Football Depth Chart Review

So with a momentary pause in the basketball season, I wanted to take a post and review how the football depth chart looks at the end of the season.

First, this is done without any knowledge about any players who might be leaving.  Coach alluded to that possibility at the end of the season, and certainly if I hear about anyone transferring, I'll pass it along.  With that in mind....

On offense, we lose only 3 players on the O-line...one starter and then two reserves.  Note that I am building this off the UT depth chart--so the loss of Blaec Walker who started early in the year prior to a career ending injury is not reflected.

At the skilled positions, we are losing two WRs--Ty Pronty and Calvin Wiley--both of whom were episodically productive but never reached the level of being consistent go-to guys.  Most notable, Willie Geter is graduating, and will be more difficult to replace.  Sad as it is to say, while our offense struggled to run due to poor line play, what we did get Willie made for himself.  With a worse back, it would have been easy worse.   We didn't see enough to know if Hopgood is the guy in there, but it remains a question mark heading into the off-season.

Nick Rieke is graduating at TE, a position where we seem pretty deep.

On defense, you wouldn't expect to graduate too many guys, given our youth, and we don't.  The biggest loss is at end, where 3 of our top 4 guys graduate and the one guy on the depth chart is a guy I don't recall getting a bunch of snaps.

Champ Fells will be difficult to replace, and it will be interesting to see how our depth develops at LB.  Calvin Marshall got a lot of snaps but has Boo-Boo Gates behind him.  The entire back end is back, which is only good if they get better as they mature.

Finally, special teams.

This is a serious issue, not so much at returner, where Cooper and Gates should be able to handle whatever is put in front of them, but at the kicking positions.  Starting at placekicking, Coach called our placekicking "embarrassing" and there is no heir apparent.  We have recruited one kicker. , but he may be a walk-on.  Kickoffs were pretty good, but Wright is graduating, and there is no apparent replacement there, and Wright also did the punting and did well.  The next player there is Jerry Phillips, and we have not seen him punt regularly.  There are all pretty big question marks.

In general, looking at the returning depth chart, I would say it is clear that the theme for the off-season is not so much replacing guys who left, but whether the guys we had who went through this 2-10 season get better next season or not.  The actual guys on the field will look similar to last year.  Whether we come off a lousy season like Miami did or like Ball State did hangs in the balance.