Every Sunday morning, I'll do a day after rundown of ten things I thought about Saturday's game. Here are my lingering observations from the 38-19 season opening loss to Alabama.
1) I was surprised by how little surprised me. We talked all August and September about how it was going to be impossible to know anything about this team. But what we saw was largely what we thought we would see. Shawn Robinson was the starting quarterback, the Tigers have a couple of very good running backs, the offensive line is a major concern, so is the defensive line, Nick Bolton is a superstar and safety may be Missouri's best overall position. Those were all things we thought in August and they were all things that played out last night. We'll get more in depth on most of those things in the rest of the column, but overall, I saw nothing last night that changes my opinion of what this team and this season will be either positively or negatively. It largely was the game I would have expected to see the day the schedule came out.
2) Last night was more about Alabama than it was about Missouri. I said on the pregame show if Alabama plays an A game it blows Missouri out. If it plays a B game it wins without much trouble. If it plays a C game, it would probably be close, but Bama still might manage to win. That's what the talent difference is. I think last night showed the difference between Nick Saban and coaches like Lincoln Riley and Ed Orgeron and even Kirby Smart. Despite a crazy offseason, despite every distraction imaginable, despite knowing nothing about the other team and not knowing for sure who would be able to play until Friday morning, Saban wasn't going to let his team come out unfocused. He is the king of preparation and it showed. Bama had a three and out on its first drive then scored on the next three possessions to remove any doubt. Jaylen Waddle is an absolute superstar. Mac Jones was very good last night, but to be fair, almost any quarterback is going to be very good when he has so much time that he could eat a snack in the pocket and the equipment guy doesn't have to wash his uniform. That's not saying he's not going to be a good quarterback. He probably will be. But the one chance Missouri had was to throw him off his rhythm and put him under duress. They never did that (the pressure they did get didn't come until freshman Bryce Young was in the game behind a different offensive line).
3) I don't want those first two thoughts to give you the impression there was nothing to like about Missouri's performance. I thought there was quite a bit to like and we're going to focus on those things for the next few bullet points. I liked that Missouri kept fighting. I don't think there's a ton of value in a last possession drive against reserves where you have to call three timeouts to get in the end zone on the final snap in most situations. But in the first game of a new regime against the No. 2 (and probably underrated) team in the country with a lot of guys trying to make an impression on the coach, I think there's some value in it. Missouri was still hitting and still running hard and still trying to squeeze every drop out of that game. I think that will probably count for something with the fans. I know it will count for something when the coaches look at the tape.
4) That attitude was most personified by Missouri's best player on each side of the ball. Larry Rountree III ran HARD. All night. I thought he was a joy to watch last night. The numbers weren't mind blowing. He had 14 carries for 67 yards. That's nearly five yards a carry against a damn good defense. That'll work. Eli Drinkwitz said after the game he should have gotten more carries. I agree. Rountree is a guy who has shown in his career he can handle 25 carries in a game. In fact, he often gets better when he gets that many. He should be option one for this Missouri team. I'd give him 80% of the carries and use Tyler Badie (hell of a burst and a nice play design on that touchdown catch--more on that in a bit) as the change of pace or when Rountree needs a break.
On the other side, Nick Bolton is Missouri's best linebacker at least since Kentrell Brothers and he might be the best since Sean Weatherspoon. The dude is just all over the place. For the first quarter and a half, if there was a Missouri player near the ball, it was almost always Bolton or Tyree Gillespie. And the dudes can both bring the lumber. The best sign for a new coach is when your best players are bought in. Both of those guys are clearly bought in and they'll lead this team.
5) The quarterback position always gets too much attention, so let's talk quarterbacks. Here's where we have to start: Shawn Robinson was the starter. Drinkwitz said after the game that he felt Robinson gave Missouri the best chance to move the ball against the Tide.
So that's our baseline. And if we use that as the baseline, I don't think Robinson did anything whatsoever to hurt his status. He was far from perfect. But the two biggest mistakes he made (the fumble on the ill advised option pitch and taking the terrible sack when Mizzou had moved inside the 10) were mistakes of aggression. He was trying to make a play. I think a lot of times with mobile quarterbacks (Deshawn Watson is an excellent example) you see more negative plays than the traditional pocket passer because they always think their legs can get them out of trouble and extend the play long enough to make something happen. Sometimes it works, but sometimes it leads to losing 20 yards. Robinson said after the game he needs to learn to throw the ball away. He's right. But other than that, I mostly liked what I saw. He was on target most of the night (19-25 with a couple of drops) and he threw the ball better than I thought he would. He did it despite being under pretty intense pressure a lot of the night.
I didn't see anything to dislike a lot from Connor Bazelak (though he did miss a few open receivers) but I didn't see anything to tell me he should overtake Robinson either. I think he's getting a lot of credit for a handful of quarters from last season. Don't get me wrong, he showed some promise, but he did it against a Georgia team that had mostly mailed it in and an Arkansas team that was terrible. I want to stress I'm not saying he isn't going to be a good quarterback. He may be and it's possible he is the best quarterback on this roster and will deserve to start at some point this season. But last night didn't show me that. Last night showed me that whatever the rotation was going into the game is what it should be coming out of the game. I don't like a two quarterback system as a general rule. I think teams are better when they settle on one. But after an offseason that greatly curtailed Drinkwitz's chance to evaluate his guys and during a season that you almost have to use at least the first three games as a version of preseason, I'm fine with putting them both out there some and finding out a little bit more about them.
1) I was surprised by how little surprised me. We talked all August and September about how it was going to be impossible to know anything about this team. But what we saw was largely what we thought we would see. Shawn Robinson was the starting quarterback, the Tigers have a couple of very good running backs, the offensive line is a major concern, so is the defensive line, Nick Bolton is a superstar and safety may be Missouri's best overall position. Those were all things we thought in August and they were all things that played out last night. We'll get more in depth on most of those things in the rest of the column, but overall, I saw nothing last night that changes my opinion of what this team and this season will be either positively or negatively. It largely was the game I would have expected to see the day the schedule came out.
2) Last night was more about Alabama than it was about Missouri. I said on the pregame show if Alabama plays an A game it blows Missouri out. If it plays a B game it wins without much trouble. If it plays a C game, it would probably be close, but Bama still might manage to win. That's what the talent difference is. I think last night showed the difference between Nick Saban and coaches like Lincoln Riley and Ed Orgeron and even Kirby Smart. Despite a crazy offseason, despite every distraction imaginable, despite knowing nothing about the other team and not knowing for sure who would be able to play until Friday morning, Saban wasn't going to let his team come out unfocused. He is the king of preparation and it showed. Bama had a three and out on its first drive then scored on the next three possessions to remove any doubt. Jaylen Waddle is an absolute superstar. Mac Jones was very good last night, but to be fair, almost any quarterback is going to be very good when he has so much time that he could eat a snack in the pocket and the equipment guy doesn't have to wash his uniform. That's not saying he's not going to be a good quarterback. He probably will be. But the one chance Missouri had was to throw him off his rhythm and put him under duress. They never did that (the pressure they did get didn't come until freshman Bryce Young was in the game behind a different offensive line).
3) I don't want those first two thoughts to give you the impression there was nothing to like about Missouri's performance. I thought there was quite a bit to like and we're going to focus on those things for the next few bullet points. I liked that Missouri kept fighting. I don't think there's a ton of value in a last possession drive against reserves where you have to call three timeouts to get in the end zone on the final snap in most situations. But in the first game of a new regime against the No. 2 (and probably underrated) team in the country with a lot of guys trying to make an impression on the coach, I think there's some value in it. Missouri was still hitting and still running hard and still trying to squeeze every drop out of that game. I think that will probably count for something with the fans. I know it will count for something when the coaches look at the tape.
4) That attitude was most personified by Missouri's best player on each side of the ball. Larry Rountree III ran HARD. All night. I thought he was a joy to watch last night. The numbers weren't mind blowing. He had 14 carries for 67 yards. That's nearly five yards a carry against a damn good defense. That'll work. Eli Drinkwitz said after the game he should have gotten more carries. I agree. Rountree is a guy who has shown in his career he can handle 25 carries in a game. In fact, he often gets better when he gets that many. He should be option one for this Missouri team. I'd give him 80% of the carries and use Tyler Badie (hell of a burst and a nice play design on that touchdown catch--more on that in a bit) as the change of pace or when Rountree needs a break.
On the other side, Nick Bolton is Missouri's best linebacker at least since Kentrell Brothers and he might be the best since Sean Weatherspoon. The dude is just all over the place. For the first quarter and a half, if there was a Missouri player near the ball, it was almost always Bolton or Tyree Gillespie. And the dudes can both bring the lumber. The best sign for a new coach is when your best players are bought in. Both of those guys are clearly bought in and they'll lead this team.
5) The quarterback position always gets too much attention, so let's talk quarterbacks. Here's where we have to start: Shawn Robinson was the starter. Drinkwitz said after the game that he felt Robinson gave Missouri the best chance to move the ball against the Tide.
So that's our baseline. And if we use that as the baseline, I don't think Robinson did anything whatsoever to hurt his status. He was far from perfect. But the two biggest mistakes he made (the fumble on the ill advised option pitch and taking the terrible sack when Mizzou had moved inside the 10) were mistakes of aggression. He was trying to make a play. I think a lot of times with mobile quarterbacks (Deshawn Watson is an excellent example) you see more negative plays than the traditional pocket passer because they always think their legs can get them out of trouble and extend the play long enough to make something happen. Sometimes it works, but sometimes it leads to losing 20 yards. Robinson said after the game he needs to learn to throw the ball away. He's right. But other than that, I mostly liked what I saw. He was on target most of the night (19-25 with a couple of drops) and he threw the ball better than I thought he would. He did it despite being under pretty intense pressure a lot of the night.
I didn't see anything to dislike a lot from Connor Bazelak (though he did miss a few open receivers) but I didn't see anything to tell me he should overtake Robinson either. I think he's getting a lot of credit for a handful of quarters from last season. Don't get me wrong, he showed some promise, but he did it against a Georgia team that had mostly mailed it in and an Arkansas team that was terrible. I want to stress I'm not saying he isn't going to be a good quarterback. He may be and it's possible he is the best quarterback on this roster and will deserve to start at some point this season. But last night didn't show me that. Last night showed me that whatever the rotation was going into the game is what it should be coming out of the game. I don't like a two quarterback system as a general rule. I think teams are better when they settle on one. But after an offseason that greatly curtailed Drinkwitz's chance to evaluate his guys and during a season that you almost have to use at least the first three games as a version of preseason, I'm fine with putting them both out there some and finding out a little bit more about them.
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