re: Bama Football Tidings

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Either Will Anderson is the best pass rusher I have ever seen

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Hello everyone. Every year I try to give some general thoughts about what I saw at the scrimmage while not providing any details that would be considered "too much". I'm not a coach and these are not predictions for the season. Just general things I saw today. And, the BOL staff has mentioned many of these things in their review already. I'm certainly not trying to step on their toes as they do a great job. As usual, the BOL staff will delete if I cross that line, but I probably don't have enough in-depth football knowledge to cross it if I wanted to.

Weather: mix of sun and overcast skies. Warm and very humid. Rained before the scrimmage started so the field was wet. Rained again near the very end of the scrimmage and this may have led to it being cut a little short (not much if any, but there were no sprints at the end like normal indicating something ended earlier than normal).

Young started with the first offense vs the second defense for the first 2 possessions. Led a nice TD drive on the first possession capped off by maybe his best throw of the day: short TD while rolling to his right and throwing back across his body after being flushed from the pocket. It was a nice play by BY and reminded me of the pass he threw last year against Missouri (I think) for a TD. Interesting note was JM started at RB. BY's second series was with the first offense again against the second defense. This ended in an 80-yeard TD pass to Metchie. It was an ugly looking pass, but was on the money. So, things looked pretty sharp to start for first offense against the second defense.

Third and fourth possessions for BY were with the first offense vs the second defense as well, but these didn't go so smoothly. Result both times were punts. In both cases, BY made open receivers try to make difficult catches. The ball was a little behind this receiver, or high to that receiver. Rarely on these drives were receivers hit in stride, if at all. In one case, a quick wr screen required the wr to climb the ladder to catch the ball and by then there was no place to run. RBs rotated for the 1st offense as did the receivers. And, there was lots of work on the ground game. This wasn't an all-out passing game drill like we have seen in some past scrimmages.

Tyson started with the second offense against the first defense. First possession was a punt, But, his second possession was with the first offense against the second defense. He led a good drive that ended with a 40-50 yard TD pass to Williams (I think). Paul made a few really nice throws and showed a really strong arm in one case where he hit a receiver along the sidelines for a ~ 15 yard first down while backpedaling to avoid the rush. Other Tyson-led possessions with the second offense vs. the first defense resulted in punts. There were a few touch sacks here and there, but in general, the D-line did not live in the backfield all day against either QB. But, it should be noted that the defenses seemed to be really testing the offenses regarding blitz pick up. There were lots of blitzes from lots of angles. Roydell and HT met in the hole on one blitz and Roydell kept him off the QB long enough to get the ball out. So, it was nice to see the young rb developing in pass protection.

Eventually, we got to see first offense vs. first defense. BY was the qb (obviously). There were some short completions, a missed open receiver or 2, a pre-snap penalty, a 30ish yd completion all mixed together. The possession ended without a score, but it was scripted as they looked to be working on some things and wanted to change personnel groups. It was interesting to see Storey in at safety for the first defense in this situation.

Tyson led 2s vs 2s in this segment of the scrimmage, but nothing notable came from it.

In redzone 1s vs 1s, BY led a TD on the first possession. The big play was a pass to JM who had a head of steam up from the 20 when he met Branch at about the 5 in the biggest hit of the day. JM's helmet flew off, but Branch got the worst of it. He got up, but went back down woozy. Looked to be a bell ringing and not an arm or shoulder injury to me. But, that is purely based upon his body posture after getting up initially. I didn't see Tyson lead a redzone possession.

More work was done on goal line and coming off the goal line. The personnel groupings seemed to become more mixed as the scrimmage wore on.

In 2-minute, BY led the first offense to a FG vs the first defense. Again, the drive was a mixed bag. Sanders had a good run of ~ 15 yards (he had a good day -- it was good to see him look pretty healthy). There were some completions, but some were more difficult than they should have been. There was a missed slant open over the middle. in one case, the receiver went in and BY threw it out. I have no idea whose fault that was. The first defense got some pressure, but it was manageable for the most part. On the second possession in this segment, BY threw his lone pick on a deep sideline pattern. I thought it was Jobe with the pick. But, I think the BOL staff had it for someone else. I will defer to them on that.

For Tyson in 2-minute, it was 2s vs 2s. He floated a pass to the flat that was almost picked. Roydell had a good run, and then Turner got an int that he returned to the 4 where Tyson shoved him out.

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