re: Any reason not to air it out?

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I don’t know if you’ve watched 2020 LSU yet but we don’t have true deep threat WRs, except Marshall, and our freshman QB throws a flat deep ball that our WRs can’t get under. The DBs easily defense these passes.

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Deep threat WRs are not the issue. We have a few guys who can get separation with their matchups, including Gilbert. The issues have been giving the QB adequate time, which has affected both QBs, and Finley’s lack of polish.

I get the calls to abandon the deep ball, but you can’t completely ignore it. The defense will just sit on everything short to try and get a pick if you refuse to throw any deep balls. The key isn’t to just do it. It’s to find a few plays in practice that Finley can execute well and feels confident in, and then set those plays up properly during the game.

This is a game where we also need to be willing to take some chances to get easy scores. We haven’t had many big plays since the USC game and that’s one of the big things holding the offense down at the moment. They need to sprinkle in a couple of flea flickers, WR/HB passes, or other trick plays to try and get an easy, wide open TD somewhere.

I get the OP’s point. Grinding alone isn’t going to win this game. It might keep us in it, but we won’t score enough to win. You’ve got to add enough big play potential to balance the scales. Creativity is the key to that, and unfortunately that makes me worried. That just isn’t E’s strength.