Feeling better about next year

[McLoofus 35,182]

7 minutes ago, Zeek said:

Not dismissing Slayton but I would still argue we have a rather deep and talented WR group. The qb battle might tear this forum apart. 

Maybe Bo can be our Trevor Lawrence lol

Deep and talented, yes. 

Experience matters, though. Even at WR. 

[abw0004 10,102]

21 minutes ago, McLoofus said:

Experience matters, though. Even at WR. 

I just remembered Will Hastings and Eli Stove return so there is your experience right there.  Man will it be fun to watch Hastings again.

[McLoofus 35,182]

Just now, abw0004 said:

I just remembered Will Hastings and Eli Stove return so there is your experience right there.  Man will it be fun to watch Hastings again.

Neither one of those guys plays Slayton's position. Neither one has as many catches in a season as Slayton had last year. And combined for their careers, they only have 12 more catches than Slayton did for his. 

It will be good to get those guys back, especially Stove, but they will not replace Slayton. (Or Davis.)  

[abw0004 10,102]

7 minutes ago, McLoofus said:

Neither one of those guys plays Slayton's position. Neither one has as many catches in a season as Slayton had last year. And combined for their careers, they only have 12 more catches than Slayton did for his. 

It will be good to get those guys back, especially Stove, but they will not replace Slayton. (Or Davis.)  

Oh I just meant as WR's in general.  When it comes to experience and leadership, it is more about the guys in your position group meetings, than the specific position

[McLoofus 35,182]

2 minutes ago, abw0004 said:

Oh I just meant as WR's in general.  When it comes to experience and leadership, it is more about the guys in your position group meetings, than the specific position

Yeah. Still going to be a lot different. They've been around, but all these freshmen who played this past season aren't going to respond to 2 guys who didn't the same way. And it's not like Hastings is some grizzled veteran. He's got 1 season of meaningful reps and another partial season. 

I'm not saying that there's no leadership or experience, but I just can't see any way that we're not taking a big hit on both. 

 

[aujeff11 6,243]

16 minutes ago, McLoofus said:

It will be good to get those guys back, especially Stove, but they will not replace Slayton. 

I think Hastings and Stove can make up for Slayton’s three catches and 50 yards per game. 

I also expect to see more opportunities for Schwartz and SW. 

And then there is also Pickens. 

 

[cole256 17,038]

1 hour ago, AUwent said:

There it is already.

”Bo was always a project!1”

?

[cole256 17,038]

When I say Slayton will be hard to replace it's more than just his numbers. Being able to consistently take the top off a defense isn't something everybody can do and it affects the ENTIRE offense. If we don't have someone who can do that everybody's job on offense becomes harder. No matter how much many dislike Slayton nobody else on this team was better than him at doing that. He had size and jumping ability to go with his elite speed. Even those throws that stidham couldn't get right during the season that were missed still controlled what defenses did against us. And it's the ONLY way to beat bammer. You must have a threat on the outside, have to see the bigger picture. 

[bigbird 60,359]

8 minutes ago, cole256 said:

?

??

[McLoofus 35,182]

1 minute ago, cole256 said:

When I say Slayton will be hard to replace it's more than just his numbers. Being able to consistently take the top off a defense isn't something everybody can do and it affects the ENTIRE offense. If we don't have someone who can do that everybody's job on offense becomes harder. No matter how much many dislike Slayton nobody else on this team was better than him at doing that. He had size and jumping ability to go with his elite speed. Even those throws that stidham couldn't get right during the season that were missed still controlled what defenses did against us. And it's the ONLY way to beat bammer. You must have a threat on the outside, have to see the bigger picture. 

I know Schwartz isn't the same overall physically, but I'm hoping he can ease that sting. 

[WarEagle1983 2,185]

On 1/8/2019 at 2:58 PM, keesler said:

Could it be AU's brutal schedule that poses some trust issues with Gus & young QBs?  AU's annual schedule compared to the likes of Clemson/OSU/UGA and even UA is much tougher than those teams.  Hell, the schedule for 2019 alone we play 6 of the pre-season top 25 teams with only SoCarlina slated to play as many as we do.  

Gus finds his ass on the hot seat so often that he simply has to have a high level of trust in the most important position on the team, and he's felt like he needs a experienced/knowledgeable player back there that's mature and a good decision maker or else he'll get $#it canned.

 

I don't think our schedule is as hard as it is made out to be. If we didn't play musical QBchairs against Clemson....Sean W. could've led us to a victory.  If we would've done any time of game planning against an average UGA team with a hurt SW...that's likely a win. Getting out coached LSU. We make things difficult on ourselves IMO. Gus has trust issues period. It's been so many examples of players being discovered only after we've had no choice but to play them either through injuries or by default. 

If Gus needs an experienced QB then why hasn't he developed one? Why is he still running to JUCO if that's what he needs? If he knows he's not even going to consider playing a young QB then it's up to him to do everything possible to have an experienced QB. Not to start a bash Gus party but just valid questions IMO. Coaches are not being gunshy about playing these younger QBs. Yes, some will pan out and some will not. It's the nature of the game and process. I'm all about playing guys who gives us the best chance to win no matter if they're a freshman or senior. 

Yes, starting with Clemson were difficult games but we blew those opportunities as well as against LSU and UGA when they were just average teams. Now we're coming up on a year where the schedule is brutal and NOW Gus wants to kick things into overdrive. That should've been the mentality years ago. But we are where we are at this point. So we'll have to see if he can get it done. He's created many of these issues himself so at this point, I'm not giving him an out simply because the schedule is brutal. 

[cole256 17,038]

1 minute ago, McLoofus said:

I know Schwartz isn't the same overall physically, but I'm hoping he can ease that sting. 

I thought about that then I realized the entire year I never saw him go get the ball over a defender. I'm hoping he may be able to as well though

[McLoofus 35,182]

Just now, cole256 said:

I thought about that then I realized the entire year I never saw him go get the ball over a defender. I'm hoping he may be able to as well though

Yeah. Of course, we know that Gus doesn't like his guys to get distracted by learning how to do more than one thing. Maybe now that will be Schwartz's thing and somebody else like Hill can do Schwartz's previous thing. 

[WarEagle1983 2,185]

22 hours ago, AU64 said:

Not sure where that comes from because I heard good things about both from the beginning.   But either, both of those guys had great Juco experience.....granted it's JUCO but that's way more than HS and they were more than two years out of HS when they got to AU.  I don't know what they looked like in practice but they were far from being HS freshmen with a couple months of mostly non-contact practice and it was pretty clear to the coaches that they could do the job.     BN definitely looks the part but class 7 HS in Alabama is a far cry from SEC.   

As for Fromm...yep that's a good story but what about the other QBs that the dawgs recruited and who have moved on?   Picking out a couple guys who are the rare exception proves nothing about any other HS prospect and IMO does not mean that a coach has to put any or all of them on the field to know what they can do?  JMO. . 

The point is that even those other guys didn't work out...many were given the opportunity. Jacob Eason was provided an opportunity. He didn't fail miserably...it was just that Fromm ran the offense better. No different than from Kelly Bryant. Point is that coaches were in place to not be scared to either make a change or stick with the young QB and let him go through the growing pains and/or set the QB up to succeed. 

My point is that we can't let fear of a freshman playing in the SEC stop us from playing the best player IF he is indeed the best QB. 

[keesler 5,922]

If we ever thought Gus was gun-shy, scared, apprehensive and skidish in the past with trusting his QBs then wait till this 2019 season.  He fells the heat on his rear end and the intensity of that heat 4-5 weeks ago was scorching.  Which would lead me to believe he'll be in super self preservation mode because of the allegations, threats, and insinuations that he has to get it right in 2019 or he's out the door.

The expectations and demands are higher this season than they've ever been.  He's literally banking on himself by taking the OC position back and he'll sink or swim on his own merits. 

But the feel is that the "Family" reached it's breaking point when he chose to slow play the remainder of the IB and milked out the clock to end the game rather than fight back and use every resource to try to score points.  Patience is paper thin.

 

[AU64 10,122]

21 minutes ago, WarEagle1983 said:

My point is that we can't let fear of a freshman playing in the SEC stop us from playing the best player IF he is indeed the best QB. 

Don't think anyone disagrees with you on this.

Just don't need to pre-concede the starting QB role before everyone has a good audition for it.  And "no" , once again I don't expect A-Day to reveal much about any of the QBs or provide evidence of who will be the starter against Oregon.  

IMO, we will get our usual ration of pablum from the coaching staff right up until the Oregon game is on the horizon.....but no surprise there....NS had his fans believing that Hurts was a good prospect to start for his team and would be an important part of their season. 

[DAG 33,949]

5 minutes ago, AU64 said:

Don't think anyone disagrees with you on this.

Just don't need to pre-concede the starting QB role before everyone has a good audition for it.  And "no" , once again I don't expect A-Day to reveal much about any of the QBs or provide evidence of who will be the starter against Oregon.  

IMO, we will get our usual ration of pablum from the coaching staff right up until the Oregon game is on the horizon.....but no surprise there....NS had his fans believing that Hurts was a good prospect to start for his team and would be an important part of their season. 

I am just going to expect the unexpected . Watch it be Cord Sandberg next year start and I will have to eat an enormous amount of crow. 

[AU64 10,122]

1 minute ago, DAG said:

I am just going to expect the unexpected . Watch it be Cord Sandberg next year start and I will have to eat an enormous amount of crow. 

😄  picking the 60 to 1 long shot huh.?    If you are right you deserve prime rib instead of crow.  

[WarEagle1983 2,185]

4 minutes ago, AU64 said:

Don't think anyone disagrees with you on this.

Just don't need to pre-concede the starting QB role before everyone has a good audition for it.  And "no" , once again I don't expect A-Day to reveal much about any of the QBs or provide evidence of who will be the starter against Oregon.  

IMO, we will get our usual ration of pablum from the coaching staff right up until the Oregon game is on the horizon.....but no surprise there....NS had his fans believing that Hurts was a good prospect to start for his team and would be an important part of their season. 

Oh i'm not giving the job to Nix if that's what anyone may think. I don't even care to listen or watch Gus's pressors anymore and that's fine if we don't know the starter until game time. My concern is that Nix may not be given the job simply because Gus has "trust" issues or it's conceived that we have the toughest schedule and he will not give Nix the job just because we play in the SEC West. My point is that if he's the best QB on the roster and gives us the best chance then none of the aforementioned should matter. We knew at a certain point that SW should've starting but Gus was too apprehensive. At this point, we're going to have a young QB with Nix, Malik or Gatewood. It's time we see what we have or don't have. 

[AU64 10,122]

6 minutes ago, WarEagle1983 said:

Oh i'm not giving the job to Nix if that's what anyone may think. I don't even care to listen or watch Gus's pressors anymore and that's fine if we don't know the starter until game time. My concern is that Nix may not be given the job simply because Gus has "trust" issues or it's conceived that we have the toughest schedule and he will not give Nix the job just because we play in the SEC West. My point is that if he's the best QB on the roster and gives us the best chance then none of the aforementioned should matter. We knew at a certain point that SW should've starting but Gus was too apprehensive. At this point, we're going to have a young QB with Nix, Malik or Gatewood. It's time we see what we have or don't have. 

Trust huh"    

  JMO but the main thing BN has going for him is that Gus likely does not trust any of the incumbents any more than he would trust BN.   I'm guessing this is the closest to a clean slate for the job that AU has had in a long time.     

PS...dilly (hopefully) will have a big role with these guys and hoping his opinion means something. ...however it turns out

[auskip07 930]

2 hours ago, McLoofus said:

Deep and talented, yes. 

Experience matters, though. Even at WR. 

seth played pretty good considering he had no experience.  

[WarEagle1983 2,185]

12 minutes ago, AU64 said:

Trust huh"    

  JMO but the main thing BN has going for him is that Gus likely does not trust any of the incumbents any more than he would trust BN.   I'm guessing this is the closest to a clean slate for the job that AU has had in a long time.     

PS...dilly (hopefully) will have a big role with these guys and hoping his opinion means something. ...however it turns out

Good point Sir! 

[cole256 17,038]

4 minutes ago, auskip07 said:

seth played pretty good considering he had no experience.  

He did pretty good but really he had about 500 yards...because he plays for us we're making it incredible but it's actually ok...there's something in the tank there. We have something we may be able to work with

[shabby 1,956]

I am very optimistic that the team as a whole will be much better this coming year. However the schedule is brutal

[McLoofus 35,182]

27 minutes ago, auskip07 said:

seth played pretty good considering he had no experience.  

I hope you didn't interpret my comment as meaning that experience is required for an individual player to produce.