* The Fisher and Quessenberry trains keptrolling Tuesday for the North team, though they both hit a littlebump in the tracks. Eric Fisher looked amazing picking Alex Okaforapart early in 1-on-1s. Perfect handwork and footwork, mirrored himperfectly to squash Okafor’s preferred speed rush. The second rep,Okafor tried to run past him, couldn’t. Tried to put a power moveon him, couldn’t. Then Fisher blew him backwards ten yards. Themost impressive work I have ever seen at these Senior Bowl workouts.A hiccup at the end, though, as Datone Jones pulled off the majorupset and became the first man to beat Fisher this week. Fisher got alittle bit overextended anticipating a speed move, and Jones tookadvantage of that to whip by him inside with a swim move. I’malready looking forward to seeing Fisher look for revenge Wednesdayagainst the speed rushers.* David Quessenberry, to my surprise,because he has looked very good here at right tackle, is actually aguard. At either position, he mostly toyed with people, especiallythe well-overmatched Margus Hunt (SMU) and Jordan Hill. Quessenberrypancaked Hunt the first time they squared off and stonewalled him therest of the way. He put Hill on the ground one time, and anothertime, Hill put himself on the ground just trying to generate any pushon the Great Wall of Quessenberry. He’s just too strong and quickoff the ball for these guys. (NFL Network sure talks Hill and Huntup, too, even though neither one of them has beaten anybody in twodays.) In 11-on-11, though, finally, a crack in the Wall, as Okaforbeat Quessenberry at RT to knock down a screen pass. At 295 pounds,I figure teams are going to want another 20-25 pounds on Quessenberryand move him inside. But I’d like to be his agent if he comes tothe Combine bigger and maintains his quickness.
* Syracuse o-lineman Justin Pugh has beenrunning with the front of the o-line pack all week, too; my apologiesfor letting him slip by me Monday. Pugh pretty much owned MichaelBuchanan, who struggled all day and didn’t really show any moves.Pugh consistently locked him up and kept him safely outside.Similarly strong outing for Joe Madsen (West Virginia). This wholeNorth o-line is going to be a bear for the South. Even the earlystrugglers are getting better. After getting whipped off the line byJones on one rep before he could even break his stance, Hugh Thornton(Illinois) got off the ball much better the rest of the way, whichallowed him to wait on his opponent to make a move and then lock himdown.
* Other than Kawann Short (Purdue), itwas a bad day in the middle of the d-line. Besides Hunt’s andHill’s flailings, Sylvester Williams failed to get any headwayagainst Thornton or Braxston Cave, who have not been standoutsthemselves so far, and got pancaked, with syrup, by Brian Winters(Kent State). Short, though, showed quickness to whip Cave right offthe snap, and solid handwork to defeat Winters another rep. AvoidWinters’ exceptionally heavy punch and you’re good. And Short wasone of the defensive stars 11-on-11, beating Thornton with a swimmove to get a pass pressure and whipping past him later to blow up ascreen pass. No screen passes off Kyle Long’s head today because hewas down with the flu, which easily could be throwing off hisperformance this week.
* Robbie Rouse (Fresno State) wasterrible in blitz pickup, and there’s little secret why: dude is5-foot-6. He got whipped badly twice, and then when he finally got inthe right position the 3rd time, Khaseem Greene just ranover him. I don’t see how any team in the league can afford tohave Rouse on the field. And how did a 5’6” dude get this high upthe chain anyway? Shouldn’t he have been in the NFLPA game? Wedon’t see special teams drills on NFL-N, so I hope Rouse is a heckof a good kick returner. That is his only chance to play in the NFL.
* If you’re going to have a rookieprotecting your QB’s back this season, you’ll be better off withJohnathan Franklin (UCLA), TE Jack Doyle (Western Kentucky), orespecially, Harvard fullback Kyle Juszczyk. Kenjon Barner was alsoeffective enough in blitz pickup to make you feel really good abouthim as a third-down back. Franklin showed the strength to absorb aninitial blow and lock on to his man, and good footwork to mirror hismovements. Juszczyk showed he can hit like a truck, stoning Greenewith one of the hits of the day. (Teams practiced in full padsTuesday.) He got jumpy and whiffed on a blitz later trying toduplicate that hit, though. Don’t lose your technique going for thekill shot.
* Kevin Reddick flashed as a goodblitzer, which is little surprise since he’s been good ateverything in Mobile. My pickfor least impressive blitzer was Steve Beauharnais (Rutgers), whokept trying to put spin moves on people. By the time you get donewith a spin move on a blitz, they’re going to be lining up for thenext snap. Reddick “popped” for the second straight day in11-on-11. He has excellent speed and shows up in the right place allthe time, blowing up a pitch to Rouse and getting Barner for a loss.
* One-on-one receiver drills werefrustrating today. We got to see very little of yesterday’s star,Aaron Dobson, but a lot of the meh Michigan QB Dennard Robinson,who’s trying to convert to WR. Marquise Goodwin had to fightthrough some jams today, and did once against Jordan Poyer for anexcellent back-shoulder catch, but couldn’t solve Jamar Taylor, whoshowed a strong jam and also good positioning to cut off slants.Chris Harper (Kansas State) made some good catches in tight coverage,which he’s going to have to be able to do in the NFL, because Ididn’t see any separation ability. Robinson’s going to be a majorproject at WR. Needs work on everything. Aaron Mellette ran betterroutes Tuesday and sold them better than he did Monday, so don’tcount him out just yet.
* The Oakland staff continues to make noeffort to coach DBs to cover without committing blatant penalties,and the guy NFL-N’s making out to be the star there, DesmondTrufant, is so full of himself he’s about to explode, and yaps waytoo much for a guy who has to commit a penalty almost every rep. Shutup and cover. Trufant shows nice break to the ball in zone coverageand good feet and speed to stay with receivers, but by the end ofthings his priorities were hacking, grabbing and talking smack.Jordan Poyer’s another DB who gets gushing praise from NFL-Ndespite committing a penalty practically every rep. Poyer ended theday on a strong note, reading a comeback route to Goodwin perfectly,jumping the route and undercutting it. Did everything right exceptmake the pick. He had another near-pick in 11-on-11, so he’sdefinitely a ball hawk. T.J. McDonald (USC) starred in 11-on-11. Hewon a train-wreck collision with Winters on a run play, which issaying something, because Winters is not only a tough SOB, he waspulling on the play and had a head of steam. McDonald also blanketedTE Ryan Otten (San Jose State) on an attempted bootleg pass.
* The UConn backs continued to struggle,along with Will Davis (Utah State), who got beat by every moveanybody tried. Dwayne Gratz jams and gets physical effectively but islost in space. He looked better in 11-on-11, where he made a goodplay to shut down an end run and would have had an opportunity tolight up Alec Lemon (Syracuse) on an ill-advised throw from RyanNassib. Robinson and Mellette are at the bottom of the North’sreceiver pack, but had little trouble beating Blidi Wreh-Wilson.
* Nassib looked nice throwing on the runin 11-on-11, but I’m still far from convinced in his ability tothrow the deep ball. The other QBs were inconsistent at best. MikeGlennon rifled a beauty to Harper down the seam, but had a weak,wobbly bomb for Dobson broken up with ease later. Zac Dysert (Miami,Ohio) threw some bullets and threw some floaters.
The North team’s going to be able toprotect their QB like Fort Knox, but who knows if they’re going totake advantage of that to throw very well? Wouldn’t surprise me atall if Barner shines Saturday as an all-purpose weapon.
Lastly, to the good folks at seniorbowl.com: could you PLEASE update your online rosters? They do not include late-arriving players, and I much prefer to refer to players by name and not number. If I have to, I will tomorrow, because a couple of them have looked good.
-$-
Hiç yorum yok:
Yorum Gönder