re: How good will Auburn be next year?

Defensively replacing Matthews and Roberts will be a bigger deal IMO than Holland. Nobody knew Holland existed last year and he played well because he played with Davidson, Russell and Brown...Coe has come along and TD played well in spots. So did Cat in some small spots.

LB's are back minus T. Williams but he was hurt most of the season. IMO our run stopping was 10 times better with him playing vs McBride or Atkinson, but both played well and if they improve we shouldn't see much drop with D. Williams and DD returning.

That leaves the secondary. Losing Carlton will be huge, but we have Dean, Davis and Dinson who have all played well when healthy. It's just hard to replace a 1st day NFL corner. The safeties both played well and Matthews like T. Williams was huge in our run stopping. Peters has looked good all season and improved. We need some guys to step up at safety though.

On O if JS returns we will be fine. IMO the OL can't get worse. I know how important KJ has been but Gus has probably earned the benefit of the doubt on plug and play RB's. The WR's improved all year and we get them back.

Kicking will take a hit though. In close games on the road I suspect this will be a bigger issue than we realize. However, honestly DC had a tough year by his standards. He cost us in the SEC title game and in the Peach Bowl. He also missed other kicks this year you wouldn't have expected him to miss. His touchbacks were off IMO as well.