Kill mentions two guys with standout speed

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Doc1001

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On sports huddle this morning he said it was quite apparent in workouts that Stoudamire and Marcus Jones have standout speed. I am kind of intrigued with two star Jones. I have a feeling he may be our punt/kick returner. Kill has mentioned his name as standing out more than once. Please no one bring up the name Harold Howell.
 


Two is better than none. But certainly not up to what Coach wants.

When the Fall comes I am guessing Coach Kill will up his total a bit. Then a bit more in 2012 and some more in 2013.
 

My only issue with the standout speed thing is that he mentioned Stoudamire. Quick as a pistol, sure. However, how may times over the past few years has he had an open lane to the end zone only to get caught from behind? Kid has quicks, but top end speed was always something about him that concerned me.
 

frozengopher said:
My only issue with the standout speed thing is that he mentioned Stoudamire. Quick as a pistol, sure. However, how may times over the past few years has he had an open lane to the end zone only to get caught from behind? Kid has quicks, but top end speed was always something about him that concerned me.
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When the average play in a football game lasts less than 6 seconds.....quickness is speed. Sorry.

Remember Zach Vraa? Not enough speed for the Big Ten? He was the 110 state hurdle champion? He was signed not because he didn't have hundred yard speed, but because he didn't have quickness.
Quickness, acceleration, and explosiveness are much more important than straight line speed 99% of the time in football.
I would venture to guess that most of the time when people are talking about speed they are more referring to explosiveness and quickness than 100 meter dash times.
 


Rosemountian said:
When the average play in a football game lasts less than 6 seconds.....quickness is speed. Sorry.

Remember Zach Vraa? Not enough speed for the Big Ten? He was the 110 state hurdle champion? He was signed not because he didn't have hundred yard speed, but because he didn't have quickness.
Quickness, acceleration, and explosiveness are much more important than straight line speed 99% of the time in football.
I would venture to guess that most of the time when people are talking about speed they are more referring to explosiveness and quickness than 100 meter dash times.
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Zach Vraa isn't a great example considering he definitely should have gotten a Gopher offer, but I agree quickness is just as important as straight line speed
 

Speed is one thing, quickness is another. If you have or develop both you could play football. Speed comes in some athletes as another gear, ablity to run away, never being caught from behind. Quickness is something all Gopher players should have. Quick off the ball, quick to the hole, quick out of cuts. Quickness is a measure of explosion. 10 yard times are a measure. I know Coach Klein has been able to lower these times at NIU. I think they were somewhere around 1.55 and he broke into the 1.48 range or better. I wonder if Coach Klein will post the the top ten 10 yard times? Now if Stoudemier has quickness to go with speed, it translates into an ability of a shut down corner. Stoudenmeir has an additional measure of explosion, his veritcal leap. Another plus from a corner.
 

DrunkGopher said:
Zach Vraa isn't a great example considering he definitely should have gotten a Gopher offer, but I agree quickness is just as important as straight line speed
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I am curious why I keep hearing that Zach Vraa "definitely should have gotten a Gopher offer". I would have been 100% cool with him getting an offer and I always support the MN guys (except against the U) but I keep hearing about Zach Vraa like he proved something last year. The kid was RS as a freshman. I am not saying he won't eventually make us wish we had offered him but as of right now, the jury is still out.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
I am curious why I keep hearing that Zach Vraa "definitely should have gotten a Gopher offer". I would have been 100% cool with him getting an offer and I always support the MN guys (except against the U) but I keep hearing about Zach Vraa like he proved something last year. The kid was RS as a freshman. I am not saying he won't eventually make us wish we had offered him but as of right now, the jury is still out.
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well considering its all opinion, I think he should have gotten one not only because he was Mr Football but also because he was state Champ in the 110 hurdles. So he is obviously super athletic and those are the type of players that you make room. Also looking at the WRs we took last year and the fact that we had to go JUCO for them this year I think its safe to say we should have given him an offer.
 



As someone who is from Rosemount...I would have liked to see Vraa get an offer just to see how he would have done. He could outjump the D backs from Eagan and Eastview, would have been interesting to see if he could do that against better competition.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
I am curious why I keep hearing that Zach Vraa "definitely should have gotten a Gopher offer". I would have been 100% cool with him getting an offer and I always support the MN guys (except against the U) but I keep hearing about Zach Vraa like he proved something last year. The kid was RS as a freshman. I am not saying he won't eventually make us wish we had offered him but as of right now, the jury is still out.
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+1

Vraa - I watched him quite closely at the North Dakota State football camp between his Jr and Sr years and though he was at only one of the days there were others that were more impressive at WR. Good SR year but not spectacular and like you mentioned he was redshirted his freshman year at NDSU. I believe that he may have received a Preferred walk-on offer from the Gophers and that seemed about right. JMO albiet based on 1 day of WR drills at a camp.
 

46Gophers said:
+1

Vraa - I watched him quite closely at the North Dakota State football camp between his Jr and Sr years and though he was at only one of the days there were others that were more impressive at WR. Good SR year but not spectacular and like you mentioned he was redshirted his freshman year at NDSU. I believe that he may have received a Preferred walk-on offer from the Gophers and that seemed about right. JMO albiet based on 1 day of WR drills at a camp.
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I don't care that people disagree with me but I don't understand what having to redshirt at NDSU has to do with him getting a offer from the U? So by that definition nobody that plays at smaller schools who had to redshirt would be good enough for an offer from the U?
 

DrunkGopher said:
I don't care that people disagree with me but I don't understand what having to redshirt at NDSU has to do with him getting a offer from the U? So by that definition nobody that plays at smaller schools who had to redshirt would be good enough for an offer from the U?
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Nope, that's not it (from my perspective when I brought it up). My theory was that as of right now we have absolutely no idea if Vraa would have been a Big 10 caliber player or not. He has not done a single thing in college because he didn't play last season due to his redshirt. That is not to say that he won't prove us wrong in a couple years. However, no one has any idea.

My entire point was that I keep reading things on here that we "obviously", "definitely" should have offered Vraa. At this point in his career, I don't think a scholarship offer was obvious. Again, he might prove that wrong, but calling it "obvious" is misleading.
 



The reason he redshirted at NDSU was because he broke his collarbone his first week of practice.
 

Rosemountian said:
The reason he redshirted at NDSU was because he broke his collarbone his first week of practice.
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Yeah, I wasn't really implying that the fact that he was RS indicated that he wasn't good, I was just saying that he hasn't shown anything at the college level yet. So it's hard to really judge whether or not he should have gotten a scholarship.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
Nope, that's not it (from my perspective when I brought it up). My theory was that as of right now we have absolutely no idea if Vraa would have been a Big 10 caliber player or not. He has not done a single thing in college because he didn't play last season due to his redshirt. That is not to say that he won't prove us wrong in a couple years. However, no one has any idea.

My entire point was that I keep reading things on here that we "obviously", "definitely" should have offered Vraa. At this point in his career, I don't think a scholarship offer was obvious. Again, he might prove that wrong, but calling it "obvious" is misleading.
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ok I get that but at the same time that can be applied to anybody on any team at any level that hasn't played yet. But like I said earlier this is all opinion, so I definitely think he should have got one but I can see why other people don't.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
Yeah, I wasn't really implying that the fact that he was RS indicated that he wasn't good, I was just saying that he hasn't shown anything at the college level yet. So it's hard to really judge whether or not he should have gotten a scholarship.
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I knew you weren't but I just thought I would put it out there.
For the record, I did not think Vraa really should have gotten an offer. But that was in stark contrast to most everyone else in the town. If a player from that neck of the woods deserved an offer and didn't get one in my opinion it was Zenner at Eagan.
 

DrunkGopher said:
ok I get that but at the same time that can be applied to anybody on any team at any level that hasn't played yet. But like I said early this is all opinion, so I definitely think he should have got one but I can see why other people don't.
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Oh absolutely, especially the borderline guys. I don't think it's obvious one way or the other if we should have offered Vraa instead of Cameron Wilson or Logan Hutton (RS WRs on the Gophers squad).

For me, I factor in other things like how well other schools recruited them. For instance, even though Lamonte Edwards hasn't played yet, I think we all know he deserved a scholarship.

But for guys like Wilson and Hutton, who were only marginally recruited more than Vraa, a case can definitely be made that we have no idea which of these three guys deserved a Gopher offer at this point.
 

Rosemountian said:
I knew you weren't but I just thought I would put it out there.
For the record, I did not think Vraa really should have gotten an offer. But that was in stark contrast to most everyone else in the town. If a player from that neck of the woods deserved an offer and didn't get one in my opinion it was Zenner at Eagan.
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I've seen Zenner play a couple times and I do think he could have played in the Big 10. You'd obviously have a much better idea than I would, but do you think he would have been moved to DB or possibly beefed up to a LB? Or do you think he would have been a RB?

Also, how would you compare Veldman with Vraa? I saw Veldman play a few times and I wish we would have offered him but I only saw Vraa once and I probably wasn't playing close enough attention.
 

I think Vraa is a much much better WR than Velman was....but I think Veldman is compareable as a Big Ten safety as to how Vraa was to a Big Ten WR. Very similar caliber prospects IMO.

I think Zenner is a RB. 9 yards per carry in the Lake Conference is hard to come by....especially on a team that lost its passing threat after 2 games. Kid would run through a wall if you asked him to. I don't know if he has the ability to put on another 30 pounds, but I think he has the mental ability to play FB if RB didn't work out. Also played some WR and returned kicks.
 

zach vraa was only mr. football because the coach from wayzata FORGOT to submit AJ tarpleys ballot. It is a true story. if you guys all remember aj tarpley was star tribune metro player of the year.
 

Well, I think we're being too judgmental, Zach Vraa needs a few more years to prove his speed and quickness on the field for the Goph... Wait a minute!

Another thread successfully hijacked. Way to stay on subject.
 

Rosemountian said:
I think Vraa is a much much better WR than Velman was....but I think Veldman is compareable as a Big Ten safety as to how Vraa was to a Big Ten WR. Very similar caliber prospects IMO.

I think Zenner is a RB. 9 yards per carry in the Lake Conference is hard to come by....especially on a team that lost its passing threat after 2 games. Kid would run through a wall if you asked him to. I don't know if he has the ability to put on another 30 pounds, but I think he has the mental ability to play FB if RB didn't work out. Also played some WR and returned kicks.
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And he actually played QB most of the year, though he was mostly a running QB of course.
 

Correct. They were essentially running the single wing without all the motions.
 

frozengopher said:
My only issue with the standout speed thing is that he mentioned Stoudamire. Quick as a pistol, sure. However, how may times over the past few years has he had an open lane to the end zone only to get caught from behind? Kid has quicks, but top end speed was always something about him that concerned me.
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Agree. I posted awhile ago that there are three kinds of speed (at least to me): straight-line speed (think 40 yard dash and 100 yard dash), football speed (think quickness and explosiveness), and football speed within a given system. This doesn't make me any kind of genius, but I think what gets lost in a lot of the conversation about Kill's comments about speed is that he may be talking about something different than what we are hearing.

Brewster recruited a fair amount of straight-line speed, but that may not translate to to what Kill sees as needed for the system he wants to run.

I think Kill's comments about Stoudermire are indicative of a mismatch between our perception and his definition. Stoudermire has excellent football speed, but I've never seen him as a classic "burner."

To contribute to the hijack, I agree with Bob_Loblaw that Vraa should have been offered.
 

What about standout speed relative to position? Then we could probably include guys like Cooper and Gray. Maybe Wilhite? Garin? Reeves?
 

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