The Deep Dig
Notre Dame Part II: Offense
presented by Wendy Swantkowksi, DDS
Looking for experienced, family and cosmetic dental care in the Houston-Memorial area? Go with the best! OB sponsor Wendy Swantkowski, DDS. Call 281-293-9140 and find out why so many Orangebloods members are her patients!
The Texas offense versus Notre Dame looked like the unit that fans have dreamt of since the Mack Brown twilight era. You know, the offense that’s been promised through countless firings, youth injections and changes in philosophy. The undelivered promise now spanning the tenures of two different head coaches. All the coach-speak and propaganda pointed toward “tempo” annually; it just never happened.
The offense fans heard about all spring and summer from practice reports — year-after-year — detailed a break-neck pace and a spread-you-out philosophy that pounds the football then makes you pay with the deep shot.
Now fans have it. Furthermore, the Deep Dig proclaims OC Sterlin Gilbert as an offensive mind appears to be a prodigy. The beauty of his work, as we noted over and over during our study of the first game, is in its simplicity. Texas fans should enjoy him while he’s in Austin.
But we must live in the present … or what else are we doing here?
And it’s tough to chart 85 offensive plays week after week, but the maniacs in our dark basement will take the tradeoff. This tradeoff being, grading 20-or-so more plays a week on offense in exchange for the offensive philosophy being one we can actually understand from play to play. One that doesn’t make us scream at the projector, throw our hands up in the air and just say “we give up!”
It’s probably how some players even felt last season in a Jay Wickson offense. However, we need to temper all of this optimism and red-hot hype over a new regime with a dose of lukewarm reality:
If you opened up the Deep Dig today anticipating you’d read about how the Texas offensive line is now magically Montee Ball-era Wisconsin, you’ve come to the wrong place.
Offensive Line Thoughts and Grades
CLICK HERE TO ACCESS OFFICIAL OL GRADING LOG
55 LT Connor Williams - 85 snaps on offense
No disruption allowed
7 knockdowns and one pin-block created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 78.18
A monster game from Connor Williams tops the news and notes of the day on the offensive line and its all downhill from here. Let’s resolve to remember that Texas was playing against the best defensive line it will likely face all season. No. 90 for the fighting Irish pursues like a hungry puma and will play on Sundays. With this said, Williams managed his second-best grade per the Deep Dig since coming to Texas (with the best being a 78.23 performance in 2015 versus a lowly Rice team).
When taking into consideration the level of competition, Williams played his best game as a Longhorn versus Notre Dame and was the key to the offense running the football effectively more than any other player. This is because the offense ran the power concept to the left side of the line in the vast majority of cases and Williams was responsible for cave-down blocks at the point of attack versus four and five-techniques while also showing terrific athleticism to get to the second level off combos once he’d helped Vahe establish play-side leverage on three-techniques.
Williams will almost certainly begin tallying scores up into the 80s this season which means he’ll be on pace to be thought of in 2018 as a high-round NFL draft pick should he choose to declare early following his junior season.
77 LG Patrick Vahe - 85 snaps on offense
2 QB hits, 1 TFL and 1 run-stuff allowed
1 chop-block penalty
5 knockdowns created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 75.24
Coming off a twisted ankle last week, it was safe to expect that Vahe may play at a level slightly lower than expected, and maybe he did. Still, a 75+-grade is certainly acceptable and it’s the type of performance that, if Texas had it in virtually all games in the last three years from all five OL positions, would have led to drastic positive differences in how those seasons turned out.
Vahe showed improvement early on in the area of identifying stunts and twists when he and Williams made a beautiful pass-off and pick-up together, but was later tested in this capacity twice more and gave up not only a QB hit on a passing down but also a TFL against a beautifully designed rush-stunt by the Notre Dame DC.
56 C Zach Shackelford - 85 snaps on offense
3 run-stuffs allowed
1 snap-infraction penalty
1 knockdown and one pin created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 71.71
It was a worse performance than notorious Deep Dig whipping boy Taylor Doyle had in all of 2015. The truth about Zach Shackelford is that he has been hidden and in many ways protected by an outstanding offensive scheme that doesn’t necessarily need dominant offensive line play to click. With so few zone-play calls in the run-game, Shackelford is far-less likely to ruin the whole play by giving up explosive and significant penetration to nose tackles in solo-base assignments. Since the offense relies on the power play so much, all Shackelford needs to do in many instances as the uncovered man is post-block the DT aligned at the backside shade once the guard pulls out.
Still, Kent Perkins was still held back a maddening number of times by being unable to get by Shackelford and to his assignment, thanks to Shackelford getting blown off his spot and into the backfield. Shackelford needs to gain strength and power and exposition to be anything more than a liability and a chess piece that needs to be game-planned to keep protected and out of critical assignments at the point-of-attack. What more could we really expect from a true freshman, though? They can’t all have Shane Buechele debuts. It’s reasonable to expect Shack to become a good college player, but he’s a work in progress.
76 RG Kent Perkins - 54 snaps on offense
1 QB pressure allowed
1 false-start penalty
1 knockdown created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 71.67
- Stop us if you’ve heard this one: Kent Perkins is moving inside from tackle, where he’d been playing “out of position,” back to his natural position at guard that takes most advantage of his immense strength and road-grading abilities in the run-game and will put him in the best position to showcase his skills for NFL teams and create a little buzz his senior season.
Ever heard something like that?
Yet, in his first game back at guard, he produced the worst score that he’s ever gotten per the Deep Dig, dating back to his sophomore year. In a game full of thrills and warm-fuzzies and throwbacks to Rose Bowl memories and more, Kent Perkins was, without a doubt, the biggest disappointment according to many vocal dwellers of our dark basement.
Perkins’ technique while engaging with defenders in the open field as a pulling guard is dreadful and is likely to lead an injury if it’s not fixed. He needs to keep his head up and his eyes on his target instead of ducking his head and shoulder and lurching. Even in the trenches, on plays where Kent Perkins usually wins — in a phone booth — he looked either hurt or extremely gassed. We think it was both. The only player in 2015 who had a worse game than Perkins did in 2016 versus Notre Dame was Marcus Hutchins versus OU.
58 RT Brandon Hodges - 70 snaps on offense
1 TFL allowed
1 knockdown created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 75.29
Likely one of the bigger pleasant surprises on the offensive line was Brandon Hodges, who, while in the game, appeared to be an upgrade from Tristan Nickelson who was the listed starter through fall camp before hurting an ankle. Some people say it takes a year to “get the JUCO out” of offensive linemen, (and it certainly was the case for former Longhorn Donald Hawkins given the elevation of his level of play from his junior to senior season per the Deep Dig).
Texas, last season, had measurably better performances from the right tackle position in only four games: Rice, Cal, Kansas State and Iowa State. If Hodges sticks at RT and plays like this every week, Texas will be substantially better off at the RT position than it was in 2015 - a year which, in its own right, saw significant improvement as well from the Camhron Hughes-doldrums of 2014.
Reserves
63 RG Alex Anderson - 28 snaps on offense
No disruption allowed
1 knockdown created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 75.36
75 RT Tristan Nickelson - 15 snaps on offense
1 QB pressure allowed
DEEP DIG GRADE: Insufficient sample
72 RG Elijah Rodriguez - 3 snaps on offense
No disruption allowed
DEEP DIG GRADE: Insufficient sample
Skill-position snap counts and one-liners
CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE SKILL PARTICIPATION CHART
Quarterback
7 Shane Buechele - 69 snaps
18 Tyrone Swoopes - 16 snaps
- You might have heard Texas founds its new quarterback; the coaches may want to tell Buechele to leave all that scrambling to Swoopes, though.
Running Back
33 D’Onta Foreman - 55 snaps
25 Chris Warren - 23 snaps
- Chris Warren will be a great runner for Texas, but even his 23 snaps to Foreman’s 55 seems like too many; the offense runs better when Foreman is in the game and Foreman’s aptitude and engagement without the ball in his hands has improved drastically in his junior year. The national hype has arrived. Finally. And deservedly.
Wide Receiver
1 John Burt - 83 snaps (54 at RWR, 29 at LWR)
3 Armanti Foreman - 83 snaps (54 at LWR, 18 at slot, 11 at RWR)
11 Jacorey Warrick - 43 snaps at slot
13 Jerrod Heard - 20 snaps (13 at slot, 7 at WR4)
6 Jake Oliver - 7 snaps at WR5
- Looks like we’ll have to wait until UTEP to get a good look at the Devin Duvernays, Lil’Jordan Humphreys and Collin Johnsons of the world.
Tight End
42 Caleb Bluiett - 58 snaps (44 at inline TE, 12 at H-Back, 2 at split TE)
47 Andrew Beck - 41 snaps (23 at H-back, 14 at inline TE, 4 at split TE)
64 Jake McMillon - 2 snaps at H-Back
- To those expecting the TE to make a big impact in the passing game within the new Texas offense, we hate to say we told ya so, but …
As we turn our attention toward a raggedy group of Miners from El Paso, we remind you that we live in constant anticipation of a future Texas monster.
We thank you, once again, for reading.
Notre Dame Part II: Offense
presented by Wendy Swantkowksi, DDS
Looking for experienced, family and cosmetic dental care in the Houston-Memorial area? Go with the best! OB sponsor Wendy Swantkowski, DDS. Call 281-293-9140 and find out why so many Orangebloods members are her patients!
. . .
The Texas offense versus Notre Dame looked like the unit that fans have dreamt of since the Mack Brown twilight era. You know, the offense that’s been promised through countless firings, youth injections and changes in philosophy. The undelivered promise now spanning the tenures of two different head coaches. All the coach-speak and propaganda pointed toward “tempo” annually; it just never happened.
The offense fans heard about all spring and summer from practice reports — year-after-year — detailed a break-neck pace and a spread-you-out philosophy that pounds the football then makes you pay with the deep shot.
Now fans have it. Furthermore, the Deep Dig proclaims OC Sterlin Gilbert as an offensive mind appears to be a prodigy. The beauty of his work, as we noted over and over during our study of the first game, is in its simplicity. Texas fans should enjoy him while he’s in Austin.
But we must live in the present … or what else are we doing here?
And it’s tough to chart 85 offensive plays week after week, but the maniacs in our dark basement will take the tradeoff. This tradeoff being, grading 20-or-so more plays a week on offense in exchange for the offensive philosophy being one we can actually understand from play to play. One that doesn’t make us scream at the projector, throw our hands up in the air and just say “we give up!”
It’s probably how some players even felt last season in a Jay Wickson offense. However, we need to temper all of this optimism and red-hot hype over a new regime with a dose of lukewarm reality:
If you opened up the Deep Dig today anticipating you’d read about how the Texas offensive line is now magically Montee Ball-era Wisconsin, you’ve come to the wrong place.
. . .
Offensive Line Thoughts and Grades
CLICK HERE TO ACCESS OFFICIAL OL GRADING LOG
55 LT Connor Williams - 85 snaps on offense
No disruption allowed
7 knockdowns and one pin-block created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 78.18
A monster game from Connor Williams tops the news and notes of the day on the offensive line and its all downhill from here. Let’s resolve to remember that Texas was playing against the best defensive line it will likely face all season. No. 90 for the fighting Irish pursues like a hungry puma and will play on Sundays. With this said, Williams managed his second-best grade per the Deep Dig since coming to Texas (with the best being a 78.23 performance in 2015 versus a lowly Rice team).
When taking into consideration the level of competition, Williams played his best game as a Longhorn versus Notre Dame and was the key to the offense running the football effectively more than any other player. This is because the offense ran the power concept to the left side of the line in the vast majority of cases and Williams was responsible for cave-down blocks at the point of attack versus four and five-techniques while also showing terrific athleticism to get to the second level off combos once he’d helped Vahe establish play-side leverage on three-techniques.
Williams will almost certainly begin tallying scores up into the 80s this season which means he’ll be on pace to be thought of in 2018 as a high-round NFL draft pick should he choose to declare early following his junior season.
77 LG Patrick Vahe - 85 snaps on offense
2 QB hits, 1 TFL and 1 run-stuff allowed
1 chop-block penalty
5 knockdowns created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 75.24
Coming off a twisted ankle last week, it was safe to expect that Vahe may play at a level slightly lower than expected, and maybe he did. Still, a 75+-grade is certainly acceptable and it’s the type of performance that, if Texas had it in virtually all games in the last three years from all five OL positions, would have led to drastic positive differences in how those seasons turned out.
Vahe showed improvement early on in the area of identifying stunts and twists when he and Williams made a beautiful pass-off and pick-up together, but was later tested in this capacity twice more and gave up not only a QB hit on a passing down but also a TFL against a beautifully designed rush-stunt by the Notre Dame DC.
56 C Zach Shackelford - 85 snaps on offense
3 run-stuffs allowed
1 snap-infraction penalty
1 knockdown and one pin created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 71.71
It was a worse performance than notorious Deep Dig whipping boy Taylor Doyle had in all of 2015. The truth about Zach Shackelford is that he has been hidden and in many ways protected by an outstanding offensive scheme that doesn’t necessarily need dominant offensive line play to click. With so few zone-play calls in the run-game, Shackelford is far-less likely to ruin the whole play by giving up explosive and significant penetration to nose tackles in solo-base assignments. Since the offense relies on the power play so much, all Shackelford needs to do in many instances as the uncovered man is post-block the DT aligned at the backside shade once the guard pulls out.
Still, Kent Perkins was still held back a maddening number of times by being unable to get by Shackelford and to his assignment, thanks to Shackelford getting blown off his spot and into the backfield. Shackelford needs to gain strength and power and exposition to be anything more than a liability and a chess piece that needs to be game-planned to keep protected and out of critical assignments at the point-of-attack. What more could we really expect from a true freshman, though? They can’t all have Shane Buechele debuts. It’s reasonable to expect Shack to become a good college player, but he’s a work in progress.
76 RG Kent Perkins - 54 snaps on offense
1 QB pressure allowed
1 false-start penalty
1 knockdown created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 71.67
- Stop us if you’ve heard this one: Kent Perkins is moving inside from tackle, where he’d been playing “out of position,” back to his natural position at guard that takes most advantage of his immense strength and road-grading abilities in the run-game and will put him in the best position to showcase his skills for NFL teams and create a little buzz his senior season.
Ever heard something like that?
Yet, in his first game back at guard, he produced the worst score that he’s ever gotten per the Deep Dig, dating back to his sophomore year. In a game full of thrills and warm-fuzzies and throwbacks to Rose Bowl memories and more, Kent Perkins was, without a doubt, the biggest disappointment according to many vocal dwellers of our dark basement.
Perkins’ technique while engaging with defenders in the open field as a pulling guard is dreadful and is likely to lead an injury if it’s not fixed. He needs to keep his head up and his eyes on his target instead of ducking his head and shoulder and lurching. Even in the trenches, on plays where Kent Perkins usually wins — in a phone booth — he looked either hurt or extremely gassed. We think it was both. The only player in 2015 who had a worse game than Perkins did in 2016 versus Notre Dame was Marcus Hutchins versus OU.
58 RT Brandon Hodges - 70 snaps on offense
1 TFL allowed
1 knockdown created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 75.29
Likely one of the bigger pleasant surprises on the offensive line was Brandon Hodges, who, while in the game, appeared to be an upgrade from Tristan Nickelson who was the listed starter through fall camp before hurting an ankle. Some people say it takes a year to “get the JUCO out” of offensive linemen, (and it certainly was the case for former Longhorn Donald Hawkins given the elevation of his level of play from his junior to senior season per the Deep Dig).
Texas, last season, had measurably better performances from the right tackle position in only four games: Rice, Cal, Kansas State and Iowa State. If Hodges sticks at RT and plays like this every week, Texas will be substantially better off at the RT position than it was in 2015 - a year which, in its own right, saw significant improvement as well from the Camhron Hughes-doldrums of 2014.
. . .
Reserves
63 RG Alex Anderson - 28 snaps on offense
No disruption allowed
1 knockdown created
DEEP DIG GRADE: 75.36
75 RT Tristan Nickelson - 15 snaps on offense
1 QB pressure allowed
DEEP DIG GRADE: Insufficient sample
72 RG Elijah Rodriguez - 3 snaps on offense
No disruption allowed
DEEP DIG GRADE: Insufficient sample
. . .
Skill-position snap counts and one-liners
CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE SKILL PARTICIPATION CHART
Quarterback
7 Shane Buechele - 69 snaps
18 Tyrone Swoopes - 16 snaps
- You might have heard Texas founds its new quarterback; the coaches may want to tell Buechele to leave all that scrambling to Swoopes, though.
Running Back
33 D’Onta Foreman - 55 snaps
25 Chris Warren - 23 snaps
- Chris Warren will be a great runner for Texas, but even his 23 snaps to Foreman’s 55 seems like too many; the offense runs better when Foreman is in the game and Foreman’s aptitude and engagement without the ball in his hands has improved drastically in his junior year. The national hype has arrived. Finally. And deservedly.
Wide Receiver
1 John Burt - 83 snaps (54 at RWR, 29 at LWR)
3 Armanti Foreman - 83 snaps (54 at LWR, 18 at slot, 11 at RWR)
11 Jacorey Warrick - 43 snaps at slot
13 Jerrod Heard - 20 snaps (13 at slot, 7 at WR4)
6 Jake Oliver - 7 snaps at WR5
- Looks like we’ll have to wait until UTEP to get a good look at the Devin Duvernays, Lil’Jordan Humphreys and Collin Johnsons of the world.
Tight End
42 Caleb Bluiett - 58 snaps (44 at inline TE, 12 at H-Back, 2 at split TE)
47 Andrew Beck - 41 snaps (23 at H-back, 14 at inline TE, 4 at split TE)
64 Jake McMillon - 2 snaps at H-Back
- To those expecting the TE to make a big impact in the passing game within the new Texas offense, we hate to say we told ya so, but …
. . .
As we turn our attention toward a raggedy group of Miners from El Paso, we remind you that we live in constant anticipation of a future Texas monster.
We thank you, once again, for reading.
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