Friday's Practice

[Helcat72]

I went to practice today and her are my thoughts:

1. Gatewood looked good. He caught a few in traffic and looked really quick. Mike Williams and Guinn also looked good. Guinn is really smoothe. He reminds me of Aaron Hill a little...but maybe built a little slighter. Receivers as a whole dropped a few passes until Bailey told them they would run halfway to the Museum if they dropped another one. After that the effort rose to a higher level. I think they were concentrating on their footwork in running a certain pattern when they dropped all the balls.

2. The O line for all the consternation we have gone through, didn't look bad. The DE I thought was Matakis (because he played first team) may have been Cogley according to the roster (#90), but #90 was at least 250 lbs if he was an ounce and could really Bull Rush! He didn't show much finesse, spins or fancy swim techniques today due to the fact that they were just schooling the O line on using leverage and their hand to control the defensive man. Actually #93 (Matakis didn't stick out and was not with the first team) The biggest war was between Ray Sebestian and Jeff Bolton one on one.

The younger kids looked pretty good actually. Beniger went up against Lowe once and did a pretty good job for someone who's feet were suspect! Daws is still at right tackle. I can't see how he's going to make it through a whole season. We need him as a long snapper. I hope someone else starts to show promise on the first team. Neither Brewton nor De Cock impressed me or coach McEndoo on this day!

3. We only have 4 running backs (including Grant Elliot) Gathing, Milton and Dominek. Gathing was limping around with an ice pack around his knee or calf. Milton and Dominek really looked quick, especially Milton. Dominek impressed Kramer when he took on a linebacker and spun away and kept running. Both of them have real break away speed. Grant Elliot is really "cut" He looks like a smaller version of Blake Wolf. He must have put on at leat 10 pounds of muscle.

4. Wolf has really improved his pass routes and catching the ball. I think he may be a deep threat this year. The freshmen tight ends are real green. It might be a stretch to think anyone is going to be as good as Goodman was last year.

5. The QB's threw pretty well both long and short. Travis is like another coach on the field.

6. Tyler Lulay is working out at Safety and looks pretty quick...just little smaller that Travis otherwise you couln't tell them apart.

It was interesting that they almost had full contact in shorts helmets and shoulder pads. The only thing they didn't do was actually tackle. A lot of hitting though! Dan Davies told me that they picked that up from the Pro Camps they visited.