Some encouraging performances

[Awsi Dooger]

Chad Thomas' development is one of the keys to next season and perhaps the most interesting. Absolutely no excuse to be so invisible against a team like Washington State, particularly when we forced Falk to hold the ball an extra count or two so often. Sure Thomas was held occasionally but they were college caliber non debilitating holds. Otherwise the lack of moves and explosiveness is borderline shocking.

I'm not convinced it's associated with 100% effort. He may think he's going full out. The new coaching staff needs to pull him aside and explain what that actually means, with pictures. Thomas right now is stuck at that mostly irrelevant level that Olivier Vernon occupied his final couple of seasons as a Cane. Vernon has only recently raised his intensity level and developed a repertoire of zig zag disruptive moves, just in time for his second contract.

Our linemen need to look like linemen. It was sickening to attend Kentucky vs. Eastern Kentucky a couple of months ago and see one tough barrel chested lineman after another on Eastern Kentucky's roster while so many of our guys are on blob alert.

Yeah, Berrios looked good but those were east/west plays against a vulnerable defense, despite how we made them look for the bulk of the game. East/west plays don't do much damage to top defenses. With Richt we need to fortify an unapologetic balanced north/south attack. It's unbelievable how many college tapes I save and watch later in which a coach basically gives away a game via too much sideways crap. Brian Kelly should be dangled from Touchdown Jesus for his play calling at Stanford, particularly in the red zone. It was so much easier for Notre Dame to gash Stanford for 5-8 yards on the ground than it was for Stanford to succeed with their preferred fullback/tight end foundation. No chance Notre Dame loses that game if the shotgun didn't exist or the Check With Me offense didn't exist. Every time they entered the red zone early in the game Kelly would find excuses for weakling play calling and had to settle for field goals as a result.

 

[BWCD]

Milo's arms may not be the length you look for at LT, but his strength is enough to make up for it. If he's improved his footwork and technique any at all, he's good enough in pass pro to be considered for either T spot. The two things that Milo really needs to work on in pass pro are anchoring his base once he gets his hands on the rusher, and not biting on inside-out fakes on the rush.

In fairness, the two things you say he needs to work on are the most important things for a T to be good at. You can't over set and get beat on the inside move because it's the quickest route to the QB when you're at T. You work inside-out. T's who have to cheat to get out quick enough are G's. That's what's happening when you're getting beat inside; you're trying to compensate for foot quickness to get outside.

The other is his anchor. That's kind of important in pass rush because if you just get walked back to the QB on every rush you're not a T either. Or a G for that matter.

I think you're misunderstanding me on the "inside-out" fake. What I mean is the fake inside by a rusher to get outside of the T. Milo (at least from what I saw in his HS vids) is susceptible to that. You attack his inside shoulder, he's fine. He's not jumping out early and getting beat inside.

His anchor against his normal HS competition was fine. In the one-on-one camp videos w/o pads against the 5* kid I mentioned, his anchor seemed to weaken and he got pushed back into the dummy. That could be a different story with a RS year and once you get the pads on...not to mention a different OL coach to maybe help improve his technique.

 

[kalinis]

i think mcdermott will be a lt. i think he was misused at rt and gaurd. darling to me is a rt. bar milo is a guy to watch as is taylor gauthier at lt also.

with new staff are no preconceptions everyone will be given a shot to prove they deserve the spot . golden spent to much time rotating guys and playing guys who were workout warriors over actual players. trent harris playing over quan comes to mind as number 1.

there is alot to like about the d in sun bowl. bush should of had 5 picks alone. chad thomas, muhammed and smith, and jackson put pressure on qb. a good dl coach should make the dl solid as should a move to a 4-3.

i still like mcdermott as a lt prospect. he was coming of knee injury and i saw the lt blocking down to help gaurds block then going out to get his man and that really hurt pass protection as he was late to his man alot.