🏈 Commentary: Why Bama Fans Shouldn't Be Concerned With Ole Miss in 2009

[CRIMSONTUSKS.COM BLOG]

I've sat and read the pre-season polls over the last few months and have certainly been intrigued by the "love" the Ole Miss Rebel football team has been receiving.Please, don't get me wrong.I do understand where it's coming from - and I don't mean from whom.If we took that aspect, ...

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[Nothing_But_A_Winner00]

Nice article, TerryP.

 

[BamaJay73]

Good stuff. :word:

 

[AFF]

Nice writeup. Great point about their OL and significance the loss of Oher and Harris will have. What I don't know is how good their replacements are. I'm just assuming there's going to be a drop off there.

 

[TerryP]

Nice writeup. Great point about their OL and significance the loss of Oher and Harris will have. What I don't know is how good their replacements are. I'm just assuming there's going to be a drop off there.

A few thoughts...

I don't see a lot of difference between what Andre contributed to our offense and what Michael Oher contributed to theirs. We both were teams that had success running over the left side.

I do see a difference between our two lines when it comes to Bama having Michael Johnson and the number of starts he has at the left guard position.

Ole Miss doesn't have that luxury.

Now, as to the left tackle position we've got Ole Miss replacing a starter with Bradley Sowell. Sowell is of good size, 6'7" 310 as a recruit, but he was also considered to be the 22nd best player available in that years class. The 22nd best player in the state of Mississippi.

(add to that they had wanted competition between Bobby Massie and Sowell for that position)

Conversely, we've got James Carpenter who still needs work but has far, far more experience than either Massie or Sowell can provide.

Ole Miss does return their center from last year. But that left side is two guys beside each other with zero SEC game experience.

You ask yourself now. Do you suspect they'll be able to run over the left side with as much success as they did last year?

That's one of the reasons I pointed to the success, or lack of, they had running over the right side. Sure, they return John Jerry who started last year and their right guard looks to be Reid Neally who has a few starts under his belt. (they've considered moving Neally to LT but Sowell won that position "by default" in the spring)

When I put one line (Bama's) against the other (Ole Miss) both are replacing three starters. But, the replacements Bama is inserting have their advantages. Not only were they considered better prospects coming into the program, they also have more experience.

Vlachos is our concern...but, that's a subject we'll get into when we start looking at our Alabama previews for the fall. (and I'm not terribly concerned)

 

[AFF]

A few thoughts...

I don't see a lot of difference between what Andre contributed to our offense and what Michael Oher contributed to theirs. We both were teams that had success running over the left side.

I do see a difference between our two lines when it comes to Bama having Michael Johnson and the number of starts he has at the left guard position.

Ole Miss doesn't have that luxury.

Now, as to the left tackle position we've got Ole Miss replacing a starter with Bradley Sowell. Sowell is of good size, 6'7" 310 as a recruit, but he was also considered to be the 22nd best player available in that years class. The 22nd best player in the state of Mississippi.

(add to that they had wanted competition between Bobby Massie and Sowell for that position)

Conversely, we've got James Carpenter who still needs work but has far, far more experience than either Massie or Sowell can provide.

Ole Miss does return their center from last year. But that left side is two guys beside each other with zero SEC game experience.

You ask yourself now. Do you suspect they'll be able to run over the left side with as much success as they did last year?

That's one of the reasons I pointed to the success, or lack of, they had running over the right side. Sure, they return John Jerry who started last year and their right guard looks to be Reid Neally who has a few starts under his belt. (they've considered moving Neally to LT but Sowell won that position "by default" in the spring)

When I put one line (Bama's) against the other (Ole Miss) both are replacing three starters. But, the replacements Bama is inserting have their advantages. Not only were they considered better prospects coming into the program, they also have more experience.

Vlachos is our concern...but, that's a subject we'll get into when we start looking at our Alabama previews for the fall. (and I'm not terribly concerned)

Sounds like a reasonable assessment. I also agree with the point you made earlier about how Nutt is a great motivator. But, that only seems to serve him well in big games where his teams are the underdogs. They won't be the underdog so many times this year. And we all know the history Nutt has whenever he is EXPECTED to have a great year.

Looking back at last year, Ole Miss started off with a record of 3-4 including losses to Wake Forest and Vanderbilt. Yeah, those two teams were better than they usually are last year - but they're still Wake Forest and Vanderbilt. Kudos to Nutt for motivating his boys against the Gators but I think Florida was caught off gaurd by a 2-2 Ole Miss team and I think the Gators would have beaten them 9 out of 10 times. The only other really impressive win for them was whipping the tar out of LSU 31-13 in Red Stick and holding their running game to a total of 37 yards. Still, I'm not convinced they could repeat that performance if they were to play again.

I believe the Rebels will be exposed as posers this year. Well, maybe not posers; maybe a "good" team as opposed to a "great" team would be a better way of putting it. The Rebels have a history of coming up short when they are expected to do well, and so does their coach. I say we whip 'em and they wind up 8-4 or 9-3 for the season.

 

[BamaCore]

Very nice article TerryP. I've always been a little skeptical of how next year's Ole Miss team will perform and it's nice to see I have reason to be. Add all of this with the fact that with all the hype surrounding them, they won't be in any position to sneak up on a team like they did Florida last year.

 

[TerryP]

Just as a side note to this-

We've all seen how Ole Miss is favored...how they are considered favorites with LSU and Bama visiting Oxford.

I think we can all agree that the guys in Vegas have a pretty good grasp on where to put the lines for games as well, right?

One thing I find interesting...

I started looking over the early odds on the BCS winner next year. I knew Florida would be considered the odds-on favorite (currently at 7-4) but I was interested to see where they had Bama, Va. Tech, etc. (Bama is at 20 to 1 right now.)

I did not find one team listed anywhere. Care to guess what team that was? Ole Miss.

Interesting to me how they give Bama and LSU 20 to 1 to win the BCS but there isn't a line on Ole Miss getting there when they are supposed to be able to beat...

What does all that mean? Nothing really. Just found it interesting.

 

[shipley00]

(add to that they had wanted competition between Bobby Massie and Sowell for that position)

"Had"? I've done good to find time to keep up with Bama recruits. "Had" is past tense. Something happen to Massie?

 

[TerryP]

"Had"? I've done good to find time to keep up with Bama recruits. "Had" is past tense. Something happen to Massie?

Massie hasn't qualified.

Hope was to get him on campus and working out with the summer groups so he'd be able to give some competition for the tackle position.

He had two summer courses he had to pass in order to qualify.

What I don't know is the date those courses conclude. Just as a comparison, Lacy's courses won't finish until the last few weeks of this month so he can't get in on summer conditioning.