[00:00:00] Speaker A: You're listening to the Whole Hog Sports podcast. And now here's your host, Matt Jones.
[00:00:07] Speaker B: Today on the podcast, Christina Long is in the studio and we talk about what she learned during the Razorback football preseason. We'll take a position by position look at this team. The offense, the defense, the special teams, you name it. We'll have that today on the show. But first, a word from Kendall King.
[00:00:23] Speaker C: At Kendall King, we're proud of over four decades of design.
We're continuing the legacy of great creative design by combining our brands of Kendall King, Soapbox and Shopcart. Together, these brands represent a new focus in marketing design with individual attention to specific areas. Through our design expertise, supported by a team of talented professionals, we showcase our best. We are Kendall King. We are Soapbox. We are Shopcart. We are Design.
[00:00:49] Speaker B: Four days away from the start of Razorback football, it's going to be a 3:15 kickoff Saturday over at Razorback Stadium against Alabama A and M. Christina Long from Hogs Illustrated here in studio today. We're going to take some time looking through the roster and some of the big takeaways.
We talked yesterday very briefly about the depth chart, but. But I want to go position by position on the roster and just kind of, you know, kind of maybe put a bow on what happened during the preseason.
You were over there a lot at practice, I guess probably pretty much every open practice. You were there.
[00:01:25] Speaker A: And.
[00:01:25] Speaker B: And we'll start with quarterback. I mean, that's the position everybody wants to talk about.
Taytle and Green obviously is the starter. There is the narrative this summer which has been so overplayed in my mind. But stop me if you've heard this, if you didn't know. It's year two of Arkansas quarterback Taylor Green and Bobby Petrino together.
But maybe going a little bit, you know, beneath the surface of it being year two of the two of them.
In his second year here with the Razorbacks. What have you seen from him? And do you see an improved quarterback? Because I'll be honest, I'm a Taylor Green skeptic based on what we saw last year. Yes, he put up a lot of yards.
You know, the offense was like 10th in total offense. But I'm a big efficiency person and I didn't see an efficient offense last year against the best teams. I mean, you think about Oklahoma State where they have 648 yards and they only had 31 points to show for it.
There were too many instances like that where if you're just looking at the yardage, hey, they had A great, you know, great day, but it's about putting points on the scoreboard and they didn't do that enough. And I also think that he put the ball in the. In. In harm's way too often. Last year he had, I think 14 turnovers in terms of interceptions and fumbles. I think there were like seven other fumbles that he recovered or somebody recovered a lot of interceptable passes where it ended up being an incompletion, but it could have been intercepted. And so sell me on Taylor Green being a better version than the 2024 Taylor Green.
[00:03:04] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, you're right about the narrative being the year two and how so many Bobby Pacino quarterbacks have just made leaps and bounds worth of strides in year two with him. And I do think you are going to see better quarterback play from him in large part because I think they have upgraded around him. I really do think that they have better pieces around him.
Do I think that it's going to be enough to win them significantly more games than last season? I'm not really sure yet. That's kind of where I've landed, is I actually. I think especially offensively, it is going to be a better football product. I'm not sure if it is going to win them more games, but I think that the large part with Green is what's around him. I think a lot of it is the offensive line. I do believe his offensive line is going to be better. But I also think, you know, you can't blame everything that Taylor, all of Taylor's issues last year on the protection issues, because there were also times where he ran himself into a really long sack when he didn't really need to.
And so I think, you know, there's been a lot of talk, you know, we ask a lot of coaches and teammates and things like that to the best that we can. And hey, is he, you know, do you see him making better decisions? Do you see him not running into those issues? But at a certain point you can do it all day in practice. But what he actually does in a game, the decisions he makes when he's actually in a game is going to be different. Um, but you know, whatever you want to. You know, you can take this with as much salt as you want. They seem to really believe that he is more comfortable, more confident, more sure of himself, making better decisions, taking care of the ball better, which is hugely important. That is the number one thing that he needs to do better, is take care of the ball and make better decisions.
[00:04:43] Speaker B: And it was a Problem with him at Boise State, too. It was why he got benched. I don't know if he really ever got benched at Boise State, but he had to split time with the backup quarterback there, Maddox Madsen, and that led.
[00:04:55] Speaker A: To his transfer, I think.
[00:04:56] Speaker B: What. He had 12 interceptions his last year.
[00:04:58] Speaker A: I don't remember the exact 12 and.
[00:04:59] Speaker B: 13 games or 12 and 12 games and so.
[00:05:02] Speaker A: And then I think nine last season. Right.
[00:05:04] Speaker B: I always. With a quarterback like that, it's like, is there such thing as being turnover prone? Yeah, you know, do you. Do you try to do too much and are you able to coach that out of a player? That's what I'm really interested to see with him this year.
[00:05:16] Speaker A: Right. And I think it's. It's gotta be a balance of both. I think, you know, if he is.
I think he is. He has been turnover prone. Prone. And so how do you coach that out? What can you do to, you know, whether it's in practice, whether it's, you know, fixing some mental mistakes? I don't know if you do it in film. I don't know if you do it with ball security drills. I don't know what you do. But they have to figure out some way to fix it. But I do think you're going to see better play because I think they've done more around him to minimize the errors that.
The errors that took place last year that made him look bad. And then there were also times where he made himself look bad.
[00:05:53] Speaker B: Okay, so you say they've done more around him. And I understand the offensive line part. You look down the line at an offensive line of mate Corey Robinson from Georgia Tech, a lot of people liked him. Fernando Carmona, we saw him play last year. Kittler, the center, they're high on Kobe Branham. If he ends up being the right guard, which I think there's probably a pretty good chance he will be the starter. Does he play every snap there? I don't know. Marion Harris, Shaq McCrory at tackle.
That seems like that may be the weakest link on the offensive line right now. But I'm gonna go back to being better around him because as I look at the receivers, I don't know that I see as good of a receiver core this year. And I'll throw a tight end in there too, because they've lost Luke Cavz, as I saw last year. You've got Satania, who transferred out, and Tesla, who's doing really well in the NFL preseason. And obviously Andrew Armstrong was his safety valve A year ago, like, so are they better because of the offensive line? Is there something about these receivers that I'm missing? Because I just don't know that I see at receiver what I saw last year.
[00:06:55] Speaker A: Yeah, well, because it's different than last year. It is not the same there. I don't think there's an Andrew Armstrong in this group. I think rather than having one person who honestly, sometimes to Taylor's detriment, he would kind of lock in on and miss other open people.
[00:07:09] Speaker B: Remember our Valentine's Day cards for Taylor Green?
[00:07:11] Speaker A: Oh my God, yes. I only have eyes for you. I do remember that. So I don't think you have that, which I don't think has to be a bad thing. I'm interested in how it's going to work because what they have done, and this is kind of what they said they were going to do financially anyway, this is the approach to the whole roster, not just the receiver core, which was rather than spend big on, you know, a big star or a, you know, a super high level talent, they were going to try to spend kind of more across the board, get more quantity, maybe over quality.
I do think Isaac Tesla was good. He is doing really well in the NFL preseason. They didn't use him in the way that we are seeing him be used now in his NFL career. Like that's the ISIS Tesla. You see that, you know, the Lions tweet out every weekend or whatever is not like the. And I'm not saying it's because he wasn't playing as well at Arkansas. It's just. I don't know. I don't know. That's like one of the great mysteries to me is like how he was used because like I don't think any of us really knew, you know, we knew he was good. I don't think any of us really would have guessed that he was going to do what we're seeing him do now at the next level, given how it feels like how comparatively little we saw him last year. And I mean he was like their second leading receiver, I think. So it's not like he wasn't on the field, but I think you're going to have more Isaac Tislaws, more Jordan Anthony's, more Isaiah Satanias than Andrew Armstrong's and I think that might be okay. But we're going to see. I don't see Satania as like a major loss and I think they've replaced him.
Like I think some of the guys they've gotten are comparable to him.
I don't think there's anybody that's like, I guess I don't. I just don't see that as a major talent deficiency that they.
[00:08:47] Speaker B: He had some good games last year. He had some games where he disappeared. Would, Would. Would it be safe to say that C.J. brown has kind of attain your role in this offense?
[00:08:55] Speaker A: I think so, yeah. And that was one of the things we talked about yesterday that was like a little bit of a surprise was C.J. brown being in that slot spot and then Jaylen Brown being in the other outside spot. And honestly, I don't know a lot about Jaylen Brown. Basically what I know about him is he's really fast. So I'm. I'm very interested to see what he can do and what he brings. Because what happened was. So he and Andy Jean, the Florida slash, spent the spring with Pitt transfer.
They came in post spring, and they were the two receivers they got post spring. And so then every time we talked about them, both us and when we would ask about coaches and how they would talk about, they would kind of lump them together. Like, these two guys are good, but I feel like we didn't really get to know either of them that well as far as their skills and what they bring.
So I was a little bit surprised to see Jaylen Brown at that number one spot. Not because I don't think he deserves it, but just because I'm interested to see what he could do. Basically what I know is they think he's fast and he's looked, you know, he looked pretty good in practice. I don't know.
So I think.
I think the receivers, they have more options, I think, than they did last year. Now, one thing that's important to know was last year in practice, Tyrone Broden looked amazing. He was making incredible plays. We were like, that is the guy. And then he disappeared. And so you might see some of these guys that we think look really good in practice, or some of these guys that we think even just look like they're going to contribute. Like I said, I don't see an Andrew Armstrong in here. I see guys that are good athletes. I see guys that are going to be, you know, somebody's got to lead them in receiving. And I see guys that I think they're consistent and reliable. But are we going to have a Tyrone Broden situation? I don't know. We might.
[00:10:27] Speaker B: You mentioned the player who had been at Florida and then, yeah, so this is kind of like a small writing, like, we'll geek out over this and somebody else may not Even care. But, you know, like, whenever you write somebody's name or if you're writing a story about somebody, a lot of times you'll put in parentheses, 6 foot 1 and 190 pounds. Like, I think we need to get to the point where we just put Florida, Pitt. That's what I've started doing.
[00:10:49] Speaker A: That's what I've started. Especially because they have Julian Neal, one of the DBs. He came Fresno State, but he went to Stanford in the spring. Except he never actually went to Stanford. He just was, like, supposed to, but then the staff got. He never actually, like, went there.
[00:11:02] Speaker B: You need, like, lots of footnotes in your story now. Yes, Gene.
[00:11:06] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. So I started putting in parentheses, like, Florida slash Pitt, Fresno State slash Stanford. Because it's like, you can't really. I don't want to call him a Stanford transfer when he was, like, never really even there.
So it's like, I. You know, but he technically was. So it's like. What do you call them? So I.
[00:11:20] Speaker B: What's the most schools you've seen somebody like. Like, when they get to Arkansas, the most schools that you've seen them be at previously?
[00:11:27] Speaker A: I think there's been some. Four.
[00:11:30] Speaker B: Like, some people, like, this is their fourth.
[00:11:31] Speaker A: I mean, Raylan Sharpe. This is his fourth.
[00:11:33] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:11:34] Speaker A: I think he was. Yeah. Houston, Missouri State, Fresno State here.
And there's other. I don't think it's just him, but he's the one that comes to mind right away, because I've written about him before, but, yeah, there's several.
[00:11:43] Speaker B: That's amazing. And then, you know, you get the players who. And I don't know if he's one of them, but the players who, like, I was reading about somebody recently who had, like, committed and he had committed, and he's going into a senior year of high school.
Like, he had committed to.
It was his fifth time that he had committed to a team and his second time that he had committed to the team that he is currently committed to.
[00:12:05] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:12:06] Speaker B: And he's only like, imagine once this guy finds the transfer portal, how much fun he'll have.
[00:12:10] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
[00:12:11] Speaker B: And so, like, you know, by the time his college career ends, he may have been affiliated with, I don't know, 11 teams.
[00:12:18] Speaker A: That's crazy.
[00:12:19] Speaker B: I don't know.
It's pretty crazy.
Mike Washington seems like there's a lot of excitement about him. Jaquin Jackson was really good last year.
Struggled with some ankle injuries. I don't know that we ever saw the. I think we saw it at the start of the season. I'd say maybe over the last two months we didn't see the best version of him.
Like is Washington. Do you think he's the type that can make people forget about Jaquinda Jackson?
[00:12:43] Speaker A: I kind of do.
I think from what we've seen of him in practice and what we've heard coaches say about him too, I think he just brings kind of an explosiveness. I think he's just kind of your every down back. He's really physical, but he's also really fast.
And I think he's a good combination of the other two running backs that they have in Rodney Hill and Braylon Russell. Braylon Russell, who we've talked about, you know, he's gotten more in shape, he's dropped some weight, whatever, but they, you know, they expect him to still be kind of more of their bruising running back. And you know, he has some speed. It's. It's not like he's just, you know, the bowling ball type of running back. And then Rodney Hill is, is your shifty or speedier, smaller guy. And I think Mike Washington offers you the best of both worlds and that's why I think he's kind of the leading person right now.
So I'm really excited about him. I, I have bought into the, the Mike Washington hype for sure. I. I just, I. What I have learned about myself is I love a running back. I love a good running back. I get more excited to watch a good running back than I think like any other position. I don't know why. I don't know if it's because I grew up watching good Arkansas running backs or what, but I just, I get really excited when I hear that there's a good running back coming. So, you know, I was really excited about Jaquinnin last year. We wrote about him early on in Hogs Illustrated and put him on a cover and then I had Mike Washington on the COVID of our Week 1 Hogs Illustrated issue. So I just, I'm partial to running backs, I think.
[00:13:58] Speaker B: Let me ask you about A.J. green because he's back. I don't know, like, how does he fit into the equation? Because whenever he was here previously, albeit it was a different offense, it was Kendall Briles offense and not the one that they're running now. I thought the last year here, I mean, Buddy run for like 400 yards, had three or four touchdowns that year. So I mean, he wasn't a great running back, but he was certainly part of the. Part of a larger rotation.
How does he fit into all of this this year.
[00:14:25] Speaker A: Yeah, they put him on the depth chart at 4. I think they gave him that of nod.
It's hard to say right now. I mean, he got some work with. With the second team. He might have gone with the first team a little bit. When to explain how we watch practice, there's a period called fastball start that is the closest thing in fall camp that media gets to watch to real football.
It's. It's when we actually get to see them, like, run some plays and do some things that actually look like the sport that you're going to see on Saturday.
But sometimes they'll hold guys out. You know, Braylon Russell didn't do a lot of fastball, but it wasn't because he was, you know, people would freak out and go, is he hurt? Because we, you know, we'll list who was with which team.
Freak out, is he hurt? And it's like, no, they just. Sometimes they'll pull different guys out to put, you know, try different things.
[00:15:07] Speaker B: So it's a different combination.
[00:15:08] Speaker A: Yes, exactly. So A.J. green got in with a couple of different off, you know, different string offenses throughout camp. But I don't know. I mean, I'm interested in that, too, because I think it's just a fascinating story when you see a guy come back to a school and I think, you know, I think he's kind of there mostly for depth. I think you'll see him a few times. I think they like him as, you know, like a special teams guy, too, but I'm not really sure. I'm. I'm curious how much they're to actually use him. I think the fact that they've got three guys they feel really good about in Washington, Russell and Hill, means you just probably won't see him that much. They're. I'm not sure situationally what. What situations they want him in, but I think you'll see him.
[00:15:49] Speaker B: I think he turns 23 this year. Green. And so there's a. I don't know, I feel like there's a maturity there, definitely, that. That maybe they can. They can take advantage of going back to quarterback.
With Green, I worry about running quarterbacks and their durability throughout the season. We saw it with him last year, albeit the reason he got hurt last year was what I think was a dirty hit in the Tennessee game. And it wasn't a matter of him, you know, scrambling and twisting an ankle or something. But there is always that concern, I think, with a running quarterback. And I was thinking through this morning the quarterbacks say, like, in the last 25 years, I mean, Matt Jones, he. And, you know, he had at least one season, maybe two, where he was dealing with something.
K.J. jefferson seemed like he was dealing with something quite frequently the last couple of years that, that he was here. And then, you know, like we said with Taylor Green last year, what they say, like last seven, eight games, they didn't feel like he was anywhere near 100%.
We saw where in the Tennessee game last year, Singleton had to come in and he was able to lead them down the field to a win. Now, there's lots of caveats there. Number one, I think Braylon Russell was the key to that drive. And then number two, Tennessee let Arkansas score so that they would have a chance to go down and win at the end with K.J. jackson.
What kind of confidence do you have that if they end up in a game where Taylor can't finish it, that K.J. jackson could come in and lead them the way that Singleton was able to last year?
[00:17:23] Speaker A: Yeah, I feel okay about it. You know, that was something somebody asked Coach Pittman, I think, Bobby Petrino as well. Now, of course, when you ask them that with a microphone in their face, they're not going to say, I don't know, we're a little worried about that. You know, what else are they going to say besides, we feel great about it? But, I mean, they did. They did feel that way, and they seem to have been pretty common, you know, pretty confident in K.J. jackson this whole time. There was never kind of a backup quarterback battle. It was always him. Even when they brought in an additional transfer after the Madden Iamaliava saga.
And so there was never any kind of doubt that it was going to be him. I think this weekend will be big for that, because one thing that, you know, when Malachi led that drive, one thing that came up a lot was, you know, he was. He was more comfortable doing that because the experience he was able to get early in the season against some of these easier teams, you know, he had seen it before, he had done it before. They try to do a lot in practice of, of getting the backup quarterbacks, the chance to work with the ones sometimes in practice, and they've continued to do that. And so I think this weekend, that's one of the goals is, hey, let's, let's get. You know, and that's. That's the goal anytime you play an FCS team, right, is you want to get out to your big lead and you want to get some guys some reps. But I think it'll be important for, for K.J. jackson especially just because like Singleton last year, it'll be his first playing time really his first meaningful playing time. I think he came in in the fourth quarter of UAPB last year.
[00:18:41] Speaker B: KJ Dax, he led the last touchdown.
[00:18:43] Speaker A: Yeah. So, so you know, he's, he's been in a game, he'll be in a similar kind of game this weekend, assuming they do what we think they're gonna do.
But you know, I, I feel okay about it. I think I need to see, you know, I need to see it in a game again a little bit more. But it seems like he's a really smart player and I think he has a little bit different, I think he's a different look than Green for sure. He's obviously smaller. Not a lot of people are as tall as Taylor Green. So I think it's different.
But I don't think it, they would have to completely change their offense necessarily.
[00:19:12] Speaker B: He's left handed too. Yeah, that's always, that's always, I've heard from receivers who say it's, it's weird catching from left handed quarterbacks when you're used to. Right. Because the spin on the ball is different.
[00:19:23] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:19:23] Speaker B: And it just takes a little bit of adjustment there. So we'll tell you the 100 year checks coming to the Hogs Illustrated Sports Club that's going to be next Thursday, September 4th at noon at home. Two suites in Springdale. You can reserve your seat
[email protected] ozarks t I x.com for Hunter Yuricheck next Thursday at the Hogs Illustrated Sports Club. We'll have a Q and A with him there and it'll be fun to do ask him a lot of the questions that I think have accumulated over the last several months, whether it be about football, about facilities, about the house settlement. I mean there's a number of things the, the collective, there's a number of things that we're planning on talking with him about.
Christina wrote a good story this morning on our website. I want you to talk about here for a second. The headline says Arkansas athletics summer layoffs part of national trend as schools cut costs for revenue sharing. Hunter didn't want to speak for this story, but you talk to a lot of industry people and just kind of put Arkansas's layoffs that they had this summer inside the department in, in maybe a bigger context as to what's happening nationally.
[00:20:34] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean basically when Arkansas had its layoffs In June, I knew other schools had done that. It was something that I kind of felt would be coming and, and not just because. And that's not to say anything about Arkansas situation specifically. I just figure a lot of schools are going to be doing this. It kind of makes sense that Arkansas would be just because I think we're going to keep seeing more and more and other SEC schools have done it. I mean, Texas A and M did it.
They were the first ones really to do it last year to come out and say, hey, we're doing this because we're trying to prepare for the money we're gonna have to spend on revenue sharing. Part of that was they had a new ad and he was coming in and going, all right, I need to, you know, make some adjustments.
So it was a slightly different situation. But all kinds of schools, you know, schools like Michigan, Michigan and Texas A and M are two very rich schools. Those are not schools that are strapped for cash. And those are still, you know, these are still conversations that they're having and actions that they're taking. So basically what I looked at was I looked at who actually got laid off by Arkansas and what departments they came from and what levels they came from. And so it was a, it was a pretty good mix of, you know, higher level administrators, so associate ads, assistant ads, things like that. And then there were some kind of some entry level ish or kind of mid level positions and they were kind of from all kinds of different departments. There was, you know, somebody that was basically an accountant. I think there were some academic advisors, things like that, more associate level type of things.
Compliance had three layoffs, which was interesting.
And I think basically what I looked at was, okay, are there trends in what other schools, the other departments that schools are cutting from? And the answer is yes. The sample size is still pretty small though. So it's, it's. You can't really look at it and go, compliance departments across the country are being slashed. And that was, you know, I didn't know, going into reporting the story, I didn't know what I would find. And basically I found different schools are doing it different ways. But it kind of seems like in general the departments that are shrinking, some are kind of student athletes support, academic support, those kinds of things, things like compliance. And it's just kind of okay, how can we kind of basically shrink the departments, give fewer people more work, if that makes sense.
And so some, some other stuff that I learned in talking to some industry people was about kind of different new technologies, new software that's emerging in different spaces to kind of make these systems more efficient where you don't have to hire as many people. That's happening as front office staffs build up. You know, the hot thing right now is everybody wants a GM and they want a GM staff.
There are a lot of really interesting technologies that exist that are basically making it, you know, making your scouting department smaller and more efficient.
So those, those departments are going to, you know, they're going to have some people, but they're not going to be. You're not necessarily going to have a massive operation because there are some things in place you can do to, to shrink that a little bit. And so there's a lot of different places. You know, I talk to people about what other areas do you think might get outsourced or, you know, either outsourced to third parties or put on somebody mentioned, you know, you might see schools have more GA's, you might have more student assistant roles, especially in social media and marketing, because they have success with that. Because you get a student in who's really hungry to prove themselves and really wants to launch their career. There's. And you're trying to market to, you know, people their age and maybe and a little older, they can do a really, really good job for you. And so there's things like that that, you know, you're going to kind of see trends that you see in, in so many other areas of the business world when people are trying to save money.
[00:24:03] Speaker B: Interesting. You can read that at our website. It's a really good read right
[email protected] when we come back, we're going to shift gears and talk about razorback defense and special teams. But first, another word from Kendall King.
[00:24:15] Speaker C: At Kendall King, we're proud of over four decades of design.
We're continuing the legacy of great creative design by combining our brands of Kendall King, Soapbox and Shopcart. Together, these brands represent a new focus in marketing design with individual attention to specific areas. Through our design expertise, supported by a team of talented professionals, we showcase our best.
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[00:24:41] Speaker B: Hey, welcome back. I want to tell you about our friends at Bentonville Glass. They've been serving their community since 1971. They're committed, professional, and versatile. If you're looking for a quality leader in northwest Arkansas or looking for skilled craftsmanship, look no further than Bentonville Glass for all your glass market needs with the highest quality products, you can come by and see them now at 507 South Main and Bentonville or online at bentonvilleglass.com want to tell you too. You can get the latest breaking news on all Razorbike
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[email protected] and on your screen right now, you'll see a QR code that'll take you to our Whole Hog Sports Daily newsletter. Hope that you'll subscribe to that. It's a free service that we send out every day to help keep you updated on what's going on here in Fayetteville. Christina Long, still with me. We'll talk Razorback defense. Now this to me, if the offense is as improved as people think it is and if they can score at a higher efficiency than they did last year, then all of a sudden the eyes turn to the defense and can you stop people enough to outscore them? And I think to me, I'm sold a little bit on just listening to, you know, various coaches and what you all have told me about practice on the offense.
I'm real skeptical about the defense and whether or not they can be as good as they've been the last two years. And honestly, again, you go back to, I think sometimes the numbers that we use, whether it be total defense or, you know, some of these other metrics, they can get skewed a little bit. You look at Arkansas last year in the efficiency rankings and they, they just weren't real good against power five team or power four teams at keeping them from scoring points.
[00:26:31] Speaker A: Yeah, the defense is a concern to me, too.
[00:26:34] Speaker B: And I don't know that this year is going to be as good as, you know.
[00:26:36] Speaker A: Right.
[00:26:37] Speaker B: Talented last year.
[00:26:38] Speaker A: I don't think that it is. And that's where I'm a little concerned. I think, you know, the highlight is linebacker. I mean, they, they get back what they had last year. They replace, they lost Brad Spence. He transferred to Texas. They bring in Bradley Shaw. Well, they don't bring him in. He's a sophomore. He's, he's back. But they, they put him in for where basically filling the role Brad Spence had. They have really similar builds. They seem like kind of similar players. I like Bradley Shaw. They feel really confident in him as that third guy. But I think, you know, Dixon, sorry, are pretty legit. So I am excited to see them. But your defense can't be, can't just be carried by its middle. And I'm a little, I'm worried about the front and I Am somewhat worried about the back end, mostly because so many of these guys are new and last year, you know, they didn't have a lot of success in past defense. Now obviously that's not entirely on the secondary, but there were some problems there. And I think, you know, it's a different looking secondary. They're a lot bigger.
I did a little research before this.
The five defensive back starters that they have listed on the week one depth chart are an inch taller and 19 pounds heavier on average than last year's for week one depth chart starters.
So they are a lot bigger. They insist they have not sacrificed speed in any significant way. I don't know, we'll see.
But I, I am worried about defensive tackle. I think everybody is. That's been like the talking point of the last couple of weeks, but I think that's warranted. I think depth is a concern.
I think defensive end is just kind of unproven. I think they might have. They might be good. They might be really good. I don't know. I'm curious what Quincy Rhodes can do. There's not a Landon Jackson here.
And that's something that you and I, I think, talked about last spring maybe was, you know, we talked about how there's not an Andrew Armstrong, there's not a Landon Jackson. It doesn't feel like there's these guys that you look at as like, okay, these are your NFL guys. I think, sorry is like that.
And that doesn't mean that there's not NFL guys on this team. It's just, I think some of it is a product of there being so many new players. So we don't know yet on a lot of them who's going to be those guys. But I think, you know, Philip Lee and Justice Boone are, are opposite Quincy Rhodes. They're on that other side.
I'm intrigued by both of them. Philip Lee has had a lot of success as a pass rusher. Justice Boone was a guy that, you know, had a, he lost a season to injury at Florida, but they feel really good about him.
They didn't hit the quarterback as much as they wanted to last year and they're really trying to be more aggressive in that this year.
But how much success they're going to have, I don't know. We'll see.
[00:29:07] Speaker B: So you talked about defensive backs and they're saying it's not like the defensive backs last year just set the world on fire.
[00:29:12] Speaker A: No, they didn't.
[00:29:13] Speaker B: So, I mean, maybe it is worth changing it up and see if that works.
[00:29:16] Speaker A: Yeah, they've taken a different approach. I think that allows you to do some different things. I think they're a lot longer, which helps.
So it's annoying. It's like they kept telling us how much longer they are. And I do think when you look at them, you can kind of tell. But I don't have, I don't get like wingspan data. You know, I get that's not on the roster. So I can't actually do the number crunching like I did with, with heights and weights. But no, I mean, I think you will have a different look.
I think there will be kind of some experimenting going on the first few weeks to see their best combination back there. I think they've got some versatility too. That was another thing they really wanted and coach Pittman talked about that a lot. He talked about with the Portal recruiting, they wanted to get a lot of value in that. They wanted to get guys they could use in different ways. And I think they, they really emphasized that with their secondary. But it just has to be better past defense wise than it was last year. And you know, the bar is kind of low, so it should, they should be able to make it better. But I'm worried about the front too.
[00:30:09] Speaker B: Just to. I want to go back real quick to the efficiency stuff I talked about last year.
This is based on games, regular season games against power four teams. There were only two defenses in the SEC that were worse than Arkansas. Mississippi State, who was like historically bad defensively last year. And then Vanderbilt was the only one that was worse than Arkansas. In their nine Power Four games last year, Arkansas gave up 35% of all points that were available to the opposing offense.
That's. I mean, and to give you an idea of like the best defenses last year, Ole Miss gave up about 20% of all available points. Tennessee gave up 20% of all available points.
Texas A and m gave up 17% of all available points. And so, you know, statistically you look at it, A and M was the best last year.
And Arkansas gave up twice as many points as Texas A and M did, or at least points available.
[00:31:04] Speaker A: Yeah, it's. It's hard to win that way. You know, somebody, I think on our message board was saying this when we were, you know, there was a thread about some of the defensive concerns and it was like, you know, I believe Texas.
[00:31:13] Speaker B: I'm sorry, not Texas.
[00:31:14] Speaker A: Yeah, it was like, I believe that the offense is better, like you were saying earlier. But I don't think, you know, the sec, it's, it's not exactly a League where you can just hope that you can score a whole ton and just compensate for your defense. That's just not really how it works. And last year, they had the opposite problem. They could have. You know, the defense was able to keep them in games, and then they kind of had to wait on the offense to do something. Sometimes they did, sometimes they didn't. But I think it's. It's harder sometimes to win, especially against the schedule that they have the other way.
I worry about that for them. That's. That's part of why I don't think they're. I think they might overall have, you know, they might be better to watch, particularly offensively, but I'm not sure if they're going to win more games.
[00:31:54] Speaker B: We need to have, like, a sound effect whenever we talk about, like, these buzz terms, these narratives, because, you know, we talked earlier about year two of talent. You just mentioned the schedule. That's the other one. Like, those are the two things that I've heard all summer long.
[00:32:07] Speaker A: It is a tough schedule.
[00:32:08] Speaker B: It is a tough. Well, we think it's a tough schedule. And that's the other thing.
You just never know. You just never know. I mean, like, how many people last.
[00:32:17] Speaker A: Seasonally, based on last season? It's basically. Yeah. Based on performance.
[00:32:21] Speaker B: How many people last season had Florida State on their schedule in the preseason? And they said, this is our toughest game of the year. This sets our schedule. I mean, this puts it over the top.
[00:32:30] Speaker A: You're right.
[00:32:31] Speaker B: And then they go out and they lay an egg.
[00:32:33] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:32:33] Speaker B: And it wasn't because they weren't talented, I don't think. Because I think they were pretty darn talented. I just think they didn't like playing for each other or with each other or there was something going on in the backdrop. And that's the thing. You'd never know. And like you said, a lot of this is based on what we saw last year.
We don't know how good these teams are going to be. We think we do.
And there's some historical perspective, too, that you can. Like Notre Dame under Marcus Freeman, we know they're going to be a pretty good football team. Texas under Steve Sarkeesian, we know they're probably going to be pretty good. LSU under Brian Kelly.
But are they going to be as good as they were last year? Are they going to be better than they were last year? We just don't know.
[00:33:14] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:33:14] Speaker B: And so that. That's kind of my annual gripe with all these schedule rankings in the preseason. It's like, you just. I would love to go back and look at, like, how closely does the. Or do the. The preseason schedule rankings, you know, like the strength of schedule, how closely does that align with what actually happened when the year's over.
[00:33:37] Speaker A: Yeah, I've caught myself assuming too much from Ole Miss.
I. That's a totally different team this year than was last year. If you pick your favorite Ole Miss player from last year, they are probably not there anymore.
[00:33:49] Speaker B: Who was your favorite Ole Miss player last year?
[00:33:51] Speaker A: I didn't. I don't know. I'm not like an Ole Miss.
[00:33:53] Speaker B: I was wondering if you had one.
[00:33:54] Speaker A: Not a. I don't know. I feel like favorite and Ole Miss for me are not really like, okay, aligned terms, but I think you're kind.
[00:34:01] Speaker B: Of like your football Vitello, right?
[00:34:03] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah, I think so. That, you know, that's a totally different team. And I think getting them early actually helps Arkansas a little bit just because of how much change there is there. But, yeah, I think I've caught myself doing the thing where I'm. I'm looking. I'm leaning too much on knowledge from last season and not enough on. Okay, what's actually here this year? What do we actually think? And I think. I do think there are several teams on the schedule where, you know, if it. If it breaks bad for them, you know, I don't think. I. I don't believe in Auburn. I just don't. I think there's kind of like some not, Not, Not Auburn hype. I don't think anyone thinks they're, like, going to contend for the sec, but, like, I think people think Auburn's gonna be better than they are. I. I'm not sure what to feel about Texas A and M. So there's just some teams on the schedule where I'm like, okay, if they're. If they're down the way they. It seems like they might be down. Okay, that helps a little bit. But I do think, you know, I think the non conference is just really tough. Like, I'm fairly high on Memphis and then obviously Notre Dame is Notre Dame, so we'll see.
[00:34:58] Speaker B: Yeah, Memphis, they've lost a lot of players from last year, too.
[00:35:01] Speaker A: It's true.
[00:35:02] Speaker B: They're not the same thing. And you just. Again, you never know. You never know. I don't want to go game by game through the schedule. There's enough shows you can do.
[00:35:10] Speaker A: There are plenty of ideas later this week. That's what we do.
[00:35:13] Speaker B: Yeah, I want to go back to linebacker because, like you said, sorry and Dicks like, those seem like those are two legitimate SEC linebackers. I think that when you look at them, you know, say, like, if you look across the board, you look at their defensive line and then you think about, okay, what do they have here and here? They probably don't stack up really well with a lot of the other SEC teams. And probably you would say the same thing about the secondary. I don't think they've got the best linebacking group in the sec. You're probably going to find better linebackers. There's so many good ones, Georgia and Alabama and some of these, you know, perennial defensive favorites. But I think that they probably line up as or they line up closer at linebacker than they do and probably much closer at linebacker than they do the other two positions.
[00:35:58] Speaker A: Yeah, that's definitely the case, I think. And, and I think to your point, I think the SEC has had such good, you know, they've had some really, really good linebackers recently. And I think you're right that we've seen some just such strong defensive teams that have had, you know, an NFL linebacker in them. And I think, you know, Arkansas could have that here. I, I agree with you that I don't think they're at the very top, but I do think these two guys are. Are both really notable and are going to be fun. But I think, like I said, I don't know how much that can carry you when the other two, you know, everything around them is a little bit iffy.
[00:36:29] Speaker B: We've also seen, and this was under a different defense, but we have seen years when Pittman was here and Odom was the defensive coordinator, where the linebackers were used so much that at the end of the year, they just were. I mean, in Bumper Pool's case, he was broken at the end of the year, he couldn't play anymore.
And so I wonder how much are they able to like, like, what's the depth like behind linebacker? To where, you know, do these two guys. Do they play 95% of the snaps? Are they able to drop them down to 80% of the snaps? That'll be very interesting, I think, to watch this year.
[00:37:05] Speaker A: I think Bradley Shaw helps you a lot with that, but I think behind those three, it's somewhat dubious just because they, you know, they got a couple of transfers in the spring, but they were kind of guys that were looking like depth guys, looking like special teams guys.
They say they liked him, but again, I don't expect them to hop on the mic and go, yeah, we don't really Know, I brought this guy in. You're probably only going to see him on special team. You know, they're not going to tell you that.
[00:37:26] Speaker B: Yes, stay healthy.
[00:37:27] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. So I think, you know, that would be an issue if they lost him. But I do think Bradley Shaw helps with that. I'm not nearly as worried about depth there as I am at defensive line or secondary, honestly.
[00:37:38] Speaker B: Okay, I want to ask you a couple of special teams. First off, Scott Starzik, probably going to, I guess he is going to be the starting kicker. He's a freshman.
You know, he's one of these. They lost the kicker who was from Mississippi, who I think he was like number one by one publication. And then they go and they get Starzik who's like number one by another. Number one by another.
And so obviously, you know, this is kind of like getting Cam Little again or potentially could be like getting Cam Little again.
But he's a freshman. What'd you see from him?
[00:38:07] Speaker A: Yeah, I think some more consistency than we saw from the kickers last season. I remember, you know, when Matthew Shipley came in, you know, he, he was the transfer kicker they brought in and it was pretty clear, okay, this is his job to lose. And then he kind of lost it. He. In the, you know, in the spring, he wasn't great. He wasn't very consistent. They brought in another transfer. They bring in Kyle Ramsey. I remember game one, we were really surprised to see Kyle Ramsey go out as the, the one kicker. We had thought it was going to be Shipley and then you end up seeing Shipley as Ramsey got hurt and.
But neither guy was great last year in practices and what we got to see there was the percentages were low. We saw some tough misses. They talk, you know, the coaches said it's hard to kick inside this stadium and they acknowledge, they were like, you know, it's hard to kick in the stadium. But you know, Cam Little didn't really have a problem with it. So like, obviously it's possible, but we.
[00:38:54] Speaker B: Saw Cam Little just made a 70 yarder preseason too, and then different kind of kicker.
[00:38:59] Speaker A: Yeah, we saw some misses on the practice field though that were tough with Starzik. I feel like I didn't see as much of him as maybe I saw of the kickers last year. Like, like literally getting to watch him.
But I do think it was better. I think there were kind of some issues in the spring again, but I think that's maybe a little normal, especially for a freshman.
They didn't go get another guy. They they didn't ever. It didn't seem like there was ever really a lot of doubt that it was going to be him.
And I think he was able to show it more in the. In fall camp, so I think they feel pretty good about him. I. The freshman of it all is a little tough, and they talked a lot in fall camp about wanting to try to, you know, simulate some pressure situations. Ultimately, the pressure you're putting a guy under on the practice field in August is not anywhere close to the same pressure that he is actually going to have. So how he does, you know, we'll see. I'm. I'm interested. I don't know a lot about his personality. I don't know a lot about what kind of situations he's found himself in before. So I'll be very curious what they actually get from him the first time he has a real pressure kick.
[00:40:01] Speaker B: And then you got Cam Shanks. He was an All American last year at uab.
He's going to be a punt returner for the Razorbanks. Kind of interesting. He's not on the kick return, but, you know, you look for different, you know, on each of those or each of those two situations. But he was an All American at uab.
And I've got two thoughts here. Number one is, look at the competition he was playing against.
You know, I think that that's, you know, is he able to do that if he's playing the sec? But on the other hand, he's probably got a lot better athletes around him at Arkansas, you know, because like, you're. You just the, the better teams seem to have. And when I say better teams, I'm saying, you know, the power teams, they seem to have more athletes that they're able to put on special teams. And so I'm interested to see how that works out with him this year.
[00:40:49] Speaker A: Yeah, and honestly, we haven't gotten to see much of him. You know, he was limited and out some in practice. We didn't get to see him with the offense very much. Neither did the coaches because he wasn't able to participate all that much. And then we don't really get to watch a whole lot of return drills and things like that. And even when you do it's drills, it's different than what you're actually going to see.
So I have a lot of questions, not because I'm doubtful necessarily, but just because I haven't really seen him. And so right now all I have is, is the hype. And so I am. I'm optimistic just Because I think I would just be really surprised if a guy that had that level of success came here and was just a total flop and a non factor. But I do think you're right about, you know, the. Everybody around him, both coming at him and with him is going to be a better athlete. And so how is that going to work out?
But I. I'm so excited about the prospect of them actually having a real weapon and exciting player in the return game, because they haven't for a little while.
[00:41:41] Speaker B: Yeah. When was lesson market had a punt return for a touchdown in an SEC game. I know they've had one against Messi.
[00:41:47] Speaker A: I was to say, are you quizzing me and you know the answer? Because I. Either of us was going to know that it would definitely be you.
[00:41:53] Speaker B: I think it was. I think it might have been over 20 years ago. You really in an SEC game?
[00:41:57] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:41:58] Speaker B: Well, I'm sorry. Joe Adams.
[00:41:59] Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
[00:42:00] Speaker B: So it's been over a decade.
[00:42:01] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:42:02] Speaker B: I forget about the Tennessee one. Yeah. Sydney's like, ask me, what the heck are you doing? Most famous punt return in school history.
But yeah, I mean, it's been a long time since they've had a game breaker at punt return.
[00:42:12] Speaker A: Yeah, it's been forever. And then like you said, they've got Rodney Hill at kick return and I think he was for at least some of the year last year. Or was it Satania on both? I don't remember.
And, you know, they didn't get a whole lot out of the return game on either side.
[00:42:26] Speaker B: So we'll see you get to this point. Like, I remember things better 20 years ago than I remember 10 years ago or 50. It's the weirdest thing. I cannot explain it. And having kids has accelerated it in ways that I could never have imagined. So I am sorry, everyone, for missing Joe Adams.
[00:42:44] Speaker A: I mean, I did, too. So it's not just you.
[00:42:46] Speaker B: Yeah. So, anyway. All right, well, hey, we appreciate everybody being with us. We'll be back with another show tomorrow. We're going to have Colby Hale, Arkansas soccer coach, on the show tomorrow. Arkansas is going to be hosting Duke, the number one team in the country, later this week over at Razorback Field. So we'll be interested to talk to Colby about his team and that big matchup coming up here in Fayetteville. Hope that we see at our website whole hogsports.com and hope we see you tomorrow on our podcast. Have a great day, everybody.
