I'm a sucker for deep-dive X-and-O talk from coaches and players, and I know some of you are as well.
Over the years as we've done these weekly video breakdowns, one of the coolest parts has been pulling various folks aside (Jeff Scott, Trevor Lawrence, Tony Elliott, Brent Venables, the head man himself) and asking about the inner workings of a particular play.
You almost always learn something you didn't know. And just as frequent is the revelation that there's so much more going on during a play than you concluded while watching the play in real time.
I was interested to learn more about this connection from Cade Klubnik to Drew Swinney:
In real time it looked pretty impressive: Fake the screen underneath. Downfield option outside (Sage Ennis) seems covered. Klubnik quickly looks to the inside option (Swinney) and, with no hesitation, fires a strike through the seam of a zone defense.
But then the replay brings further perspective, and introduces a fair question:
Is that ball picked off against a better defense, a faster safety?
It sort of gets back to what Paul and I have explored of late in assessing Klubnik and DJ Uiagalelei:
The starter -- and heck, probably even the play-caller himself -- seems hesitant at times and it probably goes back to spending the past eight months guarding against making the catastrophic mistake.
This is exactly what Dabo Swinney referenced after the game when asked what DJ showed that was an improvement over last year.
"He didn't make a bad play worse," he said.
Moving forward, Uiagalelei and Brandon Streeter are going to need to bring freer and quicker execution and operation in building on the positives that were on display in Atlanta. As they've said and we've said, this offense just needs confidence and that is an incremental process.
Yet there's something to be said for having some restraint and protecting the football when you have what looks to be an elite defense.
Not an easy balance, for sure. But given some of the self-impaling mistakes we saw last year in not just the three losses but a few other instances as well, you can see how that history influences the mindset at present.
Now here comes Klubnik, and he's not haunted by any of the ghosts from last year. The dude just comes in ready to take on all comers, oozing with confidence that he can make every throw into every window.
So that part has to be harnessed, too. And while Klubnik wasn't far from the cardinal sin of a red-zone pick, the fact is he did complete the throw. And the fact is he completed it in large part because of how quickly he saw it and fired.
And the fact is Uiagalelei could stand to make decisions as quickly as Klubnik did on this play. Because the slightest hesitation means a narrow passing window quickly closes, which means scrambling and then often throwing the ball away, or a sack.
But the line between a good decision and a bad one is so microscopically small, and we think this play illustrates that.
OK, to Klubnik's explanation of the play:
We asked him to take us inside his head from the snap as he scanned the left side and chose to do what he did.
And his answer was gold for football junkies:
"It's pretty much like a fake screen to the boundary. The No. 1 and No. 2 receivers are doing a switch-release, so the outside guy is coming in and the inside guy is going out.
"We're pretty much reading inside-out. It started on the No. 1. But then I kind of saw out of my left view that the outside guy actually had to take an inside release, so that was kind of just done for just because that's a tough throw with an inside release and an outside press corner.
"So just based on that -- I'm making it way too complicated, but -- I saw him open, and it was open. So I fit it in the hole."
Great stuff there from the Texas kid. Regardless of what happens in the near future with this quarterback competition, it's going to be so much fun to be around this guy over his career. He's just different.
-- Speaking of different, Barrett Carter would qualify.
Wow, what a difference a year makes.
Remember this time last year when Swinney said Carter was on the redshirt bubble and it created a sensation because you just naturally assume someone this talented is going to come right in and make an immediate splash?
Remember when Carter had to be eased in early in the year -- one snap against Georgia, just 13 against S.C. State, three against Georgia Tech?
And even when he got the start at Pitt and played 46 snaps, remember when he showed he was still swimming a bit mentally to necessitate a more reduced role thereafter?
Well, none of that now. This guy is playing so fast, which is of course a function of confidence, which of course is a function of knowledge.
Don't just watch him knocking this guy's head off. Watch him before:
Wow man. What a talent.
-- A longtime subscriber, tigerrecon, said he couldn't remember many drops on balls thrown by Uiagalelei and asked us to put them all in this week's video review.
We counted nine balls that hit the hands of the intended receiver but were not caught. We must emphasize that of course not all these are considered drops. The total was closer to five or six, and the ball definitely could've been placed better on some of these.
Still, a lot of drops.
Here are the aforementioned nine passes that hit the hands of the target:
Just so everyone is clear: This week's review was not an attempt to address every part of the game that stood out to us. Next week we will present more clips from the opener, in addition to the Furman game. We'll probably also throw some of them up on the board between now and then to continue the discussion about what we saw against Tech upon closer review.
Hope everyone out there is doing well and has a great weekend!
Over the years as we've done these weekly video breakdowns, one of the coolest parts has been pulling various folks aside (Jeff Scott, Trevor Lawrence, Tony Elliott, Brent Venables, the head man himself) and asking about the inner workings of a particular play.
You almost always learn something you didn't know. And just as frequent is the revelation that there's so much more going on during a play than you concluded while watching the play in real time.
I was interested to learn more about this connection from Cade Klubnik to Drew Swinney:
In real time it looked pretty impressive: Fake the screen underneath. Downfield option outside (Sage Ennis) seems covered. Klubnik quickly looks to the inside option (Swinney) and, with no hesitation, fires a strike through the seam of a zone defense.
But then the replay brings further perspective, and introduces a fair question:
Is that ball picked off against a better defense, a faster safety?
It sort of gets back to what Paul and I have explored of late in assessing Klubnik and DJ Uiagalelei:
The starter -- and heck, probably even the play-caller himself -- seems hesitant at times and it probably goes back to spending the past eight months guarding against making the catastrophic mistake.
This is exactly what Dabo Swinney referenced after the game when asked what DJ showed that was an improvement over last year.
"He didn't make a bad play worse," he said.
Moving forward, Uiagalelei and Brandon Streeter are going to need to bring freer and quicker execution and operation in building on the positives that were on display in Atlanta. As they've said and we've said, this offense just needs confidence and that is an incremental process.
Yet there's something to be said for having some restraint and protecting the football when you have what looks to be an elite defense.
Not an easy balance, for sure. But given some of the self-impaling mistakes we saw last year in not just the three losses but a few other instances as well, you can see how that history influences the mindset at present.
Now here comes Klubnik, and he's not haunted by any of the ghosts from last year. The dude just comes in ready to take on all comers, oozing with confidence that he can make every throw into every window.
So that part has to be harnessed, too. And while Klubnik wasn't far from the cardinal sin of a red-zone pick, the fact is he did complete the throw. And the fact is he completed it in large part because of how quickly he saw it and fired.
And the fact is Uiagalelei could stand to make decisions as quickly as Klubnik did on this play. Because the slightest hesitation means a narrow passing window quickly closes, which means scrambling and then often throwing the ball away, or a sack.
But the line between a good decision and a bad one is so microscopically small, and we think this play illustrates that.
OK, to Klubnik's explanation of the play:
We asked him to take us inside his head from the snap as he scanned the left side and chose to do what he did.
And his answer was gold for football junkies:
"It's pretty much like a fake screen to the boundary. The No. 1 and No. 2 receivers are doing a switch-release, so the outside guy is coming in and the inside guy is going out.
"We're pretty much reading inside-out. It started on the No. 1. But then I kind of saw out of my left view that the outside guy actually had to take an inside release, so that was kind of just done for just because that's a tough throw with an inside release and an outside press corner.
"So just based on that -- I'm making it way too complicated, but -- I saw him open, and it was open. So I fit it in the hole."
Great stuff there from the Texas kid. Regardless of what happens in the near future with this quarterback competition, it's going to be so much fun to be around this guy over his career. He's just different.
-- Speaking of different, Barrett Carter would qualify.
Wow, what a difference a year makes.
Remember this time last year when Swinney said Carter was on the redshirt bubble and it created a sensation because you just naturally assume someone this talented is going to come right in and make an immediate splash?
Remember when Carter had to be eased in early in the year -- one snap against Georgia, just 13 against S.C. State, three against Georgia Tech?
And even when he got the start at Pitt and played 46 snaps, remember when he showed he was still swimming a bit mentally to necessitate a more reduced role thereafter?
Well, none of that now. This guy is playing so fast, which is of course a function of confidence, which of course is a function of knowledge.
Don't just watch him knocking this guy's head off. Watch him before:
Wow man. What a talent.
-- A longtime subscriber, tigerrecon, said he couldn't remember many drops on balls thrown by Uiagalelei and asked us to put them all in this week's video review.
We counted nine balls that hit the hands of the intended receiver but were not caught. We must emphasize that of course not all these are considered drops. The total was closer to five or six, and the ball definitely could've been placed better on some of these.
Still, a lot of drops.
Here are the aforementioned nine passes that hit the hands of the target:
Just so everyone is clear: This week's review was not an attempt to address every part of the game that stood out to us. Next week we will present more clips from the opener, in addition to the Furman game. We'll probably also throw some of them up on the board between now and then to continue the discussion about what we saw against Tech upon closer review.
Hope everyone out there is doing well and has a great weekend!
