Ok Gents and Lady Gopher. What do you think of our wide receiver situation?

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I'd be interested in seeing more Brooks and Smith together with Brooks in the backfield and Smith moved to the slot (motion to the slot).
 

Unregistered User said:
They're both RS Sophomores that have dealt with lingering injuries. I'm not ready to discard them too quickly. I hope they both have a healthy offseason and are 100% going into the opener next year.
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I was speaking more to them leaving by their choice. I'm not discarding them, but MHjr5's only injury I am aware of is his ability to consistently catch the ball. He practiced full all year, was passed by a walk-on on the travel team early and then when he earned that spot back he never stepped foot on the field. My assumption isn't that he can't play it is that he wants to play and if not here, elsewhere.

As for IG2, it is documented that he was close to transferring out after last year and was convinced to give it one more year. I know he was injured most of this year (again) but my assumption is based on nothing this year could have possibly reinforced his decision to stay.

I'm not discarding them. I'm expecting what many kids with talent do if they have been in a system for 3 years with no PT. I hope they stay as they both play on arguably the weakest position on our team and we need all the help we can get. I'd be shocked if they both do tho.


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I like Johnson. I expected a lot more based on the first few games, but then he kinda vanished.

As much as I like Mitch he does at times make it hard to evaluate WRs... On target balls it often seems like the WR doesn't expect the ball where it is. Hard to know who that is on.
 

MNVCGUY said:
Similar to QB it is tough to put a lot of faith in this staff's ability to recruit/develop quality WR's. We have recruited plenty of guys who look the part but have not produced. Would be great to see what a healthy Gentry could do and Johnson looked solid as well at times in brief flashes this year. But overall there is not a lot there in the returning WR corps to get really excited about heading into next year, at least in the guys we have seen on the field to this point.

A healthy Lingen will be huge for next year because a good TE is a big safety blanket for a young QB. Woz proved this year that he just isn't all that reliable as a receiver. Lingen had the look of a very solid pass catching option last year so hopefully he can come back healthy next season.

The biggest problem is that our offense just isn't going to be all that attractive to a lot of receivers. We are clearly a run first team and we don't throw enough for most of those guys to really take notice.

One of those tough situations, I am sure the coaches would like to throw more but they don't have the WR/QB to get it done and they have a hard time attracting the higher end WR/QB because they see a team that can't/won't throw.
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Passing offense ranks:

MN - 108
WI - 106
IA - 114
NEB - 90
MI - 82

They all seem to be able to recruit good WRs. Gophs only need the passing threat to be credible, which is absolutely achievable. I think the Gophs have good enough receivers for that, they just are not performing to potential and the play calling has not helped put them in successful situations. Easy to say, I know, but I see plenty of run-first teams who have good receivers. Gophs are really no different.
 

A_Slab_of_Bacon said:
I like Johnson. I expected a lot more based on the first few games, but then he kinda vanished.

As much as I like Mitch he does at times make it hard to evaluate WRs... On target balls it often seems like the WR doesn't expect the ball where it is. Hard to know who that is on.
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Agree on Johnson, tough to know if that was him fading some as the season went on or Mitch not getting him the ball. Don't watch close enough to say if he was open when he was out there or even the amount of time he was on the field as the season progressed. Mitch had a definite tendency to lock in on Wolitarsky a lot of the time as it was clear those two had a strong connection (or at least as strong as anything in our passing game can be).

An X factor in all this might be Williams if he ends up switching from QB to WR. But again, I have a hard time putting much faith in this staffs ability to find/develop WR talent because the position has been a weakness for a while now. I guess next year we will get to answer the question of how much of the problem was the QB and how much was the WR. Personal opinion is that both position groups left a ton to be desired.
 


MNVCGUY said:
Agree on Johnson, tough to know if that was him fading some as the season went on or Mitch not getting him the ball. Don't watch close enough to say if he was open when he was out there or even the amount of time he was on the field as the season progressed. Mitch had a definite tendency to lock in on Wolitarsky a lot of the time as it was clear those two had a strong connection (or at least as strong as anything in our passing game can be).

An X factor in all this might be Williams if he ends up switching from QB to WR. But again, I have a hard time putting much faith in this staffs ability to find/develop WR talent because the position has been a weakness for a while now. I guess next year we will get to answer the question of how much of the problem was the QB and how much was the WR. Personal opinion is that both position groups left a ton to be desired.
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It might take a bit more than 1 year to be sure who the WR situation is on. New guy, not sure we can expect him to be all that great either.
 

Not what I saw...

tikited said:
I agree, but remember that we couldn't run against Iowa and Nebraska at all and struggled against Wisc.
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Penn St Rodney 4.5 per carry Brooks 7.1
Iowa Rodney 4.0 Brooks 5.5
Neb Rodney 3.5
Wisc Rodney 3.5 Brooks 4.1

And we eat clock with a lead and it is far more likely we can convert a 3rd and 5 if necessary with a pass if we run the route beyond the sticks or pass to Rodney (neither of which we did very often) than it is throwing deep or over the middle and hoping for a miracle. Not to mention we had a fullback in a quarterback to bull his way on third and one.
3 times any of those averages is a first down. Rodney and Shannon both are like watching Adrian in years past as well...nothing, nothing, boom they rip off the big gainer. Rodney got almost all his yards all year eluding tackles in the backfield, so those opponents were nothing different. Our sequence was horrible.
Take Wisconsin, Mitch kept it on the read option in the first half for like 75 yards or something close...it was absolutely there in the second half when he carried out his fakes. Never kept the read option in the second half and his numbers went in like half with sacks, crappy scrambles etc.
We just played dumb. Certainly absolutely not to our strengths.
 

Still gets himself in position to make plays and never does. How many jump balls did he drop that he got his hands on this year?

Johnson might be their leading receiver next season.
 

Jaykay said:
Still gets himself in position to make plays and never does. How many jump balls did he drop that he got his hands on this year?

Johnson might be their leading receiver next season.
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Maybe Still could be a part of a new Men's volleyball team?
 





I see Still being a solid #1 option next year. I don't get the pessimism on him especially if you were high on him as a freshman but not anymore. He has a higher ceiling than Johnson as well IMO. It would have been really nice to have Brian Smith for next year. He was playing really well and showed a lot of talent and skill. I thought GHers really underplayed the significance of his dismissal from the team.
 

Brian Smith

die hard gopher said:
I see Still being a solid #1 option next year. I don't get the pessimism on him especially if you were high on him as a freshman but not anymore. He has a higher ceiling than Johnson as well IMO. It would have been really nice to have Brian Smith for next year. He was playing really well and showed a lot of talent and skill. I thought GHers really underplayed the significance of his dismissal from the team.
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I was miffed by the Brian Smith decision. Was he still a walkon? Why wouldn't you just suspend him, versus kick him off? I know they said he was a knucklehead but there are a lot of 18, 19 year old knuckleheads who become pretty accomplished adults. It was a discipline thing, right?
 



60's Guy said:
I was miffed by the Brian Smith decision. Was he still a walkon? Why wouldn't you just suspend him, versus kick him off? I know they said he was a knucklehead but there are a lot of 18, 19 year old knuckleheads who become pretty accomplished adults. It was a discipline thing, right?
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Some sources in the trib article noted "last straw" so I don't think this is a one or two off acted knucklehead kind of thing.... maybe a lot more.
 

Smith was the most natural, fluid guy out there. Chew on that for awhile. You never know who will emerge. We have some young guys, some walk-ons. Gentry and Holland may return from Siberia some day. Good QB work will make these guys look good. That is a low bar.
 

60's Guy said:
Penn St Rodney 4.5 per carry Brooks 7.1
Iowa Rodney 4.0 Brooks 5.5
Neb Rodney 3.5
Wisc Rodney 3.5 Brooks 4.1

And we eat clock with a lead and it is far more likely we can convert a 3rd and 5 if necessary with a pass if we run the route beyond the sticks or pass to Rodney (neither of which we did very often) than it is throwing deep or over the middle and hoping for a miracle. Not to mention we had a fullback in a quarterback to bull his way on third and one.
3 times any of those averages is a first down. Rodney and Shannon both are like watching Adrian in years past as well...nothing, nothing, boom they rip off the big gainer. Rodney got almost all his yards all year eluding tackles in the backfield, so those opponents were nothing different. Our sequence was horrible.
Take Wisconsin, Mitch kept it on the read option in the first half for like 75 yards or something close...it was absolutely there in the second half when he carried out his fakes. Never kept the read option in the second half and his numbers went in like half with sacks, crappy scrambles etc.
We just played dumb. Certainly absolutely not to our strengths.
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Most of the yardage against (correct me if I'm wrong) Iowa, Nebraska, and Wisc. came on big runs and in the first half. Then in the second halves...nothing much. The opponents adjusted and we couldn't run anymore. That's why we were pass happy. Again, not agreeing with the decision by the staff to do this, but that is why they did imo.
 

Pompous Elitist said:
Smith was the most natural, fluid guy out there. Chew on that for awhile. You never know who will emerge. We have some young guys, some walk-ons. Gentry and Holland may return from Siberia some day. Good QB work will make these guys look good. That is a low bar.
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Natural and fluid though kinda seems like "tight spiral" stuff. Some guys look the part... never take off.
 

bemidjigopher said:
No one thought Maye and to a lesser extent Woli were either
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I thought Woli was hands down the best in the last four-five years at getting open. He just had a really hard time catching the ball consistently. I felt that out of everyone he would have been the one to break-out. I wish it happened earlier.

Maye really came on as a Jr., so it wasn't terribly surprising that he had a huge Sr. year.

I don't really see Tyler Johnson doing this, but that is why I wrote I hope someone does.
 


tikited said:
Most of the yardage against (correct me if I'm wrong) Iowa, Nebraska, and Wisc. came on big runs and in the first half. Then in the second halves...nothing much. The opponents adjusted and we couldn't run anymore. That's why we were pass happy. Again, not agreeing with the decision by the staff to do this, but that is why they did imo.
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Lol... you might be right... but for me it's a chicken and egg thing.. they couldn't run because they chose to pass all three downs far too often or certainly on first down...putting us in a hole. All I noticed between the first and second halves is we didn't run. Again Rodney breaks tackles often to get his yards. Brooks only needs the tiniest crease because he hits the hole so hard and fast. How often did we run in the second halves of those games on all three downs and punt? I'll bet it's less than once a game if that. That's what I saw w/o making it a research project. We THOUGHT we had to pass...and it wouldn't be quite so maddening if we were not ahead in all those games....aiding our opponent by stopping the clock and putting our defense back out there time after time within less than minute of game time.
I think we feel similar on the idea the offense was flawed.
 

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