Gone Fisching

It's officially official- Jedd Fisch is leaving Minnesota to become the quarterbacks coach of the Seattle Seahawks. His departure means Brewster will have to hire his third offensive coordinator in four seasons, and that senior QB Adam Weber will be playing for his fourth OC in five seasons. Yikes. As hard as I've been on Weber, that is not a recipe for success for a QB, no matter how good or bad they are.

As I said yesterday, this creates quite the problem for head coach Tim Brewster. Fisch's system was trying to fit square pegs into round holes- his two best quarterbacks, Weber and MarQueis Gray, both have strengths that do not fit a classic pro-style offense. Anyone who watched Minnesota in 2009 saw this was obvious, yet Brewster has remained steadfast that he wants the new OC to maintain continuity by keeping Fisch's playbook, right down to the terminology. AS GN says over at The Daily Gopher (and props to those guys for getting pub in Rittenberg's blog. They're definitely the hardest working bloggers in all of Gopherland), maintaining continuity is pretty much impossible at this point, but in hopes of saving his job, Brewster says he's sticking to the plan.

I've said this before and will say it again: Weber's run a spread system before. Gray ran it in high school. Most of your linemen have run the spread too. Yes, it'd be a departure from Fisch's system- BUT IT WOULD FIT YOUR CURRENT PERSONEL, ESPECIALLY AT QUARTERBACK!!!!!!

While I would love to believe, even for the briefest of moments, that Brewster realizes this and just gets the best man for the job, I can almost guarantee you it won't happen. Brewter is desparately coaching for his job, and he clearly seems to think getting a Fisch clone is the best way to keep it. It's not, and for all the anti-Brewster people out there, this could be the final nail in his coffin. But then again, maybe whomever he brings can still make something happen despite being hamstrung by Brewster's demands.

The Strib has a list of possible replacements from outside the program, but the guy who makes the most sense is current o-line coach and running game coordinator Tim Davis. Yes, he's never called plays, but if you want continuity, Davis will know the players, and Fisch's system, better than anyone Brewster could bring in. Let's just hope Davis emphasizes more of the packages and plays that play to the strengths of Weber and Gray instead of trying to force them to be pocket passers.

Heck, maybe Brewster will be right, and all these kids needed was another offseason to keep learning the same offense and same plays. Maybe just another year of experience is all they need. While I'm not Brewster's biggest supporter, I'm going to watch this team regardless of who is coaching and what offense they're running. So here's hoping the new OC can turn our group of offensive players into a productive unit, because I'm not sure I can handle another year of offensive ineptitude like we had to endure in 2009.