Special teams

[Guest BasketBull.]

While I'm on my coffee-high and on a roll, how do you Bulls feel about our special teams?

I think we have the makings of a top 25 Bulls squad next year, but is our special teams up to snuff?

Q: Who will be the burner with hands to replace Ean?

What about punting and kicking? --Do you feel things are fine or do we need revamping?

Scenario: We are at Auburn with 2 seconds to go, and we have to make a 37 field goal to win the game. Would you Bulls feel confident?

(I'm not even thinking of our players or naming names, just trying to figure out if we are okay with special teams.)

[BigShoop]

http://www.thebullspen.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/nph-YaBB.pl?num=1168072930

[usfgrad84]

I think our kicking game will be fine.  First, punting-- at worst we still have the Teachey, rugby kick as a fall back on.  However, both Petrov and Alvarado both have big legs, they just need to learn how to catch.  After a year of taking snap and using the ball machine, I would hope that they should be able to take the snaps.

Alvarado was coming around pretty well on PK  towards the end of he year.  I'm feeling better than last year.  To answer your question.  No, if there is a FG on the line in any game I'm not feeling very confident.  That's an improvement over the kicker we had to start the year each of the last 2 years.  When he was on the field for any kick I didn't feel confident.

I'm sure we can replace Ean with Amarri or one of the other receivers.  Maybe even Ryan Gilliam.  He's one of the fastest players in all of college football.  Hopefully he can field punts.

[Velcro]

How about Hester Jr?  I've heard the Hester family is good at Kick returning

[Paul Wall]

whats the story on gilliam, I don't know much about him at all. anyone want to fill me in

[BiggTipp]

I'll take Alvarado as PK...obvious range and got better and better as the year went on

[E.T.]

Thinking Johnson and Hester on returns and one of the FR receivers, 4get which one.

I feel better about the Punting Game than the FG game ... hope it's corrected by the fall.

[JoeB]

Here's the deal on kicking from last year.  We were 6-14 overall.  Not great by any means, but when you look closer here is what bugs me.  We were a staggering 2-9 from 30-49 yards out.  That stat kills me.  We should be at least 60% from those distances.  22% is horrendous, so no I'm not confindent in our kicking game at this point.  Extra points seem to be OK as we were 31/33 for the season.  

[outrunner]

Scenario: We are at Auburn with 2 seconds to go, and we have to make a 37 field goal to win the game. Would you Bulls feel confident?

I'm not sure anyone could feel truely confident at that point. Truthfully, if we are that close to beating Auburn, I would be too excited to be thinking about that. But I would be pulling out a rosary, rabbit's foot, four-leaf clover, and lucky horse-shoe just to be sure.

[ptimario]

whats the story on gilliam, I don't know much about him at all. anyone want to fill me in

Supposedly he was a pretty good DB coming out of high school and went to Oregon then transfered to USF after a year I think, or two. He also runs track. Placed in the top six at the Pac-10 championships in the 100. This past spring running for USF he ran with a lot more weight thans he's used to but ran 10.7, not too bad. I think he would be a good choice to replace Ean if he can field punts.