Sunday, September 09, 2007

Grading the Gamecocks..


This may seem very Garnet colored but I feel that I deserve it! :)

Offense

QB- B+: Blake Mitchell had a very good game. He finished the day with 20-31 (65%) and 174 yds. He showed that he can get the job done if has time to throw the ball and receivers to catch it. He also showed that he can take off and run with the ball if he has to. The reason he was not ranked higher is because he didn't throw a TD. He threw no picks and very few arrant passes (I only remember one.) Overall, very good game for Blake, a GA native, to lead his team to a victory over UGA in his senior year.

RB- A: Cory Boyd and Mike Davis may be the 2nd best duo of RBs in the SEC behind only Arky. While their stats were not earth shattering, they got the job done when they had to. Very tough, smart, hard-nosed backs. Cory finished with 5.4 yds per carry and Mike with 6.2. Mike is really starting to get it. He has come a long way. Chris Culliver also had a couple of reverses which combined for 21 yds (10.5 yds per carry.) Brent and I decided that he somewhere between Jacoby Ford and CJ Spiller talent wise. That is a huge compliment!

WR and TE- B+: Kenny is the man! He finished the day with 102 yds on 7 catches. He is also a GA native and it has to feel good for him to beat his home state Bulldogs. Jarod Cook, Moe Brown, and Freddie Brown showed good things. The B+ ranking is because of 2 passes that may could have been caught but weren't. They showed the ability to not let that get them down and made up for the drops with the catches they did have. Cory and Mike also contributed well in the passing game.

Offensive line- A: WOW, those guys came to play! I was so proud of how well our O-line did. They gave Blake plenty of time to throw the ball and opened good holes for Cory and Mike. They also didn't give up one sack. It was unbelievable bro, I wish you coulda seen it. Brent said on a couple of occasions "The O-line is standing Blake!" He was impressed with them as well. The reason I didn't give them A+ was because of a one or two penalties, which are going to happen to every team. Our only ? has been the O-line and if they play like they did yesterday in every game, look out!

Defense

I'm just going to give an overall defensive ranking of A. The D-line played well and although they didn't log a sack, they were in Stafford's face after every pass or during every pass. I think they got him rattled. Stafford finished the game with a choking 42% completion percentage. Part of that also had to do with no one being open most of the time. There were a couple of case where he had a guy open but he couldn't throw a good pass because he had a defender in his face. Carolina did a great job at stuffing the run up the middle but had a little trouble stopping Moreno when he ran to the outside. Moreno by the way is awesome. Casper and Jasper had huge games as well as Eric Norwood. He was the main one that was drilling Stafford as he let go of the ball. Emanuel Cook played some and his presence was felt. He saved a TD as he drilled a UGA defender as he was catching the ball to cause a drop. It was a huge hit and it put the WR on the sidelines. I'm glad Cook is back! Tackling overall was majorly improved.

The most impressive thing about the Defense is this.. THEY DID NOT GIVE UP ONE TD! That is unbelievable against a team as talented as UGA especially with a guy like Stafford leading them. That kid could play in the NFL right now! Ask Brent, he has a freaking cannon and that may have been some of his trouble. He may have been getting the ball to the WR to quickly, he needs to show more touch. You could hardly see the ball as it streaked through the air.

What a freaking game though. We come out 1-0 in the conference for the first time since I can remember. We are ranked #17 and it is only the 3rd week of the season. I see great things on the horizon! Thoughts?

Followers

Pageviews past week

Blog Archive