I know SI isn't a super trusted source for reporting, but podcasts generating content on Stanford football are appreciated and somebody on TOS shared this interview with Troy Taylor that I missed around Signing Day:
It's the same general vibe and many of the same talking points as his other media availabilities so far so I won't do as detailed of a reactions post as usual but it's a longer and pretty relaxed exposure so gives some of the best flavor we've gotten so far. I wouldn't say I learned much per se but there were a few things that jumped out that I can remember (I listened to it a few days ago and these thoughts are random rather than chronological or a summary of the interview):
* Taylor understands how dire the attrition/returning production situation is and is putting a lot of emphasis on his trust in his ability to reverse that trend going forward. He truly believes Stanford players will stay for four or five years under his watch. Hearing the emphasis he puts on four years and Stanford players not leaving without their degrees does make me wonder if he's going to have a big challenge convincing players to stay a fifth year. I fear he's empirically wrong about Stanford players not leaving without their degree (witness massive numbers of third year NFL departures compared to other schools plus the more recent disturbing running back transfers) and fighting strong forces that lead players to seek football, academic, and/or professional opportunities elsewhere after the fourth year. I wish him luck as I think this will be a massively important factor for competitiveness in the trenches. The good thing is he recognizes the problem and says the right things. Now for his culture to wreak significant change.
* Listening to the tones and subtext of Taylor's voice it's pretty clear that lack of QB experience is a major issue for him. I think I'm going to call now that I can't really see a definitive outcome to the QB competition before live bullets start firing.
* He talked up the importance of OL/DL and it was another place where listening to the tones and subtext I sensed he thinks there's a lot of work to do. That's pretty obvious, of course, but I got the sense of girding for a grinding battle to improve our standard up front over time. He talked about recruiting, coaching, and strength and conditioning, and I also continue to get the sense that improving our amount of usable volume is a focus.
* Skeptics of spread offenses will/should like how defensive Taylor is that his offense emphasizes the run game plenty. He has a track record of rushing success and is proud of it along with the passing game for which he is known.
* Fascinating to hear his philosophy of ideally building up leads and using the run game to grind out clock. At multiple points in the interview he sounded downright passionate about the merits of turtling. Many here don't like that but I always felt like the criticisms of Shaw for it were somewhat misplaced. Shawfense was lame for all kinds of reasons but turtling wasn't high on the list. It's pretty standard fare to grind clock when you have a lead and Taylor expounds the philosophy. Not a full pedal to the metal guy.
* It may have been a function of the questions asked, but it was interesting that he was specific and substantive about the traits of the defensive coaches and did not mention the offensive coaches at all, other than Pritchard due to a specific question on retaining Pritchard and Alamar (Taylor said Pritchard was retained for love of Stanford, being a good guy, connection to returning players, and being a good recruiter....the right/obvious reasons, just interesting offensive acumen wasn't on the tip of Taylor's tongue; Taylor said we were very lucky to retain Alamar in a senior quality control role....obviously both sets of comments overtaken by events. Oh well.). This makes some sense given the offense being the Taylor show surrounded by a bunch of unproven youngsters and the defense being where we brought in proven Power Five coaching. I breathed a bit of a sigh of relief that the interview didn't have Taylor waxing philosophic about how important Adams was. That would have been awkward in light of subsequent events.
* Interesting if unsurprising window into Taylor's mentality when he said the way to build resilience to adversity on the team is to model it as a leader and how he won't get high with success or low with setbacks. No different from Shaw in this respect and I think our ability to move past a losing culture and rebuild resilience will have to rely more on competence than personality.
It's the same general vibe and many of the same talking points as his other media availabilities so far so I won't do as detailed of a reactions post as usual but it's a longer and pretty relaxed exposure so gives some of the best flavor we've gotten so far. I wouldn't say I learned much per se but there were a few things that jumped out that I can remember (I listened to it a few days ago and these thoughts are random rather than chronological or a summary of the interview):
* Taylor understands how dire the attrition/returning production situation is and is putting a lot of emphasis on his trust in his ability to reverse that trend going forward. He truly believes Stanford players will stay for four or five years under his watch. Hearing the emphasis he puts on four years and Stanford players not leaving without their degrees does make me wonder if he's going to have a big challenge convincing players to stay a fifth year. I fear he's empirically wrong about Stanford players not leaving without their degree (witness massive numbers of third year NFL departures compared to other schools plus the more recent disturbing running back transfers) and fighting strong forces that lead players to seek football, academic, and/or professional opportunities elsewhere after the fourth year. I wish him luck as I think this will be a massively important factor for competitiveness in the trenches. The good thing is he recognizes the problem and says the right things. Now for his culture to wreak significant change.
* Listening to the tones and subtext of Taylor's voice it's pretty clear that lack of QB experience is a major issue for him. I think I'm going to call now that I can't really see a definitive outcome to the QB competition before live bullets start firing.
* He talked up the importance of OL/DL and it was another place where listening to the tones and subtext I sensed he thinks there's a lot of work to do. That's pretty obvious, of course, but I got the sense of girding for a grinding battle to improve our standard up front over time. He talked about recruiting, coaching, and strength and conditioning, and I also continue to get the sense that improving our amount of usable volume is a focus.
* Skeptics of spread offenses will/should like how defensive Taylor is that his offense emphasizes the run game plenty. He has a track record of rushing success and is proud of it along with the passing game for which he is known.
* Fascinating to hear his philosophy of ideally building up leads and using the run game to grind out clock. At multiple points in the interview he sounded downright passionate about the merits of turtling. Many here don't like that but I always felt like the criticisms of Shaw for it were somewhat misplaced. Shawfense was lame for all kinds of reasons but turtling wasn't high on the list. It's pretty standard fare to grind clock when you have a lead and Taylor expounds the philosophy. Not a full pedal to the metal guy.
* It may have been a function of the questions asked, but it was interesting that he was specific and substantive about the traits of the defensive coaches and did not mention the offensive coaches at all, other than Pritchard due to a specific question on retaining Pritchard and Alamar (Taylor said Pritchard was retained for love of Stanford, being a good guy, connection to returning players, and being a good recruiter....the right/obvious reasons, just interesting offensive acumen wasn't on the tip of Taylor's tongue; Taylor said we were very lucky to retain Alamar in a senior quality control role....obviously both sets of comments overtaken by events. Oh well.). This makes some sense given the offense being the Taylor show surrounded by a bunch of unproven youngsters and the defense being where we brought in proven Power Five coaching. I breathed a bit of a sigh of relief that the interview didn't have Taylor waxing philosophic about how important Adams was. That would have been awkward in light of subsequent events.
* Interesting if unsurprising window into Taylor's mentality when he said the way to build resilience to adversity on the team is to model it as a leader and how he won't get high with success or low with setbacks. No different from Shaw in this respect and I think our ability to move past a losing culture and rebuild resilience will have to rely more on competence than personality.
