Well, What Can You Say?

[Snaggletiger]

Ugly, ugly win at Cal.  Quick take aways.

What a defensive effort.  Never seen a defense put behind the 8 ball so many times in one game.  Met the challenge every time.

I saw Eugene Asante make some nice plays in the UMass game.  Okay, kind of whatever.  It was UMass.  His play against Cal flat out gave me wood.  Speed, quickness and attitude.  Hope it continues.

The offense was inept.  Thorne was not good.  More on that in a second.  Two things, both of which are fixable, correctable, unfuckable.  Hold on to the damn ball.  Pure concentration.  Just fix it.  Second, Phillip Montgomery and U Free need to get their heads out of each other’s asses.  Unbelievably bad play calling. 

If you didn’t catch U’s presser after the game, he didn’t hold back on Thorne.  I mean, you rarely hear a coach call a player out.  He did.  I told you guys I wasn’t that impressed with him in game one.  He was pretty bad Saturday night.  However, much of that is on Freeze.  The play calling didn’t put Thorne, Ashford and the entire offense in a position to succeed.  I expected more from U. 

In the presser, he was asked if he took over the play calling.  He basically said no, but hinted that it may happen. 

I truly believe we are waaayy better offensively than we showed Saturday night.

[Snakebite]

Ugly, ugly win at Cal.  Quick take aways.

What a defensive effort.  Never seen a defense put behind the 8 ball so many times in one game.  Met the challenge every time.

I saw Eugene Asante make some nice plays in the UMass game.  Okay, kind of whatever.  It was UMass.  His play against Cal flat out gave me wood.  Speed, quickness and attitude.  Hope it continues.

The offense was inept.  Thorne was not good.  More on that in a second.  Two things, both of which are fixable, correctable, unfuckable.  Hold on to the damn ball.  Pure concentration.  Just fix it.  Second, Phillip Montgomery and U Free need to get their heads out of each other’s asses.  Unbelievably bad play calling. 

If you didn’t catch U’s presser after the game, he didn’t hold back on Thorne.  I mean, you rarely hear a coach call a player out.  He did.  I told you guys I wasn’t that impressed with him in game one.  He was pretty bad Saturday night.  However, much of that is on Freeze.  The play calling didn’t put Thorne, Ashford and the entire offense in a position to succeed.  I expected more from U. 

In the presser, he was asked if he took over the play calling.  He basically said no, but hinted that it may happen. 

I truly believe we are waaayy better offensively than we showed Saturday night.

I’ve heard 2 different head coaches say that Holden throws the best. Put him in, for the love of all that is good and pure in this world. I want so badly to have a scary passing game that helps our running game. I’ll even take his fuck ups from time to time. If he isn’t the answer, then ride with Thorne.

[jmar]

Ugly, ugly win at Cal.  Quick take aways.

What a defensive effort.  Never seen a defense put behind the 8 ball so many times in one game.  Met the challenge every time.

I saw Eugene Asante make some nice plays in the UMass game.  Okay, kind of whatever.  It was UMass.  His play against Cal flat out gave me wood.  Speed, quickness and attitude.  Hope it continues.

The offense was inept.  Thorne was not good.  More on that in a second.  Two things, both of which are fixable, correctable, unfuckable.  Hold on to the damn ball.  Pure concentration.  Just fix it.  Second, Phillip Montgomery and U Free need to get their heads out of each other’s asses.  Unbelievably bad play calling. 

If you didn’t catch U’s presser after the game, he didn’t hold back on Thorne.  I mean, you rarely hear a coach call a player out.  He did.  I told you guys I wasn’t that impressed with him in game one.  He was pretty bad Saturday night.  However, much of that is on Freeze.  The play calling didn’t put Thorne, Ashford and the entire offense in a position to succeed.  I expected more from U. 

In the presser, he was asked if he took over the play calling.  He basically said no, but hinted that it may happen. 

I truly believe we are waaayy better offensively than we showed Saturday night.

I saw a team that lost the battle up front on both sides of the ball which kept Cal firmly in the game.


We just happened to have a number of skilled players better than Cal that could  overcome such with the right sequence of calls in the fourth quarter. Thorne wasn't good but was pressured, Ashford was stymied even when we had a blocking advantage in numbers. We have a pretty good receiving corp, better than I anticipated anyway. And we have three backs that could play on most teams.


Thorne might not wow us with his athleticism but he's no slouch either or wasn't at MSU. But if you are gonna restore that new car feeling and trade our Thorne in for a Geriner- Samford is the team to do it against.
Cal had the ball for the majority of the first half, 34:48 for the game and from my view we were getting beaten up front.
 
We have a talented group in the secondary, not particularly large but they bring the wood and battle. They will look volatile against better opponents for lack of fight up front.
Asante was exceptionally good but then there were others like Steiner; slow afoot, squatting and lunging with missed arm tackles. It's not all bad just not enough talent to dominate a team we should beat by 30 even with a new staff.
The core of the team still has Harsin's signature on it. Thank God we have great staff members like Cadillac to work with the offensive line coach to skirt some of these inadequacies before we meet up against better talent in the trenches... same for our D-line.
We can defend the pass... just not long enough for a sandwich and a bag of chips. The opposing QB has to a least feel uncomfortable. We might get burnt by having to bring a safety down in the box in order to gain an advantage against the run.
If there's any consolation we still don't tackle as badly as USC and Bowling Green in 2022. And we have time to gel as a unit on the offensive line where we can get more consistent production there.
It's not awful, just not good enough at this point to beat most of our SEC opponents.


The old adage is that most teams show the most improvement by the third game of the season can still prove true. Unfortunately for us our next opponent is cupcake Samford which can only yield a "false positive."


We've seen this before-much more over the years than we care to admit... or recollect. In 2022 we were 97th in team defense, 73rd in total offense. (78th in sacks allowed)


All I'm saying is that we have remnants of a culture that might take some extra treatments to rid us of the stench left behind. I'm not going to berate players excessively that might not belong in this league. None of them are failures although (suffice to say) some of them are truly out of their element.


In reality this Auburn edition is a team that will do well to make a bowl game.
I think we have the makings for that much and possibly a little more with some good breaks and late game heroics.


Nothing would please me more than to sit down to a plate of crow at the end of this season and admit I was wrong.

[Snaggletiger]

I saw our defense make the adjustments as the game went along, especially in the run game.  They were attacking us straight up the gut, but by the second half, that was completely shut down.  Made a huge difference.

On the other side of the ball, Cal was doing exactly what we should have been doing in the passing game. Quick throws on drag routes, out patterns, and to backs out of the back field.  We finally started going to that in the 4th, giving Thorne one quick read.  Our first score was on a drag route to Jay Fair, and I'm asking, why is that the only time we're running something like that?  Fair and Johnson are fast as hell.  Use them.

On a side note, they released the depth chart for Samford, and Gunnar Britton is back at right tackle.  Don't know if he was banged up this past Saturday, but Izavion Miller was the one getting schooled on the edge.

[GH2001]

Hugh wasn't out of line - the QB play was bad. I think the coaches were at a loss, thus some of the crazy rotation and play calling. Trying to find some combo or rhythm that worked. I think at the end Fairweather and Alston with Thorne proved to be that combo to a degree. Hopefully it's something they can work with going fwd. QB's have to make reads, make decisions quicker and the WRs HAVE to get some separation. Until then, Fairweather may be our kid just lobbing up some 50/50 fades like Sat night.

The D.....wow. Asante is a grown man. We have THAT linebacker again. Nixon and McLeod are terrible either. To think this was a weakness of the team in August. Its still early but those guys are overperforming.

[Snakebite]

Keonte Scott undergoes ankle surgery today.  Out for considerable amount of time (likely the season).

Kam Stutts, Izavion Miller, Pritchett, Jarquez Hunter, Donovan Kaufman, Austin Keys, Larry Nixon and more I am not thinking of are all dealing with their own shit at varying levels of severity.  That's a lot of key players & leaders that will or could potentially be missed to open SEC play.  Who amongst you can ward off evil spirits & injury bugs?

[wesfau2]

Keonte Scott undergoes ankle surgery today.  Out for considerable amount of time (likely the season).

Kam Stutts, Izavion Miller, Pritchett, Jarquez Hunter, Donovan Kaufman, Austin Keys, Larry Nixon and more I am not thinking of are all dealing with their own shit at varying levels of severity.  That's a lot of key players & leaders that will or could potentially be missed to open SEC play.  Who amongst you can ward off evil spirits & injury bugs?

Hate to lose Scott, he was playing inspired football.

As for those other guys...suck it up.  Unless you're going under the knife, it's all hands on deck.

[jmar]

Hate to lose Scott, he was playing inspired football.

As for those other guys...suck it up.  Unless you're going under the knife, it's all hands on deck.

Damn Wes be Rick Tricketing the lame.

[CCTAU]

Scott is a loss. We saw that with the ten guys fumbling punts.