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John Schlarman wasn't happy
On Friday Neal Brown said he felt like they had more offensive linemen that could play than he expected. This to a football pundit who has UK as a favorite, this news is like pigskin music to the ear. We know that more than ever in today's football it all starts in the offensive. On monday O-line Coach John Schlarman was a singing a somewhat different song. "I'll tell you what, today wasn't a good day to ask that question because they were dropping like flies out there today," the coach lamented.
"We've got some injuries but I've been really with Darrian Miller's progress. He is a guy that battles every snap. And I think he's done a great job.
* "Big Kevin Mitchell who's a little beat up right now but he's had a good spring. Being a senior and a guy these guys look to our there.
* I think Jordan Swindle is coming along. He's go to get some strength on him. He's got to get in that weight room and hammer it out. He's not going to get that much stronger from now until Wednesday. But he's learning technique. He's a big tall guy and he like Big Jack has got to learn leaverage, too. He's got to learn how to that use big long reach to his advantage. And he's getting there.
* We got Zack West first day back out there today and working in some team drills. We didn't want to throw him out there and get to many reps the first day back. We wanted ease him back into it."
Schlarman said that the big spot to fill is the graduation of (Larry) Warford. Those are big shoes to fill. The right guard spot. "From Friday to today we had three guards go down so obviously that's a big spot to fill," Schlarman said. So we are working a lot of people in there.
* "Tevin Eatman-Nared has come a long way in the spring. I feel like he's had a good spring from start to finish. We were on him a lot at the beginning because he's a guy that we've got to count on. I think he a guy that's well capable in getting in there and mixing it up for us. The biggest thing with him is the consistency factor. He'll have a fantastic play where he'll knock the guy off the ball and then the next play he might have a let down. He's just got to find that consistency where his bad plays don't cost us. His bad play may cost us a one or two yard gain not a four yard loss."
The coach said West was full go and he would have to look at the film. He said he felt like West did some good things with the naked eye. "The thing with guys like West is the game isn't so fast for them because they've been in the fire so it doesn't seem everything is moving so fast. They have a tendency to see things before they happen where as guys with less experience they see it after the fact or they feel it during the fact and by then it's too late."
Even though they have the most experience on the left side they are moving some guys around to see what they have. The coach said they are playing West some at center and (red shirt freshman) Jon Toth in there, too. Schlarman said - "It's ugly at times because there's a lot of inexperience at center. Zack Meyers is another guy that has come along and I just got through talking to him after practice because he's another one that will have a good practice and follow that up with a bad practice.
"We are still learning who to block not how we are going to block them. Once we get to the point of know who to block then we can hammer out some of the details; the steps to take; the foot work; the pad level; and some of those things." The coach said the difference in this offense as opposed to the last offense for the o-linemen is things are going a lot faster because you don't have that fifteen or twenty seconds between plays to figure what happened on the last play. You've got eight or nine seconds, the ability to think on the run and make adjustments. That's the biggest difference in this offense. We asked the coach about the line splits, which in some spread offenses are wider than others. He said - "We call them "smart splits." We will use them in times when it works to our advantage and other times we will tighten them down. There's always some positives to that and some negative so we have to use them to your advantage."
From talking to the coach it seems like once the consistency arrives across the board the offensive line could be a plus for the Wildcats. And everything now is an adjustment.
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