Texas Spring Ball Practice #2 Takeaways

0:00Whether you're solving murders during breakfast, cracking cold cases on your commute, or playing amateur detective at bedtime, Amazon Music's got millions of podcast episodes waiting. Just download the Amazon Music app and start listening to your favorite true crime podcasts, ad-free, included with Prime. Welcome to the Inside Texas Football YouTube channel, paired by InsideTexas.com. I'm Joe Cook. That's Evan Veeath. We were at Texas Second Spring practice today in DKR on Campbell Williams Field. Got a good look at the offense, the defense. We also got to talk to a couple players after. So we'll go over everything we saw and heard today. But of course, we already wrote everything we saw and heard today over on InsideTexas.com. So make sure you go to InsideTexas. Use that first link in our description or use that QR code at the top left of the screen. Sign up for 50% off the annual subscription price. You're going to want to join not only for all the best Texas intel, but the best recruiting intel.

1:00There are visitors there. We've also got some great insight on who is on campus. Not just today, but who will be on campus throughout the entire spring over there. So come check us out on InsideTexas. Evan, you got to look at the defense. I was checking out the offense. That's a little bit of a tough task, I'll admit, because you're standing in the north end zone. That's where Texas keeps us media wise and all the defensive players are on the south end zone, south side of the field. So some things were tough to see, but what were some of the big takeaways you had maybe from the linebacker spot before we go in just some other positions? Yeah, not a lot of room to the spurs there, but I think just overall for the defense, we'll must champ. You heard him a lot today. I think we talked yesterday or on Monday, but I was a little bit quieter from him out in the news fields, but his voice was echoing throughout TKR, and that came throughout the pursuit drills and all the individual drills for these team, for these position groups. But looking at linebackers, I think the person that really impressed

2:01me today, and I know we hadn't heard about a lot this off season because his recruitment was a little bit later as a late flip, late Ryzer and Rivals rankings is linebacker Rocky Cummings, because this is a player that comes in at 6'4, 2'25, and then he's, he is 6'4. It is the tallest player in that linebacker room pretty easily, and we couldn't see close up, but when they were doing those stack and shed drills, ones where you're asked to hold on, shuffle your feet and then move and burst out, he looks really, really, really good. He was a natural at that spot. I think your question mark with a player of that size is does he have the foot speed to go and go after a runner or cover a tight end or even hopefully not a slot receiver, but those kind of players, as well as his feet able to move, and I think with this size, you're going to have a great run, run defender eventually for his team, but we even heard Lance Jackson say in the interviews after like, this might be someone who surprises you as like a day one player and maybe not day one day one, but think about Texas State and UTSA, if Texas can win those games comfortably and you get some

3:02of those subs in a third and fourth, might be a guy who pops a little earlier than you might see, and that's just a benefactor, a really good lineback for recruiting the cycle between he, I can send it out, Paula. What do you think about what you were able to see at defensive back? We got to talk a little bit to Grayson Littleton, who it sounds like it's going to do whatever is asked of him, whether that's nickel, whether that's outside corner, seems like someone who is up for whatever role he has, but what do you see from some of the defensive backs? White Littleton at corner, like Cade Phillips at corner, like Bob Masco all over the place, Jolani McDonald, or some of the things you saw. Yeah, it's funny. Littleton kind of skated around the idea of committing to a slaughter outside, and I think that tells you that he really wants one of these outside roles, but what you're seeing with the cornerback specifically and Muschamp split up the team into CB and safety, it wasn't really like a homogenous group, and it also wasn't a cornerback and nickel situation. It was cornerbacks, which stood out to me. Muschamp was heavily involved with that group. That's where he spent most of his time in the practice. Most of his coaching effort kind of

4:05went to talking to those players, and we talked about the hockey style lineup slash with the D line. It's kind of like that with the cornerbacks right now. You enter with Kobe Black and Cade Phillips in your first line, then you have Bob Masco and Grayson Littleton, which I think is a great pairing, because it's a veteran with a younger player who's got a lot of experience, but not quite as an outside corner. Warren Roberson and Wardelle Mack, and then the two freshmen, Hayward Howard and Samari Matthews. Matthews is funny. I almost was sticking for Cade Phillips, because he's now wearing number 11 with the longer hair, and I'm like, no, Phillips is definitely number eight, right? Am I going crazy? But you're seeing that I think what's going to happen here, and we've talked about the O line, I think flood and Muschamp slash Orfei have a similar idea where they're going to find their two best outside cornerbacks, however they can. And I think any of those first six names I mentioned, including Wardelle Mack, could be the person that does that, and they're going to have that competition there. Then from there, they're going to try to find that next starting nickel, who's the best guy, who's the next of the three, maybe the next tackler who can go, and then you make your second line from there. But I think the cornerback position is much more based on my idea.

5:06We're going to find who's good on the outside, and we have the talent to have whoever is next to go and play on the inside. At safety, it's a thinner room, kind of similar to linebacker, which I didn't quite mention a lot of it, but linebackers are a bit thinner just without the players that have kind of cycled out of the team and tie at the spits dealing with injury. But with safety, you've got Jona Williams playing baseball, Xavier Filzamy and Zellis Hicks are both injured right now, still recovering. So you've got your Derek Williams and Jolani McDonnell line, which we're all accustomed to. But then you've got Walk on Ziky Meizulu and the second team playing with JJR. So I think Jordan Johnson Rebels got a big chance to have a pretty nice spring for his development, because he's the clear number three safety in that room, plays first team special teams with a bunch of other starters, and that always looks good in from sea to circuition. And then when you're looking at that third line, it's another Walk on, but Jonathan Cunningham really looks like a safety now. I think that was the problem. He's no Walk on. Hold on a minute there. I said a Walk on and Jonathan Cunningham. I'm forgetting who exactly was. I don't

6:06believe Graham Gillespie has any more eligibility. Maybe he does, but Cunningham comes in as a linebacker as a recruit and then moves over. We hear he moves to defensive back, but it's a lot of red shorting, a lot of behind-the-scenes stuff. He finally looks like a DB Joe, but that's at six foot two, like six to one, ninety two, one, ninety five in that range. And that's where you'd like him to be if he's going to play that position. He looks fast. He broke off the ball well in the drills. They did a lot of defensive backs in general, did a lot of interception work, a lot of playing tight man coverage or leading a tight end up a field. And someone Yehem Riley, which is named Yalka here a lot about, it's a true freshman, lower tier recruit, really, really fast when they were doing their pursuit drill was flying down the field to get to the ball care that he would theoretically be tackling about drills in real games. So just keep an eye out for him and Torey Davis, don't fear make a big impact this year, but in a thinner room, I mean, that's the kind of player that can really kind of slowly make their way up in the spring and then maybe into the fall. Between what you heard from guys like Hero Kanu and Colin Simmons and our little media session

7:09with them after practice or from what you were able to see and any big things to note on the defensive line and in the edge group. Yeah, I think there's a lot of respect for Inga Fraud, who is that veteran defensive tackle from Arkansas. Giant dude with 385 pounds knows tackle. And I think they all kind of accept that this is the kind of guy that just makes everyone around them better. Similarly, Rashim Biles, I asked Kanu because he was one of those players that came in as a transfer, but then immediately became a leader of this defense and the team. Like, is there anyone that fits that identity for the defense and kind of hoping he would say Biles? And that's exactly what he said. I mean, Biles, both Ian Simmons said, like, this is a dog. This is a guy who's going to be clear starter on this team, really good leader, a lot of effort going into it. But on the defensive line in general, I think what you notice is this team is just so deep. Brad Spence is going to play on the edge for now. That's restarting in the spring. And with him there, you're talking about Lance Jackson, Colin Simmons, you know, who was Umuzolo, Colton Vossick, Richard Wesley, Jamarian Carlton. The name just keep flowing. They a lot of good things to say about our Richard

8:11Wesley and Carlton there. And I think there's just a lot of good players down the line. And another shout out is Josiah Sharma, who Kanu said, completely different player this year, completely reenergized. And it's got his body in a better shape, lost some pounds that makes him a little more of an athletic nose tackle, potentially for this team. So I think the D lines one where you just, you kind of just got trusted. This is going to be a really, really solid group. And one top to bottom that has both star, star, level, town and Simmons, but also really good freshman and some good solid role players are maybe a little over. Yeah, it's going to be fun to watch Brad Spence just to be able to develop it a variety of different roles and what he's able to do for this defense. And I liked what I heard from hero Kanu and Colin Simmons about Ian Gafford, like, and even Lance Jackson, like all those guys have a varying level of familiarity with them where they're watching them on film or if you're Lance through what you knew from your brother land. And it's just, you know what, big boy, but I can play football too. Over on the offensive side,

9:12that's where I kind of got to get a little bit of look of all over the place. Without archmaning there, you know, sometimes my focus goes away from quarterback just because I know we're on the arch beat. We're always on the arch beat, but with him, you know, going through very small amount of warm-ups and then going off and doing his own thing as part of recovery for his injury, got a good chance to see KJ Lacey Diabelle and MJ Morris do their thing. But one thing that always stands out to me and we talk about resources and resources used to be like a code word for money. And it still is and resources now not only means what you can, you know, spend on nutrition and coaching staff and stuff like that. It's also what you can spend on rosters. But it's still important to spend on your coaching staff. And I'm sure it was the same on defense because I'm thinking about all the different spots and just some of the names we know as far as analysts goes, including one who's a big name who Sark has said is not with the program quite yet, but basically every position on this

10:17team. For everyone who solves crime from their couch knows more about forensics than their own job and has trust issues with small town sheriffs. Amazon Music's millions of podcast episodes are calling. Just download the Amazon Music app and start listening to your favorite true crime podcasts ad-free included with Prime. Has their main assistant coach? So let's say you're a tight-end. You've got Jeff Banks and you know there are seven I think tight-ends in that group maybe six and then you've also got Steve Kasula from Michigan who's coaching you and that applies across the board. So like I think it is indicative of just the level of resource Texas has and we got to see it firsthand today. At least I noticed it firsthand today just that all these players and they're going above 85 which is a little bit of a change. They can go up to 105. All these players have multiple coaches who can get in the personalized coaching and that's one of the things that's kind of only

11:19possible in a place like Texas. I know that's a kind of big picture macro thing but still kind of something that you know if you go and cover I don't know not to speak ill of them but like if you go and cover Kansas. You know what? Kansas probably isn't dedicating enough money to have multiple four offensive line coaches or four guys who can coach offensive line and that stood out to me. You know they call it the polo army but that's something Texas has and other places don't. Yeah and I think Kasula was someone that that first day on Monday really stood out to me. He was coaching those tight-ends hard and both both past catching but especially I think he's going to do a lot for the the run blocking. I mean the Michigan's known for their blocking tight-ends and their ability to run the ball and that's that's the program he's coming over from. Joe especially for me when I'm thinking about these new coaches and both assistants but also just the heads of the room. Wilma Shep is maybe the lattice guy in the field if he's not it's because Jabbar Jalook is talk about his energy with the running back room and just what you saw from those running backs as well. Yeah. Jabbar Jalook you can hear him. You hear him plenty no matter whether you're on the

12:26northwest corner, northeast corner no matter what corner the stadium here is. Jabbar Jalook's on the field you can hear him. And running back coaching you know a lot of it looks pretty similar. You hold on to the ball you run where it's blocked like there are only so many ways to teach a guy to go forward and gain yards but I got to see a few different drills that kind of hinted a shape of the offense like if you have two running backs in a backfield and you're teaching them how to you know okay y'all two are back here you're the blocker you're the either the play fake or the rusher that says a lot about what maybe Texas could do because you're teaching these movements to be used at a later date. Well why are you teaching two back set movements? Well because you maybe plan to use two back sets. So that that really appealed to me. Another thing that appealed to me about Jalook is if you're teaching past protection there are so many finer points about the sport

13:26of football to where it's like okay you block that guy. Well Jalook was not only saying hey you block that guy on these types of plays but there was a finer point of like look you're trying to push this guy out of the way of this throwing lane. And so that was something that really appealed to me and he was asking it to everybody you know the top two in that room were Hollywood's mothers and Ray Leake Brown. Ryan Nibblet was right behind them and then you got to some of the you know freshmen or even red shirt freshmen like James Simon Derrick Cooper, Jet Walker, Michael Terry and those guys he was asking the same of them all but the fact that I saw a little bit of a scheme input on some of the drills and of course that's what drills are supposed to do it's supposed to translate to what you're doing on the field but like oh that's a two back set we didn't see a whole lot of that last year we haven't seen a whole lot of that since Brennan Marion they're teaching that as a point to maybe use that later in the year and that also applied to some of the stuff that we

14:30saw from the wide receivers and tight ends too. Big financial decisions don't have to fill overwhelming there's someone who can guide you every step of the way. David McClellan is a fiduciary financial advisor with forum financial and he's working closely with his clients as a true financial life coach guiding every aspect of your financial journey with expertise and care. If his name sounds familiar that's because David was a swimmer at Texas and a member of several national championship teams. Today he channels that same championship mindset into helping people win with their finances. David specializes in financial planning and he's contributed numerous articles to Kaipelinger on the topic of retirement tax bombs and right now David is offering viewers a free intro consultation to assess your financial situation. Do not miss this chance to get personalized guidance from a trusted expert. To schedule your free consult email David at Demaclellan at forum financial.com or you can call him directly at 312-933-8823. The contact info is in the description.

15:33And if Nibble is going to be a real part of this offense I think the two backsets probably is most optimal formation then when you have brown and smothers there. Got to give him as many touches as possible and I will really shout out to me when I saw Jalook just right in front of me was he had such different ideas for each player and that is a nice thing to see that for brown it's about ball security for smothers it's about effort. Michael Terry it's more about are you feeling comfortable going in taking your cuts jet walk or your feet are they quite are they aren't quite there yet how can we get them there someone's got a block from though Joe no matter how much we can hype up the these names and and the new additions and some of these freshmen at Derek Cooper impress me you need to have the line in front of you to do that and we've talked since Monday about how it seems like Brandon Baker stuck in a right guard there's still that competition for left guard but just in general now that we kind of more know who's who's where what they're part on the order and where and the pecking order they're going to be what did you see from this group that either you liked or maybe it was a bit of concern today. Yeah the drills for Kyle

16:36floods group are about the same you know whenever we're there in that that early portion of practice it's about a two man sled and you know just effort there kind of does a warm up and then it's all right are you taking the right zone steps and are you putting your hands in the right spot and it's been like that since coflip got here that's that's nothing new but it's interesting to see who they have at what spot and what those guys look like and you know this was my first time really getting to really observe Melvin Ciani and yeah he looks kind of like Trevor Goosby does you know a big guy playing that right side already at that right tackle spot they're not letting him do like okay come wrap it left tackle because we need you to spring for numbers with Goosby out no they're keeping him at right tackle they're keeping Brandon Baker at right guard they've got Jayden Chattman competing for that left guard spot and then you know like they're putting their second offensive linemen or second left tackle Jordan Coleman there at the left tackle spot so left to right across the first string Jordan Coleman Jayden Chattman Conor Robertson Brandon Baker Melvin Ciani and then

17:39second string and of course we know that they they plug in the next best best guy they don't plug in the second right guard if the first one goes out it was at least this practice John Taneum and Dylan Sokorsky Jackson Christian Devon Coleman and then John Turnthine and I think that speaks well to John Turnthine I think it speaks well to Jayden Chattman's ability at this juncture Dylan Sokorsky I thought you know we're at a little bit of an elevated angle so I wasn't really going to make much of an estimation on his height but hey I think they list him at 344 and he definitely looks 344 I was intrigued about the center group because it was Conor Robertson Jackson Christian Sokorsky Devon Coleman and then Brooks Keaton at junior no Jayden Chattman but Jayden Chattman's there working to be the starting left guard so make sense that he's part of that even though I'm pretty sure Sark said the other day that's someone who's contending at that center or yeah or an option at that center spot you know it stinks because we just don't get to see a lot

18:41of work against defensive linemen whenever we get these opportunities to see alignment in practice but off the hoof you know everybody looks pretty darn good I like when I saw from Sokorsky and it just looking at those players you can feel that there's going to be six you know I think that was something where last year they struggled to find six because one of those spots at left guard was just all right let's try this all right let's try this I feel a little bit better because if you throw in Gooseby to the mix you've got third year guy Gooseby I think fourth year guy Chattman fifth year guy Robertson third year guy Baker and then another college football veteran I think from three or four years in Ciani there for your top five and then from there you're you know you're probably not relying on freshmen you're going with some guys who you know have either played ball at Texas or elsewhere and you can probably find a good six they need him to be a great

19:41six but at this point I think there's progress being made and we just have to figure out what it looks like when they start going against that Texas defense yeah and hopefully you hear about the eligibility of Lawrence Seymour soon either way it wasn't going to make it in the spring it's finished his degree of Western Kentucky of course O'Lean's a bit of a harder one to identify but when the pass catchers are running right in front of you it's hard to ignore some of these names and these these body types and the way that they're running we talked a lot about Cam Coleman on Monday I think he was kind of the star of the show when I came to the talk with the team and what we observed but for me when I when I was at least looking a little bit of the receivers it seemed like some of the younger guys are the ones that sit out Joe who did you really like seeing it and and were there any eye popping catches or runs what would you what did you get from that group I one thing that really stands out to me is the fact that again they're they're not going to go oh you're the next step at X so you're up if the first guy at Y and the second guy at Y or Z

20:42and the second guy Z or better so they would move guys over but without Emmett Mosley being full-go right now without Ryan Wingo being full-go there is just not a lot of bodies who are slot receivers so Daelin McCutchen is the only scholarship guy right now who is repping at slot receiver during the portion of practice we got to look at that's a lot of reps for him and he was thrown into the mix early last year a lot of it had to do with injury to Mosley but like that was someone who was playing and doing things right away behind Deandre Moore, Ryan Wingo and Parker Livingstone he's got an opportunity here to continue to to find those roles and then also guys like Jermaine Bishop and Cohen Brown I don't think Sterling Birkhalter is going to fit on the inside but like those are a lot of those are guys who could probably find some roles on the inside as usual you know Texas what they do is they run routes to really emphasize the pre snap read

21:43and post snap reads there aren't defensive backs at least in the portion we saw there so a coach really oh it's cover two and that changes the route based on what they do and scene can Coleman run that deep over route I know I talked about it earlier today with Homer and he was excited to hear that moving him in a different alignment it's not changing positions per se but moving him in the different alignments was interesting to see Cohen Brown you know Jermaine Bishop even Chris Stewart guys who looked the part Sterling Birkhalter looks the part it's just a different room right now because they have seven of the nine scholarship guys that they anticipate having but that's still again big opportunities for not just Kim Coleman to you know learn what all these Texas quarterbacks are like but Dale and McCutchen because he had you know bad breaks for Texas become good breaks for him last year and get him into the line up early maybe something else maybe something along those same lines shakes out this year when you know you're still kind of

22:46waiting on Wingo and Mosley at this point in spring at the at the current juncture yeah I think people have kind of an unnecessary sour taste in their mouth with McCutchen because he had a dropper two in in the citrus bull and fair but he was also the most advanced rod receiver from a very talented freshman group last season and that doesn't mean nothing especially when Sark's the one putting him out there he he has a role on this team and like you said being the only guy in a scholarship uniform who's running those slots naps is it's really nice same idea with the or KJ Lacey being kind of the guy at quarterback that it's just going to be good for development only McCutchen and Kuli Klocke are players that are back from last year's team though you were currently seeing him there so yeah so it's just it's just funny that we've so many new names and faces there moving lots of last spot on the offense tight end I think the talk of the town was Michael Mosunas' size on Monday but that's just how these guys look in their uniforms what'd you see from the tight ends today you know they're going through a blocking sled with Steve Kusula and Jeff Banks or doing some tandem blocking with some of the offensive tackles or kitchen routes or catching passes running

23:51routes the one thing I did notice that that was kind of peculiar was they have split the wise the inline guys and the h's the kind of off-ball motion guys they have those as separate groups that hadn't been the case as long as I can remember so you had an inline group led by Spencer Shady and Michael Mosunas and then a h group led by Nick Townsend in Imari Winston and just to you know I think have that separation speaks to what I talked about earlier you have the coaches and of course again we're only there for about 20 30 minutes they're doing other things with these guys but I feel like that just hints at a little bit better specialization for guys in this offense and you know are there gonna be times when Nick Townsend needs to be the only tight end on the field yeah is he gonna have why responsibilities absolutely but I think they're kind of coaching to maybe a little bit more of an optimized form of what they want with 12 personnel with Mosunas being the main inline blocker and then Townsend moving around or Shannon being the main inline blocker in Winston moving

24:57around nothing they really did physically stood out to me but just got some of their deployment was something that caught my eye pretty quickly yeah that'll also caught my attention and it goes to show that this this talk of the 12 personnel being slain at Texas really majors and I think has some merit to it and I think you're talking about bringing a guy like Mosunas and Nick Townsend was already revered for his blocking ability maybe less ability but effort and right and the highlights were highlights which you don't see from blockers a lot I think it's like a pan-kakably advanced Vanderbilt maybe might have or Arkansas late in the season where like Townsend laid the guy out well on the on the cutback so I think that's a position group that you can be a pretty optimistic about the production not in terms of yardage but in terms of quality blocking and having a pretty high floor I think you'd feel better about that especially with Kasula in line and just the room in general shaping out a little bit better any other last thoughts show maybe special teams I know Raleigh Brown was was taking some puns again but I think that doesn't from from my observations unless you've got anything else. No that's about it you know one quick special

26:00mention Mac Chiminto and Mikey Bukowskis are fine but yeah it's still kind of it's still kind of OTA-ish I know Sark hasn't used that this year but you can just tell with some of the guys getting some things and it's also week one like things are going to ramp up next next week when they're on spring break but things are going to ramp up when they're finally able to get shoulder pads and eventually leg pads on like it things are going to start moving it should be a lot of fun to track over the next couple weeks so make sure you do go to inside texas.com you said first link in our description use that QR code at the top left of the screen not only do we have practice insight Evan you and I were there R.T. was there we have all of our observations from earlier today we'll also have some stuff from texas players we got to talk to Colin Simmons here Ocanu Lance Jackson and Grayson Littleton so a lot of texas defensive standouts we're going to have a

27:00bunch of stuff of course basketball later tonight baseball starts SEC play recruiting never stops there were visitors on campus today so we'll have all that over inside texas so use that first link in our description or use that QR code there at the top left of the screen Evan thank you so much thank you for watching we'll see you next time on the inside texas football youtube channel powered by inside texas.com