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O-line Talk

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straight talk said:
I do believe that Clark and Nelson will be part of the long term solution. They both remind me of many of the OL recruited to UM NC teams. Scaife is decent and will continue to improve. He has the right attitude, just needs more size and strength to play OG. He should be an OG not an OT, but he is the best OT on the team today. D1 strength for OL typically takes 3 years to gain. Donaldson would be much better if he would stop listening to agents and 305 homie hanger ons. But he probably leaves after this year and play a couple years as a practice squad player in the NFL. Gaynor will continue to improve and be pretty good - he is not the problem, nor is the an ultimate solution. Campbell is a 2nd year guy. Was abused by a 5th year guy against the Gators. He should get better and be part of the solution. Traore, not ready now, but I like his size and attitude of wanting to be better. He want to JC not because he was a dummy, but because he wanted to raise his profile. At the very least he is an upgrade from Mahoney and Boulware. Herbert actually looked fat to my eyes. I will give him the benifit of doubt due to a shoulder injury - makes it difficult to improve upper body strength. But I do have concerns he was just overated out of HS and rode an early Michigan offer to build a reputation. Hillery is a big man but was a project out of HS. He is the kind of guy that may never do anything or it might come together sometime. Worth having on the team. Kennedy = fraud, I want to hire his marketing team. Did he really have an offer from Oklahoma, or Texas? Dykstra, see Hillery comment, but he looks too happy just being on the sideline in the uniform, see Bar Milo film. Elgammal, is a project, but I like the idea of taking a tall, big bodied and athletic Power Forward that recently started playing football.

My biggest question to Manny is why only 11 scholarship OL.? When a position group is weak, it should be over recruited until it is fixed. We have 1 third stringer on OL. DT was very weak when Manny arrived. Now at least we have 8 players to work at 2 positions including three true FS. Not saying we have Brown, Kennedy, Maryland, Sapp in that group but at least it is not a glaring weakness. Bethel is solid - not great, Ford is showing major progress and at least looks like an NFL DT, UCLA transfer is a solid rotation guy, Nesta when healthy and hopefully realizing that their should be at least a 10 to 1 ratio of good plays vs. stupid penalties should be a strength. Miller might end up being a star. He is making big plays in limited snaps. And Blisset, Hunte and Holley all have good HS credentials. We have three committed solid DT's for 2020 and will loose two to graduation. At least the numbers are in place, unlike OL?

Bottom line is Manny must figure out a way to load up on the OL room until it is at least not a horrible weakness, which it is now.
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A lot of this makes sense but the problem is you can't tank this season waiting for reinforcements to arrive. If that happens, are we going to get quality recruits? What about the guys playing this year, are they going to become head cases knowing nothing but failure and having to have to be built up from scratch next spring? That's what Barry's being paid for. He may have been dealt a weak hand, but he has to make these guys serviceable.
 
My question is what are the coaches seeing in practice. Is it only in games where Zion is getting beat like that or does he hold his own against our defense. What does that say about our vaunted defense. Things that make you say hmmm 🤔
 
No one on here has the answer as to why our OL sucks, but I do know one thing—our last OL coach was a journeyman bum and our new one is a complete unknown with no resume at all. The last two OCs haven’t helped either with the type of offense they tried to run.

I’m a firm believer that OL is the one position above all others that requires an incredible teacher. Some positions like WR and RB any clown can coach. You need bigtime recruiters at those two spots, but you need a technical wizard coaching your OL.
 
brock said:
We need to try herbert out, he can’t be that worse where he can’t even get into games. I was saying the same thing about duke oline, in 4 games 1 sack given up while playing bama already vs Miami giving up 18 sacks in 4 games. Sh*t is ridiculous
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Duke’s staff is thousands of miles above ours. Sad but true.
 
Concerning the O-line next season. Manny and Barry are going to have hit GT lotto winning ticket again. Ala WR KJ Osborn.
 
Daperfectstorm said:
My question is what are the coaches seeing in practice. Is it only in games where Zion is getting beat like that or does he hold his own against our defense. What does that say about our vaunted defense. Things that make you say hmmm 🤔
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Zion doesnt have a problem blocking Garvin in practice because Garvin spends all his time in pass coverage or spying the QB.
 
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To be clear

Zion should be redshirting. It isn’t fair to the kid to be put in this situation.

Dammit! I think he’s my favorite player insofar as wanting to see him do well every play just bc of the situation.

Can we at least not make him put a hand down?
 
So, I'm doing something I never do, which is watch pro football. I'm watching the vaunted Rams offense. I'm noticing that the Rams' O-line is playing pretty poorly in this game vs the Bucs. Dudes are getting beaten right and left, Goff doesn't have much time to throw. Running game isn't really there. Yet they are still manufacturing points and are still in the game. They're doing it by getting the ball out quickly and making very accurate passes. I'm not sure why we couldn't do this.
 
A1cane said:
Imo Nelson's problem is he over thinks presnap and loses track of the snap count and that's why he when he gets beat he loses to outside move and he is the last guy off the ball. That is just a example of a true freshman starting and trying to do to much. I am the least worried about him. Donaldson plays with heavy feet, gaynor goes for kill shots and whiffs alot, scaife is the best lineman we have, and clarke over sets and leaves holes
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the TLDR is.... Kid isn’t ready and shouldn’t have been out there

scaife Donaldson gaynor Reed and Herbert
 
The Franchise said:
Zion doesnt have a problem blocking Garvin in practice because Garvin spends all his time in pass coverage or spying the QB.
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Couldn’t agree more. Football coaches need to embrace being football coaches. Seems like our staff thinks of themselves a cerebral bunch and it’s holding back some of our difference makers, namely Garvin. Line that kid up and say go. As much of a lazy bum Kool was on the recruiting trail he understood the positives of keeping it simple. Jess was more of a run technician, but still didn’t out think himself. We are drifting back to Doh’Nofrio ****. Manny needs to fix this as it’s his side of the ball.

Go Canes!
 
Wouldn’t mind seeing some unbalanced sets to help spark the run game as a change of pace to dictate to the opposing defense. If you RPO off of this unbalanced look you can make defenses pay especially the way jarrens throwing the ball in the intermediate game.
 
A lot has to do with our slow developing I formation under center offense.
 
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252cane said:
I just cant figure out how the o-line is so shìtty. I looked at duke who only gave up 1 sack to bama and there o-line looks decent.

Guess what? Duke has 2 new starters at tackle and one is a rsfresh and the other a true fresh. Their center is a rssoph. Does that sound familiar? Their highest rated starter was the true freshman tackle at 88. They do have a rssr and rsjr at guard but donaldson has a ton of experince and scaife has started the last 10 or 11 games.

So i don't want to keep hearing the excuse of being young. Either the coaching sucks or the evaluations wasn't good.

I know El isn't a big fan of herbert and i wasn't high on him coming out of hs. But at this point is he really that much worse than zion and campbell? I think at the least he will get out his stance quicker than zion.

Some needs to be done expeditiously.
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I would put my money on coaching
 
bacane said:
Yeah, ok, O-line is a mess, let's not get carried away.

As stated, problem is on the shoulders of the last staff and Searels in particular. The lack of evaluation and development in the 2-3 previous classes is eye opening. Pretty much a reach to put the OL nightmare on Manny, or current coordinator or OL coach. They scrambled like **** bringing in a freshman class and taking flyers on Traore and Kennedy (oh boy). Nelson came in at 230 lbs or whatever. You really think he was gonna put on some quick weight - even though still undersized - and physically hold up against grown *** men? And you're gonna move a true freshman center, who again isn't physically ready to play, over to guard and we'll roll? These cats are being throw in because they're apparently better than the alternatives. This OL mess will take at least another year or two to straighten out, to where these kids are physical ready and talent can be infused. Staff needs to be digging through the JUCO ranks as we speak.

Not giving Enos and offensive underlings a pass, either. Hoping he'll have a revelation during the off-week and get the QB from behind center. Don't want to ever see Jarren turning his back to the line of scrimmage again.
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It's easily the worst O-line situation since the 1970s here. And the 1994 line cost us a national championship.
 
JMG said:
A lot has to do with our slow developing I formation under center offense.
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But what people are not understanding about the under the center formations is that a lot of the plays under center mimic each other so defenses will pay if they continue to blitz us thinking it’s run when it’s pass or vise versus sah. The RBS after the fake have got to pick up the blitz better. Guys think because a running back is fast and runs hard that they should be starting or seeing more time but can THEY PASS BLOCK TOO?
 
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