Clemson Football: The Good, the Bad and the Sus – Georgia Tech

The Sus

Quarterback play: Things haven’t changed much since last year. Well, I need to walk that back a bit: things early this season aren’t that different from the first half of last season. I think we need to continue to reinforce that right now. This was just the first game of the season. The 2021 squad improved as the season went on, and I think it is reasonable to think this one will as well.

Acknowledging that, the reality is that the offense was stagnant and mistake-prone for much of the first 40 minutes of the game against Tech. It is fair to say DJ Uiagalelei’s performance contributed to that stagnation. The snap on 3rd down of the first drive wasn’t ideal, but DJ got his hands on it. He needed to reel that in. The defender made a heads up play to punch the ball out of DJ’s hands on the fumble, but he needs to hold onto the ball. There were errant throws and DJ seemed hesitant to pull the trigger on several occasions.

There is one big reason that DJ is ‘sus’ and not ‘bad’: there were plenty of other places you can point the finger. As noted, the running game didn’t support DJ. The receivers were ok but several observers have noted that they weren’t getting great separation. There were key drops, just like in 2021.

We’re right back in that frustrating place where we just can’t decipher if DJ is struggling because the rest of the offense isn’t good, or the rest of the offense is struggling because DJ isn’t good.

We won’t get any clarification on this until we see this offense run by a different quarterback.

Wide receivers: We saw some good things last night from this group. We saw better blocking from the wide receivers last night than we saw much of last season, and it was a welcome sight.

What we didn’t see with any emphasis was the receivers getting separation from the defenders. We also continued to see drops.

The Tigers will need to find receivers that are reliable. No one emerged in this first game. There were some flashes. Antonio Williams’ debut was anticipated, and the few times we saw him he looked good. He led the receivers with four receptions. Beaux Collins led the team in receiving yards, but also had a drop and wasn’t able to bring a couple passes in that were in his range. Beaux missed a lot of camp with an injury, so I tend to think he will get going soon.

The guys who need to have a fire lit under their backsides are Joseph Ngata (1 reception for 7 yards) and EJ Williams (1 reception for 8 yards). Patience is a virtue, but so is accountability. If these young men can’t be more productive, Clemson needs to see what other receivers can do. Adam Randall’s return from injury appears to be right around the corner. Just saying.