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Red Raider Gridiron | Morris: Don't "Mistake Our Kindness for Weakness"; Tausch & Richardson Gone

Back-up quarterbacks Tanner Tausch and Mike Richardson are leaving the program. Offensive coordinator Eric Morris talks Kingsbury: "Don't mistake our kindness for weakness." Plus, Kerry Hyder visited the Cowboys.

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Q&A with Saturday Edge: Hey, I did a Q&A with Saturday Edge about things after the spring, so go check it out (via Saturday Edge).

Tausch and Richardson = Gone: Well, that didn't last long as Tanner Tausch and Mike Richardson have decided to leave the program, with Tausch focusing on academics and Richardson looking to play immediately, so he'll look elsewhere (via LAJ). The quarterbacks that are expected to be here in the fall (or summer) are Patrick Mahomes, Vincent Testaverde, Jr., Payne Sullins and Mason McClendon. We fine.

Morris Opines on the Program: This is really good and I suggest that you read the whole thing as offensive coordinator Eric Morris does a terrific Q&A (via ESPN). I'm only going to quote two parts, but I'm really wanting you to go read the whole thing. You'll thank me later and buy me a beer. The first bit is about how Kingsbury differs from Mike Leach as far as offensive game planning:

Kliff does a great job finding, catering to the athletes on his team, finding a way to get them the ball in space. Those are two things, but they’re really similar as far as running the organization day-to-day. Mike is a really late guy, he’ll stay up all hours of the night. Kliff is a really early guy, he’ll be up here at 4 a.m. pretty much every single morning. That’s a little bit of a difference. Kliff’s dad with his military background and coaching background, what surprised me so far, [is the] discipline and the way he runs a tight ship with the players.

I do think that an offense needs to morph a bit to play to the strength of the players rather than be something that doesn't change at all.

Then this was just great. That first sentence is what it's all about and it's great that Kingsbury and the rest of the coaching staff how to be adults and young men and all of that stuff.

The worst thing ever is if you mistake our kindness for weakness. It’s definitely a case where we have to pull on the reins a little bit more at times. And Coach does an incredible job of really teaching these guys about how to be respectful to women, to people that are trying to help this program, to donors, to people that serve us food at the training table and things of that nature. And if they don’t, there’s punishment for it. He’s done an awesome job of not letting things go, even though they have excuses. If they mess up, there’s going to be a cost to pay. That’s one thing they know, and you can ask any player right now, if they’re not going to class, if they’re not doing the right things, then there’s going to be a price to pay.

Just love that. This isn't to say that things won't happen, but you have to coach them up to try to be good human beings. Just great.

Hyder Visits Cowboys: DT Kerry Hyder went on his only visit thus far, to the Dallas Cowboys yesterday and he talked about what he brings to the team as a defensive tackle (via Dallas Cowboys):

"I always consider myself a defensive lineman. We played a lot of schemes at Tech, and I was able to play in every defense and be productive," Hyder said. "So I feel like I can play any scheme no matter what it is. I consider myself a defensive lineman. Not a 3-technique, not a 4-technique, I play D-Line. Put me somewhere and I can play it."

Links:

Pretty good Q&A with Uniwatch's Paul Lukas talking with the guys that created the SpeedFlex helmet and how it is improved (via ESPN).

I love this NCAA Union stuff and I think I've found some lawyas say that Title IX doesn't mean anything and some say that it's problematic (via Inside Higher Ed).  We're just getting started.

Kingsbury was on the Jim Rome show (via Jim Rome).

Texas Tech has two players in ESPN's top 50 players (via ESPN).

Action: Goosebumps. Seriously. Goosebumps.