I don’t know about the rest of you, but that was a rough offseason for me as a college football fan. I’ve never loved any sport anywhere near as much as this one, but damn, there are forces out there trying hard to make me love it less. I couldn’t be happier to get back to actual games, especially those of our beloved Dawgs. With that in mind, I’m rekindling this feature from last year, the 4 Key Questions for Georgia’s Season.
Question One: Can the Defensive Line Dominate?
This is my evergreen question for any football team, because historically the team with the best DL wins championships. Last year, this unit was excellent at stopping the run, but struggled at times to generate pressure or collapse the pocket on QBs. Elijah Griffin is the star and the Dawgs could really use a level-up year from him, penetrating and generating pass rush from the inside from time to time. Big Baby Hall will be back to full strength and endurance soon, and his experience will be critical as well. After that, it’s a lot of unproven but developing young talent like JJA, Horton, Nasir Johnson, Hanne, and then a bunch of good looking but green freshmen. Losing McLeod this week was not ideal, but one has to wonder if some of the young pups might have passed him by. I’m most intrigued by Valdin Sone, the kid from Sweden (!) who apparently is turning heads. Best to not expect much from him this year, but instead look to the older guys. Can JJA finally step up and compliment Griffin and Hall? Did Horton’s reshaping of his body give him more ability to get off blocks? How big will the drop off be for the second string? If I put the over/under for sacks for this group at 6.5, what would you take? I have a lot of faith in the linebackers getting a ton of sacks, so if that means the DL plays old school Kirby defense and occupies blocks to let the faster guys eat, I’m fine with that too, but man the Dawgs are nastiest with the big boys overpowering opponents’ OL. What say you, do we get 2022-level play from this group?
Yes, praise Jesus college football is back.
Your mention of the defensive line is timely as apparently Xavier McCleod quit the team this week. He made a brief statement explaining he was retiring from football. Really odd timing. Why go through camp first? Makes me wonder if he was shown the door.
Ok I see you mentioned that.
I’m one of those who absolutely wants sacks, but I also understand that generating sacks only happens when the conditions are right (unlike a certain guy who talks Georgia football on a daily podcast). If a QB wants to get the ball out quickly (less than 2 seconds), you aren’t going to get sacks. Sacks happen when you win 1st and 2nd down and force a QB to hold the ball long enough to allow the play to develop downfield.
Last year (think Bama 1) we didn’t get pressure on 3rd down and Simpson could throw on time to get 1st downs.
I’ll be watching 3rd down on Saturday to see if we are beating guys up front without bringing pressure.
Agreed, I’d just like to see them squeeze the pocket better against the good teams, maintain rushing lanes, and get more TFLs. But some of these guys (Griffin, Horton, Hanne, Sone) are twitchy enough to get sacks in the coverage is tight enough or a LB blitz spooks a QB towards them.
Yeah it always bugs me when people are texting me during the game raising hell about us not getting pressure onnthe quarterback when the quarterback is getting the ball out in three seconds. I don’t understand what some people are looking at and I guess they don’t either.
Totally, sacks are much tougher to get against fastball offenses.
I know people hate hearing the term “extended handoffs” when describing the quick passing game, but that’s exactly what they are. You don’t expect to disrupt the QB on a traditional handoff unless a DL makes a tremendous play, yet people expect to get QB pressure on a quick WR screen or an RPO slant. A defensive lineman has to make an incredible play to get to the QB on the quick passing game.
Trying hard and being successful in my case. The game I grew up with, went to college with, followed and loved for decades is long gone. I find I don’t even mind being invited to a wedding on game day. Heck, we’re actually going to one. I’ll check the game on my phone occasionally. I may or may not watch it later. We used to have season tickets, spent thousands of dollars tailgating and our fall weekends revolved around trips to Athens. I haven’t attended a game in person in a couple of years.
It’s a sad truth I think will become more common.
Going to three this year. Thinking there won’t be any more season tickets after this year. You are correct about the costs. Age also factors into it. Always gonna love’m, but time moves on!
After reading that I realize it’s going to take me a few games to get all the names on the roster down. I used to know the roster three deep but in this age of NIL and commitments meaning nothing I have kind of given up on trying to keep track of it. In the age of “me” I have regressed to just pulling for the Red and Black and the G on the helmet and not being concerned about the name on the back. Old man rant over 🙂
Imagine if Kirby operated the way some of these other teams do. He at least retains half his roster every year.
Don’t think we’ll ever see a front 7 like 2022 again. I’d like to see an edge rusher cause problems and the line containing and forcing the QB to throw quickly. Sacks will come when the QB makes bad decisions because of the pressure and our DBs are doing their job.
I said 2022 on purpose. 2021 was the all-timer DL. In 2022 we had one star (Jalen) and a bunch of good guys. I see parallels with this group. I do agree though that pass rushing is a team effort, and a better secondary will facilitate the late sacks that DL guys get.
I think they’ll be better at sack’s primary due to last year being suboptimal. I love to see sacks. Against pocket passers go get’em. If the QB is mobile trying for sacks rather than disrupting the play has hurt Kirby’s defense in the past.
I’m now in the camp of get the defense off the field without allowing points as fast as possible. Stats are nice winning is more impressive.
“I feel I just stepped from the wilderness all squint eyed and confused… but even babies raised by wolves they know exactly when they’ve been used…”
-Tragically Hip.
Feels appropriate for the state of CFB about now.