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SJ Alofaituli- season stats, other interesting stats. Mensah is saving the line

DMoney said:
Of course. @ssvir made that up and then pivoted.

I told you SJ would start. We were the first to say that. He is starting. Would you like me to tell you he's not going to play?

As for Buchanan, I actually thought Cantwell/Congdon would start because they took most of the first-team RG reps in camp. But at the end of camp, I noted Buchanan was surging in reps and could possibly take a spot. He did.





Cantwell started every practice at LT in spring. I thought he did well. Most people who watched the spring game agreed. There is a long thread about it.

I admitted I got too excited about Cantwell's early success. Samson came back from injury and won the LT job. He previously struggled at T, which is why he didn't compete for a spot there his first three years. He improved. That's football. Cantwell had to move to guard and is not as comfortable there right now.

Every single insider, writer, podcaster said that OL was the biggest question mark on the team. I said it repeatedly. Nobody said it was as good as last year. People like you are rewriting history because you're frustrated and want to point fingers.

I'm hopeful the OL will improve, because young players with elite coaching usually do. But we'll see. It's a long season.
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Everything you say here makes sense. However, are the coaches making the right decisions here? I think emotions are dictating poor decisions. Maybe after the game on Friday, they can be honest with themselves. I think they thought this would be ok. They were and are wrong.

Mass kicks ***. Play the best 5. That is Mirabal. That isn’t what has occurred so far.
 
skyman said:
Then the edges are vulnerable and DEs eat mensah alive?
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If we move a tackle it’s likely McCoy to guard, and then Cantwell takes his lumps at RT. We’ve done similar things before: Frances in ‘23 and we threw Bell right into the fire when he really wasn’t “ready” and Rivers was already one of the best tackles in the ACC. I’d rather deal with edge pressure especially now that our TEs actually appear able to block, than have to worry about interior blow up destroying most of the plays they occur on.

Whether we’ll do that here remains to be seen. The staff may look at it through the prism that we have one of the best tackle situations in the country and they’d rather square peg/round hole their way at guard than “rock the boat” at tackle. No clue, we’ll see.

One thing I KNOW is that we’re stuck with Rodriguez at center. Personally I think the staff should have gone to the portal again there instead of letting themselves fall in love with him, but we’ve made our bed there and now we have to sleep in it. My real concern with RR is more in the run game, like against some team’s really good 1-tech or nose in the playoffs on a “4th and 1 and a half” type situation.

I THINK Buchanan is going to be ok even though he’s had some rough moments too. Needs to get stronger (but that’s a year over year thing though). I’m guessing he’s going to continue to get opportunities there.

So it’s probably going to come down to what they decide to do about LG. Going to be interesting to see the combos they use against CMU.
 
DMoney said:
He's an inexperienced player with physical limitations at guard. I projected him to start based on info, but I view him as a center longterm. The surprise to me is that he's struggled with teams like Wake and Stanford. I thought he'd be adequate there until the playoff-caliber opponents.

One thing I'd say about both SJ and Buchanan- they are young players, too. I expect them both to improve.
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He can't play center if he can't snap. He definitely can't play guard. We can't have 6'0 OL on our roster. He's never going to be able to play here. If he continues to play this season, we are screwed
 
DMoney said:
He's an inexperienced player with physical limitations at guard. I projected him to start based on info, but I view him as a center longterm. The surprise to me is that he's struggled with teams like Wake and Stanford. I thought he'd be adequate there until the playoff-caliber opponents.

One thing I'd say about both SJ and Buchanan- they are young players, too. I expect them both to improve.
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What do you think is end game for SJ, he cant snap and hasnt done it I think yet in a game.

I dont think I see any upside in SJ, if you gonna be THAT small, you need to be the most cerebral, quick athletic mutha****a I ever seen, guy plays like spazz, cant stay on his feet, constantly on his knees, looks out of position and the type of guy you cant hide because he is next to a 6th year limited center and he has his hands full because he is limited himself..

I dont see the upside of SJ or the development track, even at highest point he is a limited guard..

What do you think about how the portal guys we lost we didnt back fill and do you think we keep same plan?

This is something I think will spread also

 
skyman said:
What do you think is end game for SJ, he cant snap and hasnt done it I think yet in a game.

I dont think I see any upside in SJ, if you gonna be THAT small, you need to be the most cerebral, quick athletic mutha****a I ever seen, guy plays like spazz, cant stay on his feet, constantly on his knees, looks out of position and the type of guy you cant hide because he is next to a 6th year limited center and he has his hands full because he is limited himself..

I dont see the upside of SJ or the development track, even at highest point he is a limited guard..

What do you think about how the portal guys we lost we didnt back fill and do you think we keep same plan?

This is something I think will spread also

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It has to be at center.

Re: the Portal, my take at the time is that we needed a blocking TE and ideally a physical, veteran OG. Seaton was expensive with character problems. But Meriweather alone was not enough.
 
DMoney said:
It has to be at center.

Re: the Portal, my take at the time is that we needed a blocking TE and ideally a physical, veteran OG. Seaton was expensive with character problems. But Meriweather alone was not enough.
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What character issues? He seems fine and they were recruiting him, why did we go after him and no one else then, his character issues turned us off portal completely?

Agreed we should of hit interior oline vet HARD.. We still will need more next season I think..
 
skyman said:
What character issues? He seems fine and they were recruiting him, why did we go after him and no one else then, his character issues turned us off portal completely?
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We wanted him. I personally thought it wasn't the worth the monster price tag and the baggage (much of which is unreported).

But we still needed to add more. I don't know why the decision was between a $6 million OT and nothing.
 
SJ and Rodriguez are absolutely Bums. FIU level players and we are starting them??Mario and our OL play way too many favorites or are retarded
 
ssvir said:
You're right. You haven't been completely wrong on every single OL take this Summer/Fall.

- Samson better G than T
- Cantwell best T in the ACC by Nov
- SJ and Buchannon earning starter reps at G

You're too close to the kids and the program. It's awesome for some things and not awesome for others.

Now you can hit me with the "everyone who went to practices has been saying the same thing" routine.
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Well. That escalated quickly.
 
How much time has Cantwell had at RT in practice? I know he was at LT and coaches were encouraged with what they saw and then Samson came back and won LT.

You need at least one of Samson and McCoy on the interior to stop the bleeding. I think you move McCoy over to RG, move Cantwell to RT and Buchanan to LG. I think that combo stops the bleeding and maybe brings a little more calm to Rrod.
 
When you got guys that aren’t physical specimens they better be well coached. Ryan plays to high and that kicks in his roller skates while SJ looks like he is playing the game on a slip and slide covered in oil and always puts himself in bad situations or he’s just missing his guy.

We got one trash game left before we kick into the meat of our schedule and I’m not seeing anything that says we are getting better each week in the interior.
 
skyman said:
What do you think is end game for SJ, he cant snap and hasnt done it I think yet in a game.

I dont think I see any upside in SJ, if you gonna be THAT small, you need to be the most cerebral, quick athletic mutha****a I ever seen, guy plays like spazz, cant stay on his feet, constantly on his knees, looks out of position and the type of guy you cant hide because he is next to a 6th year limited center and he has his hands full because he is limited himself..

I dont see the upside of SJ or the development track, even at highest point he is a limited guard..

What do you think about how the portal guys we lost we didnt back fill and do you think we keep same plan?

This is something I think will spread also

Click to expand...

I don’t think it’s that he can’t snap. How hard can that be. I think the problem is he can’t be trusted to diagnose the defense and direct the protections. A center in some ways is a quarterback of the line calling out blitzes and which way to slide. The guy can’t even get his assignments right as a guard. Mensah will be in the hospital if SJ plays center and messes up calls.
 
sfcane2 said:
How hard can that be.
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It's not too difficult to snap when the QB is under center, but try snapping a ball between your legs with a perfect spiral to someone standing 5-7 yards away, without looking behind you. And then have someone who weighs 320 lbs ready to knock you over the instant the ball moves.
 
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