UT Writeup

OK, per usual, couple of thoughts on Vandy first, then UT…

  • Umm, I can’t recall our offense ever looking so balanced.  Maybe 1992?  I’m anxious to see how they perform against some of these better defenses they’re going to face later though.
  • Rome appeared to get more meaningful PT against Vandy than he had to date.  I’m thinking that goes up even more with Lynch’s easy drop on his only target.  With as well as so many guys are playing, you have to make the most of your chances and on the season Lynch has a clear drop and a fumble in only  handful of targets.
  • Vasser is playing better than I had imagined he could.  I loved his comment about the progression under Grantham.  Year 1 was learning where he was supposed to be.  Year 2 was learning where everyone else was supposed to be and understanding how his role was supported by the rest of the D.  This year he said everything has slowed down enough and he feels comfortable enough that he’s able to focus on the details of playing LB.  The results are clearly working.
  • How the heck did Vandy leave Jarvis Jones, the best pass rusher in the country, completely unblocked on a 4th down passing situation?
  • Maybe the most impressive thing about that whole performance Saturday was the fact that we did it only causeing 1 turnover.  It wasn’t like one of those games where Vandy couldn’t do anything right and kept giving us a short field to work with…no, we just flat beat them up on both sides of the ball and dominated series after series.  Nice effort.

When UT has the ball:

  • Tyler Bray is as good a QB as we’ll face all year.  Strong arm, quick release, accurate, tall…he’s got a lot of traits you look for in a top level QB.  One of the only issues he has is decision making.  Both on and off the field he sometimes doesn’t think everything through.  Todd McShay had a great stat from Bray’s effort against UF.  When UF brought 4 or less, Bray completed 62% of his passes but when UF blitzed a man and brought 5 or more, that rate dropped to 30%.
  • Bray’s skill set pairs well with the 2 stud WRs UT sports.  Both guys will play in the NFL, and likely it will be next year.  Justin Hunter is a long, lanky AJ Green type guy that has shown no ill effects from his ACL tear last year at Florida.  Cordarelle Patterson was considered a UGA lean for a long time last year but might have made the right call going to UT as he’d be one of a bevy of weapons in Athens for his likely 1 season versus being one of only two guys in K’ville with the departure of Da’Rick Rogers.  Patterson has speed to burn and isn’t afraid to get physical with his considerable size.  Both of these guys accentuate Bray’s positives.
  • UT doesn’t sport a very strong run game.  Raijon Neal leads in rushing but is averaging a mere 4.5 ypc (less than half of Gurley’s avg…just sayin’) and if you drop the two cupcakes they’ve played, his stats get worse (drops to 3.11 ypc in those games).
  • The UT OL is large but pass blocks better than they do run block.  Look for lots of false starts as they struggled with that a lot against Florida…at home.  They’ve only given up 2 sacks all year but that’s probably a function of Bray’s quick release more than it is their ability to stop the rush.  That’s further supported by Bray’s 30% rate on blitzes.
  • UT is dangerous on offense when you boil it down.  They can strike quick and deep with those two weapons outside.  UGA has struggled this year giving up big plays and even in our most solid performance of the year against Vandy last week we gave up some passing yards in chunks.  Bray is at a whole other level than Rodgers.  If we give him room he’ll torch us.  I fully expect us to bring heat early and often.  At the same time, I expect UT to try and neutralize our rush with passes into the flats, draws, etc. to keep us guessing.  They’ve shown very little effectiveness in the run game and with all of our guys finally getting back, I expect to see a different level of defensive effort.  Ogletree returning at ILB should greatly improve our running defense, which wasn’t bad to begin with.  The big plays we gave up against Missouri should be rectified by the fact we’ve added 4 starters back since that game.
  • I’m excited about the flexibility the reutrn of Rambo adds to the team also.  With him back, we can slide Commings over to CB again.  This allowed Mitchell to spend more time on offense which is good because he struggled at CB last week and is clearly an impact guy on offense.  Rambo coming back is huge versus the pass though.
  • Look for a big game from: Jarvis Jones.  I know it’s a cop out but that guy is having a special year.  He’s one of those rare players that just seems to be around the ball every play.  He’s going to cause some havoc getting after Bray and forcing him into a bad throw or two.  He showed in Missouri that he’s also capable of making plays in coverage.  Look for Grantham to have some fun bringing guys from all over and making Bray think his way down the field.
  • Key to the game:  Early heat.  If we bring stuff early and don’t get to Bray and he gets a little rhythm going, it could feed his considerable confidence.  This will only be his 4th start outside of the state of Tennessee and one of those was UK, with another being a UT-filled GA dome.  This is UT’s first game in an opponent’s stadium this year.  Expect some chaos.  This will be a hostile environment similar to the one Bray saw in Gainesville last year where he barely completed 50% of his passes.  I expect to see a lot of pressure early but how often it gets there and disrupts the play is the key.
When UGA has the ball:
  • UT isn’t nearly as daunting on defense as they are on offense.  In their 3 games against FBS opponents, they’re giving up an average of 28 ppg.  Keep in mind that one of those teams was Akron and another was an NCSt team that only managed 10 pts against the other FBS team they played (UConn).  They’ve begun to switch to a 3-4 a la Saban, which makes sense as new DC Sal Sunseri came from Saban’s staff last year.  UT just doesn’t have the horses right now to be effective and they’re working through some of the issues in converting from a 4-3 to a 3-4.
  • Florida wore UT down and used a combination of a solid ground game and the fact that Driskel could extend plays with his feet to find guys down field to ultimately put 37 points on the board.  That was with a QB that hasn’t really done much at all prior to that.  With Murrays’ considerable experience, I expect to see him continue his high level of play as UT struggles to get after the QB, ranking in the 90s nationally in sacks and in the 80s in tackles for loss.
  • The days of UT having dynamic playmakers in the secondary, fierce linebackers roaming everywhere and NFL DLs lined up waiting to play are long gone.  The talent level just isn’t the same as it once was.  Sunseri is a hard-nosed no nonsense kind of guy but he’s probably a year or two from getting the results Dooley wants.  Last week’s effort against Akron was better but they still gave up big plays, evidence that their guys are still trying to figure out where to be, who to cover, etc.  If UGA has shown anything this year it’s the ability to strike a lot of different ways and for big yardage.  I think we lead the country in plays of either 20 or 25 yards or more.  That’s impressive.
  • I can’t wait to see Gurley and Marshall against an SEC defense.  They may not be the UT defenses of the 90s but they’re a step up from Vandy.   Those two have cleared every hurdle that’s been laid before them so far but I want to see how they respond to a little adversity.  UT has considerably more size along the front than we’ve faced to date so I want to see how our OL and RBs respond.  I think we’ll find a little less space to gallop, but maybe I’ll be pleasantly surprised.
  • Look for a big game from: Todd Gurley.  Gillislee at Florida rushed 18 times with a better than 6 ypc avg against UT, and that was without much threat of a pass.  Gurley is more suited to the pounding of a bigger SEC defense than Marshall and could be poised for a breakout game in his first CBS action.  His stiff arm last weekend on that TD run was a thing of absolute beauty.  He’s got great balance and his lower half is already so developed that he’s able to sustain impacts and keep going.  He’s special but I want to see it Saturday.
  • Key to the game:  Aaron Murray staying calm early.  I have no reason to expect he won’t, as the guy is playing with considerably more, well, everything, this year.  When he’s struggled, it’s usually out of the gate early and he typically settles in.  If he comes out and connects early like he did last week and is able to keep those safeties peeled back, then the running game explodes and Bobo has the full playbook at his fingertips.  Murray’s ability to pick up blitzes could be key.

Random Thoughts

  • OK, so the only team that presents a hurdle of any significance for FSU the remainder of the season is Florida, who could very well finish 3rd in their division (and are currently ranked as such).  Yes they still have to play Miami and VT on the road but neither one of those teams are currently ranked.  FSU knows they’re going to be on the outside looking in at whoever wins the SEC and Oregon (although they still have a pretty tough slate left in a pretty good Pac 10), so expect to see them put up numbers as much as they can.  They could also very likely get passed by one of the remaining unbeaten Big XII teams (KSU, WVU and UT).  I expect FSU will run up some gaudy stats from here on out…and it might not matter.
  • The NFL has always been something for me to watch on Sundays.  I enjoy seeing the game played at such a high level.  I’m a Falcons fan but their wins and losses register far lower on my impact scale than UGA.  Regardless, watching these replacement refs has taken whatever joy I took from watching the NFL.  As much as they struggled with adding replay years ago but it messed with the flow of the game, you’d think they’d have gotten this ref strike handled in week 1.  It’s embarrassing.
  • With that being said, I’d love to be lead counsel in the negotiations for the Ref’s union.  Talkin’ about bargaining from a position of power…wow.
  • I can’t wait to see that 4th quarter video with AC/DC playing about the Chapel Bell when the crowd has reason to be excited and amped.  To date all the home games have been laughers by that point, but there’s no doubt that it would get a different response in the right environment.  I’ve been pretty critical in the past of some of the quality of videos that we’ve seen and the general inflexibility and unwillingness to update but they’ve stepped it up this year with highlights of most recent games, etc.  Top notch.  I loved the Missouri highlights pre game and hope to see a Vandy montage this week.  There’s certainly plenty of clips to pick from.
  • We are currently 14th in the SEC in net punting.  It took me a while to wrap my head around that.  First off, I had kinda sorta forgotten that the SEC now had 14 teams.  Then I realized we were dead last.  Nowhere to go but up I guess.
  • I don’t know if you saw the clip of John L. Smith referring to his team as “the state of Alabama football team” or not.  It was pretty sad.  You may recall he’s the coach of Arkansas…not Alabama.  Might explain that 52 point drubbing they took to Bama though.
  • While the home slate isn’t exactly a list of the top games to see in CFB this year, it looks like we’re going to have the best weather year in a while.  Yeah, the opener was scorching, but I was in the shade the whole time.  These last two games have been absolutely pristine and Saturday looks no different.
  • So, with a baby girl on the way any week now, if these things stop showing up, wish me luck.

Until next time…

Have a safe weekend,

Jody

Posted under 2008 Season by jody on Thursday 27 September 2012 at 12:55 am

Vandy Writeup

Alright, a quarter of the season (hard to believe that) is gone and we’ve managed to get to this point unscathed, roughly as expected.  It’s interesting to look at how we’ve gotten here.  Preseason I felt like we had a very solid team at QB and WR, ultimately would have a solid RB stable once they got some experience and I was pretty concerned about our OL.  Frankly, we’ve exceeded each of those expectations.  Our defensive inconsistencies are where it’s been an interesting road so far.  We’ve had a singular performance from Jarvis Jones that matches any defensive effort I can remember and outside of that I can’t say any of the other personnel groupings have outperformed expectations.  That’s not fair, Shawn Williams has probably been all we expected.  Abry Jones as well.  Granted, when expectations are that high it’s hard to exceed them but we’ve given up too many big plays in each of the 3 games for me to feel as good as I hoped I would at this point about our D. Maybe when we add back two of our best defenders next week we’ll see our A effort.

It’s strange to be in this position though.  Folks clamoring for Bobo to get the boot are left in a position where they have to acknowledge the fact that no UGA team ever has scored 40 or more in each of the 3 opening weeks.  Not many expected the offense to be the reason we’ve been climbing the polls.  They’re way ahead of schedule as Gurley looks like an upperclassman and the OL has benefited greatly from Murray’s (and let’s face it, Bobo’s) ability to get us into the right plays. The beauty of this situation is that as we hit the meat of the schedule, the D should start to play markedly better and the O can use all of the confidence they’ve built in the opening weeks to produce what could be a pretty potent football team if everything clicks.  We can only hope.  Now, on to Vandy.

First, quick points from FAU:

  • I don’t know that Murray’s ever looked as sharp as he did Saturday.  Honestly, I wasn’t that upset at the pick on his final attempt either, as he’s the kind of kid that will gnaw at, making him practice that much harder in the coming weeks.
  • I’m sure it’s not a record or even close to have two true freshmen get 100 yards rushing in the same game but somehow I highly doubt it’s been done on so few carries (10 each) before.  That’s truly remarkable.  I still think Marshall is getting acclimated to the extra weight up top but that move he put on the DB on that naked pitch thing we ran showed what he’s capable of.
  • Justin Scott-Wesley can cover some ground in a hurry.  I don’t want to read too much into one play but while he looks insanely fast, he doesn’t look particularly fluid in terms of trying to make folks miss.  I’d imagine he’d be a great target on a reverse though or as a decoy on a reverse.
  • You got the feeling we could run at will last week or pass at will if we wanted.  To the tune of over 700 yards of offense with over 12 minutes left in the game and our 2nd string offense already in.  I mean, the last time we went over 700 yards was, well, never.
When Vandy has the ball:
  • James Franklin’s attempts at subterfuge this year extend to starting another QB last week and not having their normal starter play a single snap.  Now, the fact that the normal starter, Jordan Rodgers, has been completely ineffective this year has something to do with it I’m sure.  I’m not convinced who we’ll see this week but I don’t know that it matters.  Rodgers is mobile, as is last week’s starter Austyn Carta-Samuels.  The new guy appears to be a touch more accurate, but most folks are against Presbyterian.  I expect we’ll see both unless the starter is on fire.  I don’t expect to see that unless Jarvis Jones breaks out a lighter and adds it to the arsenal.
  • Vandy always has several smallish, quick RBs that are indistinguishable.  I imagine they will again.
  • Their OL is a little small and will likely struggle with John Jenkins (most do, don’t feel bad Vandy).
  • They have a pair of big WRs that have between the two of them caught almost 75% of the team’s completions this year, meaning they don’t spread it around a whole heckuva lot.
  • I expect to see our defense play with a lot more fire this week.  It’s no secret that Grantham wasn’t exactly pleased with Franklin last year and I’m betting he’s privately (or likely not very privately) had this one circled.  He probably took full advantage of the blown assignments and resultant big plays to grill his boys and expects solid play.  In theory, we should be able to maul Vandy but last year we eeked out a win in a game where we won the turnover battle 4-1 and Vandy’s best QB went 4-19 for less than 50 yards.
  • As explosive as Malcolm Mitchell is and as much potential as he has at CB, Saturday we saw the fact that he’s still learning the positions.  In zone coverages against some combo routes you could see he was having to think too much on who to follow/release/etc.  He’s more at home in man coverage, where he can utilize his superior athleticism to it’s fullest extent.  The problem with that is if you start topping your hand to man, a mobile QB will start running at that spot behind a fly route.  Obviously it’s early, and he’s still learning but it’s pretty clear he’s an unfinished product.
  • At the end of the day though, Vandy is averaging 13 ppg against the two FBS teams (SC and NW) they’ve faced this year.  That’s not good.
  • Look for a Big Game from: Cornelius Washington.  The guy is built to wreak havoc and he’s played well this year, it’s just been lost in all of the Jarvis talk.  With defenses focusing on Jarvis, I expect big Cornelius (Soul Train) to get more opportunities one on one and that could result in a big day for him.
  • Key to the Game:  Keep Vandy from getting into a rhythm. The defense has struggled giving up a few big plays to date but I’m more worried about the potential of the Vandy offense getting into a confident rhythm picking up several first downs.  I want 3 and outs and general confusion from the Vandy offense.
When UGA has the ball:
  • Vandy did a very solid job against SC on defense, easily playing well enough to win if their offense had contributed anything.  They admittedly received a large boost from the fact that Connor Shaw was limited, but they were the ones who limited, hitting him early and often, exposing a poor SC OL.
  • I’ve been very impressed with our run game and how Bobo has managed to balance it not only with the passing attack but also with the various running game weapons we have.  Adding little wrinkles like the Pistol formation or Malcolm Mitchell and going back to old staples like the TE tells me that Bobo is feeling very comfortable with what he has right now.  Against SC, Vandy got exposed by Lattimore on a few runs that weren’t the “break a few tackles and rumble through the 2nd level” type plays but were rather the “run through that large gap, make one guy miss and house it” type that Todd Gurley has brought back with style.
  • Speaking of Gurley, as talented as Isaiah Crowell was, he had a carry of 30 yards or more last year exactly zero times (got close, but never got to 30, check the stats).  Gurley has gone for 38 or more in ever game this season.  Crowell had everything you wanted in a breakaway back but couldn’t manage to pull it off.  Gurley has done so with ease.
  • What I love about our passing attack is that we’ve established multiple guys that are legitimate threats but we’ve done so without running a ton of 4 and 5 WR sets.  We just run a lot of base packages, rely on our balance and trust Murray to get us into the right play.  We’ve shown the ability to be explosive from base formations on the ground and through the air.
  • I’m really anxious to see our OL against a DL with a pulse again.  Missouri was able to get some pressure on us.  While Vandy won’t rank in the top half of the SEC’s DLs, they did manage to put a hurt on Shaw (mostly on QB runs, but they still pressured him a lot).  I’m excited that Beard was playing well enough going into last week to have earned playing time before the injury to Lee.  If the light comes on for him and he’s able to add vital depth if not start, then our line, easily the weak point of the offense, starts to look better and more capable of weathering a long season, particularly helpful given that we’ve already lost 3 OL to ankle sprains through 3 weeks.
  • You can’t help but be excited to see Malcolm Mitchell split out wide.  He’s going to be the ultimate deep threat/decoy all season whenever we want to use him.  He’s just so suited to that role.
  • Given the number of screen passes we ran when Bobo was a senior, I’m surprised that we don’t see more of them, or rather that we don’t see more of them executed properly.  We hit the one to King at Missouri and went a long way (should have been a score).  Other than that, I can’t think of one we’ve connected on successfully.  With speed like Gurley and Marshall possess, there’s some tremendous potential there and it seems like it’s been a while (Crowell against SC maybe?) since we had one that busted big.
  • Look for a Big Game from:  Aaron Murray.  He’s clicking right now and I honestly feel like he’s starting to get to the next level in terms of confidence and ability to read the defense and translate that into effective plays.  I’m hoping we see that continued growth this weekend, as he could easily produce a 275 yd, 65% completion, 3 TD ho hum kind of day that gets overlooked if Gurley/Marhsall have big days.  Make no mistake about it, they feed off of each other but it’s Murray’s ability to get us into the right play that puts the whole team at an advantage.
  • Key to the game:  Turnovers obviously as that’s an equalizer but I’m more concerned with seeing us continue to finish drives.  One of the reasons we struggled in Nashville last year was the fact that we attempted 6 FGs (and only converted 4 in Walsh’s season of discontent).  We’ve done a great job of going ahead and scoring TDs this season but I’m hoping we continue with that against a defense that caused us some trouble last year.

Random Thoughts:

  • I had this conversation with my dad during the game, but the removal of the incidental facemask penalty has resulted in a situation where a defender has no reason to let go when they’ve grasped the mask.  It almost resulted in Murray’s head getting snapped off last week.  It’s almost like they need a flagrant version of that foul, maybe sit the person out a play or something.
  • So Jarvis Jones is now #1 on Kiper’s Big Board?  Wow.  Impressive.  That makes me even more excited about what he can do the rest of the year.  With more big performances like the one from week 2, that’s going to be a very, very wealthy man soon.
  • Speaking of ESPN love, Murray currently resides at #1 on their Heisman predictor.  It’s funny because in the experts’ poll he doesn’t crack the top 10, gaining only 1 5th place vote.  Their predictor thing is a balance of remaining schedule, past results, etc. all weighted in.  He’s on pace for 36 TDs/8 INTs in the 12-game regular season, so who knows.  Both are the level of improvement we were hoping to see out of him.
  • If FSU beats Clemson this weekend go ahead and pencil them in to the title game.  I think by the end of the season when they face UF, the Gators will be struggling as they don’t have a ton of depth and still have a tough gauntlet of games coming up, with FSU being 1 of 4 teams currently ranked in the top 7 that they still have to face.
  • Based on what I saw in Auburn last week, this weekend’s game could be a very, very tough one for the Fighting Chiziks.  The great equalizer though is Mettenberger, who has yet to have to really do anything.  With that defense and ground attack he won’t have to do much but eventually he’ll face a team that stacks the box and can play some D behind it.  I don’t know that it will be this weekend but it’ll happen at some point.
  • So, anybody still lumping Arkansas into that group of SEC-West teams we don’t have to face?  Auburn could very well finish last in that division, but it’s pretty clear that the drop from Bama-LSU to the rest is pretty large.
  • Speaking of teams in the SEC that suck, a big thanks to Arkansas and Kentucky for losing to FCS schools and besmirching the league.  Kentucky is going to finish 3rd in their state and that 10-7 win over UT to end the season seems like a long, long time ago.
  • I love night games in Sanford, but man, that was a long day for a glorified scrimmage.
  • I thought the SEC refs were bad, then I saw that Monday Night Football game.  It’s like the NFL had no contingency if their refs went on strike.  Reviewing plays to see if a pass was tipped when it was tipped 5′ in front of the WR?  It’s just basic stuff that they can’t seem to get right.  Roger Goodell doesn’t seem to be the type to handle mistakes all that well.  I’m betting he wants to punch a few people.

Until next time,

Have a safe weekend,

Jody

Posted under 2008 Season by jody on Thursday 20 September 2012 at 1:05 am

FAU Writeup

OK, I can honestly say I thought we’d win that game.  I can’t honestly say I felt like we’d win by 3 TDs.  I was impressed by Missouri’s fight and spirit early and I think we got their best punch, unfortunately for them it was a 4-round fight and not just 3.  Our superior athleticism, size and general talent level coupled with a clearly improved strength and conditioning program really manifested itself in the 4th quarter as we were able to enforce out will on both sides of the ball.  It felt good.  Like 2002/3 kinda good.

Points from the game:

  • Jarvis Jones is a complete stud and is rapidly shooting up my list of favorite players to don the red and black.  Do yourself a favor and read the great story on ugasports.com (it’s free) that’s an interview with Jones about playing hurt and being a leader.  Man crush.  The fact that guy put on that kind of performance with an injured groin makes me feel bad for opposing OLs once he gets healthy.  All of the concerns of week 1 about our lethargy on defense have seemingly been wiped away.  Add a couple more potential all-Americans and the concerns lessen even more.
  • I get some of the frustration with Aaron Murray as he missed a couple of passes, but folks have to remember no QB in the country is perfect.  ESPN currently has Murray 2nd on their Heisman predictor.  The two knocks I’ve heard consistently are that he’s flustered early and can’t win the big game.  At about 7:30 Saturday night, you’d have a hard time finding anyone that would say that game wasn’t a big one.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, it’s a TEAM effort that wins or loses games.  Murray’s played well enough to win several games that we didn’t and has played poorly in a few we’ve won.  Now, as to the settling down thing, I think of our guys make a few grabs on those drops, we’re probably not having this conversation at all.  The INT was tough because with our insistence on running play action, Murray has about 1/2 second to make that read and it’s largely dependent on the predication that the LB has taken at least a step up.  He didn’t.  The pass to the FB that was missed is tough too as it hit him in the hands.  Yes, it wasn’t ideal, but I assure you if you ask any of the guys on the team if that catch should’ve been made they’d answer affirmatively.  Is the kid perfect?  Nope, but he’s as close as this conference has right now and there aren’t many in the country playing at a higher level.  The two TDs to Marlon Brown were as good a throws as you’ll see at this level.
  • Speaking of…Marlon Brown looked like a different guy completely.  Reminded me a bit of Michael Johnson against Auburn in that he was just so clutch out of seemingly nowhere.  Just think if he hadn’t dropped two easy ones.  Along those lines, I’m thinking whatever nagging injury Michael Bennett was going through was causing him some lack of focus (talk to him Jarvis).  His drops were highly uncharacteristic.  Back to Brown, it’s nice to see the guy who was getting so much talk in the offseason actually live up to it.
  • My concerns about Mitchell at CB in his opening game were realized early when he got thrown on a couple times right out of the gate.  I figured it would take him some time to get acclimated to the speed of the game out there at a new spot.  My hopes for him at the position were realized shortly thereafter as he showed really, really good break on the ball and some surprising physicality.  Might need to get someone to talk to him about celebrating over an opponent he’s drilled though.  That’s not ideal.  Especially when they’ve already picked up a first down.
  • I’d like to think that Bobo was feeling out Missouri and the coaches’ gameplan was to keep it close, stay basic and open it up when we needed to.  When you think back, every time we needed a score to answer, we did so with relative ease, I’d just like to see us do that to start games so we can close things out a little quicker.  I guess it all boils down to execution though.  If we execute what gets called, I feel like we’ve got a puncher’s chance against anyone.
  • Gurley is legit.
  • Marshall Morgan is going to make things interesting.  Don’t assume anything.  Get your popcorn ready.
  • I’m thinking John Theus’ ankle was impacting his lateral mobility.  He tweaked his left ankle and that’s his push off leg to kick out and seal the edge and he didn’t seem capable of kicking out and anchoring.  I can safely say that Jadaveon Clowney had to have been licking his chops watching that performance though.  I’m thinking we’re going to see considerable improvement out of our young OT though as the season goes along.  We’re going to need it.
When FAU has the ball:
  • They’ve not done much this year.  They won their opener 7-3.  Over Wagner.  Wagner has moved on to 0-2 after falling to mighty Georgetown.  FAU is bad on offense but they somehow have a big senior QB who has completed almost 80% of his passes, hasn’t thrown an INT and has accounted for all of the FAU TDs on the season.  As bad as they are (a notch behind Buffalo even), it wouldn’t shock me to see them move the ball a little and score 14-17 points again due to a combination of lack of focus/scheme and liberal substitutions late.  I don’t expect our A effort Saturday and I don’t expect we’ll need it.  I think we’ll see the last opportunity for several guys on the fringe of contributing on D to audition and make an impression.  As Commings and Vasser get back this week and we add ‘Tree and Rambo at some point, it’s going to be harder and harder for some of these guys to get an opportunity so I’m hoping our reserves come in with some fire in their belly.
  • If Rambo doesn’t go, I think we’ll see Commings at safety alongside Williams.  He’s got the size and has played there before and honestly, with the play of Swann, Mitchell and Smith, we have some skill at CB right now and the more Commings can provide some schematic flexibility, the more dangerous we become.  Just another toy in Grantham’s toy box.
  • Look for a big game from: Jordan Jenkins.  As he starts to get a feel for the speed of big time football, he’s got a chance to position himself as the heir to Jarvis’ playmaker spot.  He was on the field in key moments last week but is still young enough to need the seasoning and will likely play more than the starters.
When UGA has the ball:
  • FAU is coached by Nebraska HC Bo Pelini’s brother Carl.  That sounds like I just made it up.  Anyway, given his brother’s status as a defensive guru, I’m thinking Carl probably is cut from similar cloth.  I’d expect that we’ll score more than MTSU’s 31 from last week though.
  • Gurley has shown a considerable knack for breaking the big one.  I want to see Marshall get one this week.  He hasn’t shown the same suddenness that Gurley has, but I think he’s still working through the added weight and getting used to carrying that.  He’s got some serious wheels and I think we get him open this week.
  • The main thing I’m hoping to see this week is improved OL play.  Pelini will likely bring some interesting looks but out young OL should have the athleticism and discipline to handle them.  Should.  Protect Murray.  Open holes for the RBs.  Should be a big day.  I think we hit 40 for the 3rd straight game.
  • As good as our WRs have generally looked, I’d like to see more snaps from Conley.  Great hands and size but he’s not seeing the field a lot.  Our rotation seems pretty set with King, Bennett, Brown and Wooten.  Not bad, but Conley can help.  We saw it last year.
  • Look for a big game from:  Tavares King.  He toasted the Buffalo secondary several times but only got the one long TD to show for it.  I’m thinking he’ll have a couple of shots this week and Bobo would love nothing more than to establish King as an even more legit downfield threat (a la Mitchell) going into the meat of the SEC schedule.  Anything to help peel those safeties back and open up a little more running room.  

Random Thoughts:

  • So, Todd McShay has 4 UGA defenders in the top 29 of his NFL draft for next year (Jones at 4, Jenkins at 5, Ogletree at 22 and Shawn Williams at 29).  That’s pretty darn impressive and reminiscent of the talent level of those 2002-2003 Dawg Ds that featured future first rd picks like Pollack, Sullivan, Davis, Thurman, Johnson, etc.  What might be most impressive is Ogletree at 22.  Consider for a second that he didn’t move to LB until after his true freshman year, missed nearly half of last year with an injury and hasn’t played at all this year due to suspension.  So he’s managed to earn that high of a rating in about 8 games?  Impressive…and scary for opponents when this D gets that kind of talent added back.  Ogletree also happens to sport one of the smaller helmets ever relative to body size.  Seriously, watch him.
  • When’s the last time Uf and UT entered their early season matchup undefeated to as little fanfare as they are this week?  No one really has them in the top 2 in the east.  UF looks pedestrian at best on offense.  No one knows what to make of UT at all yet.  They have no running game but a QB that can sling it and some serious talent at WR but can they stop anyone on offense?  I’m not entirely sure we’re going to know much more about either team even after this game unless one team really clocks the other one but I honestly don’t see it.  Sadly, one of those two teams is going to be in the top 15 after this weekend.
  • Um, Auburn?  They’re 0-2 and facing the team that just beat #8 Arkansas.  Granted, Tyler Wilson missed the 2nd half, but the reason he did was because he got rocked.  Down goes Frazier?  Vegas ain’t buying it, installing AU as a 17-pt favorite.  That should be interesting.  What’s really surprised me is how bad they’ve been on defense.  Van Gorder hasn’t had the impression I (and a ton of others) were expecting.
  • I have to say I’m pretty surprised that GT is going to roll (apparently) with the hive helmet deal for the whole season.  In talking to the GT grad I work with, he didn’t seem pleased by it but acknowledged that given how often they change the shade of yellow and the uniform in general, it wasn’t like they were putting Bama in plaid or something.  Good point.
  • Bama still looks pretty beastly, but what’s probably scaring me most about them is that it appears their offense has finally started to play at a high enough level that they can afford to take some chances on D (if they wanted to).  They have the best OL in college football, a bevy of bruising backs and those things aren’t really knew.  That passing attack and their willingness to use it is new though.  They really are a balanced team.  I think the debacle in that first matchup with LSU last year forced Saban to at least prepare his offense to open it up some.  Having an OL like that certainly helps.
  • I’ve always sort of been against SEC expansion in the back of my mind because I think it starts to endanger some of the traditional matchups if we continue the expansion to 14.  I’m hoping we stay here.  The only positive I saw was the decreased likelihood that we’d have to endure a Penn Wagers refereed game.  The problem here is that I’m assuming whatever jackleg they hire as the new group (which I’m assuming they’ve done for this year obviously) would be an improvement over Wagers.  While I think I’m pretty safe in that assumption, the SEC office hasn’t actually done a whole lot in the past to make me feel all warm and fuzzy about that.
  • Speaking of officiating, they might want to go over with the boys what a horse collar tackle is.  The only way that Missouri DB was bringing Gurley down on his scamper out of the shadow of our goal line was a perfectly executed horse collar tackle.  That’s one of those “go ahead and tackle the WR and take the pass interference call when you’re beat, at least you don’t give up the TD” deals for the last defender.  How the crew missed it I don’t know.  Probably the same way they missed Blake Sailors’ clear halo violation.

Until next time,

Have a safe weekend,

Jody

Posted under 2008 Season by jody on Wednesday 12 September 2012 at 11:33 pm

Missouri Writeup (sort of)…

This one’s going to be pretty short.  Been a crazy week with a couple of curveballs so it’s going to be just the talking points so to speak that you can expect for this week.  Still no pdf as of now as I don’t really have it formatted worth anything.  I can say that once my nursery is complete there may be a small window where these things can return to their previous state, but something tells me that window is rapidly closing. So, enough about me…

 

The Buffalo game…

I can’t say that I’m really surprised at all by that effort.  Can fault be found in our performance?  Absolutely.  Do I think for a second that if we had been playing Missouri this week that that performance would’ve been what we’d see?  Absolutely not.  At the end of the day, if I’m picking which games get our A effort, Buffalo would’ve been pretty close to the bottom, maybe even 12th out of 12.  Seriously.  The fact we slid a bit doesn’t bother me either, as very few teams looked scary (outside of Bama) because it was hard to get a feel for what they faced.  SC and Arkansas both struggled at least as much as we did.  At the end of the day, we worked out some kinks and put ourselves in a position to have some coaching points and come out stronger this weekend.

 

Things that surprised me:

  • Connor Norman getting all the PT over Moore.  I was shocked to see him spend all of this time there.
  • How much we played a 2-man front.  I know we rarely play a true 3-4, but Saturday we spent a TON of the day with Washington stood up as a rush DE opposite Jarvis.  Incredible positional flexibility from that formation but I don’t think we see it much against teams we feel are going to run it a lot.
  • Gurley’s speed – I knew he was fast, and I knew he was an athlete, but he was explosive and coupled with his forward lean and effort and you have a pretty darn solid RB.

Things that didn’t surprise me:

  • Injuries along the OL – I’ve come to expect that if we have a thin position, we’ll suffer some injuries to further that thinning.  This year’s concern area was OL, where our thinness was manifested in our complete lack of experience in the 2-deep.  Go figure that we lose 2 guys to sprained ankles and another to a chest contusion.  Hopefully Theus can go and Burnette appears to be ready as well but I don’t want another one of those “oh crap” moments when I realize we’ve got an OL down.
  • Our freshmen stud RBs struggled in pass protection – it’s one of the old jokes that Richt didn’t start Moreno as a freshman because he wasn’t ready to block but you could see Saturday why it’s pretty helpful if those guys can keep Murray from getting drilled.  If a defense can say with certainty that if Gurley is in the game then a) we’re running the ball or b) if we’re passing it then he’s a liability, then we’ve got problems because they’re going to come right at him.
  • The fact our fans were lackluster…it’s Buffalo and it was like 112 in the stadium.  And folks were surprised our team was flat?  I can’t recall a more G-Day like atmosphere in Sanford for a non G-Day game.

The Missouri game:

When we’re on offense -

  • The weakness in the Mizzou defense is in the back 4.  They have pretty solid LBs and their DL is MUCH better than what we faced last weekend as our young pups were getting acclimated to the game.  While this makes you think we’d attack their secondary, I’m thinking Bobo is going to try and establish the run early and often with Gurley and company.  If Mizzou proves they can stop our run game, we’ll move away but so much of what we do relies on play action anyway, if we can establish something on the ground our chance go way up.  Against Buffalo, we threw it deep because they simply couldn’t cover King deep, so why not go there.  I don’t know that we can expect that kind of time this week.
  • With Murray facing some pressure last weekend, I fully expect to see him scrambling some Saturday, but I’m OK with that.  I’d love to see a fair share of bootlegs to take some of the pressure off of our OL.  Murray is plenty athletic to handle it and throws well on the run.
  • I expect to see us work the TE back in.  We didn’t target a TE once Saturday and that was a big spot for Murray last year.  In fact, only 4 guys caught balls and all were WRs.  As dangerous as Marshall appears to be in space, we’ll get him the ball out there at some point and he’s going to do some damage.  Back to the TE though, I think we’ll obviously keep Lynch in a fair amount as he’s a natural aid to our young OTs but we should be able to slide him out on occasion to and reward him.

When we’re on defense -

  • QB James Franklin is a dangerous dual threat QB but he’s coming off offseason surgery.  He looked solid in week 1 but if our OL is thin, theirs is emaciated.  They had a rash of injuries during fall camp and are starting a true frosh and a former walk-on at the guard spots.  I fully expect our front 6 or 7 or whatever the heck we run on any given play (who knows) to be disruptive.  The Mizzou offensive scheme is all about timing and it’s one of those spread deals where they try to get matchups they want in space.  If our NG is blowing their center back into the pocket, timing is the first thing out the window.
  • I’d expect after last week to see Franklin try and set the tone early with his feet but that’s a dangerous proposition with a guy coming back form injury as the UGA defense has some headhunters.  I would imagine Grantham has schemed for this game a good bit, I can only hope he’s done so knowing exactly what personnel he’d be afforded.
  • I can’t wait to see Dorial Green-Beckham or whatever his long name is.  As the top WR in the country last year, he brings near TE size but explosive speed and athleticism to an already solid WR group.  If Mitchell can’t go (or being limited) and with Commings out, we don’t really have a lot of size at CB to counter, but I don’t expect a lot of man coverages anyway as we’ll have to be keeping an eye towards the line to make sure Franklin hasn’t broken contain.

Bottom Line:  Mizzou has a very solid offense although their ground game is essentially all Franklin.  They run a very effective scheme but we’re going to bring a physicality that they might not be used to.  I’m not saying that because we’re the almighty SEC, I’m saying that because there’s a reason guys like Jarvis Jones and John Jenkins are in Kiper’s and McShay’s top 6 picks for next year’s draft.

I don’t expect the crown to be that big of a deal.  I’m sorry Mizzou, I know you’re fired up, I know this game means a lot to you, but your stadium seats 70,000 people and we’re regularly walking into stadiums signficantly larger, filled with fans that absolutely hate us (Auburn, UT, SC, Bama, etc.).  I’m sure there’s going to be a lot of energy, but no more than there is in Knoxville or other Columbia.

At the end of the day, this is going to be a big game.  We step up and shut this group down, even at considerably less than full strength (yes, I don’t expect Rambo or Ogletree to play…Rambo maybe, not likely though) and we start to build a buzz about the team.  Start getting some key players back and this season starts to look pretty sporty.  That all changes if we lay an egg Saturday.

Random Thoughts:

  • I loved the Samuel L Jackson voiceover on the pre-game video.  Not many schools have that going for them.  ”Commit to the G”?  I was ready.
  • Not sure how many of you saw the Florida game, but if Bowling Green could hit a FG they would’ve been up int he 2nd half against as bad a UF offense as I can remember seeing.  I’m not saying it’s likely, but if they play like that the rest of the season, it’s possible they could finish 6th ahead of only UK in the East.  Seriously.
  • OK, so Bama is apparently pretty good.  I think Michigan might not be the 8th best team in the country though.
  • I’m having a hard time understanding why the University invests so much money in asking folks to clean up the stadium, etc. then when you’re walking out there is literally not a trashcan that isn’t overflowing.  It’s like playing jenga trying to get a powerade bottle to balance on one of those things.
  • If there’s a more stubborn coach in the country than Paul Johnson, I haven’t seen him yet.
  • My seats stayed in the shade all day Saturday.  From all accounts the heat in the sun was pretty much unbearable.  I was pretty comfortable but I’m sure I’ll be paying for it later in the year when I’m freezing.
  • I purposefully didn’t say “Show Me” anywhere in here, but I’m betting we hear it a few thousand times Saturday.
  • How nice was it being back in Athens on Saturday?  I just love every time I get the opportunity to get up there.  That’s why I was even more amazed at how angry some folks were after the game.

Until next time,

Have a safe weekend,

Jody

Posted under 2008 Season by jody on Thursday 6 September 2012 at 12:52 am