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Leonard Taylor is a DC Defender

gogeta4 said:
Boy yall couldnt wait to jump on em...Stay Classy friends. lol

Dude is currently on an nfl team but heyyyy....
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“Stay classy”? Is LT your nephew? He was a five star who severely underachieved, left early, went UNDRAFTED leaving hundreds of thousands of dollars behind and is fighting for a spot on the practice squad in the NFL (let’s call it as it is please). Some fans, myself being one, are sick and tired of seeing these underachieving five star flops and that results in a “stay classy”?
 
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OrangeBowlMagic said:
This is the definition of showing up on the field. That’s a big boy play and can be the literal difference in winning or losing football games.
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I have a lot of respect for your opinions and agree with them more times than not. Not picking on your takes when it comes to Leonard, just using a reputable contributor’s comments to be a contrarian.

First and foremost as a man in his 40’s I refuse to refer to him as LT, 56 , or whatever he or others around him refer to him as. Ironically the real LT56 football life was airing yesterday so I feel even stronger about my resistance to it. Savage vs chihuahua comes to mind when I think of the two.

The physical ability and traits Leonard has dwarf most of those who have lined up on defensive line over the last 20 years of college football. The reality is his collective performance during his time here showed flashes, but ultimately was consistent with him being a UFA. Most organizations would take a flyer on a guy like this because of those traits and abilities. Bottom line is there’s enough red flags with him outside of that physical ability to where a draft pick was not wasted on him.

I refuse to get personal as we’re all in some way a product of our genetics and environment. But looking at guys like this and seeing their approach off and often times on the field yields nothing except the thought of being an absolute bust and borderline waste of God given ability 99.99% of others don’t have and will never have. Yet those of us around the program and in the stands think he was some massive impact player who deserves more credit than he gets. Personally that thought process is indicative of just how awful we’ve been for a very long time.

The brutal reality is he and others are better off being gone from the facility. I challenge anyone involved with the program to say he made his teammates better, worked his *** off, and cared enough to be really good, much less great. Anyone who says he did is not being truthful.
 
OrangeBowlMagic said:
Also, we bag on this kid a lot, me included. But this is a concern for me. I think we’ll be OK at DT, but this dude did have explosive plays and I’m not sure we have anyone on the roster who has these type of ceiling plays in their range of outcomes.

This is a perfect look for fsu. They execute it perfectly, and it’s a walk-in TD if not for 56 just ragdolling the center. 81 gets mushed, as usual. The pulling tackle erases the backer. The backside backer is late and is sealed. This is a massive gain, but 56 wins, and it’s a TFL. And this is where we need to be careful with “their OL stinks”, too. They all executed flawlessly here, but LT makes a play one-on-one, and the narrative is, oh they can’t run on us. If he takes this play off, or if anyone else on the roster is in on this play, it’s likely 6 and the narrative is massively different.

Do we have anyone on the current roster who makes this play? Hopefully Barrow is the dude who can replace production like this.

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I 100% believe we have guys on the roster right now they can make that play but even more important, they won’t take the next 10 plays off like this lazy kid did.
 
NicKane said:
I 100% believe we have guys on the roster right now they can make that play but even more important, they won’t take the next 10 plays off like this lazy kid did.
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TrumpyCane looks at it like this

Can the DTs on our roster be consistent play in and play out with high effort because that will be more beneficial than Taylor making 1-2 splash plays a game and the rest of the time ******* off
 
Contrary to popular belief. A lot of players and I mean a lot.
We’re not ready for the drastic change from Manny to Mario.

We went from a program where a coach could literally smell flower on the players and were literally high during games.
Then Mario steps in and has the bull**** meter at 0.00 level.
That doesn’t mean Mario has no faults; but come on man!

Mario is more of a Miami fan than most of the dudes that were on the team. You can only say that about a few college coaches.

The change was not welcomed at all.
I doubt that’s the only reason Taylor left. And I’m not sayin he was getting high. But he didn’t adapt and looked like he didn’t adapt at the Jets.

The nfl eats its own. There is a reason why those careers are short. If it isn’t the coaches it’s the teamates that will call you out on your bs. Especially if you’re not producing. They’ll walk straight into the coaches office and say “this dude has gotta go”. There is a lot of pride and money at stake.

The nfl is full of 2 types of players imo.
Talented a- holes and grinders that won’t be denied.

Talented a- holes are tolerated up to a point.
But grinders that are true teammates are the ones that last. A lot of nfl pensions are from dudes nobody has ever heard of.

I’ll keep posting it over and over again.
Talent is not that rare, and the most overrated attribute of an athlete.

We can post hundreds of high school tapes against legit competition that make you wonder “holy sht what happened”. ****, even college tape makes you wonder what happened.

Whenever I meet a professional player from any sport I always ask one question: Did you play with or against a player in high school that was better than you but didn’t make the league? All of them say yes.

We had 2 players just of the top of my head that were played on the wrong position and thrived when they got to the league.
Shields and Chick.

Taylor either did not develop the skill to play elite 3t in the league or just didn’t have it. and the combine showed it. A lot players move up the draft based on combine alone.

This has happened numerous times down here.
Pope and JT4 are prime examples of dudes that didn’t lack ability to play a long time in the league. And don’t say size please cause Hollywood Brown was 165 and toasted the dolphins for like one-fiddy in his first nfl game and ran the 40 in 4.27!!! Cot dammm!!!!

Some dudes are born with it. Some dudes learn it.

And some dudes have so much talent that they just don’t believe that they need anything else to improve them.
 
BigDikDaddyFromCincinnati said:
Are you his uncle too?

PS. No one is “******” on Rueben Bain or the Mauigoa brothers. I wonder why.
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No relation. He underachieved and didn’t put in the work he should have. I don’t need to go on the internet and talk **** about him anonymously though. I’ll critique football skills but none of this personally hurts my feelings so I don’t need to personally try to hurt someone else’s feelings to feel better.
 
Ghandi said:
$400k
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EOCRnpvUYAAgmza.webp
 
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pacusmc said:
Contrary to popular belief. A lot of players and I mean a lot.
We’re not ready for the drastic change from Manny to Mario.

We went from a program where a coach could literally smell flower on the players and were literally high during games.
Then Mario steps in and has the bull**** meter at 0.00 level.
That doesn’t mean Mario has no faults; but come on man!

Mario is more of a Miami fan than most of the dudes that were on the team. You can only say that about a few college coaches.

The change was not welcomed at all.
I doubt that’s the only reason Taylor left. And I’m not sayin he was getting high. But he didn’t adapt and looked like he didn’t adapt at the Jets.

The nfl eats its own. There is a reason why those careers are short. If it isn’t the coaches it’s the teamates that will call you out on your bs. Especially if you’re not producing. They’ll walk straight into the coaches office and say “this dude has gotta go”. There is a lot of pride and money at stake.

The nfl is full of 2 types of players imo.
Talented a- holes and grinders that won’t be denied.

Talented a- holes are tolerated up to a point.
But grinders that are true teammates are the ones that last. A lot of nfl pensions are from dudes nobody has ever heard of.

I’ll keep posting it over and over again.
Talent is not that rare, and the most overrated attribute of an athlete.

We can post hundreds of high school tapes against legit competition that make you wonder “holy sht what happened”. ****, even college tape makes you wonder what happened.

Whenever I meet a professional player from any sport I always ask one question: Did you play with or against a player in high school that was better than you but didn’t make the league? All of them say yes.

We had 2 players just of the top of my head that were played on the wrong position and thrived when they got to the league.
Shields and Chick.

Taylor either did not develop the skill to play elite 3t in the league or just didn’t have it. and the combine showed it. A lot players move up the draft based on combine alone.

This has happened numerous times down here.
Pope and JT4 are prime examples of dudes that didn’t lack ability to play a long time in the league. And don’t say size please cause Hollywood Brown was 165 and toasted the dolphins for like one-fiddy in his first nfl game and ran the 40 in 4.27!!! Cot dammm!!!!

Some dudes are born with it. Some dudes learn it.

And some dudes have so much talent that they just don’t believe that they need anything else to improve them.
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I don’t necessarily disagree but most of Taylor’s career was played under Mario. He played one season under Manny as a reserve freshman tackle. He had every opportunity to transfer when Manny got fired but he stayed and played two seasons for Mario. I don’t think he was going to give full effort no matter who the coach was.
 
DTP said:
No relation. He underachieved and didn’t put in the work he should have. I don’t need to go on the internet and talk **** about him anonymously though. I’ll critique football skills but none of this personally hurts my feelings so I don’t need to personally try to hurt someone else’s feelings to feel better.
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I have not talked **** about him. I have spoken indisputable facts. I’m not trying to hurt him. My life is pretty awesome in many ways; not perfect, but pretty awesome. No need for me to bash him to make myself feel good since I already feel good. I got passed over by major programs because I’m 6’0” not 6’4” so it irks me when people who have that size and talent **** it away. I’m a middle aged football fan on a message board venting about an underachieving five star. It’s what we do.

Have a nice day and go Canes.
 
No_Fly_Zone said:
Two things can be true at once:

(1) LT did not realize his potential during his time at UM. He was inconsistent, had sub-par conditioning, and really seemed to take plays off.
(2) LT was/is a hurricane and now that he isn't here to hurt us in games, there's really no need to pile on and dance on his (professional) grave.

Kevin Olsen, Trevor Darling, Joe Yearby, Bar Milo, Jovani Haskins, Navaughn Donaldson, DJ Ivey, and now LT... these former blue-chip Hurricanes are all gone from the program. They can't hurt us anymore. Let their careers rest in peace.
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Joe Yearby, Trevor Darling, and DJ Ivey shouldn't be mentioned with the rest of these guys in this post. They had solid UM careers.
 
Just wish we could feel slightly better about the DT position in 2024. Taylor may never fulfill his potential but would have liked to see him paired with Barrow/Clark.
 
rok said:
Just wish we could feel slightly better about the DT position in 2024. Taylor may never fulfill his potential but would have liked to see him paired with Barrow/Clark.
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Unlikely we would have went through all the Barrow hassle if Taylor was still here.
 
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jps2344 said:
I have a lot of respect for your opinions and agree with them more times than not. Not picking on your takes when it comes to Leonard, just using a reputable contributor’s comments to be a contrarian.

First and foremost as a man in his 40’s I refuse to refer to him as LT, 56 , or whatever he or others around him refer to him as. Ironically the real LT56 football life was airing yesterday so I feel even stronger about my resistance to it. Savage vs chihuahua comes to mind when I think of the two.

The physical ability and traits Leonard has dwarf most of those who have lined up on defensive line over the last 20 years of college football. The reality is his collective performance during his time here showed flashes, but ultimately was consistent with him being a UFA. Most organizations would take a flyer on a guy like this because of those traits and abilities. Bottom line is there’s enough red flags with him outside of that physical ability to where a draft pick was not wasted on him.

I refuse to get personal as we’re all in some way a product of our genetics and environment. But looking at guys like this and seeing their approach off and often times on the field yields nothing except the thought of being an absolute bust and borderline waste of God given ability 99.99% of others don’t have and will never have. Yet those of us around the program and in the stands think he was some massive impact player who deserves more credit than he gets. Personally that thought process is indicative of just how awful we’ve been for a very long time.

The brutal reality is he and others are better off being gone from the facility. I challenge anyone involved with the program to say he made his teammates better, worked his *** off, and cared enough to be really good, much less great. Anyone who says he did is not being truthful.
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Very fair, sir.
 
DC3 said:
He’s got a shot to make the roster or at least PSquad with the Jets, but half the guys on the thread think he already got cut
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Ive been on here long enough to know how it works.... its hilarious watching it unfold.
 
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