zn wrote:

InvaderRam wrote:

i just fell in love. and his name is brian randolph.

Reminds me of the way McCleod played under Wms. Which I am sure is no accident.

i hadn’t thought of that, but i can see it. time for williams to work his db magic.

i just fell in love. and his name is brian randolph.

i’m really going to be rooting for this kid.

wow. team leader. smart. i read somewhere that he got a degree in management and spent his fifth year as a graduate student. all-academic. but he’s also got a goofy side. a little bit of a clown but in a good way.

learned three different schemes in his time at tennessee.

the one negative is the acl tear he had his sophomore year but has played three full seasons since then. he sounds exactly like what this secondary needs.

http://www.knoxnews.com/sports/vols/football/brian-randolph-will-leave-void-at-safety-locker-room-for-vols-2814959f-612b-1b17-e053-0100007f0588-363867001.html

Brian Randolph will leave void at safety, locker room for Vols

By Dustin Dopirak of the Knoxville News Sentinel

TAMPA, Fla. — Brian Randolph was surrounded by media members during a group interview late in the season when Kendal Vickers signaled to Randolph from behind them.

“I have a question,” the Tennessee defensive tackle said to the senior safety. “Who’s the strongest person in the weight room?”

If the 6-foot, 200-pound Randolph wanted to be honest and accurate, he could’ve said it was Vickers, a 6-3, 286-pound converted defensive end who reportedly can squat 710 pounds.

But accuracy isn’t funny. Randolph, who doubles as a steady captain and a sly court jester for Tennessee, will never choose accuracy when deadpanned fake bravado is an option.

“I’m the strongest person in the weight room,” Randolph said. “You oughta see my bench. I get 30 (reps) on 225 (pounds.) Stronger than Vick, a D-lineman. I take great pride in that. … They call me Hercules.”

Nothing he said was true, of course. Not even close. But Randolph never let on. He never laughed, smiled or so much as changed his facial expression even as the press around him cracked up.

That’s Randolph’s schtick. He uses sharp, dry wit to come up with preposterous, self aggrandizing statements he can stay with a straight face. Usually, that involves him declaring his team superlatives.

“I’m the fastest, the strongest, the best looking,” said Randolph, who will play his final collegiate game Friday (TV: ESPN2, noon) after four years as a starter when the Vols (8-4) meet No. 12 Northwestern (10-2) in the Outback Bowl at Raymond James Stadium.

He was especially entertaining Sunday when the Outback Bowl held its bowling outing for the two teams.

Randolph told the media after practice earlier that day that he was the best bowler on the team and had a technique “no one can grasp.” He also told the media that in golf, he’s “The next Tiger Woods.”

The technique, it turned out, involved him lifting the ball over his head, running toward the pins, and falling over right in front of the line while pushing the ball forward in a motion similar to a basketball bounce pass.

He actually managed to bowl a respectable 118 that way.

“I knew Brian had done that for a while,” senior left tackle Kyler Kerbyson said. “We were in a bowling class together freshman year. … He did it in class and I’m pretty sure he got an A.”

The Vols will remember Randolph’s antics and wise cracks when he moves on, but they will also remember those as a means to an end. He kept the atmosphere light, and used that to connect with younger players so they could learn from his Football IQ and grit.

“Randolph is a crazy dude,” junior linebacker Jalen Reeves-Maybin said. “I remember when I came here my freshman year, he told me, ‘the longer you stay here, the crazier you’re going to get.’ I can tell it happened to him. He got crazier every year. … But on the field he’s more calm. He gets everyone settled down. He’s real smart. I guess he just decides to let loose sometimes.”

‘voice of reason’

Randolph’s most outward displays of his personality are manifestations of soft rebellion.

His parents, Mark and Lisa Randolph, required their sons to walk a tight line, put academics first, stay out of trouble and generally not do anything to attract unwanted attention. Brian’s older brother, Justin, a former walk-on at Georgia Tech, walked that line dutifully.

Brian, though, occasionally tests the boundaries. His dreadlocked hair with its multi-colored braids, which he said are just the contributions of girls who like to play with his hair, would not have been allowed in the Randolph household. The only reason it doesn’t cause more of a stir when he goes home, his high school football coach said, is because his mother is more opposed to tattoos and piercings.

“His brother is the more serious type,” said Derek Cook, who coached the brothers at Kell High School in Marietta, Ga. “He was always the guy with the calm voice, the voice of reason. Brian you had to pull back a little bit. He was the younger brother, a little more mischievous and fun.”

But Brian didn’t violate his parents’ core guidelines and realized that there were some lines not to be crossed.

“He was never in trouble in high school,” Cook said. “He was never the class clown. He knew when to pull the trigger and when to act like a fool and when not to.”

Two places he didn’t were classroom, where he was a 4.0 student, and the football field, where he was a three-time All-State pick and the 2010 Georgia Gatorade Player of the Year.

Randolph was revered as a high schooler in part because of raw talent. At that level, he could do anything, rushing for 1,068 yards and 16 touchdowns, catching 17 passes for 414 yards and recording 162 tackles and four interceptions as a senior. He was a bone-crushing hitter as a safety and nearly unstoppable with the ball in his hands.

But he also had a high Football IQ, understanding how to line up his teammates, and he set the team’s standard for work ethic.

“He never finished second in a sprint,” Cook said. “Never. He never let anybody beat him at anything.”

And he wouldn’t let anything keep him off the field.

Randolph tore the labrum in his shoulder in his junior year, Cook said, because of the wear and tear he got from all of the blows he delivered as a safety. However, he opted to delay surgery until after the season and played through it. Every time Randolph raised his arm his shoulder popped out of place, and he had to have it put back before he could re-enter the game.

But Randolph not only played through that, he practiced through it.

“That’s not something you see a lot in this generation,” Cook said. “A lot of guys if they’re hurt will spend all day hiding in the training room. Brian was the exact opposite. He wouldn’t even talk to the trainer because he might find out he couldn’t play. We actually had to hide Brian’s pads one time to keep him from practicing, because if you didn’t, he’d put them on and sneak back in there.”

Problem Solver

In his five years at Tennessee, Randolph has convinced younger players to follow him for the same reasons.

He has always been productive, going back to his freshman year in 2011 when he was named an SEC All-Freshman pick and a Freshman All-American by multiple publications. He sat out most of his sophomore season after tearing his ACL, but has started 35 of the Vols’ 37 games since.

Randolph heads into Friday’s game with 307 tackles including 6.5 for loss, seven interceptions and 20 pass deflections in his career. He has 67 tackles this season, and his pass break-up at the end of the 38-31 win over Georgia clinched Tennessee’s most important victory of the season.

After the Vols missed bowl games in each of his first three seasons in the program and surrendered 35.7 points per game in 2012, the year he lost to injury, Randolph has helped make Tennessee’s defense steady if not dominant. They finished the regular season ranked sixth in the hyper-competitive SEC in scoring defense, allowing 21.2 points per game, and eighth in total defense, allowing 370.4 yards per game.

“He means so much to our defense,” defensive coordinator John Jancek said. “He makes so many checks. He solves so many problems for us. … He just does a fantastic job back there.”

Said Tennessee coach Butch Jones: “He’s been one of those seniors that’s really played his best football, which has been very stable for us. He’s provided stability for us, not just in our back end, but in our football program.”

Because, as he did at Kell, Randolph has set a standard for the young defensive backs. Like the rest of the defensive backfield, he fell victim to breakdowns in coverage and tackling early in the season, but the Vols have generally been able to rely on him to know where he is supposed to be on every play and to also counsel his teammates.

“He’s very, very smart and not many people realize that,” Kerbyson said. “… He’s a very smart individual, and that helps him in the back end and it helps him coach the younger guys too and let them know what they need to do. On Fridays, the DB’s have tests, they’re all coming up to Brian asking him questions. He can help them in that aspect and he can keep it light in the room being his funny self and doing his little antics.”

Randolph’s humor and antics carved him his own niche in Tennessee’s leadership next to the more boisterous Curt Maggitt, the older brotherly Kerbyson and quarterback Joshua Dobbs, the offense’s by-the-book CEO.

With his departure, they lose a player who could make them all better, even while constantly reminding them that he is the best at everything.

how in the heck was this brian randolph kid not drafted???

hey, mack. no by all means say what’s on your mind! and welcome back!

Agamemnon wrote:

InvaderRam wrote:

well i’m sure everyone thinks so, but all things considered, i think the rams did a good job. good value it would seem with the higbee and thomas picks. possible day 2 talents gotten on the day 3.

i’m especially hopeful of the higbee pick. having a dual threat tight end would be tremendous especially paired alongside kendricks.

yeah, and there are some good udfas out there

yes. udfas. those will be important this year.

here’s another video on mike thomas. rsp film room.

2016 NFL Draft Scouting Report: Southern Mississippi WR Mike Thomas

can never have too many h-backs in my opinion. if it were up to me. i’d get rid of all wide receivers and replace them with h-backs.

zn wrote:

Vikings took Moritz Boehringer, the German Unicorn.

nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.

yeah. i’m liking how the offense is shaping up. possible steal of a tight end. a slot receiver.

no number one wr type. but maybe don’t need one with goff spreading the ball around. hopefully the receivers we have now also actually get the ball with a qb able to actually see the open receivers. kendricks and austin that is. and britt too! almost forgot.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 6 months ago by InvaderRam.

yeah legal issues stemming from some bar fight he got into. pleading not guilty but also not his first run-in with the law. he might be stupid.

Agamemnon wrote:

<span class=”d4pbbc-font-color” style=”color: blue”>If Fisher has Tom Brady, he is not going to use him?</span>

well yes. he will use him. i’m not trying to say this is going to be 3 yards and a cloud of dust but like zn said there’s going to be balance.

for me personally i want to see 300 carries for gurley and 500 passes for goff with some austin running the ball a little bit. around 50 carries.

and i’d also want to see gurley featured more in the passing game. kind of like a le’veon bell.

it’s not a fisher qb. it’s a fisher philosophy.

as long as gurley is on this team it’s going to be lining up under center and play action. we’re not going to see goff lining up the majority of snaps in shotgun and whipping the ball around like brady.

it’s just not going to happen while gurley is a ram. if it does i’ll admit i’m wrong but i don’t see it.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 6 months ago by InvaderRam.

As for those concerns about Goff’s frame, Flaherty thinks the QB will be up to “240 pounds easy” by his third season in the league. Keep in mind, Goff also doesn’t turn 22 untill the middle of his rookie season.

wow. i didn’t think 240. i figured maybe 230 pounds. but it’s good to hear. and yeah he’s only 21 years old.

for what it’s worth rodgers at cal was 18-7 in his two seasons. he did not start his freshman year like goff did.

so his record was 18-7 compared to goff who was 13-12. he did have marshawn lynch and jj arrington his last year at cal. jj arrington was a second round pick the same year rodgers declared for the nfl draft in 2005. arrington had 2000 yards rushing that year. lynch had 628 yards that year. 2004. cal went 10-2. goff went 8-5 this season his last.

i have nothing against goff. i still have problems with the trade though. this is a deep defensive draft, and there are some prospects to be gotten in the second round. shoot. if i was the rams and i hadn’t made the trade, i’d be looking to move up to draft myles jack.

that being said i think goff will turn out to be good. i got this from the original herd board. and it makes me feel comfortable with the pick despite his small hands.

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stat-analysis/2016/qbase-2016

football outsiders has goff as the 9th best qb prospect to come out in the last 20 years. meaning he has the ninth best chance of succeeding in the pros of any qb in the last 20 years. now this isn’t foolproof and they are constantly changing the factors that go into predicting success. some guys have ended up as flops such as beck, griffin, ponder, and mcnown. but he’s in pretty good company right there.

and the fact that he has gurley to shoulder a lot of the load and a good defense to take pressure off him makes his chances that much better.