1) The bling is back. I saw the guys enjoying their new shoulder pads & Big giant red & black beads. People who think guys won't go out & work extra hard to make a big ply to wear the bling & get recognized are either too old to remember what made them tick as a teenager which half of them still are, or they never played the game at all.
2) Ben did an even better job of running the team & managing the game than I thought as the game was being played. When I hear people complain about every single play like they are all supposed to be perfect, it makes me think of someone scratching a chalk board. There are several reasons plays don't work in football. One of them is great planning & execution by the other guys. And a lot of the incompletions we had were caused by the other team simply putting too much pressure & having too good a coverage against our guys. For the most part, Ben did a great job of reading & reacting to coverage & pressure. And he made some passes that were as good as any I've seen at any level. But his tough running in the 2nd half is what really put that game away for us. He completely put his body on the line to make plays to extend drives, score TDs & run out the clock.
3) The sunbelt in general has some of the best defensive backs in the country from what I've seen this season. And UL has one of if not the best defensive back sevens in the country. So all of this balogna about oh, they're just not that good this year is a bunch of crap. I don't know what kind of 40 time Braylon Trahan has, but I have liked his play since the first time I saw him. I don't know if he will be highly sought after at the NFL level, but this guy is a pipe laying, ball hawking mean bastard who isn't afraid to hit anybody. And I'm definitely gonna be pulling for him at the next level.
Eric Garror has next level star written all over him. Pedesclaux, not sure about that spelling, is an opportunistic sneaky hitter that plays way bigger than he looks. I don't want to miss anyone here, but I really enjoy watching these guys play along with Zion, Moncrief, Jones, just the whole crew. A lot of very talented hard hitting guys earning that bling.
4) Jefferson is definitely an NFL talent at WR. Now that he has a QB that can get him the ball anywhere on the field, it is going to be fun to see just how badly this guy can abuse DBs. if he can abuse Marshall's DBs he can abuse just about anyone.
5) Our offensive blocking scheme sucks donkey balls. It needs trashing right quick & in a hurry, or our whole offensive line will never have any confidence in themselves. I don't want to have to go into details, but if the coaches can't look at the film of the games I've seen & figure it out, then shame on them. I can tell you just looking at the size of our line that we should be playing way better than we are. But our schemes are just putrifying & I don't care what this O'line coaches resume is, he needs to be replaced.
6) Once again, we managed to under utilize out tight ends. But we did manage to run a couple of crossing routes this week. Both of which had massive success. So it was nice to see some imagination. But until we get the blocking schemes on offense changed, it is going to be hard to have sustained success with anything else we do.