Sunday, April 25, 2010

Rants and Musings on Spring Game--24 HRs Later


GENERAL RANTS

1. Attendance was terrible. The Football team derserved much better support than what they got from the fan base (even with the weather)

2. I talked with several of the 2010 recruits and all of them are eager to be here on June 5th.


Team Rants and Musings


OFFENSE:

1. La Rod King has made tremendous strides and will definitely be a playmaker this year

2. Brian Adams has come a long way and will also make some noise

3. Both Gene McCaskill and Aaron Boyd are way behind the pack and may not be able to make up any serious ground

4. The TE fight looks to be between J Aumiller and N Melillo (at least at this point)

5. Do NOT count C Burden out as the Starting OLT --he looked pretty good yesterday

6. Overall, the O-line is not in nearly the shambles that most believed it to be in before Spring Practice began (at least not yesterday)

7. The QB position is basically a dog fight: Do they want M Hartline starting and M Newton coming off of the bench? Or, do they want M Newton starting and M Hartline coming off of the bench? R Mossakowski was making some deep throws and will make a huge push at some point.

8. Speed, talent, and playmaking ability has increased tremendously on this side of the ball

9. The RB position is deep and a dog fight as well (in depth after D Locke)

10. Believe it or not, we are not that far away from being really good on Offense. There were some timing issues that can easily be worked out.


DEFENSE:

1. M Cobble will be a player this year. He really stood out.

2. The backup DEs are getting some serious time on the field which is good. J Henderson will be a player and a starter for the '11 season.

3. I would have hoped to see more from R Lumpkins and S McCord

4. Both C Ukwu and P Ligon were getting mentioned in the game

5. R Sneed's name was mentioned, but you would have thought that it would have been mentioned more

6. W Guy played lights out! He had 2 INTs and could have had more. He still needs to wrap up on tackling more instead of going for the block tackle

7. The CBs did get beat a couple of times and it could have been more IE the deep pass that was overthrown over the middle-should have been a TD

8. The DTs look to have a good battle going on. The starters might be M Crawford and M Cobble from what I saw

9. Team speed has increased dramatically

10. Yes, Qua Huzzie played well, and will be tough to keep off of the field at some point

8 comments:

  1. The important story lines of this scrimmage involve Donald Russell, Qua Huzzie, and Mister Cobble. Russell has now nailed down the #2 RB job behind Locke, and Donald also has a big advantage for the 2011 starting job. I realize UK has three talented freshman RBs coming in August, but a lot of people haven't grasped yet how good Russell will be a year from now. Donald does everything well. He runs with great vision and cutback ability. His receiving skills have improved dramatically. He blocks like a FB. 2010 will be a breakout season for Donald.

    Huzzie struggled at times in this month's drills, but he won the starting MLB job yesterday with an aggressive performance. He isn't very big, but he pursues sideline-to-sideline better than any UK MLB I can remember and he tackles better than any of UK's other defenders.

    Cobble is basically the only DT I see on this roster who can be an effective every-down SEC player inside the box. He is a run stuffer, and he also gets a push up the middle in the pass rush. Maybe his inexperience hurts at times, but he has to play.

    The QB competition was not solved yesterday. Everyone has a different opinion about which QB played the best. The key here is that Joker could have named Hartline the starter, but he didn't. Joker is keeping the two younger QBs focused, so no one starts thinking about a transfer over the summer. This is shrewd. I still think Hartline starts against UL, but it isn't at all clear who will be starting in November.

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  2. Messenger:

    Seems like great minds think alike!

    Thanks for the comments.

    As always, you are one of the fresh minds and true thinkers in regards to UK Football.

    As always, I also appreciate the posts over at VBS!!

    Keep up the great work

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  3. Two comments:

    1) I never thought the OLine was in shambles and did not get the feeling that anyone else felt that way either. Despite losing 4 starters, the guys coming back all have significant PT behind them and many have at least a few starts as well.

    2) By the time he graduates, LaRod King will go down as one of the truly GREAT WRs in UK football history. At the very least, he will be mentioned in the same breath as Keenan Burton. He has the tools to be even better than Burton, if he stays clean, stays healthy and works on his game.

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  4. I sat with La Rod's mother and father yesterday, they are very excited and should be about LaRod. He showed on the field that he has taken his game to the next level and it looks like he will indeed be a great one for the program!

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  5. I never feared the running game, we had it last yr and we look to have it again no problem, Donald Russell looked really good. I'd say made a good statement for the #2 spot behind Locke.

    The passing game, seemed better, under Hartline
    he seemed able to get his passes up past the shoelaces for an entire outing which was good but still could miss intermediate throws but land the deep ball,the other can still be corrected.

    Newton I thought was best overall but busted it with the endzone int when he could have thrown it away and the offense took the FG in the final six seconds which would ended the 2nd quarter on a good note or better yet, with Mathews is 6'4 put him in the corner and good grief make it a jump ball and throw it high in the endzone and let him climb the ladder for it, seems like every fan knows this but the O-coord doesn't!

    The defense I'd say we're still shaky on the run defense part, but we got penetration plenty of times against the pass.

    Finally I'd say we got some TE's that can catch
    Yes! so whoever is the QB doesn't always have to
    look to dump it off to a RB. Plenty of blanks to fill in with what I said, and will make a few mad about the Newton comment, But I thought he had the best day till he shanked it in the endzone, BTW Mossakowski looked very good too!

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  6. I think my biggest disappointments this Spring have been Wallace and even more so, Kendrick. From the film I saw on Kendrick, he looks almost Tamme-like as receiver. I think he could be such an awesome offensive weapon. It is too bad he cannot get the blocking part down.

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  7. I think Hartline is the starter against Louisville. Moss and Newton have room to really improve. How much more can Hartline improve? If Moss continues to progress, he could be the starter. I felt Newton held on to the ball too long. I think Newton has a huge upside too, however he needs to run more north and south and not so much east and west.

    Huzzie will be on the field. He is too fast and will improve over the summer. No one is talking about Ridge Wilson, he led the team in solo tackles yesterday.

    We have depth at RB which is great. I thought all of the backs did good things, Russell was just better.

    The receivers looked good and better than we have seen the past couple of seasons. I too was disappointed in the TE's. Aumiller dropped an easy catch, but he will progress. Kendrick can be a factor if he gets the blocking down. Don't count out Melillo either. Wallace?

    OL has to get better or we will get creamed in the SEC. Granted they were not 100%, but by the time the team hits SEC play they won't be then either. OL MUST GET BETTER!

    Mister Cobble has to play, he isn't Corey Peters, but as a unit we should be better. Overall a good day and good spring.

    Start the countdown! Freshmen report in June and practice starts in August. It will be here before you know it! GO CATS!

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  8. Was I wrong, or did I not see the TE's catch some nice passes, I thought kendrick catch at least 2, and I watched melillo go up in the air and grab one. Granted its not all about passing skills but it's still part of the package and I for one am frankly glad we might finally have a couple of TE's that can catch than say oops I dropped another one on 4th and 2 in the 4th quarter like in Miss ST game

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