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New wide receivers coach Jim McElwain was brought in to coach his group, but also to bring his wealth of knowledge as an offensive guru. He helped lead Alabama to a national championship as the team’s offensive coordinator and was outstanding at Colorado State after that.
Though he didn’t have great success at Florida, McElwain is still respected for his offensive knowledge. He said last week he was just there to observe and help.
“I’m trying to learn what Pep [Hamilton]’s teaching and help him in any way I can,” McElwain said. “More than anything, I’m just trying to understand ‘what’ and ‘how’, and then maybe over the years of doing this maybe there’s a thing or two that maybe can help our guys play fast. But like I said, I’m not reinventing [the offense]. It’s an offense that’s here and I’m just trying to learn it.
“He is kind of running it, and like I said, we’re just here to help.”
Hamilton, however, disagreed with that assessment Sunday, insisting all of the offensive coaches had a say, but head coach Jim Harbaugh was the guy in charge of it all. Asked if his role had changed and if he had more responsibility than last year he responded, “No. Not at all.”
"Coach Harbaugh, it’s his offense,” Hamilton said. “Everything goes through Coach, and it starts and ends with Coach Harbaugh.
“We all process things together — Coach McElwain, [line] Coach [Ed] Warinner, [analysts] Ron Prince and Ben McDaniels along with [assistants] Jay Harbaugh and Sherron Moore,” he said. “We work well together, all in an effort to present Coach Harbaugh some ideas with some things we like. He gives us the yes or no.
“It’s always been that way. We make suggestions to Coach Harbaugh, he gives it thumbs up or thumbs down. We work well together, have had open lines of communication throughout. Coach Harbaugh dictates what do and what we’re working on.”
So asked if he disagreed with McElwain’s assessment of the hierarchy, he smiled.
“Just a little, yeah,” he said.
NOTES
• Hamilton commented on whether last year’s passing offense needed to be tweaked or overhauled:
“I think a lot of players had the opportunity to play last year and have more experience, and they’ll make more plays as well as we’ll put them in positions to make more plays,” he said.
• Junior quarterback Shea Patterson has had a great spring, but Hamilton said all of his quarterbacks were taking equal reps. He did acknowledged Patterson had some ability.
“He’s a playmaker,” Hamilton said. “Everybody gets excited when he’s out there and if he makes a special play, you can feel the energy throughout our team, you can just feel it, the positive energy, and he is a playmaker.”
He also praised his ability to extend plays by scrambling and his arm strength. He noted Patterson was heavily into the playbook before spring even started.
“If in fact he’s cleared, then he’ll be up to speed as far as being able to manage the offense,” he said.
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