GroupThink 3 - Kitty Hawk, 2022

[Fritz]

you might as well cut Leslie now.

[Fritz]

Why don't I recall Ellison? Was that a GM pick?

[cuervo72]

Originally posted by Fritz
you might as well cut Leslie now.

In that case we're finished. I re-signed Rufus (apparently bonuses are only special cases for new signees), cut Leslie and picked up pass rushing SILB Kurt Moe. That puts us at 60. I'll post the files if that's ok, and you guys can tackle training camp tonight.

[cuervo72]

Originally posted by Fritz
Why don't I recall Ellison? Was that a GM pick?

Ellison was the FB that Quik converted, our 5th rounder.

[Fritz]

Originally posted by cuervo72
Ellison was the FB that Quik converted, our 5th rounder.

wow

[Fritz]

my intent in preseason is to install a plan that batters the gut heavy and then goes DEEP on passes.

I think it will bomb, but will develop our linemen and screw up the first team play against.

After the preseason our plan will look more like it has the past two seasons.

[cuervo72]

Hey, if it galvanizes the line and sorts out the receivers, so be it.

Here's the first file:

[cuervo72]

And the second:


Feel free to let me know if I f'd anything up.

[cthomer5000]

Originally posted by cuervo72
That's fine, I guess it could be a little shady. If we did it once, what's stopping us from doing that with every rookie FA (making them one big experiment) not drafted? Maybe we should look at a general position change rule - I don't know if a limit has been discussed yet.

As on outsider who's read every post of this "dynasty," I think a limit on the number of position changes might be worthwhile. While moving a veteran OLB to MLB might not be that big a deal in real life, significant coaching time might be needed to help move a rookie RB to WR. The learning curve is sharp enough for a rookie player, but one trying out a completely new position would (in real life) need a pretty large amount of indivudal attention.

I think you should basically pretend your staff has limited time for "project" players each off-season, and decide how many you should allow yourselves.

[Buzzbee]

Originally posted by cthomer5000
As on outsider who's read every post of this "dynasty," I think a limit on the number of position changes might be worthwhile. While moving a veteran OLB to MLB might not be that big a deal in real life, significant coaching time might be needed to help move a rookie RB to WR. The learning curve is sharp enough for a rookie player, but one trying out a completely new position would (in real life) need a pretty large amount of indivudal attention.

I think you should basically pretend your staff has limited time for "project" players each off-season, and decide how many you should allow yourselves.

I think that might be a pretty good idea. It allows Fritz and Albion some flexibility and creativity in setting their game plans, yet prevents us from exploiting the game.

I believe it is probably more prevalent for rookies to change positions than veterans (a college DE moving to OLB in the NFL), so perhaps we could allow 2 rookies and 1 veteran per year. Or more? Or less?

[albionmoonlight]

While we are waiting for the season to start, I would like the opinions of all lurkers and participants (who choose to comment) on our situation at WLB/SLB.

As you may know, it appears pretty likely that FOF4 takes out the WLB when the team switches to a nickel defense.

Our defense had been premised on putting our strongest run stopper (Mills) at SLB and using the WLB as our primary pass rusher. I made that decision based on my instinctive belief that teams would run more in the direction of the TE and that it would be easier to get to the QB on the side without the TE. An analysis of run directions against us seems to confirm that belief. Teams run more toward the strong side and less toward the weak side.

With this new knowledge, we are faced with a couple of related choices. I would like your input.

We have been setting the WLB to do most of the blitzing. This setup has had the effect of having our nickelback get a lot of sacks because (apparently) he "inherets" the WLB sack percentage. He got a handful of sacks last year in that role, but perhaps he would be better in coverage.

We have been putting Mills at SLB. He cannot rush the passer, and he cannot cover receivers, but he can stop the run. If we keep him on the strong side, teams will continue to run toward him. However, he stays on the field for passing downs. If we switch him to WLB, he will come off the field for passing downs. Of course, we will then have to lower the WLB blitz percentage a lot because Mills is poor at rushing the passer.

Another option (that occurs to me as I type) might be to switch to a 3-4 this preseason to see who is taken off the field in the nickel situation. If it is the WILB (as opposed to the WLB), then Mills could play WILB and we could still get lots of rushes from the WLB spot. That is probably worth trying.

I am probably not doing a good job of explaining what I am asking, but that is because I am not really asking any one thing. In general, I would just like people's insights into how to take into account our new knowledge about the nickel replacement and teams' run direction in deciding how to run the defense.

[Fritz]

I think in the nickle that you wil have 4 down linemen, and the WLB and WILB willcome off.

[dixieflatline]

Albion,

In my latest TCY dynasty I have had a similiar problem that my best run stuffing OLB is not the best pass defending OLB. In TCY at least, Fritz is right both the WOLB and WILB come off and SILB and SOLB stay on. The best way I have found to counter this is to move the run stuffing OLB to DE on passing downs. Then the WOLB will come off but he will be the first replacement and since the starting SOLB is playing at DE the WOLB comes in his place and plays SOLB. I hope that makes sense. That works better for me than it probably would for you though because both of my OLB's can rush the passer and Mills can't really rush the passer. You might be able to use something similiar if you go 3-4 because FOF seems to move you back to four downlineman in Nickel situations though. Maybe Mills as the WILB would be the answer.

[Buzzbee]

I ran training camp based on the times we used the past two seasons. Here are the results. The last two columns show the change in the Current rating (CurrCHG) and the Future rating (FutCHG). It is evident that Karl Preston is a bust. Larry Wylie and Chuck Drake had great camps, and Ethan Francis, David Huntley, Kenneth Alston, Irv Wallace, and Cornell Devitt had solid camps according to our scout.

Player		Pos	Current	Future	CurPost	FutPost	CurrCHGFutCHG

Sparks,	Heath	QB	41	41	41	41	0	0

Francis,Ethan	QB	32	51	36	51	4	0

Tittle,	Bennie	QB	15	34	16	34	1	0

Lindsay,Rod	QB	12	35	14	32	2	-3

Finley,	Daniel	RB	66	66	66	66	0	0

Strong,	Rob	RB	33	39	35	39	2	0

Harden,	R.J.	RB	53	62	55	62	2	0

Rivers,	Dennis	RB	26	34	27	34	1	0

Kowalski,RondellFB	19	19	19	19	0	0

Rubble,	Earnest	FB	59	60	59	60	0	0

Robertson,Peter	FB	21	40	24	43	3	3

Diana,	Julio	TE	24	26	24	26	0	0

Wayne,	Bernard	TE	29	42	32	42	3	0

Wylie,	Larry	TE	54	68	59	68	5	0

Carr,	Kenneth	FL	37	38	37	38	0	0

Song,	Peter	FL	54	54	56	56	2	2

Sanderson,RobertFL	32	42	34	42	2	0

Ellison,KendrickFL	20	49	21	44	1	-5

Mixon,	Eric	SE	18	48	20	48	2	0

Jefferson,Chad	SE	24	34	25	32	1	-2

Irwin,	Nolan	SE	15	39	15	33	0	-6

Andrews,Willie	LT	59	59	59	59	0	0

Johns,	Timothy	LT	44	49	47	49	3	0

Huntley,David	LT	44	49	48	49	4	0

Hausermann,Dave	LG	39	40	39	40	0	0

Drake,	Chuck	C	41	53	46	53	5	0

Alston,	Kenneth	C	30	73	34	70	4	-3

Johnson,Jerry	RG	38	60	41	60	3	0

Peterson,Rufus	RG	40	44	43	44	3	0

Wallace,Irv	RG	22	50	26	50	4	0

Preston,Karl	RG	17	48	18	29	1	-19

Grolsko,Frank	RT	29	44	31	44	2	0

Saldana,Van	P	43	55	45	55	2	0

Arellano,Neil	K	44	48	46	48	2	0

Manning,Bryan	LDE	55	55	55	55	0	0

Upshaw,	Sam	LDE	31	60	33	56	2	-4

Peters,	Ellis	LDT	38	38	38	38	0	0

Guthrie,Bart	RDT	34	55	37	55	3	0

Littlejohn,Jack	RDT	41	42	43	43	2	1

Sinclair,J.C.	RDE	47	48	49	49	2	1

Emerson,Geoff	RDE	29	33	30	33	1	0

Mills,	J.J.	SLB	36	36	36	36	0	0

Rapp,	Percy	SLB	29	49	31	49	2	0

Boyd,	Howie	SLB	33	56	35	56	2	0

Moe,	Kurt	SILB	27	46	29	46	2	0

Daniels,Russell	MLB	64	64	64	64	0	0

Plank,	Oscar	MLB	31	42	34	42	3	0

Satterlee,Kerry	MLB	18	51	20	46	2	-5

Mitchell,Otis	WLB	27	64	29	64	2	0

Middleton,Buddy	WLB	46	63	48	63	2	0

Henderson,JosephLCB	51	52	51	52	0	0

Devitt,	Cornell	LCB	23	50	27	50	4	0

Duran,	Luther	LCB	24	35	26	35	2	0

Perry,	Shane	RCB	38	41	40	41	2	0

Bordano,Edgar	RCB	68	69	68	69	0	0

Hawkins,Ricky	SS	45	45	45	45	0	0

Hillard,Preston	SS	7	41	9	46	2	5

Yamashita,Grady	SS	9	47	11	41	2	-6

Reynolds,Louie	FS	43	43	43	43	0	0

McNair,	Orlando	FS	39	62	42	62	3	0

[Buzzbee]

File #1 of 2.

[Buzzbee]

File #2 of 2.

[Fritz]

no big deal with Preston. He cuts easy.

[haji1]

On the defensive question Albion I would say to switch to the 3-4. You have been talking about this for a while and this seems to be the time to do it. I think it fits your personnel the best, plus it gives you the flexibilty you want to get the right players on the field for you in the right spots.

[cuervo72]

Well, there's definitely some consistency in the training camp mechanism, because I ran it as an experiment before downloading the new files, and the numbers came out exactly the same.

The only difference was that someone offered a 1st rounder for CB Edgar Bordano. Might have been worth considering, as he's looking for $107,240,000 over 5 yrs. to resign

For our two LB's converted to SS, looks like Hillard came through nicely and Yamashita hasn't.

Tough selling tickets in Kitty Hawk....

[Buzzbee]

I did a little testing this morning. I wanted to see if I could confirm that the WLB is removed in nickel coverage. I set the Blitz frequency to 100 and set the WLB to blitz so that no one else could blitz. I simmed a game, with the score board on so that I could see the defensive alignment and who was blitzing.

Middleton was the WOLB and Perry was the Nickel Back. As we thought, when not in nickel coverage Middleton was blitzing and when in nickel Perry was. Also, this was done in a 3-4, so it doesn't look like the WILB is removed.

I'm not quite sure how to handle the disappearing pass rushing linebacker, but I do have a suggestion at SLB. It may hurt initially, but I think could pay dividends down the road. I'd like to try Otis Mitchell at SLB. He is weak against the run now, but has the potential to be a very solid run stopper. Also, he has some pretty good coverage skills. He's got poor technique at rushing the passer, so the move to SLB seems like a good fit.

Also, I'd really like to see middleton on the field quite a bit. Putting him at WLB takes him out in nickel coverage. Perhaps a 3-4 with SOLB Mitchell, SILB Daniels, WILB Middleton, and WOLB Rapp, Boyd, Mills or whoever fits.

This will probably help our D-Line as well since we only have 3 DT's (I think).

[cthomer5000]

I say you guys just do whatever you need to have the best players on the field at all times. I think you should stop rushing the WLB/WOLB so much if it means your nickel back is going to be blitzing like crazy.

Is moving Mills to MLB an option? I'm not familiar with how devoted you are to the middle backer. Or just move Mills to WLB, and move your heavy pass rush to the MLB (or both inside backers if you go 3-4) and your SLB. If you go 3-4, you can still keep your SLB as primarily a run-stopper if you like, and hope you generate your pass rush up the gut with the ILB's.

[cuervo72]

Wow...the country must really be in a recession in the 2020's. Most of the economies are fair, and these teams are hemmoraging money. Ft. Wayne lost $219.6M last year, and $229M the previous. Mazatlan lost $291M last year. That's over 40% of the value of the team!

Somebody has to move to Las Vegas...

[cthomer5000]

Originally posted by cuervo72
Wow...the country must really be in a recession in the 2020's. Most of the economies are fair, and these teams are hemmoraging money. Ft. Wayne lost $219.6M last year, and $229M the previous. Mazatlan lost $291M last year. That's over 40% of the value of the team!

Somebody has to move to Las Vegas...

Another sign that the economics of the game are way off. Whenever I've played deep into FOF about half the league will just be leaking money like there is no tomorrow, yet they do nothing to stop it. In FOF2001 I could easily rake in annual incomes higher than the rest of the league combined.

I hope Jim completely re-works the economics and coaches/scouts in the next version of FOF. He really just left those alone in FOF4, which was very disappointing.

[cuervo72]

I think the GM had mentioned moving Otis Mitchell to MLB, which was one of the reasons we let Shon sign elsewhere. Of course the time to do an official change would have been before camp, but we could play him there anyway.

Where's the DC, anyway?

[cuervo72]

Originally posted by cthomer5000
Another sign that the economics of the game are way off. Whenever I've played deep into FOF about half the league will just be leaking money like there is no tomorrow, yet they do nothing to stop it. In FOF2001 I could easily rake in annual incomes higher than the rest of the league combined.

I hope Jim completely re-works the economics and coaches/scouts in the next version of FOF. He really just left those alone in FOF4, which was very disappointing.

That is dissapointing. Does this happen to the same extent if you're not on the "Wall Street" setting though? IOW, the AI can handle finances in the lower levels, but not in the higher levels of the game? Maybe economic conditions as a whole (the overall economy) tend to be worse?

[albionmoonlight]

Thanks for all of the suggestions on the defense. It is nice to confirm the WLB/Nickel switch.

I am leaning toward placing Mills as WLB (whether we play the 3-4 or the 4-3). It does not make sense to have him on the field on nickel passing downs. That will also decrease the WLB blitz percentage by a lot.

As for the other changes, I will need to look at the files and set the depth chart based on that and based on everyone's suggestions. If someone could post the files today, that would be great.

(I can understand if people want to get the preseason out of the way before the weekend. I don't really care much about the preseason (just like in real life.) As long as I have the file to examine over the weekend and set up the base defense, I will be fine. Feel free to post them at any stage of the process.)

[Buzzbee]

Albion, the files are posted. I posted them about 10:45 last night.

[albionmoonlight]

Cool.

I won't be able to do anything until I look at the files. Is there anything else that people with the files can do today?

[cuervo72]

Well, I guess we can do some overall scouting, but not much more than that I'd guess. Next thing I would imagine is to get the game plans for the preseason set and sim that.

[cuervo72]

Any of you guys have an idea what 'citydata.fdt' does in the main program directory? I didn't think I changed anything, but it looks like it was modified on my system at 9:47 AM today. Maybe this just saves automatically on a save game (though thinking about it, I haven't saved a game today).

Also, does anyone see anything noteworthy in their change.txt file? Curious to see if any real position changes are there, besides just weak/strong left/right etc. I doubt it, I don't think that's in the AI's programming.

[Buzzbee]

I wasn't planning on doing any scouting for the pre-season. We basically tinker with game plans, try out personnel to see if they make the squad, etc. We don't really try to take advantages of other teams weaknesses or care if we win, so I figured it was fairly pointless.

Other than determining inactives, setting our depth charts and tinkering with game plans, I think we're ready to sim preseason.

[Buzzbee]

Originally posted by cuervo72
Any of you guys have an idea what 'citydata.fdt' does in the main program directory? I didn't think I changed anything, but it looks like it was modified on my system at 9:47 AM today. Maybe this just saves automatically on a save game (though thinking about it, I haven't saved a game today).

Also, does anyone see anything noteworthy in their change.txt file? Curious to see if any real position changes are there, besides just weak/strong left/right etc. I doubt it, I don't think that's in the AI's programming.

I'm assuming citydata contains either the names of the cities, or the names, weather, population, economy and all that stuff. Just a guess though. Did you toy with moving Mazatlan to Vegas???

[Buzzbee]

Originally posted by albionmoonlight
Cool.

I won't be able to do anything until I look at the files. Is there anything else that people with the files can do today?

Since you won't be able to set defensive game plans I think we are in a holding pattern. We might be able to determine who we want inactive for the preseason. I think Fritz said he plans to inactivate his starting receivers to let the backups "tryout".

[cuervo72]

Notable (and semi-notable) rookies -

Daryl Anunson, SE, 2nd, Ft. Wayne. 32/64 .
J.R. Pasricha, SS, 1st, Bermuda. 51/77.
Josh Tate, LT, 1st, Champaign. 18/33. 5yr contract.
Antoine Coble, TE, 7th, Champaign. 22/37.
Casey Galloway, WLB, 7th, Cheyenne. 19/51
Ronald Concerto, LT, 1st, Death Valley. 30/63
Teddy Webster, LG, 2nd, Death Valley. 27/63.
Dixon Wynn, LT, 1st, Ft. Wayne. 50/79
Barry Miller, SILB, 1st, Key West. 43/70
Leland Dawkins, LDT, 2nd, Lake Erie. 27/39
Ed Manning, QB, 1st, Little Rock. 8/34
Al Hartzell, FL, 3rd, Little Rock. 35/43
Gus Bolt, FB, 4th, Mazatlan. 48/76
Van Bush, RDE, 1st, Mazatlan. 46/67
Antoine Burroughs, FL, 1st, Nashua. 41/68
Riddick Wolfe, RDE, 1st, Niagra Falls. 37/74
Ted Rivers, SILB, FA, Norfolk. 24/48
Bernie Darquea, FS, 2nd, Norfolk. 38/62
Tracy Ekuban, LT, 1st, Norfolk. 38/74.
Randy Mahe, LCB, 1st, Ocean City. 47/83
Andrew Hodges, MLB, 1st, Pensacola. 43/72
Sammie Boone, SE, 1st, Providence. 46/65
Leonard Poston, RG, 1st, Puget Sound. 24/70
Phillip Cote, C, 4th, Thunder Bay. 30/62
Cornell Burns, FS, 2nd, Thunder Bay. 48/73
Sammy Dunn, NT, 1st, Thunder Bay. 60/79
Larry Clarke, QB, 1st, Tijuana. 10/61
Orlando Davis, C, 7th, Tijuana. 19/63
Maurice Alexander, RDE, 1st, Tulsa. 41/71
Gene Westbrook, LDT, 1st, Wheeling. 42/75
Rico Sinclair, SLB, 2nd, Wheeling. 39/61
Antoine Lindsay, SLB, 3rd, Wheeling. 33/57
Alonzo Dimry, SE, 7th, Ypsilanti. 23/44
Bernie Golden, RB, 1st, Ypsilanti. 41/67
Barry White, QB, 2nd, Ypsilanti. 28/57

[cuervo72]

Originally posted by Buzzbee
I'm assuming citydata contains either the names of the cities, or the names, weather, population, economy and all that stuff. Just a guess though. Did you toy with moving Mazatlan to Vegas???

No, I couldn't pull something like that off. They should consider it though, as should Pensacola. But Mazatlan at least has a decent roster.

[QuikSand]

Looks pretty good to me, gang.

[Buzzbee]

QuikSand you're baaaack!!! Didja bring me anything? Huh, didja didja??

[QuikSand]

Originally posted by Buzzbee
QuikSand you're baaaack!!! Didja bring me anything? Huh, didja didja??

Yeah, it's in the back of the truck... wait a few minutes, okay?

[finkenst]

You do not make a profit, you lose 10% of your salary cap, right?

What happens when you are in the black after one of those years?

[QuikSand]

Originally posted by finkenst
You do not make a profit, you lose 10% of your salary cap, right?

What happens when you are in the black after one of those years?

Last year we made it into the black, so this year we are allowed to spend the full salary cap. But I think we might be in for a 10% penalty next season, in all likelihood. Under these rules, it's certainly possible that it just turns into a yo-yo situation.

[QuikSand]

Originally posted by cuervo72
Ellison was the FB that Quik converted, our 5th rounder.

Originally posted by Fritz
wow

Decent case study in why it's worth dabbling with position switches, if your rules allow them. Getting guys who are right around the "target" weight for the new position affords a real opportunity when the switch is made.

Ellison was a RB, not a FB by the way. But the point stands.

Regrettably, Ellison looks like he has some phony potential (he dropped some in camp) but still is probebly better than most of all of the true WRs left in the draft by round five.

[QuikSand]

Originally posted by Buzzbee
Since you won't be able to set defensive game plans I think we are in a holding pattern. We might be able to determine who we want inactive for the preseason. I think Fritz said he plans to inactivate his starting receivers to let the backups "tryout".

This seems to have been the last post of substance here... are we waiting for something in particular, or have we just lost steam for the weekend? (Not trying to be pushy, just trying to find out where we are)

[Buzzbee]

I think we have just lost steam for the weekend. At this point we are waiting on determining who needs to be inactive for the preseason and on Fritz and Albionmoonlight to set game plans for the pre-season. Once that is done we can sim the pre-season and prepare for the real nitty gritty.

[albionmoonlight]

Downloading now. Will repost with gameplans/depth charts set.

[albionmoonlight]

Here they are with the D gameplan and depth chart set.

I decided against the 3-4. I think that we learned a lot about the 4-3 this "offseason." I think that our changes based on that are enough. No need to make too many changes to a D that helped us get to the super bowl.

I decided that Mitchell is still a bit too raw to start this year. However, assuming that some LBs will miss time due to injury, Mitchell will get to see a lot of the field this year, I am sure. He will be very involved as players get injured.

I decided to keep our blitz percentages high, but I am blitizing less with multiple players. Going to see how that affects things.

Mills is now our WLB. He will come off in passing downs.

McNeil is now our nickel back.

The blitz will come mainly from Middleton from the SLB spot and from Daniels from the MLB spot. They both have the ability, so they should be able to put up the numbers.

Finally, on passing downs, we are going to move one of our DEs inside and bring in one of our OLBs to take his spot on the line. In effect, we are losing a DT, but gaining a OLB on passing downs. That should be a good trade off.

[albionmoonlight]

#2

[albionmoonlight]

If Fritz is available to sim on monday, we can get through the preseason. I don't really use the preseason in FOF, so I don't need it to determine anything.

If Buzzbee can get these files tonight, maybe he can scout some of our early season opponents. If so, we may actually be able to get through our first four games Monday, too.

[QuikSand]

Originally posted by albionmoonlight
Mills is now our WLB. He will come off in passing downs.

McNeil is now our nickel back.

I'm optimistic about both of these things.

[Buzzbee]

SCOUTING REPORT: Mazatlan Marauders

After having the top pick in the draft two years running you would expect them to show some signs of improvement. On the offensive side of the ball that seems to be true. On the defensive side they are still pretty weak. I look for a high scoring game this year

Offense:
Last year was the first time in three years that QB Jeff Francis was healthy. It didn't matter much because he didn't have anyone to throw to anyway. The top overall pick in the draft last year, FL Fernando Belser only saw the field as a kick returner last year while he learned the offense. Reports from training camp are that he is the real deal and will become Fancis' go to receiver. Considering they don't have a lot of other talent at WR, it could be a long and frustrating year for Belser because he should se a fair amount of double teams.

Mazatlan have a decent group of backs, but no real standout. J.C. Donaldson, the Marauders first pick in 2020 is slated to be the starting back coming out of camp. He is an elusive back who sees a lot of action out of the backfield. He hasn't seen the field much in his first two seasons so it is difficult to tell how he will handle the starting role. Look for limited action as Mazatlan's playcalling tends to focus on the pass.

The Offensive Line is not very deep, but one of the best in the league in my opinion. The line is undersized, averaging around 6'2" and 290 lbs. This is IF you subtract out behemoth RT Karl Humphrey. His 6' 8" 341 pound frame tends to skew the numbers. Despite their size, they are very good at both pass and rush blocking. The tackles are the best set in the league, so our pass rush may be neutralized. Center is the weakest chain on this link, so Daniels may have some success.

MY THOUGHTS
Mazatlan historically is a pass heavy team. With the addition of Fernando Belser to the starting group, they are a lot more potent in the past. The offensive line will give Francis time to pass and he is good enough to take advantage of it. Double teaming Belser should help neutralize the passing game. Forcing the lesser receivers to beat us may prove fruitful. They are good against a pass rush, so an even mix of rush and coverage may keep them off balance.

Defense
Defensively the studs are LDT Peter Starkey and LCB Joe Rhodes. The rest of the D isn't much of a supporting cast. Knee surgery to MLB Hunter Shapiro won't help their cause. Top overall pick from this years draft, DE Van Bush should help, but he still needs to learn the techniques of an NFL DE.

MY THOUGHTS
They are strong at LDT but weak on the ends. Take advantage of Bush's youth now, because you won't be able to take advantage of him later. The weak linebackers and safeties open up a lot of opportunities. CB Joe Rhodes is a top notch player and one to avoid during the crunch.

[Buzzbee]

SCOUTING REPORT: Loiusville Hawks

Offense
QB Andre Barton is a stud. He is one of the best QB's in the league and led Louisville to the League Championship game where they lost to eventual champions, Fort Knox. He is solid in all areas, but especially good at not turning the ball over. In his 6 year career he has 132 TD's, but only 65 INT's. 21 of those 65 came in his rookie season, but only 9 last year vs. 23 TD's.

Louisville decided they wanted some controversy, so to complement thier 900 yard rusher from last season, Patrick Carlson they brought in another 900 yard rusher, Irving Finch from Nevada. They like Finch's 4.8 YPC compared to Carlson's 2.9, so look for Finch to get the start.

The receivers are fairly talented. FL Cassidy is the go to guy with SE Albert complementing on the other side. Third receiver FL Mickey Haag is as good or better than Haag and will see a fair amount of action as well.

The offensive line is capable and balanced. There are no real weaknesses, and no superstars. They run and pass block well, but will not dominate the line of scrimmage.

MY THOUGHTS
They have a great QB who is going to get his completions. He has two capable, but not dominating RB's behind him to keep the defense from keying on the pass. A good pass rush may result in some big plays for us, but also some big plays for them. Plan for a passing assault, but don't ignore the run.

Defense
RDE Artie Porter anchors this defense. He is far and away the best player. He can stop the run and get to the QB. He will be a handful. The Defensive line seems to be setup to stop the run, but are weak at getting to the QB (except Porter, of course). The linebackers are pretty good, and deep. However, like a lot of teams in this league, the WLB is a weak spot. They corners and safeties are average at best and with the weak pass rush, will probably give up some yardage this year.

MY THOUGHTS
If we fall behind early, don't get discouraged. This defense will probably give up some fourth quarter leads. They can stop the run, but are weak against the pass. The SLB and MLB are pretty good underneath, so quick outs, flys, and posts may be more effective than slants and crossing patterns. Use the run to setup the pass and we can expect some big plays. RDE Artie Porter is a hoss, so run away from him on crucial plays.