Initial Impressions from the A-Day Game

on a side note though, did anybody catch that new opening video? and where can i find that?

hoping it pops up on youtube soon

but maybe that was just because AJ was tossing them 35 yard passes in stride.

also Trent is one hell of a pass catcher after all. we have so many weapons this year it’s re-friggin-diculous. i can picture TR taking at least 4 or 5 wheel routes to the house this year.

did anybody else see julio jones standing in the end zone all alone on that flea-flicker play? sure it was a “td” but damn you gotta question the throwing decision

did anybody else see julio jones standing in the end zone all alone on that flea-flicker play? sure it was a “td” but damn you gotta question the throwing decision

on the kid, last name Bush (carter i think?) who did lots of kick-off receiving?

also, as a side note, i LOVED that all 4 QBs led a scoring drive. i was especially excited for starr and whether or not he chooses to stay, he will always be a winner (and has those BADASS rings to prove it!).

As well as the secondary… though they weren’t as bad as I was afraid they might be.

I, for one, am relieved to know that we even have a good backup on the bench going into this year. That hasn’t often been the case with us.

AJ likes to air that ball out! lol it was nice to see so many deep balls thrown. Gibson had the day I think everyone expected julio to have. I wonder if mcelroy’s ribs are more the reason of his lack of long yard throws than arm strength. I mean what can we really believe? we were told rolando had the flu before the rose bowl, but maybe it was his crohn’s acting up, but now he’s saying the doctors say he doesn’t have it. so, I don’t necessarily believe greg’s ribs are back to 100%. I think he is a great starter, but I hope his production and accuracy isn’t limited still because of injury… I think this loss to the white team will shake him up a little and push him.

star impressed me the most out of all the quarterbacks, call me crazy. I was rooting for him the most maybe bc of his underdog status. His TD drive was awesome.

I vote maze our return guy next year. and I wonder who the fastest guy on the team is. I can’t find anything about it anywhere…

dareus will become another alabama legend next year… bank it! I think our OL play was flat. with all the questions revolving around defense this spring, and praise being heaped upon the offensive. I think the D’s of both sides played with an extra bit of zealousness. time after time again, the pocket would collapse and none of the quarterbacks had much time to get the ball off accurately. I believe that affected mcelroy and sims the most. had they had to be tackled I think they wouldn’t have been spooked so soon. they seemed extra flighty to me considering just a touch by the D counted as a sack.

and good lord… we need to pray, do penance, beg, bleed, or whatever to improve our kicking game. we could be goliath next year, but if our kicking game gets exploited by an opponent we are done! several teams last season really tested our kick off team for weakness. I hope our punting and kick off units aren’t our achilles’s heel.

coaches. there were a number of times that saban was giving the heat to the staff on the sideline and during the miked up section he clearly called mcelwain out for playcalling. what did you see from a coaching standpoint that we possibly could learn from?

and as rough a day as it seemed to be for the OL, i’m not overly concerned. it takes a hell of a lot of time for a group to coalesce and start working as a unit. one spring really isn’t enough. it will need all pre-season practice and hopefully just one warm-up game. i would be a hell of a lot more concerned if the defensive line didn’t have success against them.

the special teams, though…. i’m not planning on sleeping much the days i let myself think about it.

is that Lacy will be the “Roy” back

and backed the winning side in the trojan war. she’d not be a bad diety to invoke in this setting. but i’d think her more the godhead for someone like rolando than fluker.

So with Fluker do you think he might need to be moved inside to guard or something? He is great at runblocking he just seems to be lacking in his passblocking which is probably because he hasn’t been playing offensive tackle that long. Everything else in the game looked good. AJ McCarron really does have one hell of a strong arm. He just flicks his wrists and throws it a long way. The main thing I was concerned with was the punting and field goal kicking but I think those concerns will be fixed by the time the first game kicks off.

I know most people are raving about how well McCarron did but I was very suprised and pleased to see how well Star Jackson played. He was throwing the ball very well yesterday. You can tell he has been practicing and working on his game.

A few things stand out to me about yesterday. 1. I think we have a problem at right tackle. Fluker just did not seem quick enough to me. But as I watched Love he didn’t seem that quick either. 2. I was really impressed with the general lack of penalties. And, almost everyone seemed lined up in the right position on every play. 3. Our front 7 on D is going to be as good as last year. 4. The player we are going to miss the most from last year is Colin Peek. 5. AJ will play and not just mop up rolls. I look for us to use him as a change of pace, say one series in each half. When he is in I think we will go deep. This will cause opponets many new headaches. 6. Our kicking game (right now) is scary bad. Opponets will take advantage of great field position this year. 7. There is enough talent on this team to contend for a 2nd NC.

By the way…trains should not be allowed to move through Tuscaloosa on A-Day!! Took me 2 hours just to get to the mall yesterday when the game was over.

he’s going to hurt someone!

QBs: To say that GMac’s hold on his position is “tenuous at best” is a bit of an overstatement, but I’ll echo others here in noting how comforting it is to see a strong backup ready to step in when his number does get called. In that regard, it is reminiscent of 2002 with Tyler Watts and Brodie Croyle.

TB: The best of all possible worlds….

WR: Unless Brandon Gibson’s day was indicative of his future, my feeling is that Maze and Hanks actually are in line to keep their starting spots. Maze’s effort on the non-TD alone was incredible, and it bears mentioning that Hanks won the Spring WR award.

TE: Can’t dispute a thing here, though I’m not ready to panic…yet….

OL: You’re absolutely right about Pendry and the line. We likely won’t know a thing until, say, the first week of September. That said, my own shot in the dark is that McCullough is still the top dog for RT and simply played LT at A-Day because neither of the other two could provide the same comfort level for A.J. at such a crucial spot. Still, you’ve got to be stoked about the overall depth on the line, the best we’ve had in decades.

Good write up, as usual. Thanks, and Roll Tide.

QB – I really liked seeing all four play well. McCarron really can throw the deep ball, but I got the feeling that it’s still McElroy’s position to lose. He does hesitate a bit on the long ball throws, which I’m not sure if he’s not able to make the read quickly enough, or he’s taking a long time to wind up that kind of a throw.

OL – I’m honestly not that worried about the O-line after last year’s performance by both Pendry and the players. I know having Mike Johnson really helped, but this year, we’ll have Carpenter and Vlachos at least. It would not surprise me to see Love at RT if Fluker continues to unimpress. But like it has been mentioned before, going against possible the best D-line in the country (and a lot more speed at LB) does change how they handle things in the spring. It’ll also prepare those guys a lot more as well.

DB – I thought the starters (or potential starters) played pretty well given the circumstances. But those guys are also being much more closely watched by CNS, so I’m just not that worried about how they turn out.

I really enjoyed yesterday simply because I’m just not worried about who’s playing where. CNS and the staff have recruited very well, and most of the new faces have had at least a year in the system – if not more. Does it mean that I think we’ll go undefeated next year? I don’t know how we’ll do this upcoming season. But I’m just not really that worried about it.

They were in a nice New Dodge (cue Gadsden barber conspiracy), but I talked to Dre for a few minutes. I told him he played well and he thanked me and smiled when he said Saban told him the same thing. I gotta say, that guy is a full 6’3, and has almost as long of a wingspan as Julio. Based on what I saw of his play, he has the #1 db spot locked down.

Most of this has already been said, but…

1. DBs looked very talented, but there were at least 3 plays where a receiver was left completely by himself downfield. Unfortunately, our QBs were never able to find the wide open man.

2. Most plays I watched Fluker it looked like he was looking for someone to block, but couldn’t find them. I think I did see him get knocked on his rear end one time in pass protection, though it was on the other end of the field so it could have been someone else.

3. Punting? I sure hope Williams is ready. Otherwise, maybe we should just always go for it on 4th down. Or bring back the quick kick. While warming up at halftime somebody punted one from the hashmark at the 50 that landed over near the fence at about the 30.

4. If people really want to talk about this offense being one of the best ever, today had better have been a fluke when it comes to all the drops. And in all fairness, it probably was. Julio is still scaring me though.

5. Red zone efficiency was very good. Only one FG for each team and one of those might have been a TD but McElroy only had to be touched to be counted down at the one. That’s one of those good/bad things depending on whether you look at it from the offensive or defensive point of view, but I’m taking it as a good thing.

6. On the bright side, QB depth is amazing, RB depth is amazing, defense will be spectacular again, I love seeing us fill up Bryant-Denny spring after spring, and despite my nit-picking on 1-4 I really do think we’ll have another great team this year.

7. The athletic department really needs to get their act together if they’re going to give out tickets. We had great seats in the shade under the west upper deck. They were the open air seats to the right and left of the president’s box. Everyone in the section got there 2+ hours early to get the best seats. Then right at kickoff as the stadium was getting full a few groups showed up with tickets. There were some arguments, but the police came and made people move so the ticket holders could sit there. Now I don’t have a problem with the university giving tickets to certain areas, but you have to let people know which sections are reserved. Thankfully, only about a dozen people out of the section of 100+ were forced to move. Even more thankfully, I wasn’t one of them. Still, this has to be done better next year.

From watching the first couple of series of each team on the tivo:

1. There were a couple of plays on that first series where any random dude out of the stands could have provided about as much resistance to Darius as Fluker did. It looked like as soon as the ball was snapped Darius simply threw him out of the way and went to the ball. Very scary. Reminded me of some of Shula’s tackles.

2. Sentimore looked very impressive in his first series.

“Julio Jones had a lot of drops — which, admittedly, given the praise Jones’ has received this year, I think it was an anomaly”

Unfortunately the drops seem to be the norm. That he has been on this spring seems to be the anomaly.

….i replied with ‘which one? – we have 5". the look on his face was priceless and his quick retort was ’isn’t it against NCAA rules to have 5?"

bahahahaha – it is good to be us!

Wasn’t he throwing against basically true freshmen DBs (with their only college experience being this spring practice)? We know that our secondary has no depth, and he was going against the second string.

Regardless, I would be shocked to see AJ get significant playing time not in mop up. As was said above, Saban is a throwback when it comes to the QB and he won’t tolerate a controversy.