Inside the Locker Room: Marcus Jones

To say I am excited is an understatement. Though I’ve never met him, Marcus Jones is one of my favorite NC State baseball players. I remember seeing him pinch-run, pinch-hit, and get some late game innings last year. This year it was good to see him get in the line up, and even better to see him have so many productive games. Like I wrote a few days ago in “Jones takes UNC to the Slammer” and several weeks ago in “Season Outlook“, Marcus is a proverbial cornerstone to this squad. Solid defense, and efficient offense from the back of the line-up, Jones is having a solid sophomore year. The future for this former HS All-American out of ‘The District’ looks bright, very bright.

Marcus was kind enough to share with me his thoughts on this year’s team, their progress, and the team’s expectations for this post-season. After the Pack’s disappointing, yet promising, series against the Tarholes, here’s what the starting CF had to say:

Before They Were Pros…

Maybe a better title would be “When (If) They Had Stars”. I went through the list of players drafted this past weekend and made a talley of where they were ranked coming out of high school.

2007 NFL Draft

Taken	3-star	2-star	NR
1-50	9	9	3
50-100	11	14	10
Top 100	20	23	13

What can we deduce from this? Well, 56 of the top 100 players taken in the NFL draft were probably not highly recruited coming out of high school. So, there seem to be two hypothesis at work here.

1) Mediocre players become outstanding players due to great coaching.

2) The elite college recruiter/scout has an uncanny ability to recognized talent where others do not.

Either way, I think this shows the importance of finding the diamonds in the rough and shaping them into potential outstanding football players. I guess the other statistic needed here to give a complete picture is how many 4 and 5 star athletes there were. Even if it were low, the fact that 13 players drafted in the first 100 were unranked coming into college is eye-opening.

Props to the Lunatics

The Lunatics? You know, you and me, the “lunatic fringe”. Fans of NCSU athletics who actually care about the progress and future of our teams. So, as a fellow lunatic, it is always good to see others recognizing our fanatacism in a good way. This from a Clemson Tigers blog:

No school hired the polar opposite as their head coach quite like NC State. Chuck Amato was brash and cocky while Tom O’Brien is quiet and reserve. Amato is a defensive coach and O’Brien cut his teeth on the offensive side of the ball. Amato let the players run roughshod through the community but O’Brien will instill discipline. X and O wise O’Brien is superior. If this staff can recruit close to what Amato did then they will be around a while.
I think NC State people care about football. I think they have the facilities in place and I think they can win at a much higher level than they are right now. The Wolfpack fans are probably more into football than any in the state of North Carolina and O’Brien may be able to capitalize on that.

The Defense that was

Looking back, we can see that the 03-04 Wolfpack defense was stacked with pro talent. This from SFN with some added info from TSW denoted by an asterisk:

2003-2004 Wolfpack Defense
DE Mario Williams – Texans (Pick 1, Round 1)
DE Manny Lawson – 49ers (Pick 22, Round 1)
DT John McCargo – Bills (Pick 26, Round 1)
DT Tank Tyler – Chiefs (Pick 82, Round 3)
LB Stephen Tulloch – Titans (Pick 116, Round 4)
LB Pat Thomas – Jaguars (Pick 194, Round 6)
LB Oliver Hoyte – Cowboys (undrafted – *now starting FB for the Dallas Cowboys)
CB Dovonte Edwards – Vikings (undrafted – *a top 4 CB for the Minnesota Vikings)
CB Lamont Reid – Broncos (undrafted – *under contract with Denver; playing in NFL Europe)
CB AJ Davis – NFL Pending (Pick 105, Round 4)
CB/FS Marcus Hudson – 49ers (Pick 192, Round 6)
S Andre Maddox – formerly Jets (pick 161, Round 5)

500

The Wolfpack baseball team fell to .500 in conference play by coming up on the short end of a 3 game series with UNC this weekend 1 to 2. Long gone are the memories of the Friday evening game where State dominated. Sunday afternoon the Pack gave up 7 runs on 12 hits , including 4 long balls, in a 7-5 loss. State had the lead halfway through the contest, but allowed UNC to score in the 6, 7, and 8th innings.

The team will have the remainder of the week off for finals. Friday starts a two game series with non-conference foe Campbell.

Two more NCSU players drafted Sunday

Two of our own were taken Sunday, both in the 4th round. Cornerback A.J. Davis went to the Detroit Lions with the 105th overall selection, and then ten picks later, center Leroy Harris was chosen by the Tennessee Titans with the 115th pick.

From everything I’ve read, Detroit fans are excited about their 4th round pick (105th overall) they got from Oakland for QB Josh McCown and WR Mike Williams. Davis, who CBS Sportsline dubs “the ACC’s top man coverage defender”, had a poor performance in the 40 (4.56 and 4.61) at his Pro Day and did not participate in the combines due to injury. Thus, his draft stock took a tumble since he finished his career at NC State, but the Lions organization thought good enough about AJ to trade away a former first rounder and their backup QB to get him. Talking about why the Lions drafted Davis, DFP writer Nicholas Cotsonika said:

Defensive coordinator Joe Barry just came down and praised his character, speed and athleticism. Some say Davis isn’t great against the run, which would make him a poor fit for the Tampa Two defense. But Barry disagrees. He said Davis’ motor was nonstop and Davis was willing to get his face in there.

I’m happy and feel that AJ has gone to a good team. I look forward to seeing him make some picks this coming season. Let’s hope he heals up good and plays to his potential.

Here are some other comments from actual Lions fans: