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Spring Game Thoughts

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hurricaneman said:
Toney is Toney. He moves like he's a light cycle in Tron.

That first route by Barkate was pretty **** nasty. I don't know how you cover that if the timing is there between him and Mensah.

Upshaw looked like Toney light.

That rep from Paris where he's being held the entire time and powered through the catch was great.
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We're stupid deep at WR
 
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I too have some concerns.

My concern is that it is April and all sorts of current evaluations in regards to this football team are about as valuable as the dump that I take every morning. It is valuable, but ultimately, it gets flushed down the toilet and it'll be followed up with new dumps.

Around this time last year, Lofton was the best player on Greentree, there were discussions on making Mauigoa a guard, Jojo Trader was the next big thing at WR and some had questions regarding Rueben Bains season, not to mention that expectations for a defense that wound up carrying us to a finale were fairly low. And Samson looked like he was due for a transfer because he wound up not developing one bit.

There's lots of weights to be lifted, film to watched and practice reps to be taken. Tons of time will pass till our first snap. So let's not get too wild over here.
 
Bender said:
I too have some concerns.

My concern is that it is April and all sorts of current evaluations in regards to this football team are about as valuable as the dump that I take every morning. It is valuable, but ultimately, it gets flushed down the toilet and it'll be followed up with new dumps.

Around this time last year, Lofton was the best player on Greentree, there were discussions on making Mauigoa a guard, Jojo Trader was the next big thing at WR and some had questions regarding Rueben Bains season, not to mention that expectations for a defense that wound up carrying us to a finale were fairly low. And Samson looked like he was due for a transfer because he wound up not developing one bit.

There's lots of weights to be lifted, film to watched and practice reps to be taken. Tons of time will pass till our first snap. So let's not get too wild over here.
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Congratulations on the regularity. Do you eat a lot of fiber?
 
Bender said:
I too have some concerns.

My concern is that it is April and all sorts of current evaluations in regards to this football team are about as valuable as the dump that I take every morning. It is valuable, but ultimately, it gets flushed down the toilet and it'll be followed up with new dumps.

Around this time last year, Lofton was the best player on Greentree, there were discussions on making Mauigoa a guard, Jojo Trader was the next big thing at WR and some had questions regarding Rueben Bains season, not to mention that expectations for a defense that wound up carrying us to a finale were fairly low. And Samson looked like he was due for a transfer because he wound up not developing one bit.

There's lots of weights to be lifted, film to watched and practice reps to be taken. Tons of time will pass till our first snap. So let's not get too wild over here.
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Well said

Projections is about all we can do we have a few years of history here in some cases

It’s only year 2 of Heatherman though and a few people that actually know things have said that what he did last year wasn’t basic or anything but in a short window with a new squad he did some things that maybe weren’t part of the plan moving forward

Got a good idea of what the offense will look like and the OL will get good coaching. DL will get great coaching, DBs look like it could be a big strength

Other than that you just hope some of these new hype people show up and don’t immediately look out of place. **** seems to happen every year

I’m sure Penn State felt good last year in April

Clemson

Texas to some degree etc it’s all too close now anything can happen
 
JHallCanes said:
Well said

Projections is about all we can do we have a few years of history here in some cases

It’s only year 2 of Heatherman though and a few people that actually know things have said that what he did last year wasn’t basic or anything but in a short window with a new squad he did some things that maybe weren’t part of the plan moving forward

Got a good idea of what the offense will look like and the OL will get good coaching. DL will get great coaching, DBs look like it could be a big strength

Other than that you just hope some of these new hype people show up and don’t immediately look out of place. **** seems to happen every year

I’m sure Penn State felt good last year in April

Clemson

Texas to some degree etc it’s all too close now anything can happen
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Great point. Historically in the AP Preseason Poll, there are almost always 1-2 teams (at fewest) who not only fall off, but completely face-plant and don't even finish ranked. I'm sure if you read the boards and listened to the reporters for every single one of those teams, in April of last year, people were talking about championship aspirations. And then they **** all over themselves.

The one thing that I feel makes the floor the highest for this program and could prevent a complete implosion is the emphasis on the lines. If you have a really good OL and DL, it's almost hard to be terrible. I don't know if that was the true root cause for Clemson and Penn State, for example, but I feel good knowing that we're always going to be good on both lines headed into a season and that likely helps us from completely torpedoing.
 
OrangeBowlMagic said:
Been saying it. It's weird, because I've said on record he will have more sacks than Bain, but he's nowhere near as good of a player overall.

This is a terrible way to do this, but Bain had 30 tackles and 24 assists last year.
Wilson had 9 tackles and 14 assists.
The year before, at UGA, he had 13 tackles and 9 assists.

Now, he had 9 sacks last season in the SEC. That was 3rd in the league, only Colin Simmons and Cashius Howell had more. Dude can get after the passer. But he's rather uninterested in capturing souls in the run game, which is what Bain prided himself on. They're markedly different players.

Can Wilson get double-digit sacks here this year and receive all kinds of national recognition? Absolutely, and I actually think he will. Will he be as effective in the run game as 3 and 4 were on a down to down basis? No. And it's Hetherman and JT's job to 1) Get as much out of him as humanly possible and 2) Understand his limitations and mitigate them. Whether that be schematically or rotationally.

Blount is my guy this year. He won't have the flashy stats that Wilson or Lightfoot will, but he's going to be an impact dude.
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Maybe that is why Wilson chose Miami, because he knows he needs to step up his run stop game. I can't count how many times we heard Bain or Mesidor state that they had to earn the right to rush the passer. In other words, they were first taught to stop the run first. I cannot imagine on Wilson's recruiting visits, this was not addressed. So he knew coming in he better get getting better at stopping the run. And maybe he bought into what Taylor told him on that subject. So I expect him to be better on that front. He won't be a Bain level, but hopefully he is a good run stuffer. Did anyone key in on Wilson playing the run in the Spring game?
 
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OrangeBowlMagic said:
Great point. Historically in the AP Preseason Poll, there are almost always 1-2 teams (at fewest) who not only fall off, but completely face-plant and don't even finish ranked. I'm sure if you read the boards and listened to the reporters for every single one of those teams, in April of last year, people were talking about championship aspirations. And then they **** all over themselves.

The one thing that I feel makes the floor the highest for this program and could prevent a complete implosion is the emphasis on the lines. If you have a really good OL and DL, it's almost hard to be terrible. I don't know if that was the true root cause for Clemson and Penn State, for example, but I feel good knowing that we're always going to be good on both lines headed into a season and that likely helps us from completely torpedoing.
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Yeah the Clemson love on this board last year was out of control. I could bump it but no sense in that. It was just parroting narratives because I mean college football is just bat**** crazy. Gotta just go with educated guesses and stood to reason they’d be good teams with their pedigrees.

I’m with you that with our DL and the way I know our OL can play above their pay grade I felt good

Then we got Mensah. That kid is sensational and he doesn’t beat himself. You always worry about the sophomore slump but we took Toney and gave him quite frankly an embarrassing amount of help at the position just to make sure teams didn’t have 6 months to figure out how to stop our biggest weapon

I’m trying my best to still stay level headed about it, but this team is loaded. Can’t. ******. Wait.
 
I think the losses of DE are huge and won’t be replaced by one guy, especially in the run game. Alternatively…I think we are going to really level up at DT with the the two deep + Blount. I think Moten + Scott both have 1st round potential and the depth will be better. In the same way we were edge dominant last year, we will be tackle dominant this year. The actual question on run fits and defense is who is replacing 0. I’ve never seen a nickel play the run like him, including setting the edge almost by himself. That is going to be a big ask
 
Memnon said:
In this Offense, in order to feature the TE more, that's going to take targets away from MToney, because that's the Y position.

It's an Inside-Out Offense where the primary route 80% of the time is the Slot-Y.

I imagine most of the people griping about the TE's lack of usage would also simultaneously be up in arms about not featuring MToney on every play.

Ultimately, it's really the QB's decision.

The TE's get plenty of burn & run routes every time they're on the field on pass plays (where they're not just blocking), it's up to the QB to decide where he wants to go with the ball.
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Would love your thoughts on our WR’s routes in this offense not named the slot. IMO, similar to our run game, it lacks creativity and are very basic.
 
ST26 said:
I think we should only be comparing our roster to the rest of college football this year, not how it compares to last year's team
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Yup and we should see much better LB play if our DTs are who we think they are. I believe we’ll be just fine on the defensive side of the ball.

Hey we were an 2 game average defense away from going to the ACCCG and playoff in 2024. I don’t know why is there a concern about the defense that may be all around better in 2026 than 2025.

And I’m on that mountain yelling #0 was just as important to the defense as having not 1 but two top DEs on the same team. We are a very very good defense if we can get production anywhere near K. Scott at the nickel position.

I’m more concerned about if Dawson (Mario) had learned anything from the last 4 games of the 2025 season. Score and keep that foot on the pedal until the clock shows 0:00. A high score from our offense will put our opponents into our preseason strengths (pass rushers and DBs) on defense.
 
TriStarCane said:
I think the losses of DE are huge and won’t be replaced by one guy, especially in the run game. Alternatively…I think we are going to really level up at DT with the the two deep + Blount. I think Moten + Scott both have 1st round potential and the depth will be better. In the same way we were edge dominant last year, we will be tackle dominant this year. The actual question on run fits and defense is who is replacing 0. I’ve never seen a nickel play the run like him, including setting the edge almost by himself. That is going to be a big ask
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😅 Didn’t make pass ST26 post before I made my response but this is also my views.

All this “setting the edge” talk is the new Cane message board talk after witnessing 1 player doing it so well. I bet two of the top 5 defenses in 2025 (OSU and TAMU) wished they had a de to set the edge like 3 or 4 “sarcastic”😎
 
Bender said:
I too have some concerns.

My concern is that it is April and all sorts of current evaluations in regards to this football team are about as valuable as the dump that I take every morning. It is valuable, but ultimately, it gets flushed down the toilet and it'll be followed up with new dumps.

Around this time last year, Lofton was the best player on Greentree, there were discussions on making Mauigoa a guard, Jojo Trader was the next big thing at WR and some had questions regarding Rueben Bains season, not to mention that expectations for a defense that wound up carrying us to a finale were fairly low. And Samson looked like he was due for a transfer because he wound up not developing one bit.

There's lots of weights to be lifted, film to watched and practice reps to be taken. Tons of time will pass till our first snap. So let's not get too wild over here.
Click to expand...
PREACH
 
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