Alabama 49, Arkansas 14

Whew. That was every bit as bad as I thought it would be and worse. I never dreamed we’d help them as much as we did. When was the last time our defense was this bad? The 4-7 season under Nutt? And, as impressed as I was with the call Bobby made to get our first score, I was underwhelmed with the Michael Smith call in the Red Zone at the end of the half.

i said before the season began that I’d be happy with 6-6. Now even that is lookin’ a bit remote. :^/

Arkansas fans are so over the top. You ran off houston nutt for this and houston is about to be 3-1

Eric, one partial year doesn’t make a career!

Also, you’ll notice there aren’t wholesale calls for Petrino’s head. So far, I’m the only one to comment on the coach and that was to question just one play call. I’ve got no complaints on Petrino’s offense. It was very enjoyable to watch when it was effective. I even found myself expecting us to march down the field and score (early on…;^) I NEVER felt that way when Nutt’s offense was on the field. Things are going to get much worse before they get better but I seriously doubt we’ll see any calls to run off Petrino.

I also found a play, for the first time (series actually) that I questioned the play-calling. When Bama held at the 1 yard line, I thought it should have been Curtis taking the early hand offs on 1st and 2nd down, instead of Barnett, but Petrino is a guy that rewards players for what they did in practice that week, so there could be something to that. We followed that play with what should have been a TD, but Casey made another terrible pass, throwing the ball at De’Anthoney’s feet. It looked as if the Tide had spooked him a little, trying not to throw another interception, instead of making the play. The last play, I was left scratching my head a little. A 175 lb. RB, running up the gut, straight into the strength of the opposing defense. Terrence Cody, at 365 lbs., can basically handle 2 men on the line of scrimmage, so that was really the only play call I’ve questioned by our new coach so far. Owasso was right on target with what he said about the overall mistakes by Special Teams, Casey, and our run-defense. I’ll cut Casey some slack on the first INT to Arenas, with the confusion at WR, but the second one was on him. There’s about 6 plays, (mistakes) as Owasso pointed out, that determined the blow-out on the score board. These are mistakes that come from youth, not talent. Casey is a SR., but remember, he hasn’t exactly been trained to run this type of offense for 4 years either. Even handing the ball off to Smith is different, after having D-Mac and Felix for the first 3 years. I’m not making excuses for Casey, but the facts are there. Considering the type of defense he played against yesterday, I’d still say he get’s a C+ on his report card. The bottom line is, you can still tell there’s a lack of cemistry, because of all the youth and newness he’s playing with. There’s still great days ahead folks. It might not be with Casey at QB, but it’s coming. We seen that when Tyler Wilson was given a chance to play. I think about 2 years from now, we’ll probably have a couple of pretty good QBs with Mallett and Wilson. Were just gonna have to be patient. As for Eric’s comment on Houston Nutt; you’ve got to be kidding, right?

I tell you one thing I notice yesterday is that our defense couldn’t tackle a 3 year old. I kept thinking that for the most part they where in the right place its just looked like they thought they where playing touch football or flag. I couldn’t keep up with the number of missed tackles. The guy would run up the middle get touched by 2 or 3 players and still break for a 20yrd gain. Defense is what wins games and this defense has not gotten any better through three games so that tells me one or two things. Either they aren’t spending enough time on it in practice or they need to do some more rotations until they find the right fit.

Personally, I think it would be better for the future of the program, if you could still red-shirt Wilson. If so, I think it’s pretty much 50-50 right now with him. It all depend’s mostly on Casey, over these next few weeks. If he doesn’t get past these mental errors, giving the defenses big TDs, and killing key drives, Petrino may be forced to tip his hand. I’ve seen Spurrier play 2 QBs for years, not knowing who the clear leader or play-maker really was on a week to week basis. We could start seeing the future at QB sooner than we exspected.

I realize I’m long-winded, but I’m pretty bored today. Just thought I’d let anyone who’s reading know that Knile Davis has been rumured close to committing to the Hogs. Davis is a 6′ 1″, 210 lb., RB, who’s a 4-star recruit, according to Scout.com recruiting. He’s rated the #20 RB in the 2009 class. Ronnie Wingo is also still considering the Hogs heavily. Wingo is 6′ 3″, 212 lbs., and is the #10 rated RB in that same class. Were up to 15 commitments now, with just a hand full to go, so those two guys, or even just one, would be a nice pick-up. I’m also keeping my fingures crossed for Gabe Lynn to commit. He’s supposed to be Darius Winston’s equel, and is also heavily considering the Hogs. GO HOGS!!!!!

There are going to be some games like this, but make no mistake, the future is very bright. If you don’t see that, then you aren’t looking very hard. Believe it or not, I’m actually looking forward to Texas next week.

Good news Hog fans. The 4 star RB I posted about earlier, Knile Davis, officially gave a verbal commit to the Hogs today. This is the type of big, physical, fast RB that Petrino like’s to use is his style of offense. Davis become’s the 16th verbal commit for the Hogs, in the 2009 class. Our recruiting is getting better and better all the time. GO HOGS GO!!!!!