Let me start by saying I don't consider myself a "spring fluff" guy or anything of that nature. I still remember two years ago going to spring practice a couple times and being so distraught by what I saw I texted a buddy and said "load up on the season unders." I'm not sure what that was in 2015, and i'm not trying to say I predicted sub .500, but my point is I feel like I can get a very good assessment and feel for the team early on. With that said, i'm usually pretty critical, which can lead to some bad tastes in peoples mouths after reading my posts from time to time. I had the pleasure of catching the tail end of Thursday's practice, then going to all of today's practice and trying to navigate around all the coaches there to see what we wanted. I kind of just winged this on the fly before heading to a friends for the game, so fire me questions if I forgot to talk about something. Here were my observations:
Defense:
- My general feel is that the move of Kalu to safety (he played there basically all day today) is an effort to get the best 11 guys on the field. My take is that Diaco and Williams have seen Lamar Jackson warming up and moving around and said "that's one of our most athletically gifted guys, we have to have him out there." What is somewhat scary is if you look at how he played last year, that's a lot of faith to have in a kid. I will say that while he has a ways to go, he looked much much better than what we saw in 2016 of him.
- Sticking with that Kalu to safety move, I think we are thin at corner. Jones and Jackson starting, with Lee Jr. and Bootle second string. That's basically a solid guy in Jones and then a bunch of question marks. I think when we go into nickel you will see another safety on the field and possibly roll Kalu down to cover the slot. Need to find that stud opposite Jones, they are hoping it's Jackson. He has the tools, not quite there yet.
- Our DL will be 2 gapping (not all the time), and people will be so mad that we are conceding a yard at the LOS since you line up further away from the ball when you do that.
- With that said, I feel extremely good about four of our DL in Stoltenberg, Davis x 2, and Akinmoladun. I am a little worried about our depth. I'm not as bullish on Newell after the first two days as some people (he was going against guys that are done in my opinion, more on that further down). I think we are going to have to have a freshman or two play. I'm not sure how much we were 2 gapping in terms of percentage, but our DL was playing in the backfield quite a bit. If we were 2 gapping, it was Suh like performances, but I think we were moving our guys around quite a bit.
- If you get to a practice, the amount of LBs moving from station to station is a small army. We have soooo many guys. But I think our problem is we only have Dedrick Young and then a ton of new guys starting. This will provide Husker fans some heart ache early on as they learn the new defense. The good news is there is tons of options at ILB between starters Young and Weber and backups Barry and Roberts. On the outside, perhaps no one benefited more with the 3-4 switch than Luke Gifford who had a decent day with a club on his hand running with the 1's. Alex Davis was with the 1's as well. But then you have guys like Ben Stille who looks like an absolute beast out there and Marcus Newby to give you some real solid guys. I think the thing we will learn though is we don't quite have the guy for OLB on our roster yet, but have guys playing it.
- Before I forget, this is the best physically I have seen our team look in quite some time. Extremely fit. Also, we are trying our best to work on getting rid of the hamstring and groin issues we have been experiencing. The WRs and everyone that was having one of those issues or trying to prevent it basically spent 10 minutes before practice getting taken thru stretches and warm-ups to prevent that. As a side note, Keyshawn Jr. tweaked something today, guess who wasn't over doing those things and was just throwing a ball back and forth with someone while it was going on? More on WRs later...
- JoJo Domann made a play on a safety blitz from the backside where he chased down our RB on a zone read play and made the tackle for a loss. Don't let his 'less tan than the others' complexion fool you, that dude belongs out there.
- Walk-on Dylan Owen had a very good day. He was going against the lower strings, but they were scholarship guys he was owning. Encouraging there.
- Chris Jones made a pick 6 on the very first 1 on 1s where he went against Stanley Morgan. Those are tough sometimes, if a corner sits on something there's not a ton the WR can do.
- This is the bullet to pay attention to for why i'm pretty pumped after these two practices. Our defense was freaking flying around to the ball, and rarely was a guy tackled with only one player, we were gang tackling everywhere. But what I also loved, is there wasn't much confusion on where to line up. From time to time Diaco had to yell something, but for the most part it was good. Also, we were doing some things like shifting our DL right before the snap to throw off the double teams of the OL, we were way further along in that regard than I thought we would be. But conversely, we weren't doing much route matching of the #2 WR, and for that matter we weren't jamming him much. So we gave up a lot to the slot guy and the TEs, or the check down to the RB. That should be encouraging to everyone, because we weren't route-matching off #2 WR, we weren't jamming/re-routing them, and we were basically just "country dropping" into cover 3, 2 man free, etc. I have a feeling not everything is installed, and when we start doing some of those things to #2, it won't be so easy for the offense. But, the things that were installed looked very very good for only practice 9. Sorry to get technical on this, but felt it was important because if you were at practice and saw the slots or TEs catching so many, you may have been worried. But we weren't doing a lot of the things we can do to prevent that.
- Starting DL was Freedom, Mick Stoltenberg, Carlos Davis. Behind them was Newell, Khalil Davis, Daishon Neal.
- Starting LBs were Gifford, Young, Weber, Davis. Behind them were Ferguson, Roberts, Barry, Stille. Don't read too much into that as they were moving things around. Also not sure what was up with Newby, as he was destroying people in one on one drills but didn't see much if any of him during scrimmage. He is a piece that has to get on the field.
- Had the pleasure of talking to Elliott for the first time and I must say my first impression was wrong of him. That dude has seen so much football and can relay what he wants so precisely with minimal words that he is so beneficial to Donte Williams and our secondary. Donte, you go get the kids, Elliott will help you coach them up.
- Redshirt Freshman Pernell Jefferson looks to be one of our pass rush specialists, he was making Duane Johnson and Matt Farniok as well as other guys look foolish coming off the edge when they gave him that chance during one on ones.
Offense:
- I'll start with QBs. It is completely clear no one is lying when they say Tanner Lee has an NFL arm. The amount of spin on it and strength is unbelievable. O'Brien and Gebbia's isn't bad, it's just not on that level. That being said, does anyone know if Lee went under center much at Tulane? One of the things I noticed is when Lee had to go under center he lost some touch to his ball trying to figure out the drop. In shotgun, when he could just get it and throw, he's lights out. But O'Briens feet are much better navigating a pocket or dropping from under center, and his throws are more accurate in that situation. Lee is fine on pre-determined rollouts and things like that, don't get it twisted, but he struggles in certain aspects. Lee's job to lose still in my opinion.
- Zero idea what's going on with RB. Ozigbo still battling something but is just a massive human being. Wilbon and Bryant are explosive and probably battling for top spot right now. But no one asserting themselves, mostly because there's not a ton of room to run.
- We are thin thin thin at WR. KJJ isn't ready yet, he spent a lot of time on the ground when passing vs. air, and he needs to work on his fitness a bit. The good news is Morgan, DPE, and Williams (slot) are a very good starting group of WRs. Spielman had a great day too. Lindsey will be in the mix from day 1 when he gets here, and McQuitty will be as well but is healing from his injury. Reimers will be Reimers, big and reliable. But we are thin, it will be an issue if we experience the soft-tissue stuff again. Keep an eye here, wouldn't even mind some grad transfer to help us out. This concerns me, especially if Morgan goes down.
- Speaking of Morgan, he's the face of our program, and a complete beast.
- Williams, Spielman, Darlington, Pelzer, and Johnson Jr. were working in the slot.
- TE is the other concerning area. Hoppes had the edge, but Snyder is right on his heels. We were running a ton of 2 TE sets (not sure if that's just what we were working on or not), and we don't have a clear cut "dude" there yet. We gotta get Engelhaupt or Stoll up and running with the previously mentioned two or Rafdal/Allen will be called upon. We didn't do a ton with an h-back or fullback today, but McNitt may need to help.
- So here we are at OL. I can tell you that we have 4 spots settled, LT Gates, LG Foster, C Decker, RG Farmer, those guys are locked in to start. We need to find a RT, Knevel was taking first team reps, but Farniok and Conrad are going to have every opportunity to rip that from him. Conrad will be our swing guy and also most likely center if Decker goes down. 2nd string OL was LT Gaylord/Conrad, LG Barnett, C Raridon/Conrad, RG Wilson, RT Farniok. Boe Wilson and Conrad give us two guys that make me real comfortable with our interior, that's 5 guys in case of injuries. But our tackle spot is still very thin. 3rd string was Gaylord, Watts, Kitten, Brokop, Johnson. Our OL kind of got handled today, but i'm not really worried because I think our DL was 2-gapping and slanting and we were going against a new defense. Cav wasn't happy i'm sure, but I saw some good things in one on ones that make me think we have 80% of the personnel we need. I still feel we will be much improved here compared to last year.
- This is opinion, but Johnson and Brokop are checked out in my opinion. They were getting owned by Jefferson and Owen and their body language just made me think "more of the same" or "I don't care." Conversely, Raridon was really struggling as well in one on ones but he had all the heart you want, he has just got to get a bit more mass on him. It's why I think Decker has the job locked up right now unless Raridon gets another 20 on him to push him. It was crazy, but our 3rd string DL with a ton of walk-ons were taking our scholarship guys of Johnson, Brokop, and Gaylord to the woodshed.
Overall, I love the look of what I saw. I feel Langsdorf is more comfortable calling plays, and our OL will be much improved. That will make life a lot simpler. The core of what we need I feel we will have which is a QB that can run things efficiently and avoid mistakes, an OL that can get 3 yards on the ground when we need it, and enough playmakers on the perimeter that we can go RB by committee. Diaco is going to get our effort level where it needs to be, and if it isn't, we have plenty of bodies to bench ya and never see you on Saturdays again. Effort won't be an issue on the DL. I think it will with some LBs when the dust settles and guys find out where they are on the pecking order, but again we have so many that we will have the talent out there. Again, corner scares me a bit, but I have to remind myself we have Blades coming in in the fall and he is slated to at the very least provide some depth. We are going to be better this year. I'm not sure if our record will indicate it as our schedule is a bit tougher in my opinion, but to see where we are now in practices compared to 2 years ago when I left putting the mortgage on the season win total unders is quite the transformation. Future is sunny Husker fans, for now.
Last edited: Today at 6:25 PM
ShortSideOption, Today at 6:04 PM
Defense:
- My general feel is that the move of Kalu to safety (he played there basically all day today) is an effort to get the best 11 guys on the field. My take is that Diaco and Williams have seen Lamar Jackson warming up and moving around and said "that's one of our most athletically gifted guys, we have to have him out there." What is somewhat scary is if you look at how he played last year, that's a lot of faith to have in a kid. I will say that while he has a ways to go, he looked much much better than what we saw in 2016 of him.
- Sticking with that Kalu to safety move, I think we are thin at corner. Jones and Jackson starting, with Lee Jr. and Bootle second string. That's basically a solid guy in Jones and then a bunch of question marks. I think when we go into nickel you will see another safety on the field and possibly roll Kalu down to cover the slot. Need to find that stud opposite Jones, they are hoping it's Jackson. He has the tools, not quite there yet.
- Our DL will be 2 gapping (not all the time), and people will be so mad that we are conceding a yard at the LOS since you line up further away from the ball when you do that.
- With that said, I feel extremely good about four of our DL in Stoltenberg, Davis x 2, and Akinmoladun. I am a little worried about our depth. I'm not as bullish on Newell after the first two days as some people (he was going against guys that are done in my opinion, more on that further down). I think we are going to have to have a freshman or two play. I'm not sure how much we were 2 gapping in terms of percentage, but our DL was playing in the backfield quite a bit. If we were 2 gapping, it was Suh like performances, but I think we were moving our guys around quite a bit.
- If you get to a practice, the amount of LBs moving from station to station is a small army. We have soooo many guys. But I think our problem is we only have Dedrick Young and then a ton of new guys starting. This will provide Husker fans some heart ache early on as they learn the new defense. The good news is there is tons of options at ILB between starters Young and Weber and backups Barry and Roberts. On the outside, perhaps no one benefited more with the 3-4 switch than Luke Gifford who had a decent day with a club on his hand running with the 1's. Alex Davis was with the 1's as well. But then you have guys like Ben Stille who looks like an absolute beast out there and Marcus Newby to give you some real solid guys. I think the thing we will learn though is we don't quite have the guy for OLB on our roster yet, but have guys playing it.
- Before I forget, this is the best physically I have seen our team look in quite some time. Extremely fit. Also, we are trying our best to work on getting rid of the hamstring and groin issues we have been experiencing. The WRs and everyone that was having one of those issues or trying to prevent it basically spent 10 minutes before practice getting taken thru stretches and warm-ups to prevent that. As a side note, Keyshawn Jr. tweaked something today, guess who wasn't over doing those things and was just throwing a ball back and forth with someone while it was going on? More on WRs later...
- JoJo Domann made a play on a safety blitz from the backside where he chased down our RB on a zone read play and made the tackle for a loss. Don't let his 'less tan than the others' complexion fool you, that dude belongs out there.
- Walk-on Dylan Owen had a very good day. He was going against the lower strings, but they were scholarship guys he was owning. Encouraging there.
- Chris Jones made a pick 6 on the very first 1 on 1s where he went against Stanley Morgan. Those are tough sometimes, if a corner sits on something there's not a ton the WR can do.
- This is the bullet to pay attention to for why i'm pretty pumped after these two practices. Our defense was freaking flying around to the ball, and rarely was a guy tackled with only one player, we were gang tackling everywhere. But what I also loved, is there wasn't much confusion on where to line up. From time to time Diaco had to yell something, but for the most part it was good. Also, we were doing some things like shifting our DL right before the snap to throw off the double teams of the OL, we were way further along in that regard than I thought we would be. But conversely, we weren't doing much route matching of the #2 WR, and for that matter we weren't jamming him much. So we gave up a lot to the slot guy and the TEs, or the check down to the RB. That should be encouraging to everyone, because we weren't route-matching off #2 WR, we weren't jamming/re-routing them, and we were basically just "country dropping" into cover 3, 2 man free, etc. I have a feeling not everything is installed, and when we start doing some of those things to #2, it won't be so easy for the offense. But, the things that were installed looked very very good for only practice 9. Sorry to get technical on this, but felt it was important because if you were at practice and saw the slots or TEs catching so many, you may have been worried. But we weren't doing a lot of the things we can do to prevent that.
- Starting DL was Freedom, Mick Stoltenberg, Carlos Davis. Behind them was Newell, Khalil Davis, Daishon Neal.
- Starting LBs were Gifford, Young, Weber, Davis. Behind them were Ferguson, Roberts, Barry, Stille. Don't read too much into that as they were moving things around. Also not sure what was up with Newby, as he was destroying people in one on one drills but didn't see much if any of him during scrimmage. He is a piece that has to get on the field.
- Had the pleasure of talking to Elliott for the first time and I must say my first impression was wrong of him. That dude has seen so much football and can relay what he wants so precisely with minimal words that he is so beneficial to Donte Williams and our secondary. Donte, you go get the kids, Elliott will help you coach them up.
- Redshirt Freshman Pernell Jefferson looks to be one of our pass rush specialists, he was making Duane Johnson and Matt Farniok as well as other guys look foolish coming off the edge when they gave him that chance during one on ones.
Offense:
- I'll start with QBs. It is completely clear no one is lying when they say Tanner Lee has an NFL arm. The amount of spin on it and strength is unbelievable. O'Brien and Gebbia's isn't bad, it's just not on that level. That being said, does anyone know if Lee went under center much at Tulane? One of the things I noticed is when Lee had to go under center he lost some touch to his ball trying to figure out the drop. In shotgun, when he could just get it and throw, he's lights out. But O'Briens feet are much better navigating a pocket or dropping from under center, and his throws are more accurate in that situation. Lee is fine on pre-determined rollouts and things like that, don't get it twisted, but he struggles in certain aspects. Lee's job to lose still in my opinion.
- Zero idea what's going on with RB. Ozigbo still battling something but is just a massive human being. Wilbon and Bryant are explosive and probably battling for top spot right now. But no one asserting themselves, mostly because there's not a ton of room to run.
- We are thin thin thin at WR. KJJ isn't ready yet, he spent a lot of time on the ground when passing vs. air, and he needs to work on his fitness a bit. The good news is Morgan, DPE, and Williams (slot) are a very good starting group of WRs. Spielman had a great day too. Lindsey will be in the mix from day 1 when he gets here, and McQuitty will be as well but is healing from his injury. Reimers will be Reimers, big and reliable. But we are thin, it will be an issue if we experience the soft-tissue stuff again. Keep an eye here, wouldn't even mind some grad transfer to help us out. This concerns me, especially if Morgan goes down.
- Speaking of Morgan, he's the face of our program, and a complete beast.
- Williams, Spielman, Darlington, Pelzer, and Johnson Jr. were working in the slot.
- TE is the other concerning area. Hoppes had the edge, but Snyder is right on his heels. We were running a ton of 2 TE sets (not sure if that's just what we were working on or not), and we don't have a clear cut "dude" there yet. We gotta get Engelhaupt or Stoll up and running with the previously mentioned two or Rafdal/Allen will be called upon. We didn't do a ton with an h-back or fullback today, but McNitt may need to help.
- So here we are at OL. I can tell you that we have 4 spots settled, LT Gates, LG Foster, C Decker, RG Farmer, those guys are locked in to start. We need to find a RT, Knevel was taking first team reps, but Farniok and Conrad are going to have every opportunity to rip that from him. Conrad will be our swing guy and also most likely center if Decker goes down. 2nd string OL was LT Gaylord/Conrad, LG Barnett, C Raridon/Conrad, RG Wilson, RT Farniok. Boe Wilson and Conrad give us two guys that make me real comfortable with our interior, that's 5 guys in case of injuries. But our tackle spot is still very thin. 3rd string was Gaylord, Watts, Kitten, Brokop, Johnson. Our OL kind of got handled today, but i'm not really worried because I think our DL was 2-gapping and slanting and we were going against a new defense. Cav wasn't happy i'm sure, but I saw some good things in one on ones that make me think we have 80% of the personnel we need. I still feel we will be much improved here compared to last year.
- This is opinion, but Johnson and Brokop are checked out in my opinion. They were getting owned by Jefferson and Owen and their body language just made me think "more of the same" or "I don't care." Conversely, Raridon was really struggling as well in one on ones but he had all the heart you want, he has just got to get a bit more mass on him. It's why I think Decker has the job locked up right now unless Raridon gets another 20 on him to push him. It was crazy, but our 3rd string DL with a ton of walk-ons were taking our scholarship guys of Johnson, Brokop, and Gaylord to the woodshed.
Overall, I love the look of what I saw. I feel Langsdorf is more comfortable calling plays, and our OL will be much improved. That will make life a lot simpler. The core of what we need I feel we will have which is a QB that can run things efficiently and avoid mistakes, an OL that can get 3 yards on the ground when we need it, and enough playmakers on the perimeter that we can go RB by committee. Diaco is going to get our effort level where it needs to be, and if it isn't, we have plenty of bodies to bench ya and never see you on Saturdays again. Effort won't be an issue on the DL. I think it will with some LBs when the dust settles and guys find out where they are on the pecking order, but again we have so many that we will have the talent out there. Again, corner scares me a bit, but I have to remind myself we have Blades coming in in the fall and he is slated to at the very least provide some depth. We are going to be better this year. I'm not sure if our record will indicate it as our schedule is a bit tougher in my opinion, but to see where we are now in practices compared to 2 years ago when I left putting the mortgage on the season win total unders is quite the transformation. Future is sunny Husker fans, for now.
Last edited: Today at 6:25 PM
ShortSideOption, Today at 6:04 PM
