Again Auburn won but I think you cannot help but compare teams watching this game and the others yesterday. Can this Auburn team do better than the previous five Auburn teams and win more conference games? Again the talent level has been upgraded which gives Auburn a chance but has it been upgraded enough and what level is our coaching? I will start with the defense. I think D.J. Durkin is a pretty good coach and that we have a decent defensive staff. I think we have decent talent on the defense with a couple of special players like Keldric Faulk. I think that is the consensus from just about all Auburn fans. The problem is the results so far tell a different story...
Baylor ran up 500 yards on this defense and South Alabama got over 300. I know it was not a big game and they will be better but South Alabama seem to impose their will many times in the game yesterday. The defense ended up making the plays needed but overall after those two games Auburn fans cannot feel great about this defense. I mean Baylor appears to be a good team and South Alabama definitely a solid one but giving up over 800 yards? I just hear warning bells going off especially with South Alabama rushing for almost 150 yards. This Auburn defense is simply going to have to play a lot better starting next week for Auburn to even have a chance at some big wins.
Next up I will just repeat again what I have in the last two posts... Auburn's passing game is just not clicking on all cylinders. Million dollar man Cam Coleman even though he had a touchdown yesterday has simply not been an impact player. Eric Singleton has been and appears to be worthy of his hype but Auburn still cannot get it to him enough and he maybe hurt. Quarterback Jackson Arnold appears to be an upgrade over Payton Thorne but still has issues. The main one that popped up to me yesterday was watching him execute a perfect play action drop back and have plenty of time... and not throw the ball at the right time or in rhythm. That just screams coaching to me.
The opposite would be Tennessee who passed the ball courageously yesterday and only lost because they could not convert a makeable field goal at the end. They have a good passing game though. That is what a good college passing game looks like. You have to have the coaching and Auburn appears to be drastically lacking there. Auburn's very expensive high rated wide receivers not only dropped several yesterday but either they or Jackson Arnold are doing something wrong since he won't pull the trigger many times. One of the reasons again appears to be that the coaches have overreacted to Thorne's bad decisions last season and, as I have already opined, made Jackson Arnold scared to make a mistake.
The offense just looks like an old high school offense passing-wise and Jackson Arnold is just not getting the coaching to pass successfully. Auburn is a better team than the last four years but with these issues in the passing game I just am not sure how successful this team will be in a tougher-than-ever SEC. The next three weeks look daunting to say the least. Oklahoma and Texas A&M are up the next two weeks. Oklahoma looks to be much improved over last season and Texas A&M just won in South Bend. I do not think this Auburn team could have done that. Georgia comes in after that and I sure do not see Auburn playing as well as Tennessee did.
I hope I am just being "negative", I hope Hugh Freeze and this Auburn team prove me wrong however I think most of us have watched good teams and they look like good teams in most all their games. I think most of us have seen well-coached passing offenses and this just does not appear to be one. This Auburn team can run the ball but it has not shown a consistent passing offense nor a tough defense. Most of all this coaching staff has just not shown the mettle to win big games. Let me repeat that, this coaching staff has just not shown the mettle to win big games. That does not bode well for next week nor the season. However Auburn is 3-0 and has a lot of good players. Please prove me wrong.
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