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Ogee Ogilthorpe

Ogee Ogilthorpe

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Some of these may have already been noted somewhere so apologies if that's the case:

>> No Cedric at safety today (at least that I saw). D. Travis played almost the entire game at the back end.

>> Very little of either Ekpe that I noticed, but LOTS of Y. Timms on the D-Line, and in multiple positions. Interesting

>> Other than perhaps the first series, Ben Lauer played the entire game at LT. Curious to see how he grades out.

Seemed to be a lot less platooning on the D-Line in general, but I could be wrong.

Side note: Marcus Jones with at least one or two more instances where he either fielded a punt poorly or didn't field it all, only to watch it roll another 20+ yards. I mentioned this in a thread several days ago; he's cost the Gophers a fair amount of field position this season already by not getting under some of those punts. I hope this changes, or they send Maye back there some more like they did today.

I'm still convinced that 90% of what they are running on Offense with Phil at the helm is what they WANT upcoming opponents to see on film; establishing apparent tendencies, etc. I expect things to look different starting next week, but I could be wrong. It looked different with Mitch in there likely because they went with what they knew Mitch to be most comfortable with. I guess we'll find out soon enough though.
 

Someone said elsewhere that Ced was mostly held out for injury concern reasons.

It was also interesting to see Lauer play most (all?) of the game at LT. Not sure the reason for that.

I also saw zero of Jack Lynn.
 

Over, I hope you are correct. But I'm not sure it's all that relevant because what they did show, a "power" running game, had NO power. Our healthy, larger, faster, stronger more experienced O line couldn't move a third tier D line off the ball. Any team watching film will certainly see that and it may be all they need to see.
 

Cedric got injured on Thursday and was held out. He should be back next week.

I was also intrigued by Timms and how we played everywhere.

I think what we are seeing is Limegrover's determination to establish us as a running team. I think his plan all along has been to use these first 3 games to run, run, and run some more. I'm not predicting that the passing game is going to explode when they open it up a little, definitely some cause for concern, but he's trying to establish a running identity and get the message through to everyone that it will be our bread and butter.
 

ncgo4 said:
Over, I hope you are correct. But I'm not sure it's all that relevant because what they did show, a "power" running game, had NO power. Our healthy, larger, faster, stronger more experienced O line couldn't move a third tier D line off the ball. Any team watching film will certainly see that and it may be all they need to see.
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We wore them down like a Big Ten team should. Cobb averaged 6.3 YPC with 2 TDs. Williams averaged 5.6 YPC with 2 TDs. We clearly broke them down in the 4th quarter.
 




I really like using Theiren Cockran as a stand up spy in our dime package to spy the QB. He got a sack late with this package (+ the one he got early at DE) and Shede got a sack on this package playing DE. Destroyed his guy with a bull rush into the QB. Awesome...
 

John Galt said:
We wore them down like a Big Ten team should. Cobb averaged 6.3 YPC with 2 TDs. Williams averaged 5.6 YPC with 2 TDs. We clearly broke them down in the 4th quarter.
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pharmacygopher said:
But it didn't look pretty :)
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I think we all expect Barber and Maroney. That will likely never happen again in our lifetimes.

I think the type of running game we've shown will work. The O line will only get better as the season progresses. Cobb and Williams have shown the ability to not only get to the hole, but adjust and move in traffic. I knew Cobb was fast-ish, but Williams has really shown some unexpected speed (quickness in not the right word). He doesn't have a second gear, but he does have a 1-1/2 gear.

If we can get Edwards back, we might see some fun stuff...
 



ncgo4 said:
Over, I hope you are correct. But I'm not sure it's all that relevant because what they did show, a "power" running game, had NO power. Our healthy, larger, faster, stronger more experienced O line couldn't move a third tier D line off the ball. Any team watching film will certainly see that and it may be all they need to see.
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I doubt we'll be able to run like that against Iowa's linebackers or against most B1G teams. I'd much rather see us develop a balanced offense with passing at least at a .600 completion rate.
 

John Galt said:
True. We all wished that we were good enough to run teams like this off the field, but we aren't. Yet.
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I agree. It's still a work in progress, but it's improving. It's been an incremental improvement, it seems people aren't happy unless it's exponential.

highwayman said:
I think we all expect Barber and Maroney. That will likely never happen again in our lifetimes.

I think the type of running game we've shown will work. The O line will only get better as the season progresses. Cobb and Williams have shown the ability to not only get to the hole, but adjust and move in traffic. I knew Cobb was fast-ish, but Williams has really shown some unexpected speed (quickness in not the right word). He doesn't have a second gear, but he does have a 1-1/2 gear.

If we can get Edwards back, we might see some fun stuff...
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Agreed. We'll be a different running style than the Maroney/Barber days, but I think we can be dominant with our own style....in time
 

Only saw the first half (family obligations) and that was about the worst half of Gopher football I've seen in awhile. I feel that unless things improve over that performance, we've won our last game of the year. Just terrible play on the offensive line. As mentioned above, they weren't moving a D-line that they should have pancaked consistently. I thought the D looked better, but things seem to be out of sync. Front line plays aggressively (but not always smart) and they still don't have the athletes on the field to cover everything behind a stunting (and charging) line.

My other observation would be why didn't they run this offense last year when they had a QB whose strength was running. For all the barking about Gray's inability to pass, they didn't seem to put in the kind of designed runs for him that they are using this year. Leidner seems to be a more instinctive passer than Nelson. Curious to see how they both develop.
 

50PoundHead said:
My other observation would be why didn't they run this offense last year when they had a QB whose strength was running. For all the barking about Gray's inability to pass, they didn't seem to put in the kind of designed runs for him that they are using this year.
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They ran designed runs for Gray all the time. The offense is essentially the same.

The only difference is that last year we had one reliable WR.
 



Gopherprof said:
They ran designed runs for Gray all the time. The offense is essentially the same.

The only difference is that last year we had one reliable WR.
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Ya, and he crapped in our lunch buckets.
 

John Galt said:
True. We all wished that we were good enough to run teams like this off the field, but we aren't. Yet.
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Well told. Let's not forget that not long ago we were losing to such teams. Now, while not playing errorless ball, we are putting them away. I like the improved discipline we're seeing, e.g. two penalties today for ten yards. 42,000 attended today's game? Really? Sure looked like a sparse crowd on TV.
 


Gopherprof said:
They ran designed runs for Gray all the time. The offense is essentially the same.

The only difference is that last year we had one reliable WR.
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Yeah, we ran run plays for Gray all the time. Not sure what he is talking about.
 

Great Plains Gopher said:
I doubt we'll be able to run like that against Iowa's linebackers or against most B1G teams. I'd much rather see us develop a balanced offense with passing at least at a .600 completion rate.
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What was the completion rate yesterday? Don't have that on the tip of your typing? Combined Nelson and Leidner were 10/12, or 83.3%. Leidner was 7/8 or 87.5% is that good enough?

You are not going to see this team winging it more than 20 times a game, more reasonably 15.
 

Great point. The ratio will increase to more passing in the big ten when it gets tougher to run on the big d lines. The more playing time are Qb's get the better the passing game will get. We will need to throw more as we go into the big ten. We have some nice dept being built at RB with Williams and Cobb , we get Kirkwood back I would think Edwards red shirts unless we get a major injury.
 

I didn't see Donovahn Jones at all, did anyone else? It was mainly Wolitarsky, Engel, Freuchte, Hutton, and Maye.
 


I also noticed that the announcer at the stadium called Ray Dixon's name twice after Cockran made two tackles. Probably needs some new glasses as he got 55 confused with 59.
 

John Galt said:
I also noticed that the announcer at the stadium called Ray Dixon's name twice after Cockran made two tackles. Probably needs some new glasses as he got 55 confused with 59.
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Are you sure? At first I thought the same thing as you, but then did a double take on the jersey number & was pretty sure it was #59. As I was looking up #59 in the program the announcer said it was Ray Dixon on the stop.
 

Costa Rican Gopher said:
Are you sure? At first I thought the same thing as you, but then did a double take on the jersey number & was pretty sure it was #59. As I was looking up #59 in the program the announcer said it was Ray Dixon on the stop.
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I didn't notice Dixon, but if this is the case they're probably getting him ready to be Rallis's replacement, as mono can hold a player out for a while.
 

Costa Rican Gopher said:
Are you sure? At first I thought the same thing as you, but then did a double take on the jersey number & was pretty sure it was #59. As I was looking up #59 in the program the announcer said it was Ray Dixon on the stop.
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On one occasion I'm positive it was Cochran, I didn't hear the other one.
 

jaymil said:
I didn't notice Dixon, but if this is the case they're probably getting him ready to be Rallis's replacement, as mono can hold a player out for a while.
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Rayfield Dixon was on the sidelines in a white jersey.
 

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