There will many new faces and unproven players playing pivotal roles for the Orange this fall. In your mind, what position is the biggest concern as we approve spring practice?
For me, it has to be Left Tackle. In '10, we all knew Pugh was going to be the guy. In '13, Hickey was the heir apparent. Two NFL-talent guys manning the blindside.
Now? We have Lasker and McGloster who have taken snaps at LT and haven't shown us much of anything. Does someone else get a chance? I think this is a huge issue that hopefully can be resolved by the time September 5 rolls around.
I think the starting LT might well be determined more by what happens at center than what happens at LT. My guess is that the staff will value experience, try to move Trudo, a very smart and very experienced player, to center. Assuming Trudo can handle snapping in the shotgun formation, that would lead to a starting lineup that looks like this:
LT Foy
LG Hayes
C Trudo
RG Robinson
RT Palmer
You have 4 experienced OL who performed well or relatively well and all are likely to start or at least play a lot. Of all the other backups, I thought Hayes looked the most ready to play/polished of the bunch, hence that is the reason I have him playing before Lasker, McGloster, Roberts or Ward.
My understanding was that the staff tried to put Trudo at center prior to last season. That was plan A. But he was so bad at snapping from the shotgun, they dropped it and went to plan B, where Miller played center and Trudo stayed at OG.
If Trudo can't handle the snapping (I am assuming the new offense will be run from the shotgun quite often), things change. I think this is a good possibility based on what happened last year. In that case, Emerich, Hayes or Duerig will be the center.
Last season Emerich looked undersized and physically overwhelmed. But the same thing happened to Miller his junior year (though it wasn't in real games). He saw he was not ready and worked his butt off to get to where he could play BCS football as a senior and it payed off for him. I hope Emerich is doing something similar this offseason. It will be interesting to see how he looks in spring ball...he is one of the first players I will be checking out.
Anyway, if we assume Trudo can't handle snapping, this is my projected starting OL:
LT Foy
LG Trudo
C Emerich
RG Robinson
RT Palmer
I think it would actually be better for Lasker, McGloster, Roberts or Ward (or Burton or Duerig for that matter) if Trudo gets the nod at center, because if Emerich starts, the Big Four experienced OL are likely going to start with him. If Trudo plays center, it opens a spot at OG or OT for the next best player outside the Big Four.
After saying all that, I think the position with the most concern is free safety. We have an astonishing lack of experience at this key position and a real lack of depth as well. My guess is Williams is going to play SS and Scissum FS but I don't even know that. Hope they start healthy. We have little depth at CB to bring over if one of these guys gets hurt or turns out to be a dud. Pretty confident Williams is going to be a fine player if he can stay on the field though. A couple of frosh are going to play key roles in the secondary on defense this season...that looks like a given.
