What did we learn from the OU game that carries into Georgia? What does Ewers need to do to ensure a smooth ride? Get seven days of IT for $1: https://www.on3.com/teams/texas-longhorns/join/ David McClellan is a fiduciary financial advisor and partner with Forum Financial. He works broadly and deeply with his clients as a financial life coach. He specializes in financial planning and has contributed numerous articles to Kiplinger on the topic of retirement tax bombs. For a free intro consult, contact him at dmcclellan@forumfinancial.com or 312-933-8823. Call Luxe Kitchen and Bath at 833-358-LUXE today or visit luxekitchenbath.com to discover where quality meets luxury and begin the process of transforming your home. Purchase The 2024 Longhorn Football Prospectus: Thinking Texas Football - 12th Annual Edition: https://sites.google.com/view/the-2023-burnt-orange-bible/home Written for the passionate, smart fan who wants more than recycled corporate media content. Find out why it's called The Burnt Orange Bible. Smashwords (compatible with any device, select epub for Apple/Kindle): https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1591653 Apple: https://books.apple.com/us/book/2024-longhorn-football-prospectus-thinking-texas-football/id6554008037 Amazon (Print): https://a.co/d/iVszuhf Be the smartest fan in the room and start Thinking Texas Football today. Listen to the Podcast: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3P0cwAUPNZrsNrTOKOfa6x Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/inside-texas-football/id1721623113 Find Us On Social Media: Twitter: https://twitter.com/InsideTexas Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/InsideTexas/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/insidetexas/ https://www.on3.com/teams/texas-longhorns/
Inside Texas Football
IT Live (10/16): Quinn Ewers Georgia Performance, What We Know About Texas Offense & Defense
Good morning, everybody. It is Texas Humor here with the one on Ian Boyd and Izzy, her sleep schedule got a little off track. And so now she will be our littlest co-host for today's life. First, make sure you guys sign up with the promo $1 for seven days and 50% off your first year. So just go to insidetext.com, join up, you'll get a heck of a deal. And today we're going to talk about what we learned about the Texas defense, what we learned about the Texas offense, this is all verse so you. And then what we think when you as needs to do versus Georgia. And then as always, your questions, you guys can take us off track. You can derail us at any moment. So you guys do your part. And I think a big thing, Ian, is we've kind of heard like Texas is untested. I think defensively, sure offensively we're not. We've been tested by Michigan and Oklahoma. They both have higher end kind of top tennis defenses. But I think we've been half tested, but I still think we can learn a lot from OU. So how are you feeling in that regard, do you want to go with, you want to start with defense? Yeah. And just speaking to that point also, wow, totally lost my train of thought, not to a great start today. Then we have been tested, we haven't been tested on defense, but we have been tested based on offense in the allegations of lack of testing. Yeah. I mean, we'll find out. I tend to think that that's, I feel like people over rate that sometimes. Like there's certain, I think what that often shows up is more in style than like quality of opponent or like technique. Like sometimes you play a top team and they just play you differently than the other teams have played you. Or it's like, hey, what's this that they're not letting us have a free release off the line of scrimmage? No. Like, what's this? They're like not crashing in to stop the run on our play action because they actually trust their big guys to hold up a little bit and like, why is this guy so much harder to move than the Colorado State guy? Or, you know, there's a lot of different things like that that I think show up. But I don't know if it's like the talent and quality because sometimes you play these weaker teams and there's some of their players are pretty good. And sometimes the gap between like a G5 and like a blue blood is not always, it's very accumulative. It's like a little bit everywhere, you know? Yeah. It's not like, it's not like everybody on the field for, you know, Mississippi State takes a smoke Mississippi State. It's not like everybody on the field for Mississippi State like didn't belong there, you know? Right. I mean, their receiving corps is one of the best in the SEC, actually. I've watched some more Georgia, I'm impressed by their offense, Texas Red Zone defense needs to be nailed. Yeah. Their offense is good. And they, and they fully utilize that offense too, right? And they can give it to ETN, a bunch of the huge tight ends and then also they have a solid receiving corps and they're getting some faster guys in there. Georgia's not that good at running the ball. But it's true. And Williams was our best alley safety, so somewhat mitigated in my honest opinion. So this is Bobby responding to how big of an impact will losing Derek Williams have. What do you think on that, Ian? That's such a good question. I wish I had put more eyes on, actually, I put more eyes on, thank you, the Jason Jordan Rebel, and especially Jelani McDonald. I think Jelani McDonald has mostly played as a nickel in the last few games this season. But I want to see if he played any at safety versus Oklahoma and how he looked. Michael Taft and Andrew McCubar playing really good. So I don't, I think it might be a real impact, but it's not there's like a, there's a limit to how bad it can hurt Texas so long as they don't have more injuries because they have two good starters, right? So. Yeah, he's only played 93 snaps this year. Yeah. Hook him from wall, Texas, indeed, a West Texas town. Yes. Okay, let's see here after watching Georgia against Mississippi State, they gave us some deep shots. Yes, they did. And intermediate throws. Do you think Texas can throw against their secondary? So these questions are already getting into Georgia. Let's, what we can do is, let's, we can flip the flow around, right? Because our, our big third topic is, is Quinn. So we can kind of, let's, let's just talk Quinn versus Georgia first and then we can kind of pull what we've gotten from Oklahoma. Okay. So yes, Georgia did give up a lot of deep shots and it gave up 50, 50 balls several times to different guys. And they busted coverages a lot as well. And so this is what I was telling you before the show, Oklahoma also has a weak secondary and Quinn didn't perform against them. So it's not always as simple as like, they have a bad secondary, therefore, we're going to be able to perform. So what do you think? Kind of what are your thoughts on Quinn's performance and what is going to have to do going forward? Well, I thought Oklahoma over played the pass pretty strongly against Texas. They played the three deep safety fly over defense. They were obviously, their priority was we cannot let Texas run behind us on deep post routes. And we cannot let them get Quinn just flicking the ball to deep over routes over the middle behind our linebackers. So what that third safety in the middle of the field lets you do is he takes across a deep crosser and then you can still play a deep safety to either side over a poster out. And like watching like anytime you would get like the in zone view or an all 22 view of Texas versus Oklahoma, you'd see that Oklahoma was matching up all of Texas's deep routes extremely well. And that was part of the issue for Quinn, part of the issue. And then Texas just ran them over because they were in three high and they couldn't stop the run. So good deal. The more I've seen, the more I think that Quinn was you can see he's still there mentally. Like I think mentally he's on a different level this season than he's ever been. That quick flip he had to Gunnar Helm or Gunnar Helm made a guy miss and then jumped over another dude. He had a free pressure and Quinn hit that outlet so fast to beat the pressure and there was a lot of times like on the big misses that we all saw where I was like, what is wrong with Quinn today? He knew exactly where to go with the ball and he was, he just made bad throws. So I think mentally he's totally, he's like still like this guy's improved. He's ready to play at his higher levels, anyone in the country. Physically you could tell that he was back footing the ball, he was bailing out of the pocket anytime he saw pressure even though Texas usually just picked it up and yeah. He ran a couple of times out of the pocket when it was not necessary. Yeah. He self-sacked on the first play of the game. Yeah. He wandered outside like came Williams is picking up a blitzing linebacker and guiding him outside and then Quinn runs outside to where the came Williams was blocking the linebacker and then there's like whoops and then he went back and then got tackled. He needs to be, I mean, it's obviously a comfort to me it seems, yeah, it seems pretty obvious that it's a comfort issue with his injury and like, like I imagine like if you ever had like a back injury or like a, something's like stiff and you go and you place, you play a sport and anytime there's a chance for contact you're like, nope, nope, like if you're feeling good and you need to lift something and you're like, I'm going to get some help to lift this today. I don't want to, that's what it felt like watching Quinn where he's like, I don't want to take a shot to the midsection. I don't want to get hit on his zone, on his zone run wherever he turns his back to avoid getting popped. Yeah. Yeah. So he's clearly, and I was telling Paul yesterday that always got to be somebody like a mowing right outside at this time, but I was talking to Paul yesterday and I was telling him I was watching some Georgia podcasts and they said JT Daniels also had no bleak injury a couple years ago and same thing like he came back but he was still weird on it for several more games. So we got to see, but also modern medicine and football, AKA Toradol, right? I mean, you can block those pain receptors if you got to. Here's the sack that we were talking about, let's see, see, like can't picks it up. It's just 24 makes him nervous and then he self-sacks, so just not trusting the line there very much. There's a bunch of other ones where he got out of the pocket successfully, but he didn't need to and he had lots of room to step up and hit some throws down the field. So there's that too, like every time that you could see Quinn hanging in there, they were usually covering things pretty good, but there was a lot of times where he just didn't even give it a chance because he got out. Yeah. So I'm trying to find out how many games JT Daniels missed before he came back because that seems like we have a really good analog now for what to expect from Quinn. I would have to go look, or holler out of Georgia fan, they can probably tell us. Where's that Skibity McGee guy that was trying to talk trash? Maybe he would know. Oh, yeah. Where's he at when we need him? So yeah, that's the thing with Quinn. You can't have that performance versus Georgia, right? But what's tricky is, this is weird. Georgia's pass rush is not like a Georgia pass rush. Like they have a couple dudes, but it's not like scary. I think Oh, used pass rush is going to be more complex. What do you think? Yeah, more complex also, they have some dudes at edge, although maybe that's not necessarily where you even want to be good against Texas. Georgia has yards, Georgia has a, yeah, right, I'm trying to find it. What's the name of that guy that was getting all the hype preseason that we all thought would be so good? Mike Hill. Yeah. Yeah, he's been, he's been coming off of injury. He plays like, I don't know, like 20 snaps or whatever, it's, you know, Jack's the season. Yeah, he's been barely playing, I think, coming off of injury. So it's actually their Ingram Dawkins, it's their, like actual true defensive end that leads the team with three sacks. But it's not like, it's not crazy. It's not intense. They're like 80th or something in the country in sacks. Like they're not finishing, they know that's actually normal for them. Like they're usually pretty low in sacks, but they usually, their linebackers usually have a bunch and they just don't, there's like so many things about Georgia this year where you're used to seeing A, B and C and they're just not there the same way this season. And one of them is a linebacker. I'm sure they're good players, but like, usually they have like a, maybe not exactly like Anthony Hill, but someone that has a huge impact like he does where there's someone that's like, this is like knifing through on blitzes all the time and inflicting negative plays. I just, you know, don't see that guy. Yeah, they don't have it. And Smile Munden is out. So they smile? Yeah. Well, it's like, it's like, I think it's to me like the end of Ishmael. So it's like Smell, but he's going to be out. They announced good coverage guys. So here's the thing. So their coverage is not rated well, right? Mississippi State. I'm kind of bummed that Mississippi State exposed it because that just gave them like a whole week to be paranoid about it, you know, and stuff like that. It would have been better if they would have been like, we're doing really good here. Yeah. But secondary is a little bit suspect. Run defenses and bad, but it's not great. It's like 20s, 30s, like not like Georgia where they're, they're always top three in the country in a opponent yards per rush. They're not that anymore. So you can run on them and you should definitely be able to pass on them. But we just got it. Like I said, Quinn, sometimes it doesn't matter statistically. Quinn can just kind of have weird games sometimes. I don't know why that is. Well, it's, I think at this time, at least it was that, yeah, it's not feeling very good. Yeah. So much sense on J.T. Daniels being iffy coming back, our own land in was saying, like, man, an oblique is bad because there's just so much of your body mechanics throwing anything depend on that. Yeah. You're a rotational athlete. Yes. That's what I said. Yeah. Where'd you get that sweater? I have no idea, man. This was like four years old. You can see it's like cracked from like the drier cycles. So. It's so nice. I'm learning a long sleeve t-shirt. I know, man. Fall weather. I woke up this morning. It was like 55ish in DFW and I was like, Oh, this is nice. Yeah. It was great. Texas defense considered elite, but I think ever this weekend we will see how they stack up. Yeah. We'll talk about the defense here shortly. Let's here's what we can do. Let's hit our sponsor and then we will talk a little bit more about the offense. I'm just going to say it, guys, you probably need a fiduciary financial advisor and I've got the guy for you. His name is David McClellan with Forum Financial. He works broadly and deeply with his clients as a financial life coach and he should know something about coaches because he won several national championships as a swimmer for the University of Texas. He specializes in financial planning and has contributed numerous articles to Kipling on the topic of retirement tax bombs. So contact David today to be your fiduciary financial planner and schedule a one-hour consultation to assess your financial situations. The free consultation is available, so just give him a call. The number is 312-933-8823, that's 312-933-8823. His email is also in the description below. Well, thank you, I'll see. Okay. So first thing we learned about the Texas offense for so you, we have a domino line and it's still the number one ranked pass blocking efficiency offensive line in the country. So that doesn't seem to be changing, right? And then also another, dang it, another first round mock for Cam Williams, dang, man, we need to keep our tackles. So let's do it too good of a job. You can't just one year and out, we need you next year, man. Isn't it wild that like, remember those guys both committed to Oregon in a span of like a week? Yeah. Yeah. And Cristo Ball, crypto ball left for Miami and Texas is able to snag him both. And now they're like, might anchor the best Texas team of the, bastard, second bastard, third best Texas team of the century, potentially. Yeah. Yeah, but I don't want them to go, man. I don't want to lose in our whole offensive line this next year, not good if that occurs, not tight. I'm not, well, it'd be nice to be nice to have just one of them for arch because you want to maximize every arch year. Yeah. But I feel really good about Trevor Gooseby and Brandon Baker. So it should be okay. We'll find out. All right. So this play called by SARC seems to have served to help buoy the quarterbacks physical confidence and taking hits without falling apart. Yeah. No, I think that's why SARC called that run. I think SARC was like, see the Quinn doesn't want to step into stuff and his footwork is not as good again. And he's like, Quinn, you're on the football field. You got to be a football player and I think that's why he called this. I also don't really think this is a read. I think they knew that Oklahoma would crash. Yeah. Yeah. And they just said, Quinn, you're taking it around the edge. And then that doesn't feel good without please. Does he, does he give up his back there or do you just get turned around a little bit? I think you just get, I think he's avoiding the first tackle and it makes them kind of go sideways. So he's like dodging the block that morse on. See? Yeah. Whoops. He's the, the block that morse on. That's all he's doing there. You know, Sark has this tendency to like, we're like Jaden Bluefumbles twice against Mississippi State. And then Sark makes him go out. Be one of the guys that goes out and talks to media and they owe you a week. The next time the next chance he gets, I think Sark, when Sark feels like it's a mental thing, then he's just like, okay, no, you're going to get, get Maverick back up in the sky. We need to, we need him to press through this. Yeah. And Sark's done that historical member, like even with like, not for pressers, but like member worthy fumbled in OU and then he went right back to him. Jaden Blue's done that. He goes right back to him or Matthew Golden makes the worst pass ever. He goes back to him versus OU. So it's like, Sark also has this thing where like he wants, he doesn't want you to sit around and think about it. He gets you another opportunity pretty quick. He also even told, he even told the broadcast guys for like the Kansas game or one of the games in 2021, that he thought Casey's thumb issue was more of a mental issue than a actual issue. Dude, the fans were driving me nuts during the Casey Thompson saga, dude. He's such a leader. He's all that. It's like the guy that cleans out his locker and is trying to transfer three times as such a leader, huh? I almost, I almost went insane. That was like, I'll throw right on the heels of COVID too. Yeah. It wasn't nuts. I think a lot of us almost went over it when insane and for me, that was the, that was like the straw that nearly broke the camel's back was just that whole saga. Yeah. Yeah. Hey man, I'll give it to you. The Thompson PR camp really effective unit, but he's not, he's not who the fans thought he was. All right. So I blocked a lot of people on Twitter in that year. Dude, it was crazy. Cause they're all, I was like, I was like, guys, Casey Thompson is not the answer. He's not the next Vince Young. And then people were like, well, that's cause you're a racist. If you're blocked by me on Twitter, it might be because you called me a racist. Yeah. There was that weird element to of it, but really it was just the average fan wasn't aware of what was occurring in the locker room. Yeah. So Ezekiel's wheel and outside zone, you didn't give me a diagram, dude. Where's your, where's your Zika will diagram? You worked hard on that in the past. Uh, could probably pull one up, but I don't think our, I don't think our viewers would appreciate the time that we can, you can see it on this, on this play. Okay. Let's run it. Um, here's, here's something about. So the idea of Ezekiel's wheel is you get three routes going opposite the run. Yeah. You have, and the way Texas will do it is they'll have a guy go outside to run a wheel. Sir, let me, let me do this. Number one, the first receiver counting from the sideline runs a glance route, which is like a deep slant. The number two receiver from the sideline, who might be in the backfield, runs a wheel route outside of him. And then they bring a tied in from the other side of the formation, run a flat route. And if you click that, uh, GIF again, we'll see it. But one trick to the way Texas was doing it is that it seems like, can you do it one more time? They do run the wheel on this one, right? Yeah, it seems like, uh, Texas anticipated that Oklahoma was going to cover all the routes and that their backside guy was going to cover helm. And so I kind of wonder if they told helm to convert the flat route into a block. Cause there are a couple of these plays they ran. If you scroll down, he's usually ends up blocking even though it looks like it's the on this one. Yeah, do that one. All right. So y'all pay attention to helm at the bottom of the screen. He's the H back right there. Okay, that's that one is, that one is the, uh, other, you know, that they run that looks like Ezekiel's wheel, but it's like a slant flat and he always blocks on that one. And then this one pay attention here, same thing. Okay. So maybe, maybe most of them were just called blocks, but they ended up, they ran that RPO a bunch of times and it usually just, it usually just converted to normal split outside zone and Oklahoma could not handle it at all. They were nervous, man. It was making, they, they do not want Ezekiel's wheel to complete. Yeah. I mean, Texas torched him with it in 2022. Yeah. And they did some pretty good damage with it in 2023 as well. You can tell Vinnables was like, look, just stay home on all the routes and we'll stop the run and we'll take our chances on their running backs. Yeah. And then Trey Weisner goes for one 18 and so what, what can you do? No, it's, uh, he's just, man, how stressful Sarc is to defend is really like, we don't appreciate it enough. It's just like fans of, of his team, you know, even later whenever Sarc's gone and we're back with like a normal human offense, we're going to be like, what do you mean? You don't have six different plays that could occur in one play. I mean, it's just a nightmare, dude, like just like the optionality, man, you can RPO it. He can run it here. He has weapons everywhere. He'll fake blocks. So you can't even trust that. It's just like this constant mental onslaught of hyper awareness and it kind of just makes your defense rattled. All right. Gunner. I'm sorry, let's do one more note on the offensive line. The fact that they're really good at outside zone is kind of a big deal because you watch like, uh, I was watching Ohio State versus Oregon and Ohio State kept wanting to run like duo tight inside zone when they needed to attack in the run game. And it was just hard because Oregon would like load the box and they have all these big transfer tackles, um, Georgia has built their program under Kirby smart. I'm just being able to smash straight ahead on tight inside zone duo type plays over and over again. And you just can't stop them. And then this year, they're, I hope they don't, they're not quite as good at it. Yeah. It, it, that, that style of play is just like you want size, physicality and low pads and that's it. And then on defense, you stop at the same way with like you either commit numbers and take your chances against the past or you need size and length and low pads and physicality. Um, outside zone is way harder to defend because the gaps are moving. The defense has to play on a string. The linebackers have to fit properly behind the, uh, defensive lineman. So it's like, is this defense lineman going to get reached or is he going to stay here and whichever, wherever he isn't, I need to make sure I'm there and you just see teams all the time, just get like badly creased on outside zone, but it's harder to execute. And it wasn't, it wasn't tell this year really that Texas has really gotten good at it under SARC. Yeah. Yeah. You need that instinctive back to that can really move sideline and cut like that was what Bijon did incredibly, like outside zone, he would find whatever gap it was going to be that he could crease and he would turn on like a 90 degree angle. Yeah. Yeah. I think he was pretty good. I think Bijon, I actually like more. I'm thinking about it. I think he's a pretty good running back. Yeah, it might be. It might have been that was actually, they were better at blocking it that year than they were in the two years after because, uh, your city had installed it and they ran it decently by the end of 2020 and then in 2021, it was like majors, a curse debtor, uh, who else was Christian Jones? All these guys that were like older and have been running the scheme and if the last two years, Texas has been a lot less good at it because they were playing all these young linemen that didn't know how to do it. Yeah. But for fans, whenever you see the whole line kind of step in one, one direction, they're all going left, they're all going right when you hear outside zone, you'll hear like, what do they say? Like bears on parade. Um, so whenever you see all these big boys just get up and start running left or get up and start running right, you're normally dealing with outside zone. Yeah. If you go rewatch some of those, uh, Ezekiel wheel clips, you'll see the line is really moving. Yeah. They're going to the sideline. Yeah. They're going to the sideline. Yeah. I think Sarks so dangerous, like in this might be basic for some of y'all or some of the viewers, um, there's, there's two battles occurring here. So you have the run and then if you tag it with an RPO, now there's another war or another battle in the war occurring out with the, the receivers in the secondary, right? So if you don't like what you see in the run game, now you can go on another battle. So if you think about it of a battlefield, you have like two units and you can kind of jump into whatever battle is advantageous for you currently. And Sark does that incredibly because Sark can also do this, like he can make three battles occur. Um, and that's where it's just like really hard as a defense to, to fight an offense that you don't know, wherever they have numbers, advantages, they're going to attack you. It's really, it's got to be incredibly stressful. Yeah. All right. Ready to talk on our helm. Let's talk in our helm to it. All right, share your take and then I want to hear in the, well, let's see what they are staying real quick. You think the text running backs can all read zone plays effectively? Where's it different? Why isn't there as good with zone, blue is good with power, et cetera. So, um, I would have to look specifically, because normally backs do have like a, a stronger one. And normally like, like so if it's a gap or a man scheme where you're just kind of looking for a single gap, it's normally better for your younger runners to zone can be a little overwhelming because it can end up going to multiple different gaps. But as far as like who's better in what situation, maybe one of somebody else in the chat has paid attention. Um, I'll definitely watch it when I watch tape to see who's better at what do you, have you noticed is why is there better in zone versus counters or whatever? Well, you know, it outside zone and inside zone are very different for the running back because outside zone is actually just like three steps lateral and then make a decision and cut and go. So like, uh, one of the, the guru of outside zone was this guy, Alex Gibbs, who passed away in like the last year or two. And his, one of his methods was that he would always teach the running backs reads to the offensive line. And so in the film room, the offensive line would know exactly when the running back was and wasn't doing what he was supposed to do. And that just created an unreal level of accountability. Like you don't want the biggest scariest dudes on your team to like know when you're screwing up and making them look bad. No, they'll make sure you don't do it again. Um, so I think why is there blue, blue might be disadvantaged somewhat and just how athletic he is and twitchy, where he doesn't want to like just take the read and make it work. Or as Weisner is just better at being patient and taking what the line is giving him on outside zone. So I think Weisner is better at it. I think blue is getting better, but blue is always like blue likes to bounce runs, blue likes to different create different lanes and Weisner is just like he's, he's, he's doing the three steps of plant and go deal, which is what outside zone really calls for. Trying to find this, uh, SARC screen for you, Phyllis. All right, um, let's see. All right, so responding to this, can y'all break down the reverse helpline screen. We throw at least once big game. It's like we look tunnel screen left, but then turn our back and throw right to a blind to a spot. So this plays is what I'm talking about, right stone, that's what you're talking about. Surely. Yeah. Um, it's getting picked up now. So like they're running in the NFL now, they, uh, they, uh, Texas state runs it. I mean, it's just, well, yeah, it, I mean, it's like, it's called the SARC screen. This is Dan Casey talking about it, Brandon and SARC screen. So it's, um, yeah, it's tough on a defense, especially because he's putting motion behind it. He's doing all this stuff to draw your eyes things going that way. And then, but teams are starting to stay home now on it. So it, um, it looks like part of what makes it work is that it looks like they're running outside zone to the right or zone to the right with an RPO on the backside. Yeah. So then Quinn fakes the RPO to the backside. And so you're like, Oh, it's outside zone. You get going one way. Oh wait. It's that backside screen. We got to get out there. And then he turns and he throws back to the outside zone side and the offensive lineman after feigning outside zone blocks are releasing down the field into a screen. Yeah. Look, he, because he can throw to, this is Kielen, right? He can throw to this motion. Well, that's what he's saying. He's looking back if he's going to get the ball. So he could pull right here, throw to Kielen theoretically, but he doesn't need to. So the whole defense looking there, this is just scary, dude. He's like, think about your defense, right? He can hand it off to Baxter or he can pull it right here. He can throw it to the motion of Kielen, who's seven running back there. And then doesn't matter. Then he can just turn and actually throw it to Baxter. It's like, what do you even do, man? That's, uh, that's crazy. All right. You know that like, I wonder how much, uh, um, Brent Venables had some comment in his presser where he said like, there was a specific play from a specific formation, specific hash that we knew Texas was going to run. We practiced it a million times and they ran it eight times successfully. Yeah. And I'm pretty sure he's talking about Ezekiel's wheel like he had to have been. Um, but the, uh, these screens, like a screen like that, Texas throws that like once a game, right? Yeah. It's time you have to spend on your, if your guys practicing it to make sure when they throw it, that it's not, uh, touchdown. Well, and what stops you from that point of like, if your back has any throwing ability, then you just release, wingo down the field and you can even have a, a technically like a running back pass on top of that. You can just like, there's so many layers to how that, that play could test you. It's scary. All right. Here's your take, uh, chat. I know you guys feel strongly either way here. So what's your, what's your take on Gunnar Helm that you, I think you tweeted, right? Gunnar Helm is better than Jutavian Sanders. Okay. Um, all right. So there's that was that mean more, more of an athletic specimen. He's more of a productive guy. Um, he's a smarter player. He's a better blocker and he has better hands. What, what is he's better than Jutavian Sanders? Yeah. I think Jutavian Sanders is a more agile athlete, but Gunnar Helm, Gunnar Helm had a route. If you scroll down, it's the second clip here. This one. Yeah. It's the second one. Watch what he does. He's going to be, uh, lined up in line and just the way he shook that Oklahoma safety, Robert Spears Jennings, number three, he shows like the inside route and then breaks back out and it's just wide open. He's so much quicker than I thought he was going to be from the last couple of seasons. And I think he trained a lot in the off season to try to gain some quickness for the stuff or what Quinn is said after the Michigan game, but, um, so he's cooked that safety, man. He cooks them. I think Jutavian Sanders was better at this kind of stuff. Yeah. But Gunnar Helm is really good at high pointing the ball, slipping down field. And most importantly, he's a much better blocker than Jutavian Sanders. And when you're a good blocker at tied in, that just sets up so much because now every time you're in the box, your first, their first thought is, is this guy about to block me? And then when he slips by you, it's nasty JT Sanders is a better player than Helm. Only thing Helm is better at blocking. What is the Titan Helio? What does the Titan do on like 70% of his snaps? He blocks. Like that's a really, it's a really big deal that he's better at blocking than Sanders. So the fact that he has this big play ability in the passing game where he's clowning people on checkdowns and picking up first downs, and guys, mossing people, hurtling people, and then scoring routinely because he gets down the field. Like if Jutavian Sanders is better, it's he's, it's because he's better at things that Texas didn't even use. Like I wondered when Sanders got to the NFL, he might become like an option route guru and just like destroy people in the NFL. But if he did, he'd be doing stuff that he didn't really do at Texas. That's just wasn't part of the Texas offense. The stuff that is in the Texas offense, Helm is better at more of the things that make Texas better than Jutavian Sanders was. Yeah, JT was a higher rated recruit. Absolutely. And I was bummed out with him falling down the draft boards like that. He's a little bit, he was a little bit short, I think. Well, I just don't, I mean, dude, his bench press, like, yeah, that was crazy, like it's like he basically didn't, it looked like he didn't train for the combine, which is not good. The bad sign, the NFL doesn't like stuff like that. They went. Yeah, that's not a good mental eval there. Hell, it's for us. That's pretty good. Yeah, I mean, he's from my town. I've watched him forever. He went to my high school. Helm isn't his injury prone to Sanders either. There's that. There's that. Yeah. Oh, that's a jinx. If I've ever seen one. Yeah. That's okay. Helm is a more complete tight end. Yeah, I think that's fair. Sanders lack of a blocking ability cost us dearly in the running game last year. So not just the run game, Queen separated his shoulder on a play where Chatevian Sanders had a really lousy block and he got sacked a couple of times against Oklahoma on plays where Sanders had really lousy blocks. I will say on those, both of those games, I don't think Sanders was 100%. But I mean, man, Sanders getting injured was maybe the biggest reason why Texas lost Oklahoma because he had, they tried, they still tried to use him in a bunch of ways against Oklahoma and like he like whiffed a block on the first play and got Xavier worthy killed on a screen and then they throw a pick and then he gets lit up near the goal line and tips the ball up and they get picked again. He got quinsacked a couple of times. I mean, he was obviously just trying his best on him to grid it out on a bad injury. So I'm not trying to like dog him, but just it always turns into like this weird dichotomous like we must hate JT Sanders. It's like, no, we love JT Sanders. I never thought Helm would be close to matching what he, what Chatevian Sanders did. I was like, we're just going to have to get some of that somewhere else. Yeah. What are Helm's draft prospects? I don't know, but they're improving. Also, what I think too that was nice was Sanders are like, what's better with Helm is like people underestimate Helm, right? So like they would kind of game plan Sanders and try to kind of take him away. Helm's been able to fly under the radar and due to that, he's like led the team in receiving yards versus OU and Michigan. So those are the two best defenses we've played and he's been integral. Now what will be interesting because Kirby smart specifically called out Gunnar Helm by name and said, you know, hey, we got to pay attention to that guy. So now it's interesting. What do you do there? And of course, if you X out one guy, it opens up another guy, Bob, a lot, but it will be interesting that teams now are kind of keying in on Gunnar Helm. See, that's the thing though. You can't really key in on Gunnar Helm because when they're like 11 personnel, which they end up playing a lot this year, because he's so good, you have to worry about Isaiah Bond or Ryan Wingo. You have to worry about DeAndre Moore in the slot. DeAndre Moore will cook you if you put garbage player on DeAndre Moore. And then Matthew Golden or Silas Bolden. Yeah. So like, yeah, there's no, you're going to end up with like your one of your weaker coverage players on Gunnar Helm. Yeah, kind of yeah, naturally, because the reality is too, you're going to double the faster players. So even though Helm is good, you can still run with him, unless he, unless he hits you with one of those routes though, unless he gets you right here, safety, wow. So that looks like it's good of a deal, like Robert Spears Jennings is a really good safety. He's really good at playing around the box is exactly the kind of guy you match up on the tight end. And then it's like you tell that safety like you got the tight end. If he's blocking, you're entering the run fit. If he's running around, you got him. Spears Jennings is a big guy. He's not going to get easily bullied, you would think. And he just got torched. He had a bad game. So I mean, what do you guys, who's, who's next? Right? Who's who else on the schedule is going to match Gunnar Helm if Spears Jennings could be made to look that bad? Yeah. The only thing that I think is interesting, I've noticed with Helm, and this is just the problem being that big of a human. The blocks get a little sketchy for him, like, you know, with holds and stuff because his arm length is so long that if someone gets up into his chest, like, collapses his arms, it's going to be a hold. Does that make sense? Like that one that they called him on, there was garbage. Yeah. But if your arms are that long, and I push him back even a little bit, they can get into his chest. And so now he's like holding you, but he's not really, he didn't try to hold you. It's just his arms are super long. If you have shorter arms, you could kind of brace yourself, you know, and make sure they can't get up on it. But his arms, he's so linky, dude, that it's easier to collapse his length. So that's what I, that's all. But that's also, that's just, he can't help that. That's a physical thing. That's just being huge and having really long arms. All right. Okay. So I think chat felt an agreement with you mostly. It will be interesting to see what he does versus Georgia with Kirby mentioning him. He's going to be good, like here's, here's, I'll spoil the ending Georgia, like every other team in college football is not built to cover a really good tight end. Yeah, dude, but they've been, they, you think with bowers, they would have like learned the secret sauce, you know, barely even, they barely even used bowers though, like you'd watch them and you'd be like, this guy's so good, but it feels like they should be using him more. Yeah. Dude, Georgia would love them. Have you seen their, like their, all their tight ends are white six four guys, like they are like making them in a lab, like Gunnar Helm would fit perfectly. You got like Delp, Lucky Lawson or Lawson Lucky, bowers, you're, you're Rossick, they're all like the same tight end. It's pretty crazy. Yep. All right, let's, let's hit the defense here, but first y'all a word from our sponsor. This video is brought to you by Luxe Kitchen and Bath. Luxe has been offering high end kitchen and bathroom remodels for three generations throughout the greater Austin area. With five star review after five star review on Google and Facebook, and an A plus rating from the Better Business Bureau, you can put your faith in Luxe Kitchen and Bath's award winning designers and skilled craft people to bring to life that dream vision of your special home, but that's not all. Luxe's all star team provides full remodels, large additions and even commercial buildouts as well. So call Luxe Kitchen and Bath at 833-358 Luxe today or visit luxekitchenbath.com to discover where quality meets luxury and begin the process of transforming your home. Get a free quote today by calling 833-358-LUX. That's L-U-X-E or by visiting luxekitchenbath.com. Link in the description. Check it out. Link in the description. All right, what have we learned about the Texas Longhorns defense against Oklahoma? Now, this is where admittedly I don't feel that strong of like we learned a lot because that was often was horrific, but also doesn't mean you can't see what a good team looks like versus a really bad team, because what's a good team going to do a bad team only let them score three points. All right, on three, I'm glad you guys are getting your ad money, huh? All right, so excelling, pressuring the quarterback. First things first. What did you think of our blitz package? We brought more heat than usual, right? Yeah, why not? They did exactly what me and you were like, hey, they should line up with five guys on the line of scrimmage and just like make them guess about which ones are actually coming and all that, and they did exactly that. And when they do it from nickel with, so they'll do it from nickel, they'll have like Colin Simmons on the field or Trey Moore, but Simmons has been a better pass rusher obviously. And then Anthony Hill and then Baron Sorel or Ethan Berkel slide inside. So you've got Simmons and Hill on either side and you can't really shape help to either very easily. And then they're still in nickel. So everybody's covered up and then Binda or La Fauce is the only guy on the back end and he can blitz too. It's tough, man, like Texas is going to face a good offense on Saturday night and they're going to do this again and we're going to see that it's not just Oklahoma that thinks it's hard to block this. Yeah, and if you remember, if you watch Alabama, Georgia, Alabama freaked back out in the beginning of that game by doing a ton of this stuff. Yeah. And so that's what's also going to be kind of impressive. Home on Homer. Jinces are nonsense. Yeah, I actually don't believe in him. I just know that the chat every time does. I'm just I'm playing to the audience chat. I'm playing to the audience here. All right. So, but that's the big thing with Beck. So they were putting, you know, seven guys on the line dropping some of them. Sometimes they were firing, but that's going to be what's interesting for Beck. Because to Beck is yet to win the big game. So that's that's the interesting part, too. They haven't won. They didn't win. They see championship. They didn't be Bama this year. They're going to have a shot versus Texas, right? And normally I don't care about like the heaven one, the big game narratives, but I do care that he can get a little shaken in those games. I was watching him against Alabama this morning for the show. And like you said, Alabama, like through some stuff at him up front. And they also like disguise their coverages and caught him a couple of times with their coverages where they would be in a different look than he thought. And you could tell he was like really shaken up. No. Like they were like their timing was off. They looked so sloppy for like the first quarter and a half or two quarters that, you just made all they made all kinds of mistakes as an offense and then he starts pressing and throwing dumb picks, you know, but then he kind of figured it out and he lit him up in the back end. That's the thing about Beck. So we can talk like Georgia's offense has been sketchy at times, right? But the most important thing is like in Kentucky, they made the plays when they had to Alabama, they made the plays when they had to. I know he lost at the end, but like I said yesterday, 99% of the time that's a game winning drive for Beck, what he did. And so that's the important part. You have to pay attention to Beck. He can be a little shaky, but as far as finishing games, you got to give him props. He like, he gets his composure later on. The advantage here is right. Can you rattle him so much like Alabama that instead of getting 28 up on him, you get 35 up on him and you can survive if he comes back like that's the, that's going to be the trick. Well, Texas gives up 30 plus points to Georgia, I don't think that's going to, that's not a good formula for success. Yeah. And I don't, I don't think they will. This, all right, dude, this is where it's like, I can feel so dumb or so right, man. Like, so like, I can see this game being by three. I can also see Texas winning this by like 14 plus, like their numbers are so weird and they're so inconsistent. I don't know what this team is. It's about Georgia. Yeah. How about Georgia? Yeah. So, yeah, they're, they're, they're so used to them being like mauling on inside zone. Yeah. Having a good tight end, like a really good one, having like at least one really dynamic receiver, and then having like the stud linebacker, the huge NFL defensive tackle, you can't move the NFL, safety's that are going pro. And it just feels like they're like just off the pace everywhere, except cool. Carson Beck is, Carson Beck is so much better than all the other guys they've had. Y'all, y'all hit me up with Drew Stets and whatever. I don't care. Carson Beck is a much better player than Stets and Bennett, whatever that guy's name was. Yeah. Yeah. Georgia. Who else? Drew. Georgia is what they are. You watch film Trust Your Eyes. That's what I'm having trouble here with. I'm like, I'm being haunted by the ghost of Georgia, you know? And so like when I watch it, I'm like, I think Texas is a lot better than this team. Like a lot and like could beat them handedly. But also I can get kind of swayed by the like, well, Texas, you know, past defense hasn't played any one. I'm like technically true. You know, so it's like, I'm in a weird spot with Georgia, but it's just, this is a weird Georgia team. And you even talk to the Georgia fans. They're like, we don't even know what's going to go on. So I don't know, it's a, we'll see, luckily they're going to play on Saturday if you guys didn't hear. I'm more worried about Quinn and him being more comfortable than I am Georgia. I feel like if Quinn, if we get Michigan Quinn or Alabama Quinn, then Texas is going to win at home. If we get Oklahoma Quinn, I don't know. And if we get like, I don't know how many different Quinns there are, we've given different Quinns names in the past, we had like mullet Quinn and we have, we have we have quentavious too. When he, when he takes off running quentavious, I don't think we're going to get quentavious. I'm pretty sure. Yeah, we're not getting quentavious. I don't think we're going to get quentavious and I don't think we're going to get mullet Quinn. Yeah. I mean, I mean, besides he's not going to have a mullet because he can't grow in in time. We're not going to get the like, doesn't know what he's doing. We'll see, we'll see, he's usually up for it in the big games. Yeah, that is one thing about Quinn, right? He's always kind of showed up and I hope, man, whenever he was injured, he was able to kind of run some Georgia tape during that period. This team is better than our natty run team. All right. Well, this is coming from somebody that was on the team during the national championship. So that sounds good. I almost, I was almost like, let's settle down and then I saw it was true. Yeah, it's like the one guy that would know is probably on the team. Solid authority. But I will say like, I don't, it's the thing, I think he's probably right. I'm thinking through it. The one thing that that natty team had that was so crazy was the events young. The five, like first, second round caliber defensive backs. Yeah. And this team is not, they're all much better in the secondary, but they're not there. But then I'm like, but. But I think Drew too, because the line backers are a lot better than the line backers on Drew's team. Drew knows, Drew's not going to be offended by that. The offensive line is as good. The receivers are way better. So. Yeah. He might be right. He might be right. Well, and also Drew told us last week when we were talking with him that the depth on this team is better. Yeah. And Brian Robinson said the same thing. So that's two players on the national championship team that says we're, we're deeper overall in this, this group. Yeah, I, hopefully Drew, man, you would know, I don't, but I just, I'm scared to be hurt again. Drew. Uh, this is this year's Georgia, Georgia's team is different than past. They have no run. Everybody has holes, um, they have also been thinking about is I'm like, I've been like, man, it doesn't seem like there's that elite team and I'm like, wait, are we the elite team? Like, that's like, it's like, man, Georgia and Alabama aren't around. It's like, wait, are we Georgia and Alabama? It's like, that's kind of like the confusing switch that we're going through now. They're like, you know, they're still like, tentativeness to be like, Hey, man, we might be really good. I broke down, uh, Oregon, Ohio state yesterday from my sub stack. America's war game.substack.com check it out and I haven't, I haven't written it yet. I haven't written it up yet, but, um, Ohio state is really, really good, but they are not, I think Texas is the best team I've watched this season. Yeah. It's not Georgia. I mean, well, maybe they'll come in a DKR and Georgia has the highest ceiling as anybody. They're just not. I don't think so. I would disagree. I would say, well, no, none of us goes wide out to, those wide outs would be real good for that. I'm also not counting the big tent at all in my evaluation. Like I was just purely thinking SCC, but I also, Texas has the highest ceiling. Who do you think has the second highest then when they're playing at max? I don't know about second highest, I'm going to throw a team out there. I'm just going to drop takes until, until the comments catch on fire. I'm starting to think that LSU is going to be a team that is like, no one wants to play on the playoffs. Okay. Because they're deep enough enough. Now that they finally got Perkins out of there, their defense is really starting to come together and they have, it looks more like an LSU defense. Not, it's not there, but it's, it's a lot better and, uh, Nussmeyer and their passing game is really scary. Yeah. Like a throw he had to beat Ole Miss. It's like you can't defend that. Yeah. My league wide like evaluations are always kind of tinted because I really just deep dive on the team that we're going to play. So I know like who we've played really, really well, but I only have like this cursory knowledge of the teams we haven't played. I just watch them like, you know, on Saturday, but it's a little different than like doing a true breakdown. I just, I think, I think Carson Beck, when he's on it can win games, you know, and like that's where I'm worried like if Carson Beck's at full steam and Quinn's being weird, that's where you, you run into problems, I think. Have you noticed that Carson Beck very much resembles Romero from Escape from New York? No. You know, the guy Romero that's like his face painted white and his hair is up and he like brings out the president's finger and he's like his thing at the helicopter, you know? Yeah. I'm trying to bring it up. That's so the audience can see. He ends up getting knifed by the, this girl, if you haven't seen it. It's a very kind. Oh, he passed away. That's sad. Yep. Yeah, that's, tell me that's not Carson Beck. He does have a kind of strange lackadaisical thing. What I thought was interesting is I was hearing on the Georgia podcast that remember when we were having this problem with Quinn early on where Quinn's like kind of a quiet guy and wasn't really being vocal there in Quinn's grown way past that, but that was kind of our fear that Quinn was going to be like chill guy and not do leadership. They're still having that issue with Carson Beck as a red shirt senior like of being fiery and talking to the team and like just going to my personality, dude. And it's there even like, hey, man, we need you to like be more vocal of a leader. I think that's interesting. But that was a really nice comparison. As soon as I realized that I was, it's just been so hard for me to believe the hill ever went to championship. That's your, that's your elite evaluations. He was a, and then he was, he was so bad to start against Bama and then he was so good. I wonder if he'll be ready this time when he's in DKR, if he'll be like, okay, I've been through this, I'm okay, or if he'll get rattled again, I really don't know. Yeah. I mean, in Texas, like we have an intense environment now and they also, if you're okay in attention, we'll, we'll do the smokescreen and you'll be blind in the third quarter. I don't know how that's allowed. I still don't understand how you can just release that level of smoke into the stadium. And all the kids in the student section just look like they're in like a war war two haze. Vietnam or something. Yeah. Literally agent orange. All right. And so we wanted, well, we also learned to wrap it up still stout and run defense. Do you think we're really able to like, are you doing this on like gap soundness? How do we really know? Because this team can't rush. When teams run the ball, when teams double and go try to go downhill on Texas is defensive tackles, they don't get rocked back. They stay there. They stay on their ground. So that scales, yeah, generally, Georgia, Georgia is usually as good at getting movement on double teams as anybody this year, maybe not quite. I think Texas will play their match quarters in this game and stay too high and dare Georgia to run because Georgia doesn't seem that interested in running this year or not. They're like a hundred something in the country and running like not stats like how many times they call runs. Yeah. So, yeah, I would I would play too high and let them make them make them show that they're still Georgia. I don't know, I don't think they can match if we get a good Quinn, if we get crew cut Quinn and we play good match quarters defense and don't let him score in the passing game easily. I don't think Georgia can match Texas running the ball. 113th in the country, rushing plays rate, wow, so there's 65th in the country and yards per rush. So they rarely run and they're not very good at it. They have two really good backs, ETN, of course, and then Frazier, good backs. It's just what I think the problem is, is they're just not emphasizing it enough in practice and therefore they're not that good at it. And so that's what's going on, but their run game is not that great. It seems like they it seems like finally having a really good quarterback is almost working against them. Yeah. I mean, well, it's working good in this regard, like, well, yeah, I mean, you know, the country and past, like they can pass for real, but it's hurting their balance and being overall a good offense. I don't know if it's going to scale because they don't have out and I Mitchell or Lad McConkie or Brock Bowers, right. And they're receiving core is good. It's just not an elite core. Yeah. They have good guys, experienced guys, Carson Beck can hit him, but there's no like that guy puts the fear of God in me type receiver right now. They've got so Dominic Lovett is there his favorite guy? Yeah, most targeted. He's pretty solid, but he also works on the slot. Aaron Smith is their deep threat. Aaron Smith and Dylan Bell are there up and coming young athletes. And those guys are if they end up like beating Texas and having an amazing season, it's going to be because Dylan Bell and Ariane Smith, torch teams in the back half of the schedule. ETN is very effective or to see we're out of the backfield. That's very true. ETN is a good back man, but he's outside runner, you know, because if you see speed and explosive, don't let him get to the edge. Luckily, we have good lateral quickness. It's crazy. They don't have their normal battery of future NFL backs to just plow downhill. No, this game comes down to Quinn's setting his feet and making the throws that makes him special last week. He looked like Quinn of last year, I agree, but I think it's just nerves and taking a hit and being out again. Yeah, that was the part that frustrated me as a first round quarterback, like set your feet, man. Like that's annoying me that we're still having to have that conversation. And that's not pure injury. That's just like, that's mechanics. You set your feet as a quarterback, whether you're hurt or not hurt. So that part's annoying me that I don't, I don't want to see regression like that. Yeah, even if it's quote, unquote, rust, whatever, you've been a quarterback since you were six. He's right. Well, I should have mentioned London Humphreys to that guy's spread like deceptively fast London Humphreys. That's the problem. He's, he's this white kind of unassuming kid, but he runs a 10 six. Yeah. He's fast. Yeah. And he's 10 six speed at six, two, two hundred and they've poached him from Vanderbilt. Yeah. What'll be interesting now is this Vanderbilt keep getting all their best players post or can they keep them home when they keep winning? Yeah. I mean, save and stole their tackle. Yeah. Or just stole their best receiver like they get their guys stolen all the time. Yep. They're like, the thing is though, is that they are recruiting in the south. And so they're just like plucking up all these like three star southern kids that are those are those kids are different than like three star kids somewhere else. Yeah. I suspect Georgia will try to blitz Quinn a lot. They saw how to sack and play one against OU affected him. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, if he's still trying to run out of the pocket and do weird stuff when he could just say, I mean, the thing too is like, trust your line, Quinn, yeah, you have to probably first round tackles. Jake Majors is 90 years old, you know, the guards are a little bit sketchy. I get less and less impressed with DJ Campbell the more I focus on him in film. Yeah. My, I have a, my buddy Keegan Renau that, uh, ever show Oklahoma a lot has told me going into the game, like DJ Campbell's the guy they'll target. He's the weak spot. Yeah. There. He's just like, you should be bad, you know, at least he's just not very intuitive. Like there's some like plays that I would watch where like there's a guy he could clearly block and he's just picking the wrong guy, not even assignments. Like after the mix happens, you know, it's like, you could clearly just work up to this guy and it would be benefit. He just, he seems to be very rule based and not able to kind of free flow with it as much whenever things kind of break down, but he'll come. He's only in his third year still, so I know what DJ Campbell and I'll stick to this. DJ Campbell would be the greatest half back this world has seen and I stand by it a thousand percent. Half back? Oh, sorry. Half H back. H back. That could be awesome. No. H back. He'll be the best H back this world has ever seen, um, he, cause if you watch his hands from high school, he was like running routes as a tied in, not in game, but like messing around in some footage. He has awesome hands. He's quick. He can block. I think he would be an elite H back like unstoppable. So now you got something to chew on fans. Think about him as a H back in, I need three articles on, uh, that potential as well. Okay. It'll be right on it. Good stuff. All righty guys. That's it for today. Thank you for hanging out. Uh, tomorrow Ian will be on with Joe and Justin at nine 30 a.m. They'll also be talking, I'm sure some recruiting stuff too. So if you guys have your recruiting questions ready for Justin, he'll be able to answer them and then it'll be a fun week versus Georgia. I won't see you guys again until I'll see you guys on Saturday post game, um, so looking forward to it. Y'all hopefully it is a happy post game. I think we have the potential to do show. So fans, Ian, thank you very much, Izzy. Have a good one. Let's say goodbye. Yeah, let us say goodbye to the people and goodbye QD hook. Um, bye bye. Bye.
What did we learn from the OU game that carries into Georgia? What does Ewers need to do to ensure a smooth ride?