Looked like a big storm was brewing to the south and Lobo practice would
be postponed for the evening, but the football gods deemed it necessary for the
Lobo football team to squeeze one in tonight.
No pads tonight (bummer) but it was one of the last
training camp scrimmages, which should break early this week and the Lobos will
move into preparing for Washington St., with the young guys running the scout
team and the first and second units running their regular plays.
There are a couple of positions still up for grabs right now. On offense it looks like, now this is
unscientific and could change or easily be all wrong so don’t hold
me to it, but by the looks I see.
QB K. Mc Kamey
RB D. Moore
FB A. Byrd
TE L. Hall (Though
Augustyniak running set.)
WR Baskett
WR C. Brawley/A. Carter
(If the Lobos open up with a 3-wide
set)
WR H. Baskett
WR C. Brawley/ M. Smith
WR A. Carter
ST “Big C” Terrell
SG R Turner
C R. Cook
QG B. Greer/B. Humphreys
QT F. Tucker/T. Pennington
On defense
DE K. Coulter
NT M. Parker
DE A. Garday
OLB F. Fashola
ILB M. Mohoric
ILB C. Harris
OLB N. Speegle
CB Gabriel Fulbright
CB Brandon Payne
S Art Haynes
S J. Bazinet
Once again this is what I’ve seen out on practice running the
1st’s
Back to tonight’s practice, no pads so mostly conditioning drills,
shuttle races, sprints, back pedaling, and my favorite drill the Harry Potter
chase the Yellow Stitch (tennis ball) drill. Early on Coach Dodd was not happy
with the speed and intensity of his offensive line and a storm was definitely
brewing there…
7-on-7 drills
There is no easy way to say this except to say it, I enjoy going out to
the practice fields because these guys for the most part give their all. If you
see someone screwing around the coaches get on them and for the most part they
rectify the behavior or lack of intensity quickly. Trust me, I have seen The Rock get into
a player’s face on the practice field and I will tell you right now, any player
out there would have a tough time with The Rock. The dude is intensity at its finest and
still looks like he could go in there and show these young pups a thing or
two…
The Rock still has game!
With that in mind, I would have to say the offense didn’t put forth their
best effort tonight, they had some exceptions, like Kole hooking up with “The
Passion” on a couple of nice plays, and of course anytime you see #18 motoring
towards the end zone on a post or fade that is always a pretty good route and
the Lobos did hook up on that, but for the most part on 7-on7 there was a lot of
mistakes and misplays.
CB Brandon Payne nearly had six, LB Mike Mohoric did have
six, Fulbright was in the mix, Malone looked good, “Tay” Epps was in on some
plays, and J. Clayton nearly had a pick… The balls were coming in flat, the
receivers weren’t uncovering, and when they were they had the dropseys.
No dissing the Defense as they did their job, but Darn it! The offense is
just better then that, and Coach Dodd let them know it as well. After practice he got on them for their
lackluster effort and play. They
got a well deserved talking to.
Being around the practice fields the past few years and seeing this
before, I know they will respond tomorrow afternoon (practice moves to a 3-5pm
schedule with school starting.)
Nick, Go
kick that Cougars...
Got a chance to say hello to a big Red Menace supporter
#89 Nick Speegle. I’m not a small
man as many of you know (granted my size isn’t dispersed evenly throughout my
body as Speegle's is), but there are very few people more intimidating on the
practice field then Speegs. He came
up and said thanks and told me he read the website every night and appreciated
all our support. He also wanted to
say, “I’m tired of hitting each other and I am ready to hit someone else.” I let
out a breath of relief as he was headed to the locker room when he said
that…
Offensive
Player of the Practice
#81 Travis Brown
I almost didn’t pick one tonight but Travis just
outshined his offensive teammates making some really nice catches including a
slant pattern in traffic and hauling in a nice 50 yard rainbow on the post
pattern with the defensive back all over him.
Defensive
Player of Practice
#23
Gabriel Fulbright
#28 Brandon Payne
Hate to split them but both guys drew the tough coverage during 7-on-7
and for the most part stayed burn free.
Not the whole time as they do have to go against #18 but Payne was a
split second away from taking one back, and Gabe broke off his streaking
receiver when he recognized the TE out pattern. He delivered a nice lick just to let the
TE know, I see you baby. Of course
doesn’t just let his play on the field do the talking, as he had a big grin and
said how you doing the old fashioned way… with his mouth!
Coming
Up
As
I said earlier, practice will be moving to a 3-5pm schedule now that classes
start at UNM. So if you want to go catch practice don’t go at night. I’m working on a couple of interviews
with three JUCO transfers that should make a huge impact on this year’s football
team. Any guess as to who these
three young men are?