Former Gator QB Chris Leak at the Elite 11 camp (Jason Roberts)
Jason Roberts and I woke up too early yesterday to check out the EA Sports / Elite 11 Regional Quarterback camp, but one benefit beyond seeing the next wave of QB talent was finding Chris Leak involved with the proceedings.
I grabbed him for a couple minutes after practice to chat with the Florida Gator all-time leading passer.
Vince Mullins: Catch me up with how your career is unfolding…
Chris Leak: I am currently with Montreal Alouettes in the CFL, I am on off-season now and I just love working with kids and helping kids get better.
VM: Kinda feels like we are in Montreal right now with the wind and the cold?
CL: (Laughs) 45 degrees and this wind, not quite but it is getting there.
VM: TELL ME about your role in this EA Sports/Nike Elite 11 Regional Camp?
I wanted to pass the mike to an old friend Mick from San Antonio. We went to high school together and in fact I was his offensive coordinator to his head coaching spot for Powder Puff football, so the sport was always a connector for us. Facebook connected us recently and he put up a great post that I wanted to share. Enjoy the Gator influenced stylings from Mick.
(Editor’s note: Ooops. The post below was actually originally posted by Dick Gatsche on Mudlizard’s Virtual Swamp. My sincere apologies to him for the confusion – it was my fault for moving too fast to share some great writing, not Mick’s since he did cite the original URL. Thanks to the many passionate MudLizard users and Dick himself for alerting me – I wish we could have met under different circumstances – VM.)
I saw the third quarter. I saw Tim Tebow get sacked. I saw Florida go 3 and out. I saw the Tide go 91 yards in workman like fashion. I saw a helpless UF defense. I saw Bama tie the game. I saw UF respond by missing their only FG of the season.
I saw Bama march again. I saw a UF team that was beat. I saw a defense with hands on hips gasping for breath getting absolutely trucked. I saw an Alabama team rolling downhill through Gator players. I saw the UF players give all that they had left to keep Bama out of the end zone. I saw the Tide take the lead heading into the 4th quarter. I saw the end of a championship dream.
No way could the UF defense recover from the extended pounding they had just endured. With two DTs out there was simply no reserve left to call upon to stem the Tide. All that had been claimed pregame by the Crimson and White faithful about how their lines would wear UF down and control the game had come true. There was no hope.
And then things changed. I saw Tim Tebow rally his offensive teammates and take them down the field. Run after run after run after run after run and they had Bama on their heels at their own 27. A throw a run and a throw and Tim has UF on the doorstep. Two more runs and Demps is leaping in the endzone. Florida has wrested the lead away and hope is reborn, dreams live again. Read the rest of this entry →
If fantasy owners have become familiar with the name Brandon Tate, wide receiver for the North Carolina Tarheels, it is likely because of his recording-breaking performances as a kick returner on the UNC special teams unit, and not because of talent he brings to the wideout position whenever quarterback T.J. Yates and the rest of Butch Davis’ offense takes the field.
Expect that all to change come the 2008 season.
Tate, who has already staked claimed to the ACC record for kickoff returns and yardage (98 returns for 2,383 yards), and will likely this year overtake former Tulane wide receiver Jeff Liggon‘s NCAA all-time career return yardage record (2922 yards, set between 1993-1996), led the ACC in all-purpose yardage in 2007, averaging 147.1 yards-per-game played last season and finished the year tops for the team with both 1765 all-purpose yards accumulated and team-high seven total touchdowns scored.
In college football today, one thing becomes apparent: the more avenues by which a wideout has the ability to make things happen out on the ball field (run, punt return, direct snaps), the better potential that player has to put up huge numbers.
Perhaps no clearer is this the case than with receivers such as Percy Harvin of the Florida Gators or Jeremy Maclin of Missouri, players who can attack opposing defenses not only downfield as elite pass catchers, but also in the midst of designed plays by team coaching staffs which utilize the respective speed and agility of each receiver on the ground as well, the wideout rushing the ball from a slot position or out of the backfield in the role of a non-traditional tailback.
Fantasy owners know the challenge with such players; generally, they are so few and far between that by the time the majority of fantasy owners get an opportunity to secure them as a draft selection, receivers like Harvin and Maclin are already long gone.
I found one on a lesser-known team in a lesser known conference – Desmond Gee, wide receiver, Middle Tennessee State University Blue Raiders, (above, Icon SMI) member of the Sun Belt Conference.
Louisiana-Lafayette has acquired quite a recruiting class for the 2008 football season, including former Brazoswood High School standout at tailback Yobes Walker .
Originally expected to commit to Walker’s hometown University of Houston, the college freshman shocked more than a few people when in late July, he announced that he’d elected instead to play for the Ragin’ Cajuns starting in the fall semester.
Walker (left, from Scout.com) , who stands 5’7″ and weighs in at 205 pounds, was the leading rusher in the Houston-metro area in 2007, where, as a senior, Walker netted himself almost 2200 yards and 17 TD rushing on an outrageous 324 carries. In six of those games last season the prep star ran for 200 yards or better, with a career high coming in a game against Cedar Creek, where Walker ran for 298 yards on the night.
As for Walker’s total production as a running back in high school? A mind-boggling 5647 yards and 56 touchdowns scored.
Louisiana-Lafayette has acquired quite a recruiting class for the 2008 football season, including former Brazoswood High School standout at tailback Yobes Walker .
