Welcome back, Commissioner. Your S&H did an excellent job in your
absence, as you know. Glad you got to be
on campus for the game.
The Grades were a little lower than we would have hoped,
except for Special Teams. But they were
fair and right.
Offense: The offense was just plain out of synch on Saturday
evening. Some of that is credit to a
good plan by LSU. Some it was just …
off. As the Commissioner points out,
sometimes the play calls just seemed off.
When the play call was good, the execution was lacking -- sometimes the
line didn’t block well at the point of attack, sometimes the quarterback made
the wrong read, sometimes the line blocked, the quarterback made the right
read, and the receiver dropped the ball.
On one pass play Calvin Ridley slipped and fell down trying to run a
crossing route. Many of the running plays
were stuffed because we had five blockers to take on six defensive players (or
even six to take on seven) and the extra man made the tackle. It was just that sort of night for the
offense. Sometimes even a good motor just sputters -- you can clean the injectors, change the fuel filter, fill it up with high test and still....
We hope that the offense has shown just what it can do on an
off night. If their “fair to poor”
performance is defeating LSU by 14 with missed officiating calls galore, then
there is a lot of room to hope. We choose to expect they'll be all tuned up by Saturday night.
Of course, you can lose track of that with the “expert”
commentary of Gary Danielson ringing in your ears. For example, on the running play from our own
10 where Arden Key tackled Bo for a 4-yard loss, Gary was quick to accuse either
Jonah Williams or Irv Smith of “missing” a block on a key defender. Watching it a few times, I’m pretty sure Gary
was wrong. I think the play is designed
to let whomever is in that position through.
What I think happened is that Jalen and/or Bo misread it. I think Key (or whomever is at that spot) is
supposed to come free and if he chooses to run into the backfield, Hurts is
supposed to keep the ball and follow a pulling lineman straight upfield while
the running back delivers a block on Key.
Instead, Scarborough and Hurts did the hand off, which was only to occur
if Key stayed at home at or behind the line of scrimmage. We read it wrong and he blew up the play. And, in all honesty, running that play
against Key, who is a future NFL talent and one of the best defensive players in
college football probably wasn’t good play design to start with. It’s fair to say that very few players would
get there that quickly.
We thought Hurts had mostly a good game, though. He made a few wrong reads and waited a second
or two late on a couple of passes.
However, our receivers dropped more balls (and got interfered with and
held even more) than he made incorrect reads.
He stepped up into the pocket several times and had key scrambles with
the pocket broke down. His achievements
were far better than in last year’s LSU game.
LSU’s defensive game plan was sound and was well-executed. Put at least seven defenders within three
yards of the line of scrimmage. Line up
in the neutral zone until you get flagged for it (they never did). Sell out to crush the ball carrier or get to
the quarterback as quickly as possible.
Leave the cornerbacks one-on-one with wide receivers. If someone gets by you, then do whatever is
needed to prevent the completion -- we’ll hope they don’t call it and if they
do, 15 yards is better than a touchdown.
Sell out to try to get Alabama in third and long. They executed this plan quite well. Other teams will try to match this plan. They need to hope they have as much talent at
defensive back and a crew of officials who have the same eye chart scores as Frank
Slade.
Defense
Maybe the offense has to carry the defense for a bit. Not how we like our football. In fact, we just don’t like those games where
teams speed up and down the field of play and you pretty much expect a score
every possession. That’s a different game. It’s called “basketball”. However, we may well have to outscore a few
teams until some of our linebackers are able to return to competition. At least we have the skill to do it if
needed.
Yes, we are worried about the injury situation on
defense. By our count four potential starting
linebackers are out of commission, though word is today that Mac Wilson could
be able to play again in 4-6 weeks after breaking his foot (don’t bother to
look for CBS’s report about him being taken from the sidelines on a cart, they
didn’t seem to think it important). So
sad for Hamilton, who is one of the smartest players on our defense and for the
second year in a row saw his season come to a premature end -- this time on an
iffy cut block by an offensive lineman.
Get well soon.
Bottom line is the defense was just on the field for too many snaps and some of that was the fault of the offense. They owe the defense one easy game. At least.
Coach Saban explained the long run at his press conference. Basically, the defense was confused. If everyone stays in the originally called defense, it’s a short gain. If everyone shifted to the last minute audible defense, it’s a short (or maybe no) gain. Instead, half the team shifted and half didn’t. That, added to Keith Holcombe being tackled like he was the ball carrier instead of the inside linebacker allowed their running back to be off to the races. As much motion, shifting, and other stuff as LSU does, the surprising thing is that we didn’t give up more long runs than just that one. Especially considering the injuries, the defense played quite well. Frankly, any time we hold a team to 10 points, we should win easily -- and we did. And holding most any team on our schedule just 10 points merits a good grade.
We don’t have enough good things to say about the kicking
game, which was not the case at the beginning of the year. We cleanly fielded every punt, some with LSU
players circling like sharks. Field goal
kicking is now solid. We aren’t likely
to make any 55 yarders, but this team shouldn’t need to. We are kicking the football off (mostly) into
the dadgum endzone. And the punting. Gracious.
Not only is Scott putting them down inside the 20 (if not the 10), the
balls are going high enough that the video screen in Dallas could be in jeopardy. In case you weren’t counting, that was eight
punts for over 400 yards. Hurrah for
him. Still, I hope next week he doesn’t have
to kick any.
Officiating So, our regular correspondents have raised a couple of
theories this week about officiating. First,
there is some concern that the redistribution of The Grades has made it even to
the SEC Offices and they are taking our rhetorical flourishes out on the
football team. That does appeal to our
ego in a twisted sort of way but because sorry SEC officiating predates our
blogging efforts, we tend to discount that.
But, thanks.
Second, there is an idea that Alabama has become so dominant
that the SEC officials have decided, consciously or unconsciously, to just
leave the flags stuck in their belts because of the idea that Alabama will win
anyway -- why slow things down and call a bunch of penalties. Other than, you know, “fundamental fairness”
and “because it is your freaking job”, of course. Whatever, the effect is real and quantifiable. In the category of Opponents Penalties
Against, Alabama still ranks 118/130, even with LSU helping the average after 5 flags (two, we recall, for illegal procedure). We
haven’t even thought about taking out the ones where no judgment is involved,
like kickoffs out of bounds or too many men in the formation. We have enough trouble sleeping at night as
it is.
Coaching Finally, as to the coaching, we think that Coach Saban just coaches
differently for LSU. I’m sure he would
tell you that no game is any more important and doesn’t require any more or
less attention and effort than any other.
He would say that we should be coaching and playing against our own
standard of excellence, not just the other team. And that wins are just the natural outcome of
doing that. Finally, each win only
counts one W. Yeah, well, we don’t believe it.
That’s seven in a row, Coach.
Good job. Keep rolling.
On to Mississippi State and their headache-inducing cowbells
(just remember, those are NOT artificial noisemakers designed to disrupt the
other team, they are “tradition”. The
SEC Office says so. Roll Tide, everyone.
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