Look at the sights and sounds from the third day of fall camp Friday as Arkansas football continues to get ready to open the season Sept. 26 at home against Georgia.
Holt on Hogs’ athletes being safer together than getting around students
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette writer Bob Holt tells Phil Elson, Matt Jenkins and Matt Travis on Halftime that the players feel safer around the football program than out and about.
Halftime Pod Presented By Jeff’s Clubhouse — August 21, 2020
Phil and Smackdown wrap up the week with a great edition of Halftime, including where Felipe Franks lands in the national QB rankings, where Phil needs to hike this weekend, and much more. Also, we really missed our pal Matty T today.
ESPN’s Cubelic joins groups looking for big things from Hogs’ Burks this year
For a guy that didn’t make it into the end zone as a freshman, Arkansas’ Treylon Burks is a guy expected to be there on a regular basis as a sophomore.
Former Auburn offensive lineman ESPN’s Cole Cubelic, who also co-hosts a daily show at WJOX in Birmingham, Alabama, is in that group, too.
“He’s got legit juice,” Cubelic said Friday morning with Tye Richardson and Tommy Craft (The Morning Rush) on ESPN Arkansas. “He’s a guy that can get over the top, hurt you in the open field, really good hands, good route-runner.”
Over the summer, Cubelic listed Burks as his breakout player in the league, that has some pretty good players in it already.
“There’s a bunch of good receivers in this league,” Cubelic said. “But (Burks) is one that because of the team he plays on probably doesn’t get enough attention. For me, when you talk about guys that know how to separate, be different and offer something extra you’ve got to have explosiveness and that’s what I see with him.”
So do his teammates. Cornerback Montaric Brown sees him up close in practice every day.
“He can do anything,” Brown said after practice Wednesday. “He has speed, power, and he can just run by you. Even though he’s like 230, he can run by you. He’s got all the weapons. He’s built like an NFL receiver, to me. He can do anything.”
Cubelic sees it in his work with ESPN where he’s comparing players from all across the college football landscape.
“He’s a guy who has elite explosive ability,” Cubelic said. “I think they’re going to find ways to utilize that and he’s going to have a big year.”
That’s the plan for Sam Pittman and we got the idea from him last week Burks is going to be on just about every special team where he’s “dynamic.”
“He’s talented enough to be the No. 1 receiver on several teams,” Pittman said. “We’ve got to find ways to get the ball to him, whether it’s throwing it to him, running him out of the backfield, throwing quick swings to him.
“He’s a big, fast receiver that we need to get touches to him.”
Last year five different quarterbacks never could quit figure out how to get to the ball to Burks consistently. Even the multi-talented receiver from Warren took a snap at quarterback in the Wild Hog formation.
Feleipe Franks has the experience and arm to get the ball to him, even though new offensive coordinator Kendal Briles is bringing in a new system but he’s betting they make it work.
“No. 1 things can be simplified,” Cubelic said. “There’s a lot of, ‘hey, we get a one-on-on we’re throwing the deep ball,’ it’s just that easy. You’re going into the season with a guy that knows the speed of the game, knows what it’s about.
“When you’re talking about stretching the field — obviously we’ve seen that pass he threw at the end against Tennessee rolling to his right and throwing it 74 yards — the guy’s got the arm to stretch ANY defense anywhere. Those shots are going to be taken.”
But Cubelic remembers what Franks’ former coach Dan Mullen told him a couple of years ago.
“They were completely excited about the way he could run and what kind of runner he could be,” Cubelic said. “It’s an added experience you can utilize and maybe something you can use but his experience is going to be big.”
It comes down to the pieces falling into place.
“(Franks) has every bit of the talent to be a big time quarterback in this league,” Cubelic said. “He’s just got to have that moment like Jason Campbell at Auburn did (in 2004 taking the Tigers to a perfect season) and when that happens he’s got a chance to really take off.”
New offensive coordinator Kendal Briles is part of that. Having guys catching the ball is another.
All of which is why Cubelic thinks Burks could really break out this year.
Just like Hog fans are hoping.
Bud Light Seltzer Morning Rush Podcast – Sold a bill of goods, betting on AR, Cole Cubelic
Tye & Tommy on buying the wrong Razorback stock, Cole Cubelic joins and more!
Starting season 2-2 shouldn’t be that big of hill for Razorback fans
Apparently, things have fallen so far with Arkansas football a lot of the fan base considers a 2-2 start to this all-SEC scheduled season of games something impossible.
That notion is often fed by some that have stopped making excuses for the failures of past problems and is now somehow unable (or unwilling) the last three seasons showed a record not indicative of the talent level.
Now that level probably wasn’t going to challenge for a division title but it should have been in a bowl game of some type … all three seasons. I really don’t care what the recruiting numbers showed.
Derek Ruscin (Ruscin & Zach) on ESPN Arkansas said Thursday afternoon he’s going out there on a limb the Razorbacks will start the season 2-2.
He’s not out there alone.
The Hogs can beat both Mississippi schools this year. They shouldn’t have lost to Ole Miss the last two years. They had talent close enough to make it a game against Mississippi State all three years.
By the end of 2016, the Hogs haven’t had a coach they had much confidence in and the last two years they were expressing disgust off the record with the guy in charge.
For the last two seasons at quarterback, the most important position to have consistency, it’s been a revolving door in Fayetteville. It was run like a high school program for two seasons.
Arkansas brought in some really good players the last couple of seasons that was actually coached DOWN.
Alabama’s Bear Bryant explained it best in the early 1970’s when he explained coaching as taking his 85% players, having them trained and coached to play 10% over that ability and they were going to beat those 95% players in the fourth quarter playing 10% below their ability every time.
Coaches say it’s about the players, which is mostly true. What they don’t say is winning games is getting those players to want to do things they normally don’t want to do. Very few players are going to play up to 100% of their ability without coaching and motivation.
Rakeem Boyd’s comment at the Zoom press conference Wednesday was one line I haven’t heard before in Fayetteville.
“They push us to limits this team didn’t know it could go to,” he said about the coaches on this staff.
There’s been one coach a couple of years ago that kept talking about the team “being close” and having to “strain” more to complete plays. He couldn’t get that last bit out of them.
The staff the last two years started off confused and got more dazed with every passing day.
What happened last year has no bearing on this year other than the fact some really, really, talented players were redshirted and Sam Pittman with a new staff and an apparently totally different approach.
The players seem to be reacting differently. You can never really know about these things until you see a game but the way they react to the coaches is different.
In the limited press conferences they appear to actually believe what they’re saying.
Nobody really thought they believed what they said the last few years.
The talent is there. They have a quarterback that’s taken a team from four wins one season to 10 the next when nobody was giving them a shot, either.
The Hogs won’t go that far. Not playing the most difficult schedule in the country.
But they will half of their first four games.
On believing that, Ruscin is not by himself.
RECRUITING THURSDAY: Davenport says Burks could be Hogs’ best ever
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette recruiting editor Richard Davenport on Morning Rush with Tye Richardson and Tommy Craft on unlimited upside of Warren’s Treylon Burks at receiver.
Franks, Boyd, Cunningham named to watch list for ’21 Senior Bowl
FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas quarterback Feleipe Franks, running back Rakeem Boyd and offensive lineman Myron Cunningham were named to the 2021 Reese’s Senior Bowl Top 250 watch list Thursday in a press release.
Players must be a senior or fourth-year junior to be eligible for the Reese’s Senior Bowl, which is the nation’s most prestigious college all-star game and has been played annually since 1950.
Franks will be playing his first season in Fayetteville as a graduate transfer after a successful three-year run at Florida, where he played in 28 games and made 25 starts, registering 4,593 passing yards with 37 touchdowns to 17 interceptions and a 59.1% completion percentage (354-for-599).
On the ground, the Crawfordsville, Florida, product ran for 438 yards and eight scores.
Last season, Franks started the first three games of the season but missed the remainder of the campaign due to an injury.
In his last healthy season as a redshirt sophomore in 2018, he started all 13 games guiding the Gators to a 10-3 record and a No. 6 final ranking in the USA Today Coaches’ Poll throwing for 2,457 yards and 24 touchdowns.
Leading the Gators to a 41-15 thrashing of No. 7 Michigan in the Chick-Fil-A Peach Bowl, he earned Offensive MVP honors racking up 173 passing yards (13-for-23) and one touchdown, while rushing for 74 yards and a score.
Franks is also on the watch list for the Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award.
Boyd led the team in rushing yards and rushing touchdowns in 2018 and 2019, totaling 1,867 career rushing yards and 10 touchdowns in his first two seasons at Arkansas.
As a junior, he ran for 1,133 yards and eight scores, while rushing for over 100 yards in five games.
Boyd ranked fourth in the SEC and 27th nationally averaging 94.4 yards per game; in addition, Boyd’s 6.4 yards per carry ranked ninth in the conference.
On just eight carries, he rushed for a career-best 185 yards against Western Kentucky, averaging 23.1 yards per attempt, including two touchdown runs of 76 and 86 yards with the latter being a career-long.
As a sophomore in 2018, Boyd ranked 10th in the SEC running for 6.0 yards per carry and 13th among league-leaders totaling 734 rushing yards.
Both the Maxwell and Doak Walker Awards tabbed Boyd to their respective watch lists before the 2020 season.
Appearing in 11 games and making 10 starts predominately at left tackle and right guard, Cunningham proved to be a durable offensive lineman in his first season last year, playing every snap of the game on eight occasions.
Cunningham excelled in pass protection and only surrendered one sack on 383 pass blocking plays. Prior to arriving in Fayetteville, Cunningham played two seasons at Iowa Western Community College, where he was a 2018 NJCAA First-Team All-American.
The Reese’s Senior Bowl has had 93 total players selected in the last two NFL Drafts, with 40 selected in the first three rounds, including 10 first-round picks in 2019.
Next year’s game will shift venues to the brand-new Hancock Whitney Stadium on the University of South Alabama’s campus in Mobile, Alabama, after being played at Ladd-Peebles Stadium since 1951.
One thing that differentiates the Reese’s Senior Bowl from other all-star games is the participation of two full NFL coaching staffs.
Last year, the two teams were coached by the Detroit Lions and Cincinnati Bengals staffs and there were over 900 credentialed NFL personnel in Mobile for game week.
Information from Arkansas Communications is included in this story.
ADG’s Murphy on observations from Hogs’ second day of fall camp Wednesday
It was the first time the media got to see Arkansas on the practice field since last November and Tom Murphy of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette gave his observations to Tye Richardson and Tommy Craft on ESPN Arkansas.
