My thoughts on the Miami@GT debacle today:
That first Miami touchdown was bullshit. The ball clearly hit the ground at the same time as Parrish "caught" it, by all the rules I could find, that's an incomplete pass. Not that it mattered in the end, but 20-3 is less embarassing then 27-3. Reggie Ball steps back too far after taking teh snap. By the time he tries to throw the ball, he's already got to go 8-10 yards just to get it to the line of scrimmage. Gailey needs to work on him with staying in teh pocket. This is an offensive line problem too. Our guys can't contain a rush at all, which is why we had no running game today. Reggie was our entire running game except one huge Chris Woods run to start the game. Clearly, PJ Daniels is our entire running game and we need him back. Let's just hope he doesn't turn out like Tony Hollings and we go without a rusher the rest of the year. Our defense still looked decent. They're gotten a little sloppy, but they did a good job containing the run for Miami and had a few decent pass coverages plays and blitzes. Reggie threw too many interceptions again and got sacked for way too many losses. He needs to learn still when to just fall down instead of running backwards in a futile escape attempt and when to throw the ball away. That will come hopefully. Calvin Johnson had a huge day at Clemson, but he's still young and inexperienced, and it showed badly today. He wasn't coming back to teh ball when he should have, wasn't watching the blitz and cutting his routes short to bail out Reggie, wasn't looking for teh ball until he was scripted to so he was an easy pick off. He'll be a great player with some more coaching and experience I think though. He's tall, he's fast, and he's aggressive, he just needs work. Our punting game is coming together nicely. Ben Arndt has a great leg. I question Gailey's playcalling and ability to keep his job next year. He's been here long enough to get his own recruits into the system and we should be having 8+ win seasons every year by now. Miami is a tough team, no contest, but we played horribly. I don't mind losing if we play our hardest and it's jsut not enough. But GT was sloppy today and we never stood a chance. Our Clemson win was luck. Getting trounced by UNC 2 weeks ago was stright up embarassing. And beating Div. I-AA Samford? Who cares? The way Maryland and VT played against West Virginia, I predict we drop both of those games. Virginia will obliterate us. The way UGA manhandled LSU today, I never want Thanksgiving to come (except for hopefully spending some time with Emily and the Rettews). Duke is starting to look better every week, and after a thorough 49-17 mauling last year, I don't realyl want to face Duke right now either. UConn is looking scary too the way they beat up on BC and Pitt. I think we'll beat NC State just because that's what we do. But that leaves us at 3-8 on the season. If this occurs, Chan will be looking for a new job. Yes, the ACC is a tougher conference with the addition of Miami and VT, and with BC joining next year. But 3-8 is unacceptable. It is of course feasible that we get our act together and beat Duke, UConn, NC State, maybe VT, and maybe Maryland. That's 7-4, not bad. More likely we'll land somewhere in the middle (5-6) and inelligible for a bowl game unless something changes radically in our offense. Again, I know we just lost to Miami, who are a fantastic team, but I don't really think they played that well either. Not like I've seen them play in previous incarnations. I'm telling you right now (in case I haven't before), Virginia has the most legitimate shot at an ACC title this year of anyone else in the conference. I can't wait to see them obliterate Clemson on Thursday. It's easy to be pessimistic after a loss, but we haven't had a good game yet where everything was really clicking. Maybe when GT comes to College Park next week to pay Maryland defector Ralph Freidgen a visit...
That first Miami touchdown was bullshit. The ball clearly hit the ground at the same time as Parrish "caught" it, by all the rules I could find, that's an incomplete pass. Not that it mattered in the end, but 20-3 is less embarassing then 27-3. Reggie Ball steps back too far after taking teh snap. By the time he tries to throw the ball, he's already got to go 8-10 yards just to get it to the line of scrimmage. Gailey needs to work on him with staying in teh pocket. This is an offensive line problem too. Our guys can't contain a rush at all, which is why we had no running game today. Reggie was our entire running game except one huge Chris Woods run to start the game. Clearly, PJ Daniels is our entire running game and we need him back. Let's just hope he doesn't turn out like Tony Hollings and we go without a rusher the rest of the year. Our defense still looked decent. They're gotten a little sloppy, but they did a good job containing the run for Miami and had a few decent pass coverages plays and blitzes. Reggie threw too many interceptions again and got sacked for way too many losses. He needs to learn still when to just fall down instead of running backwards in a futile escape attempt and when to throw the ball away. That will come hopefully. Calvin Johnson had a huge day at Clemson, but he's still young and inexperienced, and it showed badly today. He wasn't coming back to teh ball when he should have, wasn't watching the blitz and cutting his routes short to bail out Reggie, wasn't looking for teh ball until he was scripted to so he was an easy pick off. He'll be a great player with some more coaching and experience I think though. He's tall, he's fast, and he's aggressive, he just needs work. Our punting game is coming together nicely. Ben Arndt has a great leg. I question Gailey's playcalling and ability to keep his job next year. He's been here long enough to get his own recruits into the system and we should be having 8+ win seasons every year by now. Miami is a tough team, no contest, but we played horribly. I don't mind losing if we play our hardest and it's jsut not enough. But GT was sloppy today and we never stood a chance. Our Clemson win was luck. Getting trounced by UNC 2 weeks ago was stright up embarassing. And beating Div. I-AA Samford? Who cares? The way Maryland and VT played against West Virginia, I predict we drop both of those games. Virginia will obliterate us. The way UGA manhandled LSU today, I never want Thanksgiving to come (except for hopefully spending some time with Emily and the Rettews). Duke is starting to look better every week, and after a thorough 49-17 mauling last year, I don't realyl want to face Duke right now either. UConn is looking scary too the way they beat up on BC and Pitt. I think we'll beat NC State just because that's what we do. But that leaves us at 3-8 on the season. If this occurs, Chan will be looking for a new job. Yes, the ACC is a tougher conference with the addition of Miami and VT, and with BC joining next year. But 3-8 is unacceptable. It is of course feasible that we get our act together and beat Duke, UConn, NC State, maybe VT, and maybe Maryland. That's 7-4, not bad. More likely we'll land somewhere in the middle (5-6) and inelligible for a bowl game unless something changes radically in our offense. Again, I know we just lost to Miami, who are a fantastic team, but I don't really think they played that well either. Not like I've seen them play in previous incarnations. I'm telling you right now (in case I haven't before), Virginia has the most legitimate shot at an ACC title this year of anyone else in the conference. I can't wait to see them obliterate Clemson on Thursday. It's easy to be pessimistic after a loss, but we haven't had a good game yet where everything was really clicking. Maybe when GT comes to College Park next week to pay Maryland defector Ralph Freidgen a visit...
