Coaching staff looking for more out of several players on offense

Written by Matthew Cannata | Twitter: @PhinManiacs
If you look at the entire offense, there aren’t many players who jump out you. Charles Clay, Brian Hartline, Brandon Gibson and a few others have been very quiet so far in 2014. Joe Philbin and the coaching staff wants to see more impact plays and see these guys break out of their shell.

“I don’t think our passing game has quite had a breakout game yet in general. I don’t know that anybody has really had a breakout game. If you look at where we are in yards per attempt in the passing game, I’m not sure that anybody has had one. So I think it’s just a function of getting everybody on the same page. Getting those three phases working together, the protection, the precision in the route running and the timing, the spacing and the decision making and the accuracy, and getting all of those working together.”

Philbin acknowledged that Lamar Miller had a huge game on the ground but says there are other things he needs to now improve on and master.

“I thought his vision was very good. He had both decisiveness and patience at the same time. There were a couple runs I thought where I thought he really did a nice job kind of having a little patience, waiting for the hole to open and then he accelerated through the hole. Other times, he saw it and went quick. I thought he ran the football well. The next step is let’s make a couple of safeties miss now at the next level and really turn some of these, he had a 24-yarder maybe, a 15-yarder, and turn some of those into even bigger runs.” 

One of the bigger stories on offense is how quiet Charles Clay has been. However, Philbin noted that while Clay doesn’t have the stats, he’s doing his job well and making an impact on offense, even though it’s not showing up in the box score.

“I think he’s done a good job. We’ve talked about this a little bit the other day I think. Sometimes, whatever you want to call it, a breakout game or what have you, obviously we have a progression-based passing system where at times he’s number one on the progression (and) at times he’s not. Certainly, that can change based on what coverage we get, whether we get the anticipated coverage or not. While he might not have had a (big statistical performance) game as of yet, he’s practicing well. He’s working hard. I think he’s done well.”

The stagnant offense is one reason why the coaching staff is considering a quarterback change. We’ll see if that lights a fire under all of them on Sunday against the Oakland Raiders.

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