So, finally game week and I thought it was probably time for me to start giving my take on the upcoming season.
2014 on offense was a roller coaster, mostly caused by injury to our godlike quarterback, Deshaun Watson. All in all we were very middle of the pack on offense, ranking 58th nationally in total offense. However, in the 4 games that Watson started or played most of the snaps (FSU, UNC, NC State, South Carolina) our offense averaged approximately 70 ypg more, an average that would have been good enough for 19th in the nation.
I anticipate our overall average on offense to go up this year, perhaps reaching the top 15 nationally. Obviously the most important factor(s) here are A) the health of Watson and B) the development of our offensive line.
Even with the depth concerns at offensive line, the fact remains that the talent at the skill positions is so elite that we will still manage to be extremely explosive. I wrote most of last season that the ball needed to get into the hands of #3, #9, and #7 as I felt they were the most talented playmakers. Going into the season, I'll be interested to see how Gallman has developed but no doubt Scott is a significant, significant playmaker that needs 10+ touches per game, and I'd look for Williams and Peake to both have big years and be go to guys in big situations. Add in the young talent of Cain and McCloud and there's almost too much talent to go around.
On Cain and McCloud, we need to be understanding that for most true freshman, it takes several games for them to truly get into a rhythm and earn the trust of the coaches. We saw this last season. Fortunately, we aren't opening with UGA and FSU this year, so I think the young guys will get plenty of snaps under their belt in the first 2 games and be in a better position to contribute early in more significant conference games, where as we had to be more patient against good competition last season.
Adding on to that, I think it's an extreme positive that we will be able to work our young OL early in the season before having to travel to Louisville. In my mind the schedule sets up well for a team trying to make some young guys grow up quickly. There's simply nothing more helpful to the learning curve than game snaps and game experience. Even against Wofford and App State, the snaps will be meaningful for a true freshman in his first game against a college opponent. Being able to learn from game film and not practice film will make a difference. Then they face their first big challenge in Louisville, then get an off week. So really 3 of the first 4 weeks of the season will be teaching weeks, and by time we reach Notre Dame on the 3rd, I hope Hyatt and company will have hit their stride a bit.
With the skill we have in place on offense, if we can keep our QB healthy and have some steady development and progress on the OL, I think we are a top 20 offense nationally. Call me crazy, but I have very little concerns about the offensive coordination going into the season. I might look back and regret that sentiment, but I think Scott and Elliott are both smart and both know what they want to do with the offense. I don't foresee Dabo going back to his bad habit of micromanaging the play calling on gameday.
Defensively I think we have to have the opposite sentiment, no question we will take a step back on defense this year, I think the real question is how big that step will be, the good news is we can take a step back and still be pretty good.
Just like on the offensive line, we're relying quite a bit on some young, but super talented defensive linemen to help shore up depth and provide an impact. Our depth at the defensive tackle position was probably, to me at least, the most impressive aspect of the 2014 unit. I think we have done a masterful job in backfilling talent there, and I don't see us having the same issue of our DL falling completely off the map the way South Carolina's did last season. I am projecting us to see a fall in our run defense numbers from where we were at 5th nationally in 2014, but that's got a lot more to do with the questions at linebacker than it does with the defensive line.
A few years ago when the Jets under Rex Ryan had probably the best defense in the NFL, I felt the primary reason for it was that they had the best cover corner in the NFL at that time in Darrelle Revis. They really built their defense around the idea that they could put Revis on anyone and he would take them away and they just didn't have to worry about it. For the most part, that worked pretty well for them. While I wouldn't say that Alexander is as good as Darelle Revis, Alexander can serve that purpose for us. He is probably the best pure, one on one, cover corner I've ever seen at Clemson.
With the talent we have at the defensive line spots, with our ability to essentially take away the most dangerous man with Alexander, its hard for me to see us not being in the top 10 in pass efficiency defense again this year.
The big question is going to be around linebackers. I think you'll probably see a lot of teams testing our LBs, both in their ability to fill gaps and respond to misdirection, as well as their ability to be disciplined on play action and cover backs and tight ends.
All in all, this is not the number 1 defense in the country. But I think we can still pull a top 25 defense here, despite the depth concerns and the departures and all the like, I just can't see this defense not being a "good" top 15-25 ranked defense. Remember, every year that Vic was here we ranked in the top 25 in total defense, and those units were, from top to bottom, less talented and in 2008 had it's fair share of depth issues and problems at linebacker (a unit that ranked 14th nationally).
So a top 25 offense and a top 25 defense. Vastly improved in one area and falling off a bit in the other - is that a recipe for a playoff appearance? No. This is a 9-3 football team, right now on August 30th. They will be a good team, they will be competitive, they will be right in the thick of the ACC championship hunt once again. I am much more excited about what the 2016 football season will bring for Clemson, as it seems like that may be a "stars are aligned" type of year for us, at least on paper. That said, a talented team like ours that is going to be competitive, if the ball bounces the right way, might just be able to put together an 11-12 win season and sneak in the backdoor of the playoff. If we catch the injury bug or have some bad luck, we could look at an 8-4 kind of year, which to me is pretty much the worst case scenario for this team.
The players I'm most interested to see are Jordan Leggett and Christian Wilkins. We all know that a great tight end can be a huge difference maker on any offense. It seems we've been waiting forever for Leggett to come around and deliver on his promise, and the talk is that this is the year for that. With so much focus going on our outside threats, there's no doubt that an athletic and physical tight end can create a lot of opportunities in both the running and passing game.
Wilkins I'm excited to see...well...because he's a stud.
Go Tigers!
2014 on offense was a roller coaster, mostly caused by injury to our godlike quarterback, Deshaun Watson. All in all we were very middle of the pack on offense, ranking 58th nationally in total offense. However, in the 4 games that Watson started or played most of the snaps (FSU, UNC, NC State, South Carolina) our offense averaged approximately 70 ypg more, an average that would have been good enough for 19th in the nation.
I anticipate our overall average on offense to go up this year, perhaps reaching the top 15 nationally. Obviously the most important factor(s) here are A) the health of Watson and B) the development of our offensive line.
Even with the depth concerns at offensive line, the fact remains that the talent at the skill positions is so elite that we will still manage to be extremely explosive. I wrote most of last season that the ball needed to get into the hands of #3, #9, and #7 as I felt they were the most talented playmakers. Going into the season, I'll be interested to see how Gallman has developed but no doubt Scott is a significant, significant playmaker that needs 10+ touches per game, and I'd look for Williams and Peake to both have big years and be go to guys in big situations. Add in the young talent of Cain and McCloud and there's almost too much talent to go around.
On Cain and McCloud, we need to be understanding that for most true freshman, it takes several games for them to truly get into a rhythm and earn the trust of the coaches. We saw this last season. Fortunately, we aren't opening with UGA and FSU this year, so I think the young guys will get plenty of snaps under their belt in the first 2 games and be in a better position to contribute early in more significant conference games, where as we had to be more patient against good competition last season.
Adding on to that, I think it's an extreme positive that we will be able to work our young OL early in the season before having to travel to Louisville. In my mind the schedule sets up well for a team trying to make some young guys grow up quickly. There's simply nothing more helpful to the learning curve than game snaps and game experience. Even against Wofford and App State, the snaps will be meaningful for a true freshman in his first game against a college opponent. Being able to learn from game film and not practice film will make a difference. Then they face their first big challenge in Louisville, then get an off week. So really 3 of the first 4 weeks of the season will be teaching weeks, and by time we reach Notre Dame on the 3rd, I hope Hyatt and company will have hit their stride a bit.
With the skill we have in place on offense, if we can keep our QB healthy and have some steady development and progress on the OL, I think we are a top 20 offense nationally. Call me crazy, but I have very little concerns about the offensive coordination going into the season. I might look back and regret that sentiment, but I think Scott and Elliott are both smart and both know what they want to do with the offense. I don't foresee Dabo going back to his bad habit of micromanaging the play calling on gameday.
Defensively I think we have to have the opposite sentiment, no question we will take a step back on defense this year, I think the real question is how big that step will be, the good news is we can take a step back and still be pretty good.
Just like on the offensive line, we're relying quite a bit on some young, but super talented defensive linemen to help shore up depth and provide an impact. Our depth at the defensive tackle position was probably, to me at least, the most impressive aspect of the 2014 unit. I think we have done a masterful job in backfilling talent there, and I don't see us having the same issue of our DL falling completely off the map the way South Carolina's did last season. I am projecting us to see a fall in our run defense numbers from where we were at 5th nationally in 2014, but that's got a lot more to do with the questions at linebacker than it does with the defensive line.
A few years ago when the Jets under Rex Ryan had probably the best defense in the NFL, I felt the primary reason for it was that they had the best cover corner in the NFL at that time in Darrelle Revis. They really built their defense around the idea that they could put Revis on anyone and he would take them away and they just didn't have to worry about it. For the most part, that worked pretty well for them. While I wouldn't say that Alexander is as good as Darelle Revis, Alexander can serve that purpose for us. He is probably the best pure, one on one, cover corner I've ever seen at Clemson.
With the talent we have at the defensive line spots, with our ability to essentially take away the most dangerous man with Alexander, its hard for me to see us not being in the top 10 in pass efficiency defense again this year.
The big question is going to be around linebackers. I think you'll probably see a lot of teams testing our LBs, both in their ability to fill gaps and respond to misdirection, as well as their ability to be disciplined on play action and cover backs and tight ends.
All in all, this is not the number 1 defense in the country. But I think we can still pull a top 25 defense here, despite the depth concerns and the departures and all the like, I just can't see this defense not being a "good" top 15-25 ranked defense. Remember, every year that Vic was here we ranked in the top 25 in total defense, and those units were, from top to bottom, less talented and in 2008 had it's fair share of depth issues and problems at linebacker (a unit that ranked 14th nationally).
So a top 25 offense and a top 25 defense. Vastly improved in one area and falling off a bit in the other - is that a recipe for a playoff appearance? No. This is a 9-3 football team, right now on August 30th. They will be a good team, they will be competitive, they will be right in the thick of the ACC championship hunt once again. I am much more excited about what the 2016 football season will bring for Clemson, as it seems like that may be a "stars are aligned" type of year for us, at least on paper. That said, a talented team like ours that is going to be competitive, if the ball bounces the right way, might just be able to put together an 11-12 win season and sneak in the backdoor of the playoff. If we catch the injury bug or have some bad luck, we could look at an 8-4 kind of year, which to me is pretty much the worst case scenario for this team.
The players I'm most interested to see are Jordan Leggett and Christian Wilkins. We all know that a great tight end can be a huge difference maker on any offense. It seems we've been waiting forever for Leggett to come around and deliver on his promise, and the talk is that this is the year for that. With so much focus going on our outside threats, there's no doubt that an athletic and physical tight end can create a lot of opportunities in both the running and passing game.
Wilkins I'm excited to see...well...because he's a stud.
Go Tigers!
