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Spring practice shows what most obvious strengths are for Georgia football
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Spring practice shows what most obvious strengths are for Georgia football
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"Defensively, Georgia may lean on the blitziting abilities of Mondon and Dumas-Johnson to make up for the youth at outside linebacker."
"Blitziting" will be very impressive and fun to watch with the strength, speed, technique, and experience of these two future All American Line Backers.
GO DAWGS!
I for one am over the Joe Moore award. Georgia had CFB's best O-line for the last two years. The results prove it.
I suspect that going against Mondon and Dumas-Johnson everyday in practice will prepare our lesser experienced linemen in a way that when we confront our schedule, games will continue to be a pleasant reprieve from the practice field.
@SmartsTheMan
No, the results didn't prove anything. Did UGA have the best CBs, WRs and RBs in 2021 and 2022 also? No, UGA had such overwhelming talent at some positions - i.e. DL, LB, TE - that it allowed them to be merely above average in others. 15 guys drafted last year, 12 guys likely this year (plus some contributors who transferred but will get draftted off other teams), likely 13-14 guys drafted next year ... that overall talent level explains the 2 (potentially 3) titles.
Now note: I am not saying that UGA did not have the most talented OL in 2021 and 2022. Instead, awards don't go to the most talented athletes or group of them. Instead, the pool of people who get awards is limited to those who perform the best according to objective criteria. This is why Gino Toretta won a Heisman while Tommie Frazier and other great veer and wishbone QBs never won the Heisman or the O'Brien, Maxwell or Manning awards for top QB: pedestrian passing stats. When you evaluate "the best OL" it means the OL that does the best performance run-blocking and pass blocking.
With UGA the run-blocking thing is obvious: the lead tailbacks get about 50 ypc at 5.5 ypc. For a ranked college team that is pedestrian. UGA's running game doesn't produce long runs, isn't reguarly called on in situations where many teams would pass, and isn't regularly asked to move the pile to convert on short yardage plays. Meaning that the OL's measurable run blocking performance is actually going to be below average, even for a spread-style team.
Pass blocking? Yes, UGA had among the fewest sacks in 2022. But in a scheme where UGA rolled the QB out a lot and the QB also got the ball out quickly on short and intermediate passes before the defense had the opportunity to mount a pass rush. An OL's pass protection ability is measured based on how well it establishes and holds a pocket for a dropback passer, which is something that UGA's OL wasn't called on to do very often.
UGA ran a scheme that was great for winning national titles but was terrible for individual stats, awards and draft status (except for the QB). Even Brock Bowers numbers would have been much better in a traditional offense. By comparison Michigan's Blake Corum would have been the Heisman winner and first round draft pick had he not gotten injured. His backup had 990 yards at 7 ypc. And their #1 WR Ronnie Bell had more yards than any UGA WR has had in the Monken era (remember Bowers is a TE, not a WR).