He had a pretty bad game at Duke. What is he doing well? Can we build his game around that or are we going to have to endure lots of growing pains?
What is Clayton doing well?
- Thread starter KramerCat91
- Start date
Extending plays and making positive yardage out of broken plays. Short passing game, underneath routes, and short outs.
He played smart at times. Hitting the ground instead of the sideline late in the game was a headsy move. He can run, deceptively too.
He played great against Duke! Even his pick was not a bad throw! He reminds me of the kid from Cal! I just saw tat kid, Goff beat Texas this weekend. Both Goff and Clayton will be playing on Sunday's! Clayton will be a better pro prospect than Seimain. Duke and Stanford had as good,if not better defense,than Mchigan State! Thorson and Walker may go to the pros in the first two rounds after their junior year! That's how good those guys are
I think the best thing he's doing right now is learning . . . gaining experience that he'll put to good use once the game starts slowing down for him.
Game is still to fast for him and he's locking on receivers (jones int). Waiting for the game where it all clicks and he just goes off
He is gaining experience but i dont personally see any learning going on from game ont thru 3. I thought he played absolutely awful against duke plus we see his limitations.
Im not suggesting we go with any other qb because as bad as Thorson is playing i believe the other two have lacked the necessary development.
On saturday, someone said that mcall changed the throwing mechanics on alviti and he still hasnt grown comfortable after 3 years. The only reason alviti would go in is for running but i think we just stick with Thorson and take our losses as a result.
Hopefully he does learn but right now imo his very bad play is more of a result of not being comfortable and being severely intimidated.
Winning. See Osu with JT Barrett last year on how much a qb can develop through the year. Granted Urban is the best coach in the game but I think we will see a much better qb by the end of the year.
If Oliver would have ever developed into a functionable Qb then we would probably have smoked duke and stanford and been rated in the top 5 by now.
Alviti needs to play on saturday after we hopefully go up on Ball state pretty big in the first half. Thorson is da man but we need to get alviti some reps this week. Feli is right about that. Fitz refused to give Oliver meaningful PT in blowouts so oliver never got his feet wet. We have to get alviti on the field passing during junk time. We cant afford oliver part 2. Its on fitz to develop backup qbs and my man is setting us behind the 8 ball by being a "sportsman" running out the clock over entire quarters with our backup. Cmon maaaannn
He's playing and learning. He stands tall in the pocket. He has made some very good throws into deeper middle seams that have been botched. He has made some very nice sideline throws. He has been very effective on designed QB running plays. He looks good in those white unis.
I agree that Alviti should be given some meaningful playing time this week against Ball State. We are always one play away from having to go to our backup and Fitz has to be willing to help prepare a plan B. This has been a real shortcoming in past years. Bringing Alviti in to hand the ball off in the 4th quarter is not enough. I would give Alviti a set of downs in the second or third quarter, not because I want to replace Thorson as a starter, but we need to have our backup experience some game time with the first team offense. This is the week to do it.
You get more like that nincompoop (who shall not be named) every day. Does Lou give you a royalty for every reply you get? So much of your stuff is just click-bait.
If we had smoked Duke/Stanford. Please define? How much more valuable is a 3 touchdown win than a 2 score win in the eyes of the voter. do you think Tom Brady could have made a difference in some of these instances? Many of the mistakes he has made have, in fact, not cost us (dropped INT's v Stanford, dropped punt following his ill-advised decision to throw instead of run in the last drive, recovered our own fumble on botched pitch). NFW this line and WR corps would have gotten us more than a 3 TD win in these games. They have trouble getting open and catching the ball.
Also the same voters that give us a ranked Auburn team right now would not have us in the top 5 no matter what. At best we'd be about 13th. So what?
It is not clear if Thorson is the next Baz or the next Tony Stauss. We won't know for a while. Last year I was pulling out my hair over using an injured TS instead of the others. You know what? They were beaten out by a Freshman. Either the staff is entirely stupid (mathematically possible), or they just are not as good. If Matt cannot pass, no matter who you blame, then his running ability would be of little value against a Cash-led defense with 9 guys in the box. Perhaps Zack's passing touch would have been better. It's possible. Would the guys be open? They couldn't get open against 9 in the box. Would they catch the ball? It's also possible that Zack's lesser mobility would have left Mr. Cash free to roam the backfield more.
He had a poor game. I think we can point to between 5 and 10 mistakes Thorson made - the pitch, the two picks, the decision to throw not run, misfire to Vitale (should Dan have cut off the route due to blitz?). Those all look like fixable mistakes. They are not "he's not athletic" or "he can't throw". He has two more weeks with the first team before B1G play. I expect improvement. I've been wrong before.
Meantime, we may have another Jason Wright/Noah Herring (sic) thing going on in the backfield. Get our walking wounded back on the OL and the problems with Thor might be moot for a while - maybe all season.
Interesting the diversity in replies. I'll say what my kid told me, since he plays the position and knows what to look for much more than I do: he's going through his progressions well and in a timely fashion. He does occasionally make the wrong read, but given his lack of experience, he's making the right read a surprising number of times. That and he has a strong arm and makes the tougher sideline throws well; the ball gets out there quickly as it should.
I would not expect a smooth learning curve from any RS frosh QB. I think he struggle adjusting to the speed of Duke, which was the fastest D he had seen in his young career with an outstanding experienced secondary that probably has 2 guys with NFL talent, maybe a third. Did you notice how many times Cash, the safety, was in the backfield? Calling those dumb option plays in H1 did not help CT.
I would expects moments of suckitude punctuated by moments of awesomeness from CT this season, with hopefully increasing consistency. We need to develop a credible downfield passing attack. This is very much a work in progress. The arm is there. The courage is there. He just needs more time.
He threw into double and triple coverage. Overall, he is developing but do not claim those were not ill advised throws. He is about what I expect for this stage in his career. See signs that he will be pretty good but he is just not there yet. But better to be complaining about him after a win than a loss.
I'd like to see CT get more help from his receivers. Thorson does a nice job of extending plays by rolling out, but I don't see the receivers coming back to him and giving him bailout options. It's pretty tough - and a lot to expect - that he'll be able to complete a long pass with rushers at his heels. Without that support, he is left with the choice of forcing a ball into coverage or throwing it out of bounds. For the most part, he's made the smart choice of throwing it away.
This may be stupid, but do you know what he may need? To be behind in a game by 2+ TDs. I think right now part of his problem is that he is playing it extremely safe worried so much about making a costly mistake. Thus, he doesn't seem quite relaxed. If he had a game where he was forced to just let it rip, it might do wonders for his confidence and comfort. I predict we'll have a come from behind win at some point this season where we all say - that was Clayton's coming of age game!
Not stupid. I can see such a game where the coaches tell him that he has nothing to lose just go out and play.
It's too easy to play amateur psychologist and conclude that CT is flummoxed or choking or whatever. A more likely condition is that the speed of the Duke game was something he had not yet seen before. The Duke secondary is quite good and capable of playing press coverage. I don't think CT saw that type of skill vs. Stanford.
To the extent that playing from behind and throwing against a softer, prevent defense will simplify the game for CT, it could benefit him.In that situation, he would probably throw a lot of completions underneath the coverage, see limited blitzes, and get a sense of how "catch up" feels.
He just needs more time against real defenses with Power 5 athletes.
To the extent that playing from behind and throwing against a softer, prevent defense will simplify the game for CT, it could benefit him.In that situation, he would probably throw a lot of completions underneath the coverage, see limited blitzes, and get a sense of how "catch up" feels.
He just needs more time against real defenses with Power 5 athletes.
It's not quite as egregious as evaluating pitchers on W-L record, but we must admit that we are winning because of great defense, and not QB play.
It is not that easy. Winning is based on a combination of all facets of the game. I saw a post where someone said that we had nothing to lose by putting in ZO against Duke since CT's stats were not very good. I disagree. Our offensive statistics included time of possession which I believe was a major contributor to our victory in the second half. This required our running game to be successful. How much of the success of our running game was the Duke DC watching the film of CT's Stanford run and saying that they were not going to get beat that way, I don't know. But Duke appeared to have one of their linebackers spying CT most of the day. If CT had not been the quarterback and that linebacker was in run support, could the outcome have been different?
I believe that - while the passing stats were not world beaters - having CT as our quarterback definitely contributed to the Duke victory.
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