Saying the unsayable.....

[xpsyclonex2002]

I'm going to get torched for saying it outloud, but Hurd isn't the "beast" we say he is. Is he good. Yeah. Has he gotten a ton of yards over his career? yes. But that is unremarkable considering that we have a QB who can't throw the ball so almost every play is run. Does he have some highlight reel runs? yes. But considering how many carries he's had......"even a blind squirrel finds an acorn every once in a while". He has no breakaway speed. He is missing that 4th gear that lets him get further than 20 yds down field before getting tracked down (and not usually by one guy. Usually half the defense is dragging him down from behind after he's already blown by them). He also goes down at the first sign of contact and falls forward for 3 more yards. That is the biggest concern to me. He either blasts through the line untouched for the first 3 yards or someone touches him and he falls. I don't think this is a knee jerk reaction to last nights game. I've thought this for the last 2 years. I can't help but feel like he's and excellent player playing the wrong position.

 

[DEFENDTHISHOUSE]

I'm going to get torched for saying it outloud, but Hurd isn't the "beast" we say he is. Is he good. Yeah. Has he gotten a ton of yards over his career? yes. But that is unremarkable considering that we have a QB who can't throw the ball so almost every play is run. Does he have some highlight reel runs? yes. But considering how many carries he's had......"even a blind squirrel finds an acorn every once in a while". He has no breakaway speed. He is missing that 4th gear that lets him get further than 20 yds down field before getting tracked down (and not usually by one guy. Usually half the defense is dragging him down from behind after he's already blown by them). He also goes down at the first sign of contact and falls forward for 3 more yards. That is the biggest concern to me. He either blasts through the line untouched for the first 3 yards or someone touches him and he falls. I don't think this is a knee jerk reaction to last nights game. I've thought this for the last 2 years. I can't help but feel like he's and excellent player playing the wrong position.

It helps when you have blocking.

 

[nashvol1]

He's like Cedric Houston. Really good, not great

 

[Pooods]

Put an O line in front of him that is hungry and good and you would see he is a horse IMO.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

I'm going to get torched for saying it outloud, but Hurd isn't the "beast" we say he is. Is he good. Yeah. Has he gotten a ton of yards over his career? yes. But that is unremarkable considering that we have a QB who can't throw the ball so almost every play is run. Does he have some highlight reel runs? yes. But considering how many carries he's had......"even a blind squirrel finds an acorn every once in a while". He has no breakaway speed. He is missing that 4th gear that lets him get further than 20 yds down field before getting tracked down (and not usually by one guy. Usually half the defense is dragging him down from behind after he's already blown by them). He also goes down at the first sign of contact and falls forward for 3 more yards. That is the biggest concern to me. He either blasts through the line untouched for the first 3 yards or someone touches him and he falls. I don't think this is a knee jerk reaction to last nights game. I've thought this for the last 2 years. I can't help but feel like he's and excellent player playing the wrong position.

I wish he had a fullback in front of him and a pro-style QB under center. And an overachieving OL... like in 2009.

No doubt about his speed being nothing special.

 

[OrangeYankee]

Dobbs and Hurd look much worse because of the terrible O-line play that has plagued this team for the past 4 years. Until that actually improves from year to year, I don't care who you have behind center, they are going to look pedestrian at best.

 

[VFL-82-JP]

Don't go all apocalyptic on Hurd yet. Last night, we took a time machine back to 2014, the season where Jalen was usually met by tacklers (plural, not just one) in the backfield before he ever got to the line of scrimmage. You don't get a whole hell of a lot of pretty runs off under those conditions.

Jalen looked pedestrian last night, agreed. He probably did come out flat, like the rest of the team. But 75% or more of Hurd's problems last night had to do with an OL that seemed determined all game long to demonstrate how sieves work.

I'm not gonna put all that on Hurd. He'll carry his share of the blame, like the rest of the team. While the OL gets a double helping.

 

[DEFENDTHISHOUSE]

I wish he had a fullback in front of him and a pro-style QB under center. And an overachieving OL... like in 2009.

No doubt about his speed being nothing special.

Indeed. He would benefit greatly from I-formation.

 

[nashvol1]

The question is not whether he is a good back, it's whether can go beast mode like Jamal or Henry or Stephens

 

[nashvol1]

Indeed. He would benefit greatly from I-formation.

Agree

 

[rcrrcr]

He also gets tackled easy. Most times one man brings him down. I think his height hurts when it comes to breaking tackles.

 

[smyborovol]

On a goal line play an App ST. Player dove under the O line and tripped Hurd up with one hand and he went down. Also he didn't cut back to daylight light Cox from Apple ST.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

I wonder how much of it was App State's coaches doing a far better job of game planning than TN's multi-million dollar coaching staff. They knew that TN was not going to run Dobbs in order to preserve him for future opponents. So they committed more personnel to stopping Hurd. Dobbs would have walked untouched into the end zone in overtime had he kept the ball around the left end instead of giving it to Hurd on one of the plays.

 

[VFL-82-JP]

He also gets tackled easy. Most times one man brings him down. I think his height hurts when it comes to breaking tackles.

Now this is revisionist BS. We've seen Hurd carry 4-5 tacklers another five to eight yards down the field. And not just once or twice; many times. He is usually at his BEST after first contact.

You want to say he doesn't have 4th gear? Reasonable. Want to say he's not as nimble as a smaller guy? Okay, have at it. But this revisionist regurgitation based on looking through a soda straw at pieces of one game of the young man's career...that's just nuts.


p.s. 28 carries for 110 yards (avg just under 4 ypc) and 1 TD. Ugly as our offense was, Jalen was still the workhorse that carried it all night.

 

[rcrrcr]

The real unsayable is can we win the east with Josh Dobbs at QB?

Last year, he was last in all qb's in the power 5 conferences in passing of passes of 30 yards or more. He was 1 for 12 in the catagory last year.

 

[Madscientistvol]

I wonder how much of it was App State's coaches doing a far better job of game planning than TN's multi-million dollar coaching staff. They knew that TN was not going to run Dobbs in order to preserve him for future opponents. So they committed more personnel to stopping Hurd. Dobbs would have walked untouched into the end zone in overtime had he kept the ball around the left end instead of giving it to Hurd on one of the plays.

I haven't heard more about Dobbs and if he got hurt on that last play, but playing it safe caused us to need him to put the game on his shoulders. He needed to run enough to where the D couldn't just focus on Hurd and not have to put himself in last second heroics mode.

 

[Biopsyman]

I'm going to get torched for saying it outloud, but Hurd isn't the "beast" we say he is. Is he good. Yeah. Has he gotten a ton of yards over his career? yes. But that is unremarkable considering that we have a QB who can't throw the ball so almost every play is run. Does he have some highlight reel runs? yes. But considering how many carries he's had......"even a blind squirrel finds an acorn every once in a while". He has no breakaway speed. He is missing that 4th gear that lets him get further than 20 yds down field before getting tracked down (and not usually by one guy. Usually half the defense is dragging him down from behind after he's already blown by them). He also goes down at the first sign of contact and falls forward for 3 more yards. That is the biggest concern to me. He either blasts through the line untouched for the first 3 yards or someone touches him and he falls. I don't think this is a knee jerk reaction to last nights game. I've thought this for the last 2 years. I can't help but feel like he's and excellent player playing the wrong position.

The delay handoff is awful.. He will blow up at the combine

 

[titansvolsfaninga]

Don't go all apocalyptic on Hurd yet. Last night, we took a time machine back to 2014, the season where Jalen was usually met by tacklers (plural, not just one) in the backfield before he ever got to the line of scrimmage. You don't get a whole hell of a lot of pretty runs off under those conditions.

Jalen looked pedestrian last night, agreed. He probably did come out flat, like the rest of the team. But 75% or more of Hurd's problems last night had to do with an OL that seemed determined all game long to demonstrate how sieves work.

I'm not gonna put all that on Hurd. He'll carry his share of the blame, like the rest of the team. While the OL gets a double helping.

Liked!

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

I haven't heard more about Dobbs and if he got hurt on that last play, but playing it safe caused us to need him to put the game on his shoulders. He needed to run enough to where the D couldn't just focus on Hurd and not have to put himself in last second heroics mode.

And where was the jet sweep? I think that the last few years it was utilized (including the decoy JS) more each series than the whole Appy game. Butch's offense is bizarre.

 

[08Vol]

Now this is revisionist BS. We've seen Hurd carry 4-5 tacklers another five to eight yards down the field. And not just once or twice; many times. He is usually at his BEST after first contact.

You want to say he doesn't have 4th gear? Reasonable. Want to say he's not as nimble as a smaller guy? Okay, have at it. But this revisionist regurgitation based on looking through a soda straw at pieces of one game of the young man's career...that's just nuts.


p.s. 28 carries for 110 yards (avg just under 4 ypc) and 1 TD. Ugly as our offense was, Jalen was still the workhorse that carried it all night.

Just an FYI the TD was a fumble recovery. He wasn't able to get into the endzone all 3 times we got close.

 

[fade route]

His yards per carry has always been very average for an SEC back, no breakaway speed. If he wasn't freakishly huge he would be playing MAC ball.

 

[Biopsyman]

The real unsayable is can we win the east with Josh Dobbs at QB?

Last year, he was last in all qb's in the power 5 conferences in passing of passes of 30 yards or more. He was 1 for 12 in the catagory last year.

He looked awful last night.. His worst game.

 

[Thunder Good-Oil]

I thought he started out pretty well, something like 8 carries for 40-45 yards. Then the momentum went into the ****ter for TN.

I'm not giving up on him yet. The OL and Dobbs seemed like bigger issues to me.

 

[armchair]

Hurd does not go down easily--that is nonsense. What have been people watching for two+ years? The blocking was crap last night, and he doesn't have a lead blocker. The Vols were a feared running team in the 1990s, when we ran out of the I formation with a bad-ass fullback in front who would flatten the first would-be tackler in the hole.

 

[DCompagnucci]

Been trying to tell everyone this about Hurd. No break-away speed, limited elusiveness, not a big play threat.

Big and strong, hard runner, gets tough yards and moves the pile forward, but limited otherwise. Pretty darn good at recovering fumbles though.