catdaddyp

Yes, he has next year if he wants it.

I wanted to touch on most of the potential starters. Not mentioned are many new players in backup roles who may also work their way into significant action. QUARTERBACK - California transfer Ben Finley was clearly the best QB in the spring game and seems to have solidified his position as the starter through fall camp. Tahj Bullock (former Virginia Tech transfer) will be the backup and participate in situational packages. RUNNING BACK - Michigan State transfer Jordan Simmons will likely be the starter and split snaps with redshirt sophomore Charles Kellom. WIDE RECEIVER - 2022 1st Team All-MAC Alex Adams (former LSU transfer) will reprise his role in the slot, if healthy. True sophomore Adrian Norton is set for a breakout season. The third receiver spot could be claimed by a number of players. Juniors Bobby Golden and Myles Walker will see significant playing time. Newcomers Jarvis Rush (JUCO) and Ahmarian Granger (Old Dominion/JMU) should also push for significant roles. TIGHT END - After coming on strong late in the 2023 season, Jake Newell (former Arizona State transfer) will claim the starting spot. The top backup will be Missouri transfer Max Whisner. OFFENSIVE LINE - This is an area that could feature a number of different players. The top offensive tackles are Josh Blanchard (former South Florida transfer), redshirt freshman Jayvin James, NC Central transfer Da’Quan Thomas, and Alabama/UCONN transfer Dayne Shor. The guards are Miami(FL) transfer Laurence Seymore, redshirt sophomore Keylen Davis, redshirt junior Colin Lyons, and JUCO Jerrod Burrell. Center should be filled by either redshirt sophomore Tyhler Williams or JUCO Alex Fox. DEFENSIVE LINE - 1st Team All-MAC CJ Nunnally (former JUCO) will start at one end, while senior Bennett Adler will start on the opposite side. Lama Lavea (former New Mexico State transfer) returns as a starter at defensive tackle. The other tackle spot will be occupied by either New Hampshire transfer Nathan Kapongo or true sophomore Marcus Moore. LINEBACKER - A deep linebacker corps returns three players that started over the course of 2023 in 3rd Team All-MAC Bryan McCoy, Antavious Fish (former JUCO), and Shammond Cooper (former Illinois transfer). DEFENSIVE BACK - Devontae Golden-Nelson (former Memphis transfer) has one cornerback spot locked up. The opposite CB spot could be filled by either Joey Hunter (former South Carolina transfer), redshirt freshman Catrell White, JUCO Justin Anderson, or JUCO Iesa Jarmon. Darrian Lewis returns at Nickelback. Safety will likely be a rotation between Cornell transfer Paul Lewis, Oregon transfer Daymon David, and Syracuse transfer Aman Greenwood. SPECIAL TEAMS - Owen Wiley returns at kicker and will be challenged by McNeese State transfer Garrison Smith. Punter Dante Jackson (former JUCO) has competition with Augustana transfer Avery Book.

Great stuff @Captain Kangaroo! A few questions: - Did you notice Seymore and Thomas along the OL? It’s great to hear Burrell and James working with the 1st string, but I thought Seymore and Thomas would be locks. - The starting DL sounds like backups. I’m assuming the staff wanted to give some others more work in the second scrimmage? If I’m not mistaken, teams can only have two full scrimmages in the preseason. Did Nunnally, Lavea, Moore, and Kapongo participate? - Notice Cheatom at all? Hopefully, Richards is healthy and will contribute this year.

First scrimmage.

Wow. Quick stay with us and Texas State. Not sure how many more chances he’s going to get.

Yeah, they are revamping the system and somehow managed to goof up some of the conference members. Still the most accurate in commitments. Feel free to compare though.

My take below is assuming we have a healthy and productive QB. 5-7 Overall, 4-4 in MAC At Ohio State - Loss. Ohio State is loaded with talent and predicted to be in contention for not only a conference title, but also a national title. My hope is the game is competitive for a while and we escape with minimal injuries. At Rutgers - Loss. Rutgers is expected to be a better team than last season’s 7 win squad. That said, if I had to pick one upset potential out of our power matchups, this would be it. Vs Colgate - Win. This is a must win game, sandwiched in-between the power schools, against a squad that won 6 games last year. At South Carolina - Loss. South Carolina will have a physical defensive front and should have one of the better defenses in the SEC this year. This is another matchup where I hope injuries are limited. At Ohio - Loss. I want to say this will be a win with all the roster turnover Ohio has experienced, but four road trips in the first five games makes for a difficult scenario. Vs Bowling Green - Win. Many pundits predict Bowling Green to make the conference championship game due to their veteran laden roster. To me, this seems like a prime spot for Moorhead to pull off an “upset.” At Western Michigan - Loss. 50/50 game with the Broncos. WMU should have a strong ground game and a decent enough passing game. However, I’m not sold on their defense. Could easily be a win for Zips. Vs Eastern Michigan - Win. In the past two matchups the score was 30-27 (2OT) and 34-28, both in favor of EMU. I know Creighton is talking conference champion with his program, yet his teams have struggled against Moorhead’s no matter who was or wasn’t playing. Vs Buffalo - Win. Buffalo may be the worst team in the MAC. At Northern Illinois - Loss. Although, if NIU still hasn’t found a QB by this point in the season, we may see a repeat of 2022 (Akron win). At Kent State - Win. Kent is still in rebuild mode. They will likely struggle to win more than 2 games this year. Vs Toledo - Loss. This could be a win if the season does not go as expected for the Rockets. Questions along the OL and at QB could make Toledo just an above average team. On the flip side, if everything goes as Toledo expects, they could be the best in the MAC. I really hope I’m wrong and this team wins at least 6 games. That is a possible scenario with all the question marks at QB for many of the teams we face. We have a talented roster that should be able to compete with anyone in the conference. My biggest concern is the 3 power games early in the schedule that may physically take their toll. I expect this team to be much better than last year’s squad, but the schedule is substantially more difficult. Curious as to what everyone else thinks.

💯 If we can somehow get to a bowl game and show progress is being made in the win column, recruiting will likely get taken up another notch. It’s already impressive what this staff has accomplished on the recruiting trail with only a handful of wins.

Another OL commit. Should play Guard for us.

Great seeing Adams back in action. I think that was freshman RB Patrick (13) juking a defender in that short clip. Not sure how much action he actually sees this year, but I’m excited about him. Went back and watched it again. Look at Kellom (22) in the background during the mesh drill. He physically looks the part. And Wiley drilling that FG like it’s nothing. Great stuff on day 1.

A lot of offers but in the end it was us, Cincinnati, and Syracuse. Syracuse dropped off a bit though.

At 2:25 McManus dominates at the Rivals camp. He beats 2026 4 star Noah Clark three times and 2026 3 star Rodney White twice.

Ka’Marrii Landers recruitment has heated up lately. Offers from Arkansas and South Carolina in the past few days. Hope he does well, but frustrating as he would have likely been a 4 year starter at LT for us.

Definitely a good one. McManus showed out at a recent Rivals camp. Hence his (5.6) 3 star rating. He’s viewed as already having solid technique with excellent athleticism and a high upside. Cincinnati was the other main player in his recruitment.

No, he was a backup and was one of the 4 (?) defenders that decided to preserve their eligibility and hit the portal 4 games in. Thomas did start 4 games in the middle of the 2022 season and played well. Once Holt was fully healthy, it knocked Thomas into a backup role. This past season, Jones and Lavea locked down the starting roles. On the bright side, Thomas hitting the portal allowed Moore to have an opportunity.

A few updates: DT Kyle Thomas transferred to Valdosta State. OL Kilbane did not make it in to UMASS. Apparently some course credits were not accepted.

Agreed. Fits the type of RB Moorhead typically utilizes in his offense, but probably a depth addition. That said, any time a homegrown talent is good enough to play here, bring him home.

Another reason the QB battle is still ongoing?

Also the only player I’ve ever seen tossed from a football game for cursing out a ref.

I know the SEC hasn’t decided if all 105 players will be on scholarship. My guess is it’ll be more than the current 85, but we’ll see.

NCAA also did away with the limited amount of coaches on staff. Programs were getting around this to an extent with all the analyst roles, but now they can be on-field coaches. Many Power schools will be able to offer more money for “Assistant LB” type roles than G5 schools will for a LB coach (pick any position for comparison). Potentially more than coordinators as well, depending on the school.

Here’s how Moorhead’s 2nd class currently stands. Only scholarship players are listed. 2023 Freshmen Still on the Team: WR - Paul Davis WR - Jean Louis WR - Adrian Norton TE - Connor Cravaack OL - Jayvin James OL - Jonas Mann OL - Delvin Morris DE - Kam Cheatom DE - Bruno Dall DT - Marcus Moore LB - Melvin Spriggs CB - Catrell White S - Darius Owens 2023 Freshmen No Longer on the Team: QB - Steele Wasel CB - Zayden Laing-Taylor S - David Jester Transfer Portal Additions still on the Team: QB - Tahj Bullock WR - Phaizon Wilson TE - Jacob Newell OL - Josh Blanchard OL - AJ George DT - Lama Lavea LB - Shammond Cooper CB - Joey Hunter CB - Terence Thomas Transfer Portal Additions No Longer on the Team: ( * has been placed beside players who have exhausted their eligibility) RB - Drake Anderson * RB - Lorenzo Lingard * OL - Ben Frank * OL - Keon Kindred DT - Terray Jones * CB - Judson Tallandier * JUCO Additions still on the Team: DE - CJ Nunnally (All-MAC) DE - Kabbash Richards LB - Gage Summers CB - Silas Proby P - Dante Jackson JUCO Additions No Longer on the Team: DE - LaJoshua Jackson DE - Antonio Smith DT - Tyler Carter

That program is an absolute mess. Solid chance they go winless if they can’t beat Hawaii to kick off the season.

I think the biggest part of it is he just didn’t recruit well enough. Whether that was due to having poor recruiters on staff, the admin not giving enough support, or some other reason, I don’t know. Maybe all of the above? Regardless, it still falls back on him. A lot of coaches that were great at X’s and O’s, but were poor recruiters have flamed out at the D1 level. Steve Spurrier is one of the elite coaches of all time and flat out stop recruited during his last few years at South Carolina. At the tail end, he just wanted to coach football and let his assistants do the rest. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work like that. I know All-Conference isn’t the end all be all, especially when some of it goes off of win totals, but it’s a decent barometer for recruiting. Arth recruited 6 All-MAC players in three classes. The caveat is that 2 of them were developed by Moorhead’s staff. Dollard Watts Brank Mumpfield Irons* Gathings* Not a single OL or DL on the list.

Revisiting now that the majority of roster movement is complete. All of this is just conjecture from what I’ve seen so far. OFFENSE QB: Finley - R. Junior (TP) Bullock - R. Junior (TP) RB: Simmons - R. Junior (TP) Kellom - R. Sophomore (HS) WR: Norton - Sophomore (HS) Polk - R. Freshman (TP) WR: Adams - R. Junior (TP) Golden - Junior (HS) WR: Rush - R. Junior (JUCO) Granger - Junior (TP) TE: Newell - R. Sophmore (TP) Whisner - R. Sophomore (TP) LT: Blanchard - R. Senior (TP) James - R. Freshman (HS) LG: K. Davis - R. Sophomore (HS) Lyons - R. Junior (Arth) C. T. Williams - R. Sophomore (HS) Fox - R. Sophomore (JUCO) RG: Seymore - R. Junior (TP) Burrell - Junior (JUCO) RT: Thomas - R. Senior (TP) Walker - R. Junior (TP) DEFENSE DE: Nunnally - Senior (JUCO) Cheatom - R. Freshman (HS) DE: Adler - Senior (Arth) Richards - R. Senior (JUCO) DT: Lavea - R. Junior (TP) Madden - R. Junior (TP) DT: Kapongo - R. Senior (TP) Moore - Sophomore (HS) LB: Fish - Senior (JUCO) Benenge - R. Freshman (TP) LB: McCoy - Junior (HS) Cooper - R. Senior (TP) NB: D. Lewis - R. Junior (Arth) T. Thomas - R. Sophomore (TP) CB: Golden-Nelson - R. Junior (TP) Anderson - R. Junior (JUCO) CB: Hunter - R. Junior (TP) White - R. Freshman (HS) S: P. Lewis - Senior (TP) D. Johnson - R. Junior (Arth) S: David - R. Junior (TP) Greenwood - R. Junior (TP) SPECIAL TEAMS K: Wiley - Sophomore (HS) Smith - R. Junior (TP) P: D. Jackson - R. Senior (JUCO) Book - Senior (TP)