Double-T Nation News:
Last night and the night before last I wrote quite a bit on Mr. Crabtree and tried to wrap my head around what he's been able to accomplish as a freshman. I've scheduled this to be posted at 10:00 a.m., figuring I needed to leave you guys plenty of time to digest the post and still get ready to party. You know, because it's Friday and we all party on Friday.
Texas Tech Football:
DMN's Brandon George is asking for questions to ask Captin Leach, so go over to the DMN College blog and get to work.
Congrats to Michael Crabtree, Louis Vasquez and Jamar Wall for being named to the Media's 2008 Preseason All-Big 12 Team. Please note that Mr. Crabtree was the only unanimous choice of the whole bunch.
The LAJ is asking for your favorite Texas Tech Football Stars, you can download the ballot here. There is one caveat, which is that no current players are eligible. Of course, this should be revised so Mr. Crabtree is eligible because there's no question who everyone's favorite receiver is and truthfully, a strong argument could be made that Graham Harrell should also be included.
I got a kick out of this, ESPN's Tim Griffin ranks the Big 12 Coaches as Players and unfortunately, Captain Leach was tied for last with Mangino:
11. (tie) Mike Leach, Texas Tech: Didn't play college football, spending much of his time playing club rugby and observing LaVelle Edwards' practices at BYU.
The only solace in all of this is that the Captain is trying to teach all of the folks out there who claim that you have to have played the game to know what you're talking about when it comes to football. The Captain proves that general philosophy wrong as he has more football knowledge in his pinkie than most mortals have in their entire body.
For all of us who are expecting great things from Brandon Sesay and McKinner Dixon, two outstanding JUCO defensive ends expected to contribute for Texas Tech this year, Rock M Nation took a look at the stats for the previous years' top JUCO defensive ends and how they played their first year at the NCAA level. Proving that for the most part, it is difficult to make a huge impact immediately.
ProFantasySports ranks the Big 12 Players from a fanasy perspective and as you would expect, Harrell, Crabtree, Morris, Lewis, Britton, Woods, and Crawford all make the list in some form or fashion. But the most interesting ranking was true freshman kicker Donnie Carona being ranked the #4 fantasy kicker. I get that he's on an offense that's going to score a ton of points, but I have no idea how good Carona is and if he's going to be able to help immediately. Physically, Carona is ready to go, but Carona will likely determine some close games this year. I'm crossing my fingers.