2007....a make or break year

Warthog · Post by **Warthog** » Tue Jan 16, 2007 10:58 pm

moneymaker02 wrote:don't forget how many players have left the program from that 2004 class and a lot are leaving that are in the 2006 class, a lot that haven't gone public yet i can tell you that. they hate our coaching staff.

Care to elaborate?

moneymaker02 wrote: a lot of players don't understand the position choices like moving aaron davis to linebacker when players have told me he was a good reciever.

I gotta admit, this one baffled me as well. We sucked at WR last year. I have no idea why we took anyone away from that position. Especially to make them an undersized LB.

hammb · Post by **hammb** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 9:12 am

moneymaker02 wrote:don't forget how many players have left the program from that 2004 class and a lot are leaving that are in the 2006 class, a lot that haven't gone public yet i can tell you that. they hate our coaching staff. a lot of players don't understand the position choices like moving aaron davis to linebacker when players have told me he was a good reciever.

I've wondered for awhile if all the transfers are public yet...hopefully it's not too many more.

Even without knowing any more I think the 2006 class was bolstered tremendously by adding a top notch kicker & punter. Especially since the punter was rated #1 in the country by some services. They're both already gone, so I think we knock the '06 class down a little already.

The fact is, as we all know, recruiting rankings are pretty irrelevant once you get the kids in your system. You have to help them grow as players and utilize those talents to their potential. We have not been doing that, and thus we're underperforming.

The list of coaches who can bring in recruits, but still not win, is quite long, and growing by the day. Recruiting is important, but until you can mold them into football players it's also irrelevant.

Jacobs4Heisman · Post by **Jacobs4Heisman** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 9:28 am

Does it seem to anyone else like this staff moves a lot of players around to totally different positions? I know it's very common to put a kid somewhere other than he played in high school, but it feels like we are moving people around a lot later than that in their career, which makes it very tough to develop. I'm not talking about moving people from safety to linebacker or vice versa. I'm talking about moving from WR to LB, LB to FB, DL to OL, WR to S, etc.

Maybe it just feels like we're doing it more often than other programs because we don't hear about it when other programs do it, but it sure does seem to happen often. Maybe it's not that we're changing them, but that we're failing to recognize where they need to be soon enough. Instead of knowing so and so should be an OL during their redshirt year, we teach them 2 years of DL technique and then switch them. The example that's sticking out in my head is Winovich. How many years did it take the staff to figure out he's a great fullback?

Warthog · Post by **Warthog** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 9:42 am

Jacobs4Heisman wrote: How many years did it take the staff to figure out he's a great fullback?

But to extenuate the problem, OUR OFFENSE DOESN'T USE A FULLBACK! They ended up changing the offense to create a position for a guy they can't figure out how to use!

But I agree with your concerns about players switching positions. And it seems like they over compensate when they do this. Two/three years ago, our LBs couldn't tackle, so then we move every warm body to LB. Then our defensive backs struggle, so we focus our recruiting on DBs and move everyone to DB. Now we our overloaded with DBs, but have no WRs. So now we know about 7, 8, 9 signings for next year and three of them are WRs. It seems like Brandon is a year behind in figuring out where the deficiencies are and then over-corrects to remedy the situation.

It's like his philosophy is "Let's throw as many people at the glaring problem and we will surely find someone that can play the position." But then you wasted a year for all those kids that didn't win the position and could have contributed somewhere else.

Flipper · Post by **Flipper** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 9:57 am

Part of the problem, at least on the defensive side of the ball, was the change in coordinators. Lovett seems to favor the smaller pursuit sized LB's. We also needed a serious influx of speed in the secondary, so an athlete like Winovich gets moved to make room for quicker LB's and the secondary gets remade with faster athletes.

On offense... we lost a ton of talent but didn't do much to restock at WR.
2004 brought Partridge as a stand out and Barnes looks like he'll be a winner from the 2005 class. Other than that? I really like Barnes and Partridge but they do not offset the loss of Magner, Sharon, Sanders, Hawk and CMac.

moneymaker02 · Post by **moneymaker02** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 3:05 pm

dont forget how sweet luke alexander and bobby t were, and lets not forget stover. a lot of the guys were talkin about how we coulda used stover so much this year because he was like bullock and macon combined into one back, hit the hole hard with speed and power and just had a mean streak about him when he ran the ball.

also, how many positions did van johnson or scott goodwin play before they finally gave it up. also, look how many different position nate waldron has had. The one position that i am very curious about is that of strong safety with jamal brown and mahone. mahone won the starting job and then got hurt in the middle of the season. i thought brown came in and did a great job as a freshmen and proved in the ohio state game that the boy can hit. i honestly prefer brown to mahone because he seems like a better athlete. therefor would be better in pass coverage.

i cant elaborate on any names that are leaving just becuase that would be wrong and disprectful to my friend who was on the team but graduated.

Falconboy · Post by **Falconboy** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 3:25 pm

Jacobs4Heisman wrote:Does it seem to anyone else like this staff moves a lot of players around to totally different positions? I know it's very common to put a kid somewhere other than he played in high school, but it feels like we are moving people around a lot later than that in their career, which makes it very tough to develop. I'm not talking about moving people from safety to linebacker or vice versa. I'm talking about moving from WR to LB, LB to FB, DL to OL, WR to S, etc.

Maybe it just feels like we're doing it more often than other programs because we don't hear about it when other programs do it, but it sure does seem to happen often. Maybe it's not that we're changing them, but that we're failing to recognize where they need to be soon enough. Instead of knowing so and so should be an OL during their redshirt year, we teach them 2 years of DL technique and then switch them. The example that's sticking out in my head is Winovich. How many years did it take the staff to figure out he's a great fullback?

Absolutely. I'm surprised its taken this long for anyone to notice.

For instance the Brandon Mack move from DE to OT. Could possibly be the worst position move by GB in the time he's been here. A studly NFL sized DE , who desperately needed last year with numerous injures , could've played DT with his added weight gain and we move to OT where we have stockpiled OL positions for the last 4 years to prevent us from having to do crap that like that.

Clearly in this area GB is clueless and I don't know why. None of these guys can develop their raw talent if you keep moving guys around like musical chairs.

Class of 61 · Post by **Class of 61** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 3:26 pm

moneymaker02 wrote:dont forget how sweet luke alexander and bobby t were, and lets not forget stover. a lot of the guys were talkin about how we coulda used stover so much this year because he was like bullock and macon combined into one back, hit the hole hard with speed and power and just had a mean streak about him when he ran the ball.

Moneymaker, FWIW, Stover was recuited by Urban Meyer at same time that PJ was...I was at a local alum function shortly after signings that year, and talked to UM personally...he described Stover as a "go to" RB, even though he thought Pope would be good too. This just shows what can happen during recruiting kids who look great in HS, may not have what it takes to stay in school. (or play at the same level in college)

Flipper · Post by **Flipper** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 3:37 pm

I don't knw why they moved Mack...when he lined up at DT next to Briggs they were very difficult to handle because of their quickness. We look pretty good at DT right now with Davis, Minturn, Young, Ream...maybe Mack since he played there at the end when the injuries piled up.

DE is a bit of a concern

Don't get me started on Winovich..the guy plays TE as a freshman and you don't throw to him out of the backfield when he plays FB? We couldn't have run a few less QB draws one game to try a little pass to Pete in the flat?

Warthog · Post by **Warthog** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 4:01 pm

Pete has linebacker hands.

Jacobs4Heisman · Post by **Jacobs4Heisman** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 4:09 pm

Warthog wrote:Pete has linebacker hands.

So did a couple of our receivers -- didn't stop us from throwing to them.

Our offense had all the diversity of a Klan rally last year.

Falconboy · Post by **Falconboy** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 4:15 pm

Jacobs4Heisman wrote:
Warthog wrote:
Our offense had all the diversity of a Klan rally last year.

Whoa, thats a good one JH4!

Schadenfreude · Post by **Schadenfreude** » Wed Jan 17, 2007 8:56 pm

falconboy wrote:
Jacobs4Heisman wrote:
Warthog wrote:
Our offense had all the diversity of a Klan rally last year.
Whoa, thats a good one JH4!

Good line.