Bear Down Wildcats

And the injuries continue...

And Rich Rod has said he was probably one of the best looking redshirts we had....sweet

AG with a spring practice preview. Lots of good stuff including some roster notes:

The school posted a new roster this week, and let's take note of a few of the weights, updated for the first time in several months.

--Defensive lineman Luca Bruno, who started 11 games last season as a sophomore, is up from 264 to 300.

--Free safety Demetrius Flannigan-Fowles, who definitely has the rangy body type a new defensive staff is looking for, is up 17 pounds to 199.

--Linebacker Jamardre Cobb has gone from 239 to 257, a rare bigger option at linebacker for the Cats.

--Starting right guard Jacob Alsadek is up to 318 from 298.

Michael Lev, Daily Star, with who is limited by injuries this spring:

Promising Arizona redshirt-freshman tight end Brion Anduze suffered a gruesome-looking injury to his left leg or knee while catching a pass near the sideline during one-on-one drills. Coach Rich Rodriguez declined to elaborate on Anduze’s status.

Offensive lineman Freddie Tagaloa will be limited during spring because of a knee injury suffered last season. Tagaloa did not practice today. Rodriguez doesn't want to rush him back.

Linebacker Cody Ippolito practiced in a limited capacity. He was among a handful of players wearing green jerseys, which means they can participate in some on-field work but generally are to avoid contact. Ippolito missed all of last season because of a knee injury.

Others wearing the green jersey included tight end Trevor Wood and freshman safety Isaiah Hayes. Wood missed last season because of a shoulder injury.

Defensive lineman Luca Bruno and linebacker Jake Matthews were among those unable to practice because of foot injuries suffered last season.

A good write-up about the position changes:

http://www.azdesertswarm.com/football/2 ... -cobb-cloy" target="_blank

we have a DL coach now right? It was promotion?

Yes, we promoted Arizona football analyst (tape review guy) Vince Amey.

This is better news than Shariff Williams injury right?
(I think he disclocated/broke his whole knee, not just the kneecap)

Gabe Encinas, AZDS, talks with Brandon Dawkins.

"[I'm] 1000 percent more comfortable," he said. "After finally getting some actual real-life reps, you know, more than just two or three reps at the end of the NAU and other games like that, actually getting real game experience like that made me a lot more comfortable in the offense and realizing what I can actually do with it instead of just going through practice."

. . .

"Khalil's doing good. He's starting to pick it up," Dawkins said. "He just got here so it just takes time. That was a big thing when I got here, there's just so much to learn especially with how they teach it here. They teach it with more learning through practice and things like that. You don't really have a set playbook you can just learn off."

Great and free QB drill video from GoAZCats.

UAEebs86 wrote:This is better news than Shariff Williams injury right?
(I think he disclocated/broke his whole knee, not just the kneecap)

Have to wait to see if there's a tear along with it.

Anu's throwing ducks. Dawkins and Tate look good.

AG with a spectacular story on the new defense written from a seated position.



In a rush this morning so I might of picked the wrong AG. But they are both spectacular in their own way.

chiefzona wrote:

UAEebs86 wrote:This is better news than Shariff Williams injury right?
(I think he disclocated/broke his whole knee, not just the kneecap)

Have to wait to see if there's a tear along with it.

If there is no tear he should be back for fall camp right?

Newportcat wrote:

chiefzona wrote:

UAEebs86 wrote:This is better news than Shariff Williams injury right?
(I think he disclocated/broke his whole knee, not just the kneecap)

Have to wait to see if there's a tear along with it.

If there is no tear he should be back for fall camp right?

Absolutely no idea right now. I just hope for the best. This kid is pretty good. I also hope Wood comes back strong. I was very impressed with him last spring. He has a chance to be something special.

ANGCatFan wrote:AG with a spectacular story on the new defense done from a seated position.



In a rush this morning so I might of picked the wrong AG. But they are both spectacular in their own way.

This looks about right. Me, circa 1979, on a nerf hoop.

Friday, Feb 20

ANGCatFan wrote:Friday, Feb 20

Love these. Keep 'em coming!

UAEebs86 wrote:

Wasted a year with Fanene on the Offense. Never understood that move from the beginning

Moving Cloy to the defensive line has me intrigued. Let's see what Amey can do with him, but I think he could be good on the edge.

From 22 Feb practice

Hanging out with Elliott Pitts apparently.

Drugs are bad.....mmmmmkay.

chiefzona wrote:Drugs are bad.....mmmmmkay.

What's the point zona? Even if you do know for sure why spread it around? Obviously the people that need to know do know and its being dealt with. You're like a caddy little high school girl spreading rumors about the popular kids.

Chief just wants attention and people to bow to his supposed insider-ness

And there it is:

Arizona's no-name defense at the very least will be interesting next year under new coordinator Marcel Yates. While there really isn't anything "new" in football, the Wildcats "secret" scheme might be secret because it's creatively evolving as a collaboration between Yates, an entirely rebuilt -- and much younger -- defensive staff and Rich Rodriguez. After watching a full-go practice Thursday in which the defense won the day, I was impressed, though mostly by the spirited and amusing trash talking banter between coaches and players.

Ted Miller ESPN

How about 4 on the floor? Cat scratch fever?

UAEebs86 wrote:And there it is:

94 mph in a 55 mph zone, and the cop smelled weed. Jones must have ate the roach since he didn't get a possession charge. Unless he had his medical card, but even then he could still get a DUI.

UAEebs86 wrote:And there it is:

Pleaded guilty to 2, 2 others dropped.

http://tucson.com/sports/blogs/uafootba ... aign=share" target="_blank

Instagram videos from Wed practice 1.

Instagram videos from Wed practice 2.

There was a spring scrimmage today, right? Anyone go? Any new wrinkles on offense or defense?

Michael Lev, Daily Star, has the best free account I read this morning.

It was just a practice open to the public, so not really a chance to see new wrinkles or schemes. Here is a couple of observations from my vantage point.

Anu was dressed with everyone else before practice. About 5:30 he started huddling with trainers (my guess) and didn't take part in any warm-ups after that. He vanished after the team warm-up and I guess he went for therapy for the reported hamstring tweak. I was surprised he wasn't at least watching practice with the QB coach and talking with the other QBs. The only possibly significant injury I saw during practice was Jake Matthews with a possible shoulder problem. Walked away with a trainer and never seen again.

Here's my impressions. QBs: Dawkins, Tate, Medina, and #10 (not on the online roster or the roster available at the practice) had all the rotations. Dawkins and Tate are clearly the top 2 behind Anu. Both have stronger arms than Anu, but overthrew most of their deep balls. Tate is fast, elusive and can throw the ball on a rope, but also behind on the offense and was slower to the see the open guy and took more sacks. Dawkins was the guy who looked like he was taking a leadership role. He was talking to guys, encouraging, and more interactive with everyone.

WRs: Too many dropped balls during drills. Phillips is now #11 and looked like the best of the group. Tony Ellison (or perhaps Abraham Mendivil) in a one on one drill with a DB kept his eye on a ball knocked away by a DB, turned picked the ball out of the air and ran for a TD. Shun Brown and Trey also looked sharp. One player getting a spring tryout (#83 with long hair) had good speed and made a couple great catches, but is not on any roster yet. He did not play in the scrimmage portion.

TEs: Matt Morin and Kern both looked good and should be used in the offense, but this is Arizona spring ball. Who knows what will happen in the fall.

RBs: David Kelley, Ch 13, Reported Nick Wilson did not participate, but I thought I saw him for a few series early in the scrimmage portion and he looked great. Zach Green got a lot of the scrimmage time and looked good as did Bradford when he was in. The surprise to me was #32, Khaylub Thompson. He got some of the late work in the scrimmage with the 3rd or 4th team and he had some good runs.

Here is my one significant observation of the defense. They were more aggressive. DBs were tighter and aggressive during drills. The thing that stood out to me was the defensive was always looking for opportunities to strip the ball. The 2-4 times a ball came loose the defense was super, aggressive to get the ball regardless of what was going on with a whistle. Our defense players want the ball!

DeAndre' Miller looked like the best defensive player during the limited scrimmage situations. Cruikshank looks like he is clearly in the battle to start at corner. RJ Morgan left one of the scrimmage situations really pissed and slammed his helmet into the bench leaving the field.

STs: Pollack made all his field goals. Only one shanked punt all day, but I missed who kicked it. Neal and Phillips did all of the punt catching.

Finally, it was a perfect evening to watch practice. They worked hard to get fans involved on the field with Matty D giving commentary on different parts of practice. Nice event, but a smaller crowd then I have seen at any of the spring scrimmages.

Playing on the PAC-12 Network right now.

Glad to hear about the aggressiveness on the part of the D.

Was able to watch it on the Pac12 network. It was interesting to see Dawkins out there with some swag, slinging the ball around. Seemed to know the offense well. The announcers said he was running with the 1s, but Nick Wilson was running with Werlinger (I believe he was #10, ANG). So maybe they were mixing it up.

It seemed that everyone was going at about 80% speed/intensity to me. Shun Brown's long TD was a good play, but it seemed like the D let up on hitting him. Or I hope that was the case.

Tate was definitely what I was looking out for. Showed some elusiveness and speed. Rocket for an arm too. Threw the ball about 70 yards in the long throw competition.

Note of frustration: I counted one high snap that went over Werlinger. I hope that was a 3rd string center because that killed us last year.

Tate has the tools but he's raw. It's gonna take time for him to learn the offense because he needs to pick a target and get the ball out as quickly as RRs scheme requires you to. Several times he seemed like he recognized where he wanted to go with the ball but by the time he started to pull back to throw it was too late. It'll come to him, but there's reasons why Solomon redshirted in favor of Denker. This scheme requires very fast decisions. Dude is quick as hell, though, and can sling it.

The defense was indeed more aggressive. They're behind the offense right now but we all figured that would be the case. They're doing things different while the offense is still running the same things. They're lining up with three down linemen and usually another guy or two up. The blitzes are fast and frequent. They'll send 5-6 guys regularly. The corners are playing better, but they will be on an island with some of the blitzes to they'll have to play a lot better. The QBs often had to throw or bolt in a hurry because there were so many guys coming in. It's going to be a risk-reward defense that's going to create big plays in both directions. They aren't going to wait for the action to come to them like last year.

Love the aggressiveness on D. I can live with any mistakes in that type of scheme. Press the issue and dictate to the offense

With Donte this is a different team. The hands on teaching of technique will pay off in spades. You can tell he is vested, this really gives me something to believe in.

Love it!

That mic'd up bit was fun to watch. Really liked watching him teach defending run plays.

On the practice vid, later in the video you can see Wilson with a nice run, seeing the hole and taking the space. You also see Tate getting picked off, another illustration of him needing to make a faster decision. Again, he'll learn, but it's a crazy offense for a QB to learn.

With basketball season over, it's time to turn our full attention back to football. Bring on the Spring Ball news!

Spring camp has already been over for a while

ASUHATER! wrote:Spring camp has already been over for a while

This is not a factual statement.