ok, I'm not going for the best analysis, but I'll give you my very unexpert observations on what I saw.
QBs: There weren't a ton of passes. Personally, I thought Sharpley was consistently the best. He had some nice passes and had a few effective drives. Clausen looked fine but did nothing fantastic. He was unable to pull off a Quinn-esqu comeback in the final 2 minutes when the blue lost the ball on 4th down. he did get a first down in the drive, but it was called back on offensive pass interference. Jones had ups and downs. He threw a pick 6 early. It looked like he led his receiver just a little bit too much and it just got past him. I don't remember exactly, but it just got by the receiver and was picked off by Bruton who was a ways back at safety. Jones' TD was wasn' that pretty, it possibly got tipped at the line or his arm got hit or something, but it still ended up being effective. Jones also had a really nice 30 yard run on 3rd and 21. He looked like he was ready to take off a few other times, but with the red jersey 2 hand tag rule, that didn't work too well. Frazer had some decent passes but also was intercepted.
based on that, I'm not sure who the top 2 are. and of course, I haven't watched the other 14 practices either. but really, I was pretty impressed with Sharpley.
RB: all of them looked good. Junior Jabbie obviously did really well. I wouldn't count him out of the competition for PT. Travis Thomas had a few really determined runs as did Aldridge. Allen def. has speed, but he wasn't able to break anything. Asaph Schwapp was running with a vengance. I thought he did really well and looked like the Ace of old. Luke Schmidt didn't do a whole lot of noticeable things. He had a few nice blocks and a carry or two. He did drop a catchable pass from Jones when the blue team was in the red zone though.
at WR, no one really stood out. Grimes didn't have a single ball thrown his way, West didn't play. I could be wrong, but I think it was Parris who made a nice adjustment on the ball for the TD from Jones. but again, I really can't even remember. Jackson almost had a really nice catch in the endzone, but it was tipped up in the air at the last second by prince. jackson almost caught it on its way down, but gaines got there in time to break the whole play up.
John Sullivan got hurt in the 3rd quarter. He was very slow being helped off the field and ended up being taken off from the sidelines on a cart. I believe it was an ankle injury, but I'm not sure.
on the D, I was impressed with Justin Brown. He seemed to be all over the place. Also, Vernaglia was in on a lot of plays. Obviously, David Bruton was the games MVP with his int return for a TD. Ray Herring had the other pick and a pretty decent return. None of the corners really got beat long, except maybe on a few trick plays, but every time the D got back in time to break up the pass. Zibby had a nice open field tackle on Travis Thomas. Kallen Wade was in on several plays and had a sack. He also got completely blown off the line a few times. Toryn Smith also had a nice game.
Nate Whitaker had an extra point blocked by Ambrose Wooden, and then since apparently blocking wasn't allowed, he went again and hooked it left. He also missed a 53 yard field goal which seemed pretty close. I couldn't tell how short it ended up being. Burkhart made all his tries.
Grimes, Gallup, and Allen all returned punts, but of course they could only fair catch them.
There were several trick plays. The blue team tried a fumble roscie (? sorry, I have no clue how to spell that), but there was a false start or something. they also ran a play were Allen passed the ball across the field to Jones who threw it way down field. the pass was barely tipped and the change in direction caused the receiver to drop it. unfortunately, it ended up being a penalty b/c Allen's pass to Jones was a forward pass to begin with. The white team ran a half back pass by jabbie which was also barely tipped which caused the receiver to drop the ball.
TD celebrations: David Bruton jumped into the stands. After the blue teams TD, all of the linemen and some of the other players made grass angels on the ground. Also, the white team doused Lou Holtz with water at the end of the game.
Brady Quinn, Victor, D Walk and others were all on the sidelines. Brady signed autographs for a while. Also, when Sullivan got hurt, Brady went over to him to talk to him and see how he was doing.
It was a beautiful day and a good game. Is it September yet?
If there are any other specific questions for those of you who weren't there, ask and I'll do my best to answer them.
To encourage analysis of the Blue-Gold Game from those who watched it themselves or otherwise followed it extensively, I'm going to offer one million vBucks -- that's v$1,000,000 -- as well as a bonus surprise gift to whoever puts together the best post on the game. All entries should be posted to this thread before the end of the day on Tuesday. Each entrant will receive a gift, just for showing the willingness to put yourself out there. Assuming we get any interest, I'll whittle down the entries to the top four or so and then put it to a vote.
ileof:
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