Spring football is back, and this much anticipated month of practices is officially off to a solid start. Perhaps more than any season in recent memory, there is an aggressive set of expectations in terms of what needs to be taught, installed, and demonstrated on the field. Anytime a staff is trying to get 30 guys acclimated into the program, over half of whom are expected to see meaningful snaps, you will find a very long list of objectives. Just like the coaches, the fans have a very long list of questions and curiosities.
To get things started, I wanted to talk a little bit about the talent tradeoff throughout the roster giving attention to the players who graduated and left early and how they will be replaced now and going forward. For those that do not know, I have strong opinions about the nationalized football recruiting rankings being wildly unpredictable. Unlike basketball, top prospects seldom play head to head against other outstanding talent from outside their region, meaning that there is a lot of guesswork when trying to rank them that goes WAY beyond measurables. Projecting all but the most elite high school prospects is very difficult, and you will find for that reason, many D1 and D2 coaching staffs are increasingly looking to the portal to address positional needs on their teams, because of experience, physical maturity, and less guesswork in how a player might perform in a college environment and on the field. The number of early defections forced the OSU staff's hand this season to place way more emphasis on the portal than they initially anticipated. The Cowboy program had been doing a pretty good job of building depth of young talent, but losing multiple starters early put pressure on the depth chart and created areas of great inexperience and immaturity. (NOTE: I am going to do brief positional overviews for now. We will get into much greater depth on individual players later.) TODAY, let's glance at the offense.
QB--Spencer Sanders was replaced by Alan Bowman. The staff was hoping to find a player in the portal who could serve as a 1-year starter to allow the young players at the position an opportunity to grow and develop. Although Spencer had his flaws as a decision maker and struggled at times with accuracy, he was a very gifted play-maker who could play at a very high level. His experience in the offense is irreplaceable. However, his struggles with accuracy on short and intermediate routes and his propensity to miss throws between the numbers limited the offense. At one point in his career Alan Bowman demonstrated very high and consistent accuracy to go with the reputation of being a strong team-first leader, traits that were highly valued in the search for the next QB1. There is some risk as he has not had a lot of game time over the past couple of seasons. He struggled after dealing with a second rib/lung injury at Texas Tech and has not had an opportunity since to really prove himself. Should he knock of the rust and play to his potential, the Cowboys are going to benefit greatly. Spring practice will be a key part of that journey, but do not discount the summer work in its importance. He should start the season as the QB1 even if he shares snaps all spring. Zane Flores is a very talented QB prospect that has really impressed since arriving on campus. His frame needs some development before playing, but he has a live arm and much better athleticism than advertised. He moves into the open scholarship slot at QB that was created when Bullock and Illingworth both transferred out before the 2022 season. Overall, this position had a positive upgrade. The numbers are better, and there is potential for more consistency and production.
RB--Dominic Richardson was the leading rusher for Oklahoma State. He was tough and ran with physicality. At times he showed good vision and 1-cut ability, but he struggled to make the first guy miss. He was a good player, but he was not the future. He lacked the make you miss ability necessary to truly thrive in the lead back role and did not have the break away speed to provide a homerun threat on the edge or when teams missed their gaps. Ollie Gordon was going to supplant him as the feature back in 2023. The interesting part is that OSU went into the portal and grabbed a similar type of back with better lateral agility and jump cut ability in Elijah Collins. The senior from Michigan State has been better than anticipated through the offseason and now into spring. He is making a major push to claim a significant chunk of the playing time at the RB position. Sesi Vailahi will arrive this summer to replace CJ Brown. Overall, this position probably gets an incomplete grade. There are simply a lot of unknowns. More good news for Cowboy fans is that Jaden Nixon has added some size & strength and has already had standout moments. {Note: the change in run game and blocking scheme could really help this stable of backs.}
WR--Obviously this is going to be one of the most argued position groups due to the number of proven playmakers involved (both coming and going). The team replaced Braydon Johnson, Bryson Green, Stephon Johnson, John Paul Richardson, Braylin Presley, and Langston Anderson with Camron Heard, De'Zhaun Stribling, Tykie Andrews, Arland Bruce, Jalen Pope, and Leon Johnson III respectively. The three transfers are already on campus and are showing up at practice. De'Zhaun Stribling has proto-typical Z-receiver traits and ability. Regardless of early departures, he was going to play a lot this season. The top 3 at the Z currently are Bray, Stribling, and Shettron. That may be the best 3 deep at that spot in a long time. Arland Bruce is about as good a replacement for JP Richardson as the staff could have found. He is strong, runs good routes, and has excellent feet to get away from coverage. There will be a lot of talk about thee guys as we get deeper into spring, and I will save comments on the rest of them until that time. It would be a bit premature to say that the position was upgraded, but the potential for that is definitely present. For now, this position certainly replaced outgoing talent.
TE--The staff reallocated scholarship distribution to pick up two players at this position. They are not replacing anyone leaving the program, but rather allowing Blaine Green and Rashod Owens to move to the WR-X spot. These portal additions will go down as some of the biggest and most unsung additions to the team in the offseason. Both Josiah Johnson and Ian Edenfield will see significant playing time. Johnson has already shown the ability to make plays on offense while Edenfield is exactly the type of point of attack blocker that the offense has been searching for the past few seasons. This position had a major upgrade in scheme and talent.
OL--This is the second easiest position to grade as apart from the Hunter Woodard, there is not that much production to be replaced. The team lost Tyrone Webber, Casey Collier, Logan Nobles, Eli Russ, and Silas Barr. Dalton Cooper is already rotating at the two tackle spots. He will at worse be a platooning third guy, but he was brought in to start, and he has done nothing since arriving to make anyone think differently. Behind him, the staff brought in a full 5-man freshman class of C Jakobe Sanders, G Jamison Mejia, G Noah McKinney, T Jack Endean, and T Gage Stanaland. The staff is really pleased with what they have seen so far, and is very high on this class on the line overall. This position had a significant upgrade in talent. Additionally, the move to incorporate more gap and power schemes with pulling linemen is going to play to the strengths of these guys and minimize some of the struggles the unit had with continuity. The zone blocking schemes necessitate continuity up front to be successful, and that is something OSU has had very little of recently.
As we get into the spring football discussion, here are four questions we will address in future threads. If you have a suggested topic, post it in a response below and we can try to incorporate into one of these threads or create a designated one for it alone:
1) What will the new defense look like under Brian Nardo? What major structural changes will be implemented from what the defense had in place last season under Coach Mason? How much if any carryover will there be from Coach Knowles? Do we have the personnel to execute the Heacock-style 3-3-5 base? Do we have front line talent in place to step in for guys that departed early? Which players are looking at new positions and/or roles?
2) In what ways will the Oklahoma State offense change in 2023? How much of those changes will be attributed to scheme versus personnel? What would be reasonable expectations for fans regarding offensive production?
3) Quarterback. There is no question that losing Spencer Sanders created a huge unknown that will drive fan interest throughout the off-season. What does OSU have in the quarterback room? How will the offense change to reflect the different skill sets? Who will likely emerge as QB1 and how long will that position battle remain open?
4) Will the Offensive and Defensive lines have the talent, experience, and depth necessary to give the Cowboys an opportunity to consistently win battles at the line of scrimmage? Compare the situations to the past few seasons. What can be expected?
To get things started, I wanted to talk a little bit about the talent tradeoff throughout the roster giving attention to the players who graduated and left early and how they will be replaced now and going forward. For those that do not know, I have strong opinions about the nationalized football recruiting rankings being wildly unpredictable. Unlike basketball, top prospects seldom play head to head against other outstanding talent from outside their region, meaning that there is a lot of guesswork when trying to rank them that goes WAY beyond measurables. Projecting all but the most elite high school prospects is very difficult, and you will find for that reason, many D1 and D2 coaching staffs are increasingly looking to the portal to address positional needs on their teams, because of experience, physical maturity, and less guesswork in how a player might perform in a college environment and on the field. The number of early defections forced the OSU staff's hand this season to place way more emphasis on the portal than they initially anticipated. The Cowboy program had been doing a pretty good job of building depth of young talent, but losing multiple starters early put pressure on the depth chart and created areas of great inexperience and immaturity. (NOTE: I am going to do brief positional overviews for now. We will get into much greater depth on individual players later.) TODAY, let's glance at the offense.
QB--Spencer Sanders was replaced by Alan Bowman. The staff was hoping to find a player in the portal who could serve as a 1-year starter to allow the young players at the position an opportunity to grow and develop. Although Spencer had his flaws as a decision maker and struggled at times with accuracy, he was a very gifted play-maker who could play at a very high level. His experience in the offense is irreplaceable. However, his struggles with accuracy on short and intermediate routes and his propensity to miss throws between the numbers limited the offense. At one point in his career Alan Bowman demonstrated very high and consistent accuracy to go with the reputation of being a strong team-first leader, traits that were highly valued in the search for the next QB1. There is some risk as he has not had a lot of game time over the past couple of seasons. He struggled after dealing with a second rib/lung injury at Texas Tech and has not had an opportunity since to really prove himself. Should he knock of the rust and play to his potential, the Cowboys are going to benefit greatly. Spring practice will be a key part of that journey, but do not discount the summer work in its importance. He should start the season as the QB1 even if he shares snaps all spring. Zane Flores is a very talented QB prospect that has really impressed since arriving on campus. His frame needs some development before playing, but he has a live arm and much better athleticism than advertised. He moves into the open scholarship slot at QB that was created when Bullock and Illingworth both transferred out before the 2022 season. Overall, this position had a positive upgrade. The numbers are better, and there is potential for more consistency and production.
RB--Dominic Richardson was the leading rusher for Oklahoma State. He was tough and ran with physicality. At times he showed good vision and 1-cut ability, but he struggled to make the first guy miss. He was a good player, but he was not the future. He lacked the make you miss ability necessary to truly thrive in the lead back role and did not have the break away speed to provide a homerun threat on the edge or when teams missed their gaps. Ollie Gordon was going to supplant him as the feature back in 2023. The interesting part is that OSU went into the portal and grabbed a similar type of back with better lateral agility and jump cut ability in Elijah Collins. The senior from Michigan State has been better than anticipated through the offseason and now into spring. He is making a major push to claim a significant chunk of the playing time at the RB position. Sesi Vailahi will arrive this summer to replace CJ Brown. Overall, this position probably gets an incomplete grade. There are simply a lot of unknowns. More good news for Cowboy fans is that Jaden Nixon has added some size & strength and has already had standout moments. {Note: the change in run game and blocking scheme could really help this stable of backs.}
WR--Obviously this is going to be one of the most argued position groups due to the number of proven playmakers involved (both coming and going). The team replaced Braydon Johnson, Bryson Green, Stephon Johnson, John Paul Richardson, Braylin Presley, and Langston Anderson with Camron Heard, De'Zhaun Stribling, Tykie Andrews, Arland Bruce, Jalen Pope, and Leon Johnson III respectively. The three transfers are already on campus and are showing up at practice. De'Zhaun Stribling has proto-typical Z-receiver traits and ability. Regardless of early departures, he was going to play a lot this season. The top 3 at the Z currently are Bray, Stribling, and Shettron. That may be the best 3 deep at that spot in a long time. Arland Bruce is about as good a replacement for JP Richardson as the staff could have found. He is strong, runs good routes, and has excellent feet to get away from coverage. There will be a lot of talk about thee guys as we get deeper into spring, and I will save comments on the rest of them until that time. It would be a bit premature to say that the position was upgraded, but the potential for that is definitely present. For now, this position certainly replaced outgoing talent.
TE--The staff reallocated scholarship distribution to pick up two players at this position. They are not replacing anyone leaving the program, but rather allowing Blaine Green and Rashod Owens to move to the WR-X spot. These portal additions will go down as some of the biggest and most unsung additions to the team in the offseason. Both Josiah Johnson and Ian Edenfield will see significant playing time. Johnson has already shown the ability to make plays on offense while Edenfield is exactly the type of point of attack blocker that the offense has been searching for the past few seasons. This position had a major upgrade in scheme and talent.
OL--This is the second easiest position to grade as apart from the Hunter Woodard, there is not that much production to be replaced. The team lost Tyrone Webber, Casey Collier, Logan Nobles, Eli Russ, and Silas Barr. Dalton Cooper is already rotating at the two tackle spots. He will at worse be a platooning third guy, but he was brought in to start, and he has done nothing since arriving to make anyone think differently. Behind him, the staff brought in a full 5-man freshman class of C Jakobe Sanders, G Jamison Mejia, G Noah McKinney, T Jack Endean, and T Gage Stanaland. The staff is really pleased with what they have seen so far, and is very high on this class on the line overall. This position had a significant upgrade in talent. Additionally, the move to incorporate more gap and power schemes with pulling linemen is going to play to the strengths of these guys and minimize some of the struggles the unit had with continuity. The zone blocking schemes necessitate continuity up front to be successful, and that is something OSU has had very little of recently.
As we get into the spring football discussion, here are four questions we will address in future threads. If you have a suggested topic, post it in a response below and we can try to incorporate into one of these threads or create a designated one for it alone:
1) What will the new defense look like under Brian Nardo? What major structural changes will be implemented from what the defense had in place last season under Coach Mason? How much if any carryover will there be from Coach Knowles? Do we have the personnel to execute the Heacock-style 3-3-5 base? Do we have front line talent in place to step in for guys that departed early? Which players are looking at new positions and/or roles?
2) In what ways will the Oklahoma State offense change in 2023? How much of those changes will be attributed to scheme versus personnel? What would be reasonable expectations for fans regarding offensive production?
3) Quarterback. There is no question that losing Spencer Sanders created a huge unknown that will drive fan interest throughout the off-season. What does OSU have in the quarterback room? How will the offense change to reflect the different skill sets? Who will likely emerge as QB1 and how long will that position battle remain open?
4) Will the Offensive and Defensive lines have the talent, experience, and depth necessary to give the Cowboys an opportunity to consistently win battles at the line of scrimmage? Compare the situations to the past few seasons. What can be expected?
