First off, that was the shortest (in # of plays and in time) of any scrimmage I've attended at Cal.
We're really practicing at warp speed this camp, noticeable difference. Secondly, they are walking the talk around injury prevention with a cap on total number of snaps when tackling. I'd guess we had 50 plays total. My guess is that we've never had a Fall Scrimmage in the past with less than 100-125 plays.
Lots of guys held out today: Vanderbilt, Hawkins, Anoi, Westerfield, Turner as well as Noa all looked healthy and did sprinting in pads but did not play. Cochran still on crutches. Gentle Williams also not in pads and of course Bankhead is out.
I'm not big on stats or even outcomes when I watch a scrimmage. I tend to see who pops and in what circumstance they flash and to get a sense of overall level of play. Let me start with guys who flashed:
Jacob Anderson started in place of Vanderbilt and flashed. Physical kid who is faster than Rubenzer (league champion in HS 110 and 330M hurdles) and built a lot like Steph McClure.
Evan Rambo is smooth and long. Made a big hit/strip. Didn't see him beat in coverage.
Zeandae Johnson had two sacks, yes. However, one was against a FB in a jumbo pass coverage set. Beyond those two plays, he's big and can move. Noticeable difference in size to our other DEs. Bright future here
Davis Webb was in command. Great checks on blitzes, no bad throws. Quick release and strong arm. Confident and poised. Stud.
Demetris Robertson and Chad Hansen. Surprised to see us single cover them on the outside. Beat press coverage and pulled away from DBs. Hansen very smooth getting in and out of his cuts
Starting OL. Mekari was flawless. Borrayo had a great day. Running holes were there. Only one had play with the 1's where there was confusion on a blitz pickup that led to a hurry and incompletion.
Jordan K. LB reminds me of a smaller Scott Fujita with his build. Tiny waist, big upper body. Moves really well and the best part was that he played up field on running plays. Only LB that did so today
Luc Bequette is quick and strong. Made a great near sack against 1st team OL. Unfortunately he struggled at times when we ran straight at him. Bright future though. Like almost all DTs, they need to get used to the physicality on run plays.
The two most impressive true frosh defenders were Chinedu Udeogu and Traveon Beck. Udeogu's a natural pass rusher, can really turn the corner and has a nice build. Got crushed on two run plays though. Beck's going to be good. He's playing faster than the other frosh DBs and is feisty and competitive.
Allensworth has fantastic technique. Gave up two receptions yet both were well covered and it took a perfect throw. Never out of position and a solid tackler.
Pretty disappointing performance overall by the defense. Tackling was not great. Not 2013 bad but not good. In general, we're behind at the same point where we were last year as you really notice Drew, Nickerson and Kragen not being out there. Mekari, Wilson, Saffle and Looney played but one series, a series in which they had but two decent plays before giving up an easy TD. Looney did though got a near sack on Webb with a wonderful move on Ooms/Borrayo. Front 6/7 that first series were only contacting Running Backs 3-4 yards beyond the LOS. We look small up front relative to the OL. Downs moves really well and is wide and strong yet he waits for plays to come to him. Biggest thing was that for the first 4 drives, the defense was emotionally flat and leaderless. Looney finally got fired up and started dropping F bombs and exorted the defense to start playing with some grit. They played better after that. Assist in leadership to Davison who pulled everyone together for Looney's Knute Rockne speech. We keep hearing how we're playing physically on defense yet it was not in evidence today save a small handful of plays.
Offense looks different from last three years. Scheme is clearly different - more two back and power running formations. More vertical throws and a different approach to screens. Our WRs seem younger, not the big catch radius guys like Lawler, Harris and Anderson. More explosion and shiftiness. Work to be done on routes, blocking, sitting down in zones, etc. More drops than we saw in camp last year.
We had a nice variety of blitzes, a couple were effective against QBs not named Webb. One resulted in a Khalfani TD which was a nice play by Khalfani as he recognized the blitz and went against the blocking to bust it. I suspect we'll be more taking more risks with blitzes. Plays to our strengths with Walker, Brown and Downs who in particular are all good blitzers. We played a lot of 3-2-6 and 3-3-5.
Some other personnel observations:
Weaver has good size, motor and speed. Yet, he is easily stood up on running plays and doesn't have a lot of pass rush moves at this point. Would like to see them stand him up as he's quick laterally and has some burst after the first step.
Tongilava had a rough day today in terms of being physical at the point of attack. He can really run and looks far more comfortable on pass coverage or running to the sideline than playing in the box. To be honest, so does Downs (other than blitzing).
Interesting that Rubenzer is best case 3rd string at safety. Hawkins looks close to coming back so who knows where he fits in with Anderson and Vanderbilt.
Ooms started but Granado got run with the 1's. Wallace started but Stuckey got run with the 1's.
Drew Kobayashi is a big WR and he can move. Had a nice TD and a bad drop, though DRob also had a bad drop.
Heard a bit of Dykes talk to the team after scrimmage. He's rarely overly negative and wasn't today yet he was clearly not pleased as he talked about inconsistent play. The team was pretty clean with only a couple of obvious mental mistakes/penalties, which was good to see. I wish I saw more obvious development with our DL and LBs. Wilson didn't flash and neither did Mekari or Saffle though to be fair they only got one series. Our returning LBs seem bereft of obvious playmakers (hopefully Downs gets better against the run). Our secondary clearly has better depth, athleticism and better technique than we did two years ago.
My guess on our defense is that we start the year behind where we were last year with a real chance to be better in the latter half of the year. Can we stop the run? Can we rush the passer without blitzing? I think we'll clean up the tackling, force TOs and our coverage will be better for sure. Folks like Saffle, Downs, Jordan K, Bequette and Z Johnson could be difference makers if they can turn experience into development during the season. Wish they were all a year older.
I think Dykes' optimism on defense is based on projecting out into the season and perhaps is a bit of convincing his own team. I don't see a lot of swagger and confidence on that side of the field. Clearly Allensworth and Looney have it, but beyond them?
Webb is the real deal. Like really good. And our OL looks really good (though the competition may not be great). I suspect our first three games will be more interesting than I thought a week ago, not sure I would bet the house on Cal vs. SDSU or Texas or even Hawaii with the big line.
We're really practicing at warp speed this camp, noticeable difference. Secondly, they are walking the talk around injury prevention with a cap on total number of snaps when tackling. I'd guess we had 50 plays total. My guess is that we've never had a Fall Scrimmage in the past with less than 100-125 plays.
Lots of guys held out today: Vanderbilt, Hawkins, Anoi, Westerfield, Turner as well as Noa all looked healthy and did sprinting in pads but did not play. Cochran still on crutches. Gentle Williams also not in pads and of course Bankhead is out.
I'm not big on stats or even outcomes when I watch a scrimmage. I tend to see who pops and in what circumstance they flash and to get a sense of overall level of play. Let me start with guys who flashed:
Jacob Anderson started in place of Vanderbilt and flashed. Physical kid who is faster than Rubenzer (league champion in HS 110 and 330M hurdles) and built a lot like Steph McClure.
Evan Rambo is smooth and long. Made a big hit/strip. Didn't see him beat in coverage.
Zeandae Johnson had two sacks, yes. However, one was against a FB in a jumbo pass coverage set. Beyond those two plays, he's big and can move. Noticeable difference in size to our other DEs. Bright future here
Davis Webb was in command. Great checks on blitzes, no bad throws. Quick release and strong arm. Confident and poised. Stud.
Demetris Robertson and Chad Hansen. Surprised to see us single cover them on the outside. Beat press coverage and pulled away from DBs. Hansen very smooth getting in and out of his cuts
Starting OL. Mekari was flawless. Borrayo had a great day. Running holes were there. Only one had play with the 1's where there was confusion on a blitz pickup that led to a hurry and incompletion.
Jordan K. LB reminds me of a smaller Scott Fujita with his build. Tiny waist, big upper body. Moves really well and the best part was that he played up field on running plays. Only LB that did so today
Luc Bequette is quick and strong. Made a great near sack against 1st team OL. Unfortunately he struggled at times when we ran straight at him. Bright future though. Like almost all DTs, they need to get used to the physicality on run plays.
The two most impressive true frosh defenders were Chinedu Udeogu and Traveon Beck. Udeogu's a natural pass rusher, can really turn the corner and has a nice build. Got crushed on two run plays though. Beck's going to be good. He's playing faster than the other frosh DBs and is feisty and competitive.
Allensworth has fantastic technique. Gave up two receptions yet both were well covered and it took a perfect throw. Never out of position and a solid tackler.
Pretty disappointing performance overall by the defense. Tackling was not great. Not 2013 bad but not good. In general, we're behind at the same point where we were last year as you really notice Drew, Nickerson and Kragen not being out there. Mekari, Wilson, Saffle and Looney played but one series, a series in which they had but two decent plays before giving up an easy TD. Looney did though got a near sack on Webb with a wonderful move on Ooms/Borrayo. Front 6/7 that first series were only contacting Running Backs 3-4 yards beyond the LOS. We look small up front relative to the OL. Downs moves really well and is wide and strong yet he waits for plays to come to him. Biggest thing was that for the first 4 drives, the defense was emotionally flat and leaderless. Looney finally got fired up and started dropping F bombs and exorted the defense to start playing with some grit. They played better after that. Assist in leadership to Davison who pulled everyone together for Looney's Knute Rockne speech. We keep hearing how we're playing physically on defense yet it was not in evidence today save a small handful of plays.
Offense looks different from last three years. Scheme is clearly different - more two back and power running formations. More vertical throws and a different approach to screens. Our WRs seem younger, not the big catch radius guys like Lawler, Harris and Anderson. More explosion and shiftiness. Work to be done on routes, blocking, sitting down in zones, etc. More drops than we saw in camp last year.
We had a nice variety of blitzes, a couple were effective against QBs not named Webb. One resulted in a Khalfani TD which was a nice play by Khalfani as he recognized the blitz and went against the blocking to bust it. I suspect we'll be more taking more risks with blitzes. Plays to our strengths with Walker, Brown and Downs who in particular are all good blitzers. We played a lot of 3-2-6 and 3-3-5.
Some other personnel observations:
Weaver has good size, motor and speed. Yet, he is easily stood up on running plays and doesn't have a lot of pass rush moves at this point. Would like to see them stand him up as he's quick laterally and has some burst after the first step.
Tongilava had a rough day today in terms of being physical at the point of attack. He can really run and looks far more comfortable on pass coverage or running to the sideline than playing in the box. To be honest, so does Downs (other than blitzing).
Interesting that Rubenzer is best case 3rd string at safety. Hawkins looks close to coming back so who knows where he fits in with Anderson and Vanderbilt.
Ooms started but Granado got run with the 1's. Wallace started but Stuckey got run with the 1's.
Drew Kobayashi is a big WR and he can move. Had a nice TD and a bad drop, though DRob also had a bad drop.
Heard a bit of Dykes talk to the team after scrimmage. He's rarely overly negative and wasn't today yet he was clearly not pleased as he talked about inconsistent play. The team was pretty clean with only a couple of obvious mental mistakes/penalties, which was good to see. I wish I saw more obvious development with our DL and LBs. Wilson didn't flash and neither did Mekari or Saffle though to be fair they only got one series. Our returning LBs seem bereft of obvious playmakers (hopefully Downs gets better against the run). Our secondary clearly has better depth, athleticism and better technique than we did two years ago.
My guess on our defense is that we start the year behind where we were last year with a real chance to be better in the latter half of the year. Can we stop the run? Can we rush the passer without blitzing? I think we'll clean up the tackling, force TOs and our coverage will be better for sure. Folks like Saffle, Downs, Jordan K, Bequette and Z Johnson could be difference makers if they can turn experience into development during the season. Wish they were all a year older.
I think Dykes' optimism on defense is based on projecting out into the season and perhaps is a bit of convincing his own team. I don't see a lot of swagger and confidence on that side of the field. Clearly Allensworth and Looney have it, but beyond them?
Webb is the real deal. Like really good. And our OL looks really good (though the competition may not be great). I suspect our first three games will be more interesting than I thought a week ago, not sure I would bet the house on Cal vs. SDSU or Texas or even Hawaii with the big line.
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