Link: Under Armour All-America Game (Jan. 4th)

[BigEasyTider]

Tommy Tuberville...

"I plan on coaching again."

"I'm going to coach again, and I hope to coach again soon."

It's amazing how he went from retirement to looking for new jobs in the course of a month, eh?

 

[crimsoncolored]

Did you notice Tubbs said he wanted an early signing period, then said he thought coaches need more opportunities to get to know these kids. He still talks out of boths sides, even when he's away from the Barn.

 

[BigEasyTider]

The production qualities of this event have been YouTube-esque thus far, but I will give ESPN credit on the Tuberville guest appearance. He has had some very good insight, and he and Feldman have had a great discussion of the possibility of an early signing period.

Moreover, Tuberville has given some very nice insight about the changes taking place in football today.

I usually think ESPN is terrible, but credit goes where it is due, and they deserve it here.

 

[ken01fan]

Agreed, the University of Thugs... I mean Miami, is racking up tonight.

 

[BigEasyTider]

Did you notice Tubbs said he wanted an early signing period, then said he thought coaches need more opportunities to get to know these kids. He still talks out of boths sides, even when he's away from the Barn.

I think Tuberville was saying pretty much on the same page. If I gathered correctly what he was saying...

He was advocating an early signing period, and the elimination of the Saban rule. Under his scheme, he would have an early signing period, and then he would give the opportunity for two or three in-home visits with recruits. So, it's not really doublespeak. You give an early signing period, but you also give a lot more time for personal contact between prospects and coaches.

 

[BigEasyTider]

Agreed, the University of Thugs... I mean Miami, is racking up tonight.

The 'Canes are loaded with talent, but it's not going to matter. Shannon is clearly in over his head, and quite frankly he would have never even been remotely considered for the head job at an elite program that actually had the money to spend (which Miami doesn't). His qualifications for the job were (1) he was cheap, (2) he was available, and (3) he knew the Miami program. Hell, even Auburn wouldn't have given him a second look.

Miami is in a boatload of trouble, regardless of who they rack up tonight with. And if Shannon can't break above the funk next year, he might be looking for a job somewhere else.

 

[BigEasyTider]

Shepard scores on a touchdown run, that kid is a great athlete.

As I've said for months, he'll never play quarterback, and frankly I figure I'm a better passer than he is. But as a pure athlete, he's elite as they come. He could be a true playmaker at the slot receiver position if he fully embraces the switch and doesn't become a diva about playing quarterback. Lord knows the raw ability is there.

 

[Fury]

How fast is Marlon Brown? Scout listed him as 4.5, but he looks way faster than that. He looked like Usain Bolt when he was galloping away from Myles on the game's opening touchdown. He just left 'em in the dust. (And Barkley's release is ulta-quick)

The shotgun/spread formations are crap in these AA games, in my opinion. In the Army game, it looked like they didn't practice enough to get the timing down. And for the UA AA game, the QB's have more carries than the RB's.

Not all of these kids run this offense in high school, and many won't in college either. Seems like they could spilt up offensive players for each team pretty easily and have one team consisting of players running a more spread-style offense and the other team running more of an under-center, pro style offense.

 

[BigEasyTider]

How fast is Marlon Brown? Scout listed him as 4.5, but he looks way faster than that. He looked like Usain Bolt when he was galloping away from Myles on the game's opening touchdown. He just left 'em in the dust. (And Barkley's release is ulta-quick)

The shotgun/spread formations are crap in these AA games, in my opinion. In the Army game, it looked like they didn't practice enough to get the timing down. And for the UA AA game, the QB's have more carries than the RB's.

Not all of these kids run this offense in high school, and many won't in college either. Seems like they could spilt up offensive players for each team pretty easily and have one team consisting of players running a more spread-style offense and the other team running more of an under-center, pro style offense.

Brown plays a lot faster than he is given credit for on the stopwatch, and Barkley could be a Heisman winner at USC.

As for the offenses in these games, you have to keep a few things in mind. First and foremost, the goal in any of these games is to prevent injuries. That's why you cannot blitz and you can only play a couple of generic cover schemes. Furthermore, that's why no one tackles low, and that's also why they spread they field so much. They do not want to run the ball very much in between the tackles and set up a smashmouth game... that gets kids hurt.

Basically these "games" are really just glorified pass skeleton drills, and it is done to ensure injuries are kept at an absolute minimum. The last thing any of these guys want to see is one of these elite prospects get hurt. Even aside from the fact that no one wants that to happen, the organizers absolutely cannot afford that to happen because then a lot of truly elite prospects will simply stop participating in them to avoid injury.

 

[BigEasyTider]

Well, Debose is coming up next, this is the big one. All I can say is please be Miami, after watching this young man tonight, the last thing I want to see us is having to face him at LSU or Florida. We'd have to face him at least twice at Florida, and four times at LSU... no thanks on both if we can avoid it.

And if he doesn't do his announcement out in the crowd, that's a quick sign he's LSU bound.

 

[M2J]

Yaaaaaaaaaay

 

[BigEasyTider]

Debose just eliminated LSU, he's staying in-state.

 

[BigEasyTider]

And Debose will be a Florida Gator.

Well, that works out better for us than if he had gone to LSU because we won't have to play him as often, but that's still not good. We'll face him at least twice at Florida, and probably more.

I really hope the Miami guys can turn him later on his official visit, but I'm afraid that's not going to happen. He talked about how he loved playing with his boys, but that he couldn't turn down Florida. The truth is that he is the absolute perfect fit for their offense. He'll be the next Percy Harvin, and if Harvin goes pro, Debose will probably be a 500 / 500 guy as a true freshman. I figure he'll stick with Florida... he just has something there that is too good to turn down.

 

[BigEasyTider]

Big hit from Petey Smith.

He'll make a pretty dang good middle linebacker at Auburn, I imagine.

 

[rolltide0692]

Oh man, the LSU boards are blowing up. Apparently, Debose was a silent commit to them, what a shame.

 

[JayRock]

I'm glad I don't have a HD TV . Marv Levy looks dead _blank:

He's one heck of a nice guy though. I was in Disney World last week and stayed at Coronado Springs, which is where all of the coaches and athletes for this game were staying. I passed Coach Levy heading back to my room and he spoke to me and asked me how I was doing. My girlfriend and her friend saw Tubby there also. He was still wearing his Auburn gear which I thought was a little odd.

 

[BigEasyTider]

Branden Smith will be picking UGA after the break...

 

[TideWatcher]

The production qualities of this event have been YouTube-esque thus far, but I will give ESPN credit on the Tuberville guest appearance. He has had some very good insight, and he and Feldman have had a great discussion of the possibility of an early signing period.

Moreover, Tuberville has given some very nice insight about the changes taking place in football today.

I usually think ESPN is terrible, but credit goes where it is due, and they deserve it here.

I didn't get to see much of the game. Did Tubby say anything about long snappers and how hard they are to project to the next level? Or anything about character being the criteria he was most interested in?

 

[BigEasyTider]

Oh man, the LSU boards are blowing up. Apparently, Debose was a silent commit to them, what a shame.

Between McFarland criticizing them in the New York Times piece, Campbell sticking with Michigan, and Debose going to Florida, I guess it's a good thing that we lost to Utah or half of that fan base would be jumping in Pontchartrain right now.

The LSU fans, many of them anyway, just cannot grasp the fact that, while they are doing extremely well in recruiting, they are simply not going to get every single recruit they want. LSU is a fine program, but it's just one of many fine programs, and they are going to lose out on a lot of top prospects to programs like Texas, Oklahoma, Alabama, Florida, and others. I don't know why that concept is so hard for them to grasp... it's not like they are not getting their fair share.

 

[BigEasyTider]

Branden Smith predictably picked Georgia... apparently we were second.

Funny enough, he "announced" by his brother / uncle / relative showing shirt he was wearing underneath. Want to know what the shirt was? A black UGA jersey.

How ironic?

Regardless, apparently he is going to get a fifth star with Scout.com, according to their analysts in Orlando. Nevertheless, that doesn't change the fact that Debose smoked him like a cheap cigar. And, you know, that really sums up UGA to a tee... Dang good in their own right, but at the end of the day they are still getting spanked by Florida.