Dear Dirk,
By Luke Sims
I think it is time we directed a message to our dear offensive coordinator. I’ve never particularly liked the way he runs the offense, but sometimes he does a good job. He does do a good job when he sticks with the run and punishes opposing defenses for even imagining that they can slow down Maurice Jones-Drew and Rashad Jennings. Unfortunately, Dirk appears to believe that the offense will flourish under the passing game. While I believe that David Garrard has a brilliant arm. And while I have faith in the hands of most of the receivers. That is not the way to dominate the opposing team. The Jaguar personnel is not designed to sustain large passing drives.
Yesterday, in writing about who was crispy, I wrote that the defense was to blame for the Jaguars falling apart against the Giants. But the blame doesn’t all fall on them. The blame also falls on Dirk Koetter and his play calling. To open the second half, rather than continue to sustain the momentum the Jaguars had via the run game, Dirk called passing plays, ultimately inspiring the Giants defense and turning the ball over. Why should the play calling shift to feature the pass when the run has been so dominant? No matter what change has come over the defense during halftime, it didn’t make them bigger and stronger. The Jaguars had demonstrated they could win in the trenches and that the offense could move the ball. Why move away from the gameplan? Dirk has shown, consistently, that he moves away from the run too early. Rather than trying to balance the run game with the passing game, he totally shifts to trying to balance the passing game with an occasional run. This allows the defense more leeway when dealing with the Jaguars’ offensive plays. How, you might ask?
When the Jaguars get an incomplete on first down, they end up with second and ten. Even with Garrard completing almost 70 percent of his passes, the odds are better that Maurice Jones-Drew or Rashad Jennings will gain one or two yards on a first down run play. Even second and eight is better than a second and ten. Dirk should have noticed the success of this in the first half and continued it, rather than moving away from it. The Jaguar offense can’t recover from a second and ten like the Colts, Patriots, or Packers. They need to gain yards on first down.
I can’t tell if Dirk Koetter just doesn’t have absolute faith in the run game, or if he is just so stuck on what he wants this team to be. Unfortunately, his vision of the team just doesn’t work. It’s about time he realized this. The quicker he does, the quicker we will start to win more games.
– Luke N. Sims