Old Man Mike
Fast as Lightning!
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Some very strange comments in places above which do not correspond to what actually happened in the game. But... here are a few of my own to add to the muddle:
1). Everett Golson seems like a case of VTs Tyrod Taylor in his first two years --- Taylor was spectacularly athletic, much WOW factor, but not polished nor therefore error-free. In fact he made mistakes quite frequently, sometimes his athleticism bailing him out; sometimes not. He, like Everett, didn't have the full sense of the college game. He was a cockier person than Everett and more difficult to coach, but despite personality differences, the two show similar on-field play ["decent"] and potential ["great"]. Neither Taylor nor Everett could throw an accurate long ball yet.
The bottomline is that we must not think that Everett is ready to do everything yet. He is "Taylor-Soph" not "Taylor-Senior". Kelly I think realizes this better than we do.
2]. Kelly was required to take Everett out of the game near the end of the second quarter because his helmet came off. NCAA rule. How people can miss this when it's mentioned clearly by both announcers boggles me. Rees then made several very good passes in a row to get us into field goal position [Mayock was in high praise of Tommy's gutty competence] which Brindza blew. Rees looked very calm and "professional" doing that. Kelly did a completely reasonable thing, and in my opinion this interlude gave Everett what he needed to get his act back together and be the offensive star of the crunchtime periods.
3]. We played the game without our Big Man-in-the-middle. Sure he was there some of the time, but not as many plays, and not full strength. Get used to what it will be like when Big Lou moves on. His ability to alter about half the plays that an opponent tries to run wasn't there except when he could reach down inside that big willpower he has and overcome. [I'd seriously consider giving him a second gameball]. Why, one idly thinks, did Manti have a punk game [for him anyway]? Maybe he had flu symptoms too, and I'll bet several did. But could it have had anything to do with a certain mountainous force not being in front of him messing the O-Line completely up?
4]. We won the game in many ways over and above the scoreboard. As BGIF said, Pitt's offense was mainly about four plays. On one of those plays a severely-hampered Matthias tried to compensate for his broken, cast-covered hand/wrist by shoulder tackling one of the best backs in the nation. It didn't work. Jabbering pseudo-fans immediately began calling him out as a loafer and a liability who should be benched, and incredibly still are, despite his injury being pointed out to them. Utter crazy Whack. What we didn't do was protect the ball. It was we who did the turnovers and we spread the blame: Everett, Tommy, Cierre, plus Brindza leaving 4 points on the field which ends the game in regulation.
5]. Re: "horrible" Kelly playcalling. Way over 500 yards of offense and over 30 first downs. Unbelievable comments. It is always possible to pick out a couple of plays and glibly say: well I sure wouldn't have called THAT, and forget about the other 100. Frankly I'm prayerfully happy that none of us has anything to do with playcalling.
6]. all week long I felt that we all were far too happy with ourselves. The atmosphere around everything seemed that, although a proper gameface was on, we had breathed our first sigh of relief, as if the Oklahoma win had finally proven that if we weren't unbeatable we were nearly so. We had arrived. Well, we are pretty darn good, but with Everett still at "Taylor-soph" stage, we are stuck with being a lunchbucket team who has to grind all week to then grind out a saturday win. That's not as much fun as being Oregon or KSU, but it's who WE are. Frankly, if we're healthy and going all-out lunchbucket, I like who we are, even with a not-quite-there-yet Everett. I remember what those VT teams looked like with the "Taylor-senior" version, and look forward to that in the future.
1). Everett Golson seems like a case of VTs Tyrod Taylor in his first two years --- Taylor was spectacularly athletic, much WOW factor, but not polished nor therefore error-free. In fact he made mistakes quite frequently, sometimes his athleticism bailing him out; sometimes not. He, like Everett, didn't have the full sense of the college game. He was a cockier person than Everett and more difficult to coach, but despite personality differences, the two show similar on-field play ["decent"] and potential ["great"]. Neither Taylor nor Everett could throw an accurate long ball yet.
The bottomline is that we must not think that Everett is ready to do everything yet. He is "Taylor-Soph" not "Taylor-Senior". Kelly I think realizes this better than we do.
2]. Kelly was required to take Everett out of the game near the end of the second quarter because his helmet came off. NCAA rule. How people can miss this when it's mentioned clearly by both announcers boggles me. Rees then made several very good passes in a row to get us into field goal position [Mayock was in high praise of Tommy's gutty competence] which Brindza blew. Rees looked very calm and "professional" doing that. Kelly did a completely reasonable thing, and in my opinion this interlude gave Everett what he needed to get his act back together and be the offensive star of the crunchtime periods.
3]. We played the game without our Big Man-in-the-middle. Sure he was there some of the time, but not as many plays, and not full strength. Get used to what it will be like when Big Lou moves on. His ability to alter about half the plays that an opponent tries to run wasn't there except when he could reach down inside that big willpower he has and overcome. [I'd seriously consider giving him a second gameball]. Why, one idly thinks, did Manti have a punk game [for him anyway]? Maybe he had flu symptoms too, and I'll bet several did. But could it have had anything to do with a certain mountainous force not being in front of him messing the O-Line completely up?
4]. We won the game in many ways over and above the scoreboard. As BGIF said, Pitt's offense was mainly about four plays. On one of those plays a severely-hampered Matthias tried to compensate for his broken, cast-covered hand/wrist by shoulder tackling one of the best backs in the nation. It didn't work. Jabbering pseudo-fans immediately began calling him out as a loafer and a liability who should be benched, and incredibly still are, despite his injury being pointed out to them. Utter crazy Whack. What we didn't do was protect the ball. It was we who did the turnovers and we spread the blame: Everett, Tommy, Cierre, plus Brindza leaving 4 points on the field which ends the game in regulation.
5]. Re: "horrible" Kelly playcalling. Way over 500 yards of offense and over 30 first downs. Unbelievable comments. It is always possible to pick out a couple of plays and glibly say: well I sure wouldn't have called THAT, and forget about the other 100. Frankly I'm prayerfully happy that none of us has anything to do with playcalling.
6]. all week long I felt that we all were far too happy with ourselves. The atmosphere around everything seemed that, although a proper gameface was on, we had breathed our first sigh of relief, as if the Oklahoma win had finally proven that if we weren't unbeatable we were nearly so. We had arrived. Well, we are pretty darn good, but with Everett still at "Taylor-soph" stage, we are stuck with being a lunchbucket team who has to grind all week to then grind out a saturday win. That's not as much fun as being Oregon or KSU, but it's who WE are. Frankly, if we're healthy and going all-out lunchbucket, I like who we are, even with a not-quite-there-yet Everett. I remember what those VT teams looked like with the "Taylor-senior" version, and look forward to that in the future.
