AUBURN | Well, A-Day has come and gone and the most interesting development was a tweet about Bo Nix improving and being a dark horse Heisman candidate, which had Auburn’s junior quarterback trending on the social media site.
If you read that opening paragraph and have no idea what I’m talking about, search Nix and Heisman on Twitter and enjoy.
Now, my main takeaway from the spring game is that Auburn’s defense is way ahead of the offense and the combination of some very athletic defenders and Derek Mason’s attacking style is going to be a lot of fun to watch on fall Saturdays.
While there was just one turnover Saturday, based on what happened in the other scrimmages and 11-on-11 work during the spring, and based on all the playmakers the Tigers have on that side of the ball, I’m expecting a lot of turnovers and big plays from this defense this fall.
I like the talent, I like the depth and I like the synergy the players already have with Mason and the new coaches on that side of the ball.
As for Nix and the offense, they’ll come around. They will absolutely get better from what we saw Saturday, especially the passing game as the wide receiver group gets healthier and adjusts to a new offense that expects a lot more from its wideouts.
I thought Nix played pretty well. He was 10 of 13 in the first half and two of those incompletions were drops. I also saw him purposely throw the ball away a couple of times in the second half, something we didn’t see a lot of last season.
Of course, we also saw something we saw way too much of last year and that’s defenders get free access to AU’s offensive backfield several times, which caused Nix to bail early.
And that brings me to my final point.
How much Auburn improves on offense this season really isn’t on Nix. It’s on an offensive line that needs to continue to improve is pass protection and be able to create running lanes for Tank Bigsby against quality opponents. It’s about keeping Bigsby and Shaun Shivers healthy and it’s about a young wide receiver corps that has talent but still has a lot to learn.
The 2021 Auburn offense can reach its potential under Nix. It's just how much potential does this group possess?
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You know how some Auburn people joke that it’s X many days until basketball season, often after an early football loss. Well, it’s officially 205 days until the NCAA scheduled start date of Nov. 10, 2021 and it’s definitely time to mark your calendars.
Auburn’s roster is still not complete but the anticipation for Bruce Pearl’s 8th season should already be at a fever pitch following the addition of Walker Kessler last week. The former North Carolina player has the potential to be one of the most skilled big men to ever play at Auburn with great hands and footwork in the paint and the ability to step outside and hit a 3-pointer at over 7-foot tall.
Add Jabari Smith, the highest-rated signee in school history, a couple of key transfers at point guard, another exciting guard signee in Trey Alexander, and whoever else Pearl and his staff bring in over the coming weeks, and you’re looking at potentially one of the best rosters Pearl has ever put together and one of the most anticipated season in Auburn basketball history.
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In today’s musical journey we go back 41 years to the beginnings of one of the greatest alternative bands of all time. On April 19, 1980, R.E.M. played for the first time as R.E.M. at the 11:11 Koffee Club in Athens, Ga. The show ended at 2 a.m. when police closed down the unlicensed venue. In the police report, the cops wrote they observed, “approximately 150 people, a live band, numerous cups, beer cans and bottles. Some of the bottles still contained what smelled like beer.” It was the first R.E.M. event attended by Bertis Downs, who was in law school at Georgia, and would become an advisor and manager of the band. R.E.M. would go on to sell over 85 million albums, which ranks among the top 100 bands of all time, and win three Grammy Awards over their 31 years together.
The band was formed in 1980 by four students at the University of Georgia: vocalist Michael Stipe, guitarist Peter Buck, bassists Mike Mills and drummer Bill Berry. They actually played their first gig as an unnamed band for a birthday party at the former St. Mary’s Episcopal Church on April 5, 1980. The only part of the church still standing is called the R.E.M. steeple and has become a pilgrimage site for fans of the band and Athens music. After considering several names, they settled on R.E.M., which Stipe chose randomly from a dictionary. They started drawing bigger and bigger crowds at venues around Athens and eventually began touring the Southeast in an old blue van with a daily food allowance of $2 apiece. They released their first song, Radio Free Europe, in 1981, and first album, Murmur, in 1983 and appeared on Late Night with David Letterman in October of 83. They released several more albums but really broke out with 1988’s Green, which included hit singles Stand and Orange Crush, and 1991’s Out of Time, which included their biggest hit, Losing My Religion, and Shiny Happy People. The 1992 album Automatic For the People was another big hit with singles Drive, Man on the Moon and Everybody Hurts. R.E.M. continued to produce albums, 15 total, and tour until calling it quits in 2011.
Radio Free Europe was written by Stipe and started being played by the band in 1981. It features one of R.E.M.’s trademarks, nearly unintelligible lyrics by Stipe. The song was recorded at Drive-In Studios in Winston-Salem, N.C., and was released on the short-lived independent label, Hib-Tone. Stipe says he often improvised the lyrics when he played the song live. It was eventually re-recorded and included on Murmur and became the first R.E.M. song to chart when it was re-released in 1983. Stipe used a blur picture for the song’s cover and its video was recorded in the garden of artist Howard Finster, who painted the cover of their second album, Reckoning.
