Before the season I talked to a player on the team, asked about different players etc. including Malcolm. He was like “that is a weird guy” but the look on his face when he said it told me everything. No idea what the specific problem is, but its clearly more than just brick hands. I stopped holding out any hope for him at that point.

My hope is that as Chiles learns as a receiver he can bring a lot of the same things to the table that Malcolm should be bringing – size, physicality, speed, etc. – and that the coaches utilize that more than with just the WR screens.

1. The offensive line has to play at, at least, a mediocre level. They are not doing that right now–in fact often they look downright atrocious.

2. Colt needs to level out…and soon. He’s not as bad as he played in the last game, and he was bad. Sailing passes over receiver’s heads is the sign of a QB who is simply not comfortable with his scheme, his receivers, or being in a real game situation. Colt knows the scheme in and out and he’s a four-year starter, so I’m tempted to lean to the conclusion that he’s not completely comfortable throwing to Chiles and Kirkendoll, and certainly not M. Williams. He’s been on the same page with Ship for two years now. For some reason he trusts Buckner like he’s, pardon the pun, a second roommate.

There are some other keys as well, which should loosen us up and make Colt more comfortable:

3. We need to get the play action game rolling. We’ve hardly run it all year, primarily because the running game has been, well, Greg Davis style w/o a wunderkind halfback to overcome the scheme. This will allow the O Line a break and consequently allow Colt to sit back in the pocket for a reasonable amount of time (holding the DEs and LBs). We all know how much the PA game can add to an offense, and seemingly Texas loves to play sans this advantage (as well as many others) that give us (along with our higher amount of talent) the ability to dominate teams consistently without having to play perfectly (a la Colt last year). We don’t have to throw 12 passes to score, we can throw 2.

4. The final piece of the puzzle is Malcolm Williams. Speaking of wunderkind talents, Williams is one of the all-world kinds of players that UT HAS to take advantage of (like we take advantage of Kindle and AJ Williams). How easily did we score in the second half with Malcolm in the Tech game last year? They had NO answer for his abilities, nor would 9/10 of the teams we will play. His deep threat ability in the PA game would torture CBs and safeties, not to mention DCs, plus lower our need for Colt to have to single-handedly win every game for us. He’s our most talented receiver since that Roy Williams guy, but for some reason his understanding of the game and his hands just haven’t caught up with his immense talent level. Somehow Davis, Kennedy, Mack, Major…whoever, need to get through to this guy and unleash him on the rest of the country. Christ, show him Roy Williams’ paycheck and say, “You could earn this too in a couple of years.” Just get the guy right in his head.

You may have noticed I didn’t mention the running game as a key. I don’t expect it to change much, maybe slight improvement with Tre Newton. But guys, it’s not like JC suddenly came back for his senior year. Monroe wasn’t used at all last game other than in the Wildhorn, and he did nothing. Maybe Chiles can add another element to the scheme, but we still won’t have that consistent rushing attack like UT is known to have.

That isn’t a full picture. You are including the 3 carries for -6 we got while lining up in the victory formation and 2 sacks for -13. You also include the 1 yard TD run for Johnson.

Take out those plays — which should not reflect our running games average per attempt — Chiles long run (34 yards), and Chiles -5 when he fumbled the snap, and you have 33 carries for 129 yards. Not saying that’s great, but it is a lot better than the misleading stats you posted.

There is some merit to the poor recruiting claim, because 3/5 of our OL is not up to par. In retrospect, I have no idea why we the internet fan braintrust actually bought into the idea that McWhorter was making a wise choice to recruit a boatload of stiff 3 star white boys from suburbia during his first few years here. I realize Nunez was abominable, but come on. When BYU’s line is more gangsta than ours … well, at that point res ipsa loquitur ought to come into play.

But really the problem with our offense is the fact that our running game sucks, and this is in large part independent of the OL personnel. This isn’t a revolutionary theory about our offense, but I think we often tend to overlook this basic truth because we all know it won’t change and it’s more comforting to think our key to improvement lies elsewhere. People were actually encouraged by our rushing performance against Tech, and we had 41 carries for 135 yards. Again, res ipsa.

And it is also a game the Horns could have easily won by 3 TD’s if Okafor falls on the ball and the DB’s hang on to just one of the 4 potential INT’s they dropped.

The offensive style/play calling is an impossible issue to solve. To run better, WE GOTTA RUN MORE — to get good at it, to get confident in it, to leave the mindset with the offense (and the entire team) that ALL THE BIG PLAYS don’t have to come out of the passing game. But, to be really efficient throwing the ball, we gotta do it regularly to achieve and maintain crisp timing. Don’t see how to do both.

1st-10, Tex20 11:06 C. McCoy passed to J. Shipley to the right for 8 yard gain
2nd-13, Tex29 9:45 C. McCoy passed to D. Buckner down the middle for 18 yard gain
1st-10, Tex49 9:45 C. McCoy incomplete pass to the right
3rd-8, TexT49 8:45 C. McCoy sacked by R. Jones
1st-10, Tex12 4:22 C. McCoy passed to J. Shipley down the middle for 1 yard gain
3rd-4, Tex18 4:22 C. McCoy incomplete pass to the left
2nd-6, TexT21 0:45 C. McCoy sacked by B. Bird
3rd-12, TexT27 15:00 C. McCoy incomplete pass to the right
1st-10, Tex47 11:36 C. McCoy passed to J. Shipley down the middle for 3 yard gain
2nd-7, 50 11:00 C. McCoy passed to J. Shipley to the right for 6 yard gain
1st-10, TexT42 10:25 L. Moore intercepted C. McCoy for 3 yards
2nd-15, Tex40 6:30 C. McCoy passed to J. Chiles to the left for 10 yard gain
3rd-5, 50 6:00 C. McCoy incomplete pass down the middle
1st-10, Tex20 3:30 C. McCoy incomplete pass to the left
3rd-5, Tex25 2:50 C. McCoy passed to J. Shipley down the middle for 6 yard gain
2nd-7, Tex34 2:00 C. McCoy passed to M. Williams to the right for 10 yard gain
2nd-4, 50 1:30 C. McCoy incomplete pass to the left
3rd-5, Tex49 1:20 C. McCoy passed to G. Smith to the right for 3 yard gain

Not good when Tech is giving you the short pass. Complete half of those misses, and you convert more third downs with short passes, and also complete more passes on third down because you don’t have to throw it as far.

In the second half, Colt completed 83%. A little more consistency in the first half will fix what’s broken this year against most teams. All teams so far are giving up the short pass. OU won’t, so that’s a different can of worms.