Texas Football Mid-Camp Report: RB, WR, QB

Scipio,

I’m interested in how you think this offense will perform regarding the distribution of yards per play. Mack has a statistic of “explosive plays” right? I think it’s a run over 15 yards or a pass over 25 yards…..

Do you think we have an explosive offense this year? Also, I’m excited to hear that Cody isn’t one for negative yardage runs.

what can be expected from shead this year? how is he looking with the big jump in competition from single A?

Thanks for the analysis Scip some great stuff. A few questions/comments:

1. I have to believe going against the best secondary in college football everyday will cure Garret Gilbert of your stated ills. My guess is that by the end of camp he will have a wallet that says “Bad Mother %$#$” on it.

2. Why no mention on DJ Monroe and the matchup problems he would bring? What secondary wouldn´t develop a case of the squirts with DJ, Goodwin, and Malcolm Williams on the field? How would you match up with that athleticism? Are there literally no packages to support this trio?

3. Don´t see much beyond short yardage for Cody. Reminds me on that cute quiet girl you take out and then find out why she is so quiet.

Nero: Believe it’s 16 for a pass play, 12 for a run, the way Mack defines it. . . . I’d be curious as well for insight as to the distribution of yards.

Scip: I agree with you on every personnel call you make. Scary.

I’m more optimistic than many of the posters I read . . . I think we’ve been wasting our OL and RB talent in recent seasons by NOT lining up and running AT people — at least some of the time. I think this offense will be surprisingly good, even early in the season.

Maybe we weren’t going to run over Suh and Nebraska, McCoy and Co. and Blow-U, but we DIDN’T EVEN TRY. We had big, relatively slow blockers that we (meaning Mack & Greg) were asking to be ballet/gymnasts. I think the revamped offense lets us control the LOS, open up the short passing zones and create 1-on-1s in which Malcolm, Goodwin, Chiles, Hales have the advantage. I like those kinds of matchups!!!!!!

Nero -
 
Personnel will dictate that, as I wrote above. Chiles isn’t going to average 18 yards a completion, no matter how he’s utilized.
 
Overall, I expect our yards per completion to go up 20%. We averaged 10.6 last year and I expect that number to come in around 12.7 to 13.0. A lot of that will be off of play action.
 
We’re also going to run fewer plays and play shorter games, generally speaking.
 
dlonghorns -
 
Shead is physically ready for D-1. He came in benching 350+ and he’s a solid 215. He’s not going to get much play unless there’s an injury to the three backs ahead of him, but he will not redshirt.
 
There are other recruiting types who think more of Shead than I do. For example: I think he’d be the 6th best back in the state if he had come out this year rather than last.
 
I don’t see him supplanting the three guys I focused on this year.

realmccoy -
 
1. It’s not hurting him, that’s for sure. The fact is our DBs win most of the battles in practice. They’ll find easier sledding against 10 of our 12 regular season opponents.
 
2. DJ can’t catch. I’ll cover that in my special teams report. We have some packages for him, but they all scream “SPECIAL DJ MONROE PACKAGE!!!”
 
I would line up DJ at RB and use him similarly to Dexter McCluster. Swing passes. Screens. Quick pitches. He may just be a pure situational guy his entire career.
 
3. You will be proven wrong on Cody, I believe.
 
edsp -
 
I don’t really care if our offense is good against scrubs or early in the year. It makes no difference to me whether we beat them 56-14 or 34-7. What matters to me is how we perform against real defenses in the real games that matter. Last year was miserable in that regard, but we disguised it by piling it on against chumps and scoring on special teams and defense.
 
Guarantee me 17-24 offensive points against all comers and this is a 13-1/14-0 football team.

What about a WR grouping of Monroe, Hales and Goodwin to test top end speed across the defense? It seems like even the best defenses would have trouble fielding enough guys to run with them and it would provide Gilbert a chance to look deep up the seams.

Routes like that would free up the running game moreso as well I would think.

E -
 
Not a bad thought. But DJ really can’t catch. So it’s more of a decoy move. It would lose its value over time. Still, might make for an interesting “oh, shit” moment from DBs and it could free up some other stuff as you mentioned.
 
Running all three of those guys vertical with Barrett Matthews slipping out late would be a good play to have in your pocket for 3rd and 9.

good stuff scip. you planning on doing SOTUs this year?

Gilbert’s proclivity to look deep probably results in more quick strikes and fewer sustained drives this year. Colt & the controlled passing game made our punt team almost a non-factor. I suspect they’ll get a lot more work this year.

eljinca -
 
tbd.
 
Matt -
 
I think you’re thinking of ’08, when the offense was actually good.
 
We punted 64 times last year. Well above the norm.

Time of possession should be better this year I imagine. One thing you are not hearing much about this year in the presser’s is hurry up. We made things tough on our defense when we’d run it on first and get stuffed. Throw an obvious pass on a passing down for 2nd and 9. And then 2/3 of time Colt scrambles to get a first on 3rd down. But if he dioesn’t… the D is back on the field less than 5 minutes of real time later.

This year I imagine a 3 and out will be short run for 3 yards on first down. 4 yard run on 2nd down. dropped pass by Chiles on the 4 yd out that pops off his chest on 3rd down. At least in that scenario its not in ‘hurry-up’ mode and our defense gets 6 minutes real-time rest.

I don’t know… admittedly sheer speculation. Just my gut tells me that we’ll be vastly improved at being able to drain clock this year and giving our defense a better chance. Can you imagine how good our D would’ve been last year if not for all the short fields they were given and all the TOP disadvantages they were handed?
They can be SCARY good if we are even halfway decent at controlling the clock on offense.

realmccoy — What you missed about the cute quiet girl analogy is that while some people quit on the quiet girl, the one who sticks with her and takes her home finds out that she’s anything but quiet in bed. I think we’re looking at the same thing with Cody.

Scip — You said Timmons is being inconsistent. Is he already back on the field after his neck injury (which required a legit trip to the hospital)?

Chipper -
 
I replied to you on the BlogPoll question.
 
You make a good point.
 
Last year, our offense really betrayed the defense and we had a major divorce between Point Allowed vs. Yards Allowed and Yards Per Play. The teams that gave up comparable ypp and ypg to us last year – Alabama, TCU, Ohio State, Florida – gave up 11.7 ppg, 12.4 ppg, 12.5 ppg, 12.8 ppg on the season.
 
We gave up 16.7 ppg. A clear outlier.
 
We also tended to screw our defense in our biggest games: NU, OU, Tech, Alabama. Not a coincidence. Although against A&M the defense did it all to itself. That was really our only bad performance on D all year. The O laid an egg in at least five games.
 
TXinDC –
 
Timmons only went briefly as a precaution. He’s OK, last I heard.

I sure wish we would redshirt Shead, there’s no reason to play him. He would be a great 3rd down back for Malcolm Brown. He’s a monster compared to Oggy and Tre too.

At 6-2, 230 he’d be perfect to fill in for Brown at times.

Plus we have 5 guys who could get carries before Shead this year, tre

Fozzy, Cody, vondrell and Jeremy hills

Your description of Gilbert brings Simms to mind.

UT wildcatter -
 
I already explained the deal with Vondrell and Hills. I don’t know if Shead can catch and that’s requisite for a 3rd down back.
 
You play Shead because you’re trying to create spacing with Malcolm Brown in 2011 and whichever elite RB recruit from 2012 and because an injury to one of Fozzy, Tre, Cody is a near certainty.
 
Juice -
 
For me it brings to mind “most young QBs with a good arm.”

@Scipio – what’s all the recent talk of Luke Poehlmann? That is coming out of left field. You think Mack is playing mind games with the ones?

TxStampede -
 
No. It jibes with what I’ve seen of Luke since he has been here. He’s a football player. He’s just too light in the ass.
 
Without that solid base, he can get bull-rushed by power rushers. He also needs to get stronger in the upper body so guys can’t rip him and throw off his hands.
 
Athletic ability, length, and motor are not issues for him.

Nailed it on the WR rotation. Chiles and Kirk on the field at same time is a non-starter.

DJ Monroe may not have a specific defined position, but will get as much PT on offense as at least a few of the players included in the writeup. I think he could actually play a pretty important role in spots this year – kind of like the few plays he got against Alabama.

If the criteria for including a player was whether they could catch or not, why include Malcolm Williams?

Any reason to believe Texas won’t go hurry-up a lot this season? I though one of the perks of the H-back was switching formations without substituting, letting you catch the D out of their preferred personnel.

Goodwin, Monroe, Malcolm, Aaron Williams, and Hales in that order for kick returns. I’ve always wanted to see Malcolm get a full head of steam and truck a kicker, but I guess that’s out for this year.

Chiles, Williams, and Goodwin on the field looking for GG’s attention, with Cody/Tre at RB to keep the LB’s honestly playing the run. Matthews plays GG’s safety valve, or the RB’s lead blocker?

If our line isn’t a complete disaster, we’ll make the 10-20 points needed to win the game. That’s just too much talent in one place to be completely unproductive.

Has anyone else noticed that Malcolm Williams falls down most of the time when he makes a catch, even in practice? Its like he doesn’t want to jeopardize the catch by running, or maybe that he’s so excited to actually catch the ball that he doesn’t even think about running. Capt. Obvious says this tends to negate his speed and YAC.

Why do you say “Wood has the upside?”

thumper -
 
Because he’s bigger, faster, stronger and more athletic.

The only problem with a grouping of Hales, Monroe, and Goodwin is all it would take is one adult sized defensive back standing at the line of scrimmage with his arms extended and they could corral the three like a day care worker on a field trip to a petting zoo.

In all honesty, the biggest problem Texas had last season with the smaller receivers is that defenses could simply hold them up early in the routes and destroy all the timing of the offense. Shipley was the Horns second biggest receiver last year and that wasn’t a good thing when you add in that none of the smaller guys has a physique close to either Quan or Jordan.

It is why Texas must get consistency from Malcolm and Davis has to get playing time.

Goodwin is THE GUY that will make the highlight reel worth watching. Any sensible OC would use him as the high frequency repeated vertical threat given we finally have a QB that can fling it 65 yards. Tremendous speed, great hands and he reacts so well to the ball without losing stride and any pace. Might not want to send him on too many crossing routes.

Malcolm may always be a work in progress — great ability and frame, just can’t catch the ball repeatedly. Reminds me of the tide’s Julio Jones, great plays interspersed with ridiculous bouts of inattention. He has to step up and be counted as the constant threat that will hurt defenses short, middle and long. I believe he is the key to Gilbert’s success his year.

Mike Davis is the real deal. Saw him play at Skyline vs. Desoto last year — best athlete on the field. He really stood out in a game full of “d1” talent. Like to see him build up the upper body, probably can’t beat a strong pressing corner …… well for most B12 corners and Rice he’s good, some work left to do to beat Bama’s guys.

Timmons and Desoto’s Terrell are wasted schollys, as will be Miles O., just wait and see.

Too bad Darius White didn’t transfer as a freshman to a real high school program. Abundant load of talent with some open field instincts that are unbelieveable, but he’s never been coached or tested. Playing against the likes of Birdville, Saginaw and Mineral Wells in not going to be much of a challenge for a guy who looks as old as Labron did @ 18. Need to put a carrot out there to keep in him interested and out of the dorms over in CS while he develops. He could be a part of a huge nightmare for DCs playing along side of Davis in the next several years.

Strong post, bevo.