Hyatt never looked like a bust.
Yeah. He did. He had stone hands. His route running was undisciplined. He couldn't get separation. And until last year... his attitude and work ethic held him back. That's according to Heupel and Hyatt himself.
Callaway also wasn’t a garbage player.
He wasn't garbage. He played almost exclusively in garbage time. In three years, he caught passes in 6 games. Akron 2-20, Pitt 3-59, TTU 1-27, UF 1-3, Auburn 1-6, Vandy 1-14. I was actually disappointed that he or Holliday weren't able to step up and earn PT. They didn't. It wasn't just one mistake that kept him off the field. UT had better options.
I also think you’re short selling Walker Merrill as well as he seemingly never did anything but score TDs when he was targeted.
I liked him and especially since he had a rapport with Milton. But supposedly he had some personal and health issues and chose a change in venue. He was looking up at better players and wanted to play sooner. That is going to happen in the portal era.
I throughly disagree with the notion that this years WR room is more talented than last years.
That's because you lack the wisdom to think about last year as it looked on June 13, 2022. They had Tillman and no one else who had proven they could compete in the SEC including Hyatt. Talent is a hard call but that's not what I said. I said "strongest". They have more guys with the talent to play and contribute. They have guys who know the system. They return two guys who have performed against top talent. I don't know anything about Thornton except the excitement the staff seemed to have about him. Leacock is very talented and had moments in the spring. In spite of you lifting your leg on them, Nimrod and Webb are guys that according to reports show a lot of promise.
It isn't just the bodies but also the maturity of the program itself.
I think Thornton has a lot of potential, but he struggled to stay on the field at Oregon for a reason and it’s going to be tough for him to be better than a healthy Cedric Tillman IMO.
Tillman wasn't healthy. I have no idea about Thornton except that the coaches and beat writers were pretty excited by what they saw. Velus Jones had 280 yds his first year at UT under Pruitt. A career high at the time. Payton was even worse transferring in. Tillman had a grand total of 8 catches before Heupel.
If Thornton can play, Heupel will get him the ball.
Tillman, Hyatt, Bru, Keyton, Squirrel, Merrill, and Calloway > Bru, Keyton, Squirrel, and Thornton.
That's so dumb. Truly it is. You are viewing "past tense" performance vs potential. You have to look at apples to apples. At this time last year, it was Tillman. There was some excitement about McCoy. But not much for Hyatt who again... was a bust to that point.
None of the other guys in our WR room have played a meaningful down of college football and it wouldn’t surprise the least bit of only 1 of them did after this season simply based on the fact unless there are injuries the number 5 and 6 WRs would have a better chance at hitting the lottery than getting a snap outside of mop up duty. Also the whole idea that we were running “vanilla schemes” is preposterous. This coaching staff has zero reason to fear Virginia’s defense. Halzle even dialed up a deep ball the first play of the game in hopes to get a TD to fire the crowd up. Joe overthrew it though. Regardless if our WR room is so talented they should’ve been able to beat the backups of one of the worst secondaries in the country
Again... LOL... if you go back to this point last year and look forward it was WORSE, not better.
