KARL DORRELL: Truth or Fiction?

1)  We should keep KD as our head coach because he has brought respect back to UCLA football, is a fine example to young men, and is an alumnus.  

A:  FICTION.  That sounds more like a nice administrative position than the qualifications for a head football coach.  IMO, we need a proven head football coach with integrity, not an alum with integrity.  The "alum" portion should be a bonus, not the requirement. Question: does a head coach have integrity when he blames the players for losses?

2)  Karl Dorrell's Bruins run the West Coast Offense.

A:  FICTION:  The WCO is a ball control offense that utilizes short, precision timed passes in place of much of the running game and via variable formations (Bill Walsh's thoughts on the WCO, my sentence).  KD's offense is a ball control offense, but it is mainly through running the ball.  In all seven games this year our offense has tried to establish the run early.  We have also continued to run the ball late in games, even if we are unable to establish a successful running game.  Our last 8 offensive play calls against Notre Dame were 6 running plays, 1 pass behind the line of scrimmage, and 1 pass for two yards.  Instead of rehashing the stupidity of the play calling, let me just say this: IMO, KD basically said that he has no confidence in our ability to execute a ball control offense utilizing short, precision timed passes.  This is no West Coast offense.

3)   KD is a very good offensive mind.

A:  FICTION.  Under three different offensive coordinators, KD's offenses have consistently been unimaginative, predictable, ultraconservative, plagued by poor clock management, suffocated by poor timeout management, etc.  Only under Tom Cable was the offensive line any good and did we know when to take risks.  Also, considering our receivers have been totally average during KD's tenure, one could argue that he isn't even a good receivers coach, which supposedly is his specialty.  

4)  Recruiting is on the upswing.

A:  TRUTH.  However, It is only getting better RELATIVE TO Karl's own past recruiting efforts.  It is not better relative to Tolardo's last few recruiting classes.

5)  KD has proven that he is a good coach because he went 10-2 last year and is 14-4 in his last 18 games (errr, make that 14-5 in his last 19 games).

A:  FALSE.  "10-2"  is the same as the "Steve-16" argument, because it only scratches the surface of the analysis.  We needed a lot of luck.  It took 5 comebacks to get to 10 wins, and 4 of them were against average teams (only Cal was decent).  If it wasn't for the FOUR miracle comebacks in the regular season, that team could have been 5-6 and not even have been eligible for a bowl game.  Without Tom Cable to show some guts and go for the win, how many of those games do we win with this year's offensive coaching?  Also, both of our losses were blowouts, including a loss to our rival where we didn't even show up.  Then, we needed our 5th comeback to win the Piss Bucket Bowl against an average Northwestern.  

Oh yeah, the "14-5" argument is annoying because it captures the easy part of the schedule over two years, yet the hard part of the schedule over only one year.  And if "14-4" (pre-ND) was so great, how come we couldn't even get one stinking vote for the top-25?   Which leads me to.....

6)  We are having a good year because we have a winning record, so stop complaining about KD.  

A: FALSE.   Sure, we are 4-3, but KD's "best team yet" had its best win against 4-4 Utah.  Also, our best win against an opponent in a major conference this year is 3-5 Arizona.  
"Best team yet"?  What does that say about how lucky we got last year to finish 10-2?
7)  All those second half comebacks last year prove that KD is very good at making halftime adjustments.

A: FICTION.  Third quarter scoring is a better indicator of successful halftime adjustments than looking at the entire second half for a few reasons; mainly that fatigue becomes a major factor.  Looking at 3rd quarter scoring last year and we were outscored by 31 points!  And by the way, for the second year in a row we were outscored in the third quarter by Rice.  

8)  The players are young so they deserve our praise, and mistakes should be expected.

A:  FICTION.  They deserve our praise because we are proud of them for playing their butts off, not because they are young.  Also, this is not a young or inexperienced team.  We may not have a lot of senior starters, but 9 of the 11 defensive starters are juniors, and most of those starters have a lot of experience from last year.  On offense we start 1 freshman, 3 sophomores, and the rest are upperclassmen.  Lastly, player mistakes are expected and forgiven, which is why 99% of the negative attention this team gets is focused on KD.

9)  We should all be happy about the Notre Dame outcome because we weren't expected to be able to compete.

A:  FICTION.  The reason we weren't expected to able to compete is because of KD's coaching:  inability to put away lousy teams like Rice, ultracoservative playcalling that puts our players in a position to lose, inability to beat a good team on the road, running out the clock on ourselves in Washington, coaches quitting on the players in Oregon, etc. (Whew!)  At best, someone could say (not me) is that we should be happy that we competed with Notre Dame CONSIDERING the fact that KD is our head coach.