that then got overturned. Glad the call went our way, considering how bad our D was playing, may have been a HUGE call, but I wasn’t so sure there was sufficient evidence to overturn the call on the field.
Thoughts?
By the way, that is one of the few “close calls” in in replay situation that I can recall going our way,
When they slowed it down, it was pretty clear to my biased mind that he touched it a half yard too soon. If you couldn’t slow it down, no way of telling.
It looked to me like he touched it about a foot short of the line. He didn’t have to touch it then, by the way; nobody was close enough and he could have let it clearly get over the 45.
Not many close reversals go our way, you’re right. The fumble by Fournette last week was one of them, but it only delayed the inevitable in that case.
Thought it was pretty easy to deduce he touched before it went 10 yards, but without clear-cut evidence was surprised we didn’t hear “play stands as called on the field”.
I also thought RWIII fumbled earlier in the game and was ruled down, but they never even reviewed it. Surprised those went our way.
The play I remember was Whaley losing the ball, but he had been stacked up before the ball came out so I suspected they had blown the whistle for forward progress long before the ball came out. The play with RW3, I think his knee was down before his elbow hit the ground – or the ball came out.
I thought he touched it too early but I thought they would fall back on the “not enough evidence to overturn” excuse-especially on the road.
I thought there was zero chance it would be overturned.
As soon as State scored, I was boring every one in the room with “they are probably going to on-side kick”. Yet, in spite of the game situation we don’t put the hands team out there, and come within a hair of letting State have the ball back.
That almost-fail is on BB, that was a game management lapse. We have not been even a good kickoff return team all year, and we were moving the ball at will against State, so the risk/reward of trading blockers for hands guys at that point in the game was all on making sure we got the ball back.
I am far from a BB hater, but that really was a coaching mistake, IMO.
While they didn’t have the traditional onside kick recovery unit out there, they did alter the positioning of the front players as if they were expecting it. If you look at the kickoffs early in the game, our front line was on about the State 48-yard line, while our second line was near the Razorback 42-yard line. On the inside kick, our front line had moved up a couple of yards to the State 46, while our second line had moved up about 5 yards to the Razorback 47 or 48.
I’m not certain who all is on the “hands team” (I know Drew Morgan is because he’s recovered them before). And it’s hard to make out numbers on the usual kickoff team because the cameras are always so far off. I can at least make out that Duwop Mitchell and Cody Hollister are in those front two lines of normal kickoff, in two positions that you would need good hands guys. Wouldn’t surprise me if they were there for “hands” team as well.
It was a kick that was played nearly perfectly by their kicker, but it wasn’t as though our guys were far out of position. Duwop and the other defender (couldn’t make out who it was) would’ve had a decent shot at the ball had it traveled two yards further. Receiving team shouldn’t touch it before it goes 10 yards anyways, because it’s then a live ball. Receiving team should be ready to grab at the 10-yard mark (40-yard line). We had a couple at the 41 1/2.
May have been from the cold air, but their kicker wasn’t getting anything near the goalline on earlier kickoffs. Pulling your “hands” team all the way up leaves a lot of empty space to pooch kick.