Just wanted to go through a few things that stood out while listening to Stoops, Gran, and Hinshaw at today's presser:
Both coaches are very high on CJ Conrad:
This is important. If you under-utilize your tight ends, your offense can become barren, and Kentucky was prone to that last season. When asked which players have stood out immediately, both coaches couldn't help but let CJ Conrad's name slip out before saying the all resumes will be clean and everybody will get their shot if they earn it.
Conrad will become one of the premier tight ends in the country, probably next year. Terrific athlete, good size, very good blocker, regardless of where you put him, and catches the ball well. In a TE friendly offense that could see him coming off the LOS, or out of the backfield at the fullback position, Conrad should be excited about that.
Gran would describe our new, incoming offense as "pro-style":
Thank goodness, goodbye Air Raid. I've not been huge on that air raid mentality. To me, it's like living and dying by the 3 (We're Kentucky, never pass on the basketball terminology when it's applicable). I feel like the Air Raid would make it incredibly difficult for our offense to ever maintain any sort of consistency. Some days our QB and receivers will be hot, some days they won't. If you take away Baylor's running game (and it's very potent, and very underrated), I'm not convinced that they would be able to put up the passing numbers that they put up. That's the case with any great offense. We have the playmakers, we have the threats all over the field, they just have to be utilized appropriately. We need balance.
The offense will be balanced:
Gran started by saying some years, your offense will be 60% run, 40% pass, sometimes it will be 60% pass, 40% run, but you have to do what you can to make it 50-50. At Cincinnati, he did a good job of that, used Houston as an example of that. Houston had the tendency to play their safeties roughly 7 yards from the LOS, made it difficult to run the ball, so the QB had a big day. Wasn't the case for the significantly more talented Florida State during bowl season, despite having one of the best running backs in the country in Dalvin Cook. Gotta take what the defense gives you.
Hinshaw was very high on Drew Barker:
Recruited him while he was at Cincinnati. He said he's aware of the accolades that Barker has had, and they were all well deserved. When Barker did some QB exercises for Hinshaw, he loved everything about Barker as a quarterback. I'm really glad that Hinshaw knows exactly what he's getting out of Barker and is that excited. He knows what it takes for QB's to be good in the SEC. Coached a darn good one at Tennessee, despite Dooley being very unsuccessful overall at Tennesee, I don't think we can say that it was for lack of passing offense. This is all while starting a true freshman QB whenever he got there.
Despite staff being high on Barker, Kentucky is still pursuing a QB that can immediately challenge Barker as starting QB:
Enter Stephen Johnson II --- Is he highly ranked? Nah. 3 star QB per 247sports Composite. Hinshaw relayed to sources close to Johnson that he has evaluated 17 different QB's in the JUCO ranks alone. We as fans are already aware that Johnson is the one with the scholarship offer. I find the kid to have impressive film. He may not have as big of an arm as Barker, but he appears to have very solid accuracy on his intermediate throws, in the pocket, or on the run. Good enough to make him the #6 dual-threat QB out of JUCO, at least. Having a QB with his speed (Some have mentioned it's actually closer to 4.5 [rather than the 4.78 listed on his Hudl account], and they cite Rowland, which makes me believe it) in case your QB is going to run the ball.
Our QB will run the ball:
Gran and Hinshaw made this abundantly clear. The QB will run the ball from time to time. It'll be by design the full way through the play, or it will be by read-option. Obviously if Stephen Johnson comes to Kentucky, the edge will go to him in this department, but this is not a dynamic that we've taken advantage of in the past couple of seasons. If you have a team with speed, the read-option is an amazing tool, and we've had some good speed out of our backfield, with Patrick Towles, and Boom WIlliams. It will be a welcomed addition to our offense, I can't stress it enough. I also think this will help us defensively. We have coaches that genuinely know how to run the read-option correctly. If we bring in Stephen Johnson, we'll have a legitimate read-option QB, and that take our defense a long way in learning how to scheme for, and stop the read-option, which has easily been UK's biggest weakness on defense (and it isn't close).
We're retaining Derrick Ansley!:
Outstanding news. He got a promotion to Co-DC, and will get a raise. Some people cringe at the word "raise" for Kentucky, but shelling out money is the only way to become great in the SEC, and he's every bit of an SEC quality coach. He'll also be groomed into a defensive coordinator along the way. This move could help UK in a big way somewhere down the line in more ways than it immediately helps by just retaining him. He's proven to be an outstanding DB coach for us.
What are some of the things that stood out to you all? I'd love to hear any opinions that you all have!
Both coaches are very high on CJ Conrad:
This is important. If you under-utilize your tight ends, your offense can become barren, and Kentucky was prone to that last season. When asked which players have stood out immediately, both coaches couldn't help but let CJ Conrad's name slip out before saying the all resumes will be clean and everybody will get their shot if they earn it.
Conrad will become one of the premier tight ends in the country, probably next year. Terrific athlete, good size, very good blocker, regardless of where you put him, and catches the ball well. In a TE friendly offense that could see him coming off the LOS, or out of the backfield at the fullback position, Conrad should be excited about that.
Gran would describe our new, incoming offense as "pro-style":
Thank goodness, goodbye Air Raid. I've not been huge on that air raid mentality. To me, it's like living and dying by the 3 (We're Kentucky, never pass on the basketball terminology when it's applicable). I feel like the Air Raid would make it incredibly difficult for our offense to ever maintain any sort of consistency. Some days our QB and receivers will be hot, some days they won't. If you take away Baylor's running game (and it's very potent, and very underrated), I'm not convinced that they would be able to put up the passing numbers that they put up. That's the case with any great offense. We have the playmakers, we have the threats all over the field, they just have to be utilized appropriately. We need balance.
The offense will be balanced:
Gran started by saying some years, your offense will be 60% run, 40% pass, sometimes it will be 60% pass, 40% run, but you have to do what you can to make it 50-50. At Cincinnati, he did a good job of that, used Houston as an example of that. Houston had the tendency to play their safeties roughly 7 yards from the LOS, made it difficult to run the ball, so the QB had a big day. Wasn't the case for the significantly more talented Florida State during bowl season, despite having one of the best running backs in the country in Dalvin Cook. Gotta take what the defense gives you.
Hinshaw was very high on Drew Barker:
Recruited him while he was at Cincinnati. He said he's aware of the accolades that Barker has had, and they were all well deserved. When Barker did some QB exercises for Hinshaw, he loved everything about Barker as a quarterback. I'm really glad that Hinshaw knows exactly what he's getting out of Barker and is that excited. He knows what it takes for QB's to be good in the SEC. Coached a darn good one at Tennessee, despite Dooley being very unsuccessful overall at Tennesee, I don't think we can say that it was for lack of passing offense. This is all while starting a true freshman QB whenever he got there.
Despite staff being high on Barker, Kentucky is still pursuing a QB that can immediately challenge Barker as starting QB:
Enter Stephen Johnson II --- Is he highly ranked? Nah. 3 star QB per 247sports Composite. Hinshaw relayed to sources close to Johnson that he has evaluated 17 different QB's in the JUCO ranks alone. We as fans are already aware that Johnson is the one with the scholarship offer. I find the kid to have impressive film. He may not have as big of an arm as Barker, but he appears to have very solid accuracy on his intermediate throws, in the pocket, or on the run. Good enough to make him the #6 dual-threat QB out of JUCO, at least. Having a QB with his speed (Some have mentioned it's actually closer to 4.5 [rather than the 4.78 listed on his Hudl account], and they cite Rowland, which makes me believe it) in case your QB is going to run the ball.
Our QB will run the ball:
Gran and Hinshaw made this abundantly clear. The QB will run the ball from time to time. It'll be by design the full way through the play, or it will be by read-option. Obviously if Stephen Johnson comes to Kentucky, the edge will go to him in this department, but this is not a dynamic that we've taken advantage of in the past couple of seasons. If you have a team with speed, the read-option is an amazing tool, and we've had some good speed out of our backfield, with Patrick Towles, and Boom WIlliams. It will be a welcomed addition to our offense, I can't stress it enough. I also think this will help us defensively. We have coaches that genuinely know how to run the read-option correctly. If we bring in Stephen Johnson, we'll have a legitimate read-option QB, and that take our defense a long way in learning how to scheme for, and stop the read-option, which has easily been UK's biggest weakness on defense (and it isn't close).
We're retaining Derrick Ansley!:
Outstanding news. He got a promotion to Co-DC, and will get a raise. Some people cringe at the word "raise" for Kentucky, but shelling out money is the only way to become great in the SEC, and he's every bit of an SEC quality coach. He'll also be groomed into a defensive coordinator along the way. This move could help UK in a big way somewhere down the line in more ways than it immediately helps by just retaining him. He's proven to be an outstanding DB coach for us.
What are some of the things that stood out to you all? I'd love to hear any opinions that you all have!
