Hello Celebritys

Day two of TCU spring practice is in the books. Coach Patterson was pleased with what he has seen in these last two practices and said there has been “lots of energy.” It is early though and this team hasn’t put on the pads yet. Here are my observations and a few minutes of audio from Coach Patterson from this afternoon.

- I thought Casey Pachall looked good. He was making the right reads and putting the ball in the right places. Pachall took all the first team reps while Matt Brown worked with the second group. More on that below.

- Tight ends Logan Brock and Corey Fuller were both making nice catches. Not just regular catches, but catches with guys in their face. Hopefully TCU will utilize the tight end position more this season.

- Josh Boyce and Skye Dawson looked sharp in their routes and catching. With those two and Antoine Hicks, I think this receiving core will be just fine come September.

- Speaking of the receiving core, Coach Patterson mentioned that they have changed the way they call plays a little bit to make it easier for the new WR’s coming in this fall. They changed it two years ago, but did not change it last season due to so many returning starters. Does this mean Patterson hopes to get Brandon Carter and/or LaDarius Brown on the field this season as true freshmen? Or it could be they just wanted to simplify things…Stay tuned…

- Redshirt freshman Sam Carter could be a star in the making at strong safety. He looked good today and others have said he looked sharp yesterday also. “We’ve only taught two days but really it’s amazing, he is a very smart player” Patterson said after practice when asked about how quickly Carter was picking up the position.

- This team is young, but Coach Patterson said he’s been very happy with all of the redshirt freshman and sophomores. He also noted that he has “really enjoyed up to this point the level of enthusiasm of trying to get better, communicating, and listening that this group has done to this point.”

- For your Dwight Smith update, he looked good and is fully healthy from all I know.

- Remember how people were making a big fuss about the new Nike cleats TCU wore in the Rose Bowl? Well, they must not have been that bad because there were players wearing them in practice today…

Here are the post practice questions I got in with Coach Patterson. To listen to Patterson’s comments, the .mp3 is posted below.

Angry Trey: Is this spring different than last year’s since the team is younger?

Coach Patterson: No. For the last 14 years we’ve taught it the same way. Same coverage got taught 14 years ago that just got taught today. The same blitz package got taught the same way. Yesterday we taught the tackling drill without pads on. It was younger so it wasn’t as good as what last years was but you have to have a starting point. You got to see how much a team can grow in 15 days because we teach spring ball just like it’s part of two-a-days. You get 29 practices in the fall and 15 in the spring. This is the growing up stage of our part of it. We are very physical in the spring, we are very demanding in the spring, we believe we have to get stronger in the spring, and academically we have to get ourselves in the right position so you can clear your mind come summer time so you can handle the grind when you get in the fall.

Angry Trey: I know you are looking for players and talent but is this the point when leaders start to emerge?

Coach Patterson: I don’t know, right now in the teaching phase everyone is trying to hang on. We’ll get through 5 days of teaching and then we start over and were not teaching anything new. The same thing happens in the fall. You go through 5 days of teaching and then you go into an evaluation stage, then you go into a getting better stage, so right now just like all of us, we will only be as good as our weakest link. So if one guy isn’t getting it done, it affects all of us.

Angry Trey: Is the QB job Casey’s to lose or is it an open battle?

Coach Patterson: No, right now he is just the next guy. Somebody asked me yesterday if this is the lowest amount of quarterbacks we'll have in the fall and the answer is no. We had to go in Andy Dalton’s freshman year, he was the starter, Marcus Jackson was the backup, and then Yogi Gallegos came in as a true freshman which is what we will start the fall with this year too.

Coach Patterson was asked other questions also, the full media session is below. It’s around six minutes long.