First, I'd like to thank the Mothership for tapping us on the shoulder to post these practice reports. I feel like the fireballer from double A getting called up to the big leagues.
Barking Carnival will now be home to the Asset's practice reports so congratulations to all involved. If you're not familiar with my home site Recruitocosm, the Asset is a source close to the program who has a chance to watch these events up close and personal, which is tricky because he's often times running a 4.6 forty while he's observing. But enough with the housekeeping. Here are his tidbits from Monday night's workout.
Garrett Gilbert had a solid day today, but keep in mind that the Horns are still in shell work (hats and shoulder pads) and there's no threat of contact. Still, Gilbert showed accuracy, poise, and a live arm, delivering the football to where it needed to go against a salty front 7 that used a variety of blitzes and coverages. David Ash continued to show flashes as well and has to be considered top two at the position if we're going by the last three workouts.
The battle of offense vs. defense seems to be a turning tide at this very early stage in the game. In the first two workouts the defense seemed to dictate the action to the offense, but in Monday's workouts the offense seems to have pulled even. The QB play and the wide receivers still had solid days, but make no mistake about it, the offensive line really competed today, and look no further than Stacey Searels as the source of their competitiveness. He seems to be instilling a "never back down" attitude among his charges and it was manifested in an indirect exchange with his coaching counterpart Bo Davis.
Let's just say that verbal volleys were exchanged between both offensive and defensive line groups (coaches included) about manhood, toughness, and womanhood. Both units are coached by tough, some might say mean, SOB's and that fact was on full display today. The good news for Texas fans is that the perennial whipping boys, the OLine, didn't back down one iota. And neither did their coach. Be sure to check out the Searels notes from And The Valley Shook here: Trench Warfare
In the spotlight battle, Mason Walters, David Snow, Trey Hopkins, and Thomas Ashcraft all had good days. Jackson Jeffcoat, Desmond Jackson, and Alex Okafor were beasts on the other side. If games are truly won in the trenches, today was a good harbinger of things to come for Longhorn fans.
That's about it. Stay tuned for tomorrow's workout when the boys should be wearing full pads.