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A day at football school
Posted by: Brian Christopherson on June 13, 2012 at 2:13PM CST
I went to football school yesterday and ended up taking more notes than I did in many of my college classes.
Of course, if you knew my GPA in college, you'd know that's not saying much.
Certainly I learned some things at Nebraska's "Football 202" clinic. It was my first time attending the event, and at day's end, I considered it time well spent. Props to Jeff Jamrog for the job he did organizing it. And there was some new information revealed here and there.
I included a recap -- though it's hard to recap eight hours of talking in 34 inches of newsprint -- in today's story about the event.
Here's some takeaways I had from the event:
***
Recruiting coordinator Ross Els said Nebraska has offered 213 scholarships in this class. Not to be lost is that just 24 or those 213 offers come from recruits living within a 500-mile radius of Lincoln.
Els noted this to drive home the point of how Nebraska has to recruit nationally. How much does Nebraska spend in private airplane funding to recruit nationally? A $300,000 amount was mentioned to answer this question at one point.
No one is saying that's chump change, though it was also noted during yesterday's talks that Florida State, which doesn't have to go as far to find recruits, has a recruiting budget of $525,000.
Nebraska's budget might be close to that when it's all said and done. This thorough report by ESPN.com's Mitch Sherman had NU spending $478,554 in 2011, which was third behind Michigan and Illinois in the Big Ten.
You didn't always hear a lot about recruiting budget numbers in the past. But I'd expect you're going to hear a lot more about them going forward.
You know well about the facilities' arms race that have been part of getting the upperhand in college athletics. Add this to that.
***
Ten Husker players showed up to answer questions from fans. Alonzo Whaley, Jason Ankrah, P.J. Smith, Will Compton, Kenny Bell, Trevor Roach, Jeremiah Sirles, Ben Cotton, Kyler Reed, Andrew Green.
Someone asked the players what they thought of a college football playoff. There might have been someone on the panel who would want one, but no one said that opinion aloud.
"I'm against it," Bell said. "It's not that I don't love football, but to extend the season two to three games, that's a lot to ask."
Sirles: "I love the bowl games too ... It's so much fun being with your friends and brothers and enjoying what you don't get to do here."
***
Addressing the issue of leadership has been one of the key points of this offseason.
I've written about it before, but the team took on a spring challenge called "The Program," which are mentally and physically stressing exercises run by former military leaders.
It was eye-opening, players said. Some guys who don't play a lot became leaders during certain challenges. Compton said it also showed players that they can't let peers get away with something when they're not doing the job.
"When you see someone screwing up and not keeping up with the group, are you going to say something?" Compton said.
***
If looking for an individual story on the team to root for this fall, Alonzo Whaley might be one. He's been very open about his past missteps, but you can tell in listening to the senior linebacker that he's in a very good place right now.
Interesting to see if that off-the-field progress carries to the field this fall.
***
The clinic included a look-in on the Huskers doing summer conditioning workouts.
Hard to take much of anything by watching 100-plus guys run wind sprints. I did notice Taylor Martinez was finishing first in many of the line sprints. That might be expected because of his speed, but it did catch my attention that he was going full bore during a June conditioning drill.
***
Big Ten Network analyst Howard Griffith did a conference breakdown, also giving his two cents about Nebraska.
"I'm going to tell you, this facility is second to none," he said.
He was really impressed by the 23 offensive lineman he saw in Nebraska's drills this spring. "I went to some places this spring where they might have had eight."
Griffith said he sees a Nebraska team that "clearly should be 4-0" heading into Big Ten play.
He also told the crowd the more cliches you hear from a team, sometimes the better.
"If the team is heading in the right direction, they're spewing the same thing they're hearing in the newsrooms," Griffith said. "It can be so canned, so generic, but as a fan you better get real excited when you read that."
His point: If players are repeating what their coaches always say, they're buying in.
As for the pressure that comes with big-time athletics, Griffith has this opinion: “We put expectations on those young men that frankly we don’t put on ourselves. Let’s always be conscious of those expectations and ask ourselves if those same expectations were to be applied to our daily life, would they be fair?”
***
The highlight of the event was the film breakdown sessions. Tim Beck and the offensive coaches went first, breaking down the film from the Ohio State game.
There was a good chemistry between them. That sounds like summer fluff, I realize, but it did stick out to me.
The offensive coaches showed how one block or two is the difference between no gain or a 40-yard touchdown. This point was illustrated well when we watched a failed third down that basically happened because one offensive lineman put his helmet on the wrong side of a defender while trying to throw a block.
His failed effort helped Ohio State blow up a play that otherwise seemed to have a lane for a big play.
We watched the play, rewinded, watched again, rewinded and watched again.
One comment from Barney Cotton in particular stuck out to me. After one play in which Mike Caputo showed well, he said: "Caputo, we wouldn't have traded him for any guy in the country, he was that good."
***
Later came Bo Pelini and the defensive coaches. Pelini is most definitely in his element when he has the clicker in hand, analyzing the good and bad of a defense.
There was mostly good to be found in the film we watched -- film from the Michigan State game last year.
We heard from both new coaches Terry Joseph and Rick Kaczenski. Someone asked Kaczenski if he planned any changes on the defensive line.
Kaczenski laughed. No, no, no, he said with Bo Pelini sitting nearby.
Later, Pelini said his new coach was just showing his humility.
"Heck, yeah, he's going to change some things. He's humble and he's not going to say it ... It's a democracy," Pelini said of the defensive meeting room. "I'm not a dictator. I hired these guys cause they're the best at what they do."
Pelini was confident in talking about what he thinks this defense can do this upcoming offseason, saying Nebraska is "probably more multiple than we've been since I've been here."
The line, Pelini said, between a great defense and an average one is a thin one.
"But when we take care of ourselves, we're pretty damn good."
Posted by: Brian Christopherson on June 13, 2012 at 2:13PM CST
I went to football school yesterday and ended up taking more notes than I did in many of my college classes.
Of course, if you knew my GPA in college, you'd know that's not saying much.
Certainly I learned some things at Nebraska's "Football 202" clinic. It was my first time attending the event, and at day's end, I considered it time well spent. Props to Jeff Jamrog for the job he did organizing it. And there was some new information revealed here and there.
I included a recap -- though it's hard to recap eight hours of talking in 34 inches of newsprint -- in today's story about the event.
Here's some takeaways I had from the event:
***
Recruiting coordinator Ross Els said Nebraska has offered 213 scholarships in this class. Not to be lost is that just 24 or those 213 offers come from recruits living within a 500-mile radius of Lincoln.
Els noted this to drive home the point of how Nebraska has to recruit nationally. How much does Nebraska spend in private airplane funding to recruit nationally? A $300,000 amount was mentioned to answer this question at one point.
No one is saying that's chump change, though it was also noted during yesterday's talks that Florida State, which doesn't have to go as far to find recruits, has a recruiting budget of $525,000.
Nebraska's budget might be close to that when it's all said and done. This thorough report by ESPN.com's Mitch Sherman had NU spending $478,554 in 2011, which was third behind Michigan and Illinois in the Big Ten.
You didn't always hear a lot about recruiting budget numbers in the past. But I'd expect you're going to hear a lot more about them going forward.
You know well about the facilities' arms race that have been part of getting the upperhand in college athletics. Add this to that.
***
Ten Husker players showed up to answer questions from fans. Alonzo Whaley, Jason Ankrah, P.J. Smith, Will Compton, Kenny Bell, Trevor Roach, Jeremiah Sirles, Ben Cotton, Kyler Reed, Andrew Green.
Someone asked the players what they thought of a college football playoff. There might have been someone on the panel who would want one, but no one said that opinion aloud.
"I'm against it," Bell said. "It's not that I don't love football, but to extend the season two to three games, that's a lot to ask."
Sirles: "I love the bowl games too ... It's so much fun being with your friends and brothers and enjoying what you don't get to do here."
***
Addressing the issue of leadership has been one of the key points of this offseason.
I've written about it before, but the team took on a spring challenge called "The Program," which are mentally and physically stressing exercises run by former military leaders.
It was eye-opening, players said. Some guys who don't play a lot became leaders during certain challenges. Compton said it also showed players that they can't let peers get away with something when they're not doing the job.
"When you see someone screwing up and not keeping up with the group, are you going to say something?" Compton said.
***
If looking for an individual story on the team to root for this fall, Alonzo Whaley might be one. He's been very open about his past missteps, but you can tell in listening to the senior linebacker that he's in a very good place right now.
Interesting to see if that off-the-field progress carries to the field this fall.
***
The clinic included a look-in on the Huskers doing summer conditioning workouts.
Hard to take much of anything by watching 100-plus guys run wind sprints. I did notice Taylor Martinez was finishing first in many of the line sprints. That might be expected because of his speed, but it did catch my attention that he was going full bore during a June conditioning drill.
***
Big Ten Network analyst Howard Griffith did a conference breakdown, also giving his two cents about Nebraska.
"I'm going to tell you, this facility is second to none," he said.
He was really impressed by the 23 offensive lineman he saw in Nebraska's drills this spring. "I went to some places this spring where they might have had eight."
Griffith said he sees a Nebraska team that "clearly should be 4-0" heading into Big Ten play.
He also told the crowd the more cliches you hear from a team, sometimes the better.
"If the team is heading in the right direction, they're spewing the same thing they're hearing in the newsrooms," Griffith said. "It can be so canned, so generic, but as a fan you better get real excited when you read that."
His point: If players are repeating what their coaches always say, they're buying in.
As for the pressure that comes with big-time athletics, Griffith has this opinion: “We put expectations on those young men that frankly we don’t put on ourselves. Let’s always be conscious of those expectations and ask ourselves if those same expectations were to be applied to our daily life, would they be fair?”
***
The highlight of the event was the film breakdown sessions. Tim Beck and the offensive coaches went first, breaking down the film from the Ohio State game.
There was a good chemistry between them. That sounds like summer fluff, I realize, but it did stick out to me.
The offensive coaches showed how one block or two is the difference between no gain or a 40-yard touchdown. This point was illustrated well when we watched a failed third down that basically happened because one offensive lineman put his helmet on the wrong side of a defender while trying to throw a block.
His failed effort helped Ohio State blow up a play that otherwise seemed to have a lane for a big play.
We watched the play, rewinded, watched again, rewinded and watched again.
One comment from Barney Cotton in particular stuck out to me. After one play in which Mike Caputo showed well, he said: "Caputo, we wouldn't have traded him for any guy in the country, he was that good."
***
Later came Bo Pelini and the defensive coaches. Pelini is most definitely in his element when he has the clicker in hand, analyzing the good and bad of a defense.
There was mostly good to be found in the film we watched -- film from the Michigan State game last year.
We heard from both new coaches Terry Joseph and Rick Kaczenski. Someone asked Kaczenski if he planned any changes on the defensive line.
Kaczenski laughed. No, no, no, he said with Bo Pelini sitting nearby.
Later, Pelini said his new coach was just showing his humility.
"Heck, yeah, he's going to change some things. He's humble and he's not going to say it ... It's a democracy," Pelini said of the defensive meeting room. "I'm not a dictator. I hired these guys cause they're the best at what they do."
Pelini was confident in talking about what he thinks this defense can do this upcoming offseason, saying Nebraska is "probably more multiple than we've been since I've been here."
The line, Pelini said, between a great defense and an average one is a thin one.
"But when we take care of ourselves, we're pretty damn good."
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