2009 Spring Game (April 25th) - Page 20 - ScarletBuckeye

louts8wings · 04-27-2009, 10:06 AM

glad to see all the fans make it out for the game!!

Buck68 · 04-27-2009, 10:58 AM

[my notes] From the O-Zone forum this morning. A universally common process, most unusually used! Of hundreds of posts & articles i've read on spring football, this is the best of 3 that have applied this universal process...so far.

Here are mine...
By Zanzibar on 10:33:46 04/27/09
[In reply to "anyone who has any takes on the SG, I'd be thrilled to read them. *" by '96Buck, posted at 10:01:26 04/27/09]

This was posted to this sometime around halftime. It is kind of brief, but it's hard to be verbose on an iPhone:

* It is really windy. Passing game definitely impacted.
* Pryor looks better than I expected.
* Not much running game to speak of, but on pass protection the lines are holding up better than I'd have expected.
* Many open WRs, though not always getting the ball to them. I wonder about the DBs.
* Looks to me like the officials were told to swallow their whistles. No penalties, and I thought a couple of Gray 1st quarter passes had blatant pass intererence.

They ran more in the second half, so the third bullet point applied to the first half only.

This is what I posted to off-topic late last night, after watching the game a second time as I recorded and edited it down to DVD:

It's kind of hard to draw conclusions. First, it was awfully windy. Second, various units where playing together is important (like the OL) are fractured and split across two teams, which makes it hard to see how they'll work. Third, it's hard to get an absolute read on what is going on because it's OSU players on both ends (if a DE keeps blowing by an OT, does it mean that the OT is bad or that the DE is good?). Finally, they were playing under weird rules (one player said they were only allowed to run on certain downs in the first quarter) and there were probably tons of other restrictions (maybe the defenses that could be played) that haven't been mentioned in public.
That said...

1. Pryor looked sharp. He completed almost all of his passes, which was nearly miraculous given the wind. The second TD drive was kind of a fluke, and wouldn't have happened in a real game (you'd have seen a prevent defense), though.

2. The offensive lines looked surprisingly good. Usually the game is dominated by the defense, but the OL protected fairly well and opened good running lanes. They were far more effective than I'd have expected, going into the game. (Does this mean the OL is going to be much better than expected, or that the DL is not going to live up to preseason expectations? I hope it is the former.)

3. There were LOTS of open receivers. I don't know what sorts of limitations were placed on the defense, and I'm sure there are some great playmakers at WR... but I fear for the DBs. Also, I thought there were two fairly blatant interference calls that were overlooked early on (I wonder if the coaching staff asked the officials to mostly keep their flags in their pockets).

louts8wings · 04-27-2009, 11:07 AM

pryor did throw the ball really well with the wind. the other thing i was really impressed with was his foot work.

Buck68 · 04-27-2009, 06:10 PM

speaking of footwork:

News Talk 610 WTVN | Best Buckeye Coverage | Columbus, Ohio

anyone catch the short DAFT SPIN Day 1 commentator soundbites on footwork & read comparison between college 'spread QB's' and 'traditional QB's?

anyone remember the raging internal coaching debate over the 7 step drop on 3rd & long?