husker07

Turning and looking for the ball as cb, especially in man to man, is a really tough skill to develop. You see guys in the NFL unable to do it all the time. Like you saw last night, great ball placement (with timing) and a greater play by a receiver can beat perfect coverage. It's kind of another thing though for safeties with help over the top, playing the ball coming forward. As great as I think Gerry has played thus far, one area he desperately needs to improve is his ball skills. He has the speed to cover his half of the field and eliminate anything over the top in 2 high. Corey Cooper is a different story, he's just not athletic enough. There are probably defensive ends with more speed and explosion than him. Still a solid player though.

Roach's tackles, for the most part anyway, weren't trail/pilejump tackles easier (ala Scott Shanle style). He was meeting people at or near the LOS all night. Thought he should've been starting way back. Losing him hurt us last year.

Sterup was getting beat by a guy who's gonna be a 1st round pick. Calhoun is going to be doing that to professionals in due time. He's fine. Bullough is a good player as well. Now Mark Pelini, that guy is not a B10 center.

I honestly didn't think they were that bad. Not particularly good, but not terrible. MSU made a concerted effort to stop Abdullah, meaning 8+ guys going downhill against 5. Throw in the fact that they have one of the nation's most talented and well-coached defenses and what do you expect? All we really had to do was establish some type of passing game and they would've eased off. Is the o-line 90's Nebraska good? No, but they're probably the best unit we've fielded in about 10 years. The offense's ineptitude rests pretty much on Tommy Armstrong. He MUST develop some type of pocket presence, footwork, and by an extension accuracy if we hope to jump into the upper echelon teams. Tim Beck can gimmick and scheme as much as he wants to make things easier for him, but right now he doesn't have the ability.

Wow. Congrats to Spencer Long.

Gerry looks much more comfortable at safety. Played really well yesterday, but made the mistake of trying to tackle Imani Cross. He got plastered lol.

Pretty much exactly the same except for: a)Kaepernick is 2" taller and 20 lbs heavier, b)Kaep has one of the strongest throwing arms in the world, c) Kaep is fast enough to make NFL defenders look slow, and d) Ryker is not a delta bravo. In all seriousness, they're both kind of gangly and move/throw kind of similarly.

From the stream. Good: Bo and the cat. Legendary. Imani Cross running tough and with some giddyup. Tough to tell how much was good running vs. bad D/tackling. Ryker Fyfe. Look comfortable in there and threw with accuracy and decisiveness. Seems a step or two in front of everyone with the playbook. The top guys on the d-line. Pushed the LOS and penetrated some. O-Line concerns possibly(?) Brandon Reilly. Bulked up some and is a smooth operator. Gladney looks to have some potential as well. Josh Banderas was on top of a lot piles. Seemed to always be around the ball. Bad: Bad tackling and angles at times. Maybe chalk that up to the spring game and hitting your own guys. Several assignment busts. TA didn't look the greatest but not horrible. Bo vs Kenny Bell. Pretty weak attempts by Bo. Barrett Ruuds kick. Really Bad: Mauro Bondi. Um yea...wth

Kids these days. UT's unis are classic.

Was high on Newby out of HS, and was impressed with a lot of what he did last year. It just didn't look like he was ready for the college stage mentally quite yet. He must be something special if arguably the best running back in the nation is raving about him.

This is a good point. While we would all love to have a Vince Young or Johnny Manziel esque playmaker kind of talent, we really don't need it to get to the place we want to be. I kind of think of (or hope to see) Tommy as being a Zac Lee 2.0 Same mold, just a slight step up. Doesn't have a cannon, not a burner although he can definitely run, will know the offense and what the coaches are asking of him and be happy in his role. We were essentially three single plays away from being 13-1 in 2009 with a decent-turned-mediocre quarterback (due to playing injured) running the helm and taking care of the ball. If our defense can take that next step and Tommy can too, we should have bright days. On a related note, I rewatched through the Georgia game last night and came away a lot more impressed with his performance than I originally remembered. Nothing that made you go "wow", but more than anything he had really good pocket awareness, didn't have any of those throws that went to nobody, and generally made really good decisions. Pretty much agree with everything you said, except I hope to God he's better than Zac Lee. That offense was so inept, I got to the point where I couldn't wait until we got our defense back out there. They could atleast get us good field position for a FG, and probably had just as good or better of a chance to put 6 on the board.

So I've been thinking how much Randy Gregory reminds me of another Randy, Mr. Moss. They look pretty similar, are extremely long and possess freakish athleticism. This led me to thinking about the possibility of #44 moving to the offensive side of the ball in redzone situations. I don't know too much about his hands, but he was a really good basketball player so I'm sure he would be alright. He would be a matchup nightmare who could out muscle and out jump pretty much anyone. Also, while we do have a really promising receiving core, I don't see anyone who could fill that redzone, body-up, fade route role (except for maybe Moore) like Quincy was able to do last year. What do you guys think?

He probably doesn't quite fit the mold of the Zs we've had recently. Burtch, Allen and Enunwa are all 6-3 while Westerkamp is "only" 6-0. Pretty similar to Kenny Bell so he could move to the outside at the X spot next year. But it's not a bad thing to have an explosive guy who catches everything working out of the slot. No, not at all. Lot's of good competition at wr this year. Should make everyone better.

Am I the only one that is a little surprised Westerkamp doesn't play in the "Z" receiver role? I know he's been working as the "A" or slot guy since last year, but I always saw him as an outside guy athletically as well as being a very good blocker.

Mitchell is an INSANE athlete. He is also however, comically uncoordinated and just generally not good at football. Would probably be a good pass rushing prospect if you just told him to go get the qb. Check out this dunk:

Had the chance to watch Fyfe play a couple times in high school. He was about as good as you'll see in Nebraska. He had arm strength, accuracy both in and out of the pocket, and mobility. I figured he would get an offer from a lower tier D1 school and do very well there. I'm looking forward to see how he's progressed in the spring game.

Heard from a pretty reliable source recently that it's going to be Armstrong, and there really isn't any competition. Who knows, and we'll find out a bunch once the bullets start flying who's gonna be the guy. Does anyone know if Darlington is going to play in the spring game? Just green jersey it up like we used to.

Doesn't mean much as already stated, but I really like Roach. He's a great athlete (at least pre-injury) and should know what Bo wants on D.

On Drake's instagram there is a video of the whole 40. I had him at 4.25-4.3 every time. Usually I'll time a few that on the combine for fun and am pretty consistently within .1. He ran a low 4.4 at worst.