As a west coast guy, I've witnessed the entire Pete Carroll era at USC. It's been a pretty amazing run for Carroll and USC. Since the BCS came into existence, they've played in a BCS game every year, the only team in the country to be able to claim that.

Carroll's also won 2 national championships, and we may soon have to change the name of the Rose Bowl to the USC Bowl. He almost always has his team ready for huge games, like Ohio State last week, and that mammoth beat down they served on Oklahoma in the title game a few years back. Carroll is damn near perfect in huge games.

But the one thing Carroll can't seem to do is get his team ready to play the easy games.

There was Stanford last year, UCLA and Oregon State (again) two years before that.

Last night's loss to Oregon State was year three of the inexcusable loss for USC. The question is, why does this keep happening?

Most people would say Carroll and the Trojans didn't take Oregon State seriously. But considering how Carroll was talking about how the Pac-10 was "ridiculously difficult" this week, and USC players were saying they wanted revenge for 2006, you'd assume USC at least prepared for this game on some level.

But even then, perhaps you don't prepare as hard as you should because you're still overconfident that you can beat your lesser opponent easily.

One of the things I've always believed about Carroll's term at USC is that he's going to lose you a shot at a national championship every so often because of his loose style of coaching. His teams always seem to be just a little bit too wild, just a little bit too arrogant, just a little bit too full of themselves. And in addition to that, sometimes his assistants seem too stubborn, unwilling to adjust to what they're facing on the field. USC's offense coordinator Steve Sarkisian seemingly did everything he could to keep the ball out of Mark Sanchez's hands in the first half last night. Why? I have no idea. But dammit, he was going to do it.

But here's the thing. While Carroll and his staff may cost you a national championship shot every so often, they're also one of the main reasons 5-star players are drawn to USC. Players like being in a system where things are loose, where they're continuously praised with accolades despite some disappointments. Because, hey, winning the Rose Bowl year after year is still quite an achievement.

To me, it seems that Carroll is USC's biggest strength and weakness at the same time. The arrogant attitude he instills in his players motivates them for big games to prove their worth, but by the same token it shoots them in foot against lesser teams.

It's a strange conundrum, to say the least. But as long as USC keeps steamrolling people in the Rose Bowl, and occasionally reaching the national championship, it seems like Carroll's system is unlikely to change. And in reality, there may be no reason to change it.