2008 Season: Week 0: Burroughs (Scrimmage)
Hello, readers, and welcome back to I'm Glad You Asked. As you can see, it has been quite some time since I last posted here: the 2008 West Ranch Junior Varsity football season is about to begin, so you should find regular game reports and comments from me here.
First, some overall comments on the fall:
As those of you who live in the area know, we have had some blisteringly hot days here. We are regularly in the 100's (and on a black rubber-cushioned synthetic field, the heat is even more intense) and our players have been subjected to withering conditions. We have also had a rash of injuries that we are only now beginning to recover from. The adversity we have faced already is considerable, but our players have responded to it well.
The first official contest of the season will be on Friday, September 12th, at Lancaster High School at 4:00. As always, the week before, we conduct a scrimmage (not exact game conditions) versus John Burroughs High School in Burbank. I write this having just come home from that scrimmage, so my thoughts about it are quite fresh.
These scrimmages are not scored, so unless one team dominates the other, it is difficult to know who "won." Today was not a domination by either squad. On the positive side, we connected well several times in the air on what we consider our "best" pass plays. We threw two long touchdown passes on plays that were not flukes. We connected to other receivers enough to know that we will be able to move the ball in the air. Pass protection was solid enough, and we did not make many mistakes.
On the ground, we had plusses and minuses. We see potential in some players who have not had as much practice time as others, and we got very good surge off the line with our offensive front. All these things add up to potential, if we can capitalize on it.
Defensively, we improved our tackling but are still not as good as we need to be on it. Our secondary covered well and picked off a few passes.
We looked quite good in the special teams area. As many of you who follow this blog know, I always say: there are three phases to the game: offense, defense, and special teams. If you win two of the three, you win the game. We look like we can win special teams often.
However.
We lost quite a bit of the intesnity we had built up over the past few weeks. We had taken some steps in practice to build competetiveness and had felt pretty good about it, but tonight, we seemed to lose an awful lot of it. We seemed to have players who were either afraid or uninterested in playing. No matter what we do as far as X's and O's, if those X's and O's don't play, you won't win. Or to quote another footballism, "It's not the X's and O's, it's the Jacks and the Joes."
Of course, there are some technical points that need recoaching, especially at the defensive end position, but we are pleased at the technical performance of the team. For the most part, we have taught the kids what to do and how to do it: apparently, we need to work on getting them to do it with intensity.
So, again, to those of you who have been reading, welcome back, and to those newcomers to the site, I'm glad you asked.
Next week: Lancaster!
First, some overall comments on the fall:
As those of you who live in the area know, we have had some blisteringly hot days here. We are regularly in the 100's (and on a black rubber-cushioned synthetic field, the heat is even more intense) and our players have been subjected to withering conditions. We have also had a rash of injuries that we are only now beginning to recover from. The adversity we have faced already is considerable, but our players have responded to it well.
The first official contest of the season will be on Friday, September 12th, at Lancaster High School at 4:00. As always, the week before, we conduct a scrimmage (not exact game conditions) versus John Burroughs High School in Burbank. I write this having just come home from that scrimmage, so my thoughts about it are quite fresh.
These scrimmages are not scored, so unless one team dominates the other, it is difficult to know who "won." Today was not a domination by either squad. On the positive side, we connected well several times in the air on what we consider our "best" pass plays. We threw two long touchdown passes on plays that were not flukes. We connected to other receivers enough to know that we will be able to move the ball in the air. Pass protection was solid enough, and we did not make many mistakes.
On the ground, we had plusses and minuses. We see potential in some players who have not had as much practice time as others, and we got very good surge off the line with our offensive front. All these things add up to potential, if we can capitalize on it.
Defensively, we improved our tackling but are still not as good as we need to be on it. Our secondary covered well and picked off a few passes.
We looked quite good in the special teams area. As many of you who follow this blog know, I always say: there are three phases to the game: offense, defense, and special teams. If you win two of the three, you win the game. We look like we can win special teams often.
However.
We lost quite a bit of the intesnity we had built up over the past few weeks. We had taken some steps in practice to build competetiveness and had felt pretty good about it, but tonight, we seemed to lose an awful lot of it. We seemed to have players who were either afraid or uninterested in playing. No matter what we do as far as X's and O's, if those X's and O's don't play, you won't win. Or to quote another footballism, "It's not the X's and O's, it's the Jacks and the Joes."
Of course, there are some technical points that need recoaching, especially at the defensive end position, but we are pleased at the technical performance of the team. For the most part, we have taught the kids what to do and how to do it: apparently, we need to work on getting them to do it with intensity.
So, again, to those of you who have been reading, welcome back, and to those newcomers to the site, I'm glad you asked.
Next week: Lancaster!
