A Premature look at your 2010 LSU Tigers

Maybe they only got 40 plays on offense because they didn't use players like Russell Shepard that would have gained yards and first downs. Miles is the HEAD COACH - ultimately, it's his fault.

I like Miles and he did a great job at Ok. State considering how they were. Based on his overall record here, he's done some great things at LSU. But there has been a noticeable slide the last few years. Yes, last year we were basically screwed by Ryan P. and by the decision to go with co-coordinators on D. Ryan P. was not Miles' fault, the defensive situation was though. But everyone makes mistakes and he was just trying to keep the success on D going. He's tried to correct that mistake and the D was better this year.

But there is no way that the offense should have been worse (50+ spots worse stat-wise) than last year. You had seniors at most key positions on offense except QB (which is important...I know). Still, things felt the same in almost every week of the season.

The lack of imagination this year was startling considering the players they had to work with. Then you add the Louisiana Tech moronic playcalling, the Ole Miss disaster and the totally undisciplined effort in the bowl game and you've got growing issues. Two years ago we gave up 50+ points twice and needed a miracle comeback after getting destroyed by Troy for three quarters.

Next year the schedule is majorly hard with only two easy games (McNeese St. and UL Monroe). And both of those are in the back half of the season. Starting off with North Carolina will not be easy after losing LaFell, Scott, Williams, Holliday, some linemen, etc.

They're gonna have to play well fast next year because there is no time to mess around like this year. West Virginia will be really tough if Noel Devine stays. He's like McCluster in the backfield. He rushed for almost 1,500 yards this year and is extremely fast. Then add in Tennessee and an extremely improved Mississippi State and those first five games are gonna be tough. And then we've got to go to Florida (even though they won't be as good), to Auburn and to Arkansas which will be really tough. We play 8 bowl teams from this year in all.

On D, we never had anyone on the D-line really jump out or play consistently really. That's a problem because if Chavis' D is ever going to be dominant, we need a fierce D-line. Nevis shows great ability at times and could have a great year next year, but other than him, we haven't seen much and that's surprising with the type of recruits we get. We're also losing a couple of good LBs. So I don't know if the D will be that much better next year since we didn't see any new guys that showed a lot of potential this year. In fact, some of our D-linemen seem to have been getting worse upon reaching their final year at LSU.

So with us losing all the guys we've lost on offense along with two linebackers that are key to what Chavis does, I don't see how we'll be that different unless they totally change some of their schemes on offense and defense. Shepard really didn't get much of any experience this year and should have been redshirted looking back. It's not like he'll have one great year of experience under his belt. The biggest disappointment in the bowl game was that we had nothing planned with him after a whole month of crucial practice. We showed nothing for the future (unless you count Ridley getting stuffed over and over). I do think Ridley is better than that, but that's basically the only different thing we showed and it didn't work.

I look forward to seeing Rueben Randle next year and think he could be awesome (IF they make an effort to throw to him). Toliver could have a huge impact as well. The RB position is a big question mark really for the first time in a while. I think JJ will be better too, but if the running game is not drastically better, it won't matter.

Overall, I think the Coker affect might be happening here. It does appear that way. We were dangerously close this year to finishing with the same amount of losses if not more than we had last year (Mississippi State..Georgia). But we won so I've got to give Les and co. credit even if Jefferson is the one that called the run to Scott that won us the Georgia game.

Anyway, Bama looks like they will be the easy favorite again next year. It seems like a possible 3+ loss season for us. If we lose four games next year, I think Miles is gone unfortunately. Three losses I think he can survive, but four and I think it's over.

A super running back could keep Miles' safe or playing Shep and having him take over like some think he has the potential to do in the future. Right now, other than Peterson on D at times, LSU has nobody that is super out there to separate them from the rest. LSU needs someone like that on offense. I think we have a couple of those guys, but it's up to the coaches now to bring those guys to the front. We'll see next year...I can always hope.

 

It may be easier said than done, as I have never coached, but you should have the scheme fit the players, not the players fit the scheme, especially in college where student atheletes' time is limited and the maturity of players is constantly changing. There comes a point, and I'm talking about the offense and CGC, where it seems to me that we're trying to do too much, trying to be so tricky, that we're tricking ourselves into bad excecution.

 

as the eternal optimist, i'll point out that the running game sucked this year so replacing black and hitt and scott could lead to improvement. dickson wasnt hardly used this year so losing him for real may not have an impact. lafell was very good but a Sr Toliver + So Randle may be as good as Sr Lafell + Jr Toliver.

the big key is the qb is back and should improve. the OL should be better because of better depth and there wont be an undersized Fr starting C, and overmatched starting Sr G and out of position So G. plus if the QB improves a little the OL will look better. also with another year comes another chance to find a great new RB.