While it’s fresh in my mind…

GOOD

~ Isiah John Williams. It’s a completely, whole-heartedly, absolutely different offense when he is at the controls. Eddie, Jacob, and Nathan were decent, with all three showing flashes of the outstanding.  Juice was outstanding with flashes of decent.  His arm strength, in person, up-close, is unbelievable.  There was one throw he made in the two minute drill at the end of the scrimmage where he was running back and to the left (back, and to the left). He spots Cumberland open in the endzone 30 yards away and, while running left, throws a laser to the center of the endzone.  It was a little low, and Cumberland dropped it, but who cares. There probably aren’t a dozen QBs in the country that can make that throw.  College or pro. Just an unbelievably athletic throw.

~ I don’t have a playbook, but the 7 yard out to Jarred Fayson better be called “Irresistible Force”.  Because a receiver that digs in and cuts like that combined with a QB with an arm like that equals a play that can’t be stopped unless the defense cheats and tries to jump the route.  And if they do try to cheat?  Burn them deep a dozen times.

~ The quick slants they threw to Fayson were things of beauty.  Especially the one that went for a 40 yard TD (I think that one was from Eddie McGee).  Fayson caught the slant in stride and took off.  Bo Flowers had a chance to grab him, but a poor angle and a stiffarm later, Fayson was in the endzone.

~ There were a ton of big plays by the first team offense.  An 80 yard run on the first play from scrimmage by Daniel Dufrene (someone with the initials BF had a chance to make the tackle, but…). A 90 yard pass from Juice to Jeff Cumberland (horribly underthrown, but that’s why you throw the horribly underthrown ball to Jeff Cumberland – Ashante Williams never had a chance).  The 40 yard TD to Fayson.  True, the second string D made some mistakes on these plays.  But it was very encouraging to see the first string offense make so many big plays.

~ On defense, two players stuck out:

1) Garrett Edwards has to have the strong safety spot locked up.  He looked really in control out there, seemingly knowing exactly where he needed to be at all times.  He flat out destroyed Justin Lattimore in the flat on one play, and was involved in the Dufrene fumble as well, if I recall correctly.  I want my strong safety to know exactly where he needs to be on every play, and it appeared that Edwards did exactly that.

2) Corey Liuget is a beast.  He didn’t start – I think Zook was playing the old Vontae Davis motivation card – but on the short yardage drill he absolutely blew up two plays.  Granted he’s going against the second string offensive line, but HE ABSOLUTELY BLEW UP TWO PLAYS. Good luck, Interior Offensive Linemen of the Big Ten (now THERE’S a bad calendar idea).

~ I have a theory on Anthony Santella.  While watching the kickers run through drills on Friday morning (which consisted of them standing around telling jokes), I heard Tad Keely call him “Tony”.  So I think there’s two Anthony Santellas.  Tony was the one who punted in the Rose Bowl, but disappeared for a year, leaving Anthony with the punting job all of last season.  But now that Tony’s back, we’re watching punts from the back of the endzone sail all the way to the other 41.  Welcome back, Tony.

BAD

~ I don’t hate Bo Flowers.  I could never hate anyone wearing the orange and blue. But he just hasn’t looked good in any of the three viewings over the past 36 hours.  I feel bad typing these words, like I need to go apologize to his mother or something, but I have no confidence in him as a starting safety. Or a backup safety.

~ Memo to Jarred Fayson: Don’t fair-catch a punt at the two.  Once you cross the ten, let it bounce, pal. (That 45 second pause in the scrimmage was Zook having a few kind words with Fayson. Again.)

~ I’ve seen plenty of good from Eddie McGee to give him a pass on what I saw over the last two days. But he’s definitely in a slump.  Bounced passes, backfield confusion, even timeouts because the play clock was at 1. He’s definitely frustrated right now.

~ We still need to tweak the redzone stuff. One of the things I really wanted to see in this scrimmage was long drives ending in 7.  Unfortunately, the drive after Dufrene’s TD went 75 yards… and stalled at the five with a bad snap on third down. And in the two minute drill, we drove to the 20… and stalled until a 4th-and-10 pass to Ramsey in the endzone bailed us out.  We did run some situational red zone drills, but the plays weren’t nearly as crisp as the open field stuff.  That has to improve, because, well, you know…

~ Mikel LeShoure dropped yet another pass in the flat.  If he can’t consistently bring that in, he won’t get consistent minutes.  I wanted LeShoure to be the guy, but it looks like Dufrene and Ford are well ahead of him at this point.

~ The first string offensive line looked solid (Randall Hunt got run over one time by Ugo Uzodinma – hey, it happens), but the second and third string O-lines looked lost at times.  Hopefully, this just means the second string D-line is ahead of the second string O-line at this point.  But there were TFLs.  And sacks.  And a safety.

PROMISING

~ The biggest surprise of the freshmen? Linebacker Eric Watts. In my book, the biggest compliment you can pay a linebacker is “he was always around the ball”.  And Eric Watts seemed to always be around the ball in his limited time on the field.  He also had two or three good pops – kid likes to hit. I’ll file that away in my “he’ll be nice to have in 2012″ file next to Joelil Thrash and Justin Lattimore.

~ I really liked my first viewing of Nathan Scheelhaase under center.  He was certainly wide-eyed at times – he and Terry Hawthorne had a mini “You’re supposed to be over there”/”No, I’m supposed to be here” argument – but above everything else, he showed he was an elite athlete.  I don’t care if he’s the future QB or a future slot receiver – it’s great to have an athlete like him on the roster.  And the throw he made on the 40 yard pass to Cordale Scott was perfectly placed away from the defense.  I’m not sure if he can throw the 18 yard out, and he seems to lift his front leg on long throws, but it’s two weeks into his first season.  Plenty of time to work on technique.

Overall, I was pleased.  Juice looked solid.  Fayson looked fast.  Donsay looked healthy.  Watching foursomes like Benn/Fayson/Jenkins/Cumberland at wideout or Pilcher/Brent/Liuget/Nurse on the defensive line made me feel really, really good about our chances this season.

Most importantly, the starters looked significantly better than the backups.  As it should be.