Biggest waste of talent in the Stoops er****

[OkieThunderLion]

Because we have no Tight Ends, are stacked with talent at WR, and not very good at run blocking.

How many points per game did we score this year?

Green is decent at TE, but he isn't better than Millard or WR3. After the K-State game (the last game where the TE took majority of snaps), Bob had come to Jesus meeting with Heupel, telling him to get Millard on the field more.

[Big Pimpin']

Run a two back set with 3 WR's. Run a one back set with Millard at TE. Millard is the most versatile athlete to come through Norman in a long time. You could do any number of things with him.

Any why isn't the O-line bad at run blocking? Maybe it's because they never do it in games or practice.

Also, Landy being a statue has a lot to do with formation. If you have a consistent running game, the defense can't pin it's ears back on every single play like they do against OU. Huepel's solution to that seems to be short passing routes. Those have their place but his answer to a running game seems to to a total swap of personnel. It's like the coaches don't know how to coach a running game and their short yardage package is basically a QB run.

[oujeremy]

You could make an argument for Adrian Peterson. If he played for USC, he may have won 3 straight Heisman trophies (and national titles). USC ran an offense that had a sophisticated under center passing attack that could beat teams in and of itself, yet used that to complement an under center traditional running attack. Meanwhile, OU had this dopey "multiple schemes" nonsense where the two halves of the offense (passing and running) operated under different formations, which meant neither complemented and built upon the other. You have to punish the defense from putting nickle and dime formations when line up in the shotgun by having a good shotgun running game or putting 8 in the box when we run the ball from the I formation by having a good, sophisticated, and varied I formation passing attack.

USC had the perfect offense to put the defense in that no man's land of unable to sell out to stop the run or p****. Leinart could line up under center, do a 3 step drop, hit Jarret or Steve Smith for a 7 yard slant. Did that enough to force opposing LBs and safeties to rethink about crowding the line of scrimmage. Then when they did run the ball with Leinart under center, Bush/White had much more room to run, because defense reacted much more slowly thanks to the good poker face at the line of scrimmage. The playaction p**** was almost an after thought--they did well enough throwing the ball from a running formation just with well timed quick strike 3 to 4 step drops into the pocket, throwing the ball from a running formation in order to set up the run from a running formation.

You could make an argument we wasted a good amount of talent stuck in this mindset of "Hey defense! Did you notice we're lined up in the shotgun?!? We don't do anything in the shotgun except throw the ball, so just go ahead and blitz Jason/Paul/Sam/Landry and double cover our best WR, because there is zero threat of a running game from the shotgun!" or "Hey defense! Did you notice our QB is under center and there's a running back 8-10 yards behind him?!? We're handing the ball to that running back! And if it isn't a handoff, it's a slow developing play action p****, likely on a deep ball! So if you run blitz us, your blitzers will be in good position to pressure our QB anyways, just keep a free safety back to pick off the deep ball if it is a playaction! You don't have to worry about a toss pitch, or a speed option, or a handoff to the flanker going in motion even though that was a valuable ****et when we won the title in 2000 handing the ball off to Josh Norman and Curtis ****an even though we've had much more athletic WRs since then, and you certainly don't have to worry about our QB taking a 3 step drop and hitting a WR in stride on a quick slant against man to man coverage or a 4 step drop and hitting the TE over the middle threatening your run-stop oriented Linebackers, nope! If the QB is under center, it's a handoff!"

This. It's a crime that AD didn't get a NC or a Heisman while at Oklahoma.

[Sooner 76]

Ben Panter's talent was wasted.

What talent? You have to have talent to waste it. ;-) Just kidding, Ben.

[Fahooglegods]

you will never win this battle with him. Finch is a stud that OU coaches dont know what they are doing with him.

YAWN

[Mr. Pink]

Rhett Bomar

YOU SHUT YOUR MOUTH YOU BLACK ****HOLE!!!

[BoulderSooner]

1. I'll echo the previous post about busts vs. waste of talent. A five star player who turns out to be average is not a waste of talent. He's a bust or just an over ranked player. Big differences.

2. I also liked the critique of our schemes over the years. It's painfully obvious when we're running or passing. I liked the I formation we ran during the Peterson years. (Remember how good Patrick looked during that season?) We just never passed out of it. We also never run out of the shotgun and the current offensive staff is the worst about it. The running plays look like they're designed to just kill time until the next passing play. Then, when we really need to run, here comes a whole new offense with a totally different backfield and QB.

This year's team has been horribly coached. We have a good but statue-esque QB and an NFL caliber FB. Why do we keep running 4 WR sets all the time with the shaky O-line we have. We've had the same statue QB for years. Why not coach them to be a downhill running team to at least keep the defenses honest? That might help their p**** blocking. To their credit, the Dallas Cowboys have done that this year. Their O-line is average at best but Demarco Murray has kept the defense honest.

3. When I saw the thread title, I instantly thought of Dampeer. If the dude could have just stayed below 320 and gone to easy classes, he'd be a top 10 draft pick, easy. That's really all they wanted but he struggled to stay below 400 pounds. Big time talent, though.

Aside from him, I'm hard pressed to find any huge wastes of talent during Stoops' tenure. Some of these players just haven't been very good or have been average.

clearly you don't know much about football we have a very good Oline and a very good qb and we have been great in the 4 wide set ..

[OUCarlton]

This. It's a crime that AD didn't get a NC or a Heisman while at Oklahoma.

He came at a bad time to win a NC. No team was going to beat that USC team. Year 2 they struggled with a Frosh at QB plus his injuries. Year 3 was an overachieving year plus he had injuries. The teams he was on in his last two seasons were not NC caliber teams.

[traxx]

They are so rare.

Switzer/Wilkinson didn't even have to win bowl games to get 3 of their 6 titles.

I'm getting pretty tired of people dinging Wilkinson's resume because he lost some bowl games. You people need to realize that it was very different back then. A bowl game wasn't really part of the season. It was just a chance for the kids and coaches to go someplace warm and have fun and play a little football. Those bolw games mattered about as much as the NFL Pro Bowl matters today. If it was required to win a bowl game to win an NC, Bud would've appraoched it much differently. But back then the voting happened before the bowl games as they weren't seen as really a part of the season. They were exhibition games. Much like how pre-season NFL games don't count toward a team's season record.

I think a lot of people are getting overhyped/busts confused with wasted talent. That being said, it makes you ask the question; Are we becoming Texas? We get these guys that are supposed to be the next great thing and they don't amount to much. Either we're wasting their talent or we're not evaluating talent very well anymore. When Bob first came, he moved guys around and found a way to get the best athletes on the field. That seems like a long time ago now.

I also agree about telegraphing our offensive plays. If I can tell what we're about to run just by the way we're lined up, that's pretty bad. Just imagine what players and coaches on the other team can tell since they know the game much better than me and have broken down game film.

[DIB]

I'm getting pretty tired of people dinging Wilkinson's resume because he lost some bowl games. You people need to realize that it was very different back then. A bowl game wasn't really part of the season. It was just a chance for the kids and coaches to go someplace warm and have fun and play a little football. Those bolw games mattered about as much as the NFL Pro Bowl matters today. If it was required to win a bowl game to win an NC, Bud would've approached it much differently. But back then the voting happened before the bowl games as they weren't seen as really a part of the season. They were exhibition games. Much like how pre-season NFL games don't count toward a team's season record.

I can think of at least one case where OU and Bud beat the national champion in a bowl game (1954 Orange over Maryland), so it cuts both ways. It was just a different time.

[Schooner9]

Moe Dampeer
Chijioke
Jermie Calhoun
Justin Johnson
Brent Rawls
Tony Cade
Brandon Keith
Chris Patterson
Adron Tennell
Kevin Brent
Justin Chaisson
Jameel Owens

Honorable Mentions
Demarcus Granger
Jamarkus McFarland
RJ Washington
Ronnell Lewis
Mike Reed
Tristan Ross
Austin Haywood
Stephen Good

List would be accurate if you eliminated Ronnell Lewis, who surpassed expectations coming from eight man football, Austin Haywood and Stephen Good.

[oujeremy]

He came at a bad time to win a NC. No team was going to beat that USC team. Year 2 they struggled with a Frosh at QB plus his injuries. Year 3 was an overachieving year plus he had injuries. The teams he was on in his last two seasons were not NC caliber teams.

Good points and I doubt AD sits around mourning that he never got a NC. It's just kind of sad from this Sooner fan's perspective that his college choice wasn't more richly rewarded.