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*****
Clearly the Texas Longhorns are in a strong position heading into their first spring football period before officially entering SEC competition, but every team has its relative strengths and weaknesses from year to year. It got me thinking.
What position group is the single biggest strength on the Longhorns offense at this point of the calendar as we look ahead?
QUARTERBACKS - Texas returns Quinn Ewers, who is currently the co-favorite along with UGA's Carson Beck to take home the Heisman Trophy in 2024 among all college players via the sports-betting markets at +750 (7 1/2 to 1). Behind Ewers, every fan of every team in the land knows who's on the Texas roster: the most famous backup QB in the sport, Arch Manning.
Anwar Richardson has recently reported that Manning is viewing this season in exactly the way you'd hope if you're a Texas fan. Per Anwar: "I was told Manning still believes he has a chance to win the job and was not deterred by Sarkisian stating there would not be a competition. Apparently, Manning dismissed what Sarkisian said as “coach speak” and intends to fight for the job this offseason. The idiots who do not follow Texas closely will speculate about Manning’s future in Austin, but he intends to compete against Ewers."
It's a QB situation, in sum, that cannot be considered anything other than a great strength -- even despite Texas fans still having slight concerns about aspects of Ewers' game and his ability to stay healthy for an entire season.
RECEIVERS - It certainly looks a lot different now after the transfer period. After Texas lost AD Mitchell, Xavier Worthy and Jordan Whittington to the NFL along with transfer portal defections, you could look at the cupboard have really freak out about only 3 returning scholarship players representing 8 total catches in a Texas uniform.
However, with 4 solid additions in the 2024 class and most importantly, the transfer additions of a bona-fide stud in Isaiah Bond, a field-stretching outside mini-dynamo in Silas Bolden and a seasoned all-around contributor in Matthew Golden, you all of the sudden look around that room and have more of a sense of excitement about what could become than a dread of what will be missed from 2023. It's not the team's greatest strength, but it is a strength.
TIGHT ENDS - It hurts to lose Ja'Tavion Sanders, no doubt, but Texas returns a 55% snap participant in Gunnar Helm who's been a good player for Texas as an inline blocker (much better than Sanders in that particular area) and has at least flashed in the receiving game when dialed up for advantage throws. He was not a 75% snap participant like Sanders, but he's had plenty of experience, playing 39.16% of his snaps at the attached, inline position, 11.06% split out, and 49.78% in a H-back/sniffer/lead-blocking role.
Where Helm lacks experience -- as a true receiving weapon split out wide -- enter Bama transfer Amari NIblack who really only played out wide and traditionally attached at Alabama ... and who Texas fans saw give the Texas defense some tough reps in Tuscaloosa last year. Niblack is a great athlete and the only real question with him is his lack of experience playing at the H-back spot, in which JT Sanders lined up at in 59.35% of his snaps last season. I don't think operating in this role will be any issue for a player of Niblack's pedigree, and for as big of a loss as JT Sanders is, the truth is that he was not a good run-blocker in 2023 and many busted plays that some might have pegged on the offensive line should have been credited to Sanders. Also, what helped Texas last season as much as Sanders' actual production was simply
the threat of a player like Sanders. Niblack poses a similar threat that defenses will have to account for in similar ways.
So, what Texas will lose from Sanders to Niblack in the receiving game as far as concrete numbers might not be as stark as what some envision, and what could be gained by getting Helm involved as more of a primary blocker in the run game could be really big as Helm is an upgrade to Sanders in this realm.
Is tight end a strength for Texas in 2024? Probably not a major one, but it's far from what should be perceived as a weakness.
RUNNING BACKS - This is pretty easy to break down: Was running back a concern after Jonathon Brooks went down with season-ending ACL surgery in 2023? Because Brooks isn't coming back in 2024, but he wasn't coming back then, either. And Texas went on to see Jaydon Blue come out of his shell as a real talent and most certainly a great complement to CJ Baxter who started the 2023 season as a true-freshman starter. If you weren't worried about running backs down the stretch of the 2023 season (most people weren't they were too busy following a team that would win the Big 12 and eventually make the CFP), it would make zero sense to be concerned about the room heading into 2024 -- especially given the injection of Jerick Gibson and Christian Clark as true freshmen.
Some might say that depending on true freshmen to make an impact is concerning on its own, but the facts are that 1) Baxter won the starting job as a true freshman, and 2) even if neither does come in and make a real move for playing time, it probably means the development and improvement of Baxter and Blue as a tandem will have been positive over the course of the winter and spring.
OFFENSIVE LINE - The 2023 iteration of the Texas offensive line is the best I've seen since I started charting each play by each player in each game in 2013 and the unit returns all starters except RT Christian Jones. In Jones' place steps in Cam Williams who is a beast and who has been biding his time to this point, having been terriffic in the two games he played enough snaps to earn a grade in the Deep Dig during 2023 at RT in Jones' stead as well as as an emergency-type RG in the spring game. Like Kelvin Banks and DJ Campbell from the same class, Cam Williams is inevitable.
There has been talk of reports from some outlet regarding moving 2023 LG starter Hayden Conner to right tackle in 2024, and if Kyle Flood were to make such a move, I do the same thing I always do when Flood does something I don't understand: I'd defer to him as having forgotten more about line play and development than I'll ever know. With that said, the move would make such little sense.
First off, Conner was not good in 2023 and my theory is that he was banged up most of the season, most likely having to do with the left side of his body, and specifically the left side of his lower body as he couldn't anchor to keep defenders from penetrating upfield through his play-side shoulder on zone concepts. It was very obvious as Conner allowed 19 instances of either run-stuffs or TFLs in this exact way.
I can't make such a regression from 2022 playing at the same spot make sense, as Conner only allowed 7.5 such instances on a similar total number of snaps in that season and having 1) another year under Kyle Flood under his belt in 2023; 2) another year of continuity with the players on either side of him under that same belt; and 3) having those players on each side of him also having the benefit of another year under Flood, with a great amount of improvement most recognizable in Jake Majors at center from 2022 to 2023.
Furthermore, who is going to replace Conner at LG if he gets moved to RT where he is not needed? Well, the names people are tossing around are Neto Umeozulu and Cole Hutson.
We know Conner had a down year in 2023. That's been established. But neither of these guys (Umeozulu and Hutson), based on both their most recent play in 2023 and samplings from Hutson's 2022 campaign where he entered Texas as an immediate starter at RG, paint the picture of being significant upgrades at all.
In 2023, Hayden Conner allowed disruption once every 25.42 snaps on 788 total offensive plays. Not unbearable, but not great. That number was a regression from once every 34.6 offensive plays through 744 total in 2022. Hutson allowed slightly less disruption in 2023 on a relatively meager 118 snaps at once every 29.5. However, if we look to the 2022 season where Hutson played a full-season sample (705 snaps), he allowed disruption at a disastrous once per every 17.41-snap clip, placing him in 70th place in the statistic among 76 100-snap qualifiers as charted by the Deep Dig dating back to 2013.
Umeozulu didn't qualify for inclusion from 2023 into the historical record with only 47 total snaps played, but in those 47 snaps, Umeozulu allowed 4 run-stuffs and committed one penalty leading to disruption caused once every 9.4 snaps. Needless to say, this would be the worst in the whole database if his play kept apace at that clip.
And this isn't to say that Umeozulu can't be good. I think he can. He has flashed, but he needs work. Kyle Flood is great at developing these guys, so the truth is, I like his chances to be real plus-player one day. The kind of player that in previous years, we'd have to bet on the come regarding and just toss out there and hope for the best.
Unlike 2024 where Texas returns Kelvin Banks for one final season before a likely first-round departure to the NFL, a vastly improved Jake Majors, a rocket-ship like candidate for most-improved player on the whole team in DJ Campbell (who had the highest Deep Dig score of any player on the regular season in the finale against Texas Tech) and the insertion of a really fleet-footed behemoth in Williams who would have started for more programs than I can count last season if not for such a well-liked and improving veteran presence like Christian Jones.
If Hayden Conner is the biggest concern on a group that projects as such a strength, it's really is an absurd abundance of riches the likes of which Texas fans simply aren't used to and might just be a little bit unprepared to understand given the putrid OL play they've experienced for over a decade until Sark and Kyle Flood got into town.
With all these things considered, we can actually point to evidence that Texas, despite having the Heisman co-favorite on its roster at QB, may count the OL as its greatest offensive strength to start things out in 2024.
Man.
Protect Kyle Flood at all costs.