1. I'm gonna start with my annual fall camp warning: Take what you read for the next month with a grain of salt. If a kid looks good day after day after day and coaches talk about him repeatedly, yeah, maybe he's going to have a bigger role. If he looks good one day, no biggie. Same if he looks bad one day. Kids are going to be up and down. If the offense looks good, the defense looks bad and vice versa. Plus, we will get to see approximately 2/3 of the practices over the next month...which means we have approximately 1/10 of the information that will go into determining a depth chart and a rotation. We'll do the best we can, we'll get all the information we can. But getting too high or too low on a kid or a position or a team based on articles from practice is going to accomplish very little other than to stress you out.
2. That said, fall camp does get going on Friday. Here are the three main questions I think Missouri has to answer:
A. Who backs up Drew Lock? Hopefully it's not an answer that matters. Hopefully the kid is healthy and takes every meaningful snap and tears it up. But Missouri has to find out if they've got a guy ready to play behind him. I think they have guys who could come in if Drew is out for a series or a quarter or a half. But if he's out for an extended period of time, do they have anyone who could step in for four weeks? I'm not nearly as sold on that.
B. Who steps up in the secondary? There are guys there. But which ones separate themselves? I think Adam Sparks is going to start. I think DeMarkus Acy probably will, but Terry Petry and Christian Holmes are going to get consideration. At safety you've got Cam Hilton and Khalil Oliver and Josh Bledsoe and Tyree Gillespie and Jordan Ulmer. Of those five, which two prove to be better than the others and go take a job?
C. Can the pass rush help the secondary out? The best thing for a secondary that has question marks is not giving the QB time to throw the ball. I think Chris Turner and Tre Williams are almost certainly your starters in week one. How good are they off the edge? And how much can Daniel Parker, Trajan Jeffcoat, Jatorian Hansford and Nate Anderson help? If Missouri develops a good pass rush, I think this has a chance to be a really, really fun season. If it doesn't, I think they're going to have to win a whole lot of 42-38 games.
I'll do my season prediction on Thursday. It's almost certainly going to be between seven and nine wins. I'm just not sure where I'll land. Depends how I feel when I wake up that morning.
3. ICYMI, Night at the Zou happened on Saturday. If you're not aware of that, I question if this is the place you want to spend your money, but I'm still glad you do. Anyway, here are the bullet points:
Martez Manuel committed
Charles Njoku committed
Maurice Massey will decide Friday. I believe he will commit to Missouri. Some Illinois people I know believe he will commit to Missouri. We'll see, but I'm relatively confident I'm right.
Marcus Washington will decide August 7th. I believe he will commit to Missouri.
Ira Henry says he's going to take all five official visits. Many people I talk to believe that he will commit to Missouri very shortly after Washington does. So we'll see on that one.
Arvell Ferguson is closing in on a decision. I will be shocked if it is not Missouri.
4. Elsewhere in the SEC, a couple of stories out of Alabama
Jalen Hurts will stay in Tuscaloosa this season. I'm not that surprised because I think Hurts will get some playing time and I think he's got a chance to add another ring. He is on track to graduate in December which means he could go somewhere with one year left to play...or two if he plays in four games or fewer this season and redshirts.
Nick Saban now makes $7.5 million per season...and it's a bargain. I mean, is it ridiculous a college football coach makes that kind of money? Sure it is. But a lot of things are ridiculous. How much money has Saban made Bama over the last ten years? First, you're worth whatever someone determines you are worth. Second, Nick Saban is worth a nearly limitless amount of money to Alabama.
5. Welcome home to Lincoln, Scott Frost.
Breaking: People are not great.
6. The fun era of Royals baseball is officially over for a while (I mean, let's be honest, it's been over for more than a year now).
First off, I'm glad Moose is going to a team that already has one of my favorite players. I've now got a baseball team to root for. I'm all aboard the Brew Crew train (sorry Cards fans).
The larger thing as a Royals fan that I've been wondering about lately is how do we feel about the organization as it stands? Let me first say, I wouldn't trade 2014 and 15 for anything. I will take four seasons of 100 losses in exchange for that run. It was glorious. And we always knew it wouldn't be sustained for a long time. In Major League Baseball, you better take advantage of walking through the door when it's open. The Royals did. The Mets didn't. There are a lot of teams that got close, but never won one. The Royals did, so I'm happy.
That said, they shouldn't be in as bad of shape as they are right now. They should have traded all these guys a year ago or more. Talk of four years before they can be competitive is ridiculous. If you're that far from being competitive, then you screwed up. Bigly. And you should probably be fired for it (not today, but before four years from today). I appreciate Ned Yost and Dayton Moore for everything they did. I'd also be perfectly fine if this rebuild was turned over to someone else because I'm not sure either of them will be in their current jobs long enough to see it have a chance to happen again.
2. That said, fall camp does get going on Friday. Here are the three main questions I think Missouri has to answer:
A. Who backs up Drew Lock? Hopefully it's not an answer that matters. Hopefully the kid is healthy and takes every meaningful snap and tears it up. But Missouri has to find out if they've got a guy ready to play behind him. I think they have guys who could come in if Drew is out for a series or a quarter or a half. But if he's out for an extended period of time, do they have anyone who could step in for four weeks? I'm not nearly as sold on that.
B. Who steps up in the secondary? There are guys there. But which ones separate themselves? I think Adam Sparks is going to start. I think DeMarkus Acy probably will, but Terry Petry and Christian Holmes are going to get consideration. At safety you've got Cam Hilton and Khalil Oliver and Josh Bledsoe and Tyree Gillespie and Jordan Ulmer. Of those five, which two prove to be better than the others and go take a job?
C. Can the pass rush help the secondary out? The best thing for a secondary that has question marks is not giving the QB time to throw the ball. I think Chris Turner and Tre Williams are almost certainly your starters in week one. How good are they off the edge? And how much can Daniel Parker, Trajan Jeffcoat, Jatorian Hansford and Nate Anderson help? If Missouri develops a good pass rush, I think this has a chance to be a really, really fun season. If it doesn't, I think they're going to have to win a whole lot of 42-38 games.
I'll do my season prediction on Thursday. It's almost certainly going to be between seven and nine wins. I'm just not sure where I'll land. Depends how I feel when I wake up that morning.
3. ICYMI, Night at the Zou happened on Saturday. If you're not aware of that, I question if this is the place you want to spend your money, but I'm still glad you do. Anyway, here are the bullet points:
Martez Manuel committed
Charles Njoku committed
Maurice Massey will decide Friday. I believe he will commit to Missouri. Some Illinois people I know believe he will commit to Missouri. We'll see, but I'm relatively confident I'm right.
Marcus Washington will decide August 7th. I believe he will commit to Missouri.
Ira Henry says he's going to take all five official visits. Many people I talk to believe that he will commit to Missouri very shortly after Washington does. So we'll see on that one.
Arvell Ferguson is closing in on a decision. I will be shocked if it is not Missouri.
4. Elsewhere in the SEC, a couple of stories out of Alabama
Jalen Hurts will stay in Tuscaloosa this season. I'm not that surprised because I think Hurts will get some playing time and I think he's got a chance to add another ring. He is on track to graduate in December which means he could go somewhere with one year left to play...or two if he plays in four games or fewer this season and redshirts.
Nick Saban now makes $7.5 million per season...and it's a bargain. I mean, is it ridiculous a college football coach makes that kind of money? Sure it is. But a lot of things are ridiculous. How much money has Saban made Bama over the last ten years? First, you're worth whatever someone determines you are worth. Second, Nick Saban is worth a nearly limitless amount of money to Alabama.
5. Welcome home to Lincoln, Scott Frost.
Breaking: People are not great.
6. The fun era of Royals baseball is officially over for a while (I mean, let's be honest, it's been over for more than a year now).
First off, I'm glad Moose is going to a team that already has one of my favorite players. I've now got a baseball team to root for. I'm all aboard the Brew Crew train (sorry Cards fans).
The larger thing as a Royals fan that I've been wondering about lately is how do we feel about the organization as it stands? Let me first say, I wouldn't trade 2014 and 15 for anything. I will take four seasons of 100 losses in exchange for that run. It was glorious. And we always knew it wouldn't be sustained for a long time. In Major League Baseball, you better take advantage of walking through the door when it's open. The Royals did. The Mets didn't. There are a lot of teams that got close, but never won one. The Royals did, so I'm happy.
That said, they shouldn't be in as bad of shape as they are right now. They should have traded all these guys a year ago or more. Talk of four years before they can be competitive is ridiculous. If you're that far from being competitive, then you screwed up. Bigly. And you should probably be fired for it (not today, but before four years from today). I appreciate Ned Yost and Dayton Moore for everything they did. I'd also be perfectly fine if this rebuild was turned over to someone else because I'm not sure either of them will be in their current jobs long enough to see it have a chance to happen again.
