Reports of Texas A&M’s first football practice and its No. 11 ranking in the initial Coaches’ Poll surely will be posted on web sites, Twitter and other social media outlets.
And the Aggies won’t see any of them.
Junior defensive tackle Justin Madubuike on Thursday said the team has agreed to ignore all social media during the four weeks of practice that lead up to the season-opener against Texas State on August 29.
That includes ignoring the praise that would come from being on the fringe of the nation’s preseason top ten.
“We don’t pay attention to that,” Madubuike said. “Actually, the Unity Council — me, Kellen (Mond), Jhamon (Ausbon) and all these guys — we decided the whole team is going to turn off social media for fall camp to just lock in and zone in. (We have) One goal in mind: to win a national championship here. So we’re just taking it one day at a time, eliminating all the noise and just increasing our focus.
“No tweeting, no Facebook, no Instagram, none of all that. We’re just trying to stay away from the phones, and be in the playbook just for this fall camp time.”
That’s an admirable, old-school approach. It’s probably a good one, too, because they might not want to see reports that their old-school coach didn’t really admire the Aggies’ first practice session.
“I watched us practice, and I don’t see it (No. 11 ranking),” coach Jimbo Fisher groused. “You’d rather be up there than not there, I guess.”
Even though this was the first practice since the end of spring drills in April, the always-demanding Fisher wasn’t allowing a grace period.
He appeared particularly annoyed by the showing from junior quarterback Kellen Mond, who is looking to build on last season’s impressive showing in which he passed for 3,107 yards and rushed for 564 to rank fourth in the Southeastern Conference in total offense.
“I’ve seen him sharper,” Fisher deadpanned.
Later, he added: “Kellen, I thought, could have played better today. He had a solid day, but I thought he could have played better and done some things. We’ll look at the film for why it happened. Was it a route? Was it a coverage? Whatever it may be. Did we miss something upfront? Whatever. We’ll look at it and see.”
Mond pointed out it was the first day of August camp, and there are several new players on hand.
Still, he was unfazed by Fisher’s criticism.
“We’re always going to be self-critical. We know he’s going to be self-critical,” Mond said. “There’s always going to be room to grow, especially on both sides of the ball. I’m always self-critical of the offense, so that doesn’t surprise me.”
It should also come as no surprise that Fisher was stressing fundamentals.
“At the end of the day, we can brag about anything you want,” he said. “How we block, how we tackle, how we leverage the ball, how we take care of the ball or create turnovers on the other side. It still gets down to fundamentals.”
And although several returning starters have demonstrated the ability to block and tackle effectively, Fisher said his priority for the four weeks of practice is to identify the best 11 to start on both sides of the line of scrimmage.
“Find the best 11 on each side, and then find their backups. I’m serious,” he said. “That’s really what it is. We’ve got to figure out who we are, what we can do, who we can count on and what we do daily and who’s going to be the guys you can count on day in and do out.
“It’s a new year. The game is zero-to-zero. Just because you did it in the past, you’ve got to show you’ll do it again. We’ll see.”
Hines running well
Fisher seemed cautiously optimistic about linebacker Anthony Hines, who missed almost all of last season with a knee injury.
“He’s bigger. He’s running extremely well,” Fisher said of Hines. “They said in the summer he was top in the sprints, running and athletic and it looks like he’s put on some size.”
Leal may end up at the end
Five-star rated freshman defensive lineman DeMarvin Leal is big enough to play tackle at 6-foot-4, 290-pounds, but will get his first look at strong-side defensive end.
“He’ll stay outside,” said Fisher. “We’ll get him situated at one position, and then we’ll let him grow from there. He will have the ability in the future to do everything.”
Blades switching on
Junior college transfer Elijah Blades is counted on to boost a struggling secondary that last season tied Ole Miss in allowing the most touchdown passes (26) in the SEC.
He was one of the few that seemed to make a good impression on the first day of practice.
“He seemed to flash out there a couple of times when I watched him over there and saw him some one-on-one,” Fisher said. "You can see his movement skills. The talent is there. We’ll look at the film and see how his assignments are coming, but you can see he’s a very talented guy.”
Fullback options
Ben Miles’ decision to enter the transfer portal might have seemed like a blow to the fullback depth chart.
Fisher said that’s not the case. He said the Aggies could use tight ends Glenn Beal, Baylor Cupp or Jalen Wydermyer in that role. Or walk-on Cagan Baldree. Or 218-pound Jacob Kibodi and 240-pound, Cordarrian Richardson, who are big running backs.
“There’s plenty of options there,” Fisher said.
He also said he understood Miles’ decision to transfer to Kansas and play for his father, Jayhawks head coach, Les Miles.
“How many guys get a chance at this level to do it?” Fisher said. “Ben did a great job for us. He was playing his tail off and finding a role in there. I totally understand and support the decision.”
