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Is Scott Frost A Good Head Coach?

It seems only fair that I respond to a few of the posts,

First, regardless of what Frost does with his own players he cannot influence the media's selection of the all BIG 10 team. Further, I saw no indication that there was a significant difference between the media and the coaches' all-conference teams. Thus, there is no evidence that Frost is influencing the selection of the all-conference team to enhance his position in my analysis. If someone has such evidence, I would like to see it.

Second, a few posters objected to my analysis saying that you are your record. Assuming this is true, then how do these posters account for Pat Fitzgerald? Under their reasoning Fitzgerald was the best coach in the West in 2018. Then, inexplicably and catastrophically plummeted to the bottom of the West and became the worst coach. Then he turned things around in 2020 and once again became the best coach. How did he do this? What changed? Which is the real Pat Fitzgerald and why?

Third, some posters continue to harp about player development, but they offer no specifics. How do these posters know what a given player's ceiling is? What is their methodology? Simply saying it doesn't make it true.

Fourth, some posters pointed to out-of-conference games as examples of where Frost lost to a team with inferior talent. How did they arrive at this conclusion? How can we check their work? Without specifics, this sounds like something that was made up.

Finally, and in the same vein, one poster said Frost has never beaten a team with a superior talent. Where are the facts supporting this conclusion?

I look forward to your answers.
No one does more with less than Fitzgerald. There are probably a few out there doing less with more than Frost.
 
Yes!!!

3 pages and going of the usual suspects trying to weave a tapestry of excuses when the answer, based on almost every imaginable objective measure, to the OPs original question of “is Scott Frost a good head coach” is a resounding:


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Please tell me where Vedral was better than Martinez last year. And this is just passing. If we throw in rushing it is even worse.

Vedral
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Martinez
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No kidding. Vedral was a turnover machine whose only win as Rutgers' QB was over a Michigan State team that turned the ball over 7 times. He also had a decent game against Michigan, but otherwise Vedral's play told you everything you need to know about why Martinez has held onto the starting QB job.
 
Please tell me where Vedral was better than Martinez last year. And this is just passing. If we throw in rushing it is even worse.

Vedral
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13622161.51,2535.79866115.4

Martinez
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Rutgers’ Noah Vedral delivers a performance for the ages in heartbreaking loss to Michigan | QB report card. Vedral threw for a career-high 381 yards on 29-for-43 passing and added three touchdowns in a 48-42 triple-overtime loss to Michigan at SHI Stadium in Piscataway.​



Vedral improves dramatically after leaving Nebraska for Rutgers while our QBs get worse each year. Even POB and Gebbia look a lot better now than when they were last at Nebraska.
 
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Rutgers’ Noah Vedral delivers a performance for the ages in heartbreaking loss to Michigan | QB report card. Vedral threw for a career-high 381 yards on 29-for-43 passing and added three touchdowns in a 48-42 triple-overtime loss to Michigan at SHI Stadium in Piscataway.​



Vedral improves dramatically after leaving Nebraska for Rutgers while our QBs get worse each year. Even POB and Gebbia look a lot better now than when they were last at Nebraska.
Gebbia and POB never started so how can you say they were better?

Wished Gebbia would have stuck around and Oregon St offense is the same offense at Nebraska...

You really need to quit visiting jlb house..
 

Rutgers’ Noah Vedral delivers a performance for the ages in heartbreaking loss to Michigan | QB report card. Vedral threw for a career-high 381 yards on 29-for-43 passing and added three touchdowns in a 48-42 triple-overtime loss to Michigan at SHI Stadium in Piscataway.​



Vedral improves dramatically after leaving Nebraska for Rutgers while our QBs get worse each year. Even POB and Gebbia look a lot better now than when they were last at Nebraska.
So he had 1 great game that resulted in a heartbreaking triple overtime loss? If Martinez did that we would blame him for the loss not celebrate the performance.

What else you got? Just the one game recap that you googled?
 
Since Hillary Clinton is arguably the most deceitful politician in history, does the choice of her for the delivery of his answer mean that JLB321 is actually trying to agree with me?
 
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So he had 1 great game that resulted in a heartbreaking triple overtime loss? If Martinez did that we would blame him for the loss not celebrate the performance.

What else you got? Just the one game recap that you googled?
why does Vedral improve dramatically after leaving Nebraska while AM declines every year?
 
Second, a few posters objected to my analysis saying that you are your record. Assuming this is true, then how do these posters account for Pat Fitzgerald? Under their reasoning Fitzgerald was the best coach in the West in 2018. Then, inexplicably and catastrophically plummeted to the bottom of the West and became the worst coach. Then he turned things around in 2020 and once again became the best coach. How did he do this? What changed? Which is the real Pat Fitzgerald and why?
Nobody is that stupid, and you know it. You are what your record says you are. For head coaches, it applies to your career record. Frost has managed only 1 winning season in 5 as a head coach. 0 for 3 on a P5 stage. He could turn it around, but will he?

I’ve seen us lose games just because of in-game coaching gaffes like not running out the clock, not paying attention to challenge opportunities, not addressing gaping special teams problems, poor timeout management, poor play calling especially in red zone, the same mental mistakes allowed to happen over multiple games/seasons, soft leadership blaming the opponents clapping. Even if our players are better, we will still lose games we shouldn’t unless Frost becomes a different coach than what we have seen so far.
 
why does Vedral improve dramatically after leaving Nebraska while AM declines every year?

Help define "improve dramatically".

From his time at Neb compared to Rutgers below, his comp %, avg yards, and rating all declined?

But he did have a helluva a game losing at Michigan in triple over time.

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13622161.51,2535.7986615115.4
 

Rutgers’ Noah Vedral delivers a performance for the ages in heartbreaking loss to Michigan | QB report card. Vedral threw for a career-high 381 yards on 29-for-43 passing and added three touchdowns in a 48-42 triple-overtime loss to Michigan at SHI Stadium in Piscataway.​



Vedral improves dramatically after leaving Nebraska for Rutgers while our QBs get worse each year. Even POB and Gebbia look a lot better now than when they were last at Nebraska.

Vedral at Nebraska in 2019 had a completion percentage of 65.4%, averaged 8.0 yards per pass and had a QBR of 132.9 He also averaged 3.5 yards per rush on the ground.
Vedral at Rutgers in 2020 had a completion percentage of 61.5%, averaged 5.7 yards per pass and had a QBR of 115.4. He also averaged 2.8 yards per rush on the ground.

He went down in every major QB efficiency statistic and every rushing one. In fact despite carrying the ball more than twice as much at Rutgers than at Nebraska, he only picked up an extra 87 yards on those 38 extra carries.


Even though you didn't compare them, for reference to you or anyone who cares, Martinez in 2020 had a completion percentage of 71.5, averaged 7.0 yards per pass and had a QBR of 135.0. He also averaged 5.7 yards per rush on the ground. Martinez had 23 extra carries than Vedral, equating to 328 more yards.

Both QB's threw one more Touchdown than Interception.

Martinez was said to have thrown too many short passes, was too slow and made too many bad decisions. Vedral was slower, threw even shorter passes and made the same bad decisions.
 
Vedral at Nebraska in 2019 had a completion percentage of 65.4%, averaged 8.0 yards per pass and had a QBR of 132.9 He also averaged 3.5 yards per rush on the ground.
Vedral at Rutgers in 2020 had a completion percentage of 61.5%, averaged 5.7 yards per pass and had a QBR of 115.4. He also averaged 2.8 yards per rush on the ground.

He went down in every major QB efficiency statistic and every rushing one. In fact despite carrying the ball more than twice as much at Rutgers than at Nebraska, he only picked up an extra 87 yards on those 38 extra carries.


Even though you didn't compare them, for reference to you or anyone who cares, Martinez in 2020 had a completion percentage of 71.5, averaged 7.0 yards per pass and had a QBR of 135.0. He also averaged 5.7 yards per rush on the ground. Martinez had 23 extra carries than Vedral, equating to 328 more yards.

Both QB's threw one more Touchdown than Interception.

Martinez was said to have thrown too many short passes, was too slow and made too many bad decisions. Vedral was slower, threw even shorter passes and made the same bad decisions.
I am about as unimpressed as anyone with the Frost regime's ability to recruit and develop quarterbacks. But the fact that they allowed a mediocre QB to transfer to an even worse team, where he put up awful stats and led the team to one win, is not part of the problem.
 
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Many on this board have said HCSF is a bad coach. This seems more an article of faith, repeated like a catechism, rather than a matter of fact, or even reasoned opinion. To answer this question we must first decide what is a good coach. There are several components to this determination. At its most basic, a good football coach is one who wins the games he supposed to win and wins some he's not supposed to win. In other words, the good football coach wins the games where he has superior talent and steals some when he has inferior talent. So, how do we decide whether a coach has inferior or superior talent?

Although not perfect, all-conference teams offer a measure of the respective talent levels for the teams in that conference. In short, these teams are comprised of the difference makers in that conference and difference makers go a long way towards deciding the outcome of a game. Of course, all-conference players are not the only measure of a team's talent level. The NFL draft also says something about the talent level of a team. But, in terms of an independent analysis of a team's talent level, this is a good pace to start. I say "independent" because I'm trying to avoid a subjective determination of a team's talent. I would also emphasize that this a good relative measure of any coach's performance because it addresses the talent on his peers' teams.

With these thoughts in mind, I analyzed the three-deep all-conference teams during HCSF's tenure at DONU. I decided, and this is admittedly a bit arbitrary, to use a 4-3-2 scoring system with 4 points for a first team all-conference performer, 3 points for a second teamer, and 2 for third string. To get this information, I used Wikipedia's summary of the media and coaches' polls. If the media and coaches' and media disagreed on a player, I chose the higher rank for each player. I did not assign points for honorable mention nor did I factor in the NFL draft. While this omission means I may not have completely captured each team's talent level, it should not have a material effect on the teams' overall rankings relative to one another. The win-loss records for the various Big 10 teams bears this out for the most part.

Name 2018 2019 2020

IU 3 10 33

IL 11 16 14

Iowa 29 21 40

Mary. 10 3 2

Michigan 49 40 6

MSU 21 13 6

Minn 10 22 10

NE 9 5 7

NW 11 3 19

OSU 35 56 53

PSU 19 24 30

PUR 17 10 12

Rutgers 0 3 7

WI 26 17 16

As you can see, DONU ranks near the bottom in each year and for the three years combined. This should come as no surprise to anyone who has followed the NFL draft. How did HCSF do?

2018--NU went 3-6 in conference with all games against superior teams.

2019—NU went 3-6 in conference; 2-0 against teams with inferior talent and 1-6 against superior teams.

2020—NU went 3-5 in conference; 2-5 against teams with superior talent and 1-0 against an evenly matched Rutgers team.

How do HCSF's 6 wins against teams with superior talent compare to other coaches? Fitzgerald also had 6 quality wins over the same period with 1 bad loss. N.B. HCSF did not have any bad losses by this definition. How about Ferentz? This was really eye-opening as far as I was concerned. He had 0 quality wins over the same time and 7(!) bad losses. 4 of the bad losses came in 2018--which had to be one of the worst underperforming teams in the BIG over this time. I did not analyze every BIG coach's record, but I"m pretty sure based on the above 2 examples that HCSF compares favorably to every one else and may be at the top of the conference. I leave it to somebody else to perform this analysis for all BIG coaches.

Some posters have complained about HCSF's play calling. The short answer here is that none of us has analyzed opposing teams' game film to determine where DONU may have an advantage and none of us is privy to the practices to see which plays the team seems able to best execute given what the coach's want to do. Notably, many of HCSF's BIG losses have been close. Given the obvious talent disparity, it's a tribute to the play calling that the games were close in the first place.

A further note. I only analyzed BIG games so I had some confidence that I was comparing apples to apples. I had no way to objectively compare out-of-conference teams' talent levels to DONU's. By limiting the analysis to BIG games I was comparing performances in roughly the same talent pool. Also, the all-conference team is based on actual performance, rather than projections based on somebody's feelings.

Of course, this isn't the only metric for measuring a coach's performance. It addresses primarily a coach's game preparation and coaching during a game. Another important metric is recruiting. In some ways it's the most important. The problem here is that rather than measuring on-field performance, recruiting rankings are a projection of possible future performance. This means there is no reliable way to measure the success of a coach's recruiting until 4-5 years down the road. The all-American teams bear this out as the vast majority (more than 75%) are juniors and seniors. We will have a much better handle on HCSF's recruiting in his first two years after the 2021 and 2022 seasons.

Another unquantifiable metric is player development. Each player has a range to his talent within which he can be "developed." Simply put, this means you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. "Player development" is unquantifiable because we have no way to gauge a player's talent range when he comes into a program. For that reason we can't gauge whether he was developed to the maximum by the staff. This also assumes that it's up to the staff alone and not the player to get this done.

To sum up, HCSF is a good coach, performing at a high level. If recruiting has been what we all hope, the future is bright.


As of right now I'd have to say no he isn't a good coach.


Holla
 
I agree with you on that chip. There is definitely something to that and I just don't feel like he has ever been comfortable here. Winning helps that, but I think at UCF he was able to be successful because he was carefree and was able to just coach. There is basically no media, a fanbase that is somewhat passionate but not crazed like ours and a pretty easy schedule to navigate. I think Scott has all of the tools, just needs to stop stepping on his dick and trying to change what has made him successful.
And he didn’t have to recruit a team from scratch.
 
I am about as unimpressed as anyone with the Frost regime's ability to recruit and develop quarterbacks. But the fact that they allowed a mediocre QB to transfer to an even worse team, where he put up awful stats and led the team one win, is not part of the problem.
This.
 
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We cannot keep going on and on and on because was a champion.

It seems he learned little from Osborne. His playing for him is in part why we were so agaga getting him.

Results suggest he is not a trancendent coach, regardless Tom Osborne

I am really not believing a staff with a cigar smoking QB fool will find success.
Bad coaches don't have the success that he had at UCF. Period. The benefit he had there to help him win so quickly was a MUCH better roster to take over than Riley left him BY FAR. It's taken him longer than I had hoped BUT IF I had listened to multiple former Huskers who had played for Tom and in the NFL I would have expected at minimum a 4-5 year rebuild. Former players were fairly vocal about the shape the roster was in when Frost took over. We're in year 4 and IMO the only thing that might hold us back from a good year is a QB who turns the ball over too much. Hell IF we had a Tommy Armstrong on the roster last year I think we would have easily won 6 games. We'll see what happens this year but QB is the number one determiner IMO.
 
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Bad coaches don't have the success that he had at UCF. Period. The benefit he had there to help him win so quickly was a MUCH better roster to take over than Riley left him BY FAR. It's taken him longer than I had hoped BUT IF I had listened to multiple former Huskers who had played for Tom and in the NFL I would have expected at minimum a 4-5 year rebuild. Former players were fairly vocal about the shape the roster was in when Frost took over. We're in year 4 and IMO the only thing that might hold us back from a good year is a QB who turns the ball over too much. Hell IF we had a Tommy Armstrong on the roster last year I think we would have easily won 6 games. We'll see what happens this year but QB is the number one determiner IMO.

Dingle,
Agree with the rebuild. Roster was thin at best.

My biggest complaint is that we lost multiple games through poor decisions, largely his decisions, whether roster management, gametime choices, or discipline.

A good coach, especially one that won it all with Osborne in 1997, should at least be able to instill discipline, regardless of talent level.

I loved his hire, advocated it, as much as an Alaskan can, and sit genuinely disappointed in the results. It was a giddy time when he was hired.

I hope you are right, and this was a woeful team he took over, and that it will take 4 or 5 years for him.

I equate discipline to a writer that may have good ideas, good points, but fails with grammar, punctuation and spelling. Both are lacking the absolute basics of their respective trades.

I sincerely hope I am wrong, and you right.

🍻🍻
 
I like this analysis as it cuts through the fantasy of Nebraska having great talent. The numbers show us in the bottom third of the league. Pretty much how we perform on the field. You throw in a coach who was full of himself and the league has schooled the Huskers.
 
Bad coaches don't have the success that he had at UCF. Period. The benefit he had there to help him win so quickly was a MUCH better roster to take over than Riley left him BY FAR. It's taken him longer than I had hoped BUT IF I had listened to multiple former Huskers who had played for Tom and in the NFL I would have expected at minimum a 4-5 year rebuild. Former players were fairly vocal about the shape the roster was in when Frost took over. We're in year 4 and IMO the only thing that might hold us back from a good year is a QB who turns the ball over too much. Hell IF we had a Tommy Armstrong on the roster last year I think we would have easily won 6 games. We'll see what happens this year but QB is the number one determiner IMO.

True enough sir! However, I'd guess that an improved OLine (and decent center hikes) will help any qb. We might see that this year compadre' and if so I'd bet AMart will look a lot better.

Sure, T. Armstrong was great! But I'd especially LOVE to see a TMart clone for us.
 
The roster problems Frost inherited were worse than most people really understand. HOWEVER, their win total should be higher than it is. They've made several poor coaching decisions in terms of their practice habits and their gameday calls that have led to losses.

They have also done a poor job of identifying/retaining top level recruits who will become contributors. The attrition they've had from the very top of their classes is unacceptable. There's a disconnect if you're consistently getting 4* kids in and then sending them back out the door within 1-2 years without having made much of an impact.
 
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The roster problems Frost inherited were worse than most people really understand. HOWEVER, their win total should be higher than it is. They've made several poor coaching decisions in terms of their practice habits and their gameday calls that have led to losses.

They have also done a poor job of identifying/retaining top level recruits who will become contributors. The attrition they've had from the very top of their classes is unacceptable. There's a disconnect if you're consistently getting 4* kids in and then sending them back out the door within 1-2 years without having made much of an impact.
Not all 4 star kids are the same. Frost reached on some guys early on who had some issues. Riley landed an O lineman out of Oklahoma in his first class. High 4 star. He was WAY over rated and the Nebraska Rivals guys noted that when they saw him in an All Star game. COVID cost some guys last year due to the mental stress and isolation. With the new attitude and rules for transfers you had better get used to highly ranked kids leaving if they don't make the 2 deep as freshmen. Wandale was the only guy I wonder about but I think we've already replaced him.
 
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The roster problems Frost inherited were worse than most people really understand. HOWEVER, their win total should be higher than it is. They've made several poor coaching decisions in terms of their practice habits and their gameday calls that have led to losses.

They have also done a poor job of identifying/retaining top level recruits who will become contributors. The attrition they've had from the very top of their classes is unacceptable. There's a disconnect if you're consistently getting 4* kids in and then sending them back out the door within 1-2 years without having made much of an impact.
I think these comments point to a pretty piss poor coach. Let's hope for a big turnaround FINALLY in year 4.
 
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