All the talent in the world and no where to go with it. Teams like Texas, USC, Penn St (2025), and Alabama (Post Nick Saban) have all been criticized for spending the equivalent of a 3rd world nation's GDP to acquire some of the best players in the nation; all to come up short in the national title hunt. All share the same problem; a lack of identity.

Oregon, unfortunately, has found its way onto this list. Division Street can pony up all the money in the world, snag 5 star after 5 star in consecutive recruiting classes. The results will be the same. This season is more proof of that than most fans were ready to accept. The offense lacks identity, plain and simple. When Chip Kelly is named dropped, there isn't a fan in the nation that doesn't immediately think speed, power run, QBs that made quick decisions and could use their feet.

Mario Cristobal, like him or hate him, the guy had a vision for the team. Genuine beef dominated the O-line and behind them, a pair of under-the radar running backs in CJ Verdell and Travis Dye were able to fight for yardage. Yes, there were questions about his game management, under utilization of Justin Herbert's talent, and that freaking pistol formation for short yardage. But the man had a plan to execute, and recruited exactly who he wanted to make it happen.

Dan Lanning's first 4 seasons as head coach saw a general continuation of the brand of football he cut his chops at. Kenny Dillingham and Will Stein designed a hybrid power gap, zone-blocking offense that propelled Bucky Irving into the stratosphere; with Jordan James hot on his heels. With NFL talent at receiver and tight end, getting the ball to skilled playmakers was not difficult. Both OCs had an eye for QB development and allowed reclamation projects like Bo Nix and Dillon Gabriel to pull themselves out of the middle of the pack and become Heisman contenders.

The problem we have arrived at is there is zero general direction and development on the offensive side of the ball. We are, to this day, still shuffling the line to find what works best (yes, the Illinois game was an improvement). We try to run the ball for a little bit and then switch to the dink-and-dunk pass game. Our QBs have regressed substantially and the game does not seem to be slowing down in their heads for them. We aren't a power run team that opens the downfield passing attack up. We aren't pass first and run when the secondary drops into coverage. Heck, we aren't even a QB pull the ball and force the defense to cover all 11 players kind of team.

The point I am trying to make is, Dan Lanning needs to re-establish an identity for his offense. He needs to bring in coaches (OC, O-line, QB) that understand what his vision is and develop players specifically to execute this plan. His next OC hire needs to demonstrate that he has a full grasp of this identity, bring his two cents into the fold, and then instill this mentality into every player and every coach on that side of the ball.

I believe Lanning is a very intelligent coach, I think will right the ship. But teams like Georgia, Ohio State, and Saban's Alabama became dynasties precisely because they knew exactly what they wanted to do from the top down. Identity was never an issue. It needs to not continue to be an issue at Oregon.

His identity has been offensive efficiency, taking whatever the defense gives you and using it to score.

The execution is not meeting the identity.

Something Cristobal learned at FIU before even coming to Oregon is that you can't take break in any area even for a year. He discussed it in context of recruiting every position hard every year, but I think it applies to coaches as well. Dan tried to coast on offensive coaching for a year with the hires to maintain continuity for Donte for this year and it bit him immediately.

I think Dan will learn from this.

Tex A&M was 11-2 last season. One of the 2 losses was 3-10 vs Miami. The game was 3-3 until Miami scored with just under 2 min remaining.

So far this season A&M is 4-4. Three of the 4 remaining games are Tennessee, Oklahoma and Texas. In two of the 4 losses they scored 6 points each. Four field goals in those two games.

What happened? O-coord Collin Klein left to become head coach at Kansas State. D-coord Jay Bateman left to work as D-coord for Will Stein at Kentucky. A&M Coach Elko promoted his receivers coach to be O-coord. He hadn't been an O-coord before. Elko promoted a guy who had been a senior analyst to be D-coord. He had a small bit of co-coordinator experience in the ACC.

Does all this sound familiar? Except A&M's returning starting QB is not injured.

A&M was AP pre-season No. 8. Third in SEC rankings behind Georgia and Texas. As noted, they are 4-4 with a game vs S. Carolina coming this weekend. A&M is no longer ranked.

I blame Babayaga. We haven’t been the same since DL’s battle cry in Los Angeles.

The thing that made Coach Lanning a good young Head Coach, aggressiveness, is now something he wants back.

https://duckswire.usatoday.com/story/sports/college/ducks/football/2026/10/30/oregon-football-dan-lanning-ducks-playing-scared/92505551007/

It took Mario a while at Miami and Ryan Day at Ohio State. Michigan is trying to get back to the Harbaugh style of power football.

Lanning is Georgiaesk, and he will get there.

I pick Oregon to win tomorrow. I will be there rooting for them!!

NIL and endorsement is the new identity. Put a year on tape, come back an extra year and cash a fat check. Shut it down before the season ends and protect your self for the draft.

27 minutes ago, Log Haulin said:

NIL and endorsement is the new identity. Put a year on tape, come back an extra year and cash a fat check. Shut it down before the season ends and protect your self for the draft.

There is truth in what you say. What/who do you blame for the behavioral outcome?

They'll need to forge a new run-first identity, at least for this season. The OL has shown some incremental improvement in run blocking against Illinois and the 4th quarter the game before so they need to lean into that hard. Add additional blockers to create heavy packages, keep schemes simple, whatever has to be done they need to do it since the passing game is so inconsistent.

Making the offense a threat up front will force defenses to stop clogging up the mid-field which made things infinitely harder Raiola and Brock so far.

2 hours ago, Desert Duck said:

There is truth in what you say. What/who do you blame for the behavioral outcome?

I just think it is the free for all, wild west, anything goes platform (or lack of).

No accountability from the player side. All this stuff has been discussed for a couple years now. Now we are seeing the consequences play out.

If I don't work, I don't eat.