I can’t get a full post up since I have to hit the road at 3:30 (20 minutes from typing this sentence) but I wanted to go over a few quick observations from practice and I’ll throw up a more in depth one tonight.
Position Battles: TJ Clemmings has pulled ahead at RT and Coach Hueber admitted it’s possible Dorian Johnson gets a redshirt after practice, especially given how pleased the coaches are with Juantez Hollins. This has nothing to do with Johnson disappointing, it’s Clemmings and At Center, it’s heating up. Artie Rowell took the majority of the reps over Gabe Roberts today and and he did well. This battle won’t be decided until the end of next week.
At WR, there isn’t a battle anymore. It’s Boyd. There were 3 “wow” plays that caused the crowd to make some noise. 2 of them were from Boyd. In the red zone, Tom Savage threw a rocket just over the DB’s hand and Boyd snatched it. The coverage was damn near perfect but the throw was better and Boyd caught it with his outstretched hands. He’s a natural hands catcher and an incredible athlete. When you watch a lot of guys catching, you see them focusing on the catch and sometimes it isn’t smooth. Boyd just catches it in stride like nothing. His second “wow moment” was a diving catch that was just out of bounds in the back of the end zone. Any other player on this team, Street included, doesn’t even make the catch.
James Conner got most of the rushes with Bennett still out (more on him tonight) but it was Rachid Ibrahim with the “wow” moment of the day. Ibrahim went off left tackle, cut inside and got into the secondary. I missed who the DB was, but Ibrahim gave him a wicked spin move to break the tackle then turned on the jets for 6. I think it was a 51 yard touchdown run. I’d place Ibrahim and Conner over Crockett at this point.
No major injuries, Street didn’t practice but he was in pads on the sideline talking the whole time. Savage was pulled early with what appeared to be a thumb injury, but he was just fine after practice, purely a precaution. Savage looked REALLY good today, especially with pressure in his face.
That’s all for now, but they looked a lot better, especially on offense, than they did last week.
You can never have too many playmakers, and since it appears we may not have one at RB, we may have 3 receivers who may qualify (Boyd, Street and Garner) .. especially Boyd
I know Street emphasized that in his interview
I don’t know what I’m going to do when I see a 30 or 40 yard pass completed. Maybe scream for a while after 4 long years of the Saskatchewan kid.
If we can protect the QB, he should have plenty of options to throw to, Street, Boyd, Holtz, Garner, Bennett, Orndorf, Witherspoon, Tinker.
I’m sure I missed someone.
The key is how long will it take this line to gel for pass blocking ?
Also I’d like to know from Justin, does Savage have a quick release ? Does he show he might have some escapability attributes to buy a few secs to get off a pass ?
I’ll admit that I thought it would take a while for Boyd to get acclimated at WR enough to get in on a starting basis but either he’s a quick study or I was mistaken on how much PT he got in HS.
Pap76 – I get your post and welcome aboard but it may be more like Chryst is forced to play true FR for the lack of depth in the two-deeps. The FR it looks like we’ll see appear pretty exciting though, don’t they.
Think about this for a second. With Savage, Conner, Bennett, Boyd, and Gardner we have five new starters out of six “skill positions” this season. Scary and exciting at the same time.
link to blogs.post-gazette.com
Boyd caught a 18 yard TD pass on Savage’s only series of plays. Voytik played well with 2 TD passes and even Trey threw a 80 yard TD bomb to ZAck Challingsworth (sp).
On the non-Koolaid side, don’t really understand why Ronald Jones (who caught like 5 passes) was involved in the 80 live play scrimmage. Nothing against the kid, but he’s suspended for the entire season. Wouldn’t have those plays called for him be better put to use with WR’s that ARE playing this season. That’s a real head scratcher !
HTP !
VeV !
Have a good Friday nite brothers !
Gotta love these pricks ! haha
Obvious joking aside, I’m REALLY looking forward to seeing what a Chryst-designed offense looks like with a real D1 college-worthy QB under center.
ABT!
H2P!
Two potential weaknesses may turn out to be strengths, wide out, and linebacker. Nice!
Thanks Justin.
It’s OK to dream big now so nice to read all the positivity… if we can at least play FSU tough (let alone and upset)… then we know we may be on a nice upswing finally.
for those who not have it here is the link to the video interviews. nice vibe…
link to pittsburghpanthers.com
H2P
Quick note, Desmond Brown only saw time against the third team defense, so his stats are very misleading.
Remember the young Pitt BB assistant with the glasses .. he’s now head coach at Sto Rox
link to post-gazette.com