Point/Line 1: I don’t get your point. Seeing how our Team Talent Composite puts us seventh in the P12 and 39th overall, we don’t recruit that well.
Point/Line 2: The OL is a position that is easy to exploit. Hence the strategy to blitz and stunt. It’s a position where the DL gets to attack you and you have to react. It’s a position that if you step inside and the guy next to you steps outside, you have a huge hole and a problem. It’s a position where is you are playing three freshmen with limited practice time vs USC’s DL…you aren’t going to succeed. I don’t care who your coach is. So to compare it to a WR or CB, where they are on an island, or a RB, who just needs to hit his hole, or a QB who needs to make a read then throw and can have plays designed to succeed…that’s a tough call.
Again, if your OL are rated at a .85 level and you are going against a bunch .90 kids like Oregon, USC and Texas has…you won’t win. That is why you need to get kids rated better and why Harding is so important. He IS GETTING THOSE KIDS. His position average the last two years is an .87. I bet that is the best position rating the last two years.
To say the the people in the program lied to us and Harding sucks because we struggled vs USC…I have news for you. USC is just better than Utah. Always have been. Always will be.
Utah will ALWAYS struggle vs USC. That is just the reality of the situation. And UW has recruited well enough to compete for a national title the last five years as has Oregon.
The smart person realizes this and chalks up those games as losses every year because that is just the way it is.
And when we beat them…enjoy it. Because Utah accomplished something special that day.
You need to watch the game again. We match or exceed USC’s players at every position except OL, and QB until our OL injured our starting QB.
The two worst offensive linemen in our opener were players who started every game last year, Daniels and Ford. Ford is not a LT, he should be playing guard.
You made my point. Ford and Daniels are two of our lowest rated OL. Give it time. We will get there. When these young OL really blossom in a year or two, watch out. We will have a USC/UW/Oregon/Stanford level line, with a coach who can get OL to the NFL.
Bake that cake or whatever Jazz fans were toughting a couple years ago. Don’t bail now. We have the ingredients. They are being mixed. And when they come out of the oven, it will be beautiful. Don’t fire the chef when he finally has high quality ingredients. Let him work.
No, players getting worse year to year is a sign the position coach isn’t effective. Our recruiting has been better because we won the south division two years in a row thanks to our defense and Huntley and Moss. The OLine is holding us back, we should have a couple Rose Bowl appearances by now if not for the crappy OLine.
Call it a practice, a mini-season, an exhibition – the o-line played poorly, freshmen or not. Whether it’s a reason, an excuse, a rationale, it matters not – still poorly. That does not mean they won’t get better. That said, o-line in recent years has not been good, or average, in some time.
And, reasonable or not, poor o-line play is partially to blame for Rising’s injury.
I can accept “at times”. As far as when we had good skill players, debatable – players like Moss, more often than not, had to fight his own way out of the back-field.
I saw Bam playing on ST - he was visibly pretty jacked up, excited.
For a kid from England to absorb all the intricacies of playing OL over American kids who’ve been doing it since they were 10 years old… I have a hunch the last chapter hasn’t been written on him.
I don’t remember who the Oline coach was before Harding but I do recall everyone thinking Harding was a huge upgrade.
I don’t know that firing him is the answer, the Oline seemed fine last year until we ran into Oregon and Texas. Last year our Dline was causing the same havoc against everyone we played. Did their fans want their Oline coach fired after playing the Utes? IDK, but maybe USC’s Dline is really good and our Oline would look great if we played byu’s front 7.
Here’s highlights against one of the weaker opponents on our schedule at the end of the season when our Oline has had plenty of time to gel.
These are highlights, so plays where the Oline completely screws up and the play ends within a second aren’t included.
I still see more losses than wins by the Oline. Huntley’s completions are nearly all after evading a pass rusher, and it’s not like he’s taking seven step drops.
The CU game was the warning shot on OLine play last year. Oregon & Texas saw the film and - with really good talent - they jammed us.
USC’s talent & us being 2 games behind was a bad look, unquestionably. (It was also evident USC was motivated.)
I’m not ready to call for a change, but there’s a concern. Play calling can keep a defense off balance, but if it’s 3rd and 1, you have to be able to punch it through.
Our DL has made many OCs look bad in the PAC. We need to find a way to make the next half step up on the OL. No question - Whit laid it out.
