Okay let's do this!
QB: Mond has a good bit of Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde to his game and the trend seems to have been Home vs Away. Now Vanderbilt at home week 1 would disprove that theory over time but he's also had a pretty serious history of struggling in openers. His negatives are his eyes betray him a ton. He seems confident in the pocket in the Florida game (their last home game) and his feet were smooth, but in their other three games this season his feet were erratic a good bit and as his feet go his accuracy on throws about 10 yards or further also goes. He's still athletic and has ability to escape the pocket when things breakdown but no one besides Bama, and not even them really, has hit him a ton this year so seeing pressure even at home might change him a good bit. One thing I really think stands out is he hasn't thrown the ball down field to his left really much at all, I don't know why but it's a weird trend.
RB: Isiah Spiller is the real deal. He's got good vision, breaks tackles well, and gains tough yards after contact. He's best downhill in the gap schemes and they run a ton of counter with him because of said vision. He's got some pretty light feet too but he's not a huge threat as a home run guy. He's a legit 6'1' 225 so we'll need to bring our hats to the party consistently for him. I also got a sense against Florida and Mississippi State that he has the ability to get better with more carries later in games so there's got to be a big focus on stopping him early in the game and hopefully make them play from behind some to limit getting him going over the span of a game. RB2 is a bit of a different deal. Anias Smith is the current RB2 but he has less than half the carries Spiller does. He's gadgety and they understand it well so he will spend some time as a slot guy for them and get touches that way as well as in the return game. He's an explosive guy but he does lack the tackle breaking ability and vision that Spiller has and that really limits his effectiveness as a downhill runner. All that's to say those the back that's in pretty much dictates what they'll be best at as an offense. They do throw to Spiller but Smith is their leading receiver even with him being in the backfield some.
WR: This is the worst unit on their offense by a pretty large margin. They've struggled to gain downfield separation and when you remove the way they've used RB's and TE's their WR's have accounted for just 41 of 81 (50.6%) total team completions for 540 of 1001 (54%) total passing yards. These percentages dip to 33% and 34.2% respectively when removing injured WR Caleb Chapman's production going into this game. They have had some inconsistencies dropping the ball and also the volume of targets to them is low in comparison to the rest of the league. #1 WR target Jhamon Ausbon opted out prior to the season to prepare for the job and the word out there was his successor 5* WR Demond Demas was supposed to be a #2 option for the year before being THE guy for Haynes King going forward. He hasn't come on and I'm not even sure I've seen him play in a game yet. He could be a factor against us with them looking for some options outside with a bye week to prepare. All in all I'm not scared of these guys. They haven't looked against worse and less talented secondary's than we have and we've also had a week to get ready for what they could have figured out. This is one of the few spots I think we have a clear advantage vs a dog fight.
TE: Jalen Wydermyer alone has accounted for 23.4% of the teams receptions and 18.4% of the teams receiving yardage. He's the real deal. His usage is a bit different from Kyle Pitts, the TE from Florida who I believe is the best TE in the country, but I do think he's similarly talented. Especially with the variety of zones we play he'll be a guy they'll use underneath a ton. He's yet to catch a TD this year so far but that's more a testament to Spiller and Anias Smith and Jimbo than a detriment at JW. He's another really big kid too at 6'5" 265 and he catches the ball in traffic really well. He doesn't come off the field when they decide to run the ball either, he's a physical blocker and I'd argue a piece that diagnoses where early down runs are headed. He's the setter for split zone and the secondary puller for the early down counter that they love with Spiller. He might be the read to getting them to uncomfortable situations with D&D early in the game. He's a bit of a mismatch for us overall and I'm excited to see BO adjust to take him away.
OL: They're good. They're really good. They're big. 65 is 6'5" 315, 55 is 6'4" 325, 77 is 6'5" 300, 73 is 6'5" 325, and 54 is 6'6" 320 for an average up front of 6'5" 317. They move well especially 55, he's the real deal, and 73. They pin front side and pull guards very well, especially to the left with 65, 55, and 77 getting a true down block and a front side double team and 73 pulling to move DE's and LB's well. That counter look with 73 kicking out the backside edge defender and 85 stacking backside LB's to give Spiller a two way go is the number one play that scares me because we will have to be a 4 down team and I think these guys will have some success moving Kelly, Nichols, Boykin, Carter, and Miller. Basically them running counter away from Grant and Marshall will be a problem in my opinion. They do a pretty solid job of not losing ground in the zone game either and do try to create the natural doubles that appear in zone schemes. They handle line games pretty well or at least they were prepared for the pressure package that Mississippi State brought them two weeks ago that includes tons of twists in the DL. 77 and 73 seem to be the weakest links in pure pass pro but their still serviceable in that regard.
Overall offensive notes: Theirs a big contrast between what we do stylistically on offense and what they do. The pace is dramatically different and I think the rosters speak to that. They're a bigger team than us and were bigger than Florida, MSU, and Vandy and they knew it, lined up and tried to run over them slowly. Mond still holds this team back with mistakes. They've only had to play behind or in a shootout in two games and they couldn't do it with Bama. Mond was lights out against Florida but Florida also had some head scratchers in their. This is the week BO pulls out another gem in a true 4-3 vs their 12 personnel or maybe an adjustment of Foucha as your 'Nickel' instead of GBJ because of his strengths coming downhill.
QB: Mond has a good bit of Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde to his game and the trend seems to have been Home vs Away. Now Vanderbilt at home week 1 would disprove that theory over time but he's also had a pretty serious history of struggling in openers. His negatives are his eyes betray him a ton. He seems confident in the pocket in the Florida game (their last home game) and his feet were smooth, but in their other three games this season his feet were erratic a good bit and as his feet go his accuracy on throws about 10 yards or further also goes. He's still athletic and has ability to escape the pocket when things breakdown but no one besides Bama, and not even them really, has hit him a ton this year so seeing pressure even at home might change him a good bit. One thing I really think stands out is he hasn't thrown the ball down field to his left really much at all, I don't know why but it's a weird trend.
RB: Isiah Spiller is the real deal. He's got good vision, breaks tackles well, and gains tough yards after contact. He's best downhill in the gap schemes and they run a ton of counter with him because of said vision. He's got some pretty light feet too but he's not a huge threat as a home run guy. He's a legit 6'1' 225 so we'll need to bring our hats to the party consistently for him. I also got a sense against Florida and Mississippi State that he has the ability to get better with more carries later in games so there's got to be a big focus on stopping him early in the game and hopefully make them play from behind some to limit getting him going over the span of a game. RB2 is a bit of a different deal. Anias Smith is the current RB2 but he has less than half the carries Spiller does. He's gadgety and they understand it well so he will spend some time as a slot guy for them and get touches that way as well as in the return game. He's an explosive guy but he does lack the tackle breaking ability and vision that Spiller has and that really limits his effectiveness as a downhill runner. All that's to say those the back that's in pretty much dictates what they'll be best at as an offense. They do throw to Spiller but Smith is their leading receiver even with him being in the backfield some.
WR: This is the worst unit on their offense by a pretty large margin. They've struggled to gain downfield separation and when you remove the way they've used RB's and TE's their WR's have accounted for just 41 of 81 (50.6%) total team completions for 540 of 1001 (54%) total passing yards. These percentages dip to 33% and 34.2% respectively when removing injured WR Caleb Chapman's production going into this game. They have had some inconsistencies dropping the ball and also the volume of targets to them is low in comparison to the rest of the league. #1 WR target Jhamon Ausbon opted out prior to the season to prepare for the job and the word out there was his successor 5* WR Demond Demas was supposed to be a #2 option for the year before being THE guy for Haynes King going forward. He hasn't come on and I'm not even sure I've seen him play in a game yet. He could be a factor against us with them looking for some options outside with a bye week to prepare. All in all I'm not scared of these guys. They haven't looked against worse and less talented secondary's than we have and we've also had a week to get ready for what they could have figured out. This is one of the few spots I think we have a clear advantage vs a dog fight.
TE: Jalen Wydermyer alone has accounted for 23.4% of the teams receptions and 18.4% of the teams receiving yardage. He's the real deal. His usage is a bit different from Kyle Pitts, the TE from Florida who I believe is the best TE in the country, but I do think he's similarly talented. Especially with the variety of zones we play he'll be a guy they'll use underneath a ton. He's yet to catch a TD this year so far but that's more a testament to Spiller and Anias Smith and Jimbo than a detriment at JW. He's another really big kid too at 6'5" 265 and he catches the ball in traffic really well. He doesn't come off the field when they decide to run the ball either, he's a physical blocker and I'd argue a piece that diagnoses where early down runs are headed. He's the setter for split zone and the secondary puller for the early down counter that they love with Spiller. He might be the read to getting them to uncomfortable situations with D&D early in the game. He's a bit of a mismatch for us overall and I'm excited to see BO adjust to take him away.
OL: They're good. They're really good. They're big. 65 is 6'5" 315, 55 is 6'4" 325, 77 is 6'5" 300, 73 is 6'5" 325, and 54 is 6'6" 320 for an average up front of 6'5" 317. They move well especially 55, he's the real deal, and 73. They pin front side and pull guards very well, especially to the left with 65, 55, and 77 getting a true down block and a front side double team and 73 pulling to move DE's and LB's well. That counter look with 73 kicking out the backside edge defender and 85 stacking backside LB's to give Spiller a two way go is the number one play that scares me because we will have to be a 4 down team and I think these guys will have some success moving Kelly, Nichols, Boykin, Carter, and Miller. Basically them running counter away from Grant and Marshall will be a problem in my opinion. They do a pretty solid job of not losing ground in the zone game either and do try to create the natural doubles that appear in zone schemes. They handle line games pretty well or at least they were prepared for the pressure package that Mississippi State brought them two weeks ago that includes tons of twists in the DL. 77 and 73 seem to be the weakest links in pure pass pro but their still serviceable in that regard.
Overall offensive notes: Theirs a big contrast between what we do stylistically on offense and what they do. The pace is dramatically different and I think the rosters speak to that. They're a bigger team than us and were bigger than Florida, MSU, and Vandy and they knew it, lined up and tried to run over them slowly. Mond still holds this team back with mistakes. They've only had to play behind or in a shootout in two games and they couldn't do it with Bama. Mond was lights out against Florida but Florida also had some head scratchers in their. This is the week BO pulls out another gem in a true 4-3 vs their 12 personnel or maybe an adjustment of Foucha as your 'Nickel' instead of GBJ because of his strengths coming downhill.
