Seth’s got a good piece on the coaches’ reactions to Tramel Terry becoming a safety. Bobo discusses what they saw when he was recruited, Ball plays the good soldier – admittedly, he’s got experience now – and Grantham’s predictably excited (although Lakatos is playing it cool).
Grantham claims that Terry’s got a shot at playing next season, something I’m a bit skeptical about, but he does make a noteworthy point that may bear remembering next August:
“He can also catch the ball. That creates turnovers,” Grantham said. “That’s something that we had really been good at up until this year, and a guy like that can really make some plays for you.”
He’ll whiff on a few plays because of inexperience, but it’s not exactly as if he’s alone in that department. If he’s got the ball skills to make some interceptions, that may give him a leg up on a group that only had five picks total this season, with no individual having more than one. You get the feeling that’s a big consideration for Grantham.
Get The Picture 
I’m all for DBs that are capable of catching the ball. One of the more frustrating things about the defense this season (besides the points, that is) was watching the ball hit one of our guys right smack in the hands and our guy not make an interception.
LikeLike
We didn’t create a lot of turnovers this year because we weren’t around the football, not because our DBs can’t catch the ball, Auburn withstanding.
LikeLike
I dunno, I saw at least 5 picks bounce off of guys’ gloves this year
LikeLike
I don’t remember the exact number, but 5 sounds like a pretty conservative estimate. I’m not sure if they were all DBs as I feel like there were quite a few dropped balls by linebackers as well.
LikeLike
Agreed, I can remember 2 or 3 bouncing off of DL’s or LB’s hands, but I can’t remember any at all bouncing out of a DB’s hands (and the Auburn thing wasn’t really an issue of being able to catch or not). Not saying that there weren’t any that our DB’s dropped, but I don’t think there were many. We were just very rarely in position to have a shot at a pick. That’s definitely the bigger issue right now.
But some guys just have a knack for being in the right spot at the right time. A lot of interceptions aren’t because the DB was in great position or anything, it’s because the ball was tipped at the line, the QB was hit as he threw, or it bounced off the WR’s hands or another DB’s hands, or the receiver is just overthrown. In those situations, sometimes the ball just comes right to you, and it seems like some guys just have a knack for being in the right place at the right time in those types of scenarios. Rambo was definitely one of those. Maybe Terry will be too. We can hope!
LikeLike
I can damn sure remember one tip/bounce that should have been an INT!
#f*Auburrn
LikeLike
Again tho, that wasn’t a lack of catching ability. That was one guy tipping it away from another.
LikeLike
I agree that a lot of interceptions are due to luck. An inaccurate pass can just as easily fall somewhere uncatchable as it can fall in an area where a defensive player can make a play. Same goes for a tipped pass. That’s why it was so frustrating to see us waste the few opportunities we did have when the stars aligned and the ball hit our guy in the hands. Gotta make those times count cause you don’t know when they will happen again!
LikeLike
WRs are easier to replace than DB prospects. If Terry can play, be it in 2014 or 2015, that’s a move that makes sense. Now we just have to wait and see if it plays out.
Who am I kidding? Let’s all make up our minds 3 days into this move and label it a smashing success or dismal failure. That’s what the UGA message board crazies will do.
LikeLike
Because our coverage scheme relies on route-recognition, I would think that a former receiver would have a distinct advantage when it comes to learning that pattern-matching scheme.
LikeLike
I feel like I heard all of this last Spring and August about some of our DB’s. We’ll see. That’s the most I’ve seen/heard from Lakatos all year…would really like to see a full interview with him.
LikeLike
Good point. He and Ball both seem to rarely be quoted. I wonder if that’s their choice, or if they just aren’t as engaging in interviews, so reporters tend to pay more attention to the other coaches.
LikeLike
I would guess the former which, if so, is certainly a tactically soundless Searelsian move on the part of Lakatos
LikeLike
WTF??????
LikeLike
Wouldn’t be surprised if they move you to WR, Brendan.
LikeLike
How’d you like to try out for quarterback Brendan? We can give you LeMay’s spot.
LikeLike
deja vu all over again
LikeLike
Why not have Ball coach the WRs and DBs? Couldn’t do worse than Lakatoes, and then we’d have an opening for a ST coach.
LikeLike
Personally I don’t get all the Lakatos hate. Our secondary hasn’t been an issue until this year when he was breaking in 3 new starters (and almost everyone is a freshmen). How much can you do with that little experience? Additionally the younger ones did come on towards the end of the year a little bit. Idk. I wouldn’t fire him based on this years performance.
LikeLike
Pretty sure we were one of tops in the conference in pass defense last year.
LikeLike
I see poor excuses for lousy performance. So Lakatos isn’t responsible for the lack of recruits during his 4 years at UGA? What about ‘dreamteamers’ like Moore and Bowman – never coached up and unprepared. “The younger ones came on a little bit” – Vad Lee was lighting it up against our DBs. I could go on, but what’s the use? Lakatos will be back, the defensive backfield will suck, and we’ll all be home watching 2 other sec teams in next year’s mnc playoffs.
LikeLike
You guys make some interesting comments, all valid, IMO. Poor safety play is not a hard thing to spot. And I think it’s quite telling that the coaches began working on this move some months ago.
Thant’s another story, based on that and the play of the 2013 season, I think it’s safe to assume that Terry is the only player we have that can really be what we need at FS.
And that’s a stunning thing to say. I always thought when you look for safeties, a key thing you should look for is a smart player. We haven’t had a really good safety, a great safety, since Sean Jones. Not even Davis and Blue, who were both good, were natural safeties. They were smart, but didn’t quite have the ideal athleticism, even though they were great players (Davis, of course, was really a LB, even at Georgia).
I love this move. Terry has the body, the great athleticism, the intelligence, the physicality, the ball skills, the intangibles, and the knack for the game that a good safety needs.
Of the 5 or 6 guys we brought in recently, none have impressed. And that shouldn’t happen, but it is happening. There’s much more to a safety than just size, speed, jump, and flip the hips. Or at least there should be. Those guys are a dime a dozen. But good safeties are harder to find.
There was a time when all you had to do to find a good safety was just look at the high school quarterbacks. Usually they were very smart, and the best overall athlete on the team. And most of them would never play QB in college. Johnny Henderson, Scott Woerner, & Chris Welton are good examples.
Those days are long gone. But the qualities needed at the safety position haven’t changed.
The standard should be something like this .. take a real athlete who is very smart and has the intangibles you need in a safety. Then, and only then, see if he has the size, speed, and all that. If you go by just the latter things, you’ll end up with mediocre safety play unless you just happen to get very lucky. And it’s been many years since we had any luck at safety.
For 7-8 years now, we’ve needed a trailblazer at safety, somebody to come in and set a standard, to show the way at that critical position.
Terry at least has the ability and the tools to be that guy.”
~~~
LikeLike
Sean Williams was pretty good at safety, too.
LikeLike
Yeah, Shawn was a SS, but he made himself into a good player and a great leader when we sorely needed one. He was different when we needed somebody to be different.
I ended up a big Shawn Williams fan.
~~~
LikeLike
A shut-down DB can improve safety play as well. Doesn’t appear Swann can be that guy. So I’d like to hear more from Lakatos about where he sees his troops talent level, run vs. pass bias, maybe why part of our defensive strategy pre-snap is to look at our own sidelines and flap our arms then run around without really lining-up on a WR. You know, stuff like that.
LikeLike
LMAO. But I wish that was wasn’t funny.
~~~
LikeLike
Just watch the tape we line up 5 to 7 yards off of the receivers so is it any wonder that the short stuff works. I really think that CTG didn’t trust his DB’s to cover in a bump and run. If the DL couldn’t hurry the QB and given that holding is no longer illegal in the SEC, they usually couldn’t, the WR’s were wide open. The ILB’s are another area that confuse me. They do not attack the gaps nor do they drop into coverage. They appear to stand and wait for the RB to come to them. The scheme is bend and break especially on 3rd down.
LikeLike
I just find every comment and observation made in this comment to be true. And if the two of us can see that play out consistently as we fail in those areas, how in the hell can our coaches not try something different? I honestly don’t think we could do any worse if we played tight on receivers at the line to knock them off the routes, or had ILBs be proactive and force mistakes. We are getting jabbed to death and do nothing to defend ourselves with our hands by our sides.
LikeLike