Sometimes necessity is simply the mother of doing what’s needed.
Both of those are indications to me that Smart intends to infuse whatever talent is coming in with the highly rated ’17 class that is SEC ready sooner rather than later. It’s certainly going to make for an intense and interesting camp next month.
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UPDATE: One other piece to the special teams puzzle isn’t about the players.
“As far as areas of concern for this team, special teams will be No. 1. We’re going to try and change things up from a special teams standpoint, as you guys know, from a quality control. Scott Fountain (formerly at Auburn) us, who I thought did a tremendous job at Auburn. He brought a lot of inside to our program and coaches. He’s going to help us be better in special teams practice, organization, and just the things that we do. We HAVE to improve in that area…”
That sounds good for training camp, but I’m hoping he can settle on an OL by early in the season (like, by the second half of the App St game). I’m a believer that the OL works best as a team that’s spent a lot of time together.
Special teams, I’m for whatever works.
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Phil Steele agrees with you. I think that’s overstated.
The OL that works best is the OL that works best. They spend a lot time together because they end up being the best combination.
I don’t think you need to settle on a combination sooner rather than later for the sake of cohesion. If you think you’ve got your starting 5 figured out early, then great, if not, keep tinkering for a little while.
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Gives me hope….at least more than a year ago. The “little things take care of the big things”.
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Starts maybe overrated but I doubt depth is. UGA hasn’t done very well on the OL in a while.
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Just give me points on the board, don’t care how you get’em. ’14 team did not have a tough time. OB position needs to develop…
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I’m with you on this Russ. The sooner the better as far as settling on the OL is concerned IMHO.
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As long as its not a change to the Fabris approach.
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Lots more scholarship players on special teams will definitely help in coverage and returns. It’s not just about the specialist. The other 10 guys matter too.
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I’ll settle for the defense being able stop somebody in the Red Zone. I’m beginning to think Kirby had so few teams even get into the Red Zone at Alabama he may not know how to do a goal line stand. I rewatched the USCe game and KY and we were awful. Nobody tried to trick us they just ran the ball and usually were untouched. That crap had better stop.
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Considering the mess that was Special Teams last season and that we brought in a QC coordinator in the offseason, I cast a wary eye toward Little Beamer since ST greatness is supposedly genetically linked to his family. Certainly CMR didn’t leave much to work with on the kicking game and a threadbare recruiting class in 2013 created issues.with quality depth and that showed up on ST coverage. Hopefully the worst of that is behind us now.
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