26CornerBlitz Posted October 19, 2018 Author Posted October 19, 2018 Byron Leftwich Gets First Chance as Offensive Coordinator By ANDY BENOIT October 19, 2018 Cardinals first-year head coach Steve Wilks made an unsurprising decision Friday, firing offensive coordinator Mike McCoy and promoting quarterbacks coach Byron Leftwich to that post. Two things I've heard whispered around the NFL: 1. McCoy's system is strung together by miscellaneous tactics and concepts that worked when he coached great field general quarterbacks like Philip Rivers and Peyton Manning, but were not user-friendly to your typical QB. 2. Leftwich, the former seventh overall pick out of Marshall who started 50 games in nine NFL seasons, is one of the league's great young quarterback minds. I heard this enough times that this past offseason I made a special trip to Phoenix to meet Leftwich and talk football. He was a joy to visit with, but to be perfectly honest, our conversation revealed very little. Leftwich is guarded with his—to borrow a Marc Trestman term—"football intellectual property." (To Leftwich's credit, he's unabashed about this. "I don't like to talk publicly about specific plays," he told me, "because I've heard too many coaches accidentally reveal things with what they thought were innocent, general comments.") What was apparent from our conversation is Leftwich believes that everything an offense does must tie not to a certain philosophy, but rather to your quarterback's perspective. You must understand how your QB sees things and build your plays and verbiage accordingly. That may seem obvious, but it's not something every offensive architect acts on.
The Frankish Reich Posted October 19, 2018 Posted October 19, 2018 4 hours ago, GunnerBill said: The offense with Tebow was good? Really? It was better than the current Bills offense. In fact, it wasn’t even close to as bad as the Bills offense has been. McCoy really did something ingenious when Fox made the call to ditch Orton and ride the Timmy T. train the rest of the way: he installed an old school college option offense, and it worked. Not well enough to stick with it the next year (although what would have happened if Peyton didn’t agree to come to Denver?), but better than the Broncs attempts to run a standard offense with Orton. I’m not sure McCoy ever got enough credit for that.
GunnerBill Posted October 19, 2018 Posted October 19, 2018 40 minutes ago, The Frankish Reich said: It was better than the current Bills offense. In fact, it wasn’t even close to as bad as the Bills offense has been. McCoy really did something ingenious when Fox made the call to ditch Orton and ride the Timmy T. train the rest of the way: he installed an old school college option offense, and it worked. Not well enough to stick with it the next year (although what would have happened if Peyton didn’t agree to come to Denver?), but better than the Broncs attempts to run a standard offense with Orton. I’m not sure McCoy ever got enough credit for that. He turned it into an ill deserved Head Coaching job that he failed in.
The Frankish Reich Posted October 19, 2018 Posted October 19, 2018 33 minutes ago, GunnerBill said: He turned it into an ill deserved Head Coaching job that he failed in. Yes, he failed. But why was it ill deserved? It's pretty standard issue for Offensive/Defensive Coordinators whose units perform well to be given head coaching jobs. Sean McDermott, anyone? Rex Ryan (a DC before his first HC job)? Doug Marrone (ostensibly the Saints OC before his stint at Syracuse)? Chan Gailey? Dick Jauron? Mike Mularkey? Gregg Williams? Wade Phillips? Marv Levy never officially held a "coordinator" job before his Bills gig, but he was a special teams coach. In other words, McCoy's primary qualification for the HC job was exactly the same as every other NFL coach's.
stuvian Posted October 20, 2018 Posted October 20, 2018 22 hours ago, Kelly the Dog said: Okay, Vontae. I'm not either. Watching ASU/Stanford and then the Sabres/Sharks in half an hour. I'm retiring for the night, not from the sport!
GunnerBill Posted October 20, 2018 Posted October 20, 2018 (edited) 7 hours ago, The Frankish Reich said: Yes, he failed. But why was it ill deserved? It's pretty standard issue for Offensive/Defensive Coordinators whose units perform well to be given head coaching jobs. Sean McDermott, anyone? Rex Ryan (a DC before his first HC job)? Doug Marrone (ostensibly the Saints OC before his stint at Syracuse)? Chan Gailey? Dick Jauron? Mike Mularkey? Gregg Williams? Wade Phillips? Marv Levy never officially held a "coordinator" job before his Bills gig, but he was a special teams coach. In other words, McCoy's primary qualification for the HC job was exactly the same as every other NFL coach's. Because McCoy only ran a successful offense one year - the year Peyton Manning was his Quarterback when the true offensive coordinator was Peyton Manning. That was the only year his unit performed well. The offense the Tebow year was horrible. It ranked 23rd in the league. They won games that year with brilliant defense and then Tebow making one or two clutch plays in the 4th Quarter. It was absolute fluke on the offensive side. All this "he ran a clever option offense" is revisionist history. The Tebow season was a fluke, Mike McCoy is a fraud and hence has now been fired as OC after less than half a season two years in a row. Sometimes good coordinators get Head Coaching jobs and fail. That happens it is the NFL. McCoy was a bad coordinator who got any NFL job and failed. That was kinda predictable. Vance Joseph is smack bang in that territory too. Edited October 20, 2018 by GunnerBill
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