Louisville football: Five burning questions for 2019
By Jacob Lane
What’s the biggest weakness and how do you fix it?
Tanner Hickman: The biggest weakness would be overall depth. The coaches have stated that they believe they could win some games with the ones however there is a significant drop off as far as quality is concerned with the second and third-string. You would hope to get some of the second and third-string guys a series or two against a lesser opponent to try to develop them but that may be easier said than done.
Presley Meyer: The biggest weakness for the Cards is their play in the trenches. On both sides of the ball, Louisville struggled to get any sort of push in 2018. Though they have talent at the skill positions, the game is won and lost upfront. Thankfully, help is on the way. We talked about attitude and effort being a big difference this year. This, perhaps, isn’t truer than on the offensive and defensive lines. I look for guys like Tyler Haycraft, Ty Tyler, and Tabarius Peterson to really help shore up some of those issues.
Ethan Sprowles: The biggest weakness has to be at offensive line. This has been Louisville’s Achilles’ heel for what seems like years now. The staff has made this clear by the way they’ve been recruiting and based off of Satterfield’s comments. Louisville is just extremely thin there right now and is an injury or two from being in some serious trouble.
Jacob Lane: The easy answer is depth, but for me, I think the biggest weakness may be at quarterback. I truly believe Jawon Pass is going to improve on his 54 percent completion rating, eight touchdowns to 12 interceptions ratio. However, in an offense where he’s going to be asked to make a lot of quick reads in the RPO and move the pocket, I am just not sure he’s good enough to do that at a high enough level to exceed the projected three to four win total.
Alan Thomas: Unfortunately, the biggest weakness is not fixable overnight…or over one season. You can call it culture if you want a broader term, but mentality is key. You can adjust this shortcoming by recruiting the right kids with the right attitude. Also, this particular staff just digging in for a few seasons wouldn’t hurt either.
Alex Stengel: The biggest weakness for this Louisville team is overall depth or lack thereof. The solution to fix it is probably one most fans don’t want to hear – time and patience.
Although the new staff has done a great job attempting to even the roster as much as they could in one offseason, there is still a concerning lack of depth in a lot of positions. The only real way to fix it is through recruiting the right players for those positions. I think if Bobby hadn’t left the roster so mismanaged and uneven, Satterfield’s rebuilding timeline would definitely be shortened.