Just re-watched a few games. Observations and Question.

So I just got done re-watching the UW, AFA and Utah State games. Besides the obvious drops by receivers, lack of emotion, and horrible tackling form, I had a couple of general observations.



1) We seem to be undersized compared to every team we have played. Not at every position, but overall, we seem small. This may just be TV playing tricks on me, but I looked up our players height and weight and compared them to the height and weight of the opponents standing next to them, and something is not jiving. The 6' 200 lb USU guy is much bigger than the 6'3 215 lb BYU guy..... Maybe its just the TV, (or jerseys, etc.) but this was noticeable in every game.



2) We don't look like a "football team". Not that our players are not big, or strong, but we don't seem to have any sort of muscular "swagger" compared to our opponents. Even USU (who typically looks small and high schoolish) looked like weight room warriors compared to us. (both offense and defense.) Again, could just be TV, or youth.



3) We are slow. This may be a product of poor positioning and being young, but we were outrun both sideline to sideline and vertically numerous, numerous times in every game I re-watched.



So, all that being said, my question to those who may know is about our strength and conditioning program. Could part of our problem be that we have a poor conditioning program, which in conjunction with a lackluster strength program, could be causing some (not all) of our on field issues? (I dont think this is a huge factor in the win/loss department this year, but it seems to be a factor on the replays I watched)



Anyone have any insight?

Well the "slowness" has been obvious, particularly on the sideline to sideline stuff. Defensively, we have consistently gotten beat to the corners, got blocked, and give up yards on the edges. Pendleton and Rich occasionally have busted through with tackles for loss outside the box, but that has been rare. I chalked that up to young defensive players, young linebackers who's reaction to the play was too late, and were just playing from behind most of the time. Supposedly, our linebackers are faster than any we've had (as a group) in awhile; but it doesn't show on the field...yet.



I also think a little of it, is the three down linemen are not stopping the run, the linebackers are making bad reads, and Rich is getting all the tackles. You know it's not good when your safety is the leading tackler on the team--it should be a linebacker.



But even when we had Fuga, teams (Air Force, Nevada) ran on us right up the middle, at will. Nevada had no respect for our defense, they never punted, every set of downs was four downs, then just didn't ever believe we could stop them--and we didn't...til it was too late.