In Reply to: Based On Postings Here All Season Long, The Dramatic Turnaround In posted by NYBruin on November 09, 2024 at 11:06:46
... who learned the game under Chip Kelly and Tim Drevno were the guys who played.
Unije and Makihele are transfer guys that fozzie Bear and Castillo brought in. They were very deficient in their technique. But they were bequeathed starting jobs without having to earn them.
Bruno Fina saw that the deck was rigged, so he hit the portal when fozzie tried to recruit over him. Too bad. Fina was playing well in spring ball, and he's playing well at Duke now.
Yoon was the center throughout spring ball.
But he wasn't fat enough. When Castillo was asked what he thought of Yoon, he said, "... he's got a big heart." Backhanded compliment if there ever was one.
Carlin and DiGiorgio weren't fat enough, either. So they porked up during the summer.
Not surprisingly, the OL was complete dogshiit for most of the year. But then some things started to change.
DiGiorgio got hurt, and Prongos had to play. And it worked! The athletically built walk on played well. So when DiGiorgio recovered, Makihele got benched. (One fat, slow ol down)
Then unije got hurt (but not before he got the qb hurt). So Prongos to left tackle... and the dominoes kept falling. Carlin moved to guard, and Yoon came in at center.
So now the OL is 100% chip Kelly Holdovers. That brotherhood and cohesion of being teammates for 2 or 3 years has been critical in achieving the level of play they have produced.
Impressively, when Prongos tore his acl last night (that's what it looked like to me), Jeffers, another Kelly Holdover, stepped in and didn't miss a beat.