You're listening to the Back Home Network presented by Home Field Apparel. Welcome back to Crimson Cast, GAIL and Clavio joining you. Here it is, Tuesday, August 20th, 11 days from the opening kickoff in Memorial Stadium and only like 4 days away from college football kicking off, which happens this upcoming weekend, I believe, as I think we've got like the Florida State, Georgia Tech that's going
to bring them in ratings wise. But but anyway, it's great to have college football back and we are right in the thick of things. We've got our friend Taylor Layman from Bite sized Bison joining us on the show. Taylor, great to see you. Happy birthday last week and happy, happy sports season. We we made it through the long pause and we're back again. Yeah, yeah. Thank you, Galen. Yeah, No, the I, I every every
year since I've been. Well, I, I remember when I was in college and I covered Indiana football, I always got so excited. I was more of a football guy than a basketball guy and just being up in the press box and covering games like that. The excitement around it was was awesome and I still kind of get similar feelings to to that when when the bat when the football season approaches. So I'm really, really looking forward to it.
Also, I feel like by size buys and now is starting to kind of shape into what I was hoping it would when I first started. So I'm actually really excited for this football season of the new things that are that are coming to the newsletter. If you haven't checked out Bite Sized Bison, please go do so folks. You can do it on sub stack. You can follow Taylor on on X or or other sites and get links to you can also go to our sub stack and there's a link to bite sized
Bison from there. Subscriptions available throughout the course of the year and you're going to want this information about IU football. If you're watching this, you're clearly an IU football fan. I think of what we do here at Crimson Cast is we try to describe the the overarching questions about why, but Taylor's here to tell us how and what.
And I think that that's a really important thing and it's certainly a resource I rely on on a regular basis to try to figure out what's going on with the team and what to be looking at as we go through not just the pre season, but ultimately the season season. So what's the what's the special right now on bite sized Bison? Let the folks know.
I'll, I will say there might be like a day before the season flash sale like like like keep your eyes out for that that week before the few days before the season begins, there might be a flash sale. Right now. There's not really a deal on bite sized bison, but until then, but I will say, Galen, I've been sending you a lot of things. It's it's going to look different than it has in in previous seasons. If you've been following along for the last two seasons, some I
I think it'll be worth. It there's some great, some great data vis there's some great charts, there's some great utilization of data and there's some other cool things. If you go to Bite Sized Bison right now, there's a pinned post How to maximize your Bite Sized Bison subscription, and there's going to be full access to a chat where we can talk as a collective about what's going on with IU football. You can comment on paid posts, you can participate in reader
polls. You get access to all the free resources that are at Bite Size Bison as well as all the newsletter posts. It's just, it's a really great deal and you get a chance to learn about many of the things that we're going to talk about on this podcast. Position battles and what's going on, looking at what the roster looks like overall, figuring out what to be thinking of when you think about this IU team.
And as the season goes along, understanding what's happening in the games from a statistical perspective. If you've been listening to this podcast for long enough, you know, we try to touch on, you know, what the implications from S&P Plus are and what we're seeing in games in terms of where IU is either excelling or struggling or just holding pat in terms of both their offensive and defensive efficiency.
Taylor's going to go a lot deeper into that, so go check out this and you'll be reading what I'm reading throughout the course of the season if you do so. So I'm trying. To say real fast, I don't interrupt you, but thank you for all of that. And also I appreciate how much you, how much you and Scott not only revised by them, but like credit it when you, when you mentioned things that that you've read.
I listened to Scott's interview with Zion Brown and, and he mentioned vice size bias me a couple times. It's like, man, it's, it's so nice that knowing that you guys read vice size bias and the people who I respect. So watch read my material. So thank you. Well, not to turn this into like a mutual admiration society, but you know, as we've often said, like we, we want to see and hear
things about IU football. And I think especially, you know, one of the problems it the problem is the wrong way of putting it. But one of the things to keep in mind about traditional media coverage from reporters and, and even from a lot of blogs is that and even pie. I think podcasts are maybe the biggest offender.
It's, it's hard to get nuts and bolts type of coverage about, you know, the what and the how the things that I was talking about earlier, like what is causing victories and, and defeats. Because you know, historically in, in sports journalism, the focus has been on, on stories regarding people or stories regarding institutions. And there's clearly that has a nice broad appeal. We want to learn about the personalities in the
backstories. It's not to say that there's not a place for those things, but there's also a need. And I think we've seen this across not just college football, but Pro Football and several other sports. There's a real appetite for the numbers. There's a real appetite for understanding like what's under the hood with football. And it's such a fascinating
sport. It's such a, it's a it's fascinating to me because it's a sport a lot of people think is just kind of this dumb clash of physical beings, when in reality it is this multi layered chess match every play and there's like 1000 variables and there's innovation and there's there's there's people falling out of favor. There's all kinds of different things. It's a fascinating subculture if you're into it.
Not everybody is. And I think it's one of the things that we've tried to to get across with Crimson cast, like not for everybody bite sized bison, maybe not for everybody. But if you want to understand how football works or you want to think about the more of the strategic or tactical implications of some of the things that are going on and how that might differ from the Tom Allen era to the Kevin Wilson era to the Curt Signetti area.
This is these are the places to come for these things. So we appreciate you, Taylor. You know, we we missed Punt, Jon punt still. And they kind of touched on this a bit. You've gone a lot deeper in some areas. You know, it's just great to have somebody in the space doing that. So my thanks to you for giving us something that we've been looking to read for a while. Yeah. Thank you. We are all here.
Well, Taylor's kind of he's in the mix, but we at the at the Crimson cast are part of the back home network. And just a reminder, the back home network is brought to you by Home Field apparel, your place to go for the finest in college fashions, the softest fabrics, the coolest designs, the just the never ending cavalcade of great stuff that
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Upland beers are sold. Again, Upland Brewing Company reminds you to drink responsibly. Go Hoosiers. So let's dive in. We wanted to talk, obviously if you haven't yet, folks, go listen to Scott and Zion talking. I have actually Taylor's ahead of me. I haven't had a chance to actually listen to that podcast yet, but we're really trying to ramp up the content and get more information about what's going on with this football program out to you. Before we got dive into some
positional discussion. One thing I wanted to touch on the vibe around camp so far and, and what we're seeing in the daily coverage and what we've heard from Kurt Signetti and his staff. Like what is stuck out to you so far? Just in terms of of what we've been seeing coming out in the press and the words that we've been hearing from the coaching staff so far or the players for
that matter. You know, I think just the, well, the biggest thing that jumps out is the is was the particular Omar Cooper quote that came out that several people sent me about the change in vibe of practice and, and the speed and intensity of practice in between Signetti and, and Alan and. Just to just. To be sure. Make sure everybody's on the same page with quote. I'll just quote this. This is from the the HT piece and this is from Omar Cooper,
junior IU wide receiver. I love Coach Allen, but last year he wasn't as hard on us and yelling at us to pick up the tempo and stuff. The fast-paced practice was a little slower. That was a little different. And, and we've heard kind of different variations of this same theme over the course of not just summer but also spring. There does really feel like the players are acknowledging there's a much different vibe here than what we were used to
before. Yeah, yeah. And I think, I think, you know, that's it, it, you know, I feel like shows us a lot about the the position that the program is in and has been in for the last, you know, year or two. And, and, and that, you know, the, the position that Tom Allen was in as as head coach last year in in 2023 and, and how Signeti has come in. And, and these these are common.
You know, these are these are common quotes from players who are carryovers from a previous administration into a new one. And that there's always some sort of increased intensity, especially if it is a a program that that let go of the coach. So, you know, I, I think that it, it, I mean the things that I've heard, they sound good. You know, obviously there are some, some injuries that you are a little concerned, you don't
hope are lingering. But but yeah, from from that, from that specific quote, I think you can take away, you know, quite a bit from that one. Yeah, obviously the news hasn't
all been positive. There was a an unfortunate season ending injury that happened and what talk a little bit about that maybe to start with, since that is a positional thing, obviously, but you know, that's that's a real problem for IU and at a position that they really can't afford a whole lot more problems at. Yeah, yeah, Nick Kidwell, the the transfer from James Madison who missed most of last season because of injury as well. And you know, he in 20/22 he was
he was good. He was one of their tackles and performed well. And in his last season he was, you know, pretty like, you know, average amongst FBS offensive lineman and and passing grade, which was going to be very significant to this offensive line. And then losing him to a season ending injury is is tough. I'm sure he'll probably get some sort of a hardship waiver that will make him available for next season, which could be helpful. But his eighth, his eighth year in power.
His eighth year in power. Yeah, right. Like, yeah, yeah, it's, it's which means he was being recruited, I think during the Obama administration. Initially, perhaps, but now it's. So yeah, yeah, it's tough. It's tough and we'll talk about that a little bit. But but I mean, overall, it does feel like there's been a lot of positive of talk coming out of of camp. A lot of the assistant coaches seem to be talking very positively about things.
Obviously things I think are still going to be kept somewhat close to the vest just in terms of how things are going. It does appear that like Curtis Rourke is clearly establishing himself as the number one QB, which I think everybody expected would be the case. And, you know, we're close enough now that, you know, the whatever words that we're trying to parse from camp become less and less important because soon we'll just see the product on the field.
And that's an. That's always a good spot to be in, I think. Yeah, yeah, I'm kind of I'm, I'm kind of I think Zion said this in in the podcast, kind of in wait and see mode now. You know, like we're we're close enough to where, you know, as long as we don't have any more Nick Kidwell situations, you know, we are getting Indiana is getting what it's getting from cursing Nettie and this turned over, you know, program so as far as staff and rosters.
So it's it'll be interesting to see what week 1 looks like. And it's coming. I mean, I mean, August is flying by. So, so it's it's yeah, it, but yeah, I mean nothing, nothing too unusual or unexpected coming out of coming out of the out of camp. The he was, I will say Signetti was pretty honest about Tave and Jackson and and kind of where he's at in relation to Curtis Rourke, which was honestly refreshing.
So, you know, he's hasn't named him starter yet, but I think that's more out of respect for Tavan and and the position that he held before Signetti and everybody else got here. So, but yeah, I would expect Curtis Rourke to start there. So let's dive into some of the positions more, Jen, or more specifically, I guess as we go through this.
I mean, so, you know, maybe this, this should start with where we have been up to this point in terms of thinking about the different roles that are going to be filled by players and how those roles coalesce within the position groups. And, you know, maybe we start off with a question I know we've gotten from a lot of our our Twitter followers and we've gotten these questions as well on the discord.
You know, what are the positions in your mind that are going to be the most foundational to success or failure this year for IU? I mean, if you had to rank order them, maybe the top three. And then like, what does it look like right now as far as each of those positions? So I'll, I'll let you start there.
Yeah, sure. Well, I mean, I, I, I would probably discount quarterback from this because obviously, but the, but the, the top three, I would say, well, especially now number one is probably offensive line and particularly interior offensive line. I think a lot of folks including myself are kind of chalking up the tackles to be kind of automatic and like like automatically productive with Trey Wettig and Carter Smith. I think there's something to
prove there too. I think that's not necessarily as guaranteed as it might feel, but but that offensive line and, and, and you know, replacing Nick Kidwell when you really only had one true guard in the 1st place is going to be difficult because left guard was looking like Tyler Stevens. And I'm not really sold on Tyler Stevens. And so, you know, the, the trio of Stevens and Bray Lynch and Drew Evans is going to be the interior or the guards and obviously Mike, Mike Haydock at the center.
So, you know, though, I mean, the guards are just going to really have to step up and, and, and play well. But, you know, I think if there is any any sort of like deterioration along the offensive line, I think this staff has already proven that it can and, and, and might lean on its passing game even more so than it did in the past. So I think, you know, offensive line number one, defensive line
number two. And with and with defensive line, I think, you know, there's been some positive talk about Mikhail Kamara coming out of camp. I kind of want to see it for myself personally. And, you know, Jacob Mango Farrar making the transfer to stud. I think is, is is is also a question mark the the center of the defensive line. I think is, is, is good. I think James Carpenter and CJ West are about as guaranteed as anything else along that
defensive line. So, yeah, so the, I guess the interior offensive line, the exterior defensive line is, is, is the biggest concern for those for honestly for the entire roster. But then #3 I think he goes several different directions, but it's obviously wide receivers. But I mean, I would just say the entire defensive backfield probably, probably cornerbacks. Honestly, I think I think a lot of guys are really going to have
to step up there. Nick Toomer got moved back to cornerback and and it's pretty it's pretty thin there. DeAngelo Pons, you know, he's, he's, I mean, he is he show what he is at James Madison and he's gotten positive, positive support from Signeti coming out of summer camp or fall camp. But you know, that I, I'm also kind of a wait and see MO with D Angelo Pons just making that jump being a true sophomore.
I kind of want to see it. And as far as the second spot goes, I mean, Jamari Sharp was not super impressive last year. And even though he did play a lot, Jamir Johnson was hurt. I think he could be OK, but Nick Toomer might end up being that second cornerback, which might say something for the rest of the room since he was playing with safeties not long ago.
So yeah. Now, there's an interesting aspect to a lot of the the projections of these folks that I think is important to keep in mind. And I and it's something that dovetails with some of what I've been seeing out of the individual assistants and the way that there's been some discussion from the players about the way the practice are being conducted. I mean, this is always the tough part about projections.
Because all we have to rely on is the film and the statistics that were generated in the previous year or previous couple of years. And there's two different sources of uncertainty with this right now. There is the uncertainty of what's been talked about a lot, the transition of the JMU players up to this level and the fact that the well, they produced really well at that level. But that's that level. That's the Sunbelt, you know, it's not, it's not the level of,
of where you're at here. Does that translate to the Big 10? I've not been that concerned about that because I, I do feel like with proper coaching and technique, there's not actually that much of A delineation at least between the middle of the Big 10 and what you'll find there. It's really the upper stages.
Where that becomes a bigger issue with the other question becomes of the players that were here the previous few years when Indiana went nine and 27 / 3 seasons, how much more can they produce with a different coaching approach, a different schematic approach? You know, do do we accept that their productivity levels have a natural cap in terms of how much they might improve just from a year to year basis?
Or are there some untapped potentials with the roster holdovers that might actually significantly elevate because they have some superior athletic talent to now go along with some superior coaching approaches? Yeah, no, that's, that's a great
question. And, you know, some, some guys that come to mind when I think about that are like Josh Sanguinetti, who is, I mean, I, I think he's probably the favorite to be free safety just based off of skill sets within that room and, and, and his experience and, and the fact that they did bring him back, which I wasn't, I wasn't, you
know, expecting that. I, I will, I haven't been too impressed by Josh Sanguinetti. So can yeah, like you were asking, can, you know, a change in a change in staff, a change in approach can that, you know, cannot change things for Josh Sanguinetti. And you know, there there are others as well, but I think, you know, somebody that you can probably point to and be like, you know, there's a possibility for that is Mike Haydick and and the way that he has improved
after Bob Oostak came to town after Darren Hiller. So, you know, those are two different examples. So you're right. And, and I, my approach to this is that especially when we're talking about like there's so many players in this roster who are making the jump from some lower level up into the Big 10. And my approach is that some guys are going to hit and some guys are not. And we don't really know who those are.
I don't even know if the coaches know who those are because a lot of coaches haven't coached in the Big 10. And so, you know, I, I don't, I don't, I, I obviously nobody has the answer to that question. And I guess that's the point that I'm trying to make. Yeah, I know. And it's, and I then I didn't ask it with the idea that you had the answer. If you did, we would have, we would have stopped the podcast and we would have gone into business together because that would have been great.
But no, I, I look at it like this, there's a, you have to give, I think a new staff that's had the success that this staff has had at taking, you know, talent at the level that they took it and turning it so quickly into a group that could work together 'cause it's not just about individual skills. It's also about the schematic structure of either the offense or the defense or the blocking scheme as it relates to the
offense. I mean, a lot of a lot of the problems last year with the offensive line might have been addressed through a different scheme or a different approach. And many people whose memories last longer than maybe a month
will remember that. Like there was a lot of consternation about I us approach on offense last year that led to, you know, the a change in in coaching leadership because it was like, why are why is IU trying to do something that they clearly don't have the personnel to do?
And when you do that, you end up putting your players in a position where they look significantly worse than they actually are because they are being asked to do things that they can't do, or they're being asked to support things that they can't effectively work with. And so you end up with this. And then that leads to confidence issues, which leads to more performance issues. And then the whole thing spirals.
And it's why it's so easy. I was thinking about, you think about an NFL team, like most NFL teams are pretty close to each other in terms of actual talent level. But it's the scheme, it's the approach. It's the way that players are asked to do certain things. And you can tell when a team A-Team can be really good one year, can make the playoffs, can, you know, can, can win a game in the playoffs. And then the next year they're they're seven and 10 or they're 6:00 and 11:00.
And it's like, well, what the hell happened? Like the personnel was essentially the same. Did the players all get worse? And most of the time, no, most of the time what happened was either you had players in the wrong spots doing things that they couldn't do, or you had a scheme that didn't match what the players could do.
And that's a common issue. It's why coaching is so difficult because that, that, that alchemy changes every year and you have to adapt it. And then so I, I just think with this, it's such a fascinating mix. And you know, the more I see rankings of, you know, people get upset about IU was ranked 83rd or 84th in in college football. And it's like, well, you are relying on, as we've talked about before on the show, you're relying on whatever date is in front of you.
And we know that if you just take the productivity at JMU, if you take the productivity of the players that were at IU and you lock them together and you put, well, here's the schedule and here's what we think. But it's not accounting for what is likely to be a, a seismic shift in philosophy on both sides of the bowl about how all this stuff conducts. And so it's where it's, you know, you look at some of the names you mentioned, like in the in the defensive backfield.
And it's hard to say how that will actually translate to this level with that position group and also who might emerge because they're being asked to do things that perhaps are closer to their skill set. That is something that I'm really fascinated by. And what else? A Galen too. And, and when they changed offensive coordinators last season, I, I, I created a, a draft of like a cumulative EPA of, you know, estimated points added per play and, and plotted it for the last five seasons.
And offensive EPA pretty much right when Rod Carey took over, started to increase. It was decreasing and then it began to increase and it ended up finishing, you know, by a substantial margin, third of the last five seasons behind 2019 and 2020. And and it was headed the same, you know, direction as 21 and 22.
But like you're saying that the scheme can really transcend a lot of and a lot of talent because of what Signeti has already said in the past the spring, which is that, you know, he's planning and he's, you know, preparing his staff to create a scheme that works with the the players that they have.
And so that's always been promising to me as far as, you know, if, if they don't have the most talent, which which I mean, they don't because Ohio State and Michigan are also in this conference, but they, they can put them in the right places like you were saying. And so, you know, you end up you end up saying the same things that you've been saying for months because there hasn't been any football played. But it is, it is what it is, you know.
And so that's something to keep in mind that might have been forgotten in the spring, I guess. And and I'd, I'd like that you brought that up. What when you think about other position groups that are in the mix here, I mean, you've got obviously there's certain things we and, and I the one last thing I'll say about the previous point. I didn't want to forget this before I move to this next point.
I there is a difference, I think, in in terms of there are certain position groups where there's only so much that scheme and coaching can do. At the end of the day, it's really about the raw materials in this case being the players and what their physicality is. So offensive line has this has always been the biggest issue for IU is that it's been very hard for them, except in the Kevin Wilson era, to recruit the right types of offensive line recruits who can play at the Big
10 level. And I think it's one of the things that Wilson didn't get enough credit for was how quickly they turned that around and got like multiple like NFL caliber offensive lineman playing at IU, which we didn't. I mean, the previous 15 years you're like is not even possible, you know, but so, you know, I do think that that kind of a thing is interesting now, you know, with wide receiver with, with the defensive backfield, with a couple of
other position groups. I do think that as long as you've got some core physical skills, but you may not have the perfect prototype. You may not have a receiver room full of 6/4 guys with, you know, Velcro hands, but you can make do with assets that work in ways that are best utilized in a clever manner where it's like we're going to take this person's best aspects and use them for that and not ask them to do things that they can't do. And that is so that's the one
other thing. And it's where I, I'm curious with your, because you mentioned the difference between the interior defensive line where physic, I think the physical nature of the players is probably the most important versus your, your edge players on the defensive line. Do you feel like that's something that you can get around a little bit, even if you don't have like maybe top end
pass rushing talent? You know if can you get around it from a physicality perspective by doing some different things scheme wise with the exterior defensive line that maybe you couldn't get away with with the offensive line. Yeah, Yeah, I think so. I think. If you can't, please tell me because I don't want to get. I'm kidding. No, Yeah, right, right. No, I think I think defensive end is a little bit more of a
struggle. You can teach technique and but at the end of the day, there's a reason why these like Big Chase Young's go to Ohio State and stuff. You know, I, I think I, but I will say that there have been, there have been, so I can't remember his name off the top of my head. Jamie Chroma, I think was his name, who was a defensive end for James Madison last year, but he was at Rutgers and then he transferred to James Madison.
Obviously that's moving down a level, but he became incredibly productive and, and, and with this with, you know, Pat Koontz as his defensive line coach. And obviously you have Buddha Williams coaching them now, but you know, those guys are paid a lot of money. Like Pat Koontz and Buddha Williams are paid a lot of money and, and they're both handling the defensive line. And so there is a lot of attention being given to that, that, that position group.
And so, you know, they, they, they have a lot of, you know, great talent on the defensive. I'm, I'm not trying to take anything away from the defensive line, but, but there's, there is
a lot more talent elsewhere. And so that's why you pay the coaches a lot of money to, to, to get that technique to where it needs to be. But yes, as far as scheme goes, you can scheme as far as, as far as I understand, Brian Haynes's defensive philosophy is that they are planning to attack from the center of the defensive line.
And so if you can coach those guys to really attack and then cause havoc, then that may be take some pressure off of the defensive ends to use their physical, you know, capabilities to get around tackles. But I will say defensive end is, is pretty predicated on, on physical skill set as well. So, but I, I don't think it's out of the out of, you know, the realm of possibility. Let's So anyway, going to the question that I was originally asking before, I just found that
unnecessary side pathway. So what? Where do you feel like the biggest variance is in the position groups like the kind of the the delta between what a bad year and a good year would be just based upon a lack of understanding of what Indiana's got to deal with could. You ask that question again, GAIL, sorry. What position? I'm sorry, I've I've phrased it
terribly. What positions do you feel like there's the greatest uncertainty in terms of this could be an amazing position group or this could be a position group that actually ends up not being very amazing at all, But we're just not totally sure because of the players and we don't know how they're going to actually work when the rubber hits the road? Yeah, I'll start with safety. Safety, the safety has a lot of talent and it has a lot of guys that fit a strong safety build,
which is interesting. There are not a lot of guys that fit a free safety build and which makes me think that they are looking to rotate a lot of safeties this year until somebody, you know, steps up and takes the job. I think right now the only safety that I can really think of well between the Rover spot and then strong safety and free safety is Sean Asbury. I would assume that he's probably starting a strong safety. He looks really good in the spring game and we've only heard
really good things about him. And so I think he's he he's he's probably pretty solid. But after him, I don't think there's really anything certain, at least from from any outsiders perspective, about who is playing the other positions. And you know, when when you watch James Madison play, they essentially just play with three safeties. And so, you know, if that room doesn't step up, that's all that's a lot of real estate to be surrendering on the on the
defensive side of the ball. Like we kind of saw in the past, you know, the Husky, Husky never really after Marcellina ball never really was super productive and that kind of cost the defense. And that's just one player. So, you know, yeah, I think safety is one where if they don't step up, it could really be costly.
I would also say, I would also say wide receivers and and like the wide receivers, the passing game has to be good this year and, and the six of six of the wide receivers are leaving. Curtis Rourke is leaving after the season, barring any injuries that would result them in using their red shirt season because a lot of them do have the red shirts available. There aren't going to be a lot of these guys leftover. And so how do you build a passing attack out of them and
can they all step up? Probably one of my own most unpopular opinions amongst IU football fans is that I'm slow to be as hyped about Donovan Nicoli as a lot of others are. I think he's going to serve a very particular role on the perimeter and especially in the red zone. But that is somebody who made the transition from quarterback to wide receiver. Even though he did flash a lot of potential and like real physical gifts, that guy is
amazing. He is also extremely unexperienced compared to a lot of the other receivers in this room. So, you know, when you look at the skill sets and how you can build a passing attack out of this wide receiver room and also tight ends and running backs, there's a lot of guys to get the ball to. And you know, Donovan Mccoley is going to have to separate himself as somebody who can play similarly to like an Elijah Serra, even though he'd be playing two different roles in
this passing attack. But he's going to have to show that he can do more than what he's done in the past, which is mostly perimeter play. And so but you know, yes, that's just one example. So I think that there are a lot of guys in that wide receiver room that can really stop. But but will they? And if they don't, that's going to really hurt the offense. So I would say those two positions come to mind first. Are, I mean, what do you, what
would you anticipate? Well, you and I were having this conversation in terms of like looking at advanced statistics when it comes to receiving core. And I mean, the Allen era kind of devolved into a thing where the only people that were regularly catching passes were wide receivers. The tight ends weren't being used the way that they had been like when Caitlin de Boer was here or even before that.
I know you've touched on this a little bit, but when we think about receiving and, and just the, the, the, the passing game in general, are you based upon what we've seen out of out of Shanahan and Sinceri in the past? Are you expecting a, a more wide-ranging approach to who gets the ball thrown to them? And does that even out maybe some of the uncertainties in terms of who in the wide receiver room would necessarily need to step up?
I mean, there's a lot of receivers here and it's just, it's going to be interesting kind of watching that that combination play into the mix if they're also going to use tight ends and running backs in the process as well. Yeah, yeah, No, I I think it will be more wide rate. I think it'll be a lot more balanced. I think a lot of the different offensive packages you'll see are are will probably they'll probably still involve tight ends, obviously at I think I'm a big tight ends guy.
So I think tight ends will will definitely be involved, especially Zach Horton and Trey Walker I think as well. But when you look at Galen, I sent you this as a draft of something I'll be putting out each week. But it when you look at the pass catchers, everybody on this roster, the pass catchers EPA per target last season, so estimated points added per target. Caitlin Black actually had a pretty high value when when compared to all the all the other running backs.
He is like significantly higher just because he's really explosive and he's effective in the passing game. But James Madison did not have a very good offensive line last year. So it was necessary just to give him the ball. So that is something that he can do is something that justice Ellison doesn't do super well and Tyson Mall and does a little bit, but but Caitlyn Black getting involved in the passing game.
So you know, it's kind of a a spoil of riches when you look at each individual pass catcher, but then how do they mesh together in in in a single passing game? I think will be be interesting to watch at this point. I kind of forgot what your question was, but.
You largely answer. I mean, the kale and black thing's an interesting one because again, it's like you look at the you look at the players that you, I mean, you got the thing about you, Donovan McCauley, you've got Omar Cooper Junior, you've got Elijah Surratt, you've got Miles Cross, you've got EJ Williams, who's still on the roster. You've got Trey Walker, you know, and and James Bondas in the mix. There's there's a bunch of
different options. And it, and I guess where I'm where I'm going with this is as we think about the conceptualization of how good the wide receiver room might be and, and what that will mean for the overall offensive health of this program. You know, what I'll note is like if you look at last year's statistics, of the top six pass catchers in for IU for the course of the season, the top five were all wide receivers. You know, Mccully had caught 48
balls. Daquis Carter, Cam Camper, EJ Williams, Omar Cooper, Jalen Lucas, who wasn't really a running back, You know, he was like a specialist. He he caught 34 balls, but only for 7.2 yards per catch. And then like the highest if you, if you take Jay Lucas out of the mix, Josh Henderson catches 8 or 10 balls through eight games and Trey Walker catches 10 balls through 11 games. And everybody else, like there wasn't another Trent Howland caught 3 balls.
Christian Turner caught 4 balls for a combined 0 yards. And, and you know, the idea is ultimately, you know, the when you put that much pressure on the wide receivers. To do all of the catching it, especially if you don't have a running game to really back it up. And, and you know, if you're not playing in that style, it just leads to a different set of expectations of what you might
get. And I mean, obviously Indiana's offense was very sick last year, even in the running backs, The the leading rusher for the entire season had 354 yards on 75 carries. Like it was, it was, it was grim that that's where I'm thinking with this as we try to anticipate with the wide receiver group, how will they do? What will that room look like? At the end of the day, it almost becomes kind of a survival of of
the the top players thing there. Because if you're able to spread the ball out a little bit more, you really have to do well when you're out there as a wide receiver to continue to get the repetitions. And that might lead to internal competition among that group for who even gets those reps in the 1st place if they aren't just having to be out there every time because they're the only ones that can catch balls. Does that make sense? Yes, yeah, it, it does, it does.
And when I was I, I wrote, I wrote it somewhere and I, I can't find it anymore. But the, when you looked at and, and the, and obviously they haven't had this sort of tight end talent since AJ Barnard left. But when, when you look at the best offenses at Indiana and, and in recent years, they got the tight ends involved and in the passing game, especially in 2019 with Hendershot and you know, and, and I, I think that's like, obviously there isn't a
whole lot. There hasn't been a whole lot of tied in talent, but at the same time you have you have to get them involved, like they have to be involved. And and if you don't have those pass catchers like you were saying, you know, it really flattens your passing schemes. And and like when you when you have somebody like a Caitlin Black who can catch out of the backfield, you know that that's just one more thing that the defense has to account for.
And so when you and and I will say to slot receiver really is a huge improvement on this roster. Yeah, go on. I'd like to hear more. Blot filler was the last real true slot. I mean DJ Matthews, but he can never stay healthy. And so you know, blot filler was the last true slot receiver they had in 2020. And so having a slot receiver, especially two of the caliber of Miles Price and Keyshawn Williams, I mean, that's, that's
huge. And, and just the, the security blanket that those two guys have already provided for previous quarterbacks and, and Curtis Rourke, you know, being, you know, fairly new to the system and to the program. I think those two guys are going to be huge and what they can do. But yeah, I mean, I, I think, yeah, you're, you're right, Galen, I'm just adding to what you're saying. No, it's fine. It's interesting.
Can you name the last season that IU had a player catch 50 or more balls and who that player was? 50 or more. Well, it had to be watfilier. It was watfilier. It was watfilier and I mean probably 2019. So is that so? He actually caught 54 in 2020, which which I feel like doesn't get as much because that was over eight games, which is nuts. Over over 12 games last year, Donovan Mcculley was the leading receiver and only caught 48 balls.
And but what's fascinating is you go back to 2019, which the, you know, the one year Caitlin de Boer is the OC here. Wapfillier caught 70 balls for 1002 yards and Peyton Hendershot caught 52 balls for 622 yards. And I remember you and I having conversations that year about how that relatively unexpected sudden leveraging of the tight end position just opened up so many more opportunities for receivers.
It was, it wasn't just Filier who was getting all of those slot cap, you know, receptions, but it was also Ty Fry, Fogle and Nick Westbrook that year were also getting opportunities. Donovan Hale caught 22 balls that year. You know, I mean, which I mean, if I'd asked you that, I, I you, you wouldn't have been able to name that off the top of your
head. But the reason I bring that up is this new offensive staff coming in, You know, I'm I'm not going to assume that you'll see Indiana step up offensively the way they did between the the end of the Mike Deboard era at the conclusion of the 2018 season and the sole year for Kaelin Deboer. But I'll note going in, coming out of 2018, the top 7 pass catchers for IU were all
receivers. It was, it was Westbrook, Hale, Luke, Timian, Fry, Fogle, Jason Harris, Wopfilier, and then Reese Taylor. There's a blast for the past. That was your top seven pass catchers. You had to go like Peyton Hendershot as a freshman was eighth on that list. And no, no running backs, no tight ends. It was all receivers. And I'll, I'll throw Reese Taylor in there as essentially a quasi receiver. And then you go to the next year and Hendershot catches 52 balls, second on the team.
Stevie Scott catches 26 balls and he's 6th on the team. That year, Indiana accrued 3931 yards in the passing game, which was I know it's it's it's I used to dream of times like these. That was 302 yards a game. The following year it was 250 a game. The following year, 20/21, it was 175. It was 217 two years ago. It was 212 last year. So when I look at that gap, you know, I look at that, that basically 75 to 80 yards a game
gap. I think a lot about this, the talent in this receiving room, physical talent in terms of Donovan Mccully experience, in terms of Serat. You know, obviously Omar Cooper looks like a guy who could really, you know, I mean, he only caught 18 balls last year as a freshman, but he was second on the team in yards per reception at 14.83. And I think he was, you know, he was a little bit low in yards per game, but he only played
nine games. Gayle, can I add to the Omar Cooper thing real fast before you move on? He was second among all the all the pass catchers on the current roster. He was second in EPA per target, just behind Donovan McAuley. He was really good. And so when I look at that and I look at the potential of having an improved tight end and running back pass catching aspect, I look at that as a rising tide that can lift all boats, including the rest of the boats in the receiver room.
Because that having to account for a tight end coming over the middle or planting, you know, 7 yards downfield or having to account for a running back kind of coming out of the backfield as a pass catching threat causes the defense to not be able to just play standard coverage against the receivers, which opens up opportunities for them as well. This was what we argued for most of last year.
It's like, why is Indiana trying to turn into a an option team or a team that's just running the ball? This makes no sense because, you know, there were different versions of this talent on the roster as well. And so not to re litigate last year, but the point is, as we think about the wide receiver room, it's not just about here's what the receivers did last year.
I think it's important to keep that context and think about what might get added to the mix given that we've got this new philosophy and this new coaching staff. Yeah, no, absolutely. Yeah, Yeah. The, the, the big joke last year between you and I was that I was a huge Dequise Carter fan and he never got used until like the second-half, second third of the season or the last third of the season. And, and, but it looks great. And it was because it added another dynamic to the passing
game. And so you have a lot of guys that can do things like that. Miles Cross is like, I think he could be a game changer. Like just, I don't know, man, there's just so much talent this wide receivers room. It's almost. He's almost guaranteed to hit, but I don't know. No, it's true.
And look again and it's philosophical differences, but I, you know, if you, if you want to look at three seasons that could point towards a a present and a future where Indiana is a lot more adept at using the passing game. Look at the last two years that Kevin Wilson was here and look at the one year that Caitlin de Boer was here. I just ran through the de Boer numbers, but in the the, in the second to last year, Wilson was here.
The Pinstripe Bowl year, Indiana had three guys who caught 54 or more balls, had a guy who went for 1035 yards. Who was that? Do you remember? The guy what? What season was a 2016? 2015. 2015, that would have been ah, shoot, that wasn't Nick Westbrook, was it? No. Oh, man. Oh, who? Oh, I'm going to kick myself. It's fine. It's semi Cobbs was was. Oh yeah. Semi Cobbs what, 60 catches 130 or 1035 yards and Ricky Jones 54
catches 906 yards that year. Going back to that number, we were talking about trying to get around 300 yards per game receiving. Indiana was at 293.8 that year and then in the final year for Wilson, Indiana was at 273.8. A little bit lower, but Nick Westbrook caught 54 balls, Ricky Jones caught 53 and Mitchell Page caught 58. You know, it is possible to by choice use the passing game in a way where it's a primary methodology of moving the
football. And, you know, even in years like that, when Indiana had a much better offensive line than they've probably enjoyed overall the last few years, they were using the passing game in a much more modern style. And I think that that to me, when I think about not just the receiving room, but also Curtis Rourke and how Indiana's going to approach that side of of play, that opens up.
And I think it actually makes the offensive line's job easier because you're, you're running run blocking is a lot. There's there's a lot more physical impact on run blocking because you don't have the added factor of being able to get the ball out of the pocket quickly and throwing the ball. You have to hand the ball off. So there's just some basic like physical philosophical differences in how these things operate. So we'll see.
I could do, we could be sitting here at the end of September and being like, well, that was we really talked ourselves into that one, didn't we? But I, I'm choosing to be optimistic on this and I am really actually very excited about wide receiver. But we talk about all this because there is this big delta between. We don't know what it could. We know what it could be, but we don't know what it will be because there's a bunch of
factors. We're still waiting to actually get a final read on before we can say for sure how Indiana's going to conduct. Themselves. Yeah, that's a great way to put it, Galen. We know what it could be, but we don't know what it will be. The Yeah. And I another note that I'll make about the the difference in run blocking and pass blocking is run blocking does depend quite a bit on talent and
physical skill set. And that's why a lot of teams that don't have the most talent along the offensive line can't really run the ball as well, especially in the Big 10 with those defensive lines. But pass blocking is a lot more, a lot, a lot more heavy on the technique. And so if you can teach technique, especially a tackle, which, you know, seems to be in a good spot right now, you know, that's it's just always seemed like they were building this offense to be a pass first offense.
And so, yeah, they, I think you what everything that you every note that you were making about the, the different layers of of a passing scheme, I think that's like on point. I think that's what's that's really what stands out the most. And I even wrote it in the recap for the spring game. I was watching Trey Walker run out of a trip set on the outside and running a mesh concept. I was like, what is happening right now, Trey Walker? But yeah, no.
And it looked great. And he caught the pass and he looked, I mean, it was it was it was awesome. And and that was the most encouraging thing coming out of that spring. Spring game for me was just like how different the offense looked philosophically and how refreshing that was to see after seeing, you know, Caitlin Devore in 2019 and then, you know, you and Kevin Wilson before that. Let me let's finish off because I don't want to go much longer
than than an hour. Let's talk just a little about special teams because that ends up always being at least a a deciding factor. It feels like in one or two games every year, either for or against IU, who could who could forget Indiana winning at Michigan State for the first time in forever because Michigan State couldn't kick the ball at the end of the of regulation? What would you anticipate there? Is Indiana in good shape as far as the different areas of
special teams? Are there areas that are concerning to you? What's your overall read right now on that? Yeah, I, I think, I think it's, I mean, as far as like kicking goes, I think that I think they're going to be good in a good spot. They have James Evans again, his last season. I think he is set to be one of the best punters in the nation. Honestly, as long as he can kind of increase his precision, I
think that's the best. That's the thing that, you know, can he get more balls down inside the 1020 yard line versus can he, you know, really kick the ball far, which he had to do last season because the offense was in such rough shape. But yes, I think James Evans is good. And then I think Derek McCormick. I think Signetti said that Derek McCormick is their kickoff special, is their kickoff kicker. Not maybe not a specialist, but is competing for field goals.
I think he'll probably end up winning that one. Yeah, I think he'll probably end up winning the the the field goal competition. He was pretty solid the last season. So I I think they're in a good spot with with kicking much better than they were last year. And then as far as like returning goes, I think they have three guys who can really return the ball as long as Solomon Van Horst can stay healthy, I think.
But Solomon Van Horst, he graded 5th in the SCS and kick off returns in 2021. You know, it was a long time ago. It was three seasons ago. But like it's it's notable the talent is there. He's a really dangerous guy, especially on kickoffs, as long as he can stay healthy. And so if you know, if that's the only thing he's required to do at Indiana, he could pull it off. And as far as, you know, punt returns go, I think Miles Price is probably the number one guy
there. He did pretty well at Texas Tech with that and he has a lot of experience doing it, probably the most on the roster. And then Keyshawn Williams is also another guy who can return kicks, but he did he did mostly kickoffs as well. So yeah, I mean, special teams seems to be in a good spot. Grant Kane is somebody who is kind of a dark horse on this staff, so and there's a special
teams coordinator. So I think, you know, I think it's it's special teams is probably one of those things that it probably transfers more so than other as far as like talent level goes from different levels. It probably transfers more so than other positions because it is there's so much reliant on physical skill and and you know, you're you're catching punts and kick offs and and and field goals. It's all kind of the same technique and it's very much singular and and ability.
So I, I, I wouldn't expect, I don't have too many concerns about special teams just based off of previous performances, which I think they did a really good job bringing guys in. We had a lot more to talk about, but we're not going to do it right now. We're going to do it later.
So we'll have more content coming up for you as we continue to round in. We're going to get Taylor's thoughts hopefully before the season starts on, on how the season will go. You'll get Scott and I will weigh in. We'll do our normal season game by game projections, which I I I don't know that we've ever, ever gotten it right. So you could just use it to laugh at us as you move forward, but we'll have all that you. Get it right, Gay. Then we'll have to go in
business together. There you go, that's good, but no Taylor Layman from Bite Sized Bison. Thank you for joining us. Always great insights and looking forward to reading you and talking with you throughout the course of the season as we continue to cover this IU football. Program. Yeah. Thanks for having me on Galen. And thanks to all of you folks for listening. We really appreciate it as always.
And we'll be back with more on the back home network as we cover IU football and eventually IU basketball, both men's and women's coming up here very soon for Taylor from Bite Sized Bison, I'm Galen Clavio from Crimson Casting. Thanks for joining us here on the show and thanks to Home Field Apparel, our presenting sponsor. We will catch you folks. On the flip side, bring back the Bison song, everybody.