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Plays that excited me, Plays that scared me

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LuCane said:
I don't care who starts, but Sam Brooks has to play more snaps than Mccloud against UL or we're going to see some cringeworthy chunk plays. Look, Zach has attributes I've been a huge fan of since he got here. But, I'm on the edge of my seat watching him choose gaps and close. If we mess around with it against UL, we're toast.
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I totally agree. think it was the first UAB play where he completely read it wrong and the QB dropped it off to the RB underneath for a huge gain. Would also love to see more help for the CBs, geez
 
I'm already beyond fed up of Blake Baker.

He was as bad as Enos last year - Diaz's loyalty is going to get him fired too.
 
LuCane said:
Just 4 plays and what they mean for later.

Since it's only game 1, let's start with the "bad." For context, most know I'm not on either extreme of the Blake Baker debate. I don't think he sucks. I don't think he's the head coach candidate some claim him to be. So far, I think he's a dude whose evidence is closer to what Manny Diaz showed us in 2016.

Play that scared me: In the second half, on a critical play, our defense ended up in a 3rd and 12. UAB was toward the top end of the TV screen and on a hash with the short side of the field being their sideline. I immediately looked over to my friends and fam watching with me and said "****, last year Baker unnecessarily sent DB blitzes from the short side of the field in this scenario. Hope that tendency is gone." Play begins and slot WR on the short side motions to the bottom of the screen. Frierson stays frozen in the slot, giving a strong tell he's blitzing. Ball is snapped and he blitzes.

Unless this is some chess game trick by the defensive coaching staff to show an old tendency during the first game against a "lesser" opponent, this should be a cause for concern. Why? Because we have to stop this **** immediately. I'm a dopey message board poster who charts plays. Any legitimate team we will face has a non-dopey QA guy charting plays getting analyzed by a near million dollar OC.

This is ONE tendency that popped up multiple times last season. There are other examples of gratuitous blitzing. Sometimes a blitz is needed. Often times, it's not! Against Louisville and beyond, our 3rd down conversion stop % (which was 20% last night) will not be aided by QBs missing open WRs or lesser talent. It could track up (hopefully not) closer to last year's numbers if we continue to play with Miami talent the way Conference USA D-Coordinators have to use their lesser talent.

Play that excited me: The results, especially in these games, are always less important to me than how they translate for future games. King scores a TD on 1st and 10 from the 12 yard line. "Hey, that's what he's supposed to do!" Well, we struggled like **** in these scenarios last year. Our RZ offense was trash because we were so rigid in our playcalling and didn't have a dynamic player.

If I remember correctly, we were in a 2X2 set with 2 WRs on each side of the formation. UAB blitzed (again, IIRC, i haven't re-watched the game and taken notes yet). Our OL/RB combined to be 6 players vs 5 UAB defenders. The route combinations were fairly vanilla and UAB had 3 defenders on 2 receivers (one being Jordan) on both sides. John Campbell had a defender slip inside and disrupt King's pocket. Last year, this is a sack, a forced ball to Jordan, or at best an incomplete pass.

This year, as you can guess, our dynamic QB tucked the ball and easily picked up a chunk (which resulted in a TD). We saw another glimpse of that on another 3rd down conversion as well. This is a big f'in deal, even if we do somehow suck this year. We have been so awful at 3rd down conversion % because we continuously get ourselves into 3rd and unmanageable. We all expected this, but it was good to see against a disciplined, well-coached defense.

Play that scared me: On a 20+ yard run by UAB, we got gashed up front for poor gap control. We know this happens with Diaz/Baker front 7 schemes. We rely on Safeties to clean up. Perhaps this play goes unnoticed because there was a bigger pass play on the drive and we also somehow allowed an 11 yard run on 3rd and 15, but it's important for our season. Amari Carter whiffed in the open field on that 20+ yard chunk play.

I'm not anti-Amari, I promise. I've had some long debates with some of the more respected posters on this board over his abilities. He has some great attributes that can help us. However, this was another example of his issues in the open field. He also got blown by on a pass play, though thankfully the QB had a junior high throw that fell short. If you're not concerned about one of our key Safeties (who will play a lot) missing tackles in the open field, then I guess expect a lot chunk plays. We can't afford them. We're not good enough at LB yet.

Play(s) that excited me: I'm lumping two plays together. YO! You see Knighton's 18 yard run from midfield? Oh, man. Everything I hoped for from him in one play. The balance, the cutbacks, the pop. YO! You see Chaney's 33 yard run to get us in scoring position in the 2nd half? That's not a garbage time run. That's a run made in a 17-14 game against, again, a well-coached defense. Later in the season, I'm sure there'll be an instance where Chaney bounces outside too quickly, but this was very nicely done and the subsequent cutback inside showed me exactly what I hoped for: this is a kid who's not close to his ceiling yet. Great balance and ran with a forward lean yesterday.
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Not a "play", but a tendency I've seen.

I have no idea if our runners get bonus points for staying within the hash marks, but they frequently overlook the ability to bounce outside and pick up significant yardage.

One play where King was running the ball (AND had a blocker ahead of him), he cut it back inside right into the arms of a tackler, when he could have slowed down a step, used the blocker for a pick, and then darted down the sideline for a lot more yardage.

Another play (RB, I think it was Cam), there was a ton of open green grass past the one defender, but he cut it inside instead of bouncing outside and got maybe a yard or two. I don't understand why this continues to happen over and over again. If we have RBs who don't have the speed to beat ONE GUY to the edge, or can't make a move to elude the guy, I don't know why we are even bothering.

Miami has superior speed. Why do we continue NOT to use it on offense with plays at the edges?
 
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LuCane said:
Agree we need way more than what we saw. The overthrow miss on the deep pass to Harley is probably a timing issue. The wide miss (to Payton, IIRC) on the triple option type RPO at the goal line was just a wild throw.

I'd stress some patience. This is a really weird year (obviously), but especially in the sense of no extended Spring and game scenarios. Put it this way, we looked better against UAB in Game 1 of 2020 than we did against Central Michigan in Game 3 last season. Not saying we'll go on to have offensive explosion games like we did against Louisville in '19, but it's just way too early to judge the passing game. My biggest concern would be the combination of our route combinations (vertical) with OL who still get beat.
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Our vertical passing game is nearly useless with this OL. King is going to be running for his life.
 
TheOriginalCane said:
Not a "play", but a tendency I've seen.

I have no idea if our runners get bonus points for staying within the hash marks, but they frequently overlook the ability to bounce outside and pick up significant yardage.

One play where King was running the ball (AND had a blocker ahead of him), he cut it back inside right into the arms of a tackler, when he could have slowed down a step, used the blocker for a pick, and then darted down the sideline for a lot more yardage.

Another play (RB, I think it was Cam), there was a ton of open green grass past the one defender, but he cut it inside instead of bouncing outside and got maybe a yard or two. I don't understand why this continues to happen over and over again. If we have RBs who don't have the speed to beat ONE GUY to the edge, or can't make a move to elude the guy, I don't know why we are even bothering.

Miami has superior speed. Why do we continue NOT to use it on offense with plays at the edges?
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Good eye. I noticed the Cam play. Impossible to comment on other than they need more game scenarios and time. Hopefully, they watch as much tape as idiots like us on message boards do, and correct little tendencies. On the other hand, Chaney bounced one outside and then only cutback inside when the defender overplayed the sideline.

Having re-watched the game now for DB play and then a third re-watch for OL play, I noticed we weren't that far from cleaner play overall. Example: on one of the few 3rd downs UAB did convert on our defense, the call was actually fine. Blades overplayed outside leverage coming from a bunch route and got beat inside for a 1st down. He'll likely watch that and, if presented with the same situation, play that differently.
 
LuCane said:
Thanks. For anyone who wants to watch:

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Thanks for posting. I'd rather watch the full film cause that tells the whole story, but this was good for a Friday afternoon. Dont mean to threadjack, but here are my thoughts from the limited rewatch. Feel free to comment, or tell me to F off.

Harrison-Huente looks explosive. Haven't seen his name mentioned. Taking on double teams and pushing them into the backfield. V impressive from a rFr. Edit: the more I watch, the more I am impressed. Future star.

8:28 mark. LT Campbell pulls on a trap. We purposely leave DE unblocked (Campbell's assignment). He doesn't even come close to getting there, and Cam gets blown up for a 3 yard loss. Don't think I've ever seen a tackle pull before. Awful playcall. I'm sure Lance will have something to say about this.

Hall and Bolden remain our best safety duo.

LB unit is not good, as I've repeatedly stated. McCloud should be a backup. The 4th down TD run in the 3rd quarter was entirely on him, and that is just 1 example. Edit: LB unit as a whole is entirely too indecisive and slow to react.

I saw a lot of posts saying the OL was solid at run blocking and weak at pass blocking. I see the opposite, for the most part. Our RBs and King mad the run game work, not the OL. Using the condensed film for rewatch may make me wrong on this point.

I'm not hating on him at all, but I don't see a lot of moves from Roche. Speed off the edge, but not much more. Small sample size, but the jump up to P5 may expose him as a merely average ACC DE. That's not a bad thing, but he may not be the all-ACC guy some predicted. Conversely, I did see moves from Phillips.

Around the 8:54 mark, 3rd and 7 and Chaney leaks out when he should have helped RT Williams in pass protection, or at least chipped. King does King things, and picks up the first down with his legs. But this is why Cam will remain the starter. I will change it from a prediction to a hot take, but I still think that 1 of the Fr RBs is a starter by year's end. That said, Cam is a solid, bruising interior RB. Breaks tackles, runs hard.

I predicted Ivey as my breakout player on defense. I was wrong. Still doesn't get his head turned around. Couch didn't look much better, which I imagine is the reason Ivey is still starting. Depth issues at CB.

Goes without saying, but King climbs the pocket so well.

51 needs to find someone to block. He had a rough night. Edit: 51 stinks.

Defense, as a unit, needs to tackle better. Game 1, so I will give them a pass.

Did Mallory even play? I see the convo between Lu and 1775, who clearly know more about the Lashlee offense than me. But I watched a ton of SMU last year, and their WRs were running free all over the place. I thought Mallory would have a huge season. Again, small sample size, but I the lack of involvement is surprising, esp considering how underwhelming the rest of the WRs were.

Keontra was underwhelmingly pedestrian.

The delayed blitzes have been talked about enough, but ugh.

Overall I thought it was a great performance against a tough, well-coached team. My expectations have gone up. Maybe not for the season win total, but certainly our power rating must be adjusted upwards a few points. I think we roll L'Ville. I said in the summer to watch out for Pitt (we face them the week after Clemson), and I fear that game even more now. Tough, physical teams that can run and are good in the trenches are gonna give us fits. We can win shootouts though, so even though UNC type teams might throw for 500 on our secondary, we might be able to outscore them. This should be the most fun season in ~20 years.
 
I really think that next week is one of the two most important games we will play all year... maybe the most important actually (for a few reasons) and maybe as high as our 2nd toughest...

I think the staff might agree because wow, we showed nothing last night. It felt like we treated the game as an important, but final scrimmage of the season, with a lot of vanilla because of people watching.

I am super psyched to see what we roll out next week. I have a feeling it will look a lot more dynamic.
 
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LuCane said:
Good eye. I noticed the Cam play. Impossible to comment on other than they need more game scenarios and time. Hopefully, they watch as much tape as idiots like us on message boards do, and correct little tendencies. On the other hand, Chaney bounced one outside and then only cutback inside when the defender overplayed the sideline.

Having re-watched the game now for DB play and then a third re-watch for OL play, I noticed we weren't that far from cleaner play overall. Example: on one of the few 3rd downs UAB did convert on our defense, the call was actually fine. Blades overplayed outside leverage coming from a bunch route and got beat inside for a 1st down. He'll likely watch that and, if presented with the same situation, play that differently.
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I agree with you on Chaney's play, I wonder if he just hasn't had as much "run inside" coaching from the UM staff. Partially kidding, of course.

The bigger point is that I have noticed this over a couple of years. And when coupled with the fact that the vast majority of our runs begin inside the tackles, it forms a baffling situation where we are just not using our speed at the edges. Strange.
 
Amari Carter is another one who should not be a starter...just cause him and Ivey are older guys does not mean they are better
 
brock said:
He had a few misses but he was pinpoint with his accuracy on majority of his throws. Had a few throw aways too and still ended up 65%.
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Yep he did. But passing for a QB is a lot like golf. It not how good you're good shots go, it's how good you're bad shots go.
 
scrantoncane said:
Thanks for posting. I'd rather watch the full film cause that tells the whole story, but this was good for a Friday afternoon. Dont mean to threadjack, but here are my thoughts from the limited rewatch. Feel free to comment, or tell me to F off.

Harrison-Huente looks explosive. Haven't seen his name mentioned. Taking on double teams and pushing them into the backfield. V impressive from a rFr. Edit: the more I watch, the more I am impressed. Future star.
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I mentioned him in another thread. He's already impressive enough that I said this (he's in the lineup):

"I'd have to ask around, but I wonder if KSmith has been worked in to some of the Safety rotation in practice. I realize he's fighting for and even splitting the "striker" job.

If I'm running that defense, I'm trying to get KSmith, Hall, Bolden, Frierson, Couch, Blades on the field at the same time in some scenarios. That dime package, with someone like Brooks or Huff, and a front 4 of Roche/Phillips/ Harrison-Hunte/Nesta is my "3rd down stop" package right now."

www.canesinsight.com

Bolden and K Smith

Are athletes. Give the secondary a completely different feel when they are on the field. We saw glimpses last year, but team speed on the backend was pathetic when bolden wasn't in last year. They are going to be huge pieces next week not letting Louisville get behind us. Could maybe include...
www.canesinsight.com www.canesinsight.com
 
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scrantoncane said:
Thanks for posting. I'd rather watch the full film cause that tells the whole story, but this was good for a Friday afternoon. Dont mean to threadjack, but here are my thoughts from the limited rewatch. Feel free to comment, or tell me to F off.

Harrison-Huente looks explosive. Haven't seen his name mentioned. Taking on double teams and pushing them into the backfield. V impressive from a rFr. Edit: the more I watch, the more I am impressed. Future star.

8:28 mark. LT Campbell pulls on a trap. We purposely leave DE unblocked (Campbell's assignment). He doesn't even come close to getting there, and Cam gets blown up for a 3 yard loss. Don't think I've ever seen a tackle pull before. Awful playcall. I'm sure Lance will have something to say about this.

Hall and Bolden remain our best safety duo.

LB unit is not good, as I've repeatedly stated. McCloud should be a backup. The 4th down TD run in the 3rd quarter was entirely on him, and that is just 1 example. Edit: LB unit as a whole is entirely too indecisive and slow to react.

I saw a lot of posts saying the OL was solid at run blocking and weak at pass blocking. I see the opposite, for the most part. Our RBs and King mad the run game work, not the OL. Using the condensed film for rewatch may make me wrong on this point.

I'm not hating on him at all, but I don't see a lot of moves from Roche. Speed off the edge, but not much more. Small sample size, but the jump up to P5 may expose him as a merely average ACC DE. That's not a bad thing, but he may not be the all-ACC guy some predicted. Conversely, I did see moves from Phillips.

Around the 8:54 mark, 3rd and 7 and Chaney leaks out when he should have helped RT Williams in pass protection, or at least chipped. King does King things, and picks up the first down with his legs. But this is why Cam will remain the starter. I will change it from a prediction to a hot take, but I still think that 1 of the Fr RBs is a starter by year's end. That said, Cam is a solid, bruising interior RB. Breaks tackles, runs hard.

I predicted Ivey as my breakout player on defense. I was wrong. Still doesn't get his head turned around. Couch didn't look much better, which I imagine is the reason Ivey is still starting. Depth issues at CB.

Goes without saying, but King climbs the pocket so well.

51 needs to find someone to block. He had a rough night. Edit: 51 stinks.

Defense, as a unit, needs to tackle better. Game 1, so I will give them a pass.

Did Mallory even play? I see the convo between Lu and 1775, who clearly know more about the Lashlee offense than me. But I watched a ton of SMU last year, and their WRs were running free all over the place. I thought Mallory would have a huge season. Again, small sample size, but I the lack of involvement is surprising, esp considering how underwhelming the rest of the WRs were.

Keontra was underwhelmingly pedestrian.

The delayed blitzes have been talked about enough, but ugh.

Overall I thought it was a great performance against a tough, well-coached team. My expectations have gone up. Maybe not for the season win total, but certainly our power rating must be adjusted upwards a few points. I think we roll L'Ville. I said in the summer to watch out for Pitt (we face them the week after Clemson), and I fear that game even more now. Tough, physical teams that can run and are good in the trenches are gonna give us fits. We can win shootouts though, so even though UNC type teams might throw for 500 on our secondary, we might be able to outscore them. This should be the most fun season in ~20 years.
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- We agree on Mccloud (as I noted earlier in the thread). And, that's coming from someone who was enamored with Mccloud's attributes early on in his career and hoped he'd put it all together.

- A lot of Ivey's issues are in his head. The biggest sign of that is watching a DB on a run play. On one play, Ivey was so hesitant he got to an outside the hash play after our DL. No idea who's coaching him specfically or talking to him, but he appears hesitant. At this point, you have to give someone else a chance.

- Scaife doesn't stink. Ha. He had a very rough game. I mentioned that somewhere else, too. When I watched the game for OL play, I was surprised to see him have so much trouble inside with UAB's big dude. It's not the last big dude he'll face, so either they have to put him on the move more, or like @gogeta4 has long claimed, maybe he can help us more outside.

- We saw different things on Keontra. Would like to read more about what you saw? He wasn't great or anything, but I didn't see pedestrian.
 
LuCane said:
- We agree on Mccloud (as I noted earlier in the thread). And, that's coming from someone who was enamored with Mccloud's attribute early on in his career and hoped he'd put it all together.

- A lot of Ivey's issues are in his head. The biggest sign of that is watching a DB on a run play. On one play, Ivey was so hesitant he got to an outside the hash play after our DL. No idea who's coaching him specfically or talking to him, but he appears hesitant. At this point, you have to give someone else a chance.

- Scaife doesn't stink. Ha. He had a very rough game. I mentioned that somewhere else, too. When I watched the game for OL play, I was surprised to see him have so much trouble inside with UAB's big dude. It's not the last big dude he'll face, so either they have to put him on the move more, or like @gogeta4 has long claimed, maybe he can help us more outside.

- We saw different things on Keontra. Would like to read more about what you saw? He wasn't great or anything, but I didn't see pedestrian.
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I was being somewhat facetious when I said stinks, but Scaife had a poor showing. Either he was blocking nobody (causing the pocket to collapse or runs getting stuffed), or getting pushed around. I didn't read up on UAB's roster, so idk if that tackle was any good. He needs to be better in ACC play.

As to Keontra, I saw nothing... and that's the problem. A check of the box score shows he had 1 tackle, 1 pass defended, and 1 QB hurry. All I saw on the condensed film was him chasing plays down from behind and delayed blitzes that didn't get home. Maybe the full film tells a different story. A striker playing that many snaps should probably have more tackles, though. What did you see?
 
CANE1775 said:
He definitely wants to run the ball. And he's going to run the ball. Either they stop it, or they don't. Honestly, you'll be able to look at the stat line and know if we won the game. If we rush for 300+, we won. If we rushed for about 125 or less, we lost. It's funny because if a team averages **** near 200 yards per game you'd think that's good, but not with a Malzahn type offense. If we aren't averaging well over 200 yards per game, there's a problem.
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In the short-term, this may to play to the strengths of our team. If I’m an opposing DC, these are the things that scare me:

- King running the ball
- Cam running the ball
- Rooster running the ball
- Chaney running the ball
- King throwing the ball against a stacked box

What killed me about Enos is that we were so pass-heavy despite having bad QBs, freshmen OL and NFL RBs. This might be the opposite situation where our tendencies favor our most talented players.
 
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scrantoncane said:
As to Keontra, I saw nothing... and that's the problem. A check of the box score shows he had 1 tackle, 1 pass defended, and 1 QB hurry. All I saw on the condensed film was him chasing plays down from behind and delayed blitzes that didn't get home. Maybe the full film tells a different story. A striker playing that many snaps should probably have more tackles, though. What did you see?
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He didn't really have a lot of opportunities to show out, but his short area stood out to me and his angles were cleaner than many of the ones I've seen Amari take. Even if just from chasing, we got flashes of athleticism and speed we need. On those aspects alone, I want to see him on the field and given chances. It's really hard to judge Safeties because you have to look at their opportunities. You have to project their steps, angles, and instincts to those opportunities. Let's see how he performs, but I see attributes that can help us more than some of the alternatives.
 
DMoney said:
In the short-term, this may to play to the strengths of our team. If I’m an opposing DC, these are the things that scare me:

- King running the ball
- Cam running the ball
- Rooster running the ball
- Chaney running the ball
- King throwing the ball against a stacked box

What killed me about Enos is that we were so pass-heavy despite having bad QBs, freshmen OL and NFL RBs. This might be the opposite situation where our tendencies favor our most talented players.
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Good post and couldn't agree more with taking the "how would our opponents defend us" approach.

If I'm an opposing DC, with respect to the passing game, I'm concerned about how we're going to use our TEs off of our run game, especially in the RPO and misdirection.

Secondarily, with respect to the passing game, I'm concerned if I have a CB and focused Safety to stay with Dee Wiggins when we ultimately roll out King on a playaction and Wiggins runs a deep post backdoor.

In the few passes King completed outside the hash, we also saw some zip. Some of those comeback routes will help us later.

Keep it very simple and effective. Stay with what works. Anyway, that's my prayer going forward.
 
LuCane said:
It's almost stupid to say, but message board discussions have had an actual impact on my perspective. A long time ago, there was a fantastic poster on Grassy and Canestime (the source of how and why we spun off this site) named "Dynasty." If I'm not mistaken, he had played college DB. More than just played the position, he was a really insightful dude.

Back then, I was obsessed with zone blitzing. I was a fascinated by everything about it. Of course, that was a different era of offense. Zone blitzes were a perfect remedy to what teams tried to do 12-20 years ago. He would always encourage me to advocate for less blitzing, less exotic calls, more simplicity - especially in the college game. As Bill Young's college concepts (and some NFL guys') started to get carved by some spread teams, I collected info. Anyway, that background is to say that, as the field started to be spread more and more in college (first) and then widespread in the pros, I used that new information to adjust my perspective:

If your options are (a) complex with big upside, but unreliable outcomes (think Enos) or (b) simpler with less upside, but reliable outcomes against certain opponents, you take (b) every time and move on.

This program is at the point where we need (b). Badly. We need to run the ball. We need to beat "lesser" teams consistently. We may not open things up now or have the talent to do what we all want to do, but these are college players who need "simpler" with some wrinkles.
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Great point Lu. I catch myself jumping way ahead and in reality we just need to first and foremost not look like a laughing stock in comparison to our past. Win some games, give kids a reason to want to play for us, then take it from there. With our schedule, if the D doesn't go off the rails, this O can do well enough to get us to the point to where we can consistently win 9/10 games. At this point as a Canes fan, you absolutely have to take that.

And it's not stupid to say because THIS discussion just impacted my perspective. Good stuff!
 
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