Going to be a pretty good signing class for the star gazers...

[1bigdawg]

While I agree about oline recruiting for the most part, CBs were a much bigger problem last season and I don't see any top flight CBs committed. There's no outrage over that though.

The USA commit is pretty misleading... we had 34 rushes for 239 yards (7.03 per carry)

It is never about the OL with you. Coincidence?

[Dawgtini]

^^This, glad to see someone else is seeing the issue I am that these repeated low number of HS OL signees is forcing us into the boat of HAVING to sign a couple of JUCO OL per year for the near future.

Is there no benefit given that many of these JUCO linemen were signed and placed by us?

[CadaverDawg]

While I agree about oline recruiting for the most part, CBs were a much bigger problem last season and I don't see any top flight CBs committed. There's no outrage over that though

Only bc we're talking OL, ha. We have a problem at CB too...BUT, unlike OL, Juco guys and even young HS athletes can step in and produce at CB more quickly than OL in this league. Plus, we're all so used to seeing soft zone coverage that most feel like whatever CB talent we have will be wasted anyway by playing no press man coverage. Meanwhile, OL is the lifeblood of our offensive philosophy, yet we land nobody. When you look at it that way, it's easier to see why OL is such a big deal.

That's not even getting into the "winning the trenches" argument, "run the ball and stop the run" argument, or the fact that defense is no longer good anywhere. Hell even Bama gave up 35 or whatever in the Title game. But you're right about CBs

[maroonmania]

He's always ridiculous

Well, he is tied to the hip of Tom Luginbill and the ESPN recruiting rankings which is widely considered the least reliable of all the recruiting sites. Luginbill lost a LOT of credibility with me with his poor rating and lack of knowledge on Keytaon Thompson. It seems like all of their rating is done off camp drills or something.

[msstate7]

It is never about the OL with you. Coincidence?

I just think oline catches all the blame when it should be catching some, not all

[maroonmania]

I agree, outside of a few of the OL prospects in the country it is extremely hard to project what an OL will turn in to. There are too many variables with OL. That being said we clearly haven't knocked it out of the park on OL as that is where we have gotten beat the last two years. You have to put together a complete OL, we have had 2 or 3 guys that play well but one hole up front can kill you. Our starting 5 this year played well towards the end of the season but our depth has hurt us. I don't like using bama as a measuring stick because they have owned just about everybody up front and our OL actually held their own against them but we have to have depth up front on both sides of the LOS if we want to have a shot at them.

I don't care where they are rated coming out of HS but when you are never getting any drafted then that shows a problem. Guys like David Stewart and Gabe Jackson were not rated high coming out of HS but they were rated high leaving college. None of Hevesy's recruits haven't panned out like that to date.

[CadaverDawg]

While I agree about oline recruiting for the most part, CBs were a much bigger problem last season and I don't see any top flight CBs committed. There's no outrage over that though.

The USA commit is pretty misleading... we had 34 rushes for 239 yards (7.03 per carry)

Yet we scored 20 points. So when the chips were down in the red zone, we couldn't run the ball and score. Same argument y'all all tried to make about scoring on Bama, LSU, etc. Our offense depends on us being able to run the ball in the red zone, especially last year with a new QB. And 239 yds is not good with a new QB & an offense built around the run...and it was USA who had several key DL out. Embarrassing.

But I don't want the debate to change into a USA game breakdown. If you have to resort to complimenting our OL in a game we lost to a SunBelt school, my point still remains valid.

[msstate7]

Yet we scored 20 points. So when the chips were down in the red zone, we couldn't run the ball and score. Same argument y'all all tried to make about scoring on Bama, LSU, etc. Our offense depends on us being able to run the ball in the red zone, especially last year with a new QB. And 239 yds is not good with a new QB & an offense built around the run...and it was USA who had several key DL out. Embarrassing.

I blame Mullen more than the oline. If fitz and aeris were in there, we'd have run for 500 and won by 3 TDs

[CadaverDawg]

I just think oline catches all the blame when it should be catching some, not all

They don't get "all the blame"....they are just the position we never recruit strong, so when it correlates to subpar play it makes people mad. Its an obvious problem and yet we cannot fix it. You know Mullen knows it's an issue...yet Hevesy can't fix it.

[1bigdawg]

I blame Mullen more than the oline. If fitz and aeris were in there, we'd have run for 500 and won by 3 TDs

Again, it is always someone other than the OL with you. We cannot seem to run once we are in the red zone against almost anybody.

The critical recruiting point is that if we are not going to sign highly rated HS OLs that have a better chance of panning out, then we have to either sign a bunch of under rated guys to weed through to find the diamond or we have to gamble on succeeding with JUCOs which have typically 1 to 1.5 good seasons at best.

[maroonmania]

Is there no benefit given that many of these JUCO linemen were signed and placed by us?

While its good that we have some guys in the JUCO pipeline that we will likely eventually get back there is no way that I believe they are getting developed in JUCO the way they would be if they were already in our program. I think that shows in the fact that we hardly ever get a JUCO OL ready to contribute as a Junior. In fact, its becoming common now for us to sign JUCOs and then redshirt them. But I would rather do that than waste a year where they don't help us and then only get one decent year from them.

[CadaverDawg]

I don't care where they are rated coming out of HS but when you are never getting any drafted then that shows a problem. Guys like David Stewart and Gabe Jackson were not rated high coming out of HS but they were rated high leaving college. None of Hevesy's recruits haven't panned out like that to date.

Exactly. If Hev were making lower rated guys into NFL players, I could live with the poor OL recruiting rankings...but he's not. So...

Meanwhile, we have had tons of turnover at secondary coach but still have guys like Banks, Slay, Redmond, Calhoun, in the NFL. We've had the same OL coach for 8 YEARS and can't recruit or develop a guy into an NFL player?

Why would anyone even want to defend that pathetic shit? Just to argue?

[msstate7]

They don't get "all the blame"....they are just the position we never recruit strong, so when it correlates to subpar play it makes people mad. Its an obvious problem and yet we cannot fix it. You know Mullen knows it's an issue...yet Hevesy can't fix it.

'15 was terrible bc we changed philosophies... we went pass first. '16 started rough bc we were breaking in a new qb and Mullen continued to give Holloway and shump too many carries. Once fitz settled in and we got back to a power identify with aeris and fitz running, we looked a ton better upfront. Mullen has to stick with it and stop falling in love with scat backs running every down

[1bigdawg]

Is there no benefit given that many of these JUCO linemen were signed and placed by us?

Other than Champion, who are you talking about? That is one, but it should be a good one. On the other hand, he has not produced yet either.

Now we may place one or two this year, but who knows if they will pan out or be back.

[CadaverDawg]

'15 was terrible bc we changed philosophies... we went pass first. '16 started rough bc we were breaking in a new qb and Mullen continued to give Holloway and shump too many carries. Once fitz settled in and we got back to a power identify with aeris and fitz running, we looked a ton better upfront. Mullen has to stick with it and stop falling in love with scat backs running every down

Excuses excuses excuses. A good OL overcomes a "pass first" excuse, and a good OL should overcome Holloway & Shump...especially against the shitty teams. Hevesy has been here 8 YEARS! Why has our run game still got excuses when our "Run Game Coordinator" has been here for 8. Damn. Years?

I agree Mullen has made frustrating choices, but bad OL play is bad OL play

[maroonmania]

'15 was terrible bc we changed philosophies... we went pass first. '16 started rough bc we were breaking in a new qb and Mullen continued to give Holloway and shump too many carries. Once fitz settled in and we got back to a power identify with aeris and fitz running, we looked a ton better upfront. Mullen has to stick with it and stop falling in love with scat backs running every down

'15 we essentially had to change philosophies. Yes, I know we had Dak throwing the ball but we could not run that year against ANYONE, not even Troy. What little running production we got was from Dak being chased in the pocket and taking off. Very few designed runs were successful for us in 2015. Now granted it got much better this year especially in the 2nd half of the year.

[Percho]

You can sign 25 in a given year, so if you sign less than 25 one year, you can sign the difference in December as JUCOs. Their scholarship numbers count back, but for recruiting sites, they're still considered part of the upcoming class.

So if we sign 20 one year, we can sign 30 the following year if 5 are early-enrolling JUCOs. But all 30 would be counted as part of the class signing in February on recruiting sites.

I think Om is going to count Powe again this year.***

[msstate7]

Excuses excuses excuses. A good OL overcomes a "pass first" excuse, and a good OL should overcome Holloway & Shump...especially against the shitty teams. Hevesy has been here 8 YEARS! Why has our run game still got excuses when our "Run Game Coordinator" has been here for 8. Damn. Years?

I agree Mullen has made frustrating choices, but bad OL play is bad OL play

Rushing ranks in sec...
'16 = 5th (4th yds/att)
'15 = 12th (8th yds/att)
'14 = 3rd (3rd yds/att)
'13 = 8th (9th)
'12 = 10th (6th)
'11 = 5th (4th)
'10 = 2nd (6th)

Only terrible years were when we went pass happy with dak and Tyler at qb in '12

[smootness]

Did you see Dak Prescott play against them in 2015? He deserves an award for not getting murdered. Our issue has been that we aren't as talented as them anywhere outside the QB position.

Yes. Again, we're not going to have an OL that is going to knock Bama's DL off the line pretty much ever. We have to do a better job of playcalling to mask that. We've tried just running right at them and standing in the pocket, and, surprise surprise, it doesn't work.

Dak ran the ball 26 times against them in 2015. That is insanity.

[1bigdawg]

Excuses excuses excuses. A good OL overcomes a "pass first" excuse, and a good OL should overcome Holloway & Shump...especially against the shitty teams. Hevesy has been here 8 YEARS! Why has our run game still got excuses when our "Run Game Coordinator" has been here for 8. Damn. Years?

I agree Mullen has made frustrating choices, but bad OL play is bad OL play

This is right. The reason Mullen ran Holloway so much is that in practice, the way that plays were drawn up, Holloway would break one of every three or four runs for huge gains. Against real competition, even USA, the holes did not open up.

So blame Mullen for calling plays that work most of the time when the OL blocks. I guess you (Mstate7) are saying that he should know better. Mullen not being able to call things because the OL cannot execute is Mullen's fault? Never blame the OL.