Offense:
Willams: He looked pretty good, and continues to show that run-block-catch combination. There was a pass block early on where he identified a middle blitzer, came up, and stood the guy up in his tracks. We've seen this before. He may be among the best pass blocking backs in the league already. He loves to hit people. He's an interesting cat. Usually the guys who love to hit are innately angry and/or predatory. When this guy isn't smacking people or moving a pile he smiling and dancing. We all saw the catch and deke for the TD just confirming what we already knew: the guy can catch and be elusive in space. As a runner, I think he's still operating under the Warren Buffett rules translated to running backs. Buffett's Rule 1: Don't lose money. Buffett's rule #2: See rule #1. Williams' case it's don't lose yards and don't fumble. These are not small things. There's till a maturation process required. In the halftime interview, when asked he said he'd rather hit a guy than elude him. That requires an adjustment to the mind set. We want to see that slash and stiff arm at the second level more often in gobbling yards. We stll don't know if he can make that adjustment to get up to the next level, but as it stands he's a solid running back.
Valdez-Scantling: Surprisingly impressive in that I did not expect him to show good routes and catches on inside routes. We knew he was a burner with decent hands, but I did not expect to see that route versatility. His college QB chronically underthrew him in his highlight clips; Kizer did the same thing on that deep completion. That 40 time is no illusion and these QBs need to catch up to it. Based on this game's performance, it looks like they'll need to find a way to get him on the field at least in 4-wide sets. See Kumerow comments below.
Moore: On the subject of route versatility, it's interesting to note that Moore saw quite a few throws, all on the sidelines just as we say on the college tape. I can't say I noted whether he ran inside routes, but if he did he didn't get the ball. The obvious knock was his drop on that near certain TD on that Boyle deep throw, like a young James Jones.
He missed on a tough low throw. He missed on a tough catch in the end zone with a defender's hand stuck in there. What does not show in the stat sheet is he drew two pass interference calls on jump balls, which is not a small thing. Some of the criticism in the above posts is excessively harsh for this early going, but based on this performance he's still just that college player we saw on tape. We might have wait for year 2 if there isn't a jump soon.
Kumerow: He had a bit of a rocky start then made a couple of plays later against the lesser competition. It was kind of interesting to see Rodgers showing his typical stone face on the sideline shots until the Kumerow TD where he went a little nuts. Relief in seeing some justfication for his comments? I think he needs to find some love, some way or some how, for Mr. Valdez-Scantling, because the mere presence of that deep threat at least opens up other possibilities.
St. Brown: Something about him bothers me. It's just a look-and-feel thing. Maybe my view is unduly colored by the reports of his father's involvement and methods. Insisting he not play special teams at Notre dames sticks firmly in my craw. I think I can best characterize my current view as "as all-technique, little intensity". It's just the way he moves on the field that's bothering me. Smooth, yes. Too smooth around the edges? Maybe. Robo receiver? That's my fear. It's early. I'd like to be wrong.
Hundley and Kizer: These were the same guys we saw last season. Hundley's pocket awareness and feel remains poor; he still looks better out of the pocket than in. Both Hundley's and Kizer's accuracy are still hit or miss. I didn't see any progress from these guys in this game. Hundley is at least trying to play his game even if it is not McCarthy's or the NFL's game on half the snaps. Kizer looks generally tentative and a little confused. It's a new system for him, of course, but he's going to have to get with the program soon to get to #2.
Boyle: On the other hand, this guy was pretty surprising. He showed good arm strength, a pretty spiral, and deep ball accuracy. He looks comfortable in the pocket compared to Hundley's twichiness. Now, Boyle had the benefit of playing against the bottom of the Titan's roster that late in the game, kind of a 2rd. tier college all-star game. I'd like to see him get some snaps earlier in the pre-season games to see what he can do against better competition. Sadly, that may require an injury to Hundley or Kizer as McCarthy defers to experience against NFL competition while these vets need the work. The way Boyle looks now, I'd say he's got a good chance of landing on somebody's practice squad, I just don't know if it will be the Packer's. More looks to come.
Bell: Scrappy vet with notable athletic shortcomings. We do not want to see him having to start. He played to that poor PFF grade of last season.
Spriggs: There's evident trouble in Spriggs City. I didn't notice him on the field until pretty late in the game with 3rd. stringers. I didn't notice him doing anything particularly good or bad, and maybe McCarthy's OK with him and for this game wanted to get a good look at Bell to decide if he's worth keeping, but that's probably wishful thinking. Spriggs is not deep on experience and could use the work, so not getting it against the better competition does not bode well. More looks are needed to confirm this preliminary impression.
Defense:
Gilbert: He was pretty impressive in limited snaps as already noted in another post above. This is your #3 OLB at this stage by a fairly wide margin. Somebody's going to have start doing something special pretty soon to change that outlook.
Short field zone: Early in the second quarter Tennessee had the ball down to the 5 yard line. The short field zone on successive plays, at least in the middle of the field that we could see, was darn near a revelation compared to what we've been looking at the last couple of years. For all the citicism of Capers, this weakness in his defense did not get enough attention. Confusion (and tantrums) were a Capers hallmark in the short field zone. Anyway, on those two plays, the positioning, awareness and handoffs among the two ILBs and the middle safety were pretty slick. Granted, it was Gabbert playing with second stringers, but he is an NFL vet and he appeared to be befuddled by what he was looking at. This is an extremely important aspect of the game if we're intested in red zone defense, which I believe we should be.
Keep an eye on it.
Burks: I liked him a lot better in coverage than against the run. I think he'll be a keeper. While nowhere near as clueless as in that infamous Alabama game tape, I noted a couple of run plays where mis-reads and late anticipation took him out of the play. I dunno. If he doesn't catch up pretty soon he may have to split time with somebody, though with Ryan out of the picture I don't know who that might be at this stage.
Jackson: Coming out, he drew some comparisons to Sherman. I didn't see that in the highlight tapes other than Jackson showing good ball skills. Now I get it. Sherman is the master of the ticky-tack. He maintains contact with receivers and justles a little, hand checks a litlle, gets the receiver off stride or messes with the route timing, on the razor's edge of legality. We saw that from Jackson a couple of plays. On the other hand, he did get called for one defensive holding call. It was off the screen so we couldn't see what he did or didn't do. If he can stay on the right side of the razor's edge a la Sherman, we just might have a winner. Let's see what happens with other officiating crews.
