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Players who Need to be Improved
HeretoBeatmyChest
Member Posts: 4,295
This could be the entire team but I pared it down to the most obvious and important. These are guys who need to be noticeably improved or should be improved. These guys need to be improved for UW to have a successful 2015 season. We know it its a rebuild but it will be deemed very successful if UW is in position to be a top 25 team heading into 2016. We want the rebuild to be mostly done in 2015 and not bleed into 2016. Notable improvement in all of these players would give UW a solid foundation for 2016 and beyond.
QB- Cyler Miles/KJ Carta Samuels- Don't know who the starter will be but they absolutely have to be materially better than Miles last year. At worst I see some improvement. Material improvement may rest on the play of the skill guys.
RB- Dwayne Washington/Lavon Coleman- Yes Coleman has little speed and yes he didn't impress but for a freshman he was decent. If he has the ability to improve and get better then he'll factor in. Minimal improvement or less and you will be passed. DW ran for 700 yards on the year. Take out the bowl game and he averaged 7.5/carry with 6 TD's and 416 yards his last 4 games. He can't catch shit and probably sucks as a blocker but if he can play like he did those last 4 conference games then he'll be a factor and run for 1000 in the regular season.
WR- Dante Pettis- Caught 17 balls for 259. All but 1 catch came the last 7 games which is 37 yards per game. He needs to be a +55 yards per game guy. Don't think he can be a #1 game breaker guy but he can be a consistent WR who will grow into a major playmaker year 3.
TE- Darrell Daniels/Josh Perkins- Caught 25 balls for 315. Nothing the first 5 games which means he averaged 40 yards per game the past 8. The same production over a full season gives you 500 yards and that would be great. Daniels needs to be one of the most improved players on the team. Caught 11 balls for 171 including a 28 yarder and the 68 yard TD against Oregon St during which he outran a safety. Oregon's TE's in recent years have been deadly catching 15 yard passes and then running through the defense for 40 or 50 yard gains. That's how I envision Daniels as a TE.
OL- Shane Brostek- Career may have been completely fucked by playing as a true freshman but according to the combine shit from last year (if I remember) he was by far the strongest OL. Thats a negative for Kent but fuck that. He has good bloodlines and redshirted. Our expectations are so minimal. I'm just hoping this is a guy who suddenly becomes a solid player.
The entire DL- Joe Mathis started to come on at the end of last year with 2 sacks in the last three games. Highly recruited guy who had 1/4 of his career wasted by Sark. He needs to have a real breakout campaign in 2015 and be an 8-10 sack guy and not some pussy shit like a 4-5 sack guy. Elijah Qualls looked good on a few plays last year but mostly was just a guy... but with promise. The redshirted players are important and especially Vita Vea. Physically there's no reason he can't be an immediate impact guy. Others like Greg Gaines and Jaylen Johnson need to show something. You got 5 guys here, three of which were 4* and the other two were high 3*. Throw in Will Dissly (aka baby Emtman) and you should have a very deep DL that should progress throughout the season.
LB- Travis Feeney- Statistically his best year was 2012. Last year he did have 4.5tfl, 2 picks, 5 pd's and a fumble forced & recovered. I haven't been the biggest Feeney fan but time for him to fucking breakthrough and be an all-conference guy.
LB-Keyshawn Bierria/Azeem Victor- They need to be at least average Pac-12 starters.
CB-Sidney Jones/Jermaine Kelly- Jones was perhaps the best surprise of the season…a true freshman coming out of nowhere. I think he was freshman all-pac12. He had 61 tackles, 2 picks, 7 passes defensed and a forced fumble and recovery. He needs to be an all-pac12 guy this season. Kelly has the talent and had his season derailed immediately with the ACL injury. If he can recovery okay then he's a guy we need to develop.
K-Cameron Van Winkle- Led the conference in FG% but his misses against Arizona & Oklahoma St factored in heavily….perhaps similar but not as bad as Coons' misses at WSU and Las Vegas in 2012. Coons went on to kill it in 2013. CVW was only a sophomore. Look for him to make a strong bid at All-P12 in 2015.
QB- Cyler Miles/KJ Carta Samuels- Don't know who the starter will be but they absolutely have to be materially better than Miles last year. At worst I see some improvement. Material improvement may rest on the play of the skill guys.
RB- Dwayne Washington/Lavon Coleman- Yes Coleman has little speed and yes he didn't impress but for a freshman he was decent. If he has the ability to improve and get better then he'll factor in. Minimal improvement or less and you will be passed. DW ran for 700 yards on the year. Take out the bowl game and he averaged 7.5/carry with 6 TD's and 416 yards his last 4 games. He can't catch shit and probably sucks as a blocker but if he can play like he did those last 4 conference games then he'll be a factor and run for 1000 in the regular season.
WR- Dante Pettis- Caught 17 balls for 259. All but 1 catch came the last 7 games which is 37 yards per game. He needs to be a +55 yards per game guy. Don't think he can be a #1 game breaker guy but he can be a consistent WR who will grow into a major playmaker year 3.
TE- Darrell Daniels/Josh Perkins- Caught 25 balls for 315. Nothing the first 5 games which means he averaged 40 yards per game the past 8. The same production over a full season gives you 500 yards and that would be great. Daniels needs to be one of the most improved players on the team. Caught 11 balls for 171 including a 28 yarder and the 68 yard TD against Oregon St during which he outran a safety. Oregon's TE's in recent years have been deadly catching 15 yard passes and then running through the defense for 40 or 50 yard gains. That's how I envision Daniels as a TE.
OL- Shane Brostek- Career may have been completely fucked by playing as a true freshman but according to the combine shit from last year (if I remember) he was by far the strongest OL. Thats a negative for Kent but fuck that. He has good bloodlines and redshirted. Our expectations are so minimal. I'm just hoping this is a guy who suddenly becomes a solid player.
The entire DL- Joe Mathis started to come on at the end of last year with 2 sacks in the last three games. Highly recruited guy who had 1/4 of his career wasted by Sark. He needs to have a real breakout campaign in 2015 and be an 8-10 sack guy and not some pussy shit like a 4-5 sack guy. Elijah Qualls looked good on a few plays last year but mostly was just a guy... but with promise. The redshirted players are important and especially Vita Vea. Physically there's no reason he can't be an immediate impact guy. Others like Greg Gaines and Jaylen Johnson need to show something. You got 5 guys here, three of which were 4* and the other two were high 3*. Throw in Will Dissly (aka baby Emtman) and you should have a very deep DL that should progress throughout the season.
LB- Travis Feeney- Statistically his best year was 2012. Last year he did have 4.5tfl, 2 picks, 5 pd's and a fumble forced & recovered. I haven't been the biggest Feeney fan but time for him to fucking breakthrough and be an all-conference guy.
LB-Keyshawn Bierria/Azeem Victor- They need to be at least average Pac-12 starters.
CB-Sidney Jones/Jermaine Kelly- Jones was perhaps the best surprise of the season…a true freshman coming out of nowhere. I think he was freshman all-pac12. He had 61 tackles, 2 picks, 7 passes defensed and a forced fumble and recovery. He needs to be an all-pac12 guy this season. Kelly has the talent and had his season derailed immediately with the ACL injury. If he can recovery okay then he's a guy we need to develop.
K-Cameron Van Winkle- Led the conference in FG% but his misses against Arizona & Oklahoma St factored in heavily….perhaps similar but not as bad as Coons' misses at WSU and Las Vegas in 2012. Coons went on to kill it in 2013. CVW was only a sophomore. Look for him to make a strong bid at All-P12 in 2015.
Comments
What I think your list shows is why there's such a feeling amongst some of us that 2015 will clearly be a transition year. I agree with just about every area that you called out (and some additional ones that you didn't). A few thoughts ...
1) I'm not holding out huge hope for the QB play in 2015. I fully expect that Browning starts in 2016 ... my biggest hope is that he's allowed to RS. That being said, it'd be nice to see improved QB play in 2015 such that Browning needs to win the job instead of inherit by default.
2) I'm really torn on the RB position. I think we'll ultimately find that Coleman will get passed. Washington seems relatively inconsistent to me and is probably more of a 10-15 carry back instead of 20-25 carry back unless he can shore up some of his issues (besides his ability to catch the ball, it's that so many of his runs are 2 yards and less with his average made up by his longer runs). RB is a spot that you can come in and play early if you are good enough ... and Gaskin is good.
3) I'm worried about the receiving options. I think we have some guys that are good complementary pieces but lack a guy that I see as being a go to option. Not only will this make it harder on the QBs, but will most likely again see the team be a heavy run first team, which leads right into the OL. You singled out Brostek, but the whole line is a concern to me given the turnover.
4) Agree that we have some solid pieces on the DL and we just need to see gradual growth there. The burning of the RS for Mathis is just a flat out boneheaded move by Seven. At least Qualls was able to retain his - I think he'll see a jump this year as I thought he definitely flashed at various times last year.
5) I really like Jones - he has that short-term memory that you need at the CB position and I expect him to continue to grow. Kelly started out really slow last year ... so how he responds from his injury will be telling. Finding a way to put Kevin King into the depth will also be critical.
6) For the most part, I thought Van Winkle was pretty good last year. The primary area that he struggled was kicking in or against the State of Arizona (3 of the 4 misses in those games). Hopefully the ASU or Arizona games aren't decided by FGs. Two areas where you'd like to find improvement would be in kicking from 40+ yards and getting more depth on his kickoffs.
I find no fault in your analysis. EVERYONE needs to step up from last year's team, especially the coaches. Petersen said it was a disappointment, so there needs to be improvements across the board... not only from talent that graduated or moved on to the NFL, but for the returning players who are the backbone of this team for 2015. The team began to click from the Arizona game onward (3 games), but the Cactus Bowl left an awful taste in my mouth, and is keeping me bitterly negative this offseason instead of slightly positive.
To echo your observations, I'd rank them:
1.) Miles/KJCS
2.) Feeney (he needs to be the leader of the defense)
3.) DL
4.) OL
5.) RB
All of those positions are areas where we can't really depend on freshmen coming in and starting from Day 1 (thought Gaskin at RB would be nice or if Browning is Jesus). I can see Renfro and the other WRs coming in and earning playing time, maybe one of the LBs if they're studs, Joyner at CB if he's better than Kelly/Hale/Gardenhire and Turner at SS if he's better than King.
1) QB
2) WR
3) OL
4) LB
5) DL
Everyone else
I'm not worried at all about our CB/S positions. We played last year admirably with basically frosh along the back of the field. A full season of work only should improve the work there.
I'm obviously a miles hater, but I will give him a bone in that his WR's were so incredibly bad last year that even though he was terrible, he didn't have any help. A QB has to have weapons, and those weapons can't just be John ross on fly routes or jaydon doing 3 yard bubble screens. Our WR's are dreck, and need guys who can actually push defenses. Conversely we need the QB to get them the ball as well.
OL wasn't horrid last year considering they were trying to block for someone who didn't know what was going on, but they obviously need improvement.
Our front defensive 7 or 8 is going to the be the most interesting to me. Which of these guys are going to step up? Lots of pedigree along the DL, but nobody has had to be the man yet. I fully believe Joe is ready.
In honor of interesting discussion my two cents
Mathias is your key on D if he can pick up slack for Kikaha on pass rush I think it can really solidify your secondary, I think u have some young talent at LB, I think D will be better than people think
Not sure about O, Daniels really needs to step up., shaky qb play needs security blanket of good TE.
Those are my two key guys 4 u
RB is instinctual and we need a guy who can help the young OL out by breaking tackles when they fail and actually finding the holes when they open them.
Hopefully his knee injury was the reason for the lack of imagination and not fucktarded coaching.
We joke about the 2 win and 4 win stuff, but his big play ability can be the difference between winning and losing, especially on an offense that will likely struggle to move the ball at times.
I would say that both the OL and DL should be on the list in their entirety.
DL because everyone left (yes, I'm a rocket scientist). The related effect will be finding out very quickly how good our DBs really are (and I think they're OK and should be better this coming season). But they're going to get torched trying to cover for 2 or 3 seconds longer than last season unless we get some pressure.
And then the OL because until we have a good OL I am operating under the assumption that we never will. Maybe some believe in miracles, but even if everyone's scout team messiah plays, he'll still look like crap running for his life on some plays and going Keith Price with the ball on others (read: The quarterback was out of the pocket therefore there is no penalty for grounding.)
It feels like a classic transition season and one where we'll find out if Pederman can steal some victories from the jaws of defeat. Either way, it will be interesting.
2. OL
3. whatever
QB- Can't wait to see how the QB battle shakes out. Miles- wondering what he's done this off season. Karta-Samuels has a gun but needs the reps hoping scout team really helped him out add in spring ball and he could be the next man up. Saw Browning play a little bit on TV has a good arm and accurate.
WR-I think we'll do OK at WR this year if the QB can get it down the field with some zip on it! The high number of floaters last year really hurt these guys on deeper throws.
OL definately has to step it up and improve substantially on last year both in pass and run blocking.
DL- Dissly played last year, although not very much, but the coaches thought he belonged on the field. Gaines made the 2 deeps early in the season but was redshirted probably because Danny had a lot more gas in the tank this year and needed little relief. Again the coaches felt Gaines was ready same as Dissly. Vea is certainly big but it remains to be seen what he can do and hopefully Spring ball will get us a look. Need to see how Johnson has come along as well we need that speed off the ends.