Double-T Nation News:
It took me a while, but I like the dingbat divider between stories. I think that most of you could care less what I use, but I like for DTN to be easy on the eyes and something you can read easily. Oh, and yes this 
is a dingbat.
DTN's Top Eight:
- Great Olympic moments on YouTube. You could waste an hour here (Jesse Owens, Fosbury Flop, Bob Beamon, Carl Lewis, and make sure and watch the Billy Mills clip - absolute greatness).
- Yahoo's Kelly Dwyer on why the Redeem Team beat Australia. This is a good read.
- Tiger Woods walks on water. Pretty cool to watch this.
- 2009 and 2010 Texas Tech opponent New Mexico is in some trouble with the NCAA.
- Flags Over Raiderland with news on a sellout of all season tickets. Pat yourselves on the back.
- Bring On The Cats on moving the Iowa State and Kansas State game to Arrowhead.
- This guy ("and boom goes the dynamite") will be broadcasting in Waco. I'm moving to Waco.
- Welcome SB Nation blog Driveline Mechanics, which is all about pitching mechanics.
Texas Tech Football:
LAJ's Don Williams feature is on left tackle Rylan Reed as he comes back from a broken ankle:
"I’m pretty confident in the way it feels right now," Reed said Tuesday, "and it’s going to feel better by the time the first game comes. It’s not like tomorrow’s game time, so I’ve still got a little bit of time to let it heal more, but I feel fine right now."
That's tremendous news. If Reed is completely healthy, then this offense is going to be scary-good. Diggity. I also like this bit from Reed at the end of the article on giving up less than a sack for every 43 pass attempts:
"We’re trying to get a lot fewer than that," Reed said. "Our goal is make Graham Harrell the most protected quarterback in the nation. That’s our goal, to be the best offensive line around the country on every Saturday. We have a great chemistry, we mesh well and we’ve all worked together well. So we’re going to have a great year."
LAJ's Williams' Red Raiders Football Notebook provides more detail on the cornerback position and it appears that it's LaRon Moore and Brent Nickerson, per cornerbacks' coach Brian Mitchell:
"They’re going to get the same amount of reps," Mitchell said. "That’s not a problem going that late. They’ve been working with (safety) Darcel (McBath) and the first unit or the second unit for a while. The calls are still the same. We’re not going to miss anything in continuity with the first group of guys."
Remember that Nickerson (6'0") adds that height component that they were searching for with Reed in comparison to his competition Moore (5'9"), Bunton (5'8") and Richardson (5'11").
Williams' Notebook also has notes on Taylor Potts, update on the kicking battle, update on scout team v. the regular 28.
I missed this the other day, but RedRaiderSports.com's Mitchell Fish featured junior weakside linebacker Blake Collier. I tend to forget about Collier which is completely unfair because he's certainly talented enough to earn playing time on this team. Here's Collier on making sure he's part of the 28:
"Defense looks good; we’ve got a lot of depth," Blake enthused to RaiderPower. "The coaches mentioned today how we’re going to eliminate it down to 28 players on both sides, so everybody’s just trying to step their game up right now and make that 28 cut."
And Collier on playing for Ruffin McNeill:
[Coach McNeill] keeps the intensity high, has everybody flying around, and that’s my kind of football… He likes to uncomplicate everything, so that way everybody can just run and hit like he says."When you get everybody thinking too much, they’re trying to do this, do that. He has everybody in pretty much one gap come down here, that’s what he wants. We’re hurting on the run defense, that’s what we’re trying to stop. So we’re just trying to get everybody coming downhill to stop the run.
"Everybody doesn’t have to think; you see a run, you come downhill, you go to your gap, and if everybody does their assignment, we’re going to make the play every time."
Pete Fiutak of College Football News ranks the top spread quarterbacks in the nation and I'm somewhat shocked to say that Graham Harrell is #1:
The key will be to keep the interceptions to a minimum with eight of his picks coming in a two-game stretch against Missouri and Colorado, both losses, and then he started to get the ball out of his hands even quicker to counteract the pass rush. While he's not a regular runner, he's mobile enough to take off from time to time when needed. A long, thin 6-3 and 203 pounds, he doesn't look like he's tough as nails but he is. Most importantly, he is clutch. After two straight fantastic bowl wins and big performance after big performance, he is the team's unquestioned main man.
It's not the number of interceptions that Harrell throw, its the number of interceptions that he throws in any given game that's troublesome. If Harrell were to spread out those 8 interceptions over the course of a season, then I'm absolutely fine with that, but when they all happen in 1 game, then there are issues.
Texas Tech Baseball:
There's a small blurb on Rivals.com's Kendall Rogers' notebook on Dan Spencer and 2009's schedule:
New Texas Tech coach Dan Spencer has gotten acclimated to his new position with the Red Raiders. In a discussion I had with him this week, Spencer unveiled some notes from his team's 2009 schedule. The Red Raiders will host Southern Utah for a three-game set, will play New Mexico in mid-week action, will play a three-game set at Cal State Northridge, will play a single mid-week game against UC Riverside, and caps off their non-conference schedule with a trip to the Palm Springs, Calif., Tournament, which includes Oregon State, Gonzaga, UC Riverside and San Francisco.
Lots of West Coast teams there, I get the feeling that Spencer is trying to lay some groundwork to recruit in familiar waters. Also, would someone please invite me to go to Palm Springs for that tournament? Sounds like an absolutely terrific get-a-way: Palm Springs and college baseball.