In the 2010's Stanford cemented themselves as one of the most physical offenses in the country led by notable players such as Toby Gerhart, Christian McCaffrey, and Bryce Love, but that the tough offense that was once associated with the Cardinal name faded over the last half decade.
Rather than being physical and successful, the offense slowly converted into outdated and ineffective. One of the many downfalls of the David Shaw tenure was the lack of willingness to change things up whether it be his staff, or most close to home; his play calling. That will no longer be a problem though, as Shaw is now out as the head coach, and Sacramento State's Troy Taylor is in.
Taylor is regarded for being one of the best offensive minds in all of college football, and will bring a much more modern offense to Palo Alto.
However, even despite his offensive prowess, 247Sports' Chris Hummer questioned how fast he can get his offense at Stanford to be productive as it needs to be in his recent article detailing the burning spring football questions about every Pac-12 team.
Hummer elaborated on his questing saying:
Troy Taylor is going to put up points. He’s done it everywhere he’s been. He did it at Folsom High School with California record-setting offenses. He did it at Eastern Washington as an OC when his team – led by Cooper Cupp – set a new FCS passing yards record. His Utah offenses made massive improvements from when he took over. Then at Sacramento State Taylor engineered some of the best (and most creative) offenses in the country.
He continued saying:
Now, Taylor takes over at Stanford where a once productive West Coast system posted just one top 80 offense since 2019. Taylor is going to run things differently. Earlier this offseason Taylor said of his offense: “We’re not fear based. We’re going to attack.” So yeah, different.
He concluded with talking about Taylor's coaching upbringing saying:
It’ll be interesting to see exactly what Taylor comes up with. He’s shown mailability as a play caller, which makes sense for someone who’s mentored under Chris Petersen but has also spent time studying Mike Leach and Rich Rodriguez’s systems.
If I had to guess, Stanford's offense will look much more impressive in 2023 even with all of the losses at receiver and quarterback. Taylor is known for putting his team's in position to succeed, and he likely won't stop now. We seem to forget that when he inherited Sacramento State, some people wanted that program abolished all together.
While it is only spring, it is understandable for fans of Stanford to be excited for what the future holds. For Taylor, he is now responsible for picking the winner of one of the nation's most interesting quarterback battles, replacing the team's three leading receivers, all while the team will be starting at least four new lineman.
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