Reviewing the Redshirts | CB Thierry Nguema

PLAYER: Thierry Nguema

POSITION: Cornerback
HEIGHT: 5’10"
WEIGHT: 168
HIGH SCHOOL: Santiago (Corona, CA)
VIDEO: Clip 1

You know how sometimes, you don't ever look at things even though they are right there? So in looking at Nguema's Texas Tech profile I noticed that Nguema's parents have a different last name than him, Mark and Danna Dye. Being the parent of an adopted child, I was intrigued. So I started to look. This is one of Nguema's brothers, Tony Dye, a former free safety at UCLA. Then I did a search for Mark Dye and Mark was one of the parents that was upset at how the UCLA pro-day went down last year. Mark also played football and baseball at San Jose St. and even played some minor league ball for Houston. So maybe it is just me, but I find that interesting and it seems like there is a story here that I would love to see be told.

The other interesting thing is that I think Nguema greyshirted the year before, which means that he actually sat out a fall semester and waited to attend Texas Tech and I think he started to attend Texas Tech last spring, a year ago. I don’t know what the connection was with Texas Tech other than Texas Tech was Nguema’s best offer, the other being Villanova. I always find it interesting when a player will choose Texas Tech without having much, if any, connection with Lubbock and/or Texas Tech.

When Nguema committed, he was listed as being 6-0/175 from Corona California. Now Nguema is officially listed as 5-10/168. Nguema’s video said that he was closer to the 5-10/168 than the recruiting sites listing his height and weight. I always wondered how that worked.

Here is Nguema’s senior year video:

So what do we think of Nguema now? I think he’s in the same line with some of the other options at cornerback, like Jeremy Reynolds, J.J. Gaines, Brandon Bagley, and Olaoluwa Falemi. I don’t know the talent level that Nguema is playing at in his film. Not a lot of plays in coverage and I’d bet that he’s not strong enough right now to force Big 12 receivers inside or outside. The weight and strength deficiencies may be the biggest issues in getting on the field. If the speed is legitimate, then he’ll play, but when you’re a smaller cornerback, you have to have a strength to handle the bigger Big 12 receivers. There were a couple of instances where I thought that Nguema didn’t force the issue and created issues for the secondary.