(Amari Cooper looks like a Julio-type, maybe better.)
A.J. was unreal on Saturday Night in Knoxville. So was Amari Cooper. A.J., to me, has put himself in the Heisman race with a spectacular performance on Saturday Night. A.J. was 17-of-22 for 306 yards and four more TDs. A.J. now is 106-of-154 (69%) for1,476 yards, 16 TDs and 0 ints on the season. He hasn’t thrown an interception in his last 238 attempts dating back to last year’s Mississippi State game after Saturday’s game against UT. He did throw three ints in the A-Day game, but he threw it 42 times, completed 29 and threw for two TDs against some pretty stout defensive players. These numbers are out the roof. Amari caught seven passes for 162 yards and two TDs. One of his TDs, a leaping 54-yard grab which he took into the end zone, was as beautiful as the Eli Manning to Victor Cruz 77-yard TD pass that won the game for the Giants over the Redskins yesterday. If you didn’t see that one, that was spectacular and so was Amari’s. Amari is a special player that is for sure. He’s a freshman who looks like an All-American right now. Is he better than Julio? I think he has a chance. Julio is one of the most dynamic players to ever play wide receiver at ‘Bama and is tearing it up with the Falcons this season, but Amari looks just as good and may even have better hands than Julio. A.J.’s knee looked fine as he was flying down the field to shoulder bump Amari after the 54-yard TD pass.
T.J. Yeldon ran for 129 yards and two touchdowns and Eddie Lacy ran for 79 without a TD. The offensive line is fantastic. I will officially put A.J. on my Heisman watch list. There is still time. This thing is usually not decided till the last couple of weeks of the season and it’s changes constantly from week to week. A.J. put his hat in the ring after that performance. Collin Klein is the leader after Saturday’s performance against a weak West Virginia defense in which he threw for three TDs and ran for four more. He’s a heckuva player, but A.J., to me, is much more of a pure passer. A.j. can’t run like Klein and he has some first round draft picks around him; if not this year, whenever they come out. Chance Warmack is first round in 2013. Barrett Jones is borderline and I bet he will be a first rounder. D.j. Fluker has a shot. Anthony Steen is the underrated guy on the line; he’s a player. Cyrus Kouandijo will be a first rounder when he comes out after next year most likely; but the Tide will have him for 2013. And some of these other receivers like Kenny Bell, Kevin Norwood andChristion and Cyrus Jones are underrated. And Amari is definitely a first rounder, but that won’t happen for another two years after this season which I know ‘Bama fans are happy about. So A.J. has the line and the weapons, but he is flat out gettin it done. If he keeps this up, he’s first round material next April.
Defense was solid with C.j. Mosley playing an excellent game and Robert Lester with an awesome interception. ESPN analyst Todd Blackledge said during the game that there are no first rounders on this defense, but collectively they’re the best unit in college football. No doubt about that. Florida and LSU are good, Florida probably better than LSU, but I like the Tide defense the best. I would say C.J. has a shot to be a first rounder next April, Robert Lester will go early second or middle second and Dee Milliner could be a first rounder. There are plenty of top four round draft choices in this bunch. And, more importantly to Alabama fans, they’re the most dominant defense in college football this year. Maybe not as talented as last year or 2009, but pretty doggone good.
But enough of the draft talk. It’s time to focus on the rest of the season. Mississippi State comes to T-town this weekend for a pretty competitive matchup. The Bulldogs are playing well and playing with a lot of confidence. They have good balance with a quarterback, Tyler Russell, playing solid ball, making a lot of excellent throws and not making mistakes. He’s a similar qb to A.J. though not as good. State has some solid wide receivers and a pretty good running game led by LaDarius Perkins. Their oline is solid, and their defense is good led by first round draft pick Jonathan Banks, a superior cornerback. He’ll probably matchup on Amari which will be interesting. They have another pretty solid corner in Darius Slay, so they’ll make A.J. work hard. ‘Bama is in for a pretty good fight here. I like them to get this done, but it’s not going to be easy. Dan Mullen is doing a solid job at State and the future looks bright in Starkville. Alabama will have their work cut out for them Saturday Night. When I asked a young high school player, who was very intelligent and a very good linebacker, about five years ago when his team was undefeated three quarters of the way through the season, what was the key to keep it going. He listed a couple of things and then the last thing he said was: “We’ve got to stay humble.” Now that is something the Tide has to do. They have to prepare every week like each game is the biggest game of their lives and then play that way. Staying humble is the key to me for this Crimson Tide team.
Auburn is just done. They’ve become irrelevant. And they’ve got to do something about it. I wrote a satirical piece last week on hiring Bobby Petrino and while I don’t think Auburn should do that for integrity reasons, there are coaches out there they can get. They’re out there. The offensive coordinator for Florida, Brent Pease, really impresses me. He has gotten Florida back to playing very well on offense. He would be a good candidate. I hate to close the book on Chizik, but after losing on Saturday to Vandy, that sealed his fate. Vandy should have beaten Auburn by a couple of touchdowns really if it wasn’t for some costly fumbles and some questionable play-calling. Auburn is just spiraling downhill and it doesn’t look like they’ll recover. They play Texas A&M and Georgia at home and Alabama on the road for their last three SEC games. They’ve got a couple of kick in non-conference foes in between, Alabama A&M and New Mexico State. But it looks like Chizik is done. It’ll be a little expensive to let him go, but the buyout is not as bad for Auburn as it’s only $200K and change a month till 2015 and he’ll probably land another job and that salary will be subtracted from the monthly buyout payments. He’ll land somewhere as a defensive coordinator or as a commentator. I feel sorry for the guy, but his 5-19 record coming into Auburn from Iowa State should have raised a caution flag to begin with. I’m not going to get into how Cam Newton came to Auburn, but it was under questionable circumstances that Auburn won a national title. The Chizik era should be over. Auburn needs to start over. They’ve got a very solid recruiting class, so the key is keeping these players and adding a few more. Rivals has Auburn ninth and 247 Sports has AU seventh in the recruiting rankings and both have Auburn with three, five-star recruits in defensive tackles Dee Liner and Carl Lawson and linebacker Reuben Foster, who is a beast according to what I’ve heard.
But Gene Chizik is not going to get Auburn where it needs to go. He doesn’t impress me at all in his interviews. He always states the obvious, but never has any specifics on how to adjust or correct things. He doesn’t seem able mentally to do that. After his wife wrote that crazy stuff on Facebook a couple of weeks ago, I do question’s Chizik’s intelligence, both as a football coach and as a person. He can’t get results out of his team. It’s just not working out. I’m not sure who could replace Chizik, but there needs to be a change. Brent Pease is a guy who deserves an interview. He has turned Jeff Driskel into a solid SEC quarterback and has turned that Florida offense into a pretty good unit. He’s still got some work left to make the Florida offense stellar, but he’s done an excellent job so far. Their defense is very good too, but their offense has really made a 180 since last year. He was terrific at Boise State as well. He had a very fine offensive head coach in Chris Peterson at Boise, but Will Muschamp is a defensive guru, and he’s left the offense up to Pease. And Pease has excelled. He could be a strong candidate and Auburn may not have to pay him as much as they would a Bobby Petrino or a Butch Davis or a Jon Gruden, whose name always comes up in coaching searches. Could be a possibility.
Florida looks legit. They are solid. Kansas State looks very legit. Bill Snyder is an exceptional coach and Collin Klein a tremendous quarterback and leader for K-State. Oregon has that blazing speed and a pretty solid defense this year with some playmakers on defense, some big, strong safeties and linebackers, who have combined for 13 ints on the season led by Avery Patterson who has three, and a great pass rusher in defensive end Dion Jordan, who has seven tackles for loss for 26 yards and five sacks on the season. They are excellent. Oklahoma looks like they’re back in the picture. They play a big game against Notre Dame this weekend in Norman, and I think the Sooners will beat the Irish by 10 to 14 points, maybe more. The Irish are good, but not great. Oklahoma has it going after crushing Texas two weeks ago, 63-21. Pretty impressive offensive bunch.
So there are some very good teams out there. Alabama looks great to me, but there is a lot of work left. K-State and Oregon look like they’re special and Florida is close. Oklahoma could get there. Some people are talking about Southern Cal, but I don’t see it. Oregon will dispose of USC when they play. Oregon State is undefeated, too, but they’re not as good as these other teams. LSU not totally out of it, but I just don’t like this team near as much as their team last year. Just seem to be missing something on offense, and while they’re good on defense, don’t think they’re great like they were last year.
Anyway, a lot of good stuff coming up this weekend. Here is the SEC schedule this weekend. Florida-Georgia is the marquee game with Alabama-Miss State right there. I don’t know what to think of Georgia. They’re always a mystery under Mark Richt. Never know what you’re going to get year to year from the ‘Dawgs.They have the talent to be elite it seems like, but they never seem to get it done under Richt. They just got by Kentucky, 29-24. Probably looking ahead. This should be a pretty good football game. Georgia is capable of beating Florida. They have the talent. If they do, they’re in the drivers’ seat for the East title. But Florida is going to be tough for them. They have a better offense than Florida, but not as good of a defense. And that will probably tip the scales for the Gators.
Will have predictions on Thursday. In the meantime will have some more stuff as it comes up this week.