn’t and this is on the head coach for losing a QB who could have stretched the field with his arm.
your post is both simplistic and wrong
The WR aren't being developed, regardless of the quarterback.
Austin, Lenzy, Keys, Jones, Wilkins are all entering their senior years and Notre Dame hasn't been able to develop any of them yet. Austin had off the field and injury issues, but 0 for 5 is a bad look for the wide receiver coach.
I don't disagree that there is a gap at quarterback as well, but the biggest difference to me is still WR. When you have WR like Smith and Waddle or Higgins and Ross, you can throw the ball up and know they'll get it or just throw it really far and know that no one is keeping up with them.
With the talent coming in an the talent already in that room, there is no reason whatsoever for a lack of production from that group like we've seen the past few years.
But I think that has a lot to do with who BK holds dear at QB.
If the QB can't get the ball downfield because he cannot throw it that far or accurately, what's the sense in working on plays that are downfield?
I would agree, Book got a lot out of what his abilities are and I praise the OLine this year and Kyren Williams (and his development as a blocker) for
giving Book room to scramble and time to throw the short crossing routes and giving him time to see the field. However, Book missed seeing
a great many open receivers who were in fact - wide open and down field. To me it was the fact Book is just not tall enough to see over his own
OLine, he has happy feet and like you pointed out, the confidence any of his other down field and open receivers had been all that developed
well enough to field balls hanging in the air for a long time while in motion. The other issue is Book's own confidence he can get a ball long distance
without it being picked off by most defenders (selfishly his stats would suffer by being picked off). Also I think Book was programed to believe
he shouldn't make those throws if they're there. The good news was, Book and the OLine did well vs every team without an elite D.
Also there was a bigtime lack of imagination by the OC and the HC. We look at Bama and Clemson and they had oodles of misdirection plays
which broke down ND's D so there is that too and that's not to say ND's D wasn't good enough. I wasn't happy with the ND secondary (save
Hamilton - or as pointed out, Crawford) most of the season but that's another topic.
I mostly fault BK in his choice of QB he develops (and ignores the rest of his QB's - PJurkovec) and his penchant for zero trust in his
better talent as in receivers. From the outside as we all are - it seems to be more of a popularity contest with Kelly and who pleases
him the most - those are the choices he makes - ND has loads of talent and many of the players do get developed, but the short
of it is, Kelly.
With ND's talent, if T. Lawrence was the QB, ND would have won the NC that's how good I believe the rest of the ND team is.
So let's hope with Buchner arriving at ND the long ball and some imagination will be put into the downfield game. As Sark proved
a little deception in plays clears a lot of the D out of the way to make big plays.
(on a side note - I also thought Book played an outstanding game vs North Carolina, best game I've ever seen him play)
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