Why no blocking for Shaw?

Submitted by silverslugger on

It seems that almost every time as of late, when I watch Mike Shaw get a carry, there is NO blocking at all for him?
But for other backs, there is blocking.

Is it a case of that we do not block well enough for Shaw only? ,etc.

NOLA Wolverine

November 22nd, 2009 at 11:27 AM ^

Sometimes maybe it's a blown block and there's nothing he can really do, a lot of times i think he doesn't read things fast enough. He's playing the same defense as Vincent, but isn't getting the production he is, with more ability.

And no, he's not Rev from Remember the Titans.

skeet

November 22nd, 2009 at 11:28 AM ^

It seemed that this was more of a problem with our blocking on stretch plays in general, and not merely when Shaw was in the game, per se.

Since Shaw is the "speed" back, he tends to have more outside runs called for him. This was one thing that I noticed yesterday. We were having much more success on inside runs with Smith, so I think that's why we stuck with that.

chitownblue2

November 22nd, 2009 at 11:30 AM ^

It seems like he got nailed on plays where OSU run-blitzed, and we just didn't have people there. On that one play, Omameh tried to come all the way across the formation (it wasn't a pull, or if it was, he was super, super late) to get a blitzing LB.

PurpleStuff

November 22nd, 2009 at 12:46 PM ^

It seemed like Shaw got a number of carries out of the pistol formation we implemented for this game. OSU seemed to sniff out this wrinkle pretty quick (I think we ran a big majority of the time out of this formation) and brought extra guys down quickly to blow up the play.

Magnus

November 22nd, 2009 at 3:44 PM ^

This is exactly what happened. We unveiled a new formation, but the fullback led the defense right to the play. If were going to run an ISO, I would have liked to run it out of a basic I-formation, which is a little more difficult for a defense to read because the ISO can go either way.

UMman911

November 22nd, 2009 at 11:40 AM ^

I recall several times during the game yesterday thinking to myself "why did Shaw take so long to cut into that crease?" It appeared to me that he was a bit slow in his reads, hopefully that's something that improves heading into next year.

Coldwater

November 22nd, 2009 at 11:44 AM ^

I don't no about the "no blocking" for Shaw, but what I saw was Smith looking like the #1 running back going into spring practice.

He has more elusiveness than any other RB on the roster that I've seen. He doesn't have the straight line speed of Shaw, but he's more of a darter and quicker.

thee1jersey

November 22nd, 2009 at 12:38 PM ^

To me, Shaw looked to dance behind the LOS, and then either get tackled behind or get a yard or 2. V Smith seems to have better vision, and hits the hole and gets upfield better. Shaw has been nicked up for parts of this year, i hope he can get past the injuries and compete for the starting job next year.

UM Fan NY

November 22nd, 2009 at 12:44 PM ^

the line did a great job, he had a couple of creases to explode through but he danced around before getting burried. he doesn't like contact. the hardest hit he delivered all day was the cheap shot he gave the kid without pads before the game. i was hoping to see cox get a shot as it was obvious shaw wasn't running hard.