2013 Blue-Gold Game
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koonja
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I have nothing against him. Just my opinion that he'll be a non-factor this year. I mention him because he's a 5-star DL on what is a great DL. It's relevant to mention his progress. Am I wrong?
Only in high school. Not sure why this matters?
DillonHall
Tommy 12-2
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Maybe your expectations are a bit too high. I think he was a consensus 4 star recruit.
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koonja
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Sorry Dr. Heisman.
You don't have to have played a sport at a high level to understand it. Do you also think Michael Jordan is a great GM because he played? He gets out GM-d every year by people who never even played in college.
Kaneyoufeelit
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Oh come on. This is ridiculous. You can't evaluate football players or have an opinion unless you played it at an equal level?
aubeirish
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You guys are putting way too much into this spring game. It's vanilla football. Obviously, the offense is not going to look very spectacular. I think the thing we can really get out of this whole thing is that almost everybody looked physically sharp. Tackling looked fine too. To me that is a very very good sign.
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koonja
Guest
Probably. I follow/comment on him because he could make this DL one for the ages. I just don't think this is the year. He doesn't seem to play with tenacity, which is a requirement on the DL. Maybe he was just sandbagging because it was a scrimmage? But if I were on 3rd team, trying to fight for season reps, I'd be doing the opposite of sandbagging.
Hopefully it clicks with him.
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koonja
Guest
Tackling was excellent. Also, the DBs are going to be very good. Overall the defense looked better than last year IMO.
Can't read too much into a spring game, but I did expect EG to look better.
As far as the hat conversation, it's the way of the world.... Kids dress like cocktards and older folks hate on it. Everyone needs to have pictures of the past, for people to laugh at in the future. In my day we grew our hair long, wore bell bottom jeans and listened to rock & roll.
Here's some funny hat stuff:
Pics? Lol. I'll look around for some when I had pink spikey hair. My gut tells me there is a correlation between dressing like a "cocktard" in your late teens to early 20's and getting laid. Anyone care to do some data analysis and throw up a chart examining my hypothesis?
Old Man Mike
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I watched some of the game for a second time and unlike some I am slightly MORE positive about it than I was [which was, taking player inavailabilities into account, positive anyway]. Why?
I don't follow the QB mainly, nor the RB when lugging the ball. I also don't think that you learn much watching the last moment of a receiver catching the ball or not; at least not usually. The success or failure of a given play is usually happening elsewhere and elsewhen.
I'm no high-quality analyst [I have a brother who "sees" all this first time viewing, but not I]. But I might have seen a few things of relevance.
1}. Our Tackles blocked but our Guards and Centers were extremely spotty. Ronnie Stanley [full excuses though due to sudden surprise gametime recruitment to play guard] was lost about half the time. Occasionally on a simple read block, he showed sufficient power to sweep the DT around. Sometimes he whiffed or got mauled. This had to be happening to Hanratty too [I need to watch again concentrating on him] as we had some DLine romps coming up the middle. Lots of this romping and play clogging occurred vs OLine two, though.
Think of this for a moment: OLine two was Elmer [who played solidly], Harrell, Hegarty [who is not strong enough yet to fight off a determined powerful NT {think Kona, Day, Springmann, and Stockton}], Heggie, and a walk-on LT!! That is not the OLine that will line up in the fall. It is no wonder that the offense couldn't get much air. The difference between our second team DLine, which MANY schools would LOVE to have as their starters, and our current second team OLine, which no major program would want starting except Steve Elmer, is chasm-ic.
2}. Any commentary about the RBs should probably be left unsaid. There was very little room on any play. Also, though I appreciate out-the-roof any statement made by BGIF, there were not enough carries for anyone to do a meaningful statistical comparison. We MIGHT learn a little something by analyzing each run and looking at the blocking failures, but we'd need to do that. EX: many of our running plays seemed to have one or both of these things happening --- guards not getting a block, or, more often, TEs "lost in space" not figuring it out. Because of this there was always penetration either at around the guard spot or at the edge. {I'd be happy top hear other views on these breakdowns}.
3}. Because, I believe, of mediocrity of guard and TE blocking, and Center too when NMart was not in there, Diaco could choose to rush 4 and sometimes 3 only and max-drop. Our receivers did not get open vs this often, and given extremely conservative "phantom sack" play stoppage [you KNOW Everett would have extended several of those plays], the offense was stymied. A lot of the max-drop situations had Ronnie Stanley not finding anyone in his area to block at all.
So, given all that, how can I be more optimistic?
A]. We are not the offensive team which was on display in that game. Our OLine will be ZMart [who was a stud], Watt [who did not play], NMart [who held up generally well], probably Lombard [who was solid], and Stanley or Elmer at RT [Elmer at least having a strong spring game, and Stanley "OK" while out-of-position.]
B]. Everett will be able to scramble without the whistle stopping him at a long-reach touch. Plays will extend and the receivers [especially Jones and a more on-the-job Daniels] will get open. TEs also.
D]. Those are fact for the most part. This next is faith: by fall the TEs will finally figure out who to block. The combination of competent blocking guards plus mainly competent blocking TEs, will get the RBs some space to run into. Not having to deal with our own DTs etc will help too.
The Offense will be WAY better appearing.
E]. The defense is fine. If you actually look at real football scoring, our D essentially shut the O out. Kelly dreamed up those other O "scoring items" probably because he knew how embarrassing the final "score" would be without them. Jarrett Grace is EVERYWHERE. ...WHEE-OOO. We have "lucked out" there if his activity in that game is any predictor. Just... wow. Suddenly this D is looking one safety away from dominance. [Shumate still needs awareness improvement --- thus Diaco's "light years away" comment].
F]. Other issues: If we cannot do any better on punt return, at least we cannot do worse. Kelly looks like he's on the verge of taking it over himself, and if we still can't block, he'll put in the fair catch strategy again and we'll live with it. The D isn't going to give anyone over two touchdowns anyway, so the offense should scrape that --- by the way, our experienced swaggering defense is going to go after the ball more this year. They may turn into their own scoring machine.
That's my view and I'm sticking with it -------------------------------- at least until tomorrow.
I don't follow the QB mainly, nor the RB when lugging the ball. I also don't think that you learn much watching the last moment of a receiver catching the ball or not; at least not usually. The success or failure of a given play is usually happening elsewhere and elsewhen.
I'm no high-quality analyst [I have a brother who "sees" all this first time viewing, but not I]. But I might have seen a few things of relevance.
1}. Our Tackles blocked but our Guards and Centers were extremely spotty. Ronnie Stanley [full excuses though due to sudden surprise gametime recruitment to play guard] was lost about half the time. Occasionally on a simple read block, he showed sufficient power to sweep the DT around. Sometimes he whiffed or got mauled. This had to be happening to Hanratty too [I need to watch again concentrating on him] as we had some DLine romps coming up the middle. Lots of this romping and play clogging occurred vs OLine two, though.
Think of this for a moment: OLine two was Elmer [who played solidly], Harrell, Hegarty [who is not strong enough yet to fight off a determined powerful NT {think Kona, Day, Springmann, and Stockton}], Heggie, and a walk-on LT!! That is not the OLine that will line up in the fall. It is no wonder that the offense couldn't get much air. The difference between our second team DLine, which MANY schools would LOVE to have as their starters, and our current second team OLine, which no major program would want starting except Steve Elmer, is chasm-ic.
2}. Any commentary about the RBs should probably be left unsaid. There was very little room on any play. Also, though I appreciate out-the-roof any statement made by BGIF, there were not enough carries for anyone to do a meaningful statistical comparison. We MIGHT learn a little something by analyzing each run and looking at the blocking failures, but we'd need to do that. EX: many of our running plays seemed to have one or both of these things happening --- guards not getting a block, or, more often, TEs "lost in space" not figuring it out. Because of this there was always penetration either at around the guard spot or at the edge. {I'd be happy top hear other views on these breakdowns}.
3}. Because, I believe, of mediocrity of guard and TE blocking, and Center too when NMart was not in there, Diaco could choose to rush 4 and sometimes 3 only and max-drop. Our receivers did not get open vs this often, and given extremely conservative "phantom sack" play stoppage [you KNOW Everett would have extended several of those plays], the offense was stymied. A lot of the max-drop situations had Ronnie Stanley not finding anyone in his area to block at all.
So, given all that, how can I be more optimistic?
A]. We are not the offensive team which was on display in that game. Our OLine will be ZMart [who was a stud], Watt [who did not play], NMart [who held up generally well], probably Lombard [who was solid], and Stanley or Elmer at RT [Elmer at least having a strong spring game, and Stanley "OK" while out-of-position.]
B]. Everett will be able to scramble without the whistle stopping him at a long-reach touch. Plays will extend and the receivers [especially Jones and a more on-the-job Daniels] will get open. TEs also.
D]. Those are fact for the most part. This next is faith: by fall the TEs will finally figure out who to block. The combination of competent blocking guards plus mainly competent blocking TEs, will get the RBs some space to run into. Not having to deal with our own DTs etc will help too.
The Offense will be WAY better appearing.
E]. The defense is fine. If you actually look at real football scoring, our D essentially shut the O out. Kelly dreamed up those other O "scoring items" probably because he knew how embarrassing the final "score" would be without them. Jarrett Grace is EVERYWHERE. ...WHEE-OOO. We have "lucked out" there if his activity in that game is any predictor. Just... wow. Suddenly this D is looking one safety away from dominance. [Shumate still needs awareness improvement --- thus Diaco's "light years away" comment].
F]. Other issues: If we cannot do any better on punt return, at least we cannot do worse. Kelly looks like he's on the verge of taking it over himself, and if we still can't block, he'll put in the fair catch strategy again and we'll live with it. The D isn't going to give anyone over two touchdowns anyway, so the offense should scrape that --- by the way, our experienced swaggering defense is going to go after the ball more this year. They may turn into their own scoring machine.
That's my view and I'm sticking with it -------------------------------- at least until tomorrow.
Junkhead
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Their D was awesome, they had 9 takeaways!
STLDomer
Schmitty
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Some things I saw from being at the game:
- GAIII's pad level is way to high to often
-Saw Prosise and Brown warming up together, Prosise's arms are about double the size of Brown's arms, he still needs to get bigger. That being said Breezy looked like a torpedo on that reverse.
- I noticed Stanley during the game a lot more often than Hanratty. I still would like to see Martin-Watt-Martin-Lombard-Stanley
- Keivarae physcically is very well put together.
- No doubt in my mind Troy is going to continue TEU
- Nix seems to be at a perfect size right now IMO.
- Grace and Carlo played very well together. Carlo looked much improved.
- Councell stood out to me more than Spond. We are DEEP at DOG w/ Jaylon coming.
- GAIII's pad level is way to high to often
-Saw Prosise and Brown warming up together, Prosise's arms are about double the size of Brown's arms, he still needs to get bigger. That being said Breezy looked like a torpedo on that reverse.
- I noticed Stanley during the game a lot more often than Hanratty. I still would like to see Martin-Watt-Martin-Lombard-Stanley
- Keivarae physcically is very well put together.
- No doubt in my mind Troy is going to continue TEU
- Nix seems to be at a perfect size right now IMO.
- Grace and Carlo played very well together. Carlo looked much improved.
- Councell stood out to me more than Spond. We are DEEP at DOG w/ Jaylon coming.
ulukinatme
Carr for QB 2025!
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I expected to see more offensively, but tbh with the cold and the wind we weren't going to see a great passing game. On the ground we went up against our stout run D, so there weren't any surprises there. I think yesterday's game was colder than any regular season game we had all last season. Defensively we looked very good, I expect us to be as good or better on defense this year. Loved seeing Big Lou get the 2 point conversion, that was the highlight of spring and got the biggest reaction from the crowd yesterday.
WakeUpEchoes
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It was freaking 30 degrees out and windy.
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Bogtrotter07
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Excellent post, and clear point. I couldn't get there yesterday! Thanks for confirming what I suspected.
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Bogtrotter07
Guest
You, too!
ulukinatme
Carr for QB 2025!
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I don't know if anyone else mentioned it, but I also noticed Braxton Cave trying to put the moves on Alex Flanagan I think.
He was awful chatty anyway. Other former players I saw were Harrison Smith, Michael Floyd, T'eo, Kyle Rudolph, Mike Golic Jr, Jake Golic, and it looked to be Jonas Gray. Some of those were only out briefly before they went in, Harrison and Kyle stayed out for the whole game I think. I didn't stay for the Alumni flag football, would have liked to, but had to head home.
ulukinatme
Carr for QB 2025!
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Start the "ACC refs are horrible" cries
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Bogtrotter07
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Hey, this ref angle just may work!
GoldenToTheGrave
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Also, while the running game never took off, it certainly had something to do with having the #1 running defense in the country. The defense shut down numerous high powered opposing rushing attacks last year.
Sherm Sticky
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Come September I think this will be the starting OL.
cody1smith
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come on.
stlnd01
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Yes. This was a glaring factor throughout.
I most noticed it when Hicks invoked the name of Bruce Heggie, because Heggie had just been railroaded by Kona Schwenke en route to Schwenke blowing up a running play. The second-string offensive line was comprised of guys who never have or in some cases never will play a meaningful minute, going up against guys like Schwenke and Springmann and Ishaq Williams who have multiple years of big-game experience under their belt. It speaks to the superior depth of our front seven, and I guess the travails of our offensive line depth. But it doesn't make for a very good running game.
Couple that with the prohibition on Golson running and it's no wonder our offense looked like poo.
UmphreakDomer
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no one gets 100+ yards rushing on us. period.
picks will be their highest team total in the past 10 years.
feature back we will not have this year. it will be committee. a freshman will have a "starting role" by mid-season.
brindza better hold up on all of these duties.
vanilla notre dame offense in spring game is as intimidating as vanilla defense as in the NC game.
not sold on GA3 as more than "breakaway threat" but not primary.
tj provides solid but not superstar numbers. in fact, i predict a underclassman to be either most yards/most TD's/or both.
love dan hicks and mayock together. great crew. very sommerall and madden combo without the madden clown-ishness.
enjoyed diaco and martin on the field.
DD is still not proven.
i, me, i, like cam. not sure as a starter.
brady quinn needs a make up person
malik challenges next year, strong.
shaq looks good throughout.
will mahone is NOT robert hughes incarnate.
ST--ouch
gingers have souls
i. like. prosise.
picks will be their highest team total in the past 10 years.
feature back we will not have this year. it will be committee. a freshman will have a "starting role" by mid-season.
brindza better hold up on all of these duties.
vanilla notre dame offense in spring game is as intimidating as vanilla defense as in the NC game.
not sold on GA3 as more than "breakaway threat" but not primary.
tj provides solid but not superstar numbers. in fact, i predict a underclassman to be either most yards/most TD's/or both.
love dan hicks and mayock together. great crew. very sommerall and madden combo without the madden clown-ishness.
enjoyed diaco and martin on the field.
DD is still not proven.
i, me, i, like cam. not sure as a starter.
brady quinn needs a make up person
malik challenges next year, strong.
shaq looks good throughout.
will mahone is NOT robert hughes incarnate.
ST--ouch
gingers have souls
i. like. prosise.
BleedBlueGold
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Spring game...ugh.
I'm not going to do a full-game break down. It's not worth it. It's the spring game. With that said, there are some obvious areas of concern for me. RB (eventhough I shouldn't have expected much against our run defense, but I felt a huge void not seeing Theo or Cierre. I think we desperately need Amir to stay healthy), punting (enough said), QB decision making (I can only hope this improves over time with Everett...he seems to miss open receivers often). Other than that...it's the spring game. I'm not going to worry too much just yet.
I'm not going to do a full-game break down. It's not worth it. It's the spring game. With that said, there are some obvious areas of concern for me. RB (eventhough I shouldn't have expected much against our run defense, but I felt a huge void not seeing Theo or Cierre. I think we desperately need Amir to stay healthy), punting (enough said), QB decision making (I can only hope this improves over time with Everett...he seems to miss open receivers often). Other than that...it's the spring game. I'm not going to worry too much just yet.
rocket66
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The reality is our defense is going to be really really good again. Most offenses would have looked just like that against our D boys. Not many spring games out there go 1's vs 1's, so all you get is a bunch of glory stats and fans drooling over the potential of their teams.
We already know Golson can ball, couple that with action being stopped when he got out of the pocket in the spring game - yeah, out of that pocket where he plays his best ball.
The offense will continue to get better and we know Golson has taken a leadership role on this team and will be a damn fine qb this year. What excites me is the fact that we will be damn tough in the trenches again and will play championship level defense again.
RB play is possibly a concern, but remember what other top rb's did against our d-line last year as well (except Lacey
). There is still a ton of talent at RB, with two more studs coming in. No way am I worried about anything at this point. IMO, both the offense and defense will be better than last year's editions, which sits just fine with me.
We already know Golson can ball, couple that with action being stopped when he got out of the pocket in the spring game - yeah, out of that pocket where he plays his best ball.
The offense will continue to get better and we know Golson has taken a leadership role on this team and will be a damn fine qb this year. What excites me is the fact that we will be damn tough in the trenches again and will play championship level defense again.
RB play is possibly a concern, but remember what other top rb's did against our d-line last year as well (except Lacey
). There is still a ton of talent at RB, with two more studs coming in. No way am I worried about anything at this point. IMO, both the offense and defense will be better than last year's editions, which sits just fine with me.
FLDomer
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Why the excuses with the weather? Is it usually sunny and 65 during the entire season in South Bend?
Other things I noticed:
-D is good but they knew what the O was running, most of time, thus making the offense, meh. From what I remember from my college days, our spring game was always meh offensively because the D knew us and what we were doing, was frustrating for us Olinemen.
-RB is concerning (Cam looking the best/well rounded, imo) and I hope Amir is healthy and Bryant has a Gurley like freshman yr.
-Oline will be ok once they get more reps together. (Poor poor Heggie)
-I wish Golson hand Tommy's pre-read capabilities and almost calmness
-Day is really quick off the ball and will be close to double digit sacks this yr.
- Grace is fast to the ball, I see why the staff is high on him
-I really wish Fox, B. Jax, Robinson could have played. Oh was Lo Wood out for the scrimmage, I don't remember seeing him.
Other things I noticed:
-D is good but they knew what the O was running, most of time, thus making the offense, meh. From what I remember from my college days, our spring game was always meh offensively because the D knew us and what we were doing, was frustrating for us Olinemen.
-RB is concerning (Cam looking the best/well rounded, imo) and I hope Amir is healthy and Bryant has a Gurley like freshman yr.
-Oline will be ok once they get more reps together. (Poor poor Heggie)
-I wish Golson hand Tommy's pre-read capabilities and almost calmness
-Day is really quick off the ball and will be close to double digit sacks this yr.
- Grace is fast to the ball, I see why the staff is high on him
-I really wish Fox, B. Jax, Robinson could have played. Oh was Lo Wood out for the scrimmage, I don't remember seeing him.
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Bogtrotter07
Guest
I watched the game again, and I just wanted to hear myself type. Part of the reason the defense looked so strong had to do with the uncalled penalties. Guys like Carlo just re-routed receivers where ever and whenever they wanted. I wonder if this was by instruction. I know ten centuries ago when I played this game, we would practice game situations, which included the prep team cheating like hell, and we better not open our mouths . . .
If that is what this game was great. If not then I may tend to filter it as arrogance. As a staff and a team you put out an extremely inferior product and laugh about it. Here, have a box of dog shiit, ha ha ha! No, with the qb's quick whistle, when our offense is predicated on qb's being able to take off, and all the pushing and shoving, and a d-line that absolutely can cleave meat from the bone before the bodies drop, a lack of offense was understandable. Please note that if you have any questions, look at the sophistication of a few plays shown in practice, versus the Spring Game.
No, it was done on purpose. Probably not about giving away technology, probably more about letting haters dominate, because Kelly likes playing from an underdog position. The lowest possible rating is the best. Everyone knows that we are going to have a really great defense; Kelly said the offense was capable of giving it back to the defense, and then this week nothing. I am good.
The only thing is, I am not lovin' the minimal access to this team. I am probably going to purchase less as a result. It kept me from the Spring Football Festival.
By the way, where was James Onwualu?
If that is what this game was great. If not then I may tend to filter it as arrogance. As a staff and a team you put out an extremely inferior product and laugh about it. Here, have a box of dog shiit, ha ha ha! No, with the qb's quick whistle, when our offense is predicated on qb's being able to take off, and all the pushing and shoving, and a d-line that absolutely can cleave meat from the bone before the bodies drop, a lack of offense was understandable. Please note that if you have any questions, look at the sophistication of a few plays shown in practice, versus the Spring Game.
No, it was done on purpose. Probably not about giving away technology, probably more about letting haters dominate, because Kelly likes playing from an underdog position. The lowest possible rating is the best. Everyone knows that we are going to have a really great defense; Kelly said the offense was capable of giving it back to the defense, and then this week nothing. I am good.
The only thing is, I am not lovin' the minimal access to this team. I am probably going to purchase less as a result. It kept me from the Spring Football Festival.
By the way, where was James Onwualu?