Zach Arnett provides his honest thoughts on Mississippi State's offense early in camp

New Mississippi State Bulldogs head coach Zach Arnett has a big task on his hands as he prepares the Bulldogs for a new era. In particular, that new era is going to see the Mississippi State offense take on a new identity.

Despite these massive changes to the offense, Arnett isn’t ready to say how he feels about the offense. It’s too early in Fall Camp.

“Not until we put pads on, I can’t answer that,” Zach Arnett said. “I mean, this is not football. Right, I mean, obviously report day all you do is talk. Head coach gives a speech, both coordinators give speeches, their side of the ball. All you do is talk. Look at me, this is what we’re gonna do. We’re gonna do that and it’s all just a bunch of empty words, right?”

Ultimately, Arnett isn’t going to think much of Mississippi State until they put the pads on in practice. Until then, it’s hard for him to get too excited.

“And the first two days are kind of the same thing. You’re going over assignments. You’re talking about fundamentals. But, obviously, we don’t have pads on, right, no one’s hitting,” Arnett said.

“We got some ball security issues today that obviously have to get eliminated. Nothing excites me about anything we do. Not just offense, defense, special teams. Nothing excites me until we start seeing guys playing actual football. Right, that’s not trying to sound like some tough coach speak, or whatever. It’s just the truth. I mean, it’s just the truth. This is not football. So, [when] we get pads on and we get into it, and we gotta find out who the football players are.”

Zach Arnett took over ahead of Mississippi State’s bowl game last season. It was an emotional and unfortunate situation as previous head coach Mike Leach passed away unexpectedly.

This year, Kevin Barbay is taking over as the team’s offensive coordinator, making the jump from App State. However, he’s notably not an Air Raid coach like Leach, which means the offense is going to look different. Because of that, there are tons of questions about that side of the ball.

“This is, I believe, an acclimatization period. Right? We’re getting the players actually ready for football. That’s the spirit of these first six days.”

Will Rogers on the biggest difference in Mississippi State’s offense

Luckily for Zach Arnett, Mississippi State has an experienced quarterback in Will Rogers. As he explained, the biggest difference is the balance between run and pass.

“I think the biggest difference in this offense is just it’s going to be a more balanced attack. 11, 12 personnel. More designed runs, more runs for the run game schematically. RPOs,” Rogers said. “I mean it’s just a normal pro-style offense for us. I think we really look forward to accepting that challenge and maybe expanding our offense a little bit.”