DAG 33,997 Posted September 29, 2020 Share Posted September 29, 2020 (edited) 14 minutes ago, McLoofus said: It makes the game threads humorous to me. Every Saturday. Auburn fans: "OMG this defense is terrible, why won't they tackle anybody, they're having their way with us" Auburn defense: *goes into halftime having only given up 7 points* This is pretty much the mindset of majority of fans. A fickle bunch, which is why I imagine the players and coaches pay very little attention to their opinion. If Shivers go off this week against UGA, these same fans will be riding his train and act like they never downplayed his role as the starting feature back. I legit try to avoid the game day threads. Edited September 29, 2020 by DAG 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
McLoofus 35,182 Posted September 29, 2020 Share Posted September 29, 2020 5 minutes ago, DAG said: This is pretty much the mindset of majority of fans. A fickle bunch, which is why I imagine the players and coaches pay very little attention to their opinion. If Shivers go off this week against UGA, these same fans will be riding his train and act like they never downplayed his role as the starting feature back. I legit try to avoid the game day threads. Yup. A few people admitted that they were still calling for CAP halfway through 2013. Most didn't, though. Totally off topic: Kerryon Johnson is currently graded as the best pass blocking RB in the NFL. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slammer1 409 Posted September 30, 2020 Share Posted September 30, 2020 On 9/27/2020 at 3:34 PM, JMR said: With this being the first of these this season (and with the way 2020 has gone so far, maybe the last), a quick reminder: I watch the game, and make a few mental notes that I try to summarize when it's over. I refuse to watch a game over and over, so I may see some things wrong, or maybe miss some things altogether. I make no claim to being "right" about what I saw, hence the name....Things I Think I Saw. I may very well be overly generous in my overall assessment, given the circumstances of this particular football season. Lots of losses to the draft and graduation, no spring practice, an erratic off-season, and a protracted pre-season with lots of disruptions and interruptions. I was relatively pleased with Auburn's play in the game. UK came in with lots of experience on both the offensive and defensive lines. Four of five UK offensive linemen were named to various pre-season All-SEC teams. The Cats returned 9 starters on defense. With all those caveats listed, here are some things I think I saw in the game: Auburn's defensive line was handled pretty easily by Kentucky's very good offensive line. UK did not miss many assignments, and appeared to be exceptionally well-versed in their blocking schemes. As the game moved along, I thought Auburn's DL got better at using their hands and keeping the UK OL from getting into their bodies. That trend continued throughout the game, and the AU defense got better from beginning to end. With a relatively experienced group of linebackers, I saw more bad fits than I expected on UK running plays between the tackles. That tendency did not improve drastically during the game, and will likely be a point of emphasis in practice this week. Auburn's offensive line play was not great, but given the fact that there were four new starters in that group, I thought they played surprisingly well. Pass protection was good for the most part, with only a couple of breakdowns. That phase I thought was an improvement over last season. Left tackle Alec Jackson had a couple of false starts, and I don't recall any others by linemen. There were some "mental lapses" by offensive linemen, like putting the head on the wrong side of the defender, not moving the knees on backside cutoffs, etc. Those things become automatic with time and experience. Auburn pulled more backside linemen (sometimes both the guard and tackle, sometimes only the guard) than I remember seeing in a while, and those pulling linemen usually found a block. The "Chad Morris Offense" was an improvement in my mind. Not as predictable, and more of the field was utilized. Keep in mind, nothing was "fine-tuned", as this was Game One for almost the entire offensive front. Auburn will have to continue to improve its run game going forward. I liked the two-point conversion call after Auburn's first TD. Don't particularly like the play itself, but love the idea of going for two when it's certainly unexpected. I think when considering the AU offense in this game, one needs to be mindful of the fact that Kentucky returned a majority of defensive starters this season, and Stoops' teams are very sound fundamentally. Some newcomers to the AU defense showed promise. Truesdell and Newkirk played hard and with lots of effort. Colby Wooden made some plays, and looks like he will be a good one. There were some breakdowns in the secondary, but those will be corrected. Overall, I thought the secondary played very well. McCreary, Simpson, and Sherwood all made big plays. The AU defense was without Big Kat Bryant, and then without Derek Hall. With having won the game, that becomes a good thing from an adjustment and experience standpoint. I didn't quite agree with the targeting call on Hall, but I am admittedly biased. For what it's worth, it was a great effort by Hall, who tackled the UK QB as he threw the ball, then hustled to catch up and make a block for McCreary after his pick. I thought Bo Nix showed progress from last year. He wasn't perfect, and lost focus on his footwork a few times, throwing off his back foot, or pedaling backwards. But the strength and accuracy of his arm looked much improved to me. He did appear to bail on plays too early a few times, and his escape from the pocket is entirely too repetitive/predictable. I don't know if there are checkdowns on some of those plays, but a handful of times, it looked like he had one defender to read, and if the prime receiver was covered, he took off. One of the things I was hoping for from Chad Morris was checkdowns to the running backs. Didn't see that this week. As is almost always true after a game, especially the first game, there is lots of stuff to work on. While it's well-recognized that Kentucky is much better than they have traditionally been over the last several years, I feel pretty comfortable saying that Georgia will be as good or better. All in all, my take on Game One is that we have a ways to go, but we are on track to get there. I thought the game was well-coached and mostly well-played. There were not a lot of stupid, emotional penalties, and that's often not the case in early games. We played a quality opponent, overcame occasional adversity, and won. I'll take it. Dawgs up next! War Eagle! Good to see you back Coach 👍. Semper Fi and WDE!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
With this being the first of these this season (and with the way 2020 has gone so far, maybe the last), a quick reminder: I watch the game, and make a few mental notes that I try to summarize when it's over. I refuse to watch a game over and over, so I may see some things wrong, or maybe miss some things altogether. I make no claim to being "right" about what I saw, hence the name....Things I Think I Saw. I may very well be overly generous in my overall assessment, given the circumstances of this particular football season. Lots of losses to the draft and graduation, no spring practice, an erratic off-season, and a protracted pre-season with lots of disruptions and interruptions. I was relatively pleased with Auburn's play in the game. UK came in with lots of experience on both the offensive and defensive lines. Four of five UK offensive linemen were named to various pre-season All-SEC teams. The Cats returned 9 starters on defense. With all those caveats listed, here are some things I think I saw in the game: Auburn's defensive line was handled pretty easily by Kentucky's very good offensive line. UK did not miss many assignments, and appeared to be exceptionally well-versed in their blocking schemes. As the game moved along, I thought Auburn's DL got better at using their hands and keeping the UK OL from getting into their bodies. That trend continued throughout the game, and the AU defense got better from beginning to end. With a relatively experienced group of linebackers, I saw more bad fits than I expected on UK running plays between the tackles. That tendency did not improve drastically during the game, and will likely be a point of emphasis in practice this week. Auburn's offensive line play was not great, but given the fact that there were four new starters in that group, I thought they played surprisingly well. Pass protection was good for the most part, with only a couple of breakdowns. That phase I thought was an improvement over last season. Left tackle Alec Jackson had a couple of false starts, and I don't recall any others by linemen. There were some "mental lapses" by offensive linemen, like putting the head on the wrong side of the defender, not moving the knees on backside cutoffs, etc. Those things become automatic with time and experience. Auburn pulled more backside linemen (sometimes both the guard and tackle, sometimes only the guard) than I remember seeing in a while, and those pulling linemen usually found a block. The "Chad Morris Offense" was an improvement in my mind. Not as predictable, and more of the field was utilized. Keep in mind, nothing was "fine-tuned", as this was Game One for almost the entire offensive front. Auburn will have to continue to improve its run game going forward. I liked the two-point conversion call after Auburn's first TD. Don't particularly like the play itself, but love the idea of going for two when it's certainly unexpected. I think when considering the AU offense in this game, one needs to be mindful of the fact that Kentucky returned a majority of defensive starters this season, and Stoops' teams are very sound fundamentally. Some newcomers to the AU defense showed promise. Truesdell and Newkirk played hard and with lots of effort. Colby Wooden made some plays, and looks like he will be a good one. There were some breakdowns in the secondary, but those will be corrected. Overall, I thought the secondary played very well. McCreary, Simpson, and Sherwood all made big plays. The AU defense was without Big Kat Bryant, and then without Derek Hall. With having won the game, that becomes a good thing from an adjustment and experience standpoint. I didn't quite agree with the targeting call on Hall, but I am admittedly biased. For what it's worth, it was a great effort by Hall, who tackled the UK QB as he threw the ball, then hustled to catch up and make a block for McCreary after his pick. I thought Bo Nix showed progress from last year. He wasn't perfect, and lost focus on his footwork a few times, throwing off his back foot, or pedaling backwards. But the strength and accuracy of his arm looked much improved to me. He did appear to bail on plays too early a few times, and his escape from the pocket is entirely too repetitive/predictable. I don't know if there are checkdowns on some of those plays, but a handful of times, it looked like he had one defender to read, and if the prime receiver was covered, he took off. One of the things I was hoping for from Chad Morris was checkdowns to the running backs. Didn't see that this week. As is almost always true after a game, especially the first game, there is lots of stuff to work on. While it's well-recognized that Kentucky is much better than they have traditionally been over the last several years, I feel pretty comfortable saying that Georgia will be as good or better. All in all, my take on Game One is that we have a ways to go, but we are on track to get there. I thought the game was well-coached and mostly well-played. There were not a lot of stupid, emotional penalties, and that's often not the case in early games. We played a quality opponent, overcame occasional adversity, and won. I'll take it. Dawgs up next! War Eagle!
JMR 2,118 Posted September 30, 2020 Author Share Posted September 30, 2020 1 hour ago, Slammer1 said: Good to see you back Coach 👍. Semper Fi and WDE!!! Semper Fi, Slammer! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoachPink7259 79 Posted September 30, 2020 Share Posted September 30, 2020 This is great stuff, Coach! Love it. It looks like the running game is going to be primarily Counter and Inside Zone with mixes of Outside Zone and other schemes. I have begged and begged for some variety in the run game and so far I thought this year is off to a good start with that. Inside Zone was probably 85% of AU's run game last year. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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