I love this hire for Auburn. This is the guy Auburn should have hired instead of Tony Franklin. However, I believe the Franklin fiasco was necessary for Gus Malzahn to be successful here.
The difference between the two is that Malzahn's offense is much more physical. He say's many people classify it as a "spread," but that it's really not that way in his mind. There are no gimmicks with this offense, from what I understand.
He has had 1000+ yard rushers in each of his three seasons as a college offensive coordinator.
He says to be successful you have to be able to run the ball first. I wholeheartedly agree with that and think most other Auburn folks would also agree. He says running sets up the pass, mostly via play-action. One wrinkle he is apparently going to throw into Auburn's new offense is throwing the ball down the field, A LOT.
This is pretty foreign to most of us and I believe will be a welcome change. We saw it a little bit in 2004 with Jason Campbell, but none since (mostly due to our quarterbacks, for various different reasons). Now, it may not be pretty next year and Malzahn is definitely going to have a lot of work to do with Kodi Burns' fundamentals. If he is successful with Burns in the offseason,I think Burns will remain the starter. But I think there is a great chance one of the other quarterbacks could step up (Todd, Caudle or most notably, Trotter). And Ray Cotton may still end up an Auburn Tiger and get into the mix. That said, I think Burns will be the guy. Malzahn said that in addition to playing against them as a coach when they were in high school, he recruited Burns and Lee Ziemba, so he is very familiar with them. That is great news for Burns, and should speak for his potential as a quarterback.
Also, it should be noted that Tulsa, from Conference USA, has a four-star quarterback commitment by the name of Shovodrick Beaver, who is currently ranked as the No. 8 dual-threat quarterback in the country and the No. 5 scrambler. Cotton is the No. 12 dual-threat quarterback and the No. 3 scrambler. If you ask me, Beaver is a better fit for a balanced offense, but you really never know. And here's the kicker: Beaver is a fairly recent commit to Tulsa and Malzahn was his recruiter. In my opinion, there is an outside chance that he could convince Beaver to commit to Auburn. He has also been recruited by the likes of Texas Tech, Arizona, Michigan and TCU.
Beyond that, don't forget that Malzahn was the OC at Arkansas when Darren McFadden and Felix Jones ran ALL OVER US several years ago at home. That should tell you that this guy is serious about moving the ball. If he can do it on the ground, I believe he will do it. If it must come through the air, I believe he will do that. Only time will tell.
If you really want to delve into this thing and see what Malzahn is all about, check out these links to see what the stats were like at Tulsa this year and last year and at Arkansas when he was there:
http://tulsa.rivals.com/playerstats.asp
http://tulsa.rivals.com/playerstats.asp?Team=TULSA&year=2007
http://arkansas.rivals.com/playerstats.asp?Team=ARKANSAS&year=2006
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Some have said CGM is a 3 run homerun for AU. I agree. I also foudn this comment in a Scarbinski column yesterday. It is so typical of the "atitudes" of both AU and UA:
"Posted by stealthyfan on 12/30/08 at 8:05AM
I'm down in Mobile for a bit, and even the Mobama Register (as a good friends call this biased rag) had good things to say about the hire. Front page banner too!.
A lot of Bama fans down here with flags in their roof gutters running around. Trouble is, the thread count is higher on the flag than their tire treads. That's the great thing about college sports - you don't have to even visit the town to show your colors.
Stealthy "
I especially liked the comparison of the thread counts...Perfect!
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