2023 Pre-season

[FUBeAR]

Big Turnout for Fan Fest.

Who stood out on the Offense
Carson Jones looks ready to step in this season if needed—Carson threw three beautiful deep balls.
Our running backs all ran hard… was really impressed with Grant Robinson.
KT… appears to be number 2. He also had some nice runs.
J Harris is bigger and still explosive.
E Harris had a grab catch on a deep ball, and so did Nick Cannon.
Colton Hinton appears to be as fast as advertised.
Hamilton was getting a lot of reps - he looked good too.
Our TEs are tall—seeing 6-5 and 6-7 TE's out there running routes is impressive.

The Defense
At times our D was dominant, they were all over our offense, and Huff and Jones had no choice but to throw the ball away.
I think Furman can go three-deep on the DL this season. Our size and speed are impressive. JJ looks fully recovered.
Our rookie DBs I thought played well, Dalton-Moson-Holmes stood out to me.

Great to hear about Robinson.

People on here used to say Antonio Wilcox reminded them of Standiford Jenkins. FUBeAR never said that. Wilcox was a real good RB, but he ain’t remind FUBeAR of 27. FUBeAR just caught a glimpse or 3 of Robinson in 2022. That dude reminded FUBeAR of 27. Hope to see more of him in 2023!

[The Jackal]

Big Turnout for Fan Fest.

Who stood out on the Offense
Carson Jones looks ready to step in this season if needed—Carson threw three beautiful deep balls.
Our running backs all ran hard… was really impressed with Grant Robinson.
KT… appears to be number 2. He also had some nice runs.
J Harris is bigger and still explosive.
E Harris had a grab catch on a deep ball, and so did Nick Cannon.
Colton Hinton appears to be as fast as advertised.
Hamilton was getting a lot of reps - he looked good too.
Our TEs are tall—seeing 6-5 and 6-7 TE's out there running routes is impressive.

The Defense
At times our D was dominant, they were all over our offense, and Huff and Jones had no choice but to throw the ball away.
I think Furman can go three-deep on the DL this season. Our size and speed are impressive. JJ looks fully recovered.
Our rookie DBs I thought played well, Dalton-Moson-Holmes stood out to me.

Great to hear about Robinson.

People on here used to say Antonio Wilcox reminded them of Standiford Jenkins. FUBeAR never said that. Wilcox was a real good RB, but he ain’t remind FUBeAR of 27. FUBeAR just caught a glimpse or 3 of Robinson in 2022. That dude reminded FUBeAR of 27. Hope to see more of him in 2023!

I am assuming that Robinson is going to pick up a lot of Devin Abram's production for the 2023.

Just from observation, Furman tended to like to hold out Roberto every third drive or so - they appeared to want him fresh for the beginning and end of each half. So, typically, those middle drives were split with the second and third backs. So, there should be a lot of carries available for him.

I had a chance to talk to Robinson's parents during the WCU game. Nice folks. I'm pretty sure they said that to that point, one or the both of them had made the trip from Texas for every game last year except VMI (which is admittedly not easy to get to).

[AstroDin]

Robinson is listed as 6-0 210; he looks taller.
Grant has already shown the power to break tackles at the line of scrimmage.
During the scrimmage, he had several runs where you could see his explosiveness.
I would go as far as to say that in the open field, Grant is shifty.

I'm also very happy KT stayed.
KT looked explosive, as you'd expect, and I've also felt he ran hard.
I'd expect Roper will find ways to get KT on the edge.

[The Jackal]

Robinson is listed as 6-0 210; he looks taller.
Grant has already shown the power to break tackles at the line of scrimmage.
During the scrimmage, he had several runs where you could see his explosiveness.
I would go as far as to say that in the open field, Grant is shifty.

I'm also very happy KT stayed.
KT looked explosive, as you'd expect, and I've also felt he ran hard.
I'd expect Roper will find ways to get KT on the edge.

I was a little surprised last season how Furman used Thomas.

In my mind, he was going to be that change-of-pace back with excellent receiving skills. In reality, Furman didn't throw to him that much. What he did really well, though, was block. He wasn't as big as Abrams, but you could see Furman used him in a very similar fashion.

You can tell our RBs are an incredibly well-coached unit.

[The Jackal]

Piggy backing on my earlier comment on being well-coached at RB as I peruse a few highlights again.

I think this play from Abrams is a good example. Abrams never touches the ball here. He never really physically blocks anyone. He knows he is in man coverage. He knows Huff is scrambling with the ball and already passed the line of scrimmage. He puts his hand up anyway - asking for the ball - and continues on his route. His man is the closest to the ball carrier and really the only man on the field with a chance to make the tackle short of the end zone. Abrams keeps him running down field with him with his back to the action. At no point does Abrams ever disclose to the defender what he knows - the QB is running with the ball right behind him.

That, to me, is evidence of a well-coached football team. It's not just the X's and O's, but the feel for the game and doing the little things that won't show up in the stat sheet. Over the course of a season, that will separate the good teams from the great teams.

[AstroDin]

Furman ran an RB/LB blitz drill.
The RBs were stout - and it was pretty intense with them going after each other.
To Jackal's point, KT more than held his own, as did Jayquan Smith.

[AstroDin]

By the way, the Quarterback preview is out:
https://furmanpaladins.com/news/2023/8/ ... backs.aspx
I meant to mention this Nehuel Garcia showed some nice eye candy on his handoffs to the running backs.

[FUBeAR]

I meant to mention this Nehuel Garcia showed some nice eye candy on his handoffs to the running backs.

He am purty, ain’t he?

[The Jackal]

I was also interested to see Fred Norman standing next to apparently normal sized human adults. Big boy.

[AstroDin]

Jackal, Furman's size is deceptive.
There are so many big men out there for Furman 6-3 guys are starting to look normal.
I watched the quarterback's receiver drills (which included tight ends).
I kept wondering how big was number 41 catching passes, he looked big, but with two 6-7 tight ends out there, it surprised me that Brock Chappell (41) was 6-5 240, and Gissinger is 6-4 240. Aiden Ruckh ain't small either at 6-3 235.

Saturday was the first time—I thought our size had notably increased.

[The Jackal]

Jackal, Furman's size is deceptive.
There are so many big men out there for Furman 6-3 guys are starting to look normal.
I watched the quarterback's receiver drills (which included tight ends).
I kept wondering how big was number 41 catching passes, he looked big, but with two 6-7 tight ends out there, it surprised me that Brock Chappell (41) was 6-5 240, and Gissinger is 6-4 240. Aiden Ruckh ain't small either at 6-3 235.

Saturday was the first time—I thought our size had notably increased.

Just in terms of what's listed on the roster, this has to be the physically biggest team Furman has ever put on the field.

Now, they may not play worth a spit, but we'll look impressive getting off the bus.

[Purple rain]

I can't wait to see our Dins next week. These dudes can play the game. We have an older Mature football team. There is a lot of excitement around this squad.

[The Jackal]

I can't wait to see our Dins next week. These dudes can play the game. We have an older Mature football team. There is a lot of excitement around this squad.

I think you are seeing the fruits of a lot of work.

- The grad school programs are keeping guys in house we might otherwise lose, and allowing us to be an attractive option for key transfer players.

- By all accounts, it seems our S&C program is a good one.

- No longer are we having to play freshmen in key roles. Some guys earn that playing time off the jump, but that's not because we necessarily need warm bodies to fill out a depth chart.

- On both sides of the ball, we rotate players a lot. I'm sure we'll see younger guys start getting some snaps during the season, get their experience up, and have them in a position to take over starting roles as juniors and seniors.

- If we keep this trend, we'll continue to have veteran teams. While we have a more mature group, we have 21 juniors, 20 sophomores, and 57 freshmen. Of our 12 grad students, 8 are transfers. So, with the grad program, we could be looking at 25ish seniors/grad students every season.

[gman84]

This Grad program has really helped us as Jackal stated. It has allowed us to be very selective in the portal process. We are able to find quality experienced depth. Most guys appear to have at least two years of eligibility. The icing on the cake has been our qb !!

[AllTimeFU]

I can't wait to see our Dins next week. These dudes can play the game. We have an older Mature football team. There is a lot of excitement around this squad.

I think you are seeing the fruits of a lot of work.

- The grad school programs are keeping guys in house we might otherwise lose, and allowing us to be an attractive option for key transfer players.

- By all accounts, it seems our S&C program is a good one.

- No longer are we having to play freshmen in key roles. Some guys earn that playing time off the jump, but that's not because we necessarily need warm bodies to fill out a depth chart.

- On both sides of the ball, we rotate players a lot. I'm sure we'll see younger guys start getting some snaps during the season, get their experience up, and have them in a position to take over starting roles as juniors and seniors.

- If we keep this trend, we'll continue to have veteran teams. While we have a more mature group, we have 21 juniors, 20 sophomores, and 57 freshmen. Of our 12 grad students, 8 are transfers. So, with the grad program, we could be looking at 25ish seniors/grad students every season.

How have the COVID year players impacted these numbers? Should we expect to see more of the younger (non-Freshman) players get more snaps when the game dictates it because we want to take care of the old knees and get ready for the COVID departure?