One of my big criticisms of Flores is that I think he got and gets far too much credit for the way we finished last year. We did things like going for it on 4th down and constant play fakes on special teams that teams who aren't out of it simply aren't willing to do. Those moments were key plays into turning several of our late season games into wins. I suspected that any team actually playing meaningful games and not just playing spoiler wouldn't do these things.
Four games into the season we haven't seen that same type of reckless aggression, and that's pretty standard. I can't recall seeing any special teams fakes. I can't recall seeing any wild trick plays. There's a reason why I discount those wins that come once your season is irrelevant. You're playing with house money at a certain point. If you're a bad team under a first year head coach with reasonable job security, there's really no reason to be afraid of losing. Once you're already a bad team an additional loss doesn't really hurt your cause. If you lose doing something aggressive, nobody cares. You were expected to lose anyway. Your decisions weren't under a microscope. But a win can do a whole lot to lend credit to your cause, so coaches pull out all the stops to do so. The benefits of winning far outweigh the almost non-existent costs of losing, so its almost a no-brainer. And while I'm speaking for these specific coaching decisions, it also has an effect on players to play with house money and with less pressure.
It's different when things reset at the beginning of a season. Even if playoffs aren't the expectation, there is an expectation of respectability and competitiveness. And so when faced with games that actually matter, coaches aren't willing to go out there and go the same way and risk losing a game because of a coaching decision. If you run a fake and it backfires when you aren't playing with house money, you're gonna get slammed. Which is why Flores and co. haven't come out to do that. But it's always why, three games into this season, we've lost to three competitive teams, while the one victory we've had was against a team widely believed to be tanking this year who had a surprise week one victory, one close game, and been steamrolled after that.
I've just not seen anything from Flores so far to make me believe that he is gonna be able to be a coach who can ever have his guys line up week one with expectations and have them beat the opponent more often than not. And I think praise for him is far too dependent on wins he never would have gotten in normal circumstances.
Four games into the season we haven't seen that same type of reckless aggression, and that's pretty standard. I can't recall seeing any special teams fakes. I can't recall seeing any wild trick plays. There's a reason why I discount those wins that come once your season is irrelevant. You're playing with house money at a certain point. If you're a bad team under a first year head coach with reasonable job security, there's really no reason to be afraid of losing. Once you're already a bad team an additional loss doesn't really hurt your cause. If you lose doing something aggressive, nobody cares. You were expected to lose anyway. Your decisions weren't under a microscope. But a win can do a whole lot to lend credit to your cause, so coaches pull out all the stops to do so. The benefits of winning far outweigh the almost non-existent costs of losing, so its almost a no-brainer. And while I'm speaking for these specific coaching decisions, it also has an effect on players to play with house money and with less pressure.
It's different when things reset at the beginning of a season. Even if playoffs aren't the expectation, there is an expectation of respectability and competitiveness. And so when faced with games that actually matter, coaches aren't willing to go out there and go the same way and risk losing a game because of a coaching decision. If you run a fake and it backfires when you aren't playing with house money, you're gonna get slammed. Which is why Flores and co. haven't come out to do that. But it's always why, three games into this season, we've lost to three competitive teams, while the one victory we've had was against a team widely believed to be tanking this year who had a surprise week one victory, one close game, and been steamrolled after that.
I've just not seen anything from Flores so far to make me believe that he is gonna be able to be a coach who can ever have his guys line up week one with expectations and have them beat the opponent more often than not. And I think praise for him is far too dependent on wins he never would have gotten in normal circumstances.
