What Happened to all the Offensive Talent?

Oct 12th 2009 - Written by: John Webb

I know that all Clemson fans are just as frustrated with our offense as I am. I have heard 500 suggestions to fix our scoring woes, and I won't pretend that I have all the answers, but a lot of my frustration comes from the plethora of alleged talent that we have on offense. Let's take a stroll through the depth chart and think of signing days past. Here was the buzz from fans, Tigernet, and other fan sites surrounding our 2009 offensive contributors when they were seniors in high school:

Offensive Line

Cory Lambert -- Big time offensive line recruit out of Greenville. I met a guy associated with Lambert's high school athletic department a few years ago. In short, he told me that Cory Lambert was Anthony Munoz reborn. He may have been biased.

Landon Walker -- Big time offensive line recruit out of North Carolina. Best offensive lineman at the Shrine Bowl that I attended his senior year, though Stanley Hunter stole the show.

Antoine McClain -- Huge steal out of Alabama.

Mason Cloy -- One of the top center prospects in the country. I was told he picked Clemson over Georgia Tech because there's no good fishing around Atlanta, but this is unconfirmed.

Thomas Austin -- Some said he was the next Stacy Long.

Chris Hairston -- Ironically, under the radar and overshadowed by Jamal Medlin, perhaps because Medlin was an instate prospect.

Running Backs

C.J. Spiller -- We hugged, shouted, and ran around my office when he committed to us on signing day.

Jamie Harper -- A "special, special guy" out of Florida, said our recruiting coordinator.

Andre Ellington -- Highly thought of, but not as much as Spiller and Harper.

Wide Receivers

Jacoby Ford -- The whole world was talking about a hand-timed sub 4.2 second 40.

Xavier Dye -- Prized recruit. Got a lot of word of mouth on the internet because so many fans knew him from Byrnes High School and his conflict with the High School League.

Brandon Clear -- Quality recruit, but fans knew little about him.

Brandon Ford -- A four star guy out of Anderson.

Jaron Brown -- Quality recruit, but fans knew little about him.

Marquan Jones -- You can't score eight touchdowns in a high school playoff game in South Carolina and be considered a sleeper, even if the game was against Blue Ridge.

Terrance Ashe -- Walk-on.

Tight Ends/Fullbacks

Michael Palmer -- Little known recruit who has overachieved.

Rendrick Taylor -- The Beast (who was markedly quicker when under 250 lbs.)

Chad Diehl -- A tough guy out of the Byrnes High School system.

Dwayne Allen -- Georgia thought they had this big time recruit in the bag. Well, zoink!

Quarterbacks

Kyle Parker -- Not just anybody goes to the Elite 11 camp in California.

Willy Korn -- Purported to defecate golden bricks.

If you look at this group, I would say that we expected most of these guys to bring the lumber on Saturdays, though I thought Michael Palmer, Terrance Ashe, and Chris Hairston would end up buried on the depth chart. Obviously they have been more productive than I anticipated.

Tommy Bowden once said (after our recruiting improved in 2005 and thereafter) that somebody was going to do a lot of winning with talent like this. He also said that he wanted to burn redshirts and play this talent as freshmen, because he didn't want to stockpile talent "for the next guy."

Well, guess what? We now have "the next guy" as our coach. And we're 2-3 with only 2 touchdowns scored in our last 13 quarters. Frustration. Clemson's offensive execution has not been very good, but shouldn't we be doing a little better than this when we have highly recruited players wearing orange?

You can point to scheme problems and lack of player development, which comes back to coaching by this staff and the last, but it may be more complicated than that. Clemson seems to be struggling to find itself in the same way that N.C. State and Florida State are right now. I don't have a clear answer, only frustration.

One thing is certain. Our coaches have until 17 October to figure out how to get a win against Wake Forest, or Clemson will increasingly be known for the only things we have left to take pride in -- tailgating and beating the fool out of South Carolina.

Please send fawning emails to sectionHrowJ@gmail.com.

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