Almost every team's fans other than maybe Alabama, Ohio State, Michigan and Michigan State think that their head coach screws up clock management and in-game decisions. I watched the bowl game between Alabama and Ohio State a couple of years ago and thought that both coaches mismanaged the clock. We have won more close games than we have lost and we have won many more games than our talent would predict, which suggests that our in-game coaching is not bad. I thought that he held on to his timeouts at the end of the Nebraska game because with 3 timeouts he could keep Nebraska from running out the clock if we didn't recover the onside kick. We need to be able to convert on 3rd and 4th down without having to burn a timeout.
As for special teams, give me a break. Our coverage teams are better than they ever were under Walker. It's not even close. Our punting is finally good and our punt returner is actually doing a nice job, which is what everyone has been bitching about for the past few years since Mark left the team. Vault has returned a couple of kick-offs for touchdowns. Our kicker, a senior who has previously had some success, is struggling. It happens. We've had some good field goal kickers under Fitzgerald, which suggests that he can coach the position. In my opinion, the issues that need to be addressed are why our offense has been consistently average or below average and, more importantly, why our offensive line has been consistently below average.
