White defensive backs 08-09

[Jimmy Chitwood]

in Wednesday night's ESPN-televised game, did anyone else see Northern Illinois safety Mike Sobol run down Ball State tailback Miquale Lewis and save a touchdown?

Lou Holtz and Mark May had been talking about the 5-6 running back's speed on several occasions, yet not a word was said when Sobol tracked him down from nearly the opposite side of the field to save the score...

how "odd."

also, i don't recall a single mention of Lewis being too small, despite his only being 5-6. once again, it appears only white kids can ever be "too small."

 

[Jimmy Chitwood]

just a couple of injury notes.

BYU's starting cornerback Scott Johnson is out for the remainder of the regular season with a double groin tear suffered last week against Wyoming. he was hit from two different directions while himself turning to make a tackle, and the impact caused him to do the splits. ouch! it is hoped that he will be healthy in time for BYU's bowl game, whichever it might be.

in his absence, another white athlete manned the cornerback spot. Andrew Rich did a solid job in his first ever start at corner. at 6-3, 202-pounds, the sophomore is HUGE for a cornerback, but he has good speed, tremendous leaping ability, and is very physical.

****************************

Colorado State's excellent corner, Nick Oppenneer, has been gutting it out. he's been playing basically with one arm for the last three or four games, with a shoulder injury. but he'd rather play hurt than hang out on the sidelines, and is battling every game. he has the heart of a champion!

despite the injury, he is still their best cover man, and in my opinion likely the best corner in the West.

 

[SteveB]

Texas A&M's Jordan Peterson has been MIA for most of the season. He was hurt early in the season and replaced by true freshman Trent Hunter (black), who has been playing well and has kept the starting job. Peterson has been used in nickel situations and special teams.

 

[celticdb15]

Tommy Nelson Out of Illionis State is a free safety who runs a 4.47 forty and also returns kicks for the team.


Here's a draftdaddy article on him


[url]http://www.pantagraph.com/articles/2008/11/11/usports/doc491 a2225b375a630756645.txt[/url]

 

[devans]

Keeping it in the family. This piece of news is a bit out of date - but I found it interesteing


From September 29, 2008


CALEB URBAN OF TRINITY UNIVERSITY, a 6-1, 200-pound junior wide receiver/kick returner from Victoria Texas., has been selected the SCAC Football Special Teams Player-of-the-Week for games played Saturday, September 27.
Urban returned the second half kick 100 yards for a touchdown to spark Trinity to a 35-10 win over SCAC foe Colorado College. His kickoff extended the Tigers lead to 21-3 and helped deflate any Colorado College comeback attempt.

Urban is the first Trinity player to return a kickoff for a touchdown since his older brother - Arizona Cardinals wide receiver Jerheme Urban - returned a kickoff for a score against St. John's in the 2002 NCAA Division III Playoffs.


Edited to apologise - should be in receivers thread!Edited by: devans

 

[backrow]

Anthony Scirotto and Bo McNally had interceptions today

 

[Jimmy Chitwood]

i saw something this past weekend that i don't believe i've ever seen before.

in the Harvard-Yale rivalry matchup, Yale started a field corner who was bigger than their linebackers!

at 6-2, 225-pounds, Yale junior Paul Rice is the rarest of athletes: a big field corner, who is white.

some of you may not know what a field corner is, so i'll briefly explain. a field corner is the cornerback who always plays the wide side of the field, as opposed to the boundary corner who plays on the narrow side of the field. not many teams flip their corners anymore, preferring to simply have each corner stay on either the left or right half of the field.

however, teams that flip their corners (field or boundary) put the best cover man on the wide side of the field because the more space a receiver has the harder it is to cover a wideout man-to-man.

that means the GIANT cornerback Paul Rice is an exceptional coverman, and he bore that out in the Yale-Harvard game. he was only thrown at twice, one incompletion and one completion where he forced a fumble.

with his size and speed, he lined up all over the place on obvious running situations. he is an exceptional player, and will be a senior next fall.

Paul Rice jumps over a receiver to make an interception

 

[jared]

Wow. Good find on Paul Rice, JC. He had 4 INTs this year in just 9 games. He's also part of the #3 pass defense in the FCS which gave up just 6 TDs this season. He's a good sleeper for next year. Edited by: jared

 

[itsme]

How about this guy(Drew McAllister).

He leads USC's defense with 3 INT's.

Edited by: itsme

 

[backrow]

Iowa's FR defensive back (listed at CB by ESPN but plays SS mostly) Taylor Sash had 2 interceptions for 74 yards in the bowl game, he now has 5 on the season!

 

[celticdb15]

Draft Daddy once again must read this site. They had this inresponse of white hating Kirk Herbsreit who constantly ridiculed Penn St. safety Scirotto unfairly the whole rose bowl


Also, prior to the U.S.C. game, one of our sources told us Anthony Scirrotto should get a Combine invite and was projected as a latter round pick, with a chance to rise with a good 40 time (N.F.L. scouts listed him at about 4.53 coming into the season). That same source told us a Combine invite is no longer very likely and he may've dropped into free agent status after the Bowl game. But in fairness to this kid, we think the vicious beating he took from ABC's Kirk Herbstreit during the Bowl game was probably a bit undeserved. Herbie put a ton of blame on Scirrotto for Penn State's loss because he felt he was "late in coverage" too often, but there were many reasons for that offensive burst by U.S.C. Anthony did save some dignity, however, when Keyshawn Johnson came into the booth in the 4th quarter and noted to Herbie that P.S.U.'s safeties had no chance at all if the teams cornerbacks didn't make a better effort to cover the wide receivers. In one replay, two minutes after Kirk flogged Anthony for giving up a touchdown, the replay showed the cornerback stood still, while receiver ran down field unabated. Keyshawn pointed out that with a quarterback like Mark Sanchez slinging the pigskin and a N.F.L. caliber receiver on the receiving end, very few safeties in America could break up that play with no help at all from a cornerback.