Morning Coffee Is In Stock

by Peter Bean on Aug 7, 2007 9:06 AM CDT in Quick Hits

At long last! Amazon lists the Eyes of Texas as in stock. For all who ordered the book from Amazon and have been getting weird emails about October delivery dates, the glitch in their system has been fixed. Finally.

With all the offseason hoopla of late, it's been easy to forget that this is a Football Team that we're talking about. That got a little bit easier as the kids finally returned to practice Monday evening. The Statesman notes that the backup quarterback position is at the top of Mack Brown's priority list. Burned last year when McCoy went down to Kansas State, Brown is vowing to use the backup this year in competitive situations:

"I want (the backup) to be playing in games that matter, when the game still is competitive, without it breaking our rhythm," Brown said. "It's tough to do."

We shall see. For now, the challenge is figuring out whether Sherrod Harris or John Chiles will be #2. If Brown is indeed serious about using two quarterbacks in some capacity, the chances of Chiles winning that #2 job do, I think, increase. I know they'd like to get him on the field somehow anyway, and keeping him happy (and getting him touches) is a priority. The battle between these two QBs is going to be fun to talk about this month.

The search for a fullback is being taken seriously this fall. As noted in the Statesman, Derek Lokey and Rashad Bobino are working out at the position, while junior linebacker Nic Redwine has been converted to fullback full time. I do hope Greg Davis intends to keep using a spread attack in 2007, but at least for short to-go situations, Texas is going to need someone who can lineup and lead the way with a big block.

Chip Brown files an excellent feature story on Texas Defensive Coordinator Duane Akina. I'm personally as excited about the reunion of two Tomey boys (Akina and Larry MacDuff) as anything else about the defense this season.

And last, but not least, I can finally congratulate Cat officially on the announcement that she's been hired as an assistant coach at DePaul. I've known since last week (her mother's a proud one), but had to keep quiet until the press release went out. Congratulations to Cat on the start of her new career.

--PB--

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This is good to hear.

In the article about Daune Akina,

"Without laying any blame, Akina says he'll get the pass defense fixed this season by getting more pressure on the quarterback."

The single most important reason last year the pass defense sucked was not poor play in the secondary( maybe just mediocre play) but lack of pressure on the passer. Stopping the run doesn't do you much good if you consistently give up passes in a offensive drive.

I would argue it's better to give up rushing yardage to control a teams passing attack. Which might happen if a defense takes more risks sending a stronger pass rush and has a secondary keying on pass defense first and run stopping second.

It also makes sense to trade off some run stopping effiencacy for trying to get pressure on the QB just for the fact that College QB's and the offenses aren't as well drilled and confidant as say pro's. Which means a disruptive pass rush can not only slow down a passing attack but also disrupt the rhythm, under cut the confidence and generally breakup the continuity of an offense.

xerxes

by Xerxes on Aug 7, 2007 11:18 AM CDT reply actions