Transmogrified Tiger wrote:Steve Spurrier also made his money today with his play calling and decision to bring in Shaw. Thompson would have killed at least one of those scoring drives with his inaccuracy, and the repeated screens put the Mizzou line in the worst spot, too tentative to get to the QB or be able to truly disrupt the screens.
Yep. I just ran through it on the DVR, and even speed-watching it, I found myself impressed with Spurrier. Shaw isn't exactly a great QB but he's exactly the kind of QB that gives Mizzou fits (or at least Mizzou with Steckel as the DC). And Spurrier showed some big brass balls going for it on 4th down so many times. He did it early and often, and usually successfully.
The national championship stuff... that's a pipe dream.
Transmogrified Tiger wrote: The 3rd down and 2 where they run blitzed Josey was that whole quarter in a microcosm. No fear of Mauk making a play, and the play calling was happy to confirm that.
Yeah I caught that play during a commercial break. Everyone in the stadium knew where that was going. Naked bootleg and he walks for a first down.
God dammit. Shaw was on the ropes and we did him a favor not blitzing at all. A couple more hits and he was done.
It's tough to gauge Mauk. He absolutely should take crap for that low completion percentage and for taking some dumb chances- which, basically, are things that freshmen QB will do. But he pushes the ball upfield really well, and he does a great job of creating more time for himself with his legs. He's the opposite of Blaine Gabbert.
Put it this way... whatever issues you may have with Mauk, and plenty are valid at this stage in his career, he was not the reason they lost that game at all.
The more I see of him, the more I can't wait for next year when he's matured a little. He's got some serious talent and he's exciting as hell to watch. I can't believe I'm echoing Matt Millen, but I think it was Millen who compared him to Brett Favre (style only) in that he's a gambler with some cajones.
I didn't realistically think that Mizzou had a shot at the BCS Championship this year, but I was hoping they would be able to stay undefeated at least until they played A&M or even better 'Bama in the SEC Championship game.
Mauk is looking pretty good tonight. I really like his decision making as far as knowing when to extend the play within the pocket vs throwing it away vs taking off running. A lot of QBs that can run never really manage that trade off well and it's great to see a guy with so little experience make the right choices already. Let's not [expletive] the bed in the second half this time.
