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Cal football: Cignetti implications
By Jonathan Okanes
Thursday, February 19th, 2009 at 10:16 am in off-season stuff.
The biggest implication of offensive coordinator Frank Cignetti’s departure for Pittsburgh isn’t so much the loss of the man himself, but what it means for Jeff Tedford.
Tedford didn’t hire Cignetti because he thought he was a brilliant offensive tactician. That’s not to say Tedford wasn’t impressed with Cignetti’s philosophies. Quite the contrary, Tedford never would have hired him if he didn’t feel Cignetti’s approach was a lot like his. But that’s just the point. Tedford brought in someone to call the plays for his offense. With our without Cignetti, Cal’s offense is Tedford’s offense.
We all know the motivation for hiring Cignetti. Tedford felt the need to shed playcalling duties so he could become a better CEO of the program. Tedford was still heavily involved in offensive scheming throughout the week, so that by the time the game came around, nothing Cignetti called would come as too much of a surprise. But with Cignetti there, Tedford could spend part of the week spending more time on other aspects of the program.
So the big question now is whether Tedford will keep the current arrangement or go back to calling the plays. He’s gone back and forth during his seven years at Cal. It was obvious it was a problem in 2007. But in other years, there didn’t seem to be any problems with it.
One of Cal’s sports information directors told me yesterday that Tedford didn’t specifically say he was bringing in a play caller but there was no reason to believe that he won’t. It appears Tedford won’t once again make himself offensive coordinator, like in 2007 (although Jim Michalczik had the title, he was more of an assistant head coach).
There may be some who feel this is bad timing with spring practice less than three weeks away. But again, this is Tedford’s offense. If there isn’t an offensive coordinator in place, Tedford can run the offense until the coordinator is brought in. It would be much more of a problem if it were defensive coordinator Bob Gregory who was leaving.
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February 19th, 2009 at 11:00 am
There has been much discussed about the play calling abilities of Cignetti. Personally, I hadn’t been one to really focus on that as the issue. Proper execution can buries a lot of poor/mediocre play calling. I thought that our QB/Receiver combination quite simply never executed on the basics often enough.
With that said, I ventured over to the californiagoldenblog site and found a very intriguing analysis of last year’s play calling vs. $C.
http://www.californiagoldenblogs.com/2009/2/18/760385/looking-back-at-usc-vs-cal
Okay, just a little less transparency in play calling MIGHT help.
Go Bears!
February 19th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
how hard is it to find a guy willing to take 400k a year to call 2 runs up the middle and then a long bomb? i’ll do it for 50k and a free tee shirt.
February 19th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
what CAL really needs is a receiver’s coach. if you look at the man in charge of the receivers you will have some understanding as to why our receivers were very slow in development, much to our and boateng’s frustration. i won’t be going into details, (you can go to calbears.com/football) but suffice it to say that Kevin is simply not qualified to be coached such an essential skill position.
February 19th, 2009 at 1:56 pm
J.O. I know it’s early in the process, but did JT give any sort of timeline for the hire? I guess here is the answer for those who were wondering what you would do in the “off-season.”
February 19th, 2009 at 8:53 pm
JO -
What about running backs coach Ron Gould? He’s been on the Cal staff for 12 years, produced a 1,000-yard rusher in each of the past six seasons, and understands the passing game as demonstrated by his previous experience as a DB coach.
Whaddayathink?
February 20th, 2009 at 9:54 am
How about $25k, two free tees and a hug from Oski.
This guy came from the Niners and as I recall they were one of the worst offensive teams in the NFL in 2007. He didn’t do anything for Alex Smith as their QB coach just as he didn’t do anything for Nate or Kevin here. There are no tears shed by me on his departure!
February 20th, 2009 at 1:05 pm
Robert, Tedford offered no timeline. As I said, it’s not quite as urgent since it’s his offense anyway. But I would think he’d like to have somebody in place by spring practice, so that person can get acclimated, etc.