With the quality additions to the secondary looking good, and the emerging depth in the defensive front four, the last missing piece of the defensive puzzle appears to be the linebackers.
In recent days, Bobby Petrino and Willy Robinson have raised some eyebrows by demoting two starters to second team. Are they still searching for linebackers at this late date, or is this a motivational ploy?
Starters from last season like Wendel Davis and Jerry Franklin have spent a good bit of the last two days on the second team. Sophomore Bret Harris and redshirt freshman Tenarius Wright jumped into the first team fray. Harris is a recently converted strong safety, while Wright has the size (6-2, 238) the coaches covet.
“We’re going to be competitive,” Petrino said. “You’ve got to come out and practice hard every day and do what you’re coached to do, run to the football. If not, then the guy behind you is going to move up.”
Our guess is Davis and Franklin will get the message and answer the call, and this is just a way for the coaches to get their attention. If coming off a season where the Hogs ranked dead last in the SEC on defense wasn’t motivation enough, maybe playing second fiddle for a few days will be.
Motivation, developing depth, this is a very impressive coaching staff. They are old school rather than 'player's coach' types and still attract great talent.
I know we are all ready for the Hogs to be the surprise team in the SEC. The coaches, and it sounds like, the players are doing their part. A lot has to come together to get there.
A few observations:
1. For the first time in memory we aren't making radical position changes to try and fill holes (Anthony Brown to WR, Chip Gregory to RB, Brandon Barnett to DB, Just to name a few)
2. We are building depth. I never really hated HDN though I might be headed there now but he was pretty bad about getting a stud at a position and not recruiting that position hard the following year. After Darren, Felix, and Michael Smith (who needs a nickname by the way) we didin't recruit a decent back for the next several years and after getting Mitch M. we didn't go hard after Mallett. That's how you compete one out of every four years which we did.
Now we are 7 deep at RB, have at least 3 pretty promising QB's on campus, and you are better than I if you can keep up with all of the quality WR's we have, when we used to just keep one good one at a time.
3. These coaches aren't used car salesmen. They sell the program when needed but Bobby P. and his staff don't spend much time trying to convince us the fans or the players how good we are going to be. If things suck, they tell it like it is and there seems to be an attitude that a player is lucky to be on board this ship instead of begging them for the buy-in. This probably ties back to the depth and competition at positions.
4. On that note, I think that competition is what will change the program. I love Cobi Hamilton's attitude coming in. He is challenging other players and that is huge. Teams on top of college football have that competition and they recruit to a players pride. "come see if you can play with the big boys." We're not promising you a starting position just for coming here. Go to Ole Miss if that's how you want to be recruited.
I'm trying to temper my excitement because I think we are still young, but damn I love what I"m hearing. Go Hogs!
I agree, Carolina Hog, The system has definately changed a bit since the Ole Houston Nutt days.
This coaching staff won't get caught up in all the dramatics. They're all business, and won't stoop to lower standards just to reel in a top quality recruit.
How many Hall of Fame coaches do you know that's labeled as a "players coach"? You might label an assistant coach such as Horton or Smith in that reference, but you'll never hear that label connected to Bobby Petrino.
His all-business style just goes hand in hand with his leadership abilities.
That is something a sucsessful HC has to have.