Tilting at Windmills

A crowd of over 25,000 gathered in Norman for the OU Red-White Spring game. Many, like me, paid $10 to watch a glorified practice. But we do it because we know there won’t be OU football for 4 months and because we have no social life. So my lonely friends and I gathered at GFOMS to see what was going to happen and to look for things to worry and fret about. Before the actual scrimmage there was a flag football game played by several OU alums. I didn’t make it in time and didn’t hear much discussion about, but apparently Snorter Luster saw it.

The pregame coin toss group was joined by honorary captains Jamelle Holieway, Tony Casillas, Lydell Carr and Brian Bosworth. The team with the highest number of honorary captains with DUIs got to call the toss. The scoring system for the Red-White game was created by a combination of test lab monkeys on acid and the International Finance Department from the Price School of Business. I’ll admit up front I’m not sure what the final score was, but the white team (defense) won.

Casillas and Boz were there to show off their rings.

Initially the first team offense went against the first team defense. Jermaine Gresham, Matt Clapp, Brody Eldridge, Chris Brown and DeMarco Murray did not play but Sam Bradford did … for 3 series. Madu started in the slot and Justin Johnson started at TB. OU never ran the I-formation today and the schemes were very vanilla. It was a hurry up offense, but mostly hurry up and punt. Stephen Good was also sidelined, and Brian Lepak started in his place. He spent most of the day diving at DE’s and DT’s who ran by him. It was not a good day for the walk-on transfer from Colorado State. After a few plays the red team was forced to punt. Tress Way lost the coin toss so he was elected to punt today. His first few efforts were very poor, although I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and dismiss it as first game jitters from a redshirt frosh.

Landry Jones led the 2nd team offense against the 2nd team defense. Very quickly the young LB’s Franklin, Wort and Bird stood out. Javon Harris also got the call at safety for the #2′s. Jermie Calhoun was the #2 RB and he did show occasional bursts, but spent most of his time stopping short of the line and looking for a hole. Given the quickness of the OU defense, that was not a good idea.

For most of the first quarter (or for most of the game actually), the defensive line controlled the trenches. Bradford found himself under more pressure today than he had all of last year, but still stepped up to hit Brandon Caleb with a nice slant and followed it with a nice TD pass to Adron Tennell. Brian Jackson was the victim on both of those plays. J.R. Bryant and Mike Balogun got the start at LB with the #1′s, and Bryant was all over the field. He seems to be a little small and does get lost in traffic, but going downhill or side to side he is very effective. He appeared to separate the shoulder of TE Trent Rattaree on one vicious tackle. OU’s LB depth is absurd at this point. Brent V must be thinking he has died and gone to LB heaven and I’m sure he is scheming some way to get 11 linebackers on the field at one time.

Looks like Pooh has shaken off the injuries.

Drew Allen got work as the #3 QB and then began alternating with Landry as Bradford took a seat with 3 minutes left in the 1st quarter. Landry threw a pass to a stumbling Madu which was intercepted and returned for a TD by Dom Franks. Franks got 2 oskies on the day and appears to be our best CB right now, although Jackson was solid. The quarter ended with Donald Stephenson getting a couple of holding penalties. The LTs for the offense struggled all day as the DEs were just too quick.

Drew Allen was mostly ineffective today. He does show a good arm, but it seemed at times that he was going for the home run and not progressing through his reads. Jones was much steadier, although it is apparent it will take time for the rust to fall away. The second quarter was a hodge podge of bad blocking and impressive defense, although like most callers on the post game show, I’m not convinced the Oline is only a step above the band’s drumline in keeping people off the OU QBs. The blocking schemes in the scrimmage are very limited, and the offense was handcuffed by not having the big play weapons available. Also, the OU defense is pretty darn good.

Halftime was filled with the passing of the microphone to a long line of alums who had returned for the game. Most of their comments were muffled, but I know of one alum from the 1946 class who attended. Curtis Lofton, Jammal Brown, the Boz, Casillas, and Kent Bradford were a few of the notables who returned. And there was even another appearance on Owen Field by Bubba Moses. You know there is only 1. Dean Blevins got a smattering of boos and some light applause from the crowd. I’m not a fan of Dean’s, but it was rather sad.

The second half was fairly non-eventful. There was another nice oskie by Franks, a fumble forced by Jeremy Beal which was returned for a TD by J.R Bryant and some bad punting by Tress Way. On one occasion following a poor punt, Bob Stoops chewed on Way for a solid minute before shaking his head and turning away.

So, were questions answered today? Probably not. I don’t put a lot of stock in these games, but do think they serve some guide on individual players. When John (Finding) Nimmo throws what was the best pass of the 2nd half I remind myself that this is a game played to give guys like him a chance, but not a game to draw final conclusions on a team or player. Last year Sam Bradford struggled mightily in the Red White game. But he had a decent fall don’t you think?

I’ll close with some final thoughts, but this is just what I saw today. It doesn’t mean that these are trends or ultimate conclusions on the makeup of this team.

1. The Oline needs work. Habern was solid at center and probably had the best day of any of the linemen. The LT’ struggled against the quick DEs, but those DEs ARE quick so that can be forgiven.

2. We didn’t learn much about the receivers except that Broyles is the best one and Tennell is good when healthy. Madu at the slot has potential, but if Brown or Murray go down he needs to be back at the tailback slot. He is superior to Calhoun and Johnson right now. I can’t comment on their WR blocking at all, and I give an “incomplete” to Owens and Miller.

3. Our LB’s are good. Period.

4. Special teams are an issue. Again. Bob said after the game that Tress was nervous and that he has looked better in practice than he showed today. Of course, we heard the same things about the Hobbit Stevens last year so I’m not so sure that is good. Kickoff coverage was a non-issue today because the return game was never practiced. However, Way kicked off and his kicks were not very good. Hopefully the kid coming from Norman North can fill that role.

5. There were a LOT of recruits there today. In fact, an entire lower section was roped off for them and their families. I wasn’t able to get close enough to see who was who or measure vertical leaps so I’ll leave that discussion to others.

6. It was a good day. Nice weather, surrounded by Sooner fans, watching football on Owen Field. Yes, it was a good day.

We’ve been able to obtain the view-from-the-stands observations from inside OU’s scrimmage this past Saturday.

We see you, Bobby Jack ...

Atlantasooner already shared his scrimmage thoughts based on the publicly-available information. Here are some things you probably didn’t see:

Stoops losing his shit all day. We’ll probably get a watered-down, pursed-lips, surly Stoops at next weeks’ spring game. If you’d been where the action was last weekend, though, you would have seen Stoops:
Throw Gerald McCoy off the field for being what he thought was too rough with one of the quarterbacks. When McCoy got to the sidelines, he got another earful from Jackie Shipp.

Nearly kick the entire defense off of the field at one point. Hard to see what was going on, but suffice it to stay that Stoops wasn’t happy.

The offense struggled to move the ball against the defense, except when they were aided by penalties. This is likely another reason Stoops was going off all day.

No surprise here, but Jermie Calhoun and Justin Johnson got most of the reps at running back. Each of them had solid days, but no breakaway runs.

Jameel Owens got a lot of looks and had a great day. He made a nice play on a ball that was put up for grabs, corraling the pass on the sidelines. He also got wide open behind the defense at one point and just missed hauling in a sure touchdown.

Tom Wort had a solid day and got in a couple of nice pops.

Corey Wilson made an appearance at practice, still using a wheelchair. Best wishes for a speedy recovery, Corey.

The King showed up to watch practice with Dallas TE Jason Whitten in tow.