Thoughts from my Offense and Defense Slow Motion Review:

[forensicbuzz]

Nah, we just did what we always do. It was the ESPN Sports Center guys who abused him and then abused him some more.

 

[Jacketman1]

Anyone thinking TQM is a better passer than JT, at least right now, needs to watch these to refresh their memory.

 

[Skeptic]

Kam Chancellor? (spelling?) A very good player for the Hokies who said some things that Coach Foster probably wishes he had not said.


Yep. He was and is the very definition of a strong safety: big, strong, fast. But on that night in 2009 we abused him like a rented mule.

Yes, that's the guy. Has been a very good safety for Seattle, I think it is. I have always wondered if Johnson read those comments and put part of his game scheming aside to rap his knuckles so to speak.

 

[Skeptic]

I can't disagree. 1 for 7 that game. But that 1 was a bomb to Thomas that started us going on offense.

Wanna know how good Thomas was? His best year at GT was 2009, when he had only 46 catches, but for more than 1,000 yards. His QBs were Josh Nesbitt who could throw the ball through the proverbial battleship he could never hit, and Tevin Washington, enough said. He played WR for Paul Johnson who thinks that 10 passes is an indictment of run blocking. Yet he was drafted in the first round, caught eight balls in his first start, made the Pro Bowl numerous times, once held the Super Bowl reception record of 13 catches, and made Tim Tebow a brief QB prospect with an 80-yard "walk off" TD in a playoff game, a play that consumed, from the time it was snapped, thrown, caught and carried 80 yards, only 10 seconds. (Sorry, but Thomas is my model when people whine about good wideouts not going to Georgia Tech.)

 

[ramblinjacket]

Nah, we just did what we always do. It was the ESPN Sports Center guys who abused him and then abused him some more.

 

[Boomergump]

I haven't done much slo-mo review myself this season, but one thing I did notice from the PITT game replay was how their defense aligned against us. Did anybody else see this? PITT went pretty much the entire game with only 7 in the box. Their safeties were drawn up close to the action but usually set very wide towards the alleys and they rushed to the alleys on pretty much any motion. Certainly this explains the lack of productivity on the toss sweep for us and TO second and third phases. Perhaps they felt their team speed was not good enough to chase from a formation we are used to seeing. Perhaps they simply respected our outside threat more than the inside. Perhaps they had more confidence in the interior of their defense and felt they could go toe to toe with us. Perhaps it was a combination of the three.

For me it was interesting, specifically in that most DCs we face place a premium on getting the dive stopped and then go from there. There are several tactics we have seen over the years to attempt and do this, but this is the first time in my memory where a team basically dared us to beat them up the middle. I'm not sure we will see a team try it again any time soon because, despite 4 lost fumbles, we pretty much controlled the game and choked off any chance they had to win. When the box isn't crowded, we have shown the ability to exploit it. We simply come off the ball too hard to get stuffed with that number of players.

I'm kind of surprised we didn't run more than a handful of midlines considering this. If you do the math, with only 7 in the box and 1 DT being optioned off, every defender is accounted for and that lead blocking AB flying through the hole can whack the safety making his way back from the alley if he needs to. Generally speaking, the QB follow was effective, but midline adds it own level of difficulty trying to defend. I dunno. It might be a good question for the coaches show. Any thoughts on this?

 

[wreckrod]

I haven't done much slo-mo review myself this season, but one thing I did notice from the PITT game replay was how their defense aligned against us. Did anybody else see this? PITT went pretty much the entire game with only 7 in the box. Their safeties were drawn up close to the action but usually set very wide towards the alleys and they rushed to the alleys on pretty much any motion. Certainly this explains the lack of productivity on the toss sweep for us and TO second and third phases. Perhaps they felt their team speed was not good enough to chase from a formation we are used to seeing. Perhaps they simply respected our outside threat more than the inside. Perhaps they had more confidence in the interior of their defense and felt they could go toe to toe with us. Perhaps it was a combination of the three.

For me it was interesting, specifically in that most DCs we face place a premium on getting the dive stopped and then go from there. There are several tactics we have seen over the years to attempt and do this, but this is the first time in my memory where a team basically dared us to beat them up the middle. I'm not sure we will see a team try it again any time soon because, despite 4 lost fumbles, we pretty much controlled the game and choked off any chance they had to win. When the box isn't crowded, we have shown the ability to exploit it. We simply come off the ball too hard to get stuffed with that number of players.

I'm kind of surprised we didn't run more than a handful of midlines considering this. If you do the math, with only 7 in the box and 1 DT being optioned off, every defender is accounted for and that lead blocking AB flying through the hole can whack the safety making his way back from the alley if he needs to. Generally speaking, the QB follow was effective, but midline adds it own level of difficulty trying to defend. I dunno. It might be a good question for the coaches show. Any thoughts on this?

I doubt PJ would say on the coaches show, but there's probably a bunch of reasons we didn't (and haven't really) run midline.

First, why? Not sarcastically, but we had essentially no trouble blocking them up front man for man. Dive dive dive. If we can run dive, we will, and it will kill the other team. Defenses have to start there with defending our O. QB follow is essentially the dive just with BB lead blocking. If the DTs aren't able to shed blocks up front, we will do what we did to Pitt. It's fast, it's simple. All day.

Kind of the same reason secondly, it goes back to basic option principles. Hard to read, easy to block. I think the midline is a tougher read, and introduces the mesh instead of a handoff. If you're not struggling with blocking a DT, and dive is working, there's no reason to go to midline. On the if-then tree, we never got to "DT is unblockable, run midline".

Marshall is tough, especially for his size. He does a good job not getting big hits. But, if you mess up the read on the midline, you can get crushed by the biggest guy on the defense. If you get the read right, you can still get crushed by the biggest guy on the defense. I think if midline was the if-then answer, we would run it. And maybe here and there to get Marshall some game speed experience with it. Overall though, just not really many reasons to run midline.

All of the above is just my opinion and I presume to know nothing.

Lastly, the only thing we can't do anything with is if the defense has multiple guys that we just can't block, especially if they're on the line. Other than that, we have an answer schematically.