Patrick Hudson Is A Texas Longhorn

Ever since Silsbee stud Patrick Hudson departed Norman this weekend without proffering his signature, the folks who'd been most dialed in to his recruitment began to feel more confident that he'd follow his heart to Texas.  Hudson had slated his announcement for Thursday, but news broke early this A.M. that the decision is in.

And Hudson will be a Longhorn.

His HUDL makes it clear why landing the big man is a very big deal for the future - if not necessarily the immediate present - of the Longhorn program:

Hudson's highlights can basically be summed up thusly:

"Our Hudsons will blot out the sun."

"Then we'll fight in the shaAAAUUUUGGGHHH!!!!" *gets driven off screen*

Hudson is simply a mountain of a man, and even when he gets too upright he's got the baseline coordination to stay locked on and take guys for a ride.   It can be tough to judge a player's true functional power from high school tapes just because the strength and technique of the guys he's going up against can vary so wildly.  So it's instructive to know that Hudson sported a diabolical 715-pound deadlift as a junior to set the Texas High School Powerlifting Association state record for the Division 2 Super-heavyweight class.  If you check out that link you'll see a few guys in other divisions and classes that meet or exceed that number, but if you've ever seen a single-sport powerlifter you'll realize that most of those dudes aren't exactly sporting what you'd call top-notch movement skills.

Hudson's own movement skills are rare for a guy with his frame and power, though there's some refinement work to be done.  He does have the tendency to pop up high out of his stance when run blocking, but that's probably more a function of easy dominance than innate stiffness.  He's got the wingspan and punch to be a menace in pass protection, though there's precious little pass pro work to evaluate in his HUDL highlights.  The general consensus from those who've seen more tape is that his footwork currently resides somewhere between "advanced" and "Buck Major."  There's some mauling right tackle potential in play here, but it's probably easiest to project Hudson inside - when he's consistently firing out with a flat back, he'll consistently put opponents flat on theirs.  A guy like Denzel Okafor is almost certainly more ready to step in and play right away, and it would be nice to do the Healthy Program Thing and 'shirt Hudson.  But while Charlie is in the midst of transforming the Texas OL chart from this:

to this:

It ain't there quite yet.  There's a decent chance we'll see some of Hudson in 2016, but even if he is pressed into action early we can all breathe a little easier in the knowledge that we won't be repeating the 2014 OL's journey to:

As the saga of the 2016 Baylor recruiting class' Great Escape winds down, we'd be remiss if we didn't give a quick shout-out to Baghdad Ashley Hodge, who has consistently put the "ass" in "Cassandra" while attempting to prognosticate each and every aspect of the Baylor debacle.  His plugged-in perspective as of 6/23:

While it's easy to take the low comedy road in bashing this perfidious purveyor of pap n' pablum, it's important to remember that not every guy named Ashley turns out to be an absolute tit:

Sometime in 2018 when Hudson is driving a Baylor DL four yards into the end zone to spring a Chris Warren TD, someone remind me to shoot a Tweet out to the fine folks at BearsTruth.com:

Listen up, you primitive screwheads - this is my BOOMSTICK.