Other depth chart observations
- Thread starter The Fatboy
- Start date
LB depth looks to be in issue.
I’ve heard from a few sources that our coaching staff if very comfortable with the WR group. I’m growing less concerned with them by the minute. Which my anxiety will probably come back about 3 plays into the SFA game.
Can our CBs cover?
Can Nick come back 100% against KState?
We get those 4 things answered, and we wil have a fantastic season
I’ve heard from a few sources that our coaching staff if very comfortable with the WR group. I’m growing less concerned with them by the minute. Which my anxiety will probably come back about 3 plays into the SFA game.
Can our CBs cover?
Can Nick come back 100% against KState?
We get those 4 things answered, and we wil have a fantastic season
yeah i thought i read something where Shoop likes to run a 4-2-5 primarily with a change to 4-3. I'm curious to see how we will come back from the 3-4. defenses change so much it shouldn't matter much, but will affect personnel some.
I think the 4-2-5 plays into our team strengths this year: LB depth is a concern, but we have plenty of hybrid/nickel/star guys in Cole, Marcus Murphy, Landrews.
Brian Cole is a heat seeking missile coming off the edge. He plays bigger than his frame like JT Gray did.
If we needed more LB depth, I think we could plug Gerri Green in there. True freshman Nathaniel Watson could be used if necessary as well. Freakishly athletic.
Brian Cole is a heat seeking missile coming off the edge. He plays bigger than his frame like JT Gray did.
If we needed more LB depth, I think we could plug Gerri Green in there. True freshman Nathaniel Watson could be used if necessary as well. Freakishly athletic.
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Could mean that Dear has had a much more difficult time getting back to 100% from his knee injury than we would have hoped.
Can our CB's cover? That is a very good question after we got burned so many times last year. Also, can our middle LB stop the run right up the middle to prevent long runs for TD's.
Rosebowl said something this morning on bounds about Dear and Mixon having some issues getting back to 100%
Disappointing because everyone acted like Dear was ready to go toward the end of last year but we didn't want to burn him since he had a redshirt year available. Now here we are a year later and he apparently is still not 100%? Would now wonder if he will ever be.
I've always thought Mixon was better than Thomas... so this would make sense seeing Thomas listed ahead of him on the depth chart.
I also have to believe Dear is not back to his original self if he doesn't get significant playing time. I can see him not starting the first couple of games either way - but if we're not seeing some explosive plays from him after the first two weeks... I'm going to become worried he'll never be as good as we expected.
I also have to believe Dear is not back to his original self if he doesn't get significant playing time. I can see him not starting the first couple of games either way - but if we're not seeing some explosive plays from him after the first two weeks... I'm going to become worried he'll never be as good as we expected.
I think some of the Dear/Mixon concerns are justified, but I think it’s also possible that Austin Williams is just better than them. I think Williams is about to have historically good career for us. That’s not saying much given our WR history, but I expect him to lead us in catches for the next several years.
I am very excited Osirus Mitchell has taken a major step... he was the forgotten man for so long...
Is it merely a coincidence Dear & Mixon are also our shortest WR's? I believe CoJoMo likes to know he can occasionally throw up a jump ball and depend on his WR to out-jump the opposing DB. OM made a living on that **** for a while. They just didn't have much of anything else to go with it offensively.
Malik Dear? He’s a running back that’s masquerading as a slot receiver. He’s got more burst and speed than a Fullback. Ashton Shumpert was a Fullback. Mullen gonna Mullen though.
I understand that he was placed there based on promises from the previous staff, but they are no longer here. He is good in space but I’ve always thought he was a clone of jrob just looking at the way he ran the ball like a bowling ball low to the ground. He has great vision. But I’m not sure where he would fit on the depth chart now at rb. Maybe 3? Gibson is a really good back too. We just have a bunch of slot receiver type players and not enough places to put them. I’m sure the most talented will find their way on the field based on what JoMo wants to do. may be a pointless discussion if he isn’t ever healthy enough to play at 100 percent again.
If what has been said in the past is true, Dear made sure himself that he’d never be as good as expected by insisting he only play WR. Even at 100%, he never had a chance in hell of being an impact player at WR in the SEC. He did have potential NFL ability at RB, but apparently that didn’t interest him. Now he is in no man’s land as far as the depth chart is concerned.
I think there’s something to that for sure. Williams’ size in the slot position seems to be something Moorhead is a big fan of.
They also had Brown, Metcalf, Jefferson and Lodge. We don't have any of those guys (yet).
I hope JoMo is going by what he's seeing in practice, rather than what he wants to do. We shouldn't be playing tall guys just to play them, they need to be the best player. That is my biggest worry, is that JoMo will get away from the ground game and zig zag stuff, when we have 2 great tailbacks along with Mixon and Dear (and Fitz). We need to be pitching the ball around in the backfield. Chunking it downfield is good, and necessary, but we don't need to force that to be a strength IMO unless Guidry and Williams are just all-world.
I take it you didn't spend a lot of time watching his offenses at Penn State if this is the concern...
We have 10x the OL that he had there as well.
You take it correctly. I have not watched it at all. All I know is what is discussed here. I don't even know what an RPO is, and I don't really care to learn, I'll take ya'll word for it. I look at the Xs/Os very generally, I just have no interest in the details. To me, recruit the best players you can and you run an offense that utilizes them. At MSU, that's usually going to be a run-based spread of some sort unless the demographics and high school coaching drastically changes.
To add to this, I didn't like the way Danny used our personnel either. We never got that 2007-2008 Florida offense we were promised.
I always remember Croom talking about wanting tall WRs, but he went out and got some bums who just happened to be 6'5", instead of getting talented players.
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Seems strange to voice concerns over something you don't seemingly care to know about -- while attempting to tie it in with our previous two coaches.
In his first season at Penn St, Moorhead ran it 540 times to 391 throws. In year two, with an elite RB and a budding star at QB, the split was 458 pass to 451 run. Keeping in mind that all of this was done with a terrible OL. And in that vein, he threw 92 of those 849 passes to RBs many of which basically amounted to extended handoffs.
In his first season at Penn St, Moorhead ran it 540 times to 391 throws. In year two, with an elite RB and a budding star at QB, the split was 458 pass to 451 run. Keeping in mind that all of this was done with a terrible OL. And in that vein, he threw 92 of those 849 passes to RBs many of which basically amounted to extended handoffs.
This was always a concern for me. He seemed to have crazy explosiveness for the weight he carried. Just seemed like a body type that once he got injured, it might be hard for him to stay healthy and/or regain that explosiveness.
Pretty critical for a simple comment regarding this subject, as many people are discussing:
The narrative is that Guidry (a newcomer who's seemingly had a bad attitude until now) and Williams (a guy on the roster last year) are the go-to guys, out of nowhere, while guys we've seen contribute before (Mixon, Dear) are nowhere to be found. Not to mention many references to JoMo being "patient" with Guidry. I.e., it appears he really favors the tall guys. I'm simply hoping that's not at the cost of playing better players. Then, the article in the CL about Mixon (could have been some Ole Miss BS there).
It's really as simple as that. If JoMo is Chip Kelly Part 2 then who will give a crap.
Or it could be as simple as Dear and Mixon are still legitimately banged up and therefore not showing the skills that we remember, and maybe people like Williams and Osiris Mitchell are now stepping up because they are getting legitimate WR coaching rather than Dan's Country Club buddy handling the WR coaching.
If he had stayed healthy and in shape, I think he would have been our go to playmaker in the slot after his freshman year.
Nobody that is 5-9, 225 is making it in this league as an every down WR only. It’s literally not possible. When you can’t get open down the field in man coverage against anybody other than a linebacker, it makes you a situational player at best. IF he was willing to put in the work at RB, he’d be unbelievable as a guy we could have in certain sets where it’s hurry up, D can’t sub, we can run him up the middle one play and take advantage of the mismatch if they are forced to cover him with a LB on the next play. But since he is apparently unwilling to do that, he basically adds very little value. If we sub him in to send him in a pattern, D is gonna sub to have a safety instead of a LB covering him, and that’s all it takes to completely take him out of the game. We have several guys that can make plays in space AND get open by themselves against most coverages (Mixon, Thomas, etc.) that can also run the ball on the edges. Dear only brings half of that equation to the table.
Yes, it is literally possible. All that is required to be good at WR is to be able to catch, run routes, have enough speed/quickness, and be strong enough not to get pushed around without making D's pay. Dear, when he was healthy, had all of that. You don't get penalized for being too big, other than it makes it less likely you can meet the speed/quickness requirements. Dear was going to be somewhat limited by not being tall enough to be a deep threat, but that's not much different than a lot of our slot players we've had recently. And to offset that he would have been much more dangerous on runs and screens.
Dear's freshman year, he was our only wide receiver that looked like he belonged on the field athletically against A&M. He couldn't stay healthy, probably at least in part because he didn't stay in as good of shape as he should have.
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