Returning Experience 2020 Season

Bill Connelly, advanced stats guru, has released his returning experience chart for 2020. As expected you guys are near the top, 21st overall (14th defense, 62nd on offense). LSU is nearly at the bottom, 126th overall. As we discussed last preseason, role reversal from 2019 for UT and LSU.

A better way to measure which teams return the most production in 2020

Of note is that LSU was near the bottom for the 2018 season, but still managed to win 10 games and a New Year's Six bowl game. Pretty good coaching job by Orgeron. Also, the Aggies return a lot of experience this year so if Jimbo is going to make some noise...this is his year with LSU and Bama both scraping the bottom in terms of experience.

 

Interesting stuff, thanks.

 

Good post.
I expect this to be one of the more competitive and even SEC years...and Big12 years..with a winner hard to pick (I'll go Bama for now SEC( LSU, Florida, UGA, Auburn, atm all at the door) and Big12 too close to call (ou or Texas with TCU,OSU,BU, and ISU all right at the door).
Should be interesting.
Returning experience matters alot...but some teams are deep enough and talented enough returning experience is only the difference between winning the CFP, playing in it or going to an upper tier bowl game ..for others, it is the difference between an upper tier bowl game or 7-6/8-5.
We will see where LSU and Texas fit in this analysis next season. True Upper Crust teams should be top 10 top 15 even in "off years"....CFP or top tier bowl in good years and still upper crust bowls in "rebuilding ones".
Seems like right now that is only a handful of teams and our teams want to be established as one of them....takes incredible depth and upper echelon coaching....we will both see next couple years. Best to you Norfolk.

 

I had a feeling Baylor had the season they did due to experience (and luck with injuries, umpiring). I actually wanted to see Rule stick around to see if he could maintain the success losing so much experience, and possible the law of averages evening out on the other things. I think he's a good coach, but still overrated a bit.

 

After reading his summaries—look for Oklahoma State to put up a lot of points on the scoreboard next year.

 

Here is my take on LSU. We are of course going to see some drop off, but not as much as many would expect. The two biggest places I see drop off is at Linebacker and Offensive line.

I think your QB is going to be very good again, not Burrow good (never would have guessed he would be that good) but still very very productive.

RB will be a strength again as you had 3 very productive guys last year and 2 are returning.

WR will be the strength of the offense with 2 guys that killed it last year.

Biggest weakness is your offensive line, you lost a ton of talent there and looking at your roster you are going to replace them with a bunch of very young guys. This makes me happy Texas is catching them in the 2nd game of the season.

On defense Your DBs are still steep and deep with talent. Two thirds of the earth is covered by water, the rest is covered by Derek Stingley (yes, I've been waiting to use that line for a very long time). Dude is the best freshmen corner I've ever seen. Now you are bringing in Elias Ricks. I don't know if he is as good as Stingley, but dude is a legit talent.

I have no idea what LSU is going to do at Linebacker, you guys took a major hit there. Same with DE. You do bring back a lot of really good DTs.

Biggest defensive loss to me is Dave Aranda, sorry but Bo Pelini is not nearly as good as Aranda. This is what really give me hope for next year. I've always thought he was overrated, but then again, I underrated LSU last year.

For now, I'm not picking a winner in this game, too many variables to look at. I want to see what LSU looks like in the Spring game.

As a whole, Texas again has a 3 game season, LSU, blowu and Okie lite. I know, I said that last year and it bit me in the ***. This coming season is Tom Herman's make or break season. He will either show us he can be the coach at Texas or he will show us we need to put together our search committee.

 

Not a problem as the HornFans Search Committee stays ready 24/7/365.

 

Very good, Viper - but we know how much influence the Hornfans Search Committe would have in that decision.

 

It still distresses me that our Hornsfans Search Committee doesn't have veto power concerning any and all hiring decisions. We would prolly have several nattys in the trophy room if they did.

 

It is CdC's fault that he doesn't listen to us. He should have learned by now.

 

LSU has 3 spots remaining for the 2020 recruiting class (only signed 22). O has said he's looking at possibly adding a grad transfer center and LB, both areas you identified above as concerns. He said he would use the 3rd on either a guy that academically qualifies late or "best available" grad transfer. So still might be some roster changes coming for LSU as late as the beginning of summer.

 

BTW NorfolkTiger
thanks for this info.

 

Baylor was 20th overall last year in returning production, and No. 7 overall in returning defensive production. Perfect situation to have a big year and parlay that into a promotion.

 

Just for you Mr Bill. I was going to wait till spring to post here about LSU. Wanted to see what changes especially on defense were made.

LSU - OL
RT - Sr - three year starter
LT - RSo - started three games last year
LG - RJr - 13 starts in career plus entered OU game on first drive and played rest of game
C - Jr - No starts. has 18 games experience on the OL
RG - RFr- Two possible guys here. Neither played last year. Both highly recruited. One was #1 OG prospect in the country in the '19 class.
The Oline is not as young as you think. Three three year guys - one four year and one in his second.

LSU had five CBs on roster last year. Four of the five were TrFr. Staff is very high on all of them. Three played a great deal. Really not expecting Ricks to make much of an impact next year.

DL - two returning starters. A third guy that played last year and had three starts. He actually led all Dlinemen in tackles, sacks and tackles for loss. Backup NT was a TrFR who was in for spring last year. He played in a dozen games. That's the four most experienced along the Dline.

LB - Wait and see what happens this spring. Clark is going to be one of the starters. He saw extensive PT last year. Couple of SRs that have quality PT over the years. Talk of moving a safety or two closer to LOS. One is Stevens who actually put up better numbers than Thorpe winner, Delpit.

Many many LSU fans very happy with the hiring of Bo. Bunch of people were getting a little tired of DA. Thought he underperformed for the talent on hand.

I will get in touch with EdO and make sure the AC is set at an appropriate temp for the game.

 

I recommend a strongly worded e-mail.

 

Along with a really large check

 

Damnit, stop ruining my Sundays.

yes, please double check that AC, we don't want any of your defensive linemen to get cramps.

 

More position speculations:

Potential position changes highlight Texas offseason storylines

 

The WR on Campus for Spring Practices:

2020 Texas Longhorns Spring Battles: The Wide Receivers

 

Has Hermann finished putting his staff together? How many did he have to replace?

 

With just field coaches he had to replace all but RB, OL, DE....

 

Sure hope they find a good place for and keep Jake motivated and plugged in.
I expect great things from Overshown.
Jwhitt is going to kill some people if he stays healthy.

 

I like Jake a lot, but I think he is over taken by Whittington. This is not to say that Smith won't be important to our receivers, but I think Eagles will take over CJ's role and Whittington will take over Duv's role. I could see Smith taking over Eagles old role where he can take advantage of his athletic ability.

 

Doesn't matter who we have on the field if our routes don't force defenses to play the entire field. Running all fades or routes outside the hashes won't cut it. We have to occupy all zones and force LBs to cover someone. We also have to teach WRs to run to open grass. Hopefully the new OC fixes our issues.

 

Again, I'm very ok with a spread attack using 4 WRs and 1 RB for many plays.

Eagles
Smith/Whit
Brewer/Epps/Whit
Moore/Washington

Where Brewer/Epps is in on 3 WR sets and Whit is in on 4 WR spread sets

 

^^^^
Agree on everything except Smith/Whit. Of course, with either 4 or 5 receivers in the pattern, the QB has to be able to hit 15+ yards down the middle of the field consistently. Also, the receivers have to be skilled in breaking routes to help a QB in distress (seems to have been an issue over the past few seasons).

If you want your best receivers on the field, Smith/Whitt should be your first two and neither one should be the X receiver. So :

00 Personnel -
H - Epps
Slot - Smith/Whitt
X - Eagles
Y - Brewer
Z - Smith/Whitt

01 Personnel-
H is out so Y becomes Epps or Brewer depending on the situation.

 

2019 WR stats (returning players only):

Eagles: 32 catches for 522 yards and 6 TDs
Smith: 25 catches for 274 yards and 6 TDs
Epps: 20 catches for 232 yards and 2 TDs
Washington: 3 catches for 33 yards and no TDs
Lewis: 1 catch for 37 yards and no TDs

Eagles and Smith are the go-to guys, with Whitt joining the 'go-to club' with his move to WR. Among the the others, Washington looks very good, and a number of the incoming true Freshman will likely see some time. Also, it will be good to get Moore back--he has some wheels. With good coaching this can be a heck of a unit.

Very fast guys: Smith, Moore, Whitt
Big guys: Epps (TE), Eagles, Lewis
Sort of big guys: Washington, Woodard

Dooooooooooods: Smith, Whitt, Eagles

 

Bill C's preseason ratings just hit...he has Texas rated higher than the early polls and says they are underrated this year. Be sure to read the text below the rankings for his take on Texas and other Big 12 contenders (hint: he has UT #2 behind Oklahoma this year).

Alabama tops preseason SP+ college football rankings

 

If this poll falls into the ags' hands, we'll never hear the end of it...