Ian Boyd has an article on his substack about Nebraska’s offense and there was some stuff in there that feels very relevant to us. The whole article is behind a paywall (it’s worth it for CFB fans) but I’m going to share just a bit.
Luckily that’s something this staff and offense already do well. Obviously there’s changes with Klein taking over and speeding up the pace but I’d be absolutely shocked if the workload placed on a QB comes close to what Frost was putting on AM, and that’s with Nebraska playing at a relatively slow pace as well. They ranked 76th last season and ran 9 more plays per game than us.
Skylar’s career highs (under this staff) in passing + rushing attempts are:
2019 WVU: 53 (39, 14)
2019 Baylor: 45 (34, 11)
2021 OU: 42 (41, 1)
2019 OU: 41 (28,13)
2021 Tech: 37 (30, 7)
so 3 of his top 5 workloads came pre-Deuce Vaughn, and even looking over a 3 year period you can’t find 5 games he was asked to do as much as Adrian did last year while being extremely beat up.
My main point here is there’s been a lot of discussion about how we’ll use him in running game, and it seems to me he’s such a talented runner that neutering that part of his game isn’t a great option, but the numbers show there’s a wide gray area between not using him enough, and how the idiot at Nebraska used him. If CK can use him smartly, I think he’s going to have a very big season
Nebraska and the "hero-ball" trap
What's been going wrong for Scott Frost and Nebraska? Can they change things around?
americaswargame.substack.com
I think everyone agrees Adrian’s turnover issues have the ability to really hurt the season, and it’s a “no shit Sherlock” comment to point out a bigger workload leads to more turnovers, but I think it’s really worth noting how drastic that split is. In games where he’s not being asked do completely carry the offense, he’s a very efficient QB.
Luckily that’s something this staff and offense already do well. Obviously there’s changes with Klein taking over and speeding up the pace but I’d be absolutely shocked if the workload placed on a QB comes close to what Frost was putting on AM, and that’s with Nebraska playing at a relatively slow pace as well. They ranked 76th last season and ran 9 more plays per game than us.
Skylar’s career highs (under this staff) in passing + rushing attempts are:
2019 WVU: 53 (39, 14)
2019 Baylor: 45 (34, 11)
2021 OU: 42 (41, 1)
2019 OU: 41 (28,13)
2021 Tech: 37 (30, 7)
so 3 of his top 5 workloads came pre-Deuce Vaughn, and even looking over a 3 year period you can’t find 5 games he was asked to do as much as Adrian did last year while being extremely beat up.
My main point here is there’s been a lot of discussion about how we’ll use him in running game, and it seems to me he’s such a talented runner that neutering that part of his game isn’t a great option, but the numbers show there’s a wide gray area between not using him enough, and how the idiot at Nebraska used him. If CK can use him smartly, I think he’s going to have a very big season
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