Antanas Kavaliauskas to Houston

Terrance Harris of the Houston Chronicle blogs that the Rockets have offered Texas A&M's former 6'11 forward a contract as an undrafted free agent. As a fan of AK during his time at A&M, I hope he is able to find a niche with the Rockets, and stick with their team.


AK scoring on Baylor

Updating the premature 2008 two-deep

Time for an update to my premature 2008 two-deep which I wrote earlier this week:

Juco defensive end Matt Moss committed to the Ags last May, and could play either DE or DT in the Fall of '08. Assuming he can add some weight to his 6'4 frame, and bulk up from 270, he might make a fair DT prospect for us.


Nice serial killer mug shot

If he comes in and plays DT, this could allow Ben Bass to stay at DE, as Moss would either start or back-up Lucas Patterson. Moss is expected to arrive next January, in time for the 2008 Spring Practice.

Winning in non-revenue sports is celebrated

The Dallas Morning News have a feature article on Bill Byrne and his plan for 'Building Champions'. My problem with this article is that of the 6 conference titles we won, 5 were in women's sports (women's basketball, track & field, soccer, golf, and women's swimming & diving), 1 was the Big 12 baseball conference tournament title. The article notes that we had a $35 million dollar budget in 2002 when Byrne was hired; our budget is now $70 million dollars. Ignoring the fact that our budget increase can be directly tied to exorbitant increases in ticket prices for many sports (football tickets alone went up 41% from 2002 to 2003), shouldn't we be getting more of a return on our investment in the revenue sports, like football and basketball, if we're bringing in so much money? Men's basketball went to the Sweet Sixteen last season, and considering how far we've come as a program in that sport, that is phenomenal, but football has been a glaring disappointment. We've had two losing seasons since Fran was hired, and set a slew of records of the worst-ever variety (worst ever loss, worst bowl loss, biggest margin of victory in a loss to a conference opponent, etc).
Doesn't Bill Byrne deserve some criticism for his lack of leadership in regards to our football program?

McGee underappreciated nationally

The Sporting News' Matt Hayes pens an excellent opinion piece on Aggie QB Stephen McGee, and why he might be overlooked nationally. While I'm all for people underestimating McGee (makes it sweeter when we surprise everyone), it makes for an enjoyable read.

Acie Law is a lottery pick, taken #11 by Atlanta

Former Texas A&M point guard Acie Law was the #11 pick of the first round of the 2007 NBA Draft, becoming Texas A&M's highest ever draft pick.
The Atlanta-Journal Constitution has a nice article about Atlanta's two lottery picks, Law and Florida's Al Horford (picked #3 overall).

The Dallas Morning News has coverage of the Big 12's showing in the lottery (3 players taken in the first 13 picks) , including the following quotes from Law:

"We talked about that coming into the draft, the opportunity that we had to
have three players go in the lottery," Law told the Kansas City Star. "It just
speaks volumes of the talent that is in that conference.

"I think this is not the [last] time you're going to see three players get
drafted in the lottery. I think there are a lot of talented players left in that
conference, and people are going to find out."

Sounds like Acie believes we'll still have plenty of terrific players to watch next season, and in the years to come.

Incredibly premature look at our 2008 two-deep

Brent Zwerneman's article yesterday got me thinking about our roster for the 2008 season. I projected out our two-deep going into 2008 (making some wild assumptions on the OL, admittedly, since I don't know who will play where and who might be a backup at Center), and noticed a glaring lack of true interior defensive linemen. Sr. Henry Smith should be starting for the Ags at DT this season, but what happens in '08 is anyone's guess.
(Bold indicates projected returning starter.)

My projections:

Offense

QB - Stephen McGee, Sr
Jerrod Johnson, So

TB - Mike Goodson, Jr or Jorvorskie Lane, Sr

RB - Cornell Tarrant, So
Bradley Stephens, RS-Fr

FB - Jodie Richardson, Jr

WR - E.J. Shankle, Jr
Terrence McCoy, So

WR - Howard Morrow, Sr
Pierre Brown, Sr

TE - Martellus Bennett, Sr
Frank Avery, RS-Fr

LT - Yemi Babaloa, Sr
Danny Baker, RS-Fr

LG - Robbie Frost, Jr
Evan Eike, RS-Fr

C - Travis Schneider, Sr

RG - Lee Grimes, Jr
Cody Wallace, Jr

RT - Michael Shumard, Jr
Vincent Williams, Jr

Defense

DE - Michael Bennett, Sr
Cody Williams, So

DT - Lucas Patterson, So
Ben Bass, RS-Fr

NT - Kellen Heard, Jr
Rod Davis, Fr

DE - Cyril Obiozor, Sr
Paul Freeney, Jr or Von Miller, So

Mike - Matt Featherston, Jr
Charles Young, RS-Fr

Will - Anthony Lewis, Jr
Derrick Stephens, So

CB - Danny Gorrer, Sr
Arkeith Brown, Sr

CB - Jordan Peterson, Jr
Chevar Bryson, So

FS - Alton Dixon, Sr
Billy Chavis, RS-Fr

SS - Devin Gregg, Sr
Lionel Smith, So

WHIP - Jordan Pugh, So
Garrick Williams, RS-Fr

I'm hoping that Rod Davis' commit sticks, and that Ben Bass can put on the weight to play on the interior DL. We're seriously lacking depth there.

Wednesday news

Brent Zwerneman of the San Antonio Express-News wrote an excellent column for today, saying A&M could go 8-4 with a better team than they had last season. Zwerneman also predicts such a record would get Franchione replaced. I predict we'd still have 'fans' saying he deserved 'one more year' to 'see what he can do with a veteran team of his players'. Because 4 years of embarrassing losses isn't enough, right?

The WWL's Mark Schlabach says Miami's Craig Cooper is #4 on his list of freshmen to watch in 2007. The Aggies will get a chance to see how good Cooper is on September 20th in a Thursday night game to be televised on ESPN.