Okay. McClain, I have little doubt, will be Tebow's spy. Tebow is great, but he won't be able to rush if this is the case. At least not for anything more than a few yards here and there. The question will be what does this force Tebow to do with his arm, and can he do it against our pass rush? We'll see.
Haden is EXCELLENT. Don't get me wrong. Very impressive. I have a feeling that they will have to put him in man coverage on Julio to stop Bama's rushing attack. No person in college ball cover Julio in single man coverage I don't think, at least not if the QB can throw a good ball. If McElroy throws him bad passes, then that could definitely tip the advantage in Haden's favor and create a turnover.
The only thing that bothers me in this game is Hernandez. If McClain is on Tebow, someone has to pick up Hernandez. If we had Hightower still, I wouldn't be worried about this at all as Hightower > Hernandez. As it is, Cory Reamer has played well in his place all season, but he's coming off an injury himself, so I'm not sure how quick he'll be. I'm very concerned about this. Reamer does a good job tackling in space, but if he's not 100%, it could be difficult as Hernandez is great at running around tacklers.
I'm really just having fun with the smack talk. In all honesty, I'm anticipating this game with high hopes and cautious skepticism. Very mixed feelings. This could go either way quickly I think. I expect Bama to do things from the Wildcat that they haven't done all season long. I just wonder how good it'll be. I also expect to see us throw the deep ball again. Hopefully McElroy will be on it. Everything rides on him really. If he plays really well (65-70% completions) and we can rush for 150 yards total, I really don't think Florida has a chance to win it honestly. If he's closer to 50%, then it'll come down to our Defense being able to hold Florida to similar passing numbers, and we'll likely lose.
I'm trying to put aside my Bama homerism and watch this matchup as a fan of the game itself. Saban vs. Meyer, two great defenses, two capable but struggling offenses, great matchups on all sides of the ball to watch, play calling strategy, new wrinkles that haven't been seen before... It's just going to be a great game all around I think. I'll be broken if we lose, but I like our chances much better than I did last year.