"Grass Basketball"

Donald Emmons of the The Blade has a nice piece on yesterday's media day. Today (Sunday) is the day players are finally allowed to put on full pads. Here's the first interesting quote in that respect.

"The real football players start rising up and the guys that just play grass basketball start drifting away," Clawson said. "I'm always curious with the first day of full pads to see some of your younger players. You really find out which guys are physically tough and which guys don't back down."

I love the phrase "grass basketball." This part of football has been a real education for me in the past few years. I never would have imagined that a player could get to D1 football and not be physically tough. It just seem like it would have shown up in high school at some point.

But it does happen. Players get a rep for being soft. I guess when the hitting intensifies at the college level, some guys aren't ready for it, but would rather play more delicately.

The second interesting item is from the end of the story where there was a drill to simulate clutch kicking. Jerry Phillips had a 32 yarder which would end wind sprints (for the entire team) if he made it, and cause more wind sprints if he missed it. Which he did not.

Third thing was Willie Geter showing his speed on some drills. If Coach Clawson can find ways for a healthy Willie to get the ball in space, he will be a dangerous and gamebreaking player. Based on his record at Richmond, you have to believe that he will figure that out.

Finally, there's a second story in The Blade (Zach Silka) on the legacy of QBs in the MAC, which is being carried through by Tim Hiller and Dan Lefevour. Tyler Sheehan is also mentioned positively. The reasoning appears to be as follows...if you are a WR, you know the team will rotate those guys in and out and you might go and compete even if you aren't the top guy. But at QB, there is only one and the team prefers to leave that guy in for years at a time. So, D1 quality players would rather head to smaller school like the MAC and get on the field than spend a career as the 3rd QB at OSU.