In this season of injury and disappointment it's hard to pin the blame on a single area since there has been so much failure. Yes, there has been improvement. No, it has not been the amount that we would hope for given the futile nature of last season. The simple fact is that we will finish two seasons in a row as the worst BCS school in the country. How did we get here? That's well documented and if I had to put a percentage on it I would say that 85% of the mess is because of Bill Doba and his staff. Their inability or laziness or incompetence around evaluating and securing recruits is the central reason that we were only able to dress out 50 players against UCLA this week. Keep in mind that the SCHOLARSHIP limit for college football is 85 and you are allowed to dress out more than 100 for home football games. No team is going to win with what is essentially an empty Senior class and 50% depth in comparison to your competition.

Nevertheless, is it really possible to say that Paul Wulff and staff are totally absent culpability? Of course not, if you are expecting a perfect coach and staff then you should check yourself. Even the best staff in the country with the best program in the country will have mistakes and misfires. Look at Pete Carroll. We shouldn't expect perfection but we should expect competence.

So, the big question is: Are there areas of coaching that clearly have demonstrated a lack of competence over the past two years?

I would submit that for the majority of the coaches you could make a clear case for being handicapped with poor talent or lack of depth. It is simply too difficult to determine scheme and adjustments when playing a group that is too small or too young to compete. In that case you default to stability and work to keep the staff in place. You make sure that recruiting is priority number one until the talent gap isn't so egregious. Clearly, the staff is doing this and with success. The last class and this year's class will allow us to compete when they grow up.

However, are there areas we see now that should be changed? Simply because it's clear the coaches have demonstrated incompetence that has magnified our poor play. I think the answer is yes for one coach and a decided maybe for another.

Coach that should be shown the door:

Harold Etheridge- Offensive Line Coordinator

This hire has been a head-scratcher from the moment he was brought on board. He replaced  a WSU guy in George Yarno that seemed to have a scheme that matched perfectly with the sort of talent WSU can bring in and he seemed to be a great teacher. He is now the lead Oline guy with the Detroit Lions. Etheridge came to WSU with no ties and with no distinguishable accomplishments on his resume.

The falloff in performance for the offensive line has been disastrous the past two years. We have allowed 30 more sacks this year than the next closest team in the Pac-10 and that's an IMPROVEMENT over last season. He has benefitted more than anyone from having guys that have Pac-10 experience and even an all Pac-10 performer. There has been no discernible improvement in the play even with experience and the prospects for next year don't get much better unless you believe that we'll solve issues at both tackle spots or Harold Etheridge will coach these guys to great improvement.

He doesn't appear to bring any value to recruiting as he's rarely cited as a primary recruiter for a given area or among our key recruits.

In essence, he seems to be dead weight on a staff that can't afford it.

My recommendation is to fire Etheridge and work to bring Keith Gilbertson in as the Oline coach. His son will be a redshirt freshmen QB next year and he'll have the opportunity to spend quality time with him over the next four years. He's been over several times for practice already and he clearly has rapport with the staff. Finally, he could be a big boon for recruiting. He was a UW assistant for many years so he knows the high school coaches up and down the West Coast. Additionally, he was an NFL assistant as recently as last year. We shouldn't lose sight of the fact that he was a phenomenal position coach before he flamed out as the Head Coach at UW.

This is something that should happen the Monday after Apple Cup and it might help us immediately with recruiting and in prep for Spring ball. We can't afford to have another season of poor line play and Gilbertson could help overnight.

Coach that should be on the hot seat:

Todd Sturdy- Offensive Coordinator

The buzz around Sturdy was that he would be the WSU version of Chip Kelly. A guy that was on the cutting edge of offensive schemes and a guy that could alter his system on the fly to adapt to the changes in personnel. We were going to look like Oregon and compete with the best simply because of the game plan we developed. In hindsight, that was probably expecting WAY too much.

It's true that Sturdy hasn't had much of a QB or Oline to work with the past two years. That's made it nearly impossible for the offense to perform and that simply isn't his fault. 

Nevertheless, there are distressing symptoms of a coach that could be in over his head. We are now nearly two years into the no-huddle experiment and it's been a disaster. We ditched it last year and if you have been able to pick out more than one to two plays this entire season where it's been a benefit I would be impressed. Even if it is the kids that aren't executing then isn't it time to question whether that is a system worth having at all after two years?

Additionally, his play calling has been questionable at best. Who would have thought that we would actually miss Timm Rosenbach so quickly? I simply see the same set of plays with no deference to the skill players we have on the field or any attempt to minimize the disadvantages that we have. Again, we shouldn't expect miracles but the reverse is also true. Shouldn't we expect to see some minimal progress to adjust rather than the same thing week after week?

Simply put, Sturdy has overseen the most inept offense in the history of the program the past two years and the dropoff from the year before cannot totally be justified by changes in personnel. It's probably a year too early to place blame at his feet but the warning signs are there. He should be on notice to develop a plan that will re-vamp the offense next year to fit our personnel and the teams we face.

---