Open Post | Tuesday, September 21st
Posted on: September 21, 2021
Quick Post Game Thoughts | Nebraska
– The Football Brainiacs – Posted on: September 18, 2021
The Sooners held on and beat Nebraska despite a shaky showing on both sides of the ball.
Some quick thoughts following the teams performance today:
1. When is the last time you’ve seen the strength of OU’s team be on the OL and the front 7 on D and the skill positions be the question marks?
2. Defense’s saving grace remains the front 7. The secondary is very shaky. On the deep ball given up by DJ Graham he was looking back without being in phase or being connected to the WR. Basic rule there. DJ’s interception was incredible but if you know your down and distance, that’s a bat down to save 15 yards.
3. Spencer still looks like he looked last year. Haven’t seen a step forward yet. But it does feel like he could be on the brink. But again, it’s really up and down right now.
4. Lincoln still doesn’t seem to have his run/pass play calling rhythm.
5. Nice to start seeing Haselwood and Spencer getting a feel for each other. Need more of that.
6. As noted above, the secondary is a problem. With Bowman and Woodi out the issue was compounded. The fact that the LBs had a few coverage busts also added to the issues. On a positive note, both units did tackle better today than they have the first couple of games.
7. Offensively, the Sooners longest play of the day was 23 yards which they accomplished on two occasions. A Kennedy Brooks run and the trick pass to Mims. Mario Williams had a couple nice plays and he continues to grow, but right now, OU is not an explosive offense.
8. OU is a talented team but needs to take some big steps to be the team they can be. The good news is the OL seems to be progressing but that’s expected with coach B’s guys. Again, the front 7 has been pretty good. But if this is the team that OU will be the rest of the season, it’s going to tough to go undefeated. Fortunately, it’s unlikely this will be who OU remains.
Sunday Brunch | Nebraska Hangover
– Charlie S – Posted on: September 19, 2021
Yesterday the Sooners beat Nebraska 23-16.
They won the game, and as we have been told, winning college football games is not easy.
We all know a win is better than a loss.
That’s all great, I get it.
But man…it gets tiring having to hear it.
I’m sure it gets tiring for the fans to hear it. I know it is tiring for those of us who cover the team to hear it. I’m relatively sure the players are tired of saying it. And I can assure you the staff is not happy having to say it.
Nobody is happy about the situation and yet here we are.
The worst part about being here for me is that last Tuesday morning, I pointed out that Alex Grinch set off some alarms for me. I mentioned in the presser thread on Tuesday that Grinch was giving me some pre-Tulane energy. He was obviously concerned with the defense and the secondary in particular.
I guess you can look at it this way…Grinch is not a master of coach speak and you pretty much know how he thinks his defense is shaping up for the week ahead when he steps to the podiums on Tuesday.
After doing a little digging, as I mentioned in chat, we were told there were some ‘bad’ practices at the beginning of the week and they only got ‘a little better’ as the week progressed.
Grinch was not wrong, unfortunately. The secondary struggled all day with maintaining coverage and they were fortunate that the Sooners defensive front was getting some good pressure on Huskers QB Adrian Martinez.
However, the defense wasn’t the main cause for the hangover. The vaunted OU offense was the main culprit on this day even though the offensive line appears to be on track. More on that in a minute but let’s talk about two plays on the same drive that pretty much summed up the secondary concerns I talked about earlier in the week following Grinchs presser.
The first play came with 10 minutes left in the 4th quarter as Adrian Martinez connected with wide receiver Zavier Betts for a 55 yard gain. Betts was being ‘covered’ by Sooners starting cornerback DJ Graham. I put covered in quotes because if you look at the play, the only thing Graham was covering was the air between he and Betts. There was no technique displayed, no inside technique or outside technique, no jam, no slide step, there was no disruption of the route, and there was no ‘look and lean’ even when the ball was in the air. It was textbook ‘ways not to cover for cornerbacks 101’ type of stuff. It was a guy just chasing another guy who beat him as soon as the ball was snapped. Certainly not something a second-year starter should be displaying.
Five plays later, that same DJ Graham made perhaps the most athletic interception I have ever seen. I wish I could attribute that to some awesome technique, but I cannot. That was just a wounded duck of a throw, far behind the intended receiver, that DJ Graham made an amazingly athletic play on to secure the interception. I’m not even here to debate the decision to make the interception, I will leave that to you all and Lincoln Riley who actually was thinking about challenging the call in hopes of buying his team some additional yards and some breathing room.
Remarkable play. Unbelievably athletic play. Not a disciplined play in any way, shape, or form though and that is not taking anything away from Graham when I say that. My questions in the secondary are about development and making the tremendous athletes that OU has (as displayed by that interception) into the best defensive backs they can be. Saturday against Nebraska showed you that OU has some very athletically gifted players back there…Saturday also showed you that there is still a lot of room for questions about development.
Anyway…back to the largest contributing factor for the Sunday Brunch hangover…that offense.
The good news first.
The offensive line has steadily been making strides since taking the field against Tulane. They started out with good pass protection against Tulane but some spotty (at best) run blocking in that game. The unit overmatched Western Carolina physically in the second game, but you saw some progress being made nonetheless. Against Nebraska, they faced the most talented defensive line to this point of the season and really looked good in both pass protection and more importantly in the run game. OU was able to run when they wanted to and Rattler was not hurried much at all and when he was it was pretty easy to see that the backs and HBs missed their assignments on most of those occasions. The Sooners need to clean that up, but after a game like the offensive line had, you would figure OU put up a ton of points.
Spoiler…they did not put up a ton of points.
Why?
I wish I could come up with a simple answer. In a nutshell…the QB is off his game and so is the play-calling (which could be partly because of the QBs play, but we can get into that another day).
Again…why? Or better yet…how?
Spencer Rattler looks just like Spencer Rattler of 2020, maybe not even as good as that. Where is that jump at?
I talked a lot about development this week, but that was in regard to the cornerbacks and safetys. Perhaps some of that time would have been better spent talking about Rattlers development. I will freely admit, I was not expecting this. I was expecting Spencer Rattler to lock in during the Western Carolina game following a ho-hum game against Tulane. That never really happened as he was pretty much ho-hum against Western Carolina.
Surely this was the week he would come out looking like the guy I thought he would be in 2021. He’s my Heisman pick.
Spoiler alert number 2…he was not locked in…particularly in the first half.
‘Throwing the ball into triple coverage, multiple times a game, is no way to go through life, son.’
Rattler looks uncomfortable in pretty much every situation right now. He has happy feet in the pocket and is quick to backpedal or vacate the pocket altogether instead of stepping up into the pocket. Rarely have we seen him step into his throw but we have seen a ton of floaters thrown off his back foot while fading away…almost like a guy who just took a 3 point shot who was watching it go through the net. We have seen him lock onto a receiver and force the throw time and time again…perhaps it wasn’t Riley trying to force the ball to Rambo for the first 5 games last year…perhaps Rattler just got locked in on him.
If this version of Spencer Rattler was playing for Kansas State…would anyone on this board even know anything about him? I don’t think so.
The explosive Sooners offense, laden with 5 and 4 star type skill position players has exactly 4 plays, through 3 games, of over 30 yards…and one of those plays came via a walkon running back and another from the backup QB.
Like it or not, that reflects on the star of the offense, and in Norman Oklahoma, that is the quarterback. Is it all his fault? Certainly not. But he is the trigger man and when you have names like Mims, Haselwood, Mario Williams, Stogner, Gray, Brooks, Mike Woods, etc…23 points against Nebraska is not going to cut it without some tough questions being asked.
Rattler looks like he is expecting to walk on the field and automatically beat these teams. He should feel his team is better than the other teams they face because on paper, his squad is better than every team on their schedule…but he has to understand that it still takes work, dedication and passion to win those games. Remember, winning is difficult.
Against Nebraska, the offensive line played well. The running backs ran well. The wide receivers caught the passes they were supposed to catch, heck Jadon Haselwood had 6 receptions alone.
Spencer has just been ‘off’. He was 24 for 34 for 213 yards a touchdown and no turnovers against Nebraska. That’s not horrible. But it certainly is not the ‘OU Standard’.
You all have your theories about why he isn’t playing the way the vast majority of the college football world thought he would be playing entering the season. And I cannot discount any of those opinions. I just simply do not know what is going on there. We aren’t hearing anything overly negative about him from sources, as a matter of fact, as I mentioned in chat this past week, we heard he had a very good week of practice.
Now, having said all that, and dealing with this metaphorical hangover…there is good news buried in there.
The Sooners are pretty darn good in the trenches on both sides of the ball.
Their offensive line has continued to gel and develop and their defensive line is right now the best unit on the team. This is huge as games are won and lost in the trenches.
When talking about the fixes for the backend of the defense and the offensive malaise emanating from the quarterback position, I truly believe one can be fixed much easier than the other.
Spencer Rattler can be better. The question is, will he be. Fixing Rattler is much easier than fixing an entire secondary right now. Rattler is one dude, who has displayed he is very capable of leading Rileys offense at a high level. The secondary is a slower process that you hope to see play out over the course of the year and they can get away with a few more issues as they have the benefit of having a very good pass rush in front of them and you can scheme for some coverage deficiencies.
The cure to this hangover, which is compounded by the fact that the landscape in college football is wide open in 2021…is Lincoln Riley pushing the right buttons with his quarterback to get him to play at a higher level each week. The pieces around Rattler are there.
The focus of the coach and the quarterback needs to be on getting to the bottom of this, quickly, or the season could go up in smoke in an instant.
It’s Sunday morning. The sun came up. The Sooners are 3-0 and all their goals for the season are still attainable.
But man, my head hurts.
Gentry Williams | Bottom Line
– Super K – Posted on: September 20, 2021
On a previous trip Gentry Williams made to Oklahoma, he gave the visit an eight out of ten.
The Sooners have been in a battle with USC and to some extent Florida. USC has since fired their coach and Florida wants Williams to play wide receiver (he prefers DB). But, he did give those visits higher marks.
So, how did this past weekend’s visit go for Gentry?
According to Gentry, it was a 10.
My sense is the changing landscape and the Sooners knocking the visit out of the park has OU in the lead. So, in my estimation, this one is trending OU.
Chris McClellan | Trending
– Super K -Posted on: September 20, 2021
As you know, Chris McClellan made his way to Florida this past weekend for a return visit to see the Gators in action.
Let me recap our position from this past summer. The notes below are from a post we published on July 13th (link). The relevant section said:
***I got the sense Florida was probably ahead of OU at the time we spoke. But I wasn’t sure how much that mattered given he had had only taken an unofficial to OU. His visit to Florida was an official.
***I did feel like coach Turner at Florida had impressed him. He said he has a good relationship with both Thibs and coach Turner but did note that coach Turner has that “pop pop” type vibe as an older guy. Seemed like Chris liked that.
***I do think part of it is that Florida was a new flavor. It was something different than Oklahoma.
Following that update, Chris had made a return visit to Oklahoma and I spoke to him after that visit, as well.
In that note from August 4th (link) something that I mentioned regarding Florida remains relevant.
***Ohio State and Florida are currently the biggest threats to Oklahoma.
***I was a bit surprised by how much more he likes Florida than I would’ve thought…
I think what surprised me about our conversation yesterday was how well Florida has held up in the process. And, it is clear that coach Turner is a big part of that. You’ll recall, Turner bit OU with Princely Umanmielen.
I have yet to speak to Chris since this past weekend’s Florida visit but I did speak to a source tied in with the Florida program and it sounds like there is a lot of confidence in Florida after this weekend.
Additionally, Turner and I happen to have a mutual friend and I was told by said friend that Turner is very high on Chris, was his first major offer and continues to have him at the top of his priority list.
Chris has spoken at length about how he not only really likes coach Turner but respects the fact that coach Turner made the big offer before so many of the other major programs did. That seems to have resonated a lot with Chris.
All of the past notes combined with what we’ve heard through the grapevine from this weekend and I’m going to continue to have this one trending Florida.
I can’t count OU out for an in-state player, and the Sooners will get additional opportunities for visits. You know how it is, even if Chris were to commit to Florida, things could change in the 11th hour and a local kid can decide he wants to stay home.
But right now, whatever lead Florida had going into this one, I think they probably stretched it a bit.
If I hear differently as I gather information in the coming days, I’ll update you but that’s my read as of now.
Injury Update | Sourced
– Super K – Posted on: September 20, 2021
***As we previously noted, Billy Bowman has been week to week. I am told the Sooners are hopeful Bowman will be able to go this week. But I surmise it will depend on how he feels through the week.
The Sooners need him.
***Have heard that Danny Stutsman underwent successful surgery. Don’t know how soon he will be ready but will be checking.
