Hating on the $EC - Mostly Alabama (and a little Georgia too)

[AlabamAlum]

Proud of the boys. Covid, injuries, but still Saban ties Bryant in NCs at Bama and passes him overall.

Gonna miss DeVonta. Gonna miss Mac, Najee, that OLine, Waddle....


DSL and Talent. I know it’s hard. Covid and injuries are frustrating. I don’t know why froot hates Coach Ryan Day. He seems pretty good.

Roll Tide.

[THE_WIZARD_]

The sandbaggery only ends at the final gun.

Just STFU. Seriously.

Cheaters 52 Somewhat Less Cheaters 24

Yay.

[AlabamAlum]

Play at Rupp tomorrow. If we can beat Kentucky, pretty good week.

[lineygoblue]

This is how I'd put the final rankings

1. Alabama -- duh .. They're the best. Proven on the field. Nick has built a true dynasty.
2. Ohio State -- I still think they belong here. They're better than Clemson and ND .. and I think they'd beat TAMU.
3. Clemson -- Only because when Lawrence is at his best, he's hard to beat.
4. TAMU -- I think they'd beat ND as well. Jimbo has got a solid team that will be better in 2021.

Beyond that, you could take Florida, ND, Georgia and Oklahoma, and rank them anywhere from 5-9.

[iam416]

Alabama 52, Ohio State 34. Ohio State may get one more at the death, but I think UAT -8' is probably safe.

I assumed Ohio State could effectively run the ball, which they could not. If you had told me that Sermon would be out then I'd downgraded the score.

The reality is Ohio State just doesn't have the DB talent it had last year and the DB talent it does have is adequate for the B10 but it's just not there for an elite offense. And I'm not sure what Coombs was doing.

In any event, not much to talk about with that one. So, I guess that's nice.

[Hannibal]

I feel for the poor bastard that has to follow in The Nick's footsteps.

[AlabamAlum]

The four differences that gave Bama the win:

- I know JF says he was “95%” but it sure didn’t seem like it. He severely limited his running. The couple of times he did run, he was effective. Losing Sermon didn’t help, either.

- Against Clemson, Ohio State’s DL manhandled the Tiger OL. Some key Covid and gameplay injuries on that line meant Jones had more time and Najee didn’t have to suffer many TFLs.

-DeVonta is special. He is faster than Jeudy, but with the same great routes and the best hands I have seen in a long time.

-Christian Barmore played out of his mind. He continually disrupted things on the line. Easily the best game of his career.

[iam416]

Clemson's OL is bad. UAT's is the best in the country.

Barmore was good all game. He became particurlarly good when Wyatt Davis went out and OSU was playing a true frosh at OG.

[AlabamAlum]

Wyatt Davis. I know Bama wanted that kid bad.

[Jeff Buchanan]

It was great CFB for a while from both teams. I don't think it's just a huge talent differential at UAT. Did we see any of UAT's or OSU's 1st round NFL picks sitting out? Nope. That tells you something about commitment to goals that are set by the coaching staffs of each program. I'd call it synchronicity. Alabama in particular had that and sustained it and I think OSU would have had developed and sustained it had injuries not occured - loss of Sermons was a killer. JF was wounded. Man, that's a lot of offense down the tubes there.

After Alabama hit 35 you could see the air going out of the OSU sideline. That is the Nick's recipe for clubbing an opponent. Yo get that kind of point differential and he deploys his D much more aggressively.

After OSU held Bama to a FG to open the 3rd then stormed down the field to score, I thought there was a chance for a comeback but how OSU's Cooms continued to deploy his D was a recipe for success on Bama's O and Sark took advantage. Sure, Sark has some tools but man he called a great game abusing Cooms with a quick, short passing game that got Devonta, Mitche (sp?) and Najee in space emptied with the loose zone (?) coverage it looked like Cooms had in. Whatever it was, whatever weaknesses Cooms was trying to cover up, it didn't work. Reminded me of Don Brown v. CRD. It had to be painful for Talent and DSL to watch. I know how that felt.

[AlabamAlum]

The other thing that hurt OSU badly was the BigTen. Limiting gameplay just got fewer reps for younger players. That coupled with onerous and overreaching Covid rules hamstrung the Bucknuts.

[AlabamAlum]

Anyway, glad we finally exorcised the ghost of Ezekiel Elliott.

[iam416]

The other thing that hurt OSU badly was the BigTen. Limiting gameplay just got fewer reps for younger players. That coupled with onerous and overreaching Covid rules hamstrung the Bucknuts.

Yeah, this is a little underrated. They were essentially replacing their secondary and they were replacing their DC. And they didn't have spring ball or much of summer ball to get any of that in. I think it definitely showed all year.

I think question is still very much up for debate re whether Coombs can be a successful DC. I'm not really inclined to pass judgment based on this fucked up season or a game against a top 3 offense of all-time. But, it wasn't an encouraging season. I knew there'd be a drop-off, but didn't think it'd be quite so stark.

[AlabamAlum]

Tuscaloosa: the next epicenter of a Covid hotspot:

[THE_WIZARD_]

...thinning the herd...cool...