Question Comparing Kiffin and Sark (related to Monday night especially)

NationalTitles18

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That's more of in the "of colt hadn't got hurt" territory of blaming stuff. We lost because Clemson was 4 points better than us, and not because we had a coordinator with his mind wandering every which a way. Like 91 said, if there was any direct blame for him it was not developing Jalen enough, but blaming him for the game ignores bo getting hurt, field conditions, refs, and just the simple fact that Watson is by far the toughest and best qb we have faced in the last 10 years.
Not even in the same ballpark of "if Colt hadn't got hurt". One was just plain bad luck and lack of preparation on the part of the coaching staff from the top down. The other was a coaching failing to fulfill his duties and being discharged when that became clear to the man in charge. Besides, I am taking nothing away from Clemson. They took advantage of their opportunities. They were tough competitors. They outplayed and outcoached our team when it counted. Hats off to their accomplishment. None of that absolves Kiffin of the blame I feel he deserves. Putting blame on Kiffin does nothing to diminish what Clemson achieved. Alabama was not prepared and that's on Alabama. And that is on Kiffin, IMHO.
 

81usaf92

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Not even in the same ballpark of "if Colt hadn't got hurt". One was just plain bad luck and lack of preparation on the part of the coaching staff from the top down. The other was a coaching failing to fulfill his duties and being discharged when that became clear to the man in charge. Besides, I am taking nothing away from Clemson. They took advantage of their opportunities. They were tough competitors. They outplayed and outcoached our team when it counted. Hats off to their accomplishment. None of that absolves Kiffin of the blame I feel he deserves. Putting blame on Kiffin does nothing to diminish what Clemson achieved. Alabama was not prepared and that's on Alabama. And that is on Kiffin, IMHO.
You said squarely on Kiffin, that pretty much puts most or atleast a very significant blame on Kiffin. That's pretty much saying," congrats Clemson, but you wouldn't have beat us had Kiffin not been with us for X amount of days more than he should have.".

I just think that logic is the same as we give Texas fans for the Colt crap, UGA for the 5 yard crap, LSU for the Chavis crap, and so on and so forth. Again if you want to talk about the mid to late season development of Jalen then that I can see that, but having any direct effect on Monday's game I would say him not being there was far more of a positive, and we probably would have gotten boat raced with his play calling.

Clemson was the better team with the better quarterback that night, and Kiffin has little to no influence that could've changed that.
 
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NationalTitles18

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You said squarely on Kiffin, that pretty much puts most or atleast a very significant blame on Kiffin. That's pretty much saying," congrats Clemson, but you wouldn't have beat us had Kiffin not been with us for X amount of days more than he should have.".

I just think that logic is the same as we give Texas fans for the Colt crap, UGA for the 5 yard crap, LSU for the Chavis crap, and so on and so forth. Again if you want to talk about the mid to late season development of Jalen then that I can see that, but having any direct effect on Monday's game I would say him not being there was far more of a positive, and we probably would have gotten boat raced with his play calling.

Clemson was the better team with the better quarterback that night, and Kiffin has little to no influence that could've changed that.
So you are willing to blame Kiffin for failing to develop Hurts, but not for essentially abandoning his post in the middle of a run for the championship. Your blame does nothing to take away from Clemson. Mine, OTOH, does despite me heaping praise on them and stating that they outplayed and outcoached our team. Mine is akin to whiny fans being whiny. Yours is valid. Mine is not. No. I don't think so. Your viewpoint is not too far off from mine. Kiffin deserves blame for not developing Hurts. Kiffin deserves blame for abandoning his duties. Both are valid sentiments. Both can be viewed a whiny cop-outs. Yet we both say Clemson deserved to win and that is where we differ from the truly whiny fans that give no credit to the opposing team. You are, of course, free to continue with your opinion in spite of what I've actually said as opposed to your perception of it. You are free to place the blame where you find it acceptable while offering no valid logical reason to invalidate the blame I place and that you find unacceptable. In reality, your version is no better or worse than mine from a whininess standpoint. But feel free to believe that it is somehow better or more acceptable.
 

81usaf92

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So you are willing to blame Kiffin for failing to develop Hurts, but not for essentially abandoning his post in the middle of a run for the championship. Your blame does nothing to take away from Clemson. Mine, OTOH, does despite me heaping praise on them and stating that they outplayed and outcoached our team. Mine is akin to whiny fans being whiny. Yours is valid. Mine is not. No. I don't think so. Your viewpoint is not too far off from mine. Kiffin deserves blame for not developing Hurts. Kiffin deserves blame for abandoning his duties. Both are valid sentiments. Both can be viewed a whiny cop-outs. Yet we both say Clemson deserved to win and that is where we differ from the truly whiny fans that give no credit to the opposing team. You are, of course, free to continue with your opinion in spite of what I've actually said as opposed to your perception of it. You are free to place the blame where you find it acceptable while offering no valid logical reason to invalidate the blame I place and that you find unacceptable. In reality, your version is no better or worse than mine from a whininess standpoint. But feel free to believe that it is somehow better or more acceptable.
Ok, so would you have gave him all the credit for the offensive success on Monday had we won???

No none of us would because the narrative would've changed to Sark being a genius for winning on 1 week's notice. So why make him the scapegoat?

My point is too much went on during that game to really blame our woes on Kiffin. If you want to blame our year's offensive woes on him then that is a better argument, but just for Monday because he was kicked out is a bit too much because the offensive production really didn't change over one week's time. To be honest play calling probably actually improved.
 

NationalTitles18

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Ok, so would you have gave him all the credit for the offensive success on Monday had we won???

No none of us would because the narrative would've changed to Sark being a genius for winning on 1 week's notice. So why make him the scapegoat?

My point is too much went on during that game to really blame our woes on Kiffin. If you want to blame our year's offensive woes on him then that is a better argument, but just for Monday because he was kicked out is a bit too much because the offensive production really didn't change over one week's time. To be honest play calling probably actually improved.
So....we agree to the point that we disagree. On that we can agree. On the rest we'll just have to agree to disagree. But you do assume a lot.
 

USCBAMA

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Sark did a good job considering everything. I can only imagine Nick Saban sent Kiffin packing for good reason. I trust CNS completely. I'll be you something though, Sark gets a lot better next year having a lot more time to get himself and the offense ready.
Disagree. I thought the offensive gameplan was bad. We kept throwing when it wasn't working, killing the clock and reducing the rest time for our tired DL. We kept running tempo against a team dying for us to run tempo, which again kept minimizing rest time for our D and kept giving clemson's offense more plays, something they thrive on.

I get that Sark was in a tough spot, but the gameplan reflected a very poor understanding of the opponent's strengths & weaknesses and a poor use of Hurts strenghts and a poor disguising of Hurts weaknesses.
 

CrimsonProf

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Disagree. I thought the offensive gameplan was bad. We kept throwing when it wasn't working, killing the clock and reducing the rest time for our tired DL. We kept running tempo against a team dying for us to run tempo, which again kept minimizing rest time for our D and kept giving clemson's offense more plays, something they thrive on.

I get that Sark was in a tough spot, but the gameplan reflected a very poor understanding of the opponent's strengths & weaknesses and a poor use of Hurts strenghts and a poor disguising of Hurts weaknesses.
I think CSS will be fine over the long term but it's hard to disagree with this. We didn't slow down. We didn't try to run enough with DH and JJ. We abandoned the middle of the field. We had plenty of space on the right to try - well, something. There were plenty of other issues, too, but this wasn't Saban or Sark's finest moment on offense.


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TIDE-HSV

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When are we going to just face facts and say it was Earle's fault the team lost for not getting the Pre-game thread up early enough?
Well, I guess sometimes the buck just stops here. :D There's one factor which has been ignored. Lane's conduct over the last few weeks was detrimental to team morale and preparation for the playoffs. He wasn't really even in good enough condition to be on the sidelines against UW. There was really not any choice but to relieve him. It's no accident that the team gave a spontaneous standing ovation when the change to Sark was announced. So do I think that the result might have been different with a fully-functioning CLK the last several weeks, or, in the alternative, Sark assuming the reins earlier? Why, yes, I do...
 

TIDE-HSV

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I think CSS will be fine over the long term but it's hard to disagree with this. We didn't slow down. We didn't try to run enough with DH and JJ. We abandoned the middle of the field. We had plenty of space on the right to try - well, something. There were plenty of other issues, too, but this wasn't Saban or Sark's finest moment on offense.


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When we continued to ignore the middle, I kept thinking that surely Hurts' passing in that area could not possibly be that bad...
 

LA4Bama

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Well, I guess sometimes the buck just stops here. :D There's one factor which has been ignored. Lane's conduct over the last few weeks was detrimental to team morale and preparation for the playoffs. He wasn't really even in good enough condition to be on the sidelines against UW. There was really not any choice but to relieve him. It's no accident that the team gave a spontaneous standing ovation when the change to Sark was announced. So do I think that the result might have been different with a fully-functioning CLK the last several weeks, or, in the alternative, Sark assuming the reins earlier? Why, yes, I do...
I haven't tried to keep up with everything about the CLK situation, but just reading from what you are saying here it sounds like CLK was not only unprepared, but actually incapacitated in some way. Are you saying he was extra, extra tired, or was there something even more potent affecting judgment?
 

CrimsonProf

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When we continued to ignore the middle, I kept thinking that surely Hurts' passing in that area could not possibly be that bad...
I don't think it is. My thought on that is that the team had certain plays in the playbook and Sark wasn't comfortable going in that direction. My guess is that Saban felt we should stay committed to the game plan. But surely we could have sent Foristall out in the middle on a quick streak, or let Hurts run a naked bootleg to the right while faking the handoff off left tackle.


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JDCrimson

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I haven't tried to keep up with everything about the CLK situation, but just reading from what you are saying here it sounds like CLK was not only unprepared, but actually incapacitated in some way. Are you saying he was extra, extra tired, or was there something even more potent affecting judgment?
There is always a reason behind being unprepared. If you rewatch our games and see how the play calling is virtually identical not only in script and sequence against alot of the teams we have played i think you will come to the reasonable conclusion that he was unprepared in several games. We were just good enough to get away with it.

This is about a profound and insightful statement you will get from Earle. But let me break it down for you he basically was taking mid term exams without cracking a book. His lifestyle outside of work was some blend of Animal House and Rodney Dangerfield going Back to School. The players would be suspended if they acted as he did. Trainwreck in motion.

For the life of me I can't understand why Saban didnt terminate the situation sooner. The only reason I can assume is the threat to go to LSU was real leverage. Personally I feel that Kiffin at some point turned on Saban for some unknown reason and it bore itself out on the field. The common denominatorn is their relationship was toxic for most if not all of the season. When have you ever heard Saban call out one of his assistants (referring to the ... chewing incident) prior to this season? I can't think of one ever. You can't fire a guy during the season who has your playbook.

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