RTR91 said:

Look at the current roster. There are only a few LBs over 240: Mekhi Brown, Ryan Anderson, Reuben Foster, and Joshua McMillon. That's a third of the scholarship/recruited LBs. There has been a noticeable difference in recruiting habits by the staff. That was my point. Yes, Williams and Evans weren't 3 down guys with the older players on the field. By chance, the older guys weigh more because they arrived weighing more. The philosophy has changed some.

Case in point the philosophy is changing - the weights of the players you listed have gone down over the last couple of years.

Click to expand...

I agree. For most teams we play it won't be a problem for Evans and Tim Williams to be everydown players. Maybe not against the I-Formation power running teams like Arkansas and LSU but they should be able to play most downs against just about all the other opponents. There's more than one way to play at the LOS. A player doesn't have to be 250-270 lbs in order to set the edge. Someone like Evans or Williams can use speed instead of power and still accomplish the same goal..

RTR91 said:

Look at the current roster. There are only a few LBs over 240: Mekhi Brown, Ryan Anderson, Reuben Foster, and Joshua McMillon. That's a third of the scholarship/recruited LBs. There has been a noticeable difference in recruiting habits by the staff. That was my point. Yes, Williams and Evans weren't 3 down guys with the older players on the field. By chance, the older guys weigh more because they arrived weighing more. The philosophy has changed some.

Case in point the philosophy is changing - the weights of the players you listed have gone down over the last couple of years.

Click to expand...

so i just learned to not pay attention to the weights on rolltide.com. Williams is up to 260 now according to his interview after the SEC championship game - coaches pushed him to gain the weight - put him right into the average of the other OLBs who have been real contributors. It's also not really much of a trend in weights going down. In fact, once Dickson got enough experience to play, they pushed hubbard over to SAM in favor of a heavier player, and even without that, we're talking about a total variation that's pretty small.

On the current roster, 9 of the 16lbs on the roster have never played a single snap and several of those still have their weights listed from when they walked on campus.

of the 7 that have played, the three that have played the most, and also all three being seniors, are over 240, with the range up to 260 with williams (adjusted based on the interview). then you've got the two JRs who have played a bit, but honestly probably not as much in the rotation as people had expected and that's SDH (listed 229) and Evans (listed 225). lastly, Miller (213) who barely made any special teams contribution this year and Holcombe (223) who got ST reps this year after redshirting to gain weight.

Of the 5 guys in the 2015 class, 3 of them are above 240 - Add bell into that with the greyshirt and it's 4 out of 6 above 240 when they got to campus. The two below 240: Anderson was/is a S/LB hybrid project and Thomas is a WILL.

Maybe Evans is heavier than listed since we know the weights are not always accurate, and if so that's probably good and I'm not sure what the ideal weight to set the edge is, but I know it's not a speed thing, it's a power and strength thing and our track record even against spread teams is guys in the 250 and up range so IF he's going to be a 3 down guy, in our scheme as an OLB, he needs to add weight and strength. The alternative is switching spots to WILL so he can use all that speed and not have to tangle directly on the LOS with an OT every play then still be able to switch down for the speed rush when the situation is right. Being able to do that would be very, very useful and help with a lot of scheme versatility and is probably why they are giving him looks at the other spots.

I am not sure of all the weights being mentioned to each player but I do know that RTR91 is right in that we have recruited more lighter, faster LB's over the last 3 or 4 recruiting classes than we have in the past. We are still going to have some heavier LB's to counter the LSU, ARK and UGA type offenses but overall our philosophy has changed to counter the HUNH offenses.

CraigD said:

Where are you getting this info? Not being critical, just wondering. He hasn't played and wasn't a prominent part of anything the public got to see last year.

Click to expand...

I based my opinion of Blake solely on his running of our Scout Team last year. Blake faced the best Defense in the country every practice last year. Lots of video of his runs, passes, and technique.

RTR91 said:

Monday, March 21 practice reports

Al.com

BOL

Rewinding Nick Saban's thoughts following Alabama's 2nd spring practice

Click to expand...

Watching footage of Bateman I couldn't help but notice how massive Cornwell looked. Dude looked big.

Cornwell has prototypical NFL size and arm strength. He has all the physical tools to be a special player. He just needs the light bulb to go on..

TiderJ said:

I am not sure of all the weights being mentioned to each player but I do know that RTR91 is right in that we have recruited more lighter, faster LB's over the last 3 or 4 recruiting classes than we have in the past. We are still going to have some heavier LB's to counter the LSU, ARK and UGA type offenses but overall our philosophy has changed to counter the HUNH offenses.

Click to expand...

I just posted about this on another thread, but actually we have been recruiting bigger LBs on average, except the 2014 class with evans, miller and holcombe. that's the only class in the last 6 classes below 230 avg weight, where all the classes prior to 6 ago were below that mark and only one (with Rolando) was above 225 avg weight. Historically we did tend to pack a lot more weight on them, and are not perhaps not pushing that quite as hard (although reggie was 250 so not small) as we are pushing speed and quickness in the conditioning program.

gtgilbert said:

I just posted about this on another thread, but actually we have been recruiting bigger LBs on average, except the 2014 class with evans, miller and holcombe. that's the only class in the last 6 classes below 230 avg weight, where all the classes prior to 6 ago were below that mark and only one (with Rolando) was above 225 avg weight. Historically we did tend to pack a lot more weight on them, and are not perhaps not pushing that quite as hard (although reggie was 250 so not small) as we are pushing speed and quickness in the conditioning program.

Click to expand...

Are you sure about your weight information? The 2008 class of Donta Hightower, Courtney Upshaw, Jerrell Harris and Chris Jordan had to have been over an average weight of 225 lbs. Donta and Courtney both played at or over 260 lbs and Harris played close to 250 lbs so I would be surprised we put 30-40 lbs on each of these guys.

TiderJ said:

Are you sure about your weight information? The 2008 class of Donta Hightower, Courtney Upshaw, Jerrell Harris and Chris Jordan had to have been over an average weight of 225 lbs. Donta and Courtney both played at or over 260 lbs and Harris played close to 250 lbs so I would be surprised we put 30-40 lbs on each of these guys.

Click to expand...

I got it straight from rivals. Cant use 247 because they update the weights over time so their weights reflect their last year in college. I can't paste a table in here for some reason, but you can check. In addition to the LBs, I put some of the kids who were listed as DEs, but we were recruiting as JLBs and that's where they played, and I took off Sunseri who played LB in HS, but was a S the minute he stepped onto campus.

For sure they all added some major bulk while at Bama.

Graphing the data across the years shows a trend in increasing weights of the incoming recruits as well.

As far as putting that much weight on them, remember some of them come from less than good environments where sometimes they struggle, and then get to campus with a registered dietitian and structured workouts.

This is just my opinion. I don't think it matters whether or not Rashaan Evans is 230 lbs or 250+lbs. I think he will be an everydown player and be one of the best players on the defense this year. You can't really go by historical data since CNS has been here because we are doing things different now. No more massive nose tackles like Cody, no more traditional safeties like Barron, last year we started a cornerback at safety in Eddie Jackson to get more speed on the field, playing smaller ends than ever before in Hand and Tim Williams, etc etc etc. If the coaches want Rashaan to put on more weight and get bigger that's fine but even if he doesn't he'll be an everydown player and a force of nature at his current measurables..

RTR91 said:

I posted the weights of the LB recruits according to Rivals going back to the 2010 class in the thread about RE yesterday. Went back today and looked at the weights listed by UA the last time the player was listed in the media guide or on the roster.

CJ Mosley and Mekhi Brown were the biggest jumps at 26 pounds gained. Shaun Dion Hamilton actually lost 9 pounds.

The average weight on the players according to Rivals was 229.2. The average weight of the players based on the school's listing was 237.8 pounds.

Click to expand...

Check out Upshaw, stinson and Hubbard - upshaw gained 40+ (220 to 260+), Stinson (who gained his way from OLB to DE) and Hubbard 30 (227 to 257).

some might be listed on rivals as a DE, but are recruited by us as LBs due to the way the Jack LB plays in our scheme.

CrimsonForce said:

This is just my opinion. I don't think it matters whether or not Rashaan Evans is 230 lbs or 250+lbs. I think he will be an everydown player and be one of the best players on the defense this year. You can't really go by historical data since CNS has been here because we are doing things different now. No more massive nose tackles like Cody, no more traditional safeties like Barron, last year we started a cornerback at safety in Eddie Jackson to get more speed on the field, playing smaller ends than ever before in Hand and Tim Williams, etc etc etc. If the coaches want Rashaan to put on more weight and get bigger that's fine but even if he doesn't he'll be an everydown player and a force of nature at his current measurables..

Click to expand...

I think you're right and I hope you're right, Force...

CrimsonForce said:

This is just my opinion. I don't think it matters whether or not Rashaan Evans is 230 lbs or 250+lbs. I think he will be an everydown player and be one of the best players on the defense this year. You can't really go by historical data since CNS has been here because we are doing things different now. No more massive nose tackles like Cody, no more traditional safeties like Barron, last year we started a cornerback at safety in Eddie Jackson to get more speed on the field, playing smaller ends than ever before in Hand and Tim Williams, etc etc etc. If the coaches want Rashaan to put on more weight and get bigger that's fine but even if he doesn't he'll be an everydown player and a force of nature at his current measurables..

Click to expand...

Could not agree more. Really pretty obvious. We want people that can move and run in response to the offenses we face. At the same time, keep just enough size on some guys for the LSU`s and Arkansas`s. I think it`s a very interesting dynamic to watch.

I am not really going to add anything at all to this, but I really am enjoying the conversation.

I feel that Evans will benefit greatly from moving off the line where the OL can get their hands on him. His speed will be evident flying around when they can't just reach out and "punch" him in the chest.