Over at Football Study Hall I took a look at what’s coming down the pipe from Gary Patterson and the Horned Frogs, in particular their three-down sub-package that they used a lot last year. It’s similar to the defense that Phil Bennett had created at Baylor towards the later years (especially 2015 and 2016) and … [Read more…]
There hasn’t been too much information flowing yet from the spring practices taking place across the Big 12. Lots of programs are fairly quiet either because they are looking for new QBs and key players, they are naturally secretive by nature, or it’s simply early and they expect things to shake out over the course … [Read more…]
There’s been an amusing trend in Gary Patterson’s public appearances recently, both at his signing day presser and then at a coach’s convention, where he’s noted that TCU’s reputation is better out of state than within the state of Texas. Because of his garrulous and self-referential nature he can be fascinating to listen to as … [Read more…]
Players are zipping in and out of the transfer portal and ending up all over the place. Nowadays QB transfers are a major, defining feature of the college game and there have been some big ones that will shape the 2019 season. Oklahoma wins the “biggest free agent in college football history” Jalen Hurts’ dad … [Read more…]
It was a solid performance overall by the Sooners but it came against a TCU team that was evidently ready to fall apart rather than to rally and make a statement win. Here is a snapshot of the sorts of solutions that Ruffin McNeil had on offer in this game:
As a close follower of the Texas Longhorns, my starting assumption to the question of whether you can recruit a top defense is “no, you cannot.” Texas has regularly recruited at the highest level in the Big 12 this decade and also put some pretty bad defenses on the field in that time. However, Texas … [Read more…]
If you haven’t heard from fans of other conferences, the Big 12 hasn’t been doing so well in the NFL draft of late. This was a big story in 2017 when only one player (Pat Mahomes, Texas Tech) was drafted from the conference into the first round. I figured that the league would rebound strongly … [Read more…]
One of the very difficult things about prognosticating in the Big 12 is how close the mid-level teams are to one another. This decade has typically included 3 teams at the top that were safely better than most of the league (generally OU plus 1-2 other squads) and then a wide morass of mid-level teams … [Read more…]
I don’t know that I want to try and rank them all again. Last year I developed a system for weighting the grades I handed out and then added it all up. This year I think I’m done with that. It’s fun content and makes for good debate but I’m not sure how valuable it … [Read more…]
We now take a brief interruption from my breakdown of every Big 12 recruiting class (only one to go, Baylor) so that I can highlight something fun I just posted up at SB Nation. I ranked the undefeated teams and another squad that I think would have been the most likely to win in the … [Read more…]