It's easy for some to get caught up in the "Gus is a great play caller" hype after the record setting fun of the Music City Bowl. And make no mistake, it was fun. It's always fun watching Auburn physically dominate somebody. Malzahn's 'signature' offenses (circa 2013) were always fun to watch. There's something inspiring about knowing the offense could score on every play. What we saw yesterday was the active realization of "what would happen if Auburn had a defense to go with that offense..."
All of us as Auburn fans should enjoy the annihilation that was yesterday. But take it for what it was. It was fool's gold. Allow me to quickly recap the flaws of the Music City Mirage.
1. Purdue is an average football team at best. Big10 teams have a habit of getting obliterated in bowl games against SEC teams. Still, that was an epic beatdown of unheard of proportions. Pantsing any P5 team the way AU did yesterday deserves some respect.
2. Gus has already proven that when he's doing nothing but calling plays and devising offensive schemes he can create an offense that's difficult to stop and relentless in its attack. Remember 2013? Most of the season was like yesterday. Score at will. The only reason any of those games were close (UGA) is that AU had no defense. Somebody (and it was Kaos) noted that if AU had any semblance of a defense to go with that offensive attack AU would unleash raw hell on the CFB world. Remember the wheels falling off at the end of 2014 and staying off pretty much until the last two games of 2017? Somebody (it was Kaos) noted that once Malzahn had to actually do the job he was hired to do, the offense was a bumbling, stumbling mess. Malzahn can call plays and he can scheme (apparently). But when he has to be the head coach and take care of all the duties that the job entails, he can't keep it all together. He can't live and breathe offensive schemes and still make the rubber chicken circuit, oversee defense and special teams, always be closing in recruiting, monitoring facilities improvements, managing the staff, making sure all the pieces and parts are in place and functional. In order for his way to work, he has to keep his head completely buried in the minutiae of the offense and ignore everything else. That isn't what a $50 mil a year head coach is supposed to be doing. He had three weeks to deep dive into an offensive plan and shut out everything else. That's what we got yesterday. He can't do that over the course of a season and be the head coach.
3. Yes, Gus was laser focused and the offense worked. But he still suffered from puzzling personnel decisions. All season long he's been trotting Baby Carlson out to try 94-yard field goals and running the risk of ruining the kid's confidence in the process. At least twice, maybe three times yesterday he had an opportunity to reward the kid by letting him kick a makeable field goal in a bowl game. Nope. Stand over there. He almost never lets the backups (particularly at quarterback) get any meaningful reps. Yeah, it was Stidham's farewell, but Willis (who obviously isn't even a realistic option) and Gatewood threw one pass each. The pair combined for a total of eight passes for 24 yards on the entire season. Going into next year, we don't know what we've got and neither does Gus.
4. If this is what the AU offense was capable of all season, why were we (and the players) forced to suffer through inexcusable garbage like the Tennessee loss, the loss to MSU and other indignities. As I watched the thrashing of Purdue unfold, I honestly felt a growing sense of anger and frustration at Malzahn's bumbling. Somebody (it was Kaos) has complained about the seemingly perpetual squandering of highly rated classes. Yesterday shined a billion watt spotlight on that squanderance. Gus can look all mad and intense like he's showing the world just how damn good he is, and the Creed thumping Malzahnites can crow all they want about how we got the old Gus back, but don't forget two things. a) that's not his job and he shouldn't make $50 mil to only run the offense, and b) if that's what AU was capable of over the last three or four years then his failure to put the team in a position to be that successful is a massive failure as a head coach. It's criminal almost.
I enjoyed the win. I felt bad for Tyler Trent having to sit there and watch that. I'm torn over whether we should have scored at the end to set the record (we had the bottom of the bench in and they were still running their starting team, so I'd have been fine with punching it across). Finally? Despite what so many seem to think, I don't believe this win portends anything for next season or for Malzahn's renaissance. It was a one-off, self-contained event. It means nothing beyond yesterday's score.
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