brophog

I'll tell you what you can't do if all of your players leave via the portal....play a spring game. Anybody catch any of CU's spring game? I've seen more competitive games at recess.

I know some people don't like the perimeter passing game because of how it was utilized under the previous crew, but if you can combine it with deep threats, crossers, and the running game it becomes extremely difficult for the opposing safeties and corners. We have TE/HB players that can hit the flats, the corners, and attack the seams. Fidone's TD is a zig off a stacked release where he runs a beautiful route on a mismatch. A lot of big, athletic bodies to create mismatches with and I thought for a 'vanilla' spring game we saw a ton. Under center, shotgun, pistol, all sorts of screens, switch releases, stacked releases, compressed sets, spread sets, empty, etc. This offense needs refinement and better execution and all of those sorts of things that come with spring ball, but conceptually you can see where this thing is going and I think it's really exciting. I thought last spring was promising, too, but circumstances meant we didn't get to see that version of the offense. This spring, imo, is a monumental step up from any point last year and while getting more capable QB play is a definite plus, credit to the staff if they can take the types of things we saw today and re-produce that regularly in the fall.

People will very correctly tell me I'm putting the cart before the horse, but in the modern pass happy era of college football Nebraska has not had a comparable QB. He's so professional in his approach that it isn't fair to other freshman QBs to call him a freshman. One example comes from his interview where he's describing the long TD pass today and how when they ran that in practice on Tuesday he took the checkdown only to notice in film study that he had the deep shot. Made the adjustment today for a nice, easy TD.

We knew they planned to throw a lot today, so that's not a surprise. But RPOs and QB decisions also make a big difference in the final tally. We've heard all spring that the QBs have been given quite a bit of latitude to change things at the line, and Haarberg's press conference today I think was the most illustrative of the 3 QBs. Simple things like throwing it out to a receiver against soft coverage or getting the ball to a TE in the flat against box counts are many times taking the place of runs. The last thing to consider, and this goes for almost any team that isn't run dominant by design, is how many runs come when you're in control of the game to kill clock and that situation didn't come up today.

Every WR should take notice....those two are going to be tough to keep off of the field.

The thing I really notice as a positive change with Haarberg is his comfort factor. He knows he can't get hit, so maybe that has something to do with it, but he was so indecisive and skittish last year. In the spring game, they're not all amazing plays but he checks down when he needs to, he throws it away when he has to, and he stands tall in the pocket.

Absolutely. I'd also say the QB coaching is light years ahead of where it's been. Danny struggled a bit but felt like he was a little jacked up, seemed better when the game sped up and he could get into a rhythm. If he's 3rd, I'm more than OK with that. The best thing for him and the program is if we have the luxury to put another year between him and Dylan. Haarberg looked far, far more capable as a passer. I'd have to watch the game more to say anything too specific, but overall the offense did a way better job getting the ball out of the QBs hands on time and in rhythm. A little messy with the penalties but not surprising given the parameters of the game. First reaction is the offense made some major strides with the ability to get a lot better.

And the guy on the backside of that gap is a former top QB prospect whom, at times, can look better than everybody else. I think he just fell to the point where his potential is so high someone has to take that chance.

There are a lot of people in the league that really like Pearsall. I don't know what it'll mean for their salary cap issues with those other guys, but this is considered by many to be a very good pick.

I'm not drawing that, or any other conclusions about the QBs, until we can see more of them. Right now, the best guys like Sipp can do is rely on gossip from those inside the program. The media gets to see practically nothing.

RE: Taking a pick too high I don't know about anyone else, but this is one of those annoying things draft analysts say every year. Mathing it out, it makes sense on the surface. You value a player at a certain spot and don't want to spend any more than you need to get that pick. The logic breaks down when you quickly realize you have picks at set intervals. Usually that is 32 picks apart, but in Denver's case they didn't have a 2nd round pick, so that pick is now 64 picks apart. Is Bo Nix still there at 76? Probably not. That leaves the option of trading down/up to maximize your pick slot. The only thing more annoying is everyone suggesting a team should trade down. Everyone knows trading down is usually a high value play, and because of that, very few teams want to trade up. One of the few positions worth trading up for, especially in this draft, is QB. Denver didn't have a lot of options here and everyone knew that when Russ was cut. As the draft got closer and closer and it became more and more apparent a lot of QBs would go early, Denver had their hands tied as to what choice of QB they may get. The didn't have the draft capital to move around the board, and they were pretty desperate for a QB. The fact next year's QB class doesn't look great also likely played a big part in many teams making the QB decisions they did.

If Haarberg is that good, then great. I'm not taking Sipp's word for it, though.

They've been trying to placate runthedamnballguy in the press conferences by saying they're just not focused on the running game because they're confident in it from last year, but anyone even remotely paying attention should see right through that. They know they have a kid with a rocket laser arm and a room of potentially very explosive wide receivers and most of those aforementioned pieces are simply young and inexperienced. What we see a lot in teams fitting Nebraska's profile of having to start a young QB after coming off a season where they ran the ball pretty effectively and had a pretty good defense is to protect the young QB and rely on those other elements. Are we seeing that in practice? No, not even close. Two of these guys should be worried who they're taking to the senior prom right now and instead are watching White play dial-a-blitz on them. They're trying to cram as much experience into these young guys as they can. My opinion, and that's all it is worth, is there is a belief in that building that if this offense can even remotely approach its potential that this can be an extremely good team this year. They're not treating this like they just need to win a couple more games and go bowling.

As perplexing as it is for Atlanta to draft an old prospect to sit behind a QB they just paid 9 gajillion dollars to, Buffalo is almost as big of a dud. From Buffalo's perspective, the trade makes a lot of sense without context. They didn't see any more value to be extracted from the first round, and between the Chiefs trade and subsequent Carolina trade they only move down 5 spots and pretty substantially upgrade from a 4th to a 3rd and a 6th to a 5th and swapped 7ths. That's some pretty good extracted extra value. They didn't get any more picks, but they already had 10 picks so from their viewpoint they saw a lot of value to get back into the 3rd round which the Chiefs provided. But trading to KC? They know what that means for them. Just a few weeks prior when they moved Diggs the rumor was he could go anywhere but KC. So, instead, they allow KC to trade up when KC was heavily linked to the fastest WR in the class. When that speed can unlock this suddenly stagnant KC offense. When KC is the team that knocks them out nearly every year since Mahomes was drafted.......consequently the last time the Bills traded down with KC.

They'll take Edwards if they can land him, not sure I'd say he's leaning Nebraska's way, though.

Much like the defensive side recruits a lot of DB body types to turn into potentially something else, the offensive side recruits a lot of TE body types. They may stay at TE or become a WR or OL or HB/FB or whatever. The staff's philosophy is all about getting good athletes and then developing them into whatever they are best at after they are here.

The punt team has been directed to not down balls inside the 2 in order to account for this vulnerability.

24 games played, 18 starts, 62 total tackles -OR- track numbers. You better contact the coaches before they make a grave mistake.

Gotta take anything the media says about this with a huge grain of salt. I'm not saying they're wrong, but they only have slightly more information than your neighborhood 5 year old.

Barring a scandal or similar, probably not. Due to all of the free media attention he gets, he's generated an enormous amount of value for the university.

For every transfer they bring in they're losing 2 because that entire team at this point is made of transfers who all came with the idea they'd be starting. Those 'scrubs' might be useful to have around in the Big12 where Colorado may see 150-160 plays a game with the new headset rules in an already high tempo conference.

I understand Barthel is trying to sell to recruits, but in actual football terms that sentence is pretty meaningless anymore. Most of the remaining differences these days are due to things like the rules, hashmark spacing, and various other things we have no actual control over.

I share your skepticism. However, one benefit of the doubt I'd give the staff here is in the flexibility of this defense. Guys often go to the lower division because their undersized, or they have the size but they aren't athletic enough. In some schemes, if you're not big enough there just becomes no where for you to play at your body type. In this defense we can take a lot of athletes and find homes for them because we can make use of a plethora of body types that less flexible schemes can not. That's no assurance that any one player will pan out and just because you're a good athlete doesn't mean you're a good football player, but our recruiting philosophy of taking great athletes and trying to find where they work out best matches our defensive scheme.

I think most of these guys Nebraska has been linked to are just us doing our due diligence. You can never have enough talented players.

It's one thing for us to put these portal entries into context, but when a head coach does it......he just told the majority of his player they may as well transfer because they aren't important.