'10 TN RB Orleans Opoku-Darkwa

#101
#101
jspvol76 said:
Ok, then I have a question, and this is serious. Who do you not take out of the following to open a spot for Darkwa?

Cullen, Luc, Jones, Smith, Lemonier, Lattimore, Rees, Hunter, Green, Stone, Dixon, Riley....

My point is we have only so many spots, so who would you rather spend your time going after? I will say if things don't work out like the coaches want, then Darkwa should get an offer.

And by the way, this is a good problem to have.
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Well you will have Decommits or non Qualifiers in Pat Harris and Ralph Williams. Not sure why those are the only two I can think of.
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#102
#102
Dawson said:
Brian Westbrook- Villanova. Kevin Smith-Central Florida(might be FIU). Ladainian Tomlinson-TCU. Michael Bush-Lousiville. Tim Hightower-Richmond. Bernard Scott-Abilene Christian. Mewelde Moore-Tulane. Michael Turner-Northern Illinois. Ray Rice-Rutgers.

Just off the top of my head, all are current players. All contribute on a regular basis for their pro team.

I don't go with the "he doesnt have many offers" argument. Is it a good measuring stick? Yeah. But there are to many that fall between the cracks. Darkwa, I believe, is one of those players.
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I agree with you on the list thing. However, i think many of those guys listed were probably affected by the schools they went to. Who knows if they would be the same players they are today if they went to a big name school.

Look at Flacco.. he was at Pittsburgh but didn't get the reps he wanted, so transfered.

Would he be in the NFL if he didn't ever go to Delaware?

Throwing out a list of RBs that went to small schools is irrelevant because i can make a case for 10x the amount of NFL RBs from big schools.
 
#105
#105
GoVols2003 said:
His offer sheet at this time begs to differ. The coaches must have reason to think that we are in it for a better back at this time if they are not going harder after OOD.
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I will say this, the TN staff thinks he is a lot better than his offer list. This i do know for a fact. Eddie Gran really likes the kid. Right now Tennessee is going to try and land a "bigger" fish so to speak at RB. But there have been times during this year that Darkwa was closer to becoming a vol than most people realize. If TN was taking two backs this year, Darkwa might have been in this class. As it is, this staff most certainly think he is good enough to play at an ACC or lower tier SEC school.
 
#106
#106
bigtime221 said:
I will say this, the TN staff thinks he is a lot better than his offer list. This i do know for a fact. Eddie Gran really likes the kid. Right now Tennessee is going to try and land a "bigger" fish so to speak at RB. But there have been times during this year that Darkwa was closer to becoming a vol than most people realize. If TN was taking two backs this year, Darkwa might have been in this class. As it is, this staff most certainly think he is good enough to play at an ACC or lower tier SEC school.
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If this were true they would never offer him.

I think he has the ability to play at the SEC level, and if the staff thinks he is good enough for UT. He will receive an offer.
 
#107
#107
I just think that this is the year we can take a chance on a guy like Darkwa. With Brown, Oku and Williams coming back and who knows about Poole. He doesn't have to come in and produce from day one. Play special teams, learn in practice, and get some reps his sophomore or junior year.
 
#108
#108
Agreed. However, if we have the chance to get someone "better" that may be able to contribute earlier then i think we wait out.
 
#109
#109
Glutton said:
Agreed. However, if we have the chance to get someone "better" that may be able to contribute earlier then i think we wait out.
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I don't see any rb out there that is considering us that will break the lineup their freshman year anyway.
 
#111
#111
Would it be worth it though to sign Darkwa and have an inside track on the huge lineman that is at Ensworth right now? Just a thought. I will stop being Orlean's agent now.
 
#112
#112
Yea that's a possibility. A DT class next year of Johnson and Richardson would/will be sick. I think Orleans is a very good back and he could very well be a Vol if we miss on those other guys...
 
#113
#113
Lord Vader said:
I believe they think they can pull one of the top 5 on their board...
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I HOPE so.
I know Im in the minority around here but I was Not impressed with Bryce Brown. to me it looked like he only gt yards that were right in front of him, his vision was pretty off and his cut back ability wasnt what I figured. but he's still young but I would Love a Seastrunk or Dyer to help fortify the situation.

I havent seen much of Darkwa tho, how do his skills compare to the other top backs?
 
#114
#114
JayGunna said:
I HOPE so.
I know Im in the minority around here but I was Not impressed with Bryce Brown. to me it looked like he only gt yards that were right in front of him, his vision was pretty off and his cut back ability wasnt what I figured. but he's still young but I would Love a Seastrunk or Dyer to help fortify the situation.

I havent seen much of Darkwa tho, how do his skills compare to the other top backs?
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He didn't have a whole lot of chances to get going with Hardesty in front of him. He had almost 500 yards rushing (460), and averaged 4.6 yards a carry. I'm not sure how you don't see that as somewhat impressive for a freshman behind a senior the whole season.
 
#116
#116
There's probably a bit of "save my guys carries" involved in the difference in carries. And I'm not complaining a bit bc I LOVE MH. Just saying, why wear out my #1 guy and signature signee when I got this guy who's leaving. (Not to mention he's a beast) if hardesty is a junior this year they split carries 60/40.
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#117
#117
I dont think it was any of that. MH was clearly the best back. He will find himself on an NFL roster next year.
Jaygunna, as to your question. I like OOD. He doesnt have breakaway speed but few RBs do. He is very durable, and has great vision. He hits his top speed fast and hit the hole fast. He isnt much of a cutback runner from what I have seen. He will lower his shoulder though.

He played a lot of tough teams this year and all he did was produce. Especially when the defenses KNEW he was getting the ball.
 
#118
#118
Lord Vader said:
5th year senior Hardesty- 4.9 yards per carry
true freshman Brown- 4.6 yards per carry
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cool, stats dont tell the entire story tho
there are runs Hardesty made in traffic that Brown just isnt capable of making. Maybe he'll grow but usually being a great Running back is an instinctual deal
Ive seen Brown Leave yards on the field.
by no means am I giving up on BB11 but I feel more comfortable with another Runner along side of Bryce.

I really Hope Oku rounds out and is able to get more burn

is it safe to say OOD is a "Taurean Poole" type back?
 
#119
#119
JayGunna said:
cool, stats dont tell the entire story tho
there are runs Hardesty made in traffic that Brown just isnt capable of making. Maybe he'll grow but usually being a great Running back is an instinctual deal
Ive seen Brown Leave yards on the field.
by no means am I giving up on BB11 but I feel more comfortable with another Runner along side of Bryce.

I really Hope Oku rounds out and is able to get more burn

is it safe to say OOD is a "Taurean Poole" type back?
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Aaron Hayden.
 
#120
#120
JayGunna said:
cool, stats dont tell the entire story tho
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That's true, but in this case, I think it tells alot. They played the same teams, ran behind the same OL, Hardesty is 4 years older than him, but Hardesty still only averages .3 more ypc than Bryce. I'm not saying he's as good as Hardesty, I just dunno what people expected out of him. I gues it comes with the territory of being the #1 players; people think you are Adrian Peterson. I mean, what do you want him to do? He can't give himself more carries. When he gets all the carries next year, he will be putting up big time numbers like Hardesty is this year. He is almost doing the same amount of damage as Hardesty is on a carry by carry basis against the same exact teams. Here is a list of games in which each player has had the better ypc:

Bryce
WKU
Auburn
Alabama
South Carolina
Memphis
Ole Miss

Hardesty
UCLA
Florida
Ohio
Georgia
Vandy
Kentucky
 
#121
#121
the ypc stat still doesnt tell the whole story tho

there are special RBs who can get 5 yards out of a run where as a RB only gets 2. and what I see from Bryce is him getting the 2 that are there and him not being able to make guys miss, find a cutback lane or break an arm tackle to get the extra 3.

Let me feel u out on Brown (Pause), off of what we've seen, what do you consider Bryce's strengths and weaknesses?
 
#122
#122
Weakness: he is young (give him time)


Why is everyone getting worried that Bryce Brown isn't going to do well? He is a freshman in the SEC, he will get better, learn and eventually excel.

Watching him run this year has been exciting, he didn't have a ton of carries so we didn't get to see what he is truly capable of.
 
#124
#124
JayGunna said:
Let me feel u out on Brown (Pause), off of what we've seen, what do you consider Bryce's strengths and weaknesses?
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Very hard runner. Strong. Finishes runs. Fast in the open field. Deceptively quick, he just needs to stop thinking and just react. One of the best pass catching RBs that we will ever see at UT when it's all said and done...

May be thinking a little too much instead of just reacting/hitting the hole which also makes him look like he is not all that quick. supposedly lived and died on the toss-sweeps in high school so he hasn't learned how to really run between the tackles in big time football yet. still adjusting to the speed of SEC defenses. is just learning how fast they are. looks for the edge too much on some plays and tries to outrun everyone instead of just getting the yards that are there...

All of his weaknesses can be fixed with time and experience. Everybody expected way too much out of him. Dude's just a freshman. With 5 years in the SEC and in a college strength program like Hardesty has been in, I can only imagine what Brown could be. I mean, in his first 4 years, Hardesty never had more than 370 yards in a single season. Bryce already has 460 rushing and 140 receiving with a game to go. I know those aren't big time stats, but he's already had a bigger year than Hardesty ever had before '09. He's gonna be a good one...
 
#125
#125
Add to that is the fact that he had a nagging injury most of this season, which slowed him down. Most all Freshmen are a little timid when they play in the SEC.
 
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