I wanted to take a little time this week to take inventory on where this team is compared to what I was thinking about at the opening of spring practice and some general thoughts/bullet points on what I’ve seen so far. Here was my thinking back in April:
Who’s going to step into Sedrick Van Pran-Granger’s leadership role?
After a couple of weeks, I thought Tate Ratledge had settled into that leadership role on the offensive line. Needless to say, his injury on Saturday night has officially thrown that out for time being (get well soon). I have been somewhat underwhelmed by how the offensive line has played to date against their 2 Power 4 opponents and a step up in weight class waits next Saturday night in Tuscaloosa. I like our talent level with the current starting 5. I just don’t know who is going to step up to be the voice if/when things get sideways. Carson Beck’s style doesn’t seem to line up with being that guy. There is no Chubb, Michel or Gurley to say to his teammates, “Get on my back, and we’re going to make it happen.”
Is the defensive line going to raise its level of play over last year?
I really don’t know where the defensive line is right now due to multiple injuries. We really need all hands on deck for Alabama as I am guessing they are going to try to play hurry-up offense to try to wear out our defensive front if Mykel Williams, Jordan Hall and Warren Brinson aren’t available. One player who needs to be at his best for the remainder of the season is Jalon Walker … he and Williams have the potential to be the true game-wreckers this defense is going to need as we move into the meat of the SEC schedule. Right now, the jury is definitely still out on the defensive line until we get some players back healthy and available. I hope the issues we saw on Saturday night in Lexington were about player availability and not a run defense that may begin to leak oil.
What impact will the young DBs make on the team?
KJ Bolden is going to be a star at safety. He has been everything through 3 games that we thought he was going to be. Ellis Robinson looks extremely athletic and also looks like he’s going to need a full cycle of Scott Sinclair’s strength program to be an every down contributor. Julio Humphrey has played well over the first 3 weeks of the season, and Daniel Harris was trending the same until his stupid joyride on the Athens loop. Joenel Aguero also has been very solid for this defense so far. Once again, assuming no major injuries, this secondary has the potential to be an asset for the defense to be built around.
Some random bullet points about what I’ve seen:
- While Beck looked good his first two weeks, he played possibly his worst game in a Georgia uniform to date on Saturday night. Then, he made possibly one of the best throws I’ve seen him make when he hit Dom Lovett perfectly in stride on the last possession to flip field position and keep the clock moving.
- Speaking of Lovett, he and Arian Smith have been a couple of bright spots in the receiving corps. Lovett’s ability to make people miss in space and Smith’s apparent confidence are strengths for this offense to build on because …
- Brock Bowers isn’t coming through a door in the Georgia locker room. Maybe I’m missing something, but Oscar Delp hasn’t had the greatest of starts to this season (someone correct me if I’m not seeing something). Lawson Luckie has made the big plays in the passing game, and Yurosek seems to be trying to find his way.
- As discussed above, the offensive line play has been a mixed bag other than the 2nd half against Clemson. Much of Saturday night was abysmal.
- Christen Miller is doing some good work in the middle of the defensive line, and Ty Ingram-Dawkins seems to have really come into his own. See discussion above about the desperate need for depth.
- The pass rush has generally been good. We lost containment a couple of times on Vandagriff, but other than that, the pass rush really helped us make Kentucky one-dimensional where the run game was the only way they could get any consistency.
- CJ Allen has been a really good player for us, and those 2 freshman linebackers (Williams and Cole) are going to be studs.
- No surprise, but the best player on the field for the first 3 weeks has been Malaki Starks. Yes, he got a holding penalty called on him on Saturday, but he is just a good instinctive safety and has proven he can play slot corner/star as well.
- The special teams are championship quality. Thorson is a field position weapon, and Woodring has picked up right where he left off. Anthony Evans is going to take a kick to the house at some point this season.
- Kirby and company have done a good job working around some injuries especially on defense. I try not to overstate things, but next Saturday night may be the biggest game Kirby has coached Georgia in. We need to show the Bammers that life in the SEC is going to be different without Nick Saban. I can’t imagine how smug they will be if they are the ones to break the regular season win streak, the SEC record regular season win streak, and the road game streak (remember Bama is the last true road game we lost in 2020).
Those are my thoughts on where we stand at the first quarter-mile pole. Let us know what you think in the comments below.
I’m not sure we’re going to see much out of Yurosek. He’s getting his a** handed to him regularly and doesn’t seem to be able to adjust to the SEC.
Yeah, haven’t really seen him much except to wiff on blocks. No blocking = no playing for Kirby.
I’m still reviewing second half film, but there is no doubt the TE’s were an issue Saturday. Both Delp and Yurosek had KEY missed blocks. Their catching efficiency is lacking and we were very lucky Arian Smith was on the spot for Delp’s fumble. I hope this is a one game deal and seems very fixable. I’m not so sure with Ernest Greene’s performance. He seemed so much quicker last year. He’s getting blown by quite a bit this year. We can’t have that vs. Bama. Beck definitely was not sharp. I point to the low snap that was mishandled as a sign of inattention. The snap was low, but catchable. The issue I saw was he was looking at the field and didn’t look the ball in. I’m thinking that was a sign that he wasn’t sure of what he was reading in the defense. The pass he missed to Bell was something he rarely does. Again I hope this was a one game thing and is very fixable. Living in Alabama I can tell you Bammers are licking their chops which sets up better for us. Their mouths are going miles a minute.
Just saw that Ratledge had the tightrope surgery on the ankle. By my calculations his earliest possible return is the WLOCP.
Not sure if that’s the earliest, but it seems the most likely with a big body like his. Really need him for Texas.
Yurosek has been a disappointment. He whiffed on at least two blocks last Saturday. The screen pass to Arian Smith he was a blocker on would have gone for a big gain too. He doesn’t look in shape either to me compared to the rest of our players. I think we see the other TEs start to eat into his playing time as Kirby isn’t going to play someone who cant block.
We are having tackling issues. UK had absurd YAC numbers. We were constantly getting hands on their RBs (and QB) behind or at the LOS but we couldn’t wrap up and bring them down. That is both concerning and odd. Especially from a Smart/Lanning led defense.
I think the DL is playing fine considering how thin we are there. We have guys playing 60+ snaps a game right now because of injuries and they are still pretty disruptive with that work load. Hopefully we get a couple guys back. Walker looks amazing rushing the QB.
I’m not really concerned about the secondary at all. Dan Jackson is a dude back there. I see why he is still starting. Starks is Starks. He just know where to go when the ball is put into the air.
My overall issue with this team is we just aren’t very aggressive. We kept running into a stacked box over and over last Saturday. Where are the passes to our playmakers down the field? I get some of it was poor OL play and Beck didn’t have enough time to find guys.
Meant Shumann defense..
Great write up, ee. The way I see it is both lines of scrimmage could be in trouble in Tuscaloosa. It definitely feels like it did going into the SECC last year: Banged up on both lines and underperforming against top competition. Not good for a line of scrimmage league, and especially against the OL the Dawgs defensive front are about to face. The thing that gives me hope about that particular matchup is that Bama hasn’t played a good DL yet. On the other side of the ball, Beck and the OL should be able to handle most of Bama’s front. They’re basically just as good as UK’s front, which is both kind of hilarious and worrisome. As for skill positions, we match up well. I actually think the entire game (and season) comes down to whether we can stop the run.
merci monsieur ee pour le rapport…
mes observations:
– does the D miss having coach boom on the sidelines for gamedays
– how conservative did we really play against UK…all will be revealed in T-town
– agree on your OL/DL points
– Brother Brock and Brother Ladd where art thou and to quote the Possum “whose gonna fill their shoes”? Mr Smith and Mr Lovett feel like they are coming on but it feels like the dropoff at TE is grand canyon sized.
– on a personal note, the Bama game is the only game that matters this season…we need to flip the narrative “avec ces cons” like we did with the barn and flo-rye-duh
I’m not worried about the D. It seems the issues really are injury-related right now, and they still haven’t given up a TD (although that likely changes in 2 weeks).
Kirby just seemed like he wanted to get out of there with a win and scare the hell out of his team while doing so.
Glad to see some others noticed the issues Yurosek had in blocking. Hoping Lovett continues to progress into a go-to guy for Beck since he’s obviously missing that. Besides that, I have faith in the staff to get things cleaned up before 9/28. Glad I found this place, really missed the insights GTP brought and appreciate yall keeping it going. Cheers
P44, we’re glad you found us.
I think Yurosek is having a hard time adjusting to the fact that he is no longer playing against Pac 12 defenses. Ernest Greene concerns me. He was beaten few times by a speed rush against Kentucky. Even worse, he was beaten few times against Tn St. That has got to be cleaned up before they face Bama.
I don’t get the Arian Smith love. He seems average to me at best. He may be fast in a straight line but I have yet to see him break a tackle or someone’s ankles.
I don’t think there’s “love” … he has gotten off to a good start. That’s all I’m saying. He has caught everything thrown his way.
We need to get him the ball in space. Throwing to him behind the line or having him run jet sweeps requires perfect blocking on the perimeter since he isn’t making people miss if they whiff on a block.
He needs more routes down the field. Let him put a double move on someone or just run by them. It’s criminal we aren’t taking a least one shot per game on a go route with him.
Btw…. Is there still something technically wrong with the site. Posting is almost impossible. I’m signed in but it tells me I’m not when I go to post
We can see your comments.
Where’s Dillon Bell at?.
Excellent write-up again EE. To revisit an earlier comment, we got spoiled with Stetson. He was/is a kid that will put a team on his small frame and drag them across the goal line if necessary to win, and to win every time. IMO, his years of being underestimated gave him the mindset that he had to win every down. Like Stetson, the loss of Van Prann, Bowers and McConkey are huge offensively. Again, all players who would individually pick the team up and carry them across the goal line. What I witnessed in the Ky game was a lack of that spark. The whiffs on blocking, the yardage gained after contact by Ky and the seeming inability of our receivers to separate seemed to exhibit an attitude of “we’ll win because we’re better than they are.” Of course, on the heels of the latest Mudcat episode, the team could have been concerned that they were all about to give up their car keys.
BTW, in a related note, does everyone remember years ago when a “Driving Czar” was appointed to make sure everyone’s DL and paperwork was up to date? What happened to that guy?
I apologize ahead of time for this, and will accept my punishment from the departed spirit of our beloved Senator:
The Driving Czar wasn’t really named the “Driving Czar.” The czar was put in charge of the driving program and looking at the root causes of what makes student athletes drive without a license and registration, or drive fast, or drive slowly when emerging from alleys. Driving is what we all do when we drive a car. A car is a thing that we all drive, when we drive a car. And as the Driving Czar, which the czar was not officially named, the czar was not responsible for solving the actual driving problem. Even though the czar was in charge for the last few years, the czar was unburdened by what had been in those years. A year is what we call a moment of time…
And to be an equal opportunity offender:
We have the most beautiful Driving Czar you’ve ever seen. He was great. They said, Kirby, why do you need a czar? And I said, we shouldn’t…but they said we need a czar and now we do. And that’s why we have the best driving czar in the whole conference. Everybody was jealous. But he wasn’t great. So, we had to fire him. That’s what I do. I fire people. It was the most beautiful firing you ever saw. The people said, Kirby, how did you fire him so well?…
Again, I apologize, but what else you gonna do in a bye week…
Equal opportunity snark is welcome here. 😉
Excellent response and all humor aside, IIRC there was a person(s) appointed to review all DLs, registrations & insurance at the beginning of the season and then was tasked with getting everyone current and keeping them current. 106MPH is one thing, but expired license, no registration, etc. is just adding fuel to the fire. Maybe you can’t keep them from actin’ a fool, but you can make sure their paperwork is in order.
I downloaded jet pack to see if I could comment this way.
And it works. I am able to comment again.
Yes, it’s been the only consistent way for me to comment since WordPress screwed up.
With some of the WP problems, here’s a funny but interesting insight…
I mistakenly clicked on the old comment section in ee’s post from March, thinking they were the current ones. I suggest others do the same because the comments read like for this past Sunday. Most interesting is the debate a few had about whether this is a rebuilding year? We lost a ton of NFL talent and have Beck…but really who else? Has everyone overestimated our potential? We’re a pretty insightful group. I’m now listening a little more closely to what Kirby had to say after Kentucky. Felt he didn’t know anything yet about this team, but they did show him resilience. Clemson is turning into a aberration, but Kentucky at night in Lexington has always been tough. Just watched the ESPN hour episode “Them Dawgs” as a recap of the 2022 season and B2B Championship. Full of seniors. Full of Kirby getting and keeping their focus. And full of amazing talent. That’s not this 2024 edition. I’m hoping we go smack ‘Bama in the mouth and destroy Texas…but I’m better prepared to accept that this is not quite a championship caliber team…missing just enough on defense, skill positions and beset by injury that we may (literally) limp into the playoffs at best.
P.S. Really no new posts today or I’m continuing to have problems getting this site to function properly?
Yeah, I’m not complaining but just want the team here to understand I get twitchy when I don’t my daily fix.
I can quit at any time. Really! But I don’t want to.
No, seriously…I can stop whenever I want.
I miss being able to see who “likes” comments. It adds to the feeling of our kindred spirits.