Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: First week of Arkansas football practice in the books. We'll talk about it today. Ethan Westerman in studio here with me. We'll also talk some about Razorback basketball, Razorback baseball. A lot to get to summertime. It just seems like it just, just, it's so busy this year on campus. Want to tell you that our podcast is brought to you by Eglins Best in Arkansas. Greatness starts early, before the pads go on, before the crowd roars, the day begins at the breakfast table. Eglins Best delivers superior nutrition with more vitamin D and and less saturated fat than ordinary eggs. You can start strong with Eglund's Best. Better taste, better nutrition, better eggs. For more information eglinsbest.com also brought to you by 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. Go buy and see them now at 507 South Main in Bentonville or online at bentonvilleglass.com if you're joining us on our social media pages, welcome. We put this live video on our Twitter Facebook page. We put video up on our YouTube page. We post an audio version of our podcast on Apple and Spotify. We're still weekly. We're going to go back to a daily podcast here in a couple of weeks once we get closer to football season.
The first. What are we, seven days into practice, Ethan, or have they had seven practices? They started last Wednesday.
[00:01:28] Speaker B: Yeah, there's seven. Seven practices. I think technically maybe like nine or 10 days. We've had a couple off days in there.
[00:01:34] Speaker A: What's the big like, like, what's the takeaway? Everybody wants to know about the quarterback battle, but. And we'll get to that. What else do people need to know about what you've seen?
[00:01:42] Speaker B: Well, first of all, summer has been flexing its muscle out there at 3, whatever PM you look pretty tan. It's been a toasty toasty.
[00:01:51] Speaker A: You need one of those. I bought last summer. I invested in one of those bucket hats. Like, like a really good one. Not one of the cheap ones, but like a really, really good bucket. You need one.
[00:02:00] Speaker B: Those are, those are pretty popular out there, let me tell you. I know people comment on like the press conference videos and stuff. These coaches are, they're crazy. They'll go out there wearing like hoodies and sweatpants and it's like they're layering up almost. And I don't know, I think it's just like a mental thing, like to show that you're tougher than that. But I actually do think the more that I've, you know, we've talked to some players, talked to some coaches, I think that going at that time of day is a really good mental toughness thing because, you know, once the season rolls around, I mean, there's no relief in sight. If you look at the extended forecast in Fayetteville right now, like, there's no telling what the temperature is going to be for the season opener. You can't control the, the what the weather's going to be like on your, on your game days. So I kind of like this right now to go at the hottest time of day to where, you know, honestly, if anything, you might get some relief once the game comes around.
I know it makes sense. Obviously, teams wanting to go the coolest part of the day, get it over with and that's nice. But I do think, like, in some instances that doesn't prepare you. I think that it, you got to go sometimes, whenever it's as hot as it can get because, you know, in the south, it gets pretty toasty. The opening, you know, few weeks of
[00:03:07] Speaker A: the season, remember, I think it was, you know, Arkansas had a really bad 2023 season.
And in the summer of 24, leading up to the season, I remember Sam Pittman saying something about he asked his strength coaches to put them through their workouts in the hottest part of the day. Like they're out there flipping tires at three o' clock in the afternoon.
And you know, his statement at that time was tough people do tough things.
And you know, so, I mean, it's kind of a similar thing here now.
I think they're going to go to morning practices pretty soon. And that's one of the big changes from Silverfield, from any of the coaches that I've, you know, seen at Arkansas. Arkansas has always been an afternoon practice program.
Silverfield is a morning practice person. Like you remember before Arkansas played Memphis last year, that was one of the things that he talked about was that they practice at 11 o' clock every morning. And he thought that might give him a leg up. Playing an 11am game against Arkansas was that they were morning practice team. So this is going to change once classes start, I think next week.
But that, that's, it's interesting that you say all that.
[00:04:14] Speaker B: Yeah, I think that, you know, by the time they get to the season, they're going to kind of done a little bit of everything, I think, with the schedule, because even you think about their scrimmages that they have. They're doing a scrimmage that I'd assume is going to start around. We're talking to Silverfield on Sunday at 1. So I'm assuming the scrimmage probably like an 11am ish type of window, so that gets you prepared for that. And then I think they're turning around that Saturday and we don't have media availability because I think they're starting that at 9pm to get ready for Utah. To get ready for Utah. So. And then they're going to go to these morning practices and they've done these afternoon ones. I'm kind of starting to think I'm like, is there a time of day that y' all haven't really kind of worked on the fields? Which I think, you know, as a coach and as a staff, like, the number one thing that they, you know that their job is you gotta have a team that's prepared. Like, that's what it all boils down to is like your job with practices and stuff is prepare a team as best as you can for whenever the games start.
I know whenever I was in college, I was a student manager for Eric Musselman, and I felt like that was honestly all of his teams. The number one thing that they had an advantage on everybody is there was nobody that was more prepared with a scouting report than that staff. I mean, and that's, I think, just with all coaching staffs, like, you can control what you can control. And right now they're controlling the schedule and, you know, they can't control this heat outside, but, man, they're going out there and making sure their team can. Can play in it.
But yeah, it's been hot out there. That's. To go back to your first question. That's been the. The number one takeaway for me is these guys are out there, you know, in extremely hot temperatures. They. They just got in pads this week and we. We on the first day they were in full pads. Didn't get to see like, all we saw was like a thud section of practice. Not like.
Like the actual live tackling. They did that later in the day. But then yesterday we got out there and that was the most that we've gotten to see yet of in the whole preseason. An hour. About an hour of a lot of live tackling, a lot of situational stuff. That was the best look that we've had in the team. I'm willing to Say, other than scrimmages and maybe red, white game since Silverfield's been here.
[00:06:16] Speaker A: And by the way, when Ethan says it's hot, I picked up my kids at 3 o' clock yesterday and it was 104 according to my truck thermometer. Now, whether or not that's accurate, I don't know, but, like, if it's 104, you're talking about a heat index probably in the 105, 110 range.
[00:06:31] Speaker B: Yeah. And then get on a turf field and pads and helmets and it is. I mean, I don't even want to know what the feels like is on that. Like, all I know is it feels to me like I'm sweating out of melting. Yeah.
Like I'm just standing there watching a practice and I'm sweating my butt off.
And these players are, you know, having to go full speed. Coaches are wearing hoodies and, you know, I think football coaches just like to do that. I always in high school found it funny. The coaches that come the playoff time, whenever it's really cold outside, will start wearing shorts. It's like, it's almost like these coaches, football coaches love to just wear what doesn't make sense.
[00:07:07] Speaker A: I understand the long sleeves. They're trying to protect against skin cancer, but it's the layering for me, the hoodies, you could get like a nice long sleeve.
[00:07:17] Speaker B: All these coaches come into the press conference with, like, very clear, like sweat spots all over them. And it's just like they all come in there just dripping. And it's been fun to kind of rotate through those guys and, you know, casual. Just like, you know, be like, man, you got to be hot right now. And it's always just the look that they give it first. Like. Like, y' all don't even know how hot it is.
[00:07:40] Speaker A: Does it feel like a quarterback battle or does it feel like they're kind of just prolonging this before they name it Jackson the starter?
[00:07:49] Speaker B: It doesn't feel manufactured to me that there's a battle. I think there really is.
I would be shocked if it's AJ Hill personally, just because I don't think that whenever you hear Tim Ramsey, Ryan Silverfield, these coaches talk about the battle. And for one of the guys with K.J. jackson, it's just we need you to. To be more accurate. We need you to like, not miss whenever, like you have like a play there. With AJ Hill, it's usually like the need you to process things quicker and it's all like between the ears. It seems like with him with kj, it's more of just like, we need you to hit your spots. And I just think with the.
How young AJ Hill is.
KJ Jackson's pretty young, too. But I think with aj, like, there's, I think he's going to be great. He had a better practice than KJ Jackson yesterday, in my opinion. I think KJ's probably had more days than him throughout fall camp. But AJ makes plays. He made a nice out of Courtney Crutchfield for a long touchdown yesterday.
But I just think that whenever it boils down, you're in a battle and there's a guy who you have at least seen in some context in an SEC game on the field, and you've seen them make plays and you have a guy who is still trying to learn a little bit.
I think you probably roll with, with K.J. jackson. K.J. jackson also is just kind of like that, more of a, I think the quarterback position, like, so you can rally the team a little bit. And it seems like he's really well respected.
But I do, I don't think it's fake that there was like a battle and they're pushing each other. I will be curious to see if they like. When we talked to Ryan Silverfield, I asked the question of, like, is there a world in which, you know, because we know how these games against FCS teams goes where there's blowouts and you play multiple quarterbacks. And I asked if there's a chance that that would serve as maybe a final audition, the North Alabama game for Utah, and he said that they're going to have one name before then. So I'm curious to see if that actually pans out, if they name a starter soon because we're getting toward the like, especially after you get a scrimmage under their belt Sunday, if one of them just really stands out. I don't know, you know, necessarily how long you want to just keep it under wraps or if you want to come out and just name a starter. But yeah, I just, I think there's a battle, but I'm not sure how close it is.
[00:09:53] Speaker A: I'm going to guess they, they string that along through the second scrimmage like that. That seems like you just, in my experience, whenever there's, you know, quote unquote quarterback battle, they want to, they want to take it through the last scrimmage of the preseason and then name the starter and give the team, you know, 10, 12 days, however long, to know that that's your starting quarterback. That, that's, that would Be my guess as to how that plays out.
[00:10:17] Speaker B: Yeah, and I do think that there is some like stringing it along. There are some like actual benefits to it and Ryan Silverfield mentioned it. But like you're lying to yourself if you say Arkansas isn't working on Utah some right now or like probably vice versa. I don't know. Utah has week one, but working on Arkansas, the word. The longer you do string it along, at least that's more things they have to look at. I don't know how. I mean if it takes up any bit of somebody's scouting time, you know, that's a benefit. But I just don't know how in today's college football, like all with the technology that you can get to scout teams and stuff, like just how beneficial that will be to string it along to throw Utah off per se. But like I do think that at least gives you somewhat of a leg up if you, you know, wait a little bit to announce it.
[00:11:04] Speaker A: Utah starts with Idaho, by the way. That's their first game of the season.
I've heard from, I feel like multiple coaching staffs who have done this where they try to get. Not game plans necessarily, but, but they try to do prep work on the first four opponents before the, before the camp is over. Now I don't know if Silverfield is that way or not. I don't think anybody's asking that, but I know that that's been the case in the past.
Receiver seems like another position that there's pretty good, you know, competition for, for playing time there.
[00:11:39] Speaker B: Yeah. And I like them all, to be honest. Like it's this time last year we came into a season with a very similar feel as far as you knew that some of the receivers that were going to have to be part of the equation didn't necessarily have like proven production in college.
I think about C.J. brown, we knew he was going to probably need to be in the mix and he had a pretty good year for his first year, really getting a lot of targets. Jaylen Brown, before he got a season ending injury was having a nice year and he didn't really have production at Florida State before that, at least not much of it. I think we're in a similar situation where there are four guys in the fold right now with Kris Marshall, transfer from Boise State, probably going to start.
There's C.J. brown's back.
He can kind of play multiple spots and then you have at the slot spot, I think a pretty, I would say pretty close competition between Ismail Sisi and Jamari Hawkins who came from Memphis, Jamari Hawkins has production from last year. And then behind those, those four, Donovan Fappel from New Mexico State. He led them in receiving yards and touchdowns last year. So he's at least done something. New Mexico State's been a factory of good players. It's kind of crazy. You think about Mike Washington who just had a long run last night in a preseason game. He came from there. And then Diego Pavia, eli Stowers, Seth McGowan. Like New Mexico State has produced these players who actually perform in the SEC when they make it there. But those kind of those five guys that in my head, like I'm. They have to be in the equation. And then you get into the weeds of like which of these others are going to kind of prove themselves. And I think Antonio Jordan. You just look out there and he has the craziest catches that are ever made in these practices are him. Like he's just got the large catch radius, he's tall, he's athletic.
I just think if he pieces it together, he can not only be like you want him in there, he can be like a serious weapon. He's got physical traits that others don't have that it's going to be hard in the secondary to cover. And then Courtney Crutchfield, I think he could burst on the scene this year. He's really taken things a lot more seriously since he got here from Missouri.
It would have been last December 2024. Whenever he got here, it seems like he's really taken the step forward to just get serious about his body mental part of the game. He's been making plays. He's who had the 88 yard touchdown from AJ Hill.
I think they have some guys there, I really do. But then the quarterback spot plays such a large role on how your receivers perform.
And this is why I think it's actually a battle going back to that. Whenever you're asking the receivers and it just seems like they don't really know who it's going to be.
You know, I think that that's kind of how you know, they just were like, whoever it is, we're going to try and be ready. But I actually kind of like this crop receivers and think that they have some good pieces.
[00:14:35] Speaker A: I want to give some context to what's open in practice. Like what do you guys see?
Because you know, you think about when I think this started when Kendall Briles was the offensive coordinator of the fastball period.
So during and then after Briles left, Pittman kept that they did that all throughout, you know, camp until he was gone.
And now it's the tempo period that I think is kind of similar in some ways to the fastball thing. Like explain to people what that is because this is really, I feel like where, you know, the reporters who are there, they're trying to glean the most information from because that's really, you know, the only time that you get to see, you know, quote unquote, actual football.
So, like explain what this tempo period is and how it changes from day to day because it's. I think what they're trying to do and correct me if I'm wrong, but they're trying to see different groupings play together. You know, this running back goes with this quarterback or this quarterback goes with this offensive line or, you know, this offensive tackle lines up, you know, this right tackle lines up to this right guard. So like, I mean, explain that.
[00:15:46] Speaker B: Yeah, and I think that this fall camp, it's really beneficial from the perspective you're trying to see how the quarterbacks look when they go with the different groups. There's some days that A.J. hill will go with the ones, some days K.J. jackson will. They mix up a lot of other things too. But this team tempo, I. This is not a knock against the former staff. And just like we didn't see their full practice, we only saw the part that we get to see.
[00:16:07] Speaker A: We only see in a full practice
[00:16:08] Speaker B: anymore, but we get to see Colorado. But you can't, goodness gracious, that email, it's like what can you cover? What can you watch? It's honestly, I was expecting the next line of that email to be come into the facility with duct tape across your eyes.
[00:16:22] Speaker A: Yeah, no self respecting reporter is going to go and agree to that.
[00:16:28] Speaker B: But, but yeah, the team tempo, I granted, you know, like I said, not a knock against the former staff, but I just think that what we're at least seeing the part where it just seems really like maybe more. I like what I see. Like, it's just like beneficial, like tempo trying to get through certain things. The drills that they do, they do this thing called perimeter drill that we get to watch where it's like you're getting maybe like a bunch formation on the outside with a couple receivers, maybe a running back or tight end or somebody and you're trying to. It's. It's very competitive. It's them versus, you know, like dbs over there that are trying to keep contained perimeter and those get really intense. I like those that we get to watch the team tempo Period is just like a fast paced. Going through some plays, try to maybe accomplish a certain goal. And then what I really like they do this thing called team compete. And team compete is just. I mean it's. You have team tempo, team compete, Team compete usually has more of like a stakes at it. Like this is the situation. This is the. I think the other day it was like maybe 13 to 8 or something was the score and team compete and you gotta. You're trying to win or I think yesterday they did some team compete that was like fourth down, all fourth down stuff. So it's very situational stuff that you get to watch in team compete. And I think that they honestly like, I like what I see during these. As far as how the coaches talk and operate. The sense of urgency they have. It seems really business like during all of these.
But yeah, all this to say, like we don't see the full. If they. You saw a full practice sheet. Like we're seeing maybe the top third if we're lucky. And then there's a lot more live tackling periods that happen. But what you can do as reporters, you know, we've been to eight of these and we've seen how many live tackling periods. You can take a collection of what you saw throughout those at the end of fall camp. I think sometimes it's a natural people like to, you know, instant reaction of what you saw in this one day, in this one period where maybe somebody was a star in this live tackling period. And then the other 17 that we didn't watch or 17 is probably pretty high. But the other however many that we didn't watch, like maybe they had an awful practice and we just saw the one, you know, so it's vice versa.
[00:18:42] Speaker A: Maybe they just had a bad period.
[00:18:44] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:18:44] Speaker A: They got some Gatorade in them.
[00:18:45] Speaker B: And it's why I don't think you can overreact to any of these. Like just one small sample size that we're getting to see at practice. I. I think it's beneficial to take like what we're doing right now, honestly, and take a collection of. We've seen a week of practice. What are we seeing that's been the same? What's kind of been consistent? I think that's where you can get kind of your better takeaways.
[00:19:04] Speaker A: I can't remember if the scrimmages got shut down under Chad Morris or under Pittman. I know that they. They none of Pittman's scrimmages or I say none. I don't think any of his August scrimmages were ever open. I think he may have opened up a spring one or two, you know, within the last few years of his time here. But you know, back in the old days when you had Nut or Petrino or even Beelima did this, like you could really learn a lot about the team during the scrimmages. I always felt like that was whenever you could, you could form a solid opinion about, okay, this is what the team is going to look like this year. Now we don't know what, you know, opponents, 1, 2, 3 and 4, what they look like, but you can, you can form an opinion on the offensive line is bad.
The linebackers are good. The, you know, whatever, whatever the case might be, the quarterback is really coming along. You know, this receiver, maybe he's not listed as a starter right now, but man, he seems to show out every time in practice and a lot of times that would, that would eventually, you know, manifest itself and show up in games with the scrimmages closed. I think that's what like in the last, you know, last decade or so it's been really hard to get a feel for what exactly to expect when the season starts. And I think it's made those first, you know, not necessarily week one, because a lot of times week one you're playing somebody that, you know, you're expected to roll over. But really it makes those first couple of weeks I think, you know, just kind of like a, I don't know, I guess maybe steel Forrest Gumps line, like a box of chocolate. You don't know what you're going to get because you just, you really have no reference for, you know, what they look like in those expanded team periods.
[00:20:46] Speaker B: Yeah. And I think in the past few years there's been classic examples of things that maybe were red flags but a scrimmage would have really getting to watch it, you know, exposed. Like for instance, last year we, we do get read off like some unofficial stats from these scrimmages that, you know, we don't see. But we're like whenever you hear last year that Monte Harrison is catching like multiple 40 plus yard touchdowns.
[00:21:07] Speaker A: Yeah. You're like, it was a red flag about the secondary.
[00:21:11] Speaker B: Yeah. At first you're like trying to be like, are we sure these are correct stats? But then you watch the season, you're like, oh, I believe it. Monte Harrison probably got some 40 yard touchdowns against these guys. It would have helped a few years ago, 20, 23 that season to see the offensive line against the defensive line. Because that, that O line was really, really, they struggled that year and we didn't get to really see any of that.
And then I think people were surprised because you had a couple returning starters on the O line and they didn't expect the O line to be that bad that year. I think that that's an instance where, you know, getting to watch a scrimmage would have revealed some things there too.
But yeah, like you said, it's like we're at the point of fall camp where you want to, the coaches probably want to have days where there's one winning and the other one, the offense winning one day, the defense winning another.
Just so you don't feel like you have a real huge deficiency. I think it's good to have like areas of concern always because I think the best coaches always have something they're concerned about.
But whenever it's a consistent, like this is always the area of concern and that's what we can't really get until you watch a scrimmage or like multiple live tackling like in or games. Yeah, it's like right now we just hear maybe one day this wasn't great. Like I know they were upset on day one of tackling. The defensive coaches thought they could have tackled better. The defensive linemen were like calling themselves out saying they could have tackled more. So you hear that and you're cautious.
But you know, was it just one
[00:22:39] Speaker A: practice, by the way, for people who don't know about this Colorado thing? I wanted to circle back to this Dion sand, like, like there is the only group of people that is more paranoid than a college football coach is maybe the government.
I mean the level of paranoia that exists in a football coaching staff is just unbelievable. And then you've got varying levels of thin skinned within the coaching community. And I think at the very top is Deion Sanders at Colorado. And they've said that you can go to practice and watch it, but you cannot bring any device. And it includes cell phones, tablets, cameras, video equipment, audio recorders, meta glasses.
That was a fun one for me. And any other recording capable devices are prohibited. I'm still trying to figure out exactly what meta glasses are. I see all these ads for them and I haven't quite totally grasped what I, you know, what I'm watching there.
No reporting on pretty much anything. No it says, no documentation, no note taking of any kind, written type, dictated or otherwise. No photograph, videography, audio recording, sketching or diagramming. Like you can't even bring like a courtroom reporter there and sketch the fact that they were actually out there on the field.
[00:24:01] Speaker B: Yeah. Like, it's more strict than a courtroom. What is the. There's one sentence about.
[00:24:05] Speaker A: This is the best one. It says, if you are uncertain whether something is reportable, the answer is that it is not.
[00:24:11] Speaker B: Basically, nothing you see actually happened.
[00:24:15] Speaker A: Just.
[00:24:17] Speaker B: It's a terrible construct in your brain that you're making up. But also they had like this thing. It was like, it felt like a middle schooler at a school where there's a no, like, phone policy. It's like, if we catch you with a phone, we're gonna put it in a bag and you can get it at the end of practice. Again, I'm like, who are you to tell me that you can take my phone right now and put it in phone jail?
Like, God forbid you're out there at a practice and an emergency happens within your family and you don't have your phone on you. Now, did they put watches? Was. What were watches on the.
[00:24:51] Speaker A: I did not see. I did not see watches.
[00:24:53] Speaker B: Okay. I would go out there with my watch and just talk into it. Since it didn't make the list, they would probably take my watch and throw it away. That sounds like the policies over there.
[00:25:04] Speaker A: As I read that, you know, it reminded me of reminding me in every, like, game contract, there is a. There's a force majeure language.
And, you know, I mean, it.
Basically any just crazy scenario you can think of is listed in this, like, war, insurrection, rumors of war. I mean, it's craziness.
[00:25:24] Speaker B: And the last one is always any act of God.
[00:25:27] Speaker A: Any act of God. Yeah, that's right.
[00:25:31] Speaker B: Basically, what they did there, it's like, if we can throw a blanket over all of this, we will. Like, if it's anything that requires that a normal human does, you can't do it. But yeah, that. That was crazy to see.
You know, our thoughts go out to our Colorado beat reporters and what they're trying to do right now to cover football.
[00:25:54] Speaker A: Let's see here a few basketball notes from the week. Brad Caliperi, we knew this was coming, that he was being promoted within the assistant coaching staff, but he signed a contract for three years that includes a no compete clause.
We got a date for the Arkansas Memphis Exhib that's going to be played October 28th at Bud Walton Arena. That was announced through Memphis's schedule that was put out earlier this week. Right now we know most of Arkansas's non conference schedule for the upcoming basketball season. I think there's about four, four or five dates left that we don't know.
At Bud Walton, they're going to play Robert Morris. And these are regular season games. In addition to, you know, playing Memphis and Gonzaga and probably somebody else in an exhibition game, they're gonna play Robert Morris, uca, oru, Central Michigan and Texas, Rio Grande Valley. Those games are going to be at Bud Walton. We know about the quote unquote neutral site games that they're going to play against Michigan State and Detroit, Arizona and Phoenix, Indiana in New York. There's a report out there they're going to play Virginia in Washington, D.C. but neither of the programs have confirmed that yet. And then Arkansas is going to play at North Carolina as part of the ACC SEC challenge. So we're getting really close there. And then some basketball news this morning. Isaiah Seeley was arrested early Friday morning in Fayetteville. This, let's see here, suspicion of what are the charges or the preliminary charges? It's on suspicion of criminal trespassing, obstructing governmental operations, minor in possession of alcohol, possession of a controlled substance. I tell our reporters all the time it's really important to get the police report before, you know, you screenshot the, you know, the mug shot on the detention, detention center website because it gives you context to what was actually happening. You read that and it's like your mind goes 18,000 different ways. Like, well, what did he do? Well, what he did, he was reportedly, and this is according to the police report, he was at a bar on Dixon Street.
He was asked to leave by the, or. He was asked for his ID by the, by the bouncer didn't provide it. Police were called, they asked for his ID a couple of times. He didn't give it to them.
He was handcuffed. And, you know, basically they, they determined because, you know, he was 19 years old, as part of their, their search, they found a THC vape pen on his body. This all according to the arrest reports. So spokesperson says Razorbacks are aware of it. They're gathering information. This is just kind of the boilerplate statement you usually get, but something to watch. Isaiah Seeley and, you know, John Caliperi.
We haven't seen, have we seen a time where a Razorback basketball player has been arrested since he's been here? I don't think we have.
You know, I mean, I don't, I don't want to jump to conclusions and say, you know, this means this or that for Sealy, but remember, he, he talked pretty forcefully when he first got here about, you know, just doing the
[00:28:53] Speaker B: right thing and his line is the no drinking, clubbing, chasing, smoking. That's the lecture he gives. It's those four things. So he's, you know, caliper, he preaches it.
[00:29:05] Speaker A: Celia is going to be out for the year anyway, we think with a knee injury. So I don't think there's going to be, I don't think this is going to impact his, his playing time in any way because he's got a lot of, you know, a lot going on in terms of the, the injury. He didn't even go with the team to the Bahamas when they went down there last week.
Some baseball news this week. Razorbacks have gotten five commitments from in state or from, from juniors. Four of those are in state players. It was really interesting to talk to their high school coaches because I talked to all the high school coaches of these in state players. And I tell you the feeling I got in talking to some people. This Brooks Robinson, who has an incredible baseball name by the way. He's at Green County Tech over in Perigle, that's in northeast Arkansas.
Like I think people think this guy could be really, really good. Like he's been, you know, like he's the number one player in the state of Arkansas.
This feels like a big one for him. The other commits they've gotten are Quinn Birdsong, he's a pitcher. Robinson's a right handed pitcher too. Robinson and Birdsong both right handed. Birdsong from Shiloh Christian.
Cameron Henderson's a left hander from Rogers. And they got infielder Evan Kanode from Bentonville. He's also supposed to be their starting quarterback on their football team. And then last night they got a big commit last night. I got to find his name here real quick. He's an infielder from, from Texas. I actually talked to him last night. Levi Abrego.
This is a guy who has really shot up the recruiting rankings, I guess.
Houston area infielder. So this is a big addition for the Razorbacks. But you know, no surprise, Arkansas is getting some big names in baseball recruiting right now.
[00:30:55] Speaker B: I know. I'm sure they're one of many sports that are very excited about this.
The home football schedule being much more conducive this September.
[00:31:03] Speaker A: One of the big recruiting weekends for baseball is, I've been told it's September 18th through 20th, Georgia.
[00:31:10] Speaker B: That's for every sport right now. What kind of hearing is that? Those are gonna, that's when you bring in the big.
[00:31:15] Speaker A: You know, when Morris was here as the football coach, I was talking to another head coach on Campus at the time. And it's like, we gotta get football better because it's killing us in recruiting.
You know, it's like you can't bring an athlete in and say, here's a Saturday game day in town and then there's 35, 40,000 people in the stands when the game begins and there's maybe 15 left at halftime because the football team's getting beat up and down the field. So they need to be competitive in that Georgia game to help track, to help baseball, to help basketball, what, you know, what you name the sport. It helps when you've got a football team that can fill the stands and then keep them there and show these recruits a good time and a good atmosphere.
[00:32:01] Speaker B: It feels to me like the, it's similar to the Notre Dame game last year that you're thrilled that no matter what you're going to have at kickoff, that's going to be a good. I don't care what happens the other first two weeks. That's going to be a great crowd for the Georgia game. But you, unlike the Notre Dame game, you want them to keep the crowd in the stands so the recruits, you know, visit experience isn't people with bags over their heads.
[00:32:27] Speaker A: I remember when football would bring, and I think they still do this, but, but there was a time where football, you know, they would bring recruits to basketball games. This is back when the February signing period was real big. And they would, they would come and, you know, they would be there at the start of the game. But then they'd always get the football recruits out before the game ended because they, I don't think they wanted the kids to see the, you know, like the possibility of the team losing and, you know, just how, you know, the booing or the leaving early or anything like that.
[00:32:58] Speaker B: Yeah, it's.
[00:32:59] Speaker A: Maybe you do that with football. Like, you bring them in, you get them there for kickoff, get out of there at the end of the first week.
[00:33:05] Speaker B: That should be a great weekend.
[00:33:06] Speaker A: At least they could have done that
[00:33:07] Speaker B: at Notre Dame because they're going to. I think that it sets up to where like, yeah, I don't think an 11am kick is ideal, but like, you can really make a lot of pie that Friday and Friday evening with these recruits that you bring in. And then you probably on the back end of a football game do a lot of stuff with, with recruits that come in. I mean, I think that is going to be the premier weekend as far as, like the. Just the big time recruits they bring in. Last year it stunk for them. As far as like everybody just got behind these other schools they were competing against in recruiting. As far as like if you want to get them there at least for like a football game weekend, you know, it's kind of hard to have a recruit on campus weekend that nothing's really going on.
Then the next weekend they go and they go to Neyland Stadium for a night game. You know, it's like kind of hard to recruit against that. Like at least the experience aspects you got to get like, I don't know. I just think that they were really in a bad spot. A lot of coaches were last year with the schedule, trying to recruit a
[00:34:07] Speaker A: couple of the baseball items before we get out of here. I don't know if we talked about Casey Opitz coming back on our podcast last week. I can't remember if we recorded or not before that happened, but he's going to be back on the staff as a coach at Arkansas. He's going to help out with the catchers. I think he's going to coach first base. One of Arkansas's high school signees, Troy Fisher, signed with the Atlanta Braves an undrafted free agent contract last, late last week.
That was kind of hinted at by Dave Van Horn in his last press conference. He said there may be a player or two that are out there that they sign an undrafted free agent contract. Well, Troy Fisher, he's an infielder from the Kansas City area.
He has signed with the Braves. So Arkansas's not going to get all of its high school signees to campus. You know, they, they got through the draft without having those taken. And then just want to plug this. There's a story on our website right now. Luke Cornelison and Carter Rutenbauer played on the Santa Barbara Foresters this summer. And that team won the NBC World Series in Wichita earlier this month. If you don't know what the NBC World Series is, that's a national baseball Congress. What they do, they bring in some really top flight teams that are in summer leagues or semi pro teams and they get together in Wichita. They've done this for almost 100 years. I think it's been like, I think they're in like year 93 or something of that tournament. They get them together in Wichita. They played the NBC World Series. It's actually a pretty cool deal. They play at the, you know, the pro ballpark there. And Rudenbar and Cornelison, they helped the Foresters win the NBC World Series.
In fact, Cornelison was the player of the game in the championship game had a really strong relief outing that day for the Foresters. Carter Rutenbar kind of did what he did all summer. I talked to both of them, talked to Bill Pentard, who's the manager of the Foresters, and I've got a long ride up on our website, wholehogsports.com that kind of gives you some insight into the summer that both of those players had. They both were all stars in the California Collegiate League and sounds like the coach that they had in Santa Barbara. He really likes him. I'll tell you one thing that stood out to me. This was a. This is a quote that I think Arkansas's coaches will love, is that Bill Pintard said.
He said, the Arkansas guys, they love baseball, man. And he was talking not just about the guys who were on the team this year, but there have been a lot of guys that have gone out to Santa Barbara over the years. In fact, Matt Hobbs, who's Arkansas's pitching coach, he played for Bill Pentard in the Foresters organization. And then Bill Pintard gave him his first coaching job as a pitching coach not long after Matt was out of college. So they've sent a lot of players out there over the years. Like Gage Wood has been there, and Christian Franklin has been there. There have been a lot of really good Razorbacks that have been in that program. But the Arkansas guys, they love baseball, man. I think that would make any baseball coach's heart happy. You know, it's like, we got guys who love to play the game.
[00:37:05] Speaker B: Not to turn this right back around to football, but that's also something I've noticed that I think they got a lot of players that I just sense, like, are, like.
I think it helps when you get players that they just love the sport they're playing. And I think that the staff, Silverfield and them, I think that they went for that with some of these players. They got just from speaking to them, that just. You just brought that up in my brain. It's kind of one of my takeaways I've had.
[00:37:25] Speaker A: Yeah.
And the way the season has started, you know, a couple of the last three years plays into this. But you really do wonder, you know, at a certain point, like last year, you. You started to wonder, like, early November, like. Like, how into the this are these guys really right now? Yeah. I think you get to a certain point and everybody's checked out, you know, and if. I think if you love that and that can still happen if you, you know, love the game.
But I think it's less likely that you get that checkout if you've got players who really do enjoy the day to day.
The day to dayness, so to speak, of the. Just, just being in whatever sport they're in. Yeah.
[00:38:07] Speaker B: And I think across all sports right now, in today's like with just the era of social media, it's like you've got to get players who like, they don't they just like playing the game. Like, because if they. The moment you get caught up in other things, I mean, I think it'll eat you up.
So I think that all coaches are kind of looking right now for those players that truly just love playing the game and can be coachable. And it seems like, yeah, you hear like remarks like that and the story that you wrote and it's. That's probably a coach's like, they go to bed, you know, listening to that. You know, that's like what they love to hear is that they, they coach players who love the game.
[00:38:42] Speaker A: So you can read more at our website, wholehogsports.com we got everything covered there. We'll have a lot of content this weekend. We'll see you next week on the podcast. Have a great weekend, everybody.
