But to praise this guy for an informative post. Seriously.
Check out this chart comparing Florida’s four best seasons from a net yardage standpoint with the 2020 performance, which was Florida’s third best season ever in offensive yardage per game.
Todd Grantham is the man.
I just hope like hell nobody shows it to Dan Mullen.
Filed under Gators, Gators..., Stats Geek!
Nick Saban, post come-to-Jesus:
Kirbs, you listening?
Filed under Nick Saban Rules, Strategery And Mechanics
Question for y’all…
Forget the men’s versus the women’s aspect of this for a sec. Which football program will be the first to recognize that promising to help recruits build their brand by spending money to market them would pay off in recruiting and why is it Alabama?
Filed under Recruiting
And one last note from Smart’s presser — Pickens or no Pickens, the defense still hasn’t caught up with the offense in practice.
What’s wrong with the defense?
“Gotta get better. Gotta grow up. I don’t think it’s a lack of effort. They’re just ahead right now. It’s not like it’s us and them. It’s we. We will get better. Who better to get you better than a team with a talented, experienced quarterback and pretty good skill players. Hey, it’s a lot of guys to replace when you got five and six guys on the back end, all new. The drills are not set up to be an advantage for the offense. We don’t really know much until you have the first scrimmage and you have to go out and tackle. I would say they’re definitely ahead in terms of execution and doing it right.”
Sounds like they could use an experienced defensive back out of the transfer portal, but what do I know?
Filed under Georgia Football
Just checking in on the 247Sports Composite 2022 SEC rankings to see how everyone’s doing, and find…
Sure, it’s early, but let’s not forget all the crowing Gator and Vol fans were doing early last year when their teams were highly ranked in the Composite. It turned out to be fools gold, especially in Tennessee’s case. The main point is that the usual suspects continue to be on the mother.
Filed under Recruiting, SEC Football
One little tidbit that Smart mentioned in yesterday’s presser that probably didn’t get much attention because the Pickens injury sucked all the oxygen out of the tent was that Darnell Washington is still growing.
How big is it for Darnell Washington to go through first spring with the team?
“It’s big for everybody to go through spring, right? I mean, it’s a huge deal to get the spring practice. It really would have been his first spring practice anyway. He’s grown a lot. He’s a lot smarter. He’s in better condition. He’s in better mental toughness state. Part of being a good player is pushing through practice and being able to sustain. He struggled to sustain through tough practices last year. He’s done that this year. He’s practiced a little harder. He’s doing some good thing. He’s still really big. He’s 275, 280 pounds. He’s a different kind of matchup guy.”
He’s put on another 15-20 pounds! Assuming he’s done so without a loss of speed or flexibility, Washington may very well be the scariest offensive player in the SEC this season. And I’m here for that.
Filed under Georgia Football
Finding a way to replace George Pickens’ production will be no easy task, as Tom Fornelli shows:
As shown in the table below, Pickens ran the most routes of any Georgia player in the first four games of the season (he missed the team’s games against Kentucky and Florida due to injury), but was third in targets.
Player Routes Targets Receptions Rec. Rate Yards per target Route Depth George Pickens 138 21 13 61.9% 1.01 10.04 Jermaine Burton 117 22 8 36.4% 0.95 8.04 Kearis Jackson 101 31 21 67.7% 3.20 7.53 John FitzPatrick 67 7 5 71.4% 6.57 5.61 James Cook 44 8 6 75.0% 13.88 0.21 You’ll notice how the shorter the average route depth is for each player listed how much more efficient and productive they were, with running back James Cook and tight end John FitzPatrick doing the most with the least.
It wasn’t until Pickens returned from his injury and Daniels took over as the team’s starter that Pickens began to look like his old self. Let’s look at this same chart with the same players, but with Daniels at QB, and replace James Cook with Kenny McIntosh who played a bigger role out of the backfield during this stretch.
Player Routes Targets Receptions Rec. Rate Yards per target Route depth George Pickens 128 32 23 71.9% 11.66 9.97 Jermaine Burton 93 24 17 70.8% 11.42 7.72 Kearis Jackson 90 14 9 64.3% 8.43 7.87 John FitzPatrick 51 7 5 71.4% 7.00 7.87 Kenny McIntosh 34 7 6 85.7% 8.57 1.31 Pickens’ average route depth stayed effectively the same, but his efficiency exploded with Daniels. He improved his catch rate on targets by a full 10%, and his yards per target exploded from 1.01 to 11.66. In short, he became the kind of big-play receiver that Georgia was hoping it had and that it needs if it’s going to win a national title.
As you can see when looking at the two charts, it’s not just Pickens’ numbers that improved. The other receivers and tight end became more efficient, while the running back became less critical but still productive.
So, what to do if you’re Kirby Smart and Todd Monken? Every damn thing.
“You take your best 11 football players and you try to find ways. That could be one back, three tight end. That could be three back, one tight end. That could be five wides, no backs, no tight ends. You find your best football players and you find ways to get them the ball and that’s what I think coach Monken does a great job of. He’s going to try to exploit whoever you are playing’s weaknesses and he’s going to try to use our strengths to do that with. We have plays that we call that are the same plays we call in all personnel groupings, it’s just another way to get another playmaker the ball. We lost a guy who is a pretty good playmaker but we’ve got other guys who we think are good playmakers and we’ll just try to find ways to get them the ball.”
Kirby’s right about that. Once Daniels was inserted into the starting lineup, Monken’s ability to exploit defenses really shone.
But, when in doubt, there’s always the old tried and true ($$).
“I think we’re enough run-oriented and we have a strong enough offensive line that people have to honor and commit to the run and they’re not able to put a lot of doubles out there on people,” Smart said.
Filed under Georgia Football, Stats Geek!, Strategery And Mechanics
When it comes to your best receiver, hope is still the best of things.
“Obviously I think that there’s a chance he’s back in 2021. We’ve had kids that have had ACL injuries – I liken it to Divaad, he got his when he first got here, it was the third day of spring practice. He didn’t know our defense, but he was going to help us, and he came back. I think he was cleared somewhere around Florida week, but the issue with Divaad is that he didn’t know the defense. The difference with George is that he knows most of the offense, he’s played longer, he’s a little bit older. But all that’s going to be dictated by Ron (Courson). We’re not concerned with that right now. What we’re concerned with is a great surgery, a great rehab. He’s got a long career ahead of him, so that’s going to be a situation where the doctors make that medical decision. I can assure you this, nobody in the country has had as many ACLs that they’ve had to work with – I’m not talking about because we have a lot of them, I’m talking about it because Ron Courson’s been here since I was here. That’s a long time. So he’s seen a lot of ACLs, and the names that he has rehabbed is pretty impressive. I know when NFL execs start talking about where did you do your rehab, that’s one of the most critical factors – I reached out to Hines Ward and talked to him for a little while, he’s a receivers coach in the NFL – the first thing he said is, ‘The No. 1 thing everyone wants to know is where do you do your rehab at,’ Well, if you do it at Georgia, it’s super credible, it’s done the right way, and we’ve got more ways to help George back to himself than anybody. The timeline of that, who knows? That’s not concerning to me right.”
Man, there’s a lot going on there in that quote — Smart talking to Hines Ward? — but, bottom line, if we see Pickens suit up in the SECCG, they need to erect a statue to Ron Courson.
Filed under Georgia Football, The Body Is A Temple
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