Adrian Martinez Injury

knapplc said:
I'm talking about their defensive line, because I'm comparing them to our O Line in relation to the Greg Austin quote I posted above. 

According to their participation report, five guys played on their D Line. Their weights:  327, 296, 279, 269 & 241.  That's against 75 offensive snaps. 

In contrast, we played seven O Linemen. Their weights:  335, 330, 325, 310, 305, 300 & 300. 

I mean, if heat was an issue, you'd think it would be moreso for the guys who played more snaps with heavier guys leaning on them.  But that didn't seem to be the case.
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But that's five defensive linemen to play three spots so they would have only had to each play about 60% of the snaps.  Our starting five played basically the entire game.

Thus Austin's comments about wanting to be able to rotate more.

 
Mavric said:
I think it's just a hard thing to do.  I don't think the "we should just be able to push them around" really applies that much anymore.  Some opponents are obviously easier than others but if it were that easy Wisconsin should have just been able to run over BYU instead of losing to them.
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I believe I had seen that we had a good body weight differential against Troy's defensive line (*Edit - @knapplc just posted the stats, thanks!). My comment was directed probably more at that in the 'we should be able to push them around' comment than in terms of just general expectations of Husker Homer.

There were some extremely well-executed run plays against Colorado where pretty much all of our primary blockers did just that - executed the play to perfection. Particularly on several of the Martinez runs.

Against Troy, kind of as you stated, there seemed to have been several things not happening.

 
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Undone said:
I believe I had seen that we had a good body weight differential against Troy's defensive line (*Edit - @knapplc just posted the stats, thanks!). My comment was directed probably more at that in the 'we should be able to push them around' comment than in terms of just general expectations of Husker Homer.

There were some extremely well-executed run plays against Colorado where pretty much all of our primary blockers did just that - executed the play to perfection. Particularly on several of the Martinez runs.

Against Troy, kind of as you stated, there seemed to have been several things not happening.
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I think Bunch mucked up a fair share of run plays. Put Martinez back there and the line suddenly looks better I would guess. There is still plenty of room for improvement but something was off saturday and I don't think it was all on the line.

 
Getting back on topic—this is turning into a Why the O line struggled thread—I think 2AM plays Saturday. They would only keep him out if the training staff thought he is at risk for making the injury worse per what Frost said Monday. If that was the case, he probably wouldn’t be practicing either.  The last thing the team’s confidence needs now is a beat down to start Big Ten play. If 2AM doesn’t play, I’m afraid that’s where we could be headed. 

 
Nebfanatic said:
I think Bunch mucked up a fair share of run plays. Put Martinez back there and the line suddenly looks better I would guess. There is still plenty of room for improvement but something was off saturday and I don't think it was all on the line.
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This really can't be understated.  Martinez probably blows up a few well defended plays and suddenly that Troy defense maybe starts to press a bit.  Bunch being no threat allows Troy to sit back and play their way.  I also agree that Troy's defense is much better than CU's and their line movement and quickness made for a lot of missed assignments.

 
Nebfanatic said:
I think Bunch mucked up a fair share of run plays. Put Martinez back there and the line suddenly looks better I would guess. There is still plenty of room for improvement but something was off saturday and I don't think it was all on the line.
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Exactly.  I don't think Austin is so much trying to make an excuse as just trying to push everyone to be better.

But the biggest problem against Troy was we were operating out of a very limited playbook because that's what we thought our QB could handle.  We were hoping it would be enough.  It wasn't.

 
knapplc said:
Here's a huge concern about Martinez, though. Especially with Michigan's stout defense on deck.


I fail to understand how fatigue can be a factor after the summer of workouts we heard about.  And if it was heat-related, Troy seemed unaffected. And we have this fancy-schmancy food/hydration plan now, so the guys should be in even better shape (side note - the O Line LOOKS like they're in way better shape than previous years).

So, you have a valuable QB in Martinez and an O Line that looked leaky, especially late in the game, against what is supposed to be a worse defense. 

Do you really want to put Martinez back there under those circumstances?
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I'd say the difference between Nebraska and Troy is Troy didn't go from idle to governed out concerning their S&C methods.  While we have drastically improved, it's a marathon not a sprint.  I'm betting by the end of the season we see it all take shape in the form of better conditioned and better disciplined players.  Call it an excuse if you'd like, but the lazy approach our players were allowed under Riley isn't going to be fixed overnight before the season.  Honestly we should be glad they are in as good a shape as they are.

 
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Mavric said:
Exactly.  I don't think Austin is so much trying to make an excuse as just trying to push everyone to be better. 

But the biggest problem against Troy was we were operating out of a very limited playbook because that's what we thought our QB could handle.  We were hoping it would be enough.  It wasn't.
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And Troy could see it, and knew Bunch wasn't a threat to run. They really did their homework and out-hustled us.

 
irafreak said:
This really can't be understated.  Martinez probably blows up a few well defended plays and suddenly that Troy defense maybe starts to press a bit.  Bunch being no threat allows Troy to sit back and play their way.  I also agree that Troy's defense is much better than CU's and their line movement and quickness made for a lot of missed assignments.
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I agree.  This is a little off topic of the thread and I don't follow their recruiting so I may be off on this but I think Troy gets some pretty decent/underrated athletes.  Seems they would get some of Alabama's/SEC's rejects based on their location.  As you said, they were pretty quick and they may be more athletic than some are giving them credit for, which could have been part of the struggles as well.  

 
Mavric said:
But the biggest problem against Troy was we were operating out of a very limited playbook because that's what we thought our QB could handle.  We were hoping it would be enough.  It wasn't.
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You & @Nebfanatic are making really good arguments here and I think I'm convinced at this point that you're both right.

Because Colorado and Troy are probably roughly on the same level. And that level is "decent." I'll bet that Colorado winds up 7-5 and Troy competes hard for another conference title. 

And against Colorado we pounded them for 377 on the ground. 

Let's get a healthy Adrian Martinez back out there and things change.

 
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