Scrimmage

Can anybody give me a rundown of todays action? Who looked good? How did our DB's and WR's do? Any suprises?

 

Today...

As I posted in another forum..

The following players made plays...

Michael Bates (looked great at RB and receiving)
Randy Fasani Started slow, but got stronger & threw a TD
Hoover Had A good run
Dante Wesley made a few plays
Goings made a few plays..
DF only had a handful of touches.. had an 8 yard gain on his first touch.
Lamar Smith looked durable..

Defense stifled the offense.

 

I think you missed a couple. My thoughts...

* For some reason, they had Lamar Smith running east/west and Foster running north/south (this was against both their strengths). Are they hiding?

* D Cooper is a beast. Very tall with long arms and huge vertical leap. He made a hell of a interception with a nice return. If we waive him, he'll get picked up somewhere quick and we'll never see him again (unless it is as an oppenent).

* Morgan is fast...I mean fast. He was floating 5 yards back in the middle of the field when #2 team QB Fasani bootlegged. Morgan closed at ungodly speed forcing Fasani to throw early. Did I mention that Morgan was fast?

* WR #17 (Baker) had a couple of impressive grabs and has good speed. This relatively tall skinny white boy reminds me a little of Pat Jeffers. He'll probably spend his rookie season on the practice squad but we'll see him again if one of our receivers goes down.

* Wesley needs to work on his tackling. Michael Bates made him look bad. Speaking of Bates, he hasn't lost a step and is also a threat out of the backfield (good hands in the flat).

* I'll say it now. Steve Smith will be our #2 WR. Bryd dropped everything thrown his way and is not a playmaker. Smith will draw double coverage and with Welsey, Muhammed, and Hoover all on the field something has to give.

* Peppers needs to work on his fan interaction. Others have talked about his attitute at Fan Appreciation Day so all I'll say is that he left the field (the only one to do so) without signing autographs. Five minutes later he was forced back out on the field with a friendly hand pushing him toward a group of fans.

Maybe more later but I need to get back to work for now. It was a long weekend as my 2 year old son and I had to drive 9 hours (one way) to attend. I was happy to see the level of support Panther Fans generated in showing up for this limited scrimmage. Cheers to all.

 

Now that's a fan! Hats off to ya, ColinG.


Thanks for the observations.

 

No problem.

And BTW, I was mistaken on the name of #17. It's Baker, not Tate. Don't know much about Tim Baker but he had some moves and speed. He was doubled when Fasani hit him for a 35 yard touchdown during the last set of 2nd vs 2nd.

 

I agree with Coiln on most everything. My top two players out the scrimmage would have to be 1)Bates and 2) Fasani. Hell, did we even have a 34 yard TD passlast year? And he almost threw another one at the end of the final 12 plays. The ref blew the whistle calling the play a sack but Fasani threw it anyway however a bit underthrown and the DB made a nice play to knock it down. Anyway I would put Fasani ahead of Weinke already.

Was dissapointed not to see Peppers playing but even more dissapointed to see him sitting on the bench with his head under a towel or BS'ing with other guys not suited up. He could at least show some interest and watch the action like Wesley Walls was. Seemed like he didn't even care if he was there or not. I know he had a headache from the collision but take some Advil and move on pal. I sure hope this guy doesn't have an attitude problem.


I wished Foster could have gotten the ball a bit more. It was hard to say either way how he looked.

The verdict is still out on Deke Cooper. The interception was thrown right to him and he looked like Robin Wiliams in "The Best of Times" before he finally hauled it in, nice return though.

Speaking of the INT return I don't know if the heat was getting to me or what but Joe Montgomery tackled Cooper and I think he actually got up and did one of those kind of shiver, dance move type deals after the tackle. I didn't know whether to laugh or walk out on the filed and cut the guy myself for making such an ass out of himself. I think someone forget to tell him his "team" just turned the ball over and that this was a practice. Making a tackle on an INT return isn't the same as scoring a TD buddy , get a life. What a scrub.

Overall, defense definatley ruled the day but I was happy to at least see the offense score once. And like I said I don't think I saw a 34 yard td last year so things already look better. And there was actually more than 1 run every 12 plays which was also encouraging.

 

By BigCat's notes Weinke was 2/4, 14 yards, 1 sack, one scramble for 6 yards. Would have been three for four if not for a Mangum drop on 3rd and 3 for the first down. Also notable was a breakup by Wesley that could have been Smith TD on flea flicker. Scramble was on 3rd and 11 after a sack and a draw. I gotta wonder why he didn't get more time.

Fasani was 1-4 for 7 yards and five yards on a scramble (3rd and 23?), then in his second set was 8/8 throwing simple patterns - stuff to the backs and then the score to Baker. he was sacked twice (if you count an ugly QB draw), threw three short ones to the TEs, and was able to complete three to backs for a total of 59 of his yards. You can tell he's West Coast, and we're gonna have to slap his wrists a few times to get him to think straight again. It doesn't surprise me that he warmed up some, nor that he was inconsistent.

I think from reading some of these comments - if the team is looking for a 3rd down type back, Bates is who they're hoping to get that done. I'd be surprised to see another back here besides he, Foster, and Smith, but I imagine a 4th could be Montgomery. Based on scrimmage I don't think Goings or Brown will have much for the team unless either really stands out in special teams...and it's not as if we don't already have a good special teams unit.

I think our DL depth is fine now. I wish I'd heard more about our linebacker play, but all I hear out of anybody is that Morgan is fast. That's good...we should be able to make him into a player that will eclipse a Zach Thomas and outpace Brooking.

Based on what I hear, I do feel a little bit better about Cousin being the one corner. I have high hopes for Howard, but I don't think that anything he'll bring will be enough to keep us from having to go get more next year.

 

I was thinking early in the week that Montgomery would beat out Brown for a roster spot, but at Friday's training camp Brown was returning kicks alongside Bates when Smith wasn't in. Makes me wonder if they will hold a special teams spot for Brown and give Montgomery the boot?

 

I was also wondering if Brad Jackson was still w/ the first team defense Saturday?

 

in answer to the question regarding the linebackers all I can say is:

* There really wasn't enough playing to watch them specifically as I was more interested in seeing our DBs play.
* I didn't see any blitzing during the scrimmage (not that there wasn't any, I just didn't catch it if they did). I'd assume they didn't blitz as it would be unfair to the QBs (they were calling sacks if a defensive player got within 5 feet). A couple of the "sacks" looked like they would have been easily avoided as they stepped into the pocket. The refs still blew the whistle.
* I was satified with the way the linebacking core and the defensive line stuffed the run but less than thrilled with how they converged on passes to the flats.
* Some say Mangum dropped a catchable pass in a crossing route but from the cheap seats (as in, shaded area) it looked like Morgan disrupted the pass. More specifically, he chased him down as Mangum went left to right getting a hand in at the last minute.

Other than all that, I'd only say it would be a ashame if we allow dink and dunks to abuse us as we of all people should know have to combat it. I can remember last season when Doug Evans would know how the WRs would adjust to one of our blitzes better than the WRs. A number of his interceptions were him just waiting for the ball. With our core of corners...sigh.

drunkmetsfan said D Cooper looked like Robin Williams trying to catch a ball thrown right at him. The dude WAS fully extended doing his best interpretation of a "jump ball" stretch. He got a finger on it tipping it once, twice, and catching it as he landed square on his back. That would have knocked wind out of me yet he got up and had a nice runback. I'm not his agent but...you'll see this guy again.