Slightly more detailed breakdown.
Offense:
Gun shy gunslinger
Some of this is on the offensive line, but Stidham looked hesitant to pull the trigger. He can't be gunshy. He's got to hit the steps and put the ball in the air. Can't stand back there and hesitate. It sucks that he didn't have time to hesitate even a little against a rinky dink team, but still.
What you're looking for against a Georgia Southern is 15-20 completions and 300 yards passing. We threw the ball 26 times (24 by Stidham) and had 185 yards. Again, some was on the line, but Stidham can't get sacked by GSU three times. He can't almost throw and then change his mind.
I remember a Bama jackass honking "weyull, ya'll mebee gots a quarterback, but who tha hayull he gon' throw to?" I wonder that myself now. Do we have anybody who can get separation? Run decent routes?
Spun glass
I like Sean "Puffy" White and Kerryon Johnson. Both are apparently made of peanut brittle and spider webs. Johnson can't stay healthy.
We ran the ball 56 times. He ran it 16 and gimped up on that 16th run. There are 18 articles on al.com about Bama freshmen, bama linebackers, bama this and bama that. No update on Johnson's injury. Based on what I saw? Looked like a hamstring. I doubt we see him next week.
Should he have carried the ball 16 times midway through the second quarter? That seems excessive. Then again, we had to run a buttload of plays because GSU couldn't muster a first down. Part of that was because Pettway stupidly got himself suspended. With him in the lineup Johnson probably has 8-10 carries and possibly stays healthy. Possibly.
Defense
Yes it was Georgia Something State or whatever. But that looked like the kind of domination you'd achieve by adjusting all the settings in the old NCAA football for PlayStation.
Smothered them at the line, effective linebacker play. That was the kind of thing that would make Pat Dye and Tommy Tuberville smile. Long way to go, but it put me in mind of the big, fast, salty defenses Dye regularly fielded in the 80s.
Be curious to see how we perform against a Clemson offense that looked pretty polished in a win over Conecuh Sausage Technical College.
SO.....
Better get our shit together with the idiots being suspended. That's not a good start.
We don't have enough depth at running back considering Johnson is made of balsa wood. Pettway worries me because he made a stupid decision and doesn't have a full season under his belt either. After that it's a bunch of little skinny kids who bring back memories of Bowden's vision for RBs: Guys built like him.
I don't know if we have receivers who can make plays, which could lead to quarterback hesitation, which is exacerbated by an offensive line that looked weak against a weak opponent. That's a concern. I think Stidham can make throws White can't, but he's got to trust himself to make them.
I didn't really see a lot of difference offensively. That looked very much to me like a Malzahn finger-printed plan. Why the HELL is he still walking around with a laminated sheet full of plays? The biggest difference is that I didn't notice that scripted "first drive that works so well we get away from it for the rest of the game" deal.
I didn't see anything (except RB depth) that can't be improved in practice. BUT... if Malzahn holds true to form, we won't see much difference from week to week. He'll TALK about getting better, but what you saw is what you're going to see. THAT worries me a lot too.
We're a seven-point underdog at Clemson. I don't think that's unfair. I had this game marked as a win for us from the start, but I've changed my mind on that. I hate Dabo Swinney. He looks like a turtle having an orgasm from anal sex. I expected them to struggle a little in the absence of Watson and Williams. I expected our offense to have more sizz. Neither of those proved true. Thus, I haven't given up hope, but I no longer consider this an automatic.
As for the rest?
A&M? Wow. Only slightly better than the bonfire fail. They will, of course, play better later in the year, assuming that they aren't in the midst of a coaching change.
Florida? Chuckles. Michigan's uniforms blinded them.
South Carolina? Raise the banner! They beat NC State! Okay then.
Georgia? Meh.
Alabama? I'm not ready to crown them. Hurts looks like the same "one read and run" clown he was last year. They should be easier to stop than they are. FSU stopped them and FSU's defense is a joke.
LSU? Looked like a Les Miles coached team. I didn't see much energy or passion. They are a lot like us in that the defense appears nasty but the offense has questions.
Ole Miss and MSU? Fuck both of them. They didn't lose, that's about the best that can be said about either.
Arkansas? Bert is still fat. Allen looked better than I expected.
I don't care about Tennessee. Butch Jones is a red-faced fool. They'll never amount to much with him there.
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