Clemson 2007

Awwright. I am sleep deprived as I don't usually get Serta-commercial rest after a loss. Much less one that had me all jacked up at midnight with the hope we were gonna pull this thing out of the crapper....so forgive my rambling.

There were clearly two games played last night and I for one liked the second one much better. The first half just made me sad. The second half made me mad, and I will get to Dad in a second...Jimbo scripts the first 15 plays every game, but I guess he did not run the script by Rick Trickett. Apparently, we also need to block someone to make these plays work. Clemson was dressing up water boys as tackles and they were strolling by Rodney Hudson like Ginger Rogers.

I know that our OL coach likes to mess with kids heads and try different lineups, but those yellow stains on the pretty white unis of those three underclassmen were unsightly. With no Tide spot remover available, after the 4th series of Custer-like futility, we finally put the (25 starts under his belt) Senior back in (with Boatman) and things seemed to stabilize. At least Antone got a handoff before he was tackled. In game two, the line actually played pretty well. Our Freshman Center Ryan McMahon did an especially great job on both of Antone's long second half runs, and pressure rarely came from the interior all night. I will say that the OL was fresh in the second half which speaks to their conditioning (a nice change). If Drew had not stepped into two sacks (from 3 man rushes), we had a chance to win.

Drew was ok. That is all...ok. He did not drool on his blanket, but (and without being there to see who was being single covered) his decision-making drove me a little batty. AND for the love of all that is holy...stop having him roll left. He does not have the arm-strength or accuracy to pull off that throw. We had him on designed rollouts four times last night (including two from the end zone) where he rolled left. Zip for 4. Scratch that from the callback sheet. My bottom line (and I am a bit of an X apologist)...if the OL is going to struggle like this, we need some more mobility than Drew doing his tar baby imitation in the backfield. Even with my limited TV viewing ability, guys were coming wide-ass open in the secondary, but he did not have time to make the play. If we only had a guy on the bench who had enough athletic ability to create some more time back there...

Preston Parker played well and DeCody Fagg had an awful game, but Greg Carr's effort really pissed me off. It was nice to see Richard Goodman catch the TD after the drops he had last season. That will be a huge confidence builder for him.

I thought the D-Line played well. You have got to love Bud Thacker. Dirty, snot all over his jersey...helmet flying off all the time. You have 11 of him, and you win...regardless of talent. Neefy played well too. Since 90% of Tiger passes were 1 and 3 step drops, it is tough to evaluate our pass rush.

I also thought our secondary (with the notable exception of Roger Williams) played well...in coverage. My bone of defensive contention last night was with the linebackers...or more specifically Derek Nicholson and Dekoda Watson. Where the heck were they in game 1? Maybe they were stuck in the locker room straightening up. Maybe they found some women at Furman and were late arrivals. But, Gawd almighty...they did not tackle anybody in the first half. We play a gap defense and the line did their job. The LB's were awful and Davis and Spiller went crazy hitting holes while Derek was filling out parole papers for his brother. When your safeties are your first line of defense (or not in Roger Williams' case), that is trouble. I love Myron Rolle and teams are absolutely staying away from Tony Carter. Good. That means we have 1/2 the field licked.

Special teams was also a mess in game one (and just as impressive as possible in game two). They kicked to the corner and we can not get it past the 20. We pooch kick and they return it 57 yards. We have an 18 and a 21 yard punt (and what was that rugby almost-fake disaster of a punt in the second quarter?) they pin us down on the 4.

Finally, Dad. GET OFF THE HEADSET!!! I know your advice is valuable, but give it between series. Your meddling is now the only common thread to us not getting plays called in time. Mark, Jeff and Jimbo all can not get the play in quickly enough on key third and 4th down plays....hmmmmm....I think not.

At least game two gave us hope. Both offense and defense adjusted on the fly and dominated. Maybe that is what we will be. We have two games to grow up. Get some Depends for our your OL and maybe we can beat an Alabama team that is about on par with Clemson talent wise.

Go Noles...See you in Doak.