Tom Luginbill Q&A on Auburn

[AUChizad]

http://www.al.com/sports/index.ssf/2010/09/auburn_qa_with_tom_luginbill.html

Auburn Q&A with ESPN analyst Tom Luginbill
Published: Monday, September 20, 2010, 5:23 PM   
Jon Solomon -- The Birmingham News

Tom Luginbill, an ESPN analyst and the network's national recruiting director, got a firsthand look at Auburn last week when he called the Tigers' game on ESPN 3D. Luginbill, a former Georgia Tech quarterback and pro coach, offers thoughts on Auburn so far, including Mike Dyer, who was rated ESPN's No. 1 recruit last year.

Q: Marcus Lattimore and Mike Dyer take the same field this week when South Carolina plays Auburn. What's the difference between the two backs?

"The difference in terms of productivity so far is who's playing quarterback for each team. South Carolina is not relying on Stephen Garcia to get things done with his legs like Auburn is, so the bulk of the load is going to fall on Lattimore. At this stage in the season, Lattimore is probably a little more versed in pass protection than Dyer is.

"The majority of Dyer's productivity will probably come in the middle to latter part of the season because Auburn wants him to be the guy. They want to make sure he's good enough to handle pass protecting."

Q: Describe the running styles of Lattimore and Dyer.

"Lattimore is tall with an upright style and power, but he's not a great top-end speed guy. Dyer is a short, compact bowling ball that has better top-end speed than Lattimore, but isn't as good a receiver as Lattimore. Lattimore is the best pass-catching receiver I've seen since I've been doing this. He could legitimately line up wide at the receiver position and play a game there. He's that good. That's one area you haven't seen yet with Dyer. Auburn wants him to develop as a tailback. A lot of that is they have to get a complement for someone else to run the football other than (Cam) Newton. Newton's not going to be able to keep doing that and stay healthy.

"Lattimore is more of a slashing, straight-line guy. Dyer has tremendous balance and agility with deceptive foot quickness in the hole -- very similar to what Mark Ingram has. It's difficult to get a clean shot on Dyer, and when you do, it's hard to knock him off his balance. With Lattimore, I would caution South Carolina in regards to being careful with the carries he's getting. Because all freshmen hit the proverbial wall. He's not going to be able to at, at 18 years old, carry it 25 to 30 times a game (every week). If he does, he's got an S on his chest. Mark Ingram didn't do that. Trent Richardson didn't do that."

Q: Dyer's carries are gradually increasing. Can he handle a heavy workload?

"I don't worry about that at all. At some point in his career, he'll be a guy that can carry it 35 times in a game if they need him to. Against Clemson, I thought Auburn got so physically whipped upfront that he didn't have a chance early. He had a succession of about four to five runs over two series that I thought showed flashes of, whoa, this guy is going to be a player."

Q: Auburn also heavily recruited Lattimore. Could Lattimore and Dyer have co-existed in the same offense?

"I don't think there's any question it could have worked because Gus Malzahn's offense is designed to be a two-back, play-action game. That's the issue they run into with Onterio McCalebb because of his size. They can't count on him every down. If they had Lattimore and Dyer, they'd never have to take them off the field."

Q: The physicality in the Auburn-Clemson game was a sight to see. How does the violence from that game compare to others you've seen?

"Those teams beat the snot out of each other. That was absolutely a back-alley brawl. Nobody deserved to lose that game. I applaud Clemson. They stacked the line of scrimmage and said, we're gonna dare you to throw the ball to beat us. They forced Cam Newton into some terrible decisions with the football. I think that's something that will be glaring on film to South Carolina. I would foresee a very similar game plan."
 
Q: It looks like Newton locks in on his receiver too quickly at times. Is that what you see?

"He does lock on to some degree. But what compounds the problem to some degree is when he locks on, he's late as well (with the pass). From a quarterback standpoint, I always used to say it to the guys I played with: Sometimes you're just not seeing it. He had no awareness of the safety alignment (against Clemson), and he didn't seem to care. He said, I'll throw it anyway. It almost cost them the ballgame. I think what we saw was a wonderful athlete but he has a ways to go in the passing game."

Q: Terrelle Pryor faced these questions about his passing game early in his career, and to an extent, he still does. Is Newton's case similar?

"Yeah, it's almost like the Terrelle Pryor syndrome. Everybody dares you to throw it to beat you. They're going to make him do what he hasn't shown he can do."

Q: So if you're Newton, how do you improve your passing game?

"I think it's going to come with reps, more comfort in the offense, more studying of the game. This is the SEC. Now they're throwing things at him he hasn't seen before, defensive alignments that maybe he's not recognizing. The biggest thing with Gus Malzahn is it's OK to play the next down. It's not OK to give the ball up."

Q: You mentioned Newton wasn't seeing the alignments well against Clemson. What plays in particular stood out to you?

"There were two balls he threw late down the sideline with a half safety who only had to go over a quarter of the field to get to the sideline. It was almost like he was throwing right to him. He should have easily been able to see that alignment pre-snap to know that he didn't need to go there right off the bat. He just wasn't seeing the entire complexion of what Clemson was trying to do defensively. I've been through that from experience. You ever see a guy and it looks like he throws the ball literally right to the middle linebacker? From my experience, you don't even see the guy.

"You compound that with Newton is late getting the ball out of his hands. When he starts patting the ball, that's not good because he's getting a bit antsy and the ball's not out at time and the rush is closing in."

Q: Did it surprise you that Auburn didn't throw more intermediate-range passes against Clemson? It seems like there's been an awful lot of shots downfield, although there are times this season Newton has shown he's capable of moving the chains with shorter throws.

"Yeah, I didn't think they did enough of that against Clemson. I'd be willing to bet when Gus Malzahn watched the tape, he's going to want to look at more high-percentage attempts. Almost all of their attempts were vertical. They didn't take a lot of shots in the short- to medium-range. Sometimes you do that early on just to generate confidence with your guy and get the tempo going. I think a lot of that may have been because they were getting whipped upfront and were not able to run the football, which completely took them out of their game plan."

Q: It looked like Clemson simply controlled the line of scrimmage with four linemen and walked up the safety as the eighth man in the box. Is that the blue print now against Auburn?

"Yeah, Clemson didn't bring pressure on many occassions. You're going to see more defenses sneaking an eighth man into the box and playing man outisde. I will say this: In the back end of the third quarter and for the rest of the game, Newton started coming alive a little bit. He started making some plays. The ball was coming out of his hands quicker. That was also around the time when they started ripping off some big runs. When that happened, it softened up the defense."

[Godfather]

That is a really good assessment.

[Snaggletiger]

That is a really good assessment.

Exactly.  I think he's spot on with that.  I think we have to realize or maybe accept the fact that a lot of this is simply not going to improve itself until he gets the reps and begins to recognize defenses.  The locking in and late delivery are apparent to everyone but I imagine (Because I've only quarterbacked in my back yard...I was damn good too and threw 4 TD's one day to David Dunbar) it's much easier said than done. 

I am so glad he also hit on the intermediate/short passes and I hope Malzahn is looking at that too.  Brian, you were saying the exact same thing during the game.