I had bitched all off season....well....several off seasons that Georgia has far too many non-scholarship players and too many slow guys on our kick coverage unit.
That's one of the primary reasons that directional kicking as executed by this program doesn't work. The physics of something slow catching something fast seem pretty obviously flawed to me. That and the geometry of kicking directionally makes little sense. But I digress.
I did like seeing more high end speed on the kickoff coverage unit last week. Richt promised to put more high-end personnel on that unit, and he delivered. I saw quite a few front line players out there, and I only saw two wedge buster walk-on types on the unit. Did that help them make the key tackle on the 78 yard return. No. And that's not a trivial thing. But the coverage was pretty good on the other two kicks.
It was nice to see players who have legit wheels on that unit.
Although, I still don't get why we have a 280 lb defensive end out there covering kicks. Why would we tire out a guy that size running down the field for 60 yards when we have so many faster linebackers, safeties, corners, tight ends and running backs on scholarship?
It's not 1989 any more. Is anyone other than Fabris still putting 280 pounders who run 4.8+ on kick coverage? Well, anyone with a good coverage unit?
People sometimes ask me, "Why doesn't Fabris or Richt go talk to Kevin Butler about kickoffs. There is only one kicker in the College Football Hall of Fame, and he's our guy. Why don't we ask him?" My retort....what's busted is so obvious, they could probably just ask Barbara Dooley and get the same answers.
I love me some Mark Richt. But on this one issue. Geez. I just scratch my head.
PWD
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10 comments:
You're dead on, PWD. What in the world is Dobbs doing on that team.
Nick Williams
Cummings
Pugh (who wasn't available Saturday)
Shawn Williams
Rambo
Gilliard
Hebron
Dent
Christian Robinson
Vance Cuff
There...I just stuffed you for a 17 yard return. It's really not rocket science. There's others like Dontavious and Branden Smith we could put on there, too.
To be fair, or at least consistent throughout the years, I remember thinking often, "What in the world is David Pollack doing on our kickoff team?" But there he was, 3-time All-American in all his glory.
I just can't figure it out from Richt's perspective. It is borderline maniacal what we are doing on that unit.
I also wonder why we always go to the same side of the field.
It allows other teams to more easily set up their return blocking schemes.
If you take the kickoff distance average (per cfbstats.com), and combine that with the kickoff return allowed average, you get a rough estimation of where the opponent starts after each kickoff.
Georgia's 2008 opponents started, on average, at the 32.04 yard line. That ranked 95th out of 120 teams. For comparison's sake, Army ranked 96th, getting .09 yards less on kickoffs and giving up .08 yards more on returns, for an average starting position of the 32.21 yard line. So, Georgia's and Army's kickoff coverage units are nearly identical. Ponder on that for a moment.
Another thing I found... the rankings of average opponent starting position -- which is really the metric that matters here -- correlates more closely to rankings of length of kickoff rather than length of kickoff return. So booming a kickoff deep will generally mean better starting field position for your defense rather than kicking it high to shorten kickoff returns.
So, now there is empirical evidence that confirms everyone's suspicion that directional kickoffs are going against the averages.
(For the record, USC has the best net kickoff ranking at 21.96. This should surprise absolutely no one. They averaged 67.91 on kickoffs and allowed 19.87 on returns.)
2 wedge busters (Gloer, Hosch, etc), then pick 8 from--Samuel, Jackson, Charles, Rambo, Dowtin, Pugh, Banks, Cummings, S Williams, N Williams, White, Cuff, Robinson, Hebron, Dent, Dewberry, Gamble, Gilliard, Smith, Love, etc. How is that so difficult?
Can someone explain why CMR signs a kicker whose purpose is to put kickoffs in the back of the end-zone but he chooses not to use him? Instead we are back to directional kicks...Is this not insanity?
Richt made a comment about the big 70+ yard return being on one of our deep kicks (if you can call any of our kicks deep). I haven't watched a replay, but I remember that being one of the directional kicks that came down at about the 5-yard-line. Anybody else seen it that can confirm?
If I'm not mistaken, UGA still has at least one walk-on (or maybe a former walk-on) on kick coverage, which is one too many IMO.
By the way, the long kickoff return against OSU was a kick that was caught at the goal line. Richt has made a point to use this as an example of why we don't kick it deep. It is times like these that I literally want to shake him silly. I haven't heard one person say that we want every kick on the goal line. Hell if that is as far as any UGA kicker can kick the ball, you mind as well squib it every time for all I care. What we need is somebody to kick it into the first row behind the end zone. Like the OSU kicker did every time last weekend.
I throw up in my mouth (just a little bit) every time we kickoff to the other team.
But that's my issue...
Go Dawgs!
It was a directional kick to the 3 that got returned. The one after the FG went right down the middle to the 3 or 4 and got returned, by their number 2 guy, to the 23. The other KO got kicked to the 9 against the sideline and returned to the 22 or 23, then there was a penalty.
I understand the logic of the directional kick but I agree with the madding crowd about the results.
By the way, ESPN360 not only shows the games for free, but you can replay them and watch this stuff. Take a look at the block in the back calls on our long punt returns...you'll see their ends were flopping for calls.
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