Cal Football Countdown: 89 Days, Spotlight on Evan Weaver

There are a handful of TV and radio calls that have cemented themselves into the annals of Cal history. Joe Starkey's call of The Play is there, Brent Musburger labeling Desean Jackson 'the wizard of returns,' is in that group as well. If the Cal defense is as good as advertised this year, Tim Brando's call of Evan Weaver's pick six may end up among those calls. Brando's yell of 'It's Evan Weaver!' could be the marker of when a star was born for the Cal defense.

With 89 days to go until Cal kicks off against UC Davis, it's time to look at Cal's 'throwback,' as Justin Wilcox calls him, and why he's an integral piece for the Bears going into 2019.

Weaver's 2018

Stats: 159 tackles, 9.5 TFLs, 4.5 sacks, 2 interceptions, 6 pass breakups

PFF Grade: 91.5 (best on the team, highest among returning Pac-12 linebackers)

Reason for wearing 89: Because he likes it

It wasn't long ago that Weaver was brought into the fold as a 4-3 defensive end, making an impact early as a true freshman with a sack against Texas in 2016. One coaching change later, then Weaver gets bumped to OLB. Thanks to depth issues, Weaver bumped inside to ILB, and that's where he's been since.

Weaver made that move to ILB in the middle of fall camp 2017, and watching him for that first week was a little like the scene in the first Iron Man movie, where Tony Stark is starting to understand how to use the suit. Weaver was starting to figure out how to play the position then, and his burst through holes was what stood out then.

Since then, he's worked to become a more complete inside linebacker, but he's always been a tackling machine. When he gets a hand on a guy, he's usually bringing them down. PFF assigned 14 missed tackles all year to him, and considering how many plays he was involved in, he limited mistakes.

What He's Worked On:

There are two main areas that go overlooked as a part of Weaver's game. The first is his pass drops, something that improved a ton going into 2018. Peter Sirmon had his ILBs watch a ton of cover 3 film from teams like the Jacksonville Jaguars and Dave Aranda's LSU defenses, and Weaver took to it. He improved as someone who could undercut passes (see Washington pick-six) and someone who could keep safety valve passes in front of him, making sure tackles when those plays happened.

The other piece is his block shedding. While in principle getting off blocks is the same everywhere on the field, it's a little different at linebacker than at defensive end, thanks to the 300 lb lineman coming at you with a little more momentum than just off the line. Weaver's hands are excellent in getting blockers off him and maintaining his leverage in run support (keeping the runner on his inside shoulder).

Weaver will have a new running mate in 2019 (early thought is that JuCo ILB Kuony Deng will join him in the starting lineup), which will make for a different dynamic for the Cal defense, but the Spokane, Washington native has all the tools to produce a big season before heading to the NFL in 2020.