How is Gathers supposed to learn how to get those passes if he doesn't get them thrown to him in the game? And it wasn't 3 feet over his head, he didn't time his jump right, and didn't properly fight off the defender. Those things can be learned, though I would be in agreement with anybody who says he should have learned them by now.
I'm more upset with the run defense, too many times there were gaping holes for the running back to scoot through, that has to be tightened up, but I do have some hope they can do that, LVE was a bit late to the party on one of the td runs, and Heath had to hit the back, who was running straight ahead, at an angle, reducing his effectiveness on the same play. Those are technique things, the fact that Heath was in position to make the tackle and LVE could have been is encouraging.
But the J. Smith experiment is a failure, imo, he makes a good play here and there but he doesn't have the awareness and play recognition he needs, that should have been developed in college for the most part, and fine tuned in the NFL, I'm afraid he doesn't have that aspect of his game and can't rely on pure physical ability like he did in college. Of course losing Woods hurt, he's the best big body they have on the d-line...