Voice of the Hawkeyes Board

You will get an upvote for this at midnight U2. I agree but be careful what you write Skyhawk may call you stupid for any valid points you have

I just don't understand how a coaching staff can analyze a playbook and rationalize that they will have a competitive passing attack when your pass plays will average ONLY around 5 yards per pass ATTEMPT.

Then we sit here and criticize Vandenberg for his crappy passing game. Vandenberg hasn't looked very good this year, but I'm thinking maybe this is the reason why. No QB, not even John Elway or Joe Montana would have average numbers when you're throwing 3, 4, and 5 yard passes each time.

In Ferentz's defense, people (and I'm talking in general terms here) are pretty stupid and while "armchair coaches" may be able to figure out some simple stuff like calling a play where every receiver at least goes 3 yards to be sure and pick up the first down, most stuff that coaches do would be things many other people would completely fail at and/or not even realize they had a responsibility to do. A favorite line from fans is saying, "well if you pay me that kind of money to coach a football team, I'd do everything I could and make sure (x) mistake doesn't happen again," but for the most part these people are all talk and would just make a fool out of themselves if put in said position. The simple fact is that Ferentz as a professional coach has the right to downplay *some* but definitely not all criticism and at this point his critics *do* in my mind have a case against Ferentz right now.

Many of our losses this year are unacceptable as you alluded to but I think you're downplaying him as a coach and giving too much credit to some assistants. Norm Parker was one of the best defensive coaches and one of the best at getting the most out of his players for decades, as proven by how many nationally elite defenses he coached at many different schools throughout his career, Norm would make most head coaches look really good. Ken O'Keefe isn't really a ton better than Davis and part of the issue here is that they run different offenses. O'Keefe was a run and shoot type OC who was forced to run a more pro-style offense at Iowa which he simply wasn't good at. For as much as I hate O'Keefe I would take him over Davis any day, but that doesn't make him a good OC when calling a pro-style offense.

Having good assistant coaches is paramount to any successful head coach and program, just look at what Suburban Meyer did at Ohio State, purposely taking his time hiring assistants so that he could get some of the best of the best to come to work under him at Ohio State. Suburban Meyer will get all the press and love for "turning around" that team, but his assistants deserve a lot of credit as well. One of the biggest things that I think Ferentz fails at is something he knows quite a lot about and that is taking chances on young, up and coming coaches exactly the type of situation that got him his first assistant job at Iowa under Hayden Fry. Ferentz actually talks about this in his autobiography and credits Fry for looking past his inexperience and seeing the potential in guys like Kirk, but if you look at Ferentz's history with assistants Brian Ferentz, Levar Woods, Lester Erb, and Eric Johnson are about the only relatively "young" coaches he's hired during his entire time at Iowa and to my memory only 3 of his former coaches have left for "better" opportunities. IMO, he's put far too much value in numerical experience and been far too forgiving/loyal to his assistants when they haven't done their jobs up to the standards that this program should have for its coaches.

KF had a great staff at Iowa when he started. Bilema has taken his team to consecutive rose bowls since he left. Continues to recruit Fla which Iowa doesnt with any success. Philbin is now an NFL head coach. Norm Parker having health issues hurt Iowa. Him retiring due to health issues has killed Iowa. Coack Kaz whether you like him or not had some good D lines. Guess what Im getting at is i agree Der. KF has not replaced these guys well.

1st year DC who has coached a long time, but basically a journeyman.

KF hires his son as OL coach after coaching 1 or 2 years.

We have GD who seemed to be allowed to staty at Texas for many yrs as a favor. Was outta football 1 yr before Iowa.

Morgan was coaching at IC West before Iowa. KF decided to switch him from OL to DL all Andy Reid like.

Woods coaching LBs. 1st yr as a paid assistant.

IDK who coaches special teams. In my mind they havent been special since Sean Considine left town.

As I stated in another thread, who are our stud recruiters? Who recruits Fla? Who recruits Texas? Who recruits Ohio? I dont expect us to go in and snag blue chippers but we need to atleast get our name out there. What happened to the D.C. pipeline? I dont expect Iowa to recuit top 10 nationally every year but atleast hire some guys with roots in these states. I cant name a player from Florida that has contributed in years. Same for Texas. Get real.

I'm not defending Davis by any stretch here, but it is entirely possible that we are seeing an inordinate amount of short passes in an attempt to get JVB going. Generally, when a QB struggles, the HC or OC will call short rhythm passes to get him comfortable and help gain confidence, and you often see controlled roll-outs for the same reason. Looking back at the last several games, this has been the trend. For whatever reason, though, it hasn't worked, and JVB continues to look lost.

Also, we have to keep in mind that our primary receivers lack explosive speed. Combine that with a make-shift O-line, and the deeper drops become exponentially more difficult.

That said, there is absolutely no excuse for that 1 yard pass play on a crucial 4th and 3. To expect a lumbering back-up TE to "make the first man miss" is delusional, and that thought process shouldn't even exist in that situation. That's completely on Davis.

I think Iowa does have some very good recruiters on the staff. I think Campbell is a star as a recruiter. Morgan and Johnson are also very good. It's difficult to evaluate Wilson since he has an area where it's difficult for Iowa to land kids from. Brian Ferentz has done an impressive job in Ohio in the 2013 class, landing Welsh, Warfield and Gressel all relatively early in the process. I think all three will be multiple year starters at Iowa. As for Woods, it's still too early to evaluate him, since he hasn't been through a full cycle yet and it isn't as common for Iowa to land as many recruits from his areas.

As far as Florida goes, Jungles and I discussed this at length in another thread. As of this minute, it doesn't look like the Hawkeyes are as aggressive there as they were when Kaczenski handled it.

Jake Rudock is a Florida kid, as are Greg Mabin and Daumantas Venckus. It'll be interesting to see how those guys progress over the next year or two. Damon Bullock, Anthony Gair, Jacob Hillyer, Melvin Spears and Jonathan Gimm are all from Texas.

Thanks hawkeyebrad. I've returned the upvotes and will continue to do so.