Recruiting Football Talk VII

#115,655
#115,655
I heard from my inside contact this morning and he gave me 3 big updates:

1) Apparently Drinkowitz was at the game last night holding up a sign about our alleged violations. What a ****.

2) Drink and Zakai exchanged words. Drink started it, but Zakai apparently got the last laugh, calling him a 4-chin fat ***.

3) Saban has been meddling bigly in Tuscaloosa and everyone in the building is tense, as Saban apparently spends 12+ hours a day in his office while non-stop calls come in from Miss Terry asking him to come home and finish his ice cream.


This guy is dead-on. Best news reporter in South Knoxville iyam
 
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#115,656
#115,656
William Inge –

I had a lot of questions about this hire so I’ve been digging as much as I could to try to find some answers. I still have some unanswered questions but I don’t know that I’m going to find any more answers so this is what I’ve got.

I’m big on questions, trying to find the right questions to ask. One of my biggest questions this year is who are our go-to receivers. I’m not sure we’ll know until the first bye week. Another question is Lance Heard was listed by UTSports with the early enrollees but he’s not listed on the pre-spring football roster. All the other early guys are listed including Peyton Lewis who Austin Price said won’t be practicing in the spring due to some medical cleanup work he had upon arrival. So what’s up with Heard? I’m like a 4 year old with all my questions. lol. jmo.

Back to Inge, according to Austin Price this hire was essentially made by Tim Banks. Inge is the guy he wanted, again, according to Price on VolQuest.

Inge is almost universally seen as a good guy and very personable. He is generally viewed as a scheme guy which I take to mean that he’s pretty smart and maybe more into the X’s and O’s than the jimmies and joes. jmo.

I don’t think he’s ever really had a talent edge because the teams he’s most associated with, Indiana, Fresno State, and Washington, didn’t really have what we might consider all that much talent, especially on the defensive side of the ball. Case in point, he went into the national championship game last month with I think two walk-ons in the starting defensive lineup, one at CB and one at LB. In fairness the LB was honorable mention All-Pac 12. Still the point is his talent wasn’t what many would consider that great. jmo.

While coaching LBs at Indiana, he managed to get a LB drafted by the NFL, something that hadn’t happened with the Hoosiers since 1988. He also put a LB on the first team All-Big 10 roster, something that hadn’t happened there since 1986.

I couldn’t find much on his recruiting. The general sense of the fans at Alabama was he was lacking in this aspect. He wasn’t at Washington long enough to do much in terms of recruiting and Indiana is not really a magnet for elite players. His all-time top recruit according to 247 was Dominique Booth, a WR who was actually slated to come here in 2014. Booth had some health issues but did play one year at Indy. He got injured and medically retired from football. He was one of my favorites that was almost in that class. Shows what I know. lol.

I think Morrell call the defenses for Washington. I only saw that in one report but I never saw anything contrary. Inge had the defensive playcalling at Fresno State. Morrell was a college teammate of DeBoer and they got their start together coaching at their Alma Mater. Both went on to become head coaches in NAIA. Morrell left his longtime gig as HC at Montana Tech to reunite with DeBoer as the safeties coach at Fresno and followed him to the Huskies. Morrell doesn’t appear to be a typical mercenary because after the staff imploded in Washington he let it be known he was headed back to Butte for the life and people he loved.

When Inge followed DeBoer to Washington he left his family in California, his wife and three kids. I don’t know if he plans to move them here but he may just be trying to provide them with some stability. jmo.

His defensive philosophy seems to be a lot like that of Tim Banks which may suggest that Banks is trying to establish some relationships for his own future coaching staff. jmo.

At Fresno State he took over the defense with the Bulldogs coming off a 4-8 season in 2019, a run defense ranked #71 and a pass defense ranked #107. The Covid year they posted a 3-3 record but in 2021 his run defense improved to 25th best in the nation and the pass defense was 22nd best in terms of pass defense rating. The scoring defense improved from #82 in 2019 to #20 in 2021 and Fresno’s record went up to 10-3. I think that would be considered pretty good. They beat UCLA among their wins.

I can’t really say much about Washington as I don’t think he was calling the defense but in year one (2022) their run defense improved from #109 to #27. Their pass defense struggled but they still posted an 11-2 record that year, up from a 4-8 record the previous year by the prior staff. Obviously this year they couldn’t stop Michigan’s rushing attack but they did do good enough against Texas and everyone else on their schedule. I think Morrell may have been trying to help his pass defense some this year and maybe provided less help to the run defenders. They did go 14-1 with what they had so I think that’s probably better than just good. jmo.

Inge has had a 25 year career so I see him as a journeyman, especially as a linebackers coach. I think he knows linebackers pretty well. What Alex Golesh was to Tight Ends is a bit like I see Inge to LBs. Alex built two all-American TEs at Iowa State and did well with what he had to work with here. jmo.

Inge also appears to have a commitment to stopping the run which is consistent with what our priorities have been. He should fit in good with our staff and may be able to help with our LBs by providing a fresh set of eyes and a lot of experience and insight into the position. From a scheme perspective he may be able to share some ideas for tweaks with Tim Banks. jmo.

I think the thing that we need to take the next step with our defense is consistency week in and week out against the run and an upgrade in talent in the back end of our unit. I think we have a chance for both of those things, up front owing to increased maturity and obviously in the back end with higher rated more athletic prospects perhaps taking the field. We may have some growing pains in the backend as most of our talent there is pretty young but we arguably have the most potential we’ve had since the arrival of this staff. jmo.

The thing that jumps out to me the most about Inge is he appears to be an immediate results guy. We're not waiting around for more talent or anything else; we're going with what we've got and we're going to be the best at what we do. I like that. jmo.

I liked Brian Jean-Mary but my sense is we probably didn’t lose anything with his departure other than continuity. Inge has had major turnaround success in his first years on a new job so I’m not expecting any drop off. From a recruiting standpoint it’s hard to judge a guy until his third year, owing to relationship building, but he’ll be recruiting to the Power T brand and that will put a lot of wind at his back. jmo.

Last year in the offseason I pointed out that we were second in the conference for rushing yards per attempt against our defense in 2022, behind only Georgia. I thought owing to our talent and returning production up front we would have a chance to move up to #1 in 2023. Well, we did. We still need to be more consistent from game to game and I think Inge working with our LB group may be a step forward in that aspect this year and maybe beyond. jmo.
 
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#115,661
#115,661
Devo182 said:
I heard from my inside contact this morning and he gave me 3 big updates:

1) Apparently Drinkowitz was at the game last night holding up a sign about our alleged violations. What a ****.

2) Drink and Zakai exchanged words. Drink started it, but Zakai apparently got the last laugh, calling him a 4-chin fat ***.

3) Saban has been meddling bigly in Tuscaloosa and everyone in the building is tense, as Saban apparently spends 12+ hours a day in his office while non-stop calls call in from Miss Terry asking him to come home and finish his ice cream.


This guy is dead-on. Best news reporter in South Knoxville iyam
Click to expand...
The pic of Drinkwitz holding that sign is from a game with Kansas a year or two ago. It wasn’t at our game.
 
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#115,673
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